Letters and Diaries

Title -   Orders and instructions to General Taylor. War Department, January 13, 1846

Date -   January 13, 1846

Publication Information -   Messages of the President of the United States, with the correspondence, therewith communicated, between the Secretary of War and other officers of the government, on the subject of the Mexican War.   Published by: Wendall and van Benthuysen, Washington, 1848

Format -   Letters (correspondence)

Collection -   The University of Texas at Arlington Library, Special Collections.

Call Number -   E404.U59 Library Collections Depository, Special Collections

Description -   The War Department instructed General Taylor to take up a position on the east bank of the Rio Grande [the Rio del Norte] to establish the United States’ free navigation rights of the river. Although the United States and Mexico were not yet at war, the administration allowed Taylor considerable discretion in deciding whether Mexico’s actions were hostile, and ordered that he should “not act merely on the defensive” if that was the case.