4$@ CONQUEST OF CALIFORNIA. 
The battle was fought on the 8th of January, 1847, the 
anniversary of the battle of New Orleans. The Ameri¬ 
cans waded through the water dragging their guns after 
them, under a galling fire from the small arms and can¬ 
non of the enemy. They reserved their own fire until 
they reached the opposite side of the river, where they 
drove back the enemy, and then charged up the bank. 
After a fight of an hour and a half they succeeded in 
driving the enemy from the field. They encamped there 
over night. The enemy made another stand on the 
plains of the Meza, in the hope of saving the capital, but 
they were again driven from the field, and on the 10 th 
the American army entered the capital in triumph. They 
had lost one private killed, and thirteen of their number 
wounded in the two fights. The enemy carried off their 
dead, but it was considerable, according to General 
Kearney, and Commodore Stockton estimates it at more 
than seventy. The insurgents fled, and surrendered to 
Colonel Fremont, who met them as he was approaching 
the City of the Angels, on the 13th of January. The 
territory now became quiet. 
The arrival of the battalion raised among the Mormon 
emigrants to California, and taken into the service of the 
United States by General Kearney, enabled him to pro¬ 
vide against the receipt of any reinforcements from the 
Mexican province of Sonoura to the Californians, by sta¬ 
tioning them as a guard and garrison at the mission of 
San Luis Rey. Captain Tompkins arrived in the country 
in February with his company of U. S. Artillery, and 
was stationed at Monterey, and the arrival of Colonel 
Stevenson, with his regiment of New York Volunteers, 
formed such a force as was considered sufficient to over¬ 
age all disaffection and opposition. 
In July three companies of the New York regiment 
were stationed at La Paz in Lower California, under 
Lieutenant-Colonel Burton. They numbered about one 
