Via Dr. Michael Hogan: Today is the anniversary of the invasion of Vera Cruz. Here is a short piece I wrote about it. Vera Cruz, April 18, 1847 There are no other poems about it: the largest amphibious landing of that century. Nothing that tells how American cannon bombarded Mexican civilians for three inglorious days. How General Winfield Scott ignored the pleas of the bishop, the mayor, the city council, even mother superior of the convent. How he declined the intercession of the British ambassador to evacuate the innocent and turned a deaf ear to the screams of three thousand women and children who perished by shot and shell which of course in our history has been carefully excised from the relevant pages (written in English, the only language we trust). So we missed the tale of Cerro Gordo as well the Battle of Puebla the Irish at Churubusco and even the final conquest of “Halls of Montezuma” which our Marine Corps bewilderingly memorializes in their lusty hymn. Now we watch this 18th of April, as a sailor places a wreath beneath a plinth near the harbor. Like so many Mexicans he remembers Americans, as the people who cannot understand any land they do not inhabit, and who consider the histories of others coarsely invented fantasies designed to make us look bad. —Michael Hogan
Posted on: Fri, 18 Apr 2014 21:56:06 +0000
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