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Updated: May 25, 2025
One of the most striking scenes in the campaign of 1847 was the taking of the fortified hill of Chapultepec, but before describing this we may briefly outline the events of which it formed the dramatic culmination. Vera Cruz, "the city of the True Cross," founded by Cortez in 1520, was the scene of the American landing, and was captured by the army under General Scott in March, 1847.
On assuming the important command to which he had been designated, General McClellan on the same day issued his General Orders No. 19, in which he gracefully and feelingly alludes to the retiring commander: "The army will unite with me in the feeling of regret that the weight of many years and the effect of increasing infirmities, contracted and intensified in his country's service, should just now remove from our head the great soldier of our nation the hero who in his youth raised high the reputation of his country on the fields of Canada, which he hallowed with his blood; who in more mature years proved to the world that American skill and valor could repeat, if not eclipse, the exploits of Cortez in the land of the Montezumas; whose life has been devoted to the service of his country; whose whole efforts have been directed to uphold our honor at the smallest sacrifice of life; a warrior who scorned the selfish glories of the battlefield when his great abilities as a statesman could be employed more profitably to his country; a citizen who in his declining years has given to the world the most shining instances of loyalty in disregarding all ties of birth and clinging to the cause of truth and honor such has been the career, such the character, of WINFIELD SCOTT, whom it has long been the delight of the nation to honor, both as a man and a soldier.
He felt as felt the dignified Montezuma, when that ruffianly Cortez, with his handful of Spanish rapscallions, bearded him in his own capital, and in the midst of his Mexican splendour. The gods were menaced if man could be so insolent! wherefore, said my Lord tremulously, "The Constitution is gone if the Man from Baker Street comes in for Lansmere!"
You will no doubt recall Keats's poem about stout Cortez staring with eagle eyes at the Pacific while all his men gazed at each other with a wild surmise, silent upon a peak in Darien. Precisely so did Peter Willard and James Todd stare with eagle eyes at the second lake hole, and gaze at each other with a wild surmise, silent upon a tee in Woodhaven.
The two lovely fountains in the wings of the Tower draw their inspiration from the days of the conquistadors. Mrs. Harry Payne Whitney's Fountain of El Dorado is a dramatic representation of the Aztec myth of The Gilded One, which the followers of Cortez, in their greed for gold, mistook for a fact instead of a fable. The Tower of Jewels epitomizes the Exposition's art.
When he drew near, Cortez dismounted advancing towards him in respectful posture; at the same time Montezuma alighted from his chair, and leaning on the arm of two of his nearest relations, approached him with a slow and stately pace, his attendants covering the way with cotton cloths, that he might not touch the ground. Cortez accosted him with profound reverence, after the European fashion.
Cortez endeavored to induce the inhabitants of the city to embrace Christianity; and would have resorted to force here, as at Cempoalla, but he was dissuaded by Father Olmedo; who, as on former occasions, urged that conversions effected by force were of little use, and that the cause would be injured, rather than benefited by such measures.
In 1519, when Cortez first saw it, the city is represented to have been nine miles in circumference, and to have contained half a million of inhabitants, a statement which, we doubt not, is greatly exaggerated, as were nearly all of his representations and those of his followers.
He knew no obstacles and would admit none in his way; he was of the type of Pizarro and of Fernando Cortez, with fewer prejudices, far more knowledge, and that clear sense of civilisation which only an Englishman born and bred amid the traditions of liberty can possess.
He received successively the brevet rank of major, lieutenant-colonel, and colonel, the latter for his service at Chapultepec. The victory at this point was the culminating event of the war. Shortly afterward the Mexican capital was occupied, and the Mexicans soon gave up the contest as hopeless. A new Cortez was in their streets, who was not to be got rid of except at a heavy sacrifice.
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