organized seven infantry regiments of two battalions each, namely, Mexico, Puebla, Tlascala, Orizaba, Córdoba, Jalapa, Toluca, Celaya, and Valladolid. There were likewise three separate battalions, named respectively Guanajuato, Oajaca, and Guadalajara. Each battalion had an effective force of 825 men, the total being 14,000, to which were to be added the two urban battalions of Mexico and Puebla, having together 930 men.
The cavalry consisted of eight regiments, namely, Querétaro, Príncipe, Reina in Guanajuato, Puebla, San Luis, San Cárlos in the province of San Luis, Michoacan, or Pátzcuaro, and Aguas Calientes; each of which had four squadrons of 361 men in time of peace, and 517 in time of war, making a total of 4,936 dragoons. In the vicinity of Vera Cruz was a body of 1,000 lancers; there were three other bodies for the protection of the old frontiers of Sierra Gorda, Colotlan, and Nuevo Santander, with 1,320 men, and an urban squadron in Mexico with 200 men.
The troops for guarding the coasts were in detached companies at different places, forming mixed divisions of infantry and cavalry, with little discipline, and not even a uniform. They were useful, however, in their respective sections. Five of them were on the gulf border, and with the two companies of negroes and colored men of Vera Cruz made up a force of 3,400.[1] On the Pacific were seven companies consisting of 3,750 men. The total force of provincial militia, both infantry and cavalry, together with the seven companies of militia artillery at Vera Cruz and other points of the coasts, when complete and on a war footing, which never occurred, would have made 29,411 men;[2] but deducting 7,200 of the coast guard, who
- ↑ In June 1806 was living at the age of 90 years Antonio Santa Ana, who was decorated with a royal medal, and was captain of the company of blacks of Vera Cruz; a master mason by trade; he wrote a farce for the theatre that won a prize. Diario, Mex., iii. 207.
- ↑ Another account gives the entire force of New Spain in time of peace in 1805 as 32,924 men. Not. de N. Esp., in Soc. Mex. Geog., Boletin, ii. 24. The
