Taos Rebellion
The Taos Rebellion occurred in early 1847 during the Mexican-American War, reflecting the tensions that arose following the U.S. annexation of Texas and subsequent military actions in New Mexico. Local discontent stemmed from fears among New Mexican residents, particularly the ricos (upper-class Mexicans), about U.S. intentions to seize land and impose taxes, which contrasted with their previous exempt status under Mexican rule. The uprising was initiated by prominent local figures and included Taos Indians, who felt threatened by the new governance under U.S. Colonel Stephen W. Kearny and his appointed officials. On January 19, 1847, violence erupted when insurgents attacked American settlers and officials, leading to the death of Charles Bent, the U.S. governor of New Mexico.
In response, U.S. forces, led by Colonel Sterling Price, engaged the insurrectionists at the Pueblo de Taos, culminating in a military confrontation on February 3, 1847. The rebellion was ultimately quelled, resulting in significant losses for both sides, but particularly severe repercussions for the insurgents, with several leaders facing execution. The aftermath of the rebellion established a prolonged period of military rule in New Mexico and set the stage for the eventual establishment of the Territory of New Mexico in 1850, where Anglo-American influence grew while many native residents struggled to secure their land rights. The Taos Rebellion thus highlighted the complex interplay of cultural, political, and economic factors in a rapidly changing frontier landscape.
Taos Rebellion
Date January 19-February 3, 1847
While the United States and Mexico were still engaged in war, Mexican and Indian residents of New Mexico organized the first open revolt against a U.S. occupation force. The insurgents managed to disrupt the new American regime but their revolt was quickly suppressed, and New Mexico was afterward subjected to four years of military rule.
Locale Taos, New Mexico
Key Figures
Stephen W. Kearny (1794-1848), American colonel who led the Army of the West to New Mexico and CaliforniaSterling Price (1809-1867), commander who took over when Kearny left for CaliforniaCharles Bent (1799-1847), trader whom Kearny appointed first U.S. governor of New MexicoDonaciano Vigil (1802-1877), first U.S. lieutenant governor, who was appointed by KearnyTomasito (d. 1847), Taos Indian rebel who was believed to have murdered Bent
Summary of Event
During the twenty years prior to the outbreak of the Mexican War of 1846-1848, the northern borderland region of Mexico—which would soon become part of the United States—underwent profound changes. A breakdown in relations with Native Americans, particularly the Apaches and the Comanches, resulted in such a large increase in Native American raids that whole sections of the frontier were depopulated of settlers. Unable to institute effective pacification measures, the national government in Mexico City largely abdicated responsibility for frontier defense to the northern Mexican states and territories, a task that few local governments had the resources to implement or maintain.
Meanwhile, U.S. influence in the borderlands was growing. In the province of New Mexico, for example, the opening of the Santa Fe Trail in 1821 increasingly drew north-central Mexico into the economic sphere of the United States. In Mexican Texas, large-scale U.S. immigration led that area to declare its independence from Mexico in 1835-1836. When the United States annexed Texas in 1845, precipitating the crisis that would lead to war with Mexico, the northern borderlands frontier of Mexico seemed acutely vulnerable to a U.S. takeover.
After the Mexican War started in May, 1846, U.S. colonel Stephen W. Kearny recruited the so-called Army of the West among enthusiastic frontier supporters of manifest destiny and Missouri merchants eager to expand their Mexican markets. Following the Santa Fe Trail, Kearny and sixteen hundred troops set out first for Bent’s Fort, a trading establishment just north of the Arkansas River, then the United States-Mexico border. The traders Charles and William Bent, with their partner Ceran St. Vrain, had established the post in 1833. From it, they had quickly monopolized the fur and American Indian trades of the southern Rockies and Great Plains. They also had expanded into the Santa Fe trade, operating a mercantile outlet in Taos, New Mexico, where Charles Bent had taken up residence after marrying into a prominent New Mexican family.
From Bent’s Fort, Kearny’s forces left for New Mexico, preceded by James Wiley Magoffin, a Santa Fe trader acting as President James Polk’s emissary. After arriving in Santa Fe, Magoffin secretly met with New Mexico governor Manuel Armijo and convinced him that resistance to U.S. occupation was futile. After making a show of defending his province, Armijo fled south, allowing U.S. troops to occupy New Mexico. On August 18, 1846, Kearny’s forces entered Santa Fe, the capital.
After taking possession of Santa Fe, Kearny quickly reassured New Mexico’s sixty thousand inhabitants that U.S. rule would not threaten their persons or possessions. The Kearny Code, in conjunction with the U.S. Constitution, codified these promises and provided a legal framework for the conquered province. Kearny established a new civil government, naming Charles Bent as governor and Donaciano Vigil of Santa Fe as secretary, or lieutenant governor. Shortly thereafter, Kearny left for California to continue the conquest of northern Mexico. Colonel Sterling Price , newly arrived from Missouri with additional troops to garrison the province, then took military command.
Kearny’s governmental appointments excluded many New Mexico ricos—members of the upper classes—who had formerly controlled the province. Several of his appointees, many of whom had traded for years in New Mexico, held land grants or interests in land grants that had been issued earlier by former governor Armijo. Their new positions of authority gave them the opportunity to expand their New Mexico holdings at the expense of the ricos, or so many ricos believed. Rumors began circulating throughout the province that the U.S. occupiers wished to register land titles, in preparation for the seizure of the ricos’ property, and to exact heavy taxes. As a territory of Mexico, New Mexico had previously been exempt from paying national taxes. Moreover, Taos Indians believed that Charles Bent also wished to acquire lands of the Pueblo de Taos.
In the midst of all this uncertainty, Tomás Ortiz, Diego Archuleta (formerly Armijo’s second-in-command), and possibly Padre Antonio José Martínez of Taos, along with other prominent native New Mexicans, began to conspire against U.S. rule, planning an uprising. When Lieutenant Governor Vigil learned of the conspiracy, he quickly suppressed it. Meanwhile, however, news of the planned insurrection was sweeping through towns and communities in northern New Mexico.
On January 14, 1847, Governor Bent left for Taos (also called Don Fernando de Taos, to differentiate it from the pueblo of same name, only two miles north of the village), ignoring warnings from Vigil that such a journey might be dangerous in the volatile climate following the suppression of the conspiracy. Bent felt reasonably secure, not only because he had long resided in Taos but also because news of U.S. military victories over Mexican troops to the south, in Chihuahua, seemed to preclude the possibility of Mexican aid reaching New Mexico from that quarter.
On January 19, 1847, however, Taos Indians, led by Tomasito, joined the insurrectionists in the village who were led by Pablo Montoya. Together, they destroyed the homes of American settlers and attacked the residence of Charles Bent. Bent himself was killed and scalped, as were other Americans and Mexican supporters of the new regime. The insurrectionists then burned a nearby distillery at Arroyo Hondo, also operated by a U.S. citizen. Similar uprisings occurred at other northern communities, most notably at Mora, where seven more U.S. settlers, many of them Santa Fe traders, were killed.
When news of these events reached Santa Fe, Colonel Price immediately set out for Taos with 480 men and four artillery pieces, while Vigil took over as provisional governor and issued a proclamation denouncing the rebels. Numbering almost two thousand, the insurgents met Price’s forces on January 29, 1847, at the village of Cañada, twenty-five miles north of Santa Fe. The U.S. settlers drove the rebels toward the Pueblo de Taos, where they made their stand in the fortress-like church. On February 3, 1847, the battle resumed. Turning their artillery on the church, the U.S. forces breached the walls, forcing the insurgents out. After more fighting, the Taos Indians and their Hispanic allies eventually surrendered. The insurgents suffered losses of 150 persons. U.S. losses were seven killed and forty-seven wounded.
While Tomasito was in custody awaiting trial, he was shot and killed by a U.S. soldier who believed he had been responsible for Bent’s murder. Pablo Montoya and fourteen other insurgents were tried by court-martial and sentenced to death. The New Mexico civil court indicted other conspirators, who were subsequently tried for treason against the United States and executed.
U.S. president James K. Polk and Secretary of War William L. Marcy later pointed out that the Mexican conspirators could not actually have been guilty of treason against the United States, as the United States and Mexico were still at war at the time of the Taos Rebellion. Nevertheless, they supported the measures taken to end the uprising and the executions of its principal leaders. Diego Archuleta fled New Mexico before he could be apprehended but later returned, took the oath of allegiance to the United States, and became active in territorial politics. Padre Martínez, against whom nothing was ever proven definitely, also escaped indictment and continued his leadership role in northern New Mexico until his death in 1867.
Significance
Although peace returned to New Mexico after the uprising, four years of military rule followed. In 1850, the Territory of New Mexico was finally established. Although Anglo-Americans tended to dominate federally appointed positions, the New Mexico ricos established firm control over the legislative assembly, largely securing their place in the new order. Other native New Mexicans, however, lost their lands to unscrupulous Anglo-American lawyers who used their knowledge of U.S. law and their political connections to undermine land guarantees given in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended the Mexican War. The Taos Indians lost much of their former territory during the period of U.S. rule over New Mexico.
Bibliography
Crutchfield, James Andrew. Tragedy at Taos: The Revolt of 1847. Plano: Republic of Texas Press, 1995. First comprehensive narrative of the events at Taos. Contains valuable appendices concerning the participants, a chronology of events, casualty figures, and other items of interest.
Dary, David. The Santa Fe Trail: Its History, Legends, and Lore. Reprint. New York: Penguin Books, 2002. Well-written history of the Santa Fe Trail, the main path by which Americans entered New Mexico in the years leading up the Mexican War.
Keleher, William A. Turmoil in New Mexico, 1846-1868. Santa Fe, N.Mex.: Rydal Press, 1952. Details the events leading up to the U.S. invasion of New Mexico and the subsequent occupation of the province.
Mahin, Dean B. Olive Branch and Sword: The United States and Mexico, 1845-1848. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1997. Diplomatic history of the Mexican War, focusing on the policies of the Polk administration and the negotiations of American diplomat Nicholas Trist.
Simmons, Marc. New Mexico: An Interpretive History. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1988. Chapter 4 covers the events of the occupation of New Mexico and briefly discusses the Taos Rebellion.
Twitchell, Ralph Emerson. The History of the Military Occupation of the Territory of New Mexico from 1846 to 1851 by the Government of the United States. 1909. Reprint. Chicago: Rio Grande Press, 1963. Quotes extensively from government documents; provides biographical sketches of the principal participants.
Weber, David J. The Mexican Frontier, 1821-1846: The American Southwest Under Mexico. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1982. A comprehensive overview of the Mexican borderlands before the Mexican War. Discusses the economic impact of the Santa Fe Trade, American Indian relations, the church, society, and culture.