Bloody Valverde: A Civil War Battle on the Rio Grande, February 21, 1862

Foreword

Foreword ON FEBRUARY 21, 1862, SOME 1,700 MILES WEST OF RICHMOND AND Washington, far from the blood-stained fields ofVirginia,two American armies clashed in combat beneath a blackened volcanic mesa along the sandy banks of the Rio Grande. Although the men who fought and died at Valverdelate in the winter of 1862 were few in comparison to those who waged the legendary campaigns in the East,the stakes in the Southwest were high. Sharing President Jefferson Davis's concept of a Confederate Manifest Destiny, a grandiose-dreaming and heavy-drinking Brigadier General Henry Hopkins Sibleyhad raised a brigade of Texansat San Antonio in the late summer of 1861 and marched them west to ElPaso and north into the Mesilla Valley. To meet the Rebel Army of New Mexico, Union forces gathered at the adobe bastion of Fort Craig, south of the village of Socorro. The Federals, comprised of frontier Regulars and hastily organized Nuevo Mexicano Territorial Volunteers and Militia, were commanded by the always cautious Colonel Edward Richard Sprigg Canby, who had been with Sibleyin Utah and NewMexico before the war. Colonel Canby realized, as did the Texans,that a Rebelvictory in NewMexico could open the door to Colorado's mineral-rich Rockiesand California's magnificent harbors and gold fields. Here, for the first time, is a detailed study of the crucial Battle of Valverde—the largest battle ever fought in New Mexico. John Taylor,a nuclear engineer by profession but a historian at heart, provides a perceptive account of this bloody clash of arms. The reader is certain to enjoy Taylor's portrayal of the major combatants . Present in Union blue were the trail-blazer and Indian agent Colonel Christopher "Kit" Carson at the head of the First New Mexico IX cavalry; and—perhaps the most courageous of the Federals—Captain Alexander McRae, a North Carolina Unionist who died defending the Federal guns. His body rests at West Point. Captain George N. Bascom, best remembered for his confrontation with Cochise a year earlier at Apache Pass, fell on Valverde's battlefield. Captain Benjamin Wingate lost a leg and died four months later as a result of complications from the amputation. Also in Federal blue was the daring and defiant Irish immigrant—Colonel Canby's eyes and ears—Captain James "Paddy" Graydon, head of his Independent Spy Company. In the Rebel ranks rode the determined Major Charles L.Pyron and his vanguard of three companies of the Second Texas. One of Sibley's regimental commanders, Lieutenant Colonel William Read"Dirty Shirt" Scurry, survivedto lead the Texansat Glorieta later in March, 1862. Colonel Tom Green, a veteran of San Jacinto, ordered the decisive charge of the shotgun-wielding Texansand fell in 1864 at Blair's Landing,Louisiana , while leading an assault on Union gunboats. Major John Schuyler Sutton, a native of NewYork who had been to New Mexico with the illfated Texan Santa Fe Expedition, was shot in the leg at Valverde.He refused amputation and died the day after the battle. Here also is a flashback to another era in the suicidallancer charge of CaptainWillis L.Lang's Company Bof the Fifth Texasagainst Captain Theodore H. Dodd's company of Colorado Volunteers. The notorious Nicaraguanfilibuster,Captain Samuel Lockridge,who bragged that he would make his wife a "shimmy" from the Federal banner flying over Fort Craig, fell in the valiant charge against McRae's battery . And of course General Sibley, a twenty-three-year veteran of the antebellum army, ill, drunk, and unable to command his Confederate Army of New Mexico, nevertheless managed to prove victorious at Valverde. Besides a thorough use of the Official Records, Taylor relies on an impressive array of solidly based primary sources to give us an exciting hour-by-hour narrative of this critical battle. Taylor also compiles and analyzes both Union and Confederate casualties. Moreover, I believe he has resolved exactly what happened around McRae's battery during the pivotal Rebelchargeon that fateful wintryafternoon.Tayloralso includes a well-researched Order of Battle for both armies, something not available in general studies of the Civil War in the Southwest. FOREWORD X Taylor has written what is certain to be the definitive study of the Battle of Valverde. Historians and general readers alike will enjoy his superb narrative and insightful interpretation. JERRY THOMPSON Professor of History Texas A&M International University FOREWORD XI ...