Fitzhugh Lee, General Lee

He was now a captain of engineers, and his mettle was soon to be tried in the fiery furnace of war, for his country and the Republic of Mexico were daily growing more angry with each other. Mexico, from 1519, when Hernando Cortez marched through the causeway leading into its Capital City to the present period, has been an object of much interest to other countries. Commencing with the Indian Emperor Montezuma's costly presents to Cortez, the land has been associated with inexhaustible supplies of gold and silver. The Spanish commander, from his quarters near the temple of the Aztec god of war, dreamed of infinite wealth for himself, his soldiers, and his country.

A fascinating interest in Mexico has always kept pace with the progress and growth of the contiguous American Republic. Upon the final overthrow of the Mexicans by the Spaniards, the adjoining sections were settled by the latter, and a permanent location was made in Texas, at San Antonio de Bexar, in 1692. France, in selling to the United States Louisiana, claimed the boundary line to be the River Rio Grande del Norte, and assigned this boundary claim to the United States. It was, however, relinquished by the American Republic to Spain, in a treaty made with that country in 1812. When Mexico, in 1820, threw off the Spanish yoke, she obtained at the same time the domain of Texas. Afterward Stephen F. Austin obtained from the Mexican Government large tracts of land in Texas and established colonies on them. Citizens of the United States were naturally attracted there, and as they grew in numbers wanted a government similar in form to the one they had left. Stephen Austin was sent to Santa Anna, then Emperor of Mexico, with petitions praying for a separate state organization, and to be no longer united with Cohahuila, the neighboring Mexican province. Austin's petition, it seems, was more than Santa Anna could stand, and he threw him into prison and kept him there over a year. The American Texans, some ten thousand in number, were indignant, and determined to resist the Mexican Emperor's authority. A war ensued, and the redoubtable Santa Anna was finally overthrown and captured at the battle of San Jacinto, April 21, 1836.