Resaca de la Palma

The morning after the Battle of Palo Alto, General Arista moved his forces about a half mile south to a resaca—a dried channel of the Rio Grande River. Twelve feet deep, 200 feet wide and lined with dense brush, Resaca de la Guerrero (or Resaca de la Palma to the Americans) proved to be a strong defensive position. The Mexicans were well dug in by mid-morning and, according to historian K. Jack Bauer, were “chagrined but not disheartened” by the previous day’s setback at Palo Alto. The American army slowly followed the Mexicans, but Zachary Taylor ordered an immediate attack when his troops reached the Mexican position. The Americans brushed aside the Mexican skirmishers but were stalled by well-entrenched infantry and artillery. American dragoons charged the Mexican guns, which they silenced but were unable to hold. Taylor advanced his infantry, and in fierce hand-to-hand bloody fighting the Americans captured the guns and forced the Mexicans to withdraw. At the same time, another American force found an undefended trail and attacked the enemy’s exposed left flank. The combined assaults panicked the Mexicans who beat a hasty retreat. The Americans pursued and captured stragglers. Some Mexicans tried to cross the Rio Grande River and “many” drowned “in their panic.” Besides eight cannon, the Mexicans also abandoned large quantities of stationery that provided Taylor’s men with paper to write letters home. An overconfident and defeated General Arista later admitted, “If I had had with me yesterday $100,000 in silver, I would have bet the whole of it that no 10,000 men on earth could drive us from our position.” The decisive American victory—the first in a war declared by the United States a few days later—drove Mexican forces out of Texas.