d chocking the wheels so that the cart could
not back, used the shafts as a sort of ladder extending to within three
or four feet of the top. By this I climbed to the roof of the building,
followed by a few men, but found a private soldier had preceded me by
some other way. There were still quite a number of Mexicans on the
roof, among them a major and five or six officers of lower grades, who
had not succeeded in getting away before our troops occupied the
building. They still had their arms, while the soldier before mentioned
was walking as sentry, guarding the prisoners he had SURROUNDED, all by
himself. I halted the sentinel, received the swords from the
commissioned officers, and proceeded, with the assistance of the
soldiers now with me, to disable the muskets by striking them against
the edge of the wall, and throw them to the ground below.

Molino del Rey was now captured, and the troops engaged, with the
exception of an appropriate guard over the captured position and
property, were marched back to their quarters in Tacubaya. The
engagement did not last many minutes, but the killed and wounded were
numerous for the number of troops engaged.

During the night of the 11th batteries were established which could play
upon the fortifications of Chapultepec. The bombardment commenced early
on the morning of the 12th, but there was no further engagement during
this day than that of the artillery. General Scott assigned the capture
of Chapultepec to General Pillow, but did not leave the details to his
judgment. Two assaulting columns, two hundred and fifty men each,
composed of volunteers for the occasion, were formed. They were
commanded by Captains McKinzie and Casey respectively. The assault was
successful, but bloody.

In later years, if not at the time, the battles of Molino del Rey and
Chapultepec have seemed to me to have been wholly unnecessary. When the
assaults upon the garitas of San Cosme and Belen were determined upon,
the road running east to the former gate could have been reached easily,
without an engagement, by moving along south of the Mills until west of
them sufficiently far to be out of range, thence north to the road above
mentioned; or, if desirable to keep the two attacking columns nearer
together, the troops could have been turned east so as to come on the
aqueduct road out of range of the guns from Chapultepec. In like
manner, the troops designated to act against Belen could have