Status Updates From Invading Mexico: America's ...

The only thing not well-done in this book is the maps. Much of the text is written at a tactical level, but the maps are way too general - and I find my West Point Atlas of American Wars is not much help - its Mexican War coverage is terrible.

John C Fremont - the Republican's first nominee for President in 1856 - was only 5'2". No wonder he didn't get elected.

So far, this is fascinating - about a topic I know not enough about!

[The Mexican War isn't a "good war." The U.S. had no real claim on California, or New Mexico. At the same time, Texas's claims to the Rio Grande seem more like the U.S. claims past the Appalachian mountains during the War of Independence. When the U.S. annexed Texas, they implicated took on Texas's border claims so I think the young Lincoln is in error when he talks about this being a "unconstitutional" war.]

[You have to wonder if it would have been better off if Santa Anna lost his battle with the Spanish and Mexico was doomed to being burned by him. Imagine if instead by some dumb stroke of luck someone like Benedict Arnold or James Wilkerson setting the standard for the future. Could Spain not have been driven out? Maybe it couldn't be helped.]

[also the line with slavery can get a bit jumbled. The book mentions the French banned slavery peacefully in 1830. This is true but misleading. The First Republic had banned it. Napoleon reversed it, and tried to impose slavery under French rule in Haiti. Haiti currently ranks third worst per percentage compared to it's neighbor, DR, which ranks 132.

The United States was the only nation where slaveholders would take up arms; even Spain's[...]abolition of slavery in Cuba[...]was peaceful. [I sort of see this, but this overstates it. There was armed resistance to eliminating slavery, and while they have other concerns, states and pseudo states (Sudan, ISIS) back slavery now.

Thornton[...]had been aboard the[...]steamer SS Pulaski in 1838 when the boiler exploded. Thornton had the presence of mind to push several women and children into lifeboats[...]. Cast adrift on his own, Thornton was found three days later, lashed to a chicken coop and raving.

[It says the Richard Stockton was the only signer of the Declaration of Independence to declare his loyalty to England, to keep his home. But this isn't the case. After being mistreated he refused to sign papers renouncing his views, he was paroled after signing that he would cease involving himself in the war, something his compatriots understood as being sthing different. His home was looted.]

[James Polk is described as both a "Jeffersonian," and a "Jacksonian." It's interesting that these two terms became associated. The two are not opposing philosophies, but Jefferson was disturbed at the prospect of Jackson becoming President, regarding him as "dangerous."]