General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, April 13, 1886

ST. LOUIS, April 13, 1886.

Dear Brother: Your letter was duly received, and the quotation from Corwin's speech will be all I want. I remember the fact that when General Taylor's army marched from Corpus Christi, Texas, to Matamoras, it was generally noted that what few people were encountered south of the Nueces were all Mexicans. Their (Mexican) maps made Texas cease at that line, and our only title to that part of the country was Texas' claim to the Rio Grande as the boundary, so that the army officers, notably General Taylor, always ridiculed the action of the President and Congress—“whereas American blood has been shed on American soil," etc., etc.

Nevertheless war did exist and did continue till we had acquired California, New Mexico, etc. Our payment to Mexico of $15,000,000 at the end of the war was an act of generosity, and made our title one of purchase rather than conquest. Mexico never could have developed California as we did, and without California we could not have filled up the intervening space. . . .

Affectionately,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 372