Combat· Mexican-American War
USS Dale skirmish at Mulege
The first armed clash of the Baja resistance, and a check to the Americans.
Learning that an armed Mexican force had gathered near Mulegé on the gulf coast of Lower California, Commander Selfridge of the sloop USS Dale put in there on 1 October 1847 and sent a landing party of his small Marine guard, reinforced by sailors, ashore against them. The Mexicans and their Baja allies, under Captain Manuel Pineda, met the landing with artillery and stiff opposition, and the Americans did not take the town; the Dale withdrew. The affair alerted the squadron that a serious revolt was brewing in Baja California Sur. Mexican accounts treat Mulegé as a victory, and the town today bears the honorific "Heroica Mulegé." No clear American death is recorded, with wounded reported on both sides. It was the opening of the harder phase of the Baja fighting.
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Record no. 339