Frontier

Conditions along the entire Atlantic seaboard stimulated migration to the newer regions. By 1800 the Mississippi and Ohio River valleys became a great frontier region. “Hi-o, away we go, floating down the river on the O-hi-o,” became the song of thousands of migrants.

In the early 190^th century old territories were divided and new boundaries were made. From 1816 to 1821, six states were created - Indiana, Illinois and Maine (free states), and Mississippi, Alabama and Missouri (slave states). The first frontier had been tied closely to Europe, the second to the coastal settlements, but the Mississippi Valley was independent and its people looked west rather than east.

One English traveler described frontier settlers as “a daring, hardy race of men, who live in miserable cabins… They are unpolished but hospitable, kind to strangers, honest and trustworthy… the rifle is their principle means of support.”

As more and more frontiersmen came to the lands of Native Americans they built comfortable log houses, grew their own grain, vegetables and fruit; ranged the wood for deer, wild turkey and honey; looked after cattle and hogs.

Farmers were soon followed by doctors, lawyers, storekeepers, editors, preachers, mechanics and politicians. Land speculators bought large tracts of the cheap land and, if land values rose, sold their holdings and moved farther west (making way for others). The settlers transformed the territory in a few years. In 1830, for example, Chicago, Illinois, was merely an unpromising trading village with a fort; but long before some of its original settlers had died, it had become one of the largest and richest cities in the nation.

Farms were easy to acquire. Government land after 1820 could be bought for $1.23 for about half a hectare, and after 1862 Homestead Act, could be claimed by merely occupying and improving it.

In 1700-1775 Frontier was almost 100 km westward the Atlantic coast; after Daniel Boom’s expedition in 1775 the frontiersmen crossed the Appalachian Mountains and settled in Kentucky and Tennessee. Louisiana Purchase in 1803 led people to the Pacific coast where they went along the routes later known as Oregon Trail, California Trail and Santa Fe Trail and only 40 years after Great Plains were settled.

The Far West was a field of great activity in the fur trade. The French and Scots-Irish trappers explored rivers and passes of the Rocky and Sierra Mountains.

The growth of the nation was enormous: from 7.25 million to more than 23 million from 1812 to 1852, and the land available for settlement increased by almost the size of Europe – from 4.4 million to 7.8 million square kilometers.

The Mexican War

American newspapers and political leaders expressed an idea called “manifest destiny”. This was a claim that it was clear (“manifest”) intention of fate (“destiny”) that the territory of the U.S. should stretch across North America from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The supporters demanded that the U.S. should take the whole of Oregon, all the way north to the boundary with Alaska at latitude 54 degrees 40 minutes. They began using the slogan ‘Fifty four forty or fight’.

In March 1845 James Knox Polk was inaugurated as the 11^th President. His inaugural address reaffirmed that the U.S. had “clear and unquestionable” title to Oregon and annexation of Texas. (On January 17, 1821 the government of New Spain gave Missouri’s Moses Austin a large grant in Texas and permission to bring in 300 American families.)

President Polk believed Texas would agree to annexation, so he simply decided to treat it as a state, even though it remained Mexican territory under international law. Soldiers under General Zackary Taylor’s command were sent to the southwestern border of Texas to guard the state against an “invasion” from Mexico. On December 29, 1845 Texas joined the Union as the 28^th state. The Mexican government was not satisfied with that and President Polk ordered General Taylor to move to a position on or near the left bank of the Rio Grande River. Taylor’s “Army of observation” counted 3,500 troops (about one-half of the US Army). That territory was always recognized as Mexican. Both armies began to build fortifications.

In April 1846 a small Mexican cavalry unit inflicted a few casualties on U.S. troops blocking a Mexican town. It gave President Polk an excuse for war.

The declaration of war was supported by Southerners who wanted more territory to be worked by slaves, while Northerners opposed the war for that very reason. (On December 22, 1847 Abraham Lincoln made his first speech in the House and sharply disagreed with President over the Mexican war).

The Mexican-American War was ended by a peace treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in February 1848. By this treaty the U.S. got over 500,000 sq. miles including what would become the states of California, Nevada, Utah, most of New Mexico and Arizona and parts of Wyoming and Colorado.

The annexation of these Mexican lands completed the “manifest destiny” of the U.S. It stretched across the North American continent from ocean to ocean (General Zachary Taylor, hero of the Mexican war, was elected President in 1848).