JOHN C. FREMONT. 493 return to the United States, which he did-turning over the command of the squadron to Commodore Stockton, who had arrived on the 15th. The next day (16th) Admiral Seymour arrived; his flag-ship, the Collingwood, of eighty guns, and his squadron the largest British fleet ever seen in the Pacific. To his astonishment he beheld the American flag flying over Monterey, the American squadron in its harbor, and Fremont's mounted riflemen encamped over the town. His mission was at an end. The prize had escaped him. He attempted acting further, and Fremont and Stockton rapidly pressed the conquest of California to its conclusion. The subsequent military events can be traced by any history; they were the natural sequence of the great measure conceived and executed by Fremont before any squadron had arrived upon the coast, before he knew of any war with Mexico, and without any authority from his government, except the equivocal and enigmatical visit of Mr. Gillespie. Before the junction of Mr. Fremont with Commodores Sloat and Stockton, his operations had been carried on under the flag of Independence-the Bear Flag, as it was called -the device of the bear being adopted on account of the courageous qualities of that animal, (the white bear,) which never gives the road to men--which attacks any number -and tights to the last with increasing ferocity, with amazing strength of muscle, and with an incredible tenacity of the vital principle-never more formidable and dangerous than when mortally wounded. The independents took the device of this bear for their flag and established the independence of California under it, and on joining the United States forces, hauled down this flag and hoisted the flag of the United States. And the fate of California would have been the same whether the United States squadrons had arrived or not, or whether the Mexican war had happened or not. California was in a revolutionary state, already divided from Mexico politically, as it had always been geographically. The last governor general from Mexico, Don Michel Toreno, had been resisted, fought, captured, and shipped back to Mexico with his three hundred cut-throat soldiers. An insurgent government was in operation, determined to be free of Mexi co, sensible of inability to stand alone, and looking partly to the United States and partly to Great Britain for the support which they needed. All the American settlers were for the United States' protection and joined Fremont. The leading Californians were also joining him. His conciliatory course drew them rapidly to him. The Picos, who were the leading men in the revolt, (Don Pio, Don Andres, and Don Jesus,) became his friends. California became independent of Mexico by the revolt of the Picos, and independent of them by the revolt of the American settlers, and had its destiny to fulfill-which was to be handed over to the United States. So that its incorporation into the American republic was equally sure in any and every event." The following passages occur in the annual report of William L. Marcy, secretary of war, made to the presi dent of the United States under the date of December 5, 1846: "At the same time, information reached him that General Castro, in addition to his Indian allies, was advancing in person against him, with artillery and cavalry, at the head of four or five hundred men; that they were passing around the head of the bay of San Francisco to a rendezvous on the north side of it, and that the American settlers in the valley of the Sacramento were comprehended in the scheme of destruction meditated against his own party. "Under these circumstances, he determined to turn upon his Mexican pursuers, and seek safety both for his own party and the American settlers, not merely in the defeat of Castro, but in the total overthrow of the Mexican authority in California, and the establishment of an independent government in that extensive department. It was on the 6th of June, and before the commencement of the war between the United States and Mexico could have there been known, that this resolution was taken; and by the 5th of July it was carried into effect, by a series of rapid attacks, by a small body of adventurous men, under the conduct of an intrepid leader, quick to perceive and able to direct the proper measures for accomplishing such a daring enterprise. JOHN C. FREMONT. 495 "On the 11th of June, a convoy of two hundred horses for Castro's camp, with an officer and fourteen men, were surprised and captured by twelve of Fremont's party. On the 15th, at daybreak, the military post of Sanoma was also surprised and taken, with nine brass cannon, two hundred and fifty stand of muskets, and several officers, and some men and munitions of war. "Leaving a small garrison at Sanoma, Colonel Fremont went to the Sacramento to rouse the American settlers; but scarcely had he arrived there, when an express reached him from the garrison at Sanoma, with information that Castro's whole force was crossing the bay to attack that place. This intelligence was received in the afternoon of the 23d of June, while he was on the American fork of the Sacramento, eighty miles from the little garrison at Sanoma; and at two o'clock on the morning of the 25th, he arrived at that place with ninety riflemen from the American settlers in that valley. The enemy had not yet appeared. Scouts were sent out to reconnoiter, and a party of twenty fell in with a squadron of seventy dragoons, (all of Castro's force which had crossed the bay,) attacked and defeated it, killing and wounding five, without harm to themselves; the Mexican commander, De la Torre, barely escaping, with the loss of his transport boats and nine pieces of brass artillery spiked. "The country north of the bay of San Francisco being cleared of the enemy, Colonel Fremont returned to Sanoma on the evening of the 4th of July, and, on the morning of the 5th, called the people together, explained to them the condition of things in the province, and recommended. an immediate declaration of independence. The declaration was made, and he was selected to take the chief direction of affairs. "The attack on Castro was the next object. He was at Santa Clara, an entrenched post on the upper or south side of the bay of San Francisco, with four hundred men and two pieces of field artillery. A circuit of more than a hundred miles must be traversed to reach him. On the 6th of July the pursuit was commenced, by a body of one hundred and sixty mounted riflemen, commanded by Colonel Fremont in person, who, in three days, arrived at the American settlements on the Rio de los Americanos. "The combined pursuit was rapidly continued; and on "Thus, in the short space of sixty days from the first de- "The commandant general, Castro, on the 9th of August, JOHN C. FREMONT. 497 ber, in laying these official communications before the public, introduced them with the emphatic declaration, 6 The loss of the Californias is consummated.' The whole province was yielded up to the United States, and is now in our military occupancy." On the 27th of October, Captain Fremont received a commission as lieutenant colonel of a rifle regiment in the army. He effected the capture of Sanoma, with thirty men, who took Vallejo, the Mexican general commanding in the north, and two other officers as prisoners of war. On being brought in, the general advanced and tendered to Colonel Fremont his sword; but the colonel courteously declined to receive it, out of respect to his superior age, and the desire to conciliate the Californians. He was sent to Sutter's fort. On the 14th of December, Don Jose Pico was arrested for breaking his parole, tried by a court martial, and sentenced to be shot; whereupon his wife, in the deepest agony, supplicated Colonel Fremont to save his life. In view of the probable influences of clemency under the circumstances, the colonel granted her request; and when the news was announced to her husband, he gave expression to the deepest emotions of gratitude. His old life, he said, was gone; but the colonel had given him a new one, and he then pledged his sacred honor to be faithful in the future. It is known that after the conquest of California was effected, Colonel Fremont was appointed by Commodore Stockton, military governor of the territory. After the capitulation of Couenga, on the 13th of January, 1847, which terminated the war, he issued the following proclamation: "The peace of the country being restored, and future tranquillity vouchsafed, by a treaty made and entered into by commissioners respectively appointed by the properly authorized California officers, on the one hand, and by myself, as military commandant of the United States forces in the district of California, on the other, by which a civil government is to take place of the military, and an exchange of all prisoners, &c., &c., forthwith ensured, to the end that order, and a wholesome civil police, should obtain through |