Kearny's March: The Epic Creation of the American West, 1846-1847 by Winston Groom is not a book for the casual nonfiction reader. It's a scholarly tome that presupposes a reader with a certain familiarity with American history, particularly up to and including the Civil War. Groom seeks to flesh out the details of small chains of events rather than rehash basic information about the large, well-known events. Hence a 275-page book that covers just two years of American history in just one area of the country.Personally, I love American history, and between Mr. Davis' thorough tenth grade class at St. Petersburg High School and my history minor in college, I like to think that I have a pretty substantial knowledge of it. Definitely enough, at least, to enjoy and keep up with Kearny's March. Yes, the excruciating detail of the battle scenes had my eyes crossing (I've never been good with the military tactic stuff. As much as you explain it to me, I just can't visualize it), but the overall information is fascinating. Of course, certain parts will stay with me longer than others, and one of those things that Kearny's March has changed is my impression of James K. Polk.
Before, when I thought of Polk (if I thought of Polk), the 11th president of the United States, I usually did so in relation to the lead-up to the Civil War, or to giggle at how silly his name sounds. Now I'll forever think of Polk as the manifest destiny president. Polk, whose mentor was Andrew Jackson, "had a vision of America... that was as sweeping as the great prairies of the West. He saw the nation as a grand expanding panorama filled with appalling risks and soaring promise, and with wealth and happiness as its God-given design" (pg. 13). What that basically translates into is that Polk wanted California really bad. Not only did the United States need California - "he could almost feel the nation stretching... as immigrants poured in and babies were born" (pg. 23), but Polk felt that California needed America, too:
"There were barely five thousand whites living in the province, most of them men who were not taking much advantage of their bounteous territory... They received little in the way of assistance from the government in Mexico City, which in any case was too far away to do much good" (pg. 23).Acquiring the California province from Mexico was just one of the four "great measures" Polk intended to carry out during his presidency. The other three were:
- "Lower the so-called Tariff of Abominations that had nearly caused South Carolina to secede from the Union. This he hoped would defuse some of the hostility and antagonism that had been building between the two sections of the country" (pg. 22).
- Establish an independent treasury (instead of reattempting a National Bank or choosing "pet banks")
- Get the British out of the Oregon Territory
Historian John S.D. Eisenhower wrote "Manifest destiny was not Polk's invention, but he was its ideal agent" (quoted on pg. 276), and perhaps, I might add, also its biggest fan.
Kearny's March is not all about Polk, in fact it's about the soldiers and mountain men who wrestled (or really just threatened to wrestle, as the Mexican troops often retreated from battle quickly) the American West away from Mexico in the Mexican-American War - right or wrong, for better or for worse. Figures that play prominent roles in Groom's narrative include John C. Fremont, Kit Carson, Alexander William Doniphan, James Magoffin, and, of course, Stephen Watts Kearny.
*This book counts toward my goal in the Non-Fiction Non-Memoir Reading Challenge.
