Siege of Los Angeles

Infobox Military Conflict
conflict=Siege of Los Angeles


caption=
partof=the Mexican-American War
date=August 13 - September 30, 1846
place=Los Angeles, California, USA
result=Californio victory
Americans driven out of pueblo
combatant1=United States
combatant2=Mexico
Californios
commander1=Robert F. Stockton
Archibald H. Gillespie
commander2=José Mariá Flores
Jose Antonio Carrillo
Andres Pico
strength1=About 50 Marines
strength2=About 60 Californios
casualties1=unknown
casualties2=unknownThe "Siege of Los Angeles" was a military occupation by the United States Marines of the Pueblo de Los Angeles during the Mexican-American war.

Occupation

On August 13, 1846, early in the American invasion of California during the Mexican-American War, the US Navy, under Commodore Robert F. Stockton, sent an occupying force of fifty US Marines, under USMC Captain Archibald H. Gillespie into the Pueblo de Los Angeles and raised the American flag without opposition, as Mexican government officials fled Alta California. A rudimentary US barricade called Fort Hill was hastily built overlooking the small pueblo.

Resistance

The martial law imposed on the surprised and confused pueblo citizens by Captain Gillespie soon ignited a popular uprising. The Californios, organized under José Mariá Flores, a Mexican Officer who remained in California, Jose Antonio Carrillo and Andres Pico, and assembled a vaquero Lancer force that began the fight to break the "Siege of Los Angeles" on September 22, 1846.

Battle

Gillespie's marines were able to resist an initial attack on the government house in town and regrouped on Fort Hill, where they strengthened their fortification with sandbags and mounted a cannon. Within a short time, the Californio force grew to just over sixty men, with several Californio citizens voicing strong opposition to the American invaders. Flores offered an ultimatum: leave within twenty-four hours or face attack. Gillespie, remembering the Americans at the Alamo, chose to withdraw from Los Angeles, and on September 30, 1846, American forces retreated to their Brig "Savannah", berthed in San Pedro Bay, with Stockton's fleet. This was the beginning of the unanticipated Californio resistance to the American invasion of Southern California.

ee also

*List of conflicts in the United States
*Battles of the Mexican-American War

References

*California History, Bancroft - http://www.1st-hand-history.org/Hhb/HHBindex.htm