Arkansas State Gazette

Thousands of men are gathered together and officered by a superannuated General who ought to have been on Washington to doze quietly in the office. The second army was the army of Chihuahua, under Inspector General. Three companies of Regulars, part of the Dragoons, with the Infantry and Artillery compose the Regular force, about 580. Infantry and four companies of Dragoons, with one of the Artillery from Pittsburgh. The rest of the force is made up of one company of Kentucky, Illinois volunteers from Alton, six companies of Missouri volunteers, marching from Lexington, two Regiments of Missouri Cavalry, and four of mounted Riflemen from Arkansas.

The force rendezvous at San Antonio, and after great delay and tribulation prepares to hunt out a road to Chihuahua, an important place in the interior of Mexico. It marches to the Presidio on the Rio Grande and then to Monclova, and there discovers that there is no wagon road to Chihuahua without going to Durango, three hundred miles south of it, and the expedition blows up. It never had a base of operations, if the Rio Grande had been a foot higher when we reached it, we never could have crossed. Half a dozen boats were made on the way and carried there, which might perhaps have bridged a stream one hundred yards wide. However, and six 6-pound field pieces—no pontooniers, no sappers and miners, no entrenching tools, no battery, crossing nothing but our men and their arms.

Marching on an exterior line of operations, deserting our base of operation, such as it was, we arrive after marching in all fifteen hundred miles, at Parras, which, removed from all the great roads and isolated in the mountains with 35 leagues of road without water immediately between it and San Luis, could not be considered a strategical point at all. Thence, a sudden alarm, we are forced to march to Saltillo, by a flank movement of a hundred miles through a narrow valley between mountain ridges, and by great good fortune and our enemies' imbecility, we reached Saltillo safe. If one of Napoleon's Marshals had been at Saltillo with half the number of those of Santa Anna's, we should have been crushed, cut off, demolished, and hardly a man would have lived to tell the tale, of the disastrous defeat which befell the Central Division, alias Army of Chihuahua.

So the attempt to sacrifice us failed. Gen. Taylor, by good luck and hard fighting escaped also, despite the miserable folly of the people in power over him. After the glorious battles of the 8th and 9th he learns that Ampudia is fortifying Monterey—a town naturally strong by position, and which, fortified by a good engineer and held by 7000 French, British or Americans would have laughed to scorn 6000 of the best troops on earth—and could not have been taken by twice the number without regular approaches. Volunteers are thrown in on the gallant old General, without supplies or means of transportation, until, much as he needs men, they are really a burden. He is then ordered to advance in the direction of Monterey and Saltillo—though the taking of both places could be of no possible advantage, nor in any way tend to determine the war. It was a line of operations which no General in his senses ever would have taken. The only pretense of propriety in it is, that it is en route to the City of Mexico—but from Saltillo to San Luis is 350 miles and thence to Mexico 350 more, through, for the most part, a mountainous, sterile, dry region, full of the strongest mountain passes in the world. Taking Camargo to Matamoros for his base, Gen. Taylor's base of operations, to reach Mexico, would be two thousand miles long: and, to reach that city with 30,000 men, (the smallest allowable number), he ought to leave at least 20,000 on the road to keep his line of communications open. In the mean time Vera Cruz, the proper base of operations, is but 150 miles from Mexico.

General Taylor marches with six thousand men on Monterey. The Government did not know how it was fortified, or how that bastions, redans, cavaliers and redoubts were erected there, which would bid an everlasting defiance to any thing but, the shell of the Engineer, regular approaches, breaching of wall, and one storm. He is sent there without a battery train, almost without wagons, without sappers or miners or entrenching tools. Gen. Vauban calculates that there are needed, for the siege of a place of the first importance, one hundred cannon, two-thirds of them twenty-four pounders and one-third eighteens and long twelves: and sixty other pieces, two-fifths howitzers, two-fifths mortars, and one fifth stone mortars, with ammunition, accessories, tools and miscellaneous articles, making a weight (including cannon) of six million four hundred and forty thousand pounds: and requiring, for transportation four thousand three hundred carriages and eighteen hundred horses. A small portion of this ought surely to have been furnished by a wise and provident Government, for the invasion of a country as strong by nature as Spain, and where the invading army was intended to march one thousand miles through mountain fastnesses, attacking or expecting to attack fortified cities, and perhaps to invest the great Capitol of the Aztecs. But with none of this, with only six thousand men, about one-fiftieth part in number of the invading army of Spain Gen. Taylor is sent against the armies and cities of Mexico: and this too with troops, brave as lions, but mostly undisciplined. and this, while the Union cries, "It will not do for the United States to carry on a small war."

Now every thing is to begin anew. We have gained three battles, and killed or put hors de combat about three thousand Mexicans. This line of operations is to be abandoned, and if we do not have peace, we are, at least, to begin at the right end. At that end our Regiment can do nothing. Though we cost the Government just as much as four Regiments of Infantry, yet our horses are worn out and unserviceable, and our men, except three or four companies, as totally undisciplined and undrilled as when they entered the service, and we are out here playing collectors of forage for the Dragoons. So far from knowing anything of his duty, the Col. has never tried to drill the Cavalry, and, two weeks ago, made a blunder in ordering the men to draw sabre. Of tactics he is as ignorant as a child: of strategy as innocent as a babe.

Better men than those of this Regiment never were assembled. This is the testimony of every Regular Officer, (and they are many,) who has been on duty with them. They are patient, obedient and brave—but because the commanding officer is totally incompetent and uninformed as to military art, the Regiment is regarded as of no value to the field, and only fit to be employed about menial occupations to which the Dragoons are not subjected. For the credit of Arkansas I regret but cannot help this. Nor can I say I am disappointed, for the proper performance of the stern duties of a military commander is totally inconsistent with, and impossible after the demagoguing, bargaining, and manoeuvres necessary to obtain it.

We have just cause to complain of Yell. Your paper has never reached us since we left Washington and we are indebted for all our information about home affairs, to the Democrat, and now and then a stray Banner. We have seen them up to the 6th of November, and have learned by letter of Ashley's election. Of other home doings we are profoundly ignorant. Rain we have had but once since we left San Antonio: but winds blow here all the time and from all parts of the compass. It is a pleasant climate when the thermometer stands at eighty at noon, and water freezes at night: with dust foot deep in the roads, and clouds of it flying like a New England snow storm.

Hoping soon to see you and other old friends, I reluctantly end this one-sided conversation.

Yours, &c.