Army Regulars on the Western Frontier, 1848-1861

Abstract

Army Regulars on the Western Frontier, 1848-1861. By Durwood Ball. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001. Pp. xxxi, 287. Illustrations, maps. $34.95.) This meticulously researched, insightful study of the United States Army's role in the American West between the Mexican and Civil Wars covers much ground geographically and topically and enhances a rich extant historiography about the nation's frontier soldiery in the nineteenth century. In less than 300 pages, Durwood Ball manages not only to cover the army's Indian-fighting record in surprising depth, but also its constabulary duty visa-vis pro- and antislavery settlers in Bleeding Kansas, Mormons in Utah, filibusters and rebellious Cortinistas (Tejanos and Mexicans) in southern Texas, filibusters and vigilantes in California, and British military forces during the explosive Pacific Northwest San Juan Island boundary dispute of 1859. Further, he frames his study with informative treatments of the army's internal organization, manpower (more diverse than the dregs stereotyped in much historiography [57]), and training, and provides an enlightening account of how the Civil War's outbreak affected the service's western commands. Several themes organize Ball's narrative. First, Ball argues that despite incessant complaints by western civilians that the army failed to provide protection for settlers against Indian depredations, the service actually conducted an effective low-intensity by squadron and company scouts (pursuit and/or patrol operations) operating out of dispersed fixed posts. By the end of the nineteenth century, America's soldiery had successfully chipped away at the edges of American Indian societies until they crumbled (32). The adoption of alternative strategies, such as dragoon officer Stephen Watts Kearny's proposal of major expeditions to intimidate the tribes, would not have worked as well. Setbacks derived far more from manpower and supply deficiencies beyond the control of officers than they did from inappropriate strategies. Ball provides revealing case studies of successful scouts, such as the 1858 expedition of Col. George Wright against Spokane, Palouse, and other upper Columbia River tribes. Second, Ball argues that racial attitudes pervasive both in the service and in Washington help to explain the scale of the army's operations. In contrast to Samuel J. Watson, who has emphasized that army officers in the immediate pre-Mexican War period demonstrated remarkable restraint respecting territorial aggrandizement (The Uncertain Road to Manifest Destiny, in Manifest Destiny and Empire: American Antebellum Expansion, edited by Sam W. Haynes and Christopher Morris [1997]), Ball insists that army officers were impelled by the values of Manifest Destiny. Thus, for instance, he highlights the absurdly bellicose stand of William S. Harvey and George E. Pickett during the army's occupation of San Juan Island. Luckily, Old Fuss and Feathers, General Winfield Scott, was still available for international peacemaking. Racist officers waged all-out war and hunts-sometimes verging on extermination-against colored peoples, but pulled their punches during constabulary duty against whites. Thus the dragoons and infantry of Squaw Killer Harvey might mow down Brule Sioux women and children and Samuel P. Heintzelman's battalion might battle Cortinistas in the chaparral near Brownsville, Texas, but soldiers donned a velvet glove (171) respecting Mormons in Utah, vigilantes in San Francisco, filibusters on the border, and even the frontier settlers they often recognized were provoking the very Indian uprisings that they were risking their lives in subduing. Third, Ball emphasizes that starting immediately after the Mexican War when they found themselves cast as occupation authorities in sectionally-contested California and New Mexico, frontier officers were shadowed (xiii) by partisan politics and the slavery issue and sometimes allowed such considerations to override their professionalism and influence decision-making during constabulary operations. …