Combat· Mexican-American War
Battle of Santa Clara
The action that quieted the last Californio resistance in the north while the decisive fighting loomed in the south.
Learning at Yerba Buena that Californios were again in arms and threatening the area, Captain Ward Marston of the Marines led out a combined force of Marines, sailors, California volunteers, and Mormon Battalion men against the insurgents near the Santa Clara mission in early January 1847. In a brief engagement the Americans drove off the Californio force, with several wounded on both sides and no American deaths. The victory secured northern California against further rising and freed the squadron to concentrate on the reconquest of the south. It was a small but useful action, led by a Marine officer over a mixed command, that closed out the northern theater just as Stockton and Kearny were preparing their advance on Los Angeles.
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Record no. 334