CHAPTER XII.
PROMOTION TO FIRST LIEUTENANT--CAPTURE OF THE CITY OF MEXICO--THE ARMY -- MEXICAN SOLDIERS--PEACE NEGOTIATIONS.
On entering the city the troops were fired upon by the released convicts, and possibly by deserters and hostile citizens.

The streets were deserted, and the place presented the appearance of a "city of the dead," except for this firing by unseen persons from house-tops, windows, and around corners.

In this firing the lieutenant-colonel of my regiment, Garland, was badly wounded, Lieutenant Sidney Smith, of the 4th infantry, was also wounded mortally.

He died a few days after, and by his death I was promoted to the grade of first lieutenant.( *4) I had gone into the battle of Palo Alto in May, 1846, a second lieutenant, and I entered the city of Mexico sixteen months later with the same rank, after having been in all the engagements possible for any one man and in a regiment that lost more officers during the war than it ever had present at any one engagement.

My regiment lost four commissioned officers, all senior to me, by steamboat explosions during the Mexican war.