The Dead March: A History of the Mexican-American War

by Peter Guardino

Overview

Winner of the Bolton-Johnson Prize
Winner of the Utley Prize
Winner of the Distinguished Book Award, Society for Military History

“The Dead March incorporates the work of Mexican historians…in a story that involves far more than military strategy, diplomatic maneuvering, and American political intrigue…Studded with arresting insights and convincing observations.”
—James Oakes, New York Review of Books

“Superb…A remarkable achievement, by far the best general account of the war now available. It is critical, insightful, and rooted in a wealth of archival sources; it brings far more of the Mexican experience than any other work…and it clearly demonstrates the social and cultural dynamics that shaped Mexican and American politics and military force.”
—Journal of American History

It has long been held that the United States emerged victorious from the Mexican–American War because its democratic system was more stable and its citizens more loyal. But this award-winning history shows that Americans dramatically underestimated the strength of Mexican patriotism and failed to see how bitterly Mexicans resented their claims to national and racial superiority. Their fierce resistance surprised US leaders, who had expected a quick victory with few casualties.

By focusing on how ordinary soldiers and civilians in both countries understood and experienced the conflict, The Dead March offers a clearer picture of the brief, bloody war that redrew the map of North America.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674244740
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	04/07/2020
Pages:	512
Sales rank:	198,447
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Peter Guardino is Professor in the Department of History at Indiana University.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

1 The Men Most Damaging to the Population 31

2 We're the Boys for Mexico 71

3 Like Civilized Nations 123

4 Even the Fathers of Families 159

5 Each Chapter We Write in Mexican Blood 203

6 The Yankees Died Like Ants 232

7 The People of the Town Were Firing 264

8 Ashamed of My Country 290

9 The Law of the Strongest 323

Conclusion 350

Abbreviations 371

Notes 373

Illustration Credits 485

Acknowledgments 487

Index 491

Editorial Reviews

Guardino breaks new ground and offers novel information about the day-to-day reality of the war. By featuring the lived experience of the soldiers and ordinary people who took part in the conflagration, Guardino gives us a more realistic view of Mexico and the United States in the middle of the nineteenth century, correcting widely held but ultimately unwarranted assumptions about vast political and military discrepancies between the two nations. In short, this book constitutes the most insightful and balanced treatment of the war that I know of.

Andrés Reséndez

Both thought-provoking and highly engaging. Drawing heavily from the letters, journals, and memoirs of participants, this social history humanizes the combatants and promotes a deeper understanding of the common soldier and civilian than perhaps any other previous work.

Hispanic American Historical Review - Michael Scott Van Wagenen

A masterful telling of the Mexican-American War…[It] is written in such a way that it will be appealing to all readers. Scholars will benefit from Peter Guardino’s immense expertise in both U.S. and Mexican history and from the book’s complex interwoven arguments concerning issues of race, religion, and gender.

Journal of the Civil War Era - Maria Angela Diaz

The Dead March builds a wonderful, sustained case for the deep similarities between the two countries, their struggles, and the circumstances of their fighting men. The material on both armies is superb. We are given marvelously lucid, textured, and probing explanations for why and how men came to serve in these armies; how they were viewed by their countrymen and women; what they experienced on march and in camp. The narrative of particular battles and confrontations is engrossing and illuminating. And the military history is surrounded by smart, compelling, analytic sections on a host of important topics. This book sets the new standard for histories of the war that cost Mexico half its national territory.

Brian DeLay

Guardino’s narratives of military engagements are captivating…His close attention to the human tragedy of the ‘dead march’ offers a model of how students of military history might investigate such conflicts in the future.

Jocelyn Olcottn Historical Review

A superb account of events leading up to the war on both sides and to the war itself.

The Americas - Barbara A. Tenenbaum

Presents a comprehensive and exciting New Military History that portrays the conflict from the point of view of ordinary people on both sides…This excellent work, suitable for U.S. and Mexican scholars, students, and wider readers, resets our evaluation of the US–Mexican War. The Dead March reveals a North America more similar and sisterly than historians have generally shown.

Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies - Stephen Neufeld

Guardino’s work offers much more than a general survey of the Mexican-American War. By delving into how the war’s participants reacted to social issues and how these issues influenced the outcome of the war, The Dead March provides scholars with a unique perspective on the war as experienced by common soldiers and civilians. Guardino’s discussion of the Mexican perspective of the war yields a nice addition to a field that is largely dominated by works that examine the war from an American perspective.

Journal of Military History - Brady L. Holley

Superb…The Dead March is a remarkable achievement, by far the best general account of the war now available. It is critical, insightful, and rooted in a wealth of archival sources; it brings far more of the Mexican experience than any other work not specifically focused on Mexico; and it clearly demonstrates the social and cultural dynamics that shaped Mexican and American politics and military force.

Journal of American History - Samuel J. Watson

Like so much of the best recent scholarship, The Dead March incorporates the work of Mexican historians and anthropologists in a story that involves far more than military strategy, diplomatic maneuvering, and American political intrigue. At its core, The Dead March is a social and cultural history of the Mexican and American armies and the societies that produced them, particularly their assumptions about race, masculinity, and religion…A book studded with arresting insights and convincing observations.

New York Review of Books - James Oakes

Guardino’s narratives of military engagements are captivating…His close attention to the human tragedy of the ‘dead march’ offers a model of how students of military history might investigate such conflicts in the future.

American Historical Review - Jocelyn Olcott

Guardino breaks new ground and offers novel information about the day-to-day reality of the war. By featuring the lived experience of the soldiers and ordinary people who took part in the conflagration, Guardino gives us a more realistic view of Mexico and the United States in the middle of the nineteenth century, correcting widely held but ultimately unwarranted assumptions about vast political and military discrepancies between the two nations. In short, this book constitutes the most insightful and balanced treatment of the war that I know of.

Andrés Reséndez

08/01/2017
The U.S. war with Mexico (1846–48), an often overlooked part of American history, had a huge impact on the development of both countries. Guardino (history, Indiana Univ.) presents the story of the war through the eyes of common soldiers in Mexican and American armies, part of the recent trend in military history studies by taking a social history approach. Through extensive research into Mexican and American archives and using the diaries, letters, and recollections of soldiers at the front lines, he challenges the common perception that the war was a U.S. victory because American soldiers were more loyal to their country. By examining the motivations and viewpoints of fighters on both sides, Guardino presents a balanced and deeper understanding of the war, challenging readers to determine why and how America triumphed and the long-term ramifications for both countries. VERDICT This extremely well-researched and highly readable book will appeal to those interested in military history and 19th-century American or Mexican history.—Michael C. Miller, Austin P.L. & Austin History Ctr., TX

Library Journal

2017-06-05
The history of a war of expansion and empire that reverberates today in talk of border walls and deportation.Viewed through a retrospective lens, the American invasion of Mexico in 1846, an act of single-sided aggression, has eerie parallels with later incursions in Vietnam and Iraq. For one thing, all were adventures that enjoyed public support at first but that lost backing as time wore on. It was also precipitated, writes Guardino (History/Indiana Univ.; The Time of Liberty: Popular Political Culture in Oaxaca, 1750-1850, 2005, etc.) in this vigorous, readable account, by an American president who "had to hide crucial information and engage in intense partisan maneuvering to start the war." Moreover, during the two years of conflict, Mexicans waged a fierce guerrilla war, while in response, the Americans "increasingly made civilians responsible for the activities of guerrillas" and committed terrible reprisals. The American soldiers, writes the author, "saw guerrilla warfare not as proof of Mexican nationalism but instead as proof that many Mexicans were violent and treacherous racial inferiors." In a narrative that blends set-piece accounts of battle, profiles of individual combatants, and wide-ranging explorations of larger issues, Guardino examines the inevitability of American victory, which proved Pyrrhic. Some of our received wisdom about the conflict, he argues, does not hold up. The Mexican forces, for example, didn't break and run at every encounter but in the main fought capably, especially the members of the volunteer militias and National Guard. Mexico, only recently independent of Spain, was defeated in the end as much by a lack of materials and funds as by force of arms. Furthermore, the author writes, the Mexican-American War preceded and in some ways produced two civil wars, one in Mexico and the other in the U.S. The Mexican war revealed how disunited the U.S. was, with sharp regional distinctions and, of course, the issue of slavery looming over the whole enterprise. The Mexican-American War is too little studied today. Guardino's swift-moving, broad-ranging history is a welcome remedy.

Kirkus Reviews