Combat· Mexican-American War
USS Portsmouth landing at San Jose del Cabo
The first American foothold on the Baja California peninsula.
On 30 March 1847 the sloop USS Portsmouth put a small Marine detachment ashore at San José del Cabo, near the southern tip of Lower California, where they raised the American flag and occupied the town. The party was tiny, a couple of dozen Marines under Lieutenant Charles Heywood, but it marked the opening of the American campaign in Baja, the beginning of a series of landings meant to assert United States control over the peninsula's ports. No resistance was met. Heywood, who established the post, would later be the man on the spot when the Mexicans tried to retake San José in the harder fighting of late 1847 and early 1848, commanding its defense. The quiet flag-raising was the modest start of a contest that would test the small garrison severely before the war's end.
Podcast episodes on Mexican-American War
Record no. 337