Combat· Mexican-American War
Capture of Tampico
The bloodless seizure of a major Gulf port that had defied the squadron earlier in the year.
On 14 November 1846 Commodore Conner's expedition arrived off Tampico, fired on the town, and demanded its surrender. The Mexican garrison, judging the place untenable, evacuated rather than fight, and the Americans landed Marines and sailors to occupy the city without combat. The occupation was then extended some twenty-five miles upriver to Pánuco, with Marines on garrison duty into early December. The peaceful capture gave the United States a valuable forward base on the Gulf coast, a sheltered port from which later operations could be staged. It was a marked contrast to the squadron's failed probe against the same town the previous May, and it showed how the steady pressure of American sea power could take a strong position without a fight once the defenders concluded they could not hold it.
Podcast episodes on Mexican-American War
Record no. 352