Jump to content

California's religious-based occupation army(ies)


Bob Hudson
 Share

Recommended Posts

I was reading an article today in a San Diego paper about a place called Presidio Park, a site near downtown San Diego that became the first permanent European settlement on the West Coast. The park has a statue and museum commemorating a 1,900 mile march from Iowa to San Diego by a US Army volunteer unit serving under the command of Gen. Stephen W. Kearny during the Mexican-American War.

 

This battalion of volunteers were all members of the Mormon church and how a church-based Army unit came to be is explained on wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Battalion

 

I toured the museum several years ago but until I read the article yesterday I had not thought of it really in terms of US military history.

 

I thought I'd read somewhere that the unit's 1,900 mile march was one if the longest one by a US Army infantry unit. ???

 

The unit didn't fight any battles, but did perform occupation duty throughout Southern California and helped quash the alleged mutinous intentions of US Army Major J Fremont.

 

Many members of the battalion stayed in California: several were working at Sutter's Mill when gold was discovered and one was the first "American" mayor of Los Angeles.

 

I've been watching two great series on Netflix called THE OCCUPATION and THE HEAVY WATER WAR, each about foreign countries occupying Norway, so it was interesting to contemplate an occupying Army in my county about 170 years ago.

 

They were not the first occupying Army here, though. That would have been the Spanish army which arrived in San Diego with Father Serra in 1769. It could be argued that was also an occupation by a church-based armed force as the main purpose of the soliders seems to have been to protect the proselytising priests. The Mormon Battalion's purpose was to use their Army salaries and uniform allowances to help pay for the mass resettlement of Mormons to Salt Lake City.

 

I'm not a student of the Mexican-American War, but it does seem like there was not a lot of warfare in that war, at least not in this part of California. However San Diego County does have a site commemorating the Battle of San Pasqual. It wasn't a large conflict, but the US suffered a high casualty rate: 17 killed and 18 wounded out of 50 officers and men. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_San_Pasqual

 

I'd venture to say most San Diegan's know little about the military history of the county, but the names Serra and Kearny live on in local place names. In 1917 Camp Kearny was established as a large Army base. Today part of it is the Marine Corps Air Station at Miramar (former home to the Navy's Top Gun School). Nearby is a large neighborhood called Kearny Mesa (it includes parts of the original Camp Kearny, and just down the road from that is Serra Mesa.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...