Sketches of the campaign in northern Mexico : in eighteen hundred forty-six and seven / by an officer of the First Regiment of Ohio volunteers.

THIE REGIMEN'T WITHIDRAWN F'IROM 11TIIE TOWN. 1793
thirty of the three hundred men whom we could perhaps
have gathered for the charge, would have lived to reach the
walls of the redoubt. The regiment must have been crushed
by the weight of the converging fires of the enemy. The
writer respectfully differs friom the gallant General of his.division, in thinking that there was even " a possibility that
the work might have been carried," by so small a force as
ours. Nothing less invulnerable than that celestial armor
which so protected certain faithful Jews in the burning furnace of Babylon's king, that not even the smell of fire was
on their garments, could have prevented the annihilation of
zthe regiment in the,rash attempt.'The battalion, now under the command of Lieutenant
Colonel Weller, prepared to execute a retrograde movement
under fire, the most difficult that new troops can be required
to perform. From the character of the conflict, the conmpanies had become so scattered and subdivided that it was
found impossible to re-form the line with much precision.
3But the column retired from the town in good order, through
a street several squares to the east of that by which we
had entered. As we emerged from the suburbs upon the
plain, we were chbtrgled by a strong' corps of Lancers from the
direction of the citadel. Fortunately, as the regiment had
not then been instructed in the formation of the square, a
brush fence happened to be near by. Behind it the nmen
were at once drawn up, and every musket leveled upon the
advancing squadrons.
The cavalry is a favorite, and very numerous corps in the
army of iMexico. Tlhe infantry battalions are composed