To: gronieel2 who wrote (885362 ) 9/5/2015 11:54:56 AM From: Wharf Rat Read Replies (1) | Respond to In late 1846 Frémont, acting under orders from Commodore Robert F. Stockton , led a military expedition of 300 men to capture Santa Barbara, California , during the Mexican–American War . Frémont led his unit over the Santa Ynez Mountains at San Marcos Pass in a rainstorm on the night of December 24, 1846. In spite of losing many of his horses, mules and cannons, which slid down the muddy slopes during the rainy night, his men regrouped in the foothills (behind what is today Rancho Del Ciervo) the next morning, and captured the presidio and the town without bloodshed. A few days later Frémont led his men southeast toward Los Angeles, accepting the surrender of the leader Andrés Pico and signing the Treaty of Cahuenga on January 13, 1847, which terminated the war in upper California. [37] Treaty of Cahuenga . However, U.S. Army Brigadier General Stephen Watts Kearny , who allegedly outranked both Stockton and Frémont, had orders from President Polk and secretary of war William L. Marcy to serve as military governor. [38] (In reality, Stockton's rank was equivalent to a rear admiral [lower half] today; therefore, Stockton and Kearny had the same equivalent rank [one star] and the War Department had not worked out a protocol for who would be in charge.) He asked Frémont to give up the governorship, which the latter stubbornly refused to do before finally relenting. Ordered to march with Kearny's army back east, Frémont was arrested on August 22, 1847 when they arrived at Fort Leavenworth . He was charged with mutiny, disobedience of orders, assumption of powers, along with several other military offenses. Ordered by Kearny to report to the adjutant general in Washington to stand for court-martial, Frémont was convicted of mutiny , disobedience of a superior officer and military misconduct. [39] James K. Polk quickly commuted Frémont's sentence of dishonorable discharge due to his services. Frémont resigned his commission and settled in California. [40] In 1847 he purchased the Rancho Las Mariposas land grant in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains near Yosemite .en.wikipedia.org
