Winfield Scott

So it proved American soldiers could fight well when they were properly led, even if the timing was absurd.

right then the mexican-american war which atkinson treats as this pivotal moment because it's the first time the country tastes territorial ambition and military success at the same time winfield scott marches from vera cruz all the way to mexico city and it's a genuine masterpiece of operational art

And Scott's insight is that war isn't just courage.

It's supply lines and reconnaissance and understanding what the enemy intends to do, which sounds obvious until you remember how many commanders ignored it.

They are both understandably shocked that a dispute over a pig has grown into a standoff that now involves as many as three warships, more than 80 guns, and over 2,000 men.

The last thing they wanted was to go to war with each other, so they sent out the commanding general of the United States Army, Winfield Scott.

So Winfield Scott was known as The Great Pacifier.

Uh, he'd recently just resolved two diplomatic nightmares on the Canadian border without, it has to be said, a single shot being fired.

So yeah, he's the guy they need.

Another critic was concerned about the increase in executive power that Polk seemed to show, saying, That critic was none other than noted peacenik Abraham Lincoln, who would go on to do more to expand executive power than any president in the 19th century except maybe Andrew Jackson.

Right, so Santa Ana's army was defeated in February 1847, but Mexico refused to give up, so Winfield Scott, who had the unfortunate nickname Old Fuss and Feathers, captured Mexico City itself in September.

A final peace treaty, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, was signed in 1848, under which Mexico confirmed the annexation of Texas and further ceded California, as well as several other places that would later become states, but we couldn't fit on the map.

In return, the U.S. paid Mexico $15 million and agreed to a no-backseas deal in Reed, Texas, thereby freeing Mexico from the shackles of Amarillo.

Van Buren's political rise was accompanied by a series of family tragedies.

In 1814, his wife, Hannah, gave birth to his fourth son, whom he named after General Winfield Scott, a hero of the War of 1812 against the British, who had worked with Van Buren in defending New York from the British.

However, Winfield Scott Van Buren died a few weeks after his birth.

Van Buren's father, Abraham, passed away in 1817, his mother, Maria, the following year, and in 1819, Van Buren's wife, Hannah, died of tuberculosis just before her 36th birthday.

He never remarried, and instead became a devoted father to his four surviving sons, Abraham, John, Martin, and Smith, all of whom would go on to support their father's political career at state and national levels.

Like most of the Democratic Party, Van Buren supported the policy as the only means of preventing bloodshed between whites and Native Americans in the South.

While most of the removals were carried out under the Jackson administration, it was up to Van Buren to oversee the removal of the Cherokees.

By 1838, 2,000 Cherokees had gone west voluntarily, and in May, Van Buren ordered General Winfield Scott and an army of 7,000 men to carry out the relocation of 14,000 Cherokees.

The one we stand to take our hats off and salute flags at sporting events was written on this date back in 1814.

In 1847, US forces under General Winfield Scott captured Mexico City in the Mexican-American War.

In 1901 on this date, President William McKinley died from complications of gunshot wounds, making Theodore Roosevelt the youngest president ever.

He was 42 years old.

Today in history.

In 1847, during the Mexican-American War, US forces under General Winfield Scott took control of the Mexican city.

In 1861, the first naval engagement since the start of the Civil War took place as the USS Colorado attacked and sank the Confederate private schooner Judah off the coast of Pensacola, Florida.

In 1901, President William McKinley died in Buffalo, New York of gunshot wounds inflicted by an assassin eight days earlier.