Freedom by the Sword - US Army Center Of Military History

448
Freedom by the Sword: The U.S. Colored Troops, 1862–1867
of its three-year term left to serve. The departure of these regiments left only ten
in the entire XXV Corps, with a strength of fewer than five thousand officers and
men present for duty. 58
With barely enough black regiments in southern Texas to constitute one division,
General Sheridan recommended the discontinuance of the XXV Corps.
Communications were so difficult in Texas, he told Grant, that a regional chain
of command allowing post commanders to report directly to district headquarters
rather than through the hierarchy of brigade, division, and corps, would move messages
more quickly. Grant agreed to the proposal, and the XXV Corps ceased to
exist on 8 January 1866. 59
While more than half of the regiments in the corps were mustering out, the
conflict across the Rio Grande that was the cause of their presence wore on. In
the late winter of 1865, the Imperialists dominated all of Mexico except for four
states on the Pacific coast and the northern border, but by the following winter the
tide had turned. Influenced by the collapse of the Confederacy and the presence of
more than forty-five thousand United States troops in Texas, by the Imperialists’
inability to subdue the Liberals and impose order on the country, and by worries
about his increasingly bellicose neighbor Prussia, Napoleon III announced on
15 January 1866 his intention to withdraw by October 1867 the thirty thousand
French troops that were the most reliable support of the Imperialist regime. 60
“About ninety eight out of every hundred officers and men are strongly in favor
of the Liberals,” General Weitzel told department headquarters in early January 1866.
For many United States citizens in the region, commercial interests outweighed allegiance
to one side or another in a foreign country’s politics, but some Americans saw
opportunities to be gained by favoring the Liberals. Two of these were R. Clay Crawford
and Arthur F. Reed, adventurers who had gravitated to the Rio Grande after the
war. Crawford was an honorably discharged former captain in the Union Army who
claimed to hold a major general’s commission in the Liberal forces. Reed was a former
lieutenant colonel of the 40th USCI. A general court-martial had cashiered him
in June 1865 for neglect of duty, insubordination, insulting his commanding officer,
absence without leave, breaking arrest, and “utter incompetence for military command.”
To be cashiered meant ineligibility for further military office in the United
States. Reed claimed to be a colonel in the Liberal forces. 61
Matamoros had been in the hands of the Imperialists since September 1864. In
the fall of 1865, its garrison withstood a sixteen-day siege by the Liberals. Suffering
more than five hundred casualties in their attempt to take the city, the Liberals
58 Dept of Texas, SO 8, 9 Jan 1866, Entry 2073, and Trimonthly Inspection Rpt, 31 Oct 1865,
Entry 539, both in pt. 2, RG 393, NA. On the muster-out policy, see War Department, GO 144, 9 Oct
1865, which authorized muster-out of all volunteer cavalry regiments east of the Mississippi River.
Entry 44, Orders and Circulars, RG 94, NA.
59 Maj Gen P. H. Sheridan to Lt Gen U. S. Grant, 30 Dec 1865 (G–1056–AGO–1865), NA
Microfilm Pub M619, AGO, LR, 1861–1870, roll 360.
60 Krause, Mexico, pp. 177–86; Vanderwood, “Betterment for Whom?” pp. 386–91; James E.
Sefton, The United States Army and Reconstruction, 1865–1877 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State
University Press, 1967), p. 261.
61 Maj Gen G. Weitzel to Maj Gen H. G. Wright, 7 Jan 1866, filed with (f/w) Maj Gen H. G.
Wright to Col G. L. Hartsuff, 14 Jan 1866, Entry 4495, pt. 1, RG 393, NA; Case of A. F. Reed
(OO–1302), Entry 15, RG 153, NA.