Part One: The Dumbest Colonizer in History

Robert is joined by Miles Gray to discuss William Walker, the American who tried to conquer Central America.

FOOTNOTES:

1. Mercenary Hero William Walker
2. Filibusters and Financiers: The Story of William Walker and His Associates [1916] 
3. William Walker's Wars: How One Man's Private American Army Tried to Conquer Mexico, Nicaragua, and Honduras
4. The Texas Press William Walker in Nicaragua 
5. William Walker’s Dark Destiny
6. Costa Rica in 1856: Defeating William Walker While Creating a National Identity.
7. Agents of Empire
8. The Grey Eyed Man of Destiny

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
M podcast. Shit, I'm Robert Evans. This is Behind the Bastards,
the most poorly introduced podcast in the podcast game. We
also talk about bad people from time to time when
I'm not introducing the show badly. My guest today is
Mr Miles Great. You so much. How you doing Miles Great? Since? Uh,

(00:25):
I mean, I don't know when this comes out, but
we saw each other recently. That was a pleasant experience
we had. That was nice. You came up to Portland's
Uh they wouldn't let us play with knives on the
stage because they were cowards, but otherwise nice people. They
don't respect respect the laws of the state. Yeah, exactly,
blated weapons are not their their tools over there. They're

(00:45):
they're wildly unregulated and it's beautiful. M h. Now, Miles, yes,
when I when we when Sophie asked you two guests
on this week's episode, and you had a simple request,
which was, don't make it horribly bleak and depressing so
that I want to die more or less. Not your
exact words, but your sentiment, yeah, is that this was

(01:09):
how bleak is this one going to be? Because you
know these shows, these episodes, I've done a few now
they kind of fall into a couple of different buckets.
Some are like so out of this world, what the
fuck is reality kind of thing where you're just your
gob smacked because of that. Other times you're gob smacked
or laughing because sometimes it's fun. Other times you so

(01:30):
brilliantly bring the focus of the show in to talk
about evil people that I found myself in a place
where jokes do not exist, and the only only response
I could have is, oh my god, that's so fucked up.
I think you're gonna like this one. Um. This is
obviously it's a story about a terrible person, thousands of

(01:53):
people die, um, but it's um, it's a story of
a of a monster that gets his come uppance in
the end. This is um. Yeah, yeah, this this one
should be fun and it's not um, you know, it's
not mass child rape like we sometimes get into on

(02:13):
this show. So that's nice too. Yeah. I felt like
even the like prevailing sentiment from listeners was like, damn,
I think that was one of the darkest episodes ever. Yeah, yeah,
as it should be. It was very dark. So today, Miles,
have you ever heard of a fella named William Walker?
I mean that sounds like a very common name where
I'm trying to rack my brain being like, I'm pretty

(02:35):
sure I do know a William Walker. It's to to
put it shortly. Um. Walker is an example of one
of my favorite kind of history stories because because he's
a guy who is incredibly well known by millions and
millions of people around the world, very close to the
United States. In fact, Um, if you go to Nicaragua,

(02:55):
if you go to Costa Rica, if you go to
Mexico's Baja Coast or Sonora. Uh. Walker is a very
prominent historical figure. And even though he's an American, he's
almost completely unknown in the United States today. I mean,
I guess most Americans have not known his name. Um.
And the reason he's well known in Baja and Nicaragua

(03:15):
in Costa Rica is that he almost single handedly tried
to conquer all of those places. What ye when recently? Um? Yeah,
like the eighteen fifties, like not all that long ago.
Do you really think about it? Yeah, okay, look at him. Yeah,
he was like a one man colonialism. Um. That's like,

(03:37):
it's weird the the term makes me shudder, But also
I dig the dedication. If you're like I'm gonna do
this whole colonialism thing just with me. Colonialism is usually
the very bleakest stories, and there's a lot of I mean,
obviously Walker was a horrible person who who did horrible
things that impacted huge numbers of people's lives. Um. But

(04:00):
there's also one of the things that's kind of I
guess makes this a little more of an upbeat story
is that this is one of those cases of colonialism
that was completely unsupported by the government that of this
guy's country, and so he gets his come uppance in
the end, Like it's not one of those tales where
he exploited these people and got away with it forever
and his great great grandkids are still rich today and

(04:20):
now that's good. They have a whole line of hotels
that we constantly patronized. Is um, Is he one of ours,
good old American? Oh yeah, yeah. There is no other
country in the world this guy could have come from.
But I thought maybe yeah, because I guess even an
English guy would be like, I think we've had our time.
I don't need to I don't need to be a

(04:40):
one man wrecking crew. Yeah, you know, the English weren't
really good at being one man wrecking cruise. There were
more you know, that slow Nazi ship. Um, this is
a very American story of a guy who just like
looked at a forward several foreign countries in a row
and was like, I bet I could take that. That's
the truly an American attitude looking at him at Huh.
Yeah about this one, Nichols rob we who cost you

(05:10):
were the right call for guests? All right, let's get
into it. William Walker was born in Nashville, Tennessee, on
May eighteen, four uh. He was the first of six
children of James S. Walker and Mary Norville Walker. His
family was not like super rich, but they were probably
like the wealthiest family or among the wealthiest family in

(05:30):
their frontier community. Um. His father was a Scottish immigrant
from Glasgow who had moved to the United States at
age twenty two and started a general merchandise store with
his uncle in eighteen twenty. Soon the business was successful
enough that James and his uncle partnered with three other
men to build a river front warehouse and by a
fleet of steamboats. Now Nashville was a big old shipping
hub at the time, uh, and as the nation expanded westward,

(05:53):
the Walkers made a small fortune facilitating the movement of tobacco, corn,
and cotton across the country. Since this was the early
eight hundreds, all these products came from the Deep South.
Uh and the Walker's business relied heavily on slavery. So
the family fortunes, such as it is, is absolutely built
off the blacks, the well backs. You know what I'm
trying to say here. Yeah, I'll let you slide with

(06:14):
that one. Yeah. After a few years, um, James sold
out and got into the business of selling commercial insurance
um which oddly enough sounds like maybe even more exploited
what he was doing before. Um. I'm sure it's not.
That's just my opinion of the insurance industry. Um So.

(06:36):
James's wife, Mary was the sister of his two former
business partners. Now, since his records from eighteen thirty, when
William Walker was six, indicate that his family owned no slaves,
which was odd for a family at their level of
wealth and Nashville at that time. By the time William
was fourteen, this had changed and the Walker family owned
four enslaved black human beings, two men and two women.

(06:56):
Um So, he absolutely comes from a slave holding background,
grows up with us Um. Religion was also a big
part of the Walker family life. His mother's family were
prominent within the Baptist community, and his father was a
member of the Disciples of Christ. Uh. The Walkers were
described as being strong and stern, and they were also
extremely political. William's mother was a good friend of Sarah Polk,

(07:18):
the wife of future President James K. Polk. While William
was a child, James was named Speaker of the House
and then the governor of Tennessee. Since Polpe was a
Democrat and Democrats were at the time the party of
even more white supremacy than the Republicans. You can assume
for yourself what kind of politics William imbibed as a child,
really really wholesome stuff. Yeah, oh my gosh. A lot

(07:40):
of people would like to move back to those days.
And that's all we'll leave it. You're talking about John Kelly, Um,
I'm talking about, yes, Stephen Miller. A whole lot of well.
John Kelly was at least gracious enough showed his grasp
of history to actually refer to like basically the antibell
him South without like fully saying that we're like, I

(08:02):
think we know what you mean. Yeah, we used to
respect each other. Okay, yeah, you mean white people. Yeah,
and I guess we had what we would call back then, uh,
indentured independent contractors. Yeah exactly. It's like, um, I don't know,
there's no good joke to me. Yeah, the one and

(08:25):
it wasn't even good. We're just gonna breeze right on
past that. Um. So. William um was recalled by a
family friend at the period as very intelligent and as
refined in his feelings as a girl. I used to
go often to see his mother and always found him
entertaining her in some way. William was devoted to his mother.
His father was kind of a giant asshole, very very

(08:45):
strict and stern. His mother was kind of more uh,
someone he could like deal with and get comfort from.
But she was also very ill throughout his childhood, and
he often spent his mornings in her room, reading to
her while she struggled to start the day. William grew
into a child a contemporaries described later as cold, quiet, studious,

(09:05):
painfully modest, slight, effeminate, almost insignificant in appearance. Uh yeah, yeah, effeminate.
Um yeah, you could yeah, the the you can tell
what they're trying to say there. Yeah, and I can
also just see like the if we we're looking at
a biopic of this guy, we're starting to see the
foundations of when he goes, oh, yeah, you know what

(09:26):
I'm gonna do, then I'll show you fucking Okay, watch
me fucking a wrecking crew. Yeah, yeah, that is really
the story here. Um. Yeah. He was small, thin, and
not very masculine at a time when that was something
a boy would pay dearly for. Um. The only physical
feature that stood out about him were his eyes, which

(09:48):
were a unique shade of gray that people without his
throughout his life would notice. Everybody would commented on this
guy's eyes. He's just sort of one of those people
who everyone's like that dude's eyes are fucking something's up there, right.
It's never the ones you're like, oh my god, you
have such beautiful eyes. It's always like, yo, did you
see the fucking guy's eyes. You see that dude's eyes? What?
Then I think he's kind of conquered Nicaragua. Yeah, he

(10:11):
looks like he's transitioning into some kind of zombie or wraith. Yeah. Yes, um, Now,
possibly due to his mother's sickness. Williams classmates found him
to be grave and seemingly always afflicted by sorrow, which
if you're a kid growing up in like the eighteen thirties,
I guess sorrow is really the only reasonable way to

(10:32):
approach life. But I don't think he was horrified by
the injustices of his time. Um. I think that was
just like we we started. That word was just used
to describe what we call emo kids. Now. Yeah, he
absolutely would have been. Yeah, and with his I'm sure
if he wasn't like super masculine, he would have got
the little fringe haircut, had like one black fingernail, and

(10:54):
been crying to like dashboard confessional lyrics too. Yeah. Absolutely
just may have been in the wrong time. This kid
would have been a huge dash head. Oh my gosh. Yeah,
his hopes are so high that your kiss might kill him.
You just revealed something about yourself there. That's the one
dashboard song I know. And I just think that lyrics

(11:14):
are so great. I know right home cut to my
full sleeve tattoo of dashboard album coverage. Uh So, Yeah,
William was like quiet and kind of sad, but he
was not unfriendly, and one class mate later noted, quote
none in school was more ready to oblige his fellow
student with a little or extra help with a difficult lesson. Um,

(11:35):
so he's a really smart kid and he helps out
his fellow classmates. A lot of kind of is known
for that. I heard that very cynically, like, yeah, he
was always down to teach someone a fucking lesson rather
than like, hi, if you need some help with your studies. Yeah,
I get the I get the legitimately helpful thing more
from like reading stuff that his his fellows reported about him. Um,

(11:55):
he was a good student, um, and developed something of
a complex around his grades. Uh. When he got an
answer wrong in class, he would cry, which did not
help with his perceived level of manliness. Um. Yeah yeah. Um.
One friend noted quote, I never saw him lively in
my life. That is, I never heard him laugh out
loud as boys do it play. Oh shit, yeah, you're

(12:17):
getting some that great right kids should laugh? That's right
there a red flag. Yeah, Spanish two skills haven't failed me.
The non laughing thing as a team. I mean, that's
a little boy. Yeah, it's dark there. That's like some
real dark ship because it's usually not to like young adulthood.

(12:40):
You meet people who have like completely just gone into
themselves and don't have any joy, And I don't want
to be like, you know, there's a fine line between
being like it's kind of weird that this guy never
laughs and like being one of those dudes who's like,
why don't you smile, ma'am? But like it is like
you hear, like everyone talks about this guy when he's
a little kid. He's like, yeah, he never really like
after played around and that is like, uh yeah, like

(13:04):
I'm I'm in the moment if I'm just taking him
and like looking at it in a vacuum, my heart
kind of goes out to this young as Yeah, he's
not an aspirate, Like at this point, he's blameless even
of the slavery. Like he's a little kid, I can't
have any choice in that. Yeah, Um, I don't know,
maybe he could have grown into maybe he like he's
clearly like a sensitive boy. Um, and we just really

(13:26):
don't know enough about his actual thoughts at the time
because it's eighteen thirties. And yeah, anyway, at least when
they start doing that this show, like a hundred years
from now, when your consciousness has been uploaded to some
kind of like bio algorithm. At least we'll be able
to look at like the Twitter and Facebook posts of
our future fascists and be like, wow, this is what

(13:47):
they were going through at the time. Oh no, they'll
come through my Twitter and be like, well, I mean,
obviously he was going to do what he did to Nicaragua.
Spoiler spoiler alert for the twenty years from now when
I conk Nicaragua bold not a not a colonialism thing,
just like just love conquering. Yep, just just leave it

(14:08):
at that. Yeah. Uh. In eighteen seven, when Billy was three,
his grandfather, Lipscomb Norville, moved to Nashville to be with
the family. Uh. Lipscomb wound up having a profound impact
on growing William. Um. See, he was a veteran of
the Revolutionary War, and he had fought at like most
of it. Um. He'd been at the Battle of Brandywine Creek,
the Battle of Trenton, the Battle of Monmouth, Um. He

(14:31):
was one of the battle hardened survivors of the hellish
winter at Valley Forge. Um. Yeah, so this like like
his grandpa was like there for the fucking war. Oh
my Trenton and Valley for it's like some ship. I
get it. I'm a pussy. You've eaten human flesh. We
know now it's starting to make sense. Your grandpa is

(14:55):
probably has in no way can look at a sensitive
child and be likes gonna work. No, he's probably chewing
bullets for gum. Um, he's done with that pewter dish.
I'm gonna melt down to some ket gonna make my
morning bullets. You're not using that t service, are you. Uh.
Norville was present at the Surrender of Charleston, which ended

(15:17):
in defeat for the Revolutionaries, and he was imprisoned for
a year as a pow. Um. So like this dude
goes through it. Um. This is a big influence on
William when he's young. His war hero grandfather his uncles
were also major influences on his future life, because you know,
William's dad was kind of very like a very boring
business and stern businessman who doesn't really he doesn't really

(15:40):
identify much with his uncles and his grandpa. He does
more so uh. Four of his uncle's either founded or
worked as editors at newspapers. UH. Three more got involved
with local or national politics, and five served in the military.
So how many how many numbers did you see? How
many fucking uncles fuck load uncles? I did ten different

(16:01):
people basically, Yeah, yeah, he's got like four seven, Yeah,
like twelve uncles. I keep forgetting that we're talking about
you don't survive, you don't survive Trenton and Valley Forge
and then just not funk out a couple of basketball
teams worth the kids. Seriously, Like, I gotta I got

(16:21):
two starting five plus a six man for each one. Yeah. Yeah,
he just goes right from war to pounding. Oh that's
a real talking about real the real baby boom coming
after yucking for surviving Valley Forge. It is impressive. Yeah.
I mean some of those are probably his mom's uncles.
I don't know. Um either way, dude as a funkload

(16:42):
to uncles. Most of them are. They're all in journalism, politics,
or the military. Um So he grows up surrounded by influential,
powerful men who either exercise political power directly or through
the press, or who are in the military fighting colonizing
the United States, killing Native and mayor Americans Mexicans. Um

(17:02):
So these are like the people who raise him, right,
They're not. They're not just like kick back and relax
if someone does some ship. You know, family, it's a
high achieving family. Um, Like they're well off, but these
aren't like they're not like inherited money, sort of like
lazy aristocrats. They're like everybody's like up and out of
bed and fucking up the continent from like eight to nine,

(17:26):
you know, and fun the country, right, and it's just
just just colonized the piss out of this this month's day.
Colonize the day. That's the that's the motto in that house. Yeah,
that is absolutely how this kid is raised. Um. And
it's not surprising that he grew up to be a
very ambitious boy. Um. In eighteen thirty seven, at age thirteen,

(17:49):
he finished his primary school education and enrolled in the
University of Nashville. Um. And Yeah, a lot of sort
of like contemporary articles that you'll find talking about this
guy will make it like he was a child genius writing.
I found like deeply written biographies of this guy by
historians say that this was actually not that unusual at

(18:10):
the time. He was a little young, but it wasn't
super weird, you know. Um, it's not many year of
college is at thirteen, not for everybody. But it wasn't
It wasn't weird. Oh, it's not like in the arrow
we live in now, it's like this baby genius is
going to college when yeah, they should be an academia
for nineteen years. Yeah, he had a friend who went

(18:30):
to college at fourteen. Like, it wasn't like super bizarre. Um,
it wasn't like the norm, but it wasn't super weird.
High school exists yet back then, or your primary school,
you're like, yeah, you're gonna learn everything you know by
fourteen and then look you can be an apprentice or whatever.
Then yeah, that's kind of the thing. By like thirteen fourteen,
you're starting to be an adult, like in Germany and
like the eighteen seventies, at fourteen you are legally an adult,

(18:52):
Like it's time to go. Um, So it's not that
weird that he's he's you know, he's in college at
Thirteens were shorter back then, right, and education was rarer.
You know, Um, you want to get a head start
on things before you die of cholera at age or
a broken leg or a broken lake or just like
a splinter from the wrong piece of world. I didn't

(19:14):
have any I didn't have the right salve to do
with the infection. Oh I got a splinter. I've loved
you all. It's been a good life, serial glad. I
went to college at age nine. Uh so Yeah, Um,
college was rigorous. Uh for a thirteen year old boy. Um.

(19:35):
And it's hard to imagine any modern team dealing with
this level of discipline not coming out fucked up that set. Again,
this was not abnormal for the time. Um. And here's
how the biography William Walker's Wars, which is a very
good biography, describes his his college education. Quote. Entering students
were expected to be accurately acquainted with the grammar, including
prosody of the Greek and Latin tongues, as well as

(19:56):
with English grammar, math, and geography. Once admitted, students pursued trigonometry,
principles of constitutional and international law, philosophy, natural history, and
religious studies. Disciplined with strict students attended chapel twice a
day and stood for a communal prayer before each meal.
Quiet hours were enforced, and activities like horse racing, dancing,
or going to the theater were strictly prohibited. Yeah no,

(20:19):
no horse racing or dancing No, absolutely no dancing of
the horse racing dancing and the miles. Every step you
take is a dancer, is a step you take with
the devil. Oh wow, I'm pretty sure that poster was
that one of am I like kindergarten classroom? Yeah, yeah,
dancing is Satan's golfing. And sadly the image was like

(20:42):
a people break dancing. They're like, just not that kind um.
I would actually argue that break dancing is the only
acceptable kind of dancing. But I mean anything like the
Seventh Day Adventist if you can fuck somebody up with
your dance moves, like, hell yeah, just keep keeping keeping on.
So William grew into an extremely devout adolescent and there

(21:02):
was talk of him becoming a minister, but then his
interest took a turn towards politics. He joined a debating
society and eventually became its president. He proposed several debate
topics during his time, including was it politic for the
French to assist the US and the American Revolution, was
it preferable a monarchical or republican form of government? And
has the career of Napoleon Bonaparte been of benefit or

(21:24):
injury to the world Wow. Yeah, hot take Steven. Pose
those questions, sir, some hot takes. Notice one of them
is wondering like whether it was worthwhile for the for
France to intervene in a foreign nations like political development militarily,
and the others wondering is this imperialist warlord was he
good for history? Yeah, I'm just asking what he's thinking.

(21:46):
I'm just asking. I'm just I don't really have an
opinion on it. I'm just seeing what you mean. It's
a question, you know, I don't know. Maybe I have
one and I'm not gonna share it with you, but
i just want to see where that how that sort
of stacks up with the rest of the world. But anyway,
just asking. I mean, I'm a big Napoleon fan, not
of his conquering but of his fucking um huge Oh
my gosh, that dude. Yeah. Oh he was landing. Oh

(22:06):
my god, like a fucking Mario man. No oh yeah,
here we go. Oh yeah. So um. William graduated summa
cum lauda on October third, eighteen thirty eight, half a
year after his fourteenth birthday, So college wasn't long back
then either. By this time, his interest had changed yet again.

(22:27):
And he decided to seek a medical degree. First, he
spent two years as an apprentice under local physicians. Then
he was admitted to the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated
in eighteen forty three and headed to Paris to further
his medical education in Europe. He arrived at age nineteen
a doctor, but one wildly unready for the cosmopolitan realities
of a progressive city like Paris. In a letter home

(22:48):
to his parents, he noted this of his new Parisian acquaintances, quote,
most of them have mistresses, and nobody thinks them, and
he was the worse for it. Indeed, the relations of
the two sexist among all classes of the idea are horrible.
You find many married couples between whom there exists a
tacit agreement that the husband may have as many mistresses
and the wife as many lovers as they choose. The

(23:09):
poison of infidelity is found in every vein the effects
of it may be seen in the whole body. What
a striking lesson may the moralists learn here? So he's like,
everybody's fucking and they're fine with it. How horrible I
can't ya? And the woman lovers as well? Yeah, I
want to make it clear, he's not like, he's not
like seeing that all of his friends are cheating on
their wives and being like that's fucked up. He's seeing

(23:30):
like all these people are fucking other people that they're
not married to and everyone knows and is okay with it.
This is awful. Yeah. How is this? How is this
city not gone asunder? Yeah? How has God not turned
it into salt? Yeah? So William was fascinated by the
power and culture that radiated from old Europe, even though
he didn't really jell with its libertine values. Um. He

(23:54):
also wasn't a fan on what he saw as its
limitations on individual rights. Um. He left Europe after two
years feeling more American than ever. He also felt less likely. Yeah,
getting around different opinions to get you to double down
on your bad opinions. Yeah, I mean there's an extent
to which I understand. Every time I go to Europe,

(24:15):
I realize how fundamentally an American I am. But it's
not in a positive way. It's like, actually that I
can't blow shut up in the middle of nowhere, and
it's like I don't know that that's a healthy thing
to do. But it's just the way it is, Like,
what do you mean you don't sell Tanner in this
hardware store? What is this communist Russian um? Yeah. William

(24:38):
also felt less like a doctor than he had upon
moving there, and a let her home to his parents.
He admitted that his interest in his chosen vocation had
begun to fade. Quote. It is said that no idea
which enters our mind is ever entirely removed. Often we
see the specter, as it were, of our departed notions
or opinions. By experience, I know how firm is the
hold of these early and long cherished ideas with me,
Whilst a child and a boy I determined on a

(24:59):
police iCal career. There have been times when I thought
that the last vestige of such an idea had disappeared,
But often it reappears to me and my waking dreams,
leaving me uncertain whether it be an angel of light
or an angel of darkness. Darkness, buddy, darkness, black on
that one. If you're in eighteen forty four, near the

(25:21):
end of William's European tour, his family friend James K.
Polk won the presidential election. James was an expansionist and
supported the annexation of the Republic of Texas, which most
people considered to be America's greatest mistake. He also supported
the United States taking over Oregon, which Great Britain also
claimed at the time. Polk's victory over the Whig showed
that a majority of the American people supported these expansionist,

(25:43):
colonialist values. It was in the air. In eighteen forty five,
writer John O'Sullivan coined the term manifest destiny, the idea
that God himself had decreed the United States should expand
to control all of North America. Mm HMM's one of
those I'm assuming we all remember this from history. Yeah,
the worst fucking idea put in anyone's head. Yeah, all

(26:04):
this was ours. What if God said like, yeah, just
take all this ship, dude. I'm on your side, dude,
I'm God. Listen to me. You can remember, though, all
those times in the Bible where Jesus stole people's houses.
That was that was Jesus. Yeah, destiny Chips to bro Yeah, sorry,
manifest destiny coming through. Get then out Manifest destiny mm hmm. Yeah. Now.

(26:29):
William returned to the United States shortly after Polk's victory,
and very soon made the decision to move to New Orleans.
This was a risky proposition at the time. The city's
swampy conditions and horrible water quality meant that it had
a death rate twice that of other American cities. So
like moving to New Orleans is a little bit like
playing Russian roulette in this period. And now to be honest,

(26:50):
um yea yeah, I have some friends there who just
had both of their neighbors murdered. Um, oh my, yeah,
it's just like it's just like a thing, like I'll
check in on them on Facebook and it'll be like
found some bullets in my lawn today, like some shells
and casings, like more gunshots last night. I don't know,

(27:11):
I haven't been. I also here. It's a wonderful place, uh,
And I have a lot of friends who love it,
like they live there. But it's always been a little
bit of a roll of the die. I can always
count on you to be like be like, oh yeah,
I know someone those there and then they knew somebody
who was murdered, Like how what happened? What happened? Well,

(27:31):
you know, if I'm not mistaken in that case, it
was like a murder suicide because like the guy's mom
had told him home that like she couldn't afford her healthcare,
and it was like, yeah, it's like a really dark,
fucking tail man, it's fucked up. Yeah, that's really not
on New Orleans as much as America. Yeah. I was like, yeah,
this this episode is pretty light, and then you bring

(27:53):
it to like the real real Oh we're getting off topic. Yeah,
and that is that's not on New Orleans, that's on
our entire country. Um yeah so um. Yeah. It was
dangerous moving to New Orleans in this period. Luckily, William
was ethnically wealthy and he was able to shack up
with a classmate from his college who had a nice

(28:15):
townhouse in an affluent part of town. So we didn't
have to deal with like as much of the disease
as like, you know, the tenements and stuff I have. Uh.
In New Orleans, William officially made the shift from medicine
to politics, and he began to study to become a lawyer. Uh.
Now in New Orleans, as in Paris, Walker was horrified
by the fact that everyone wasn't an insufferable goody two shoes.

(28:35):
He wrote to his parents that they had no idea
of the profaneness of the people of New Orleans. I
just love the pro clutching of this guy. Yeah, and
just cut to whatever dark shit is inevitable here. But
somebody is saying poop yeah profane yeah, Like it is
like he's literally talking about curse words. Um. And he

(28:58):
was particularly horrified by the nity used by one of
his law teachers, a man named Mott. Quote. Looking at him,
I would suppose him almost incapable of using an oath.
But yet I hadn't been in the office long before
my ears were saluted with such words that I had
deemed long before consigned to Draymond importers. This common use
of oaths appears to be procuted, But I think he

(29:19):
meant to say precluded by an absurd affection of energy.
Not content with activity and simple power, They must have
bustle and swelling words. A man wants to have the
appearance of strength, although he is conscious of weakness. Oh wow, okay,
big yeah. Yeah. You know it's kind of like you
know some people like when folks are like pose with
guns and stuff, they'll be like that person must have

(29:40):
a tiny dick. He's kind of doing the same thing,
but with curse words. It's like, you're yeah, the reason
to use curse words is because you have a little
weener And that's it, you know. And that's why I
always talk nice words. Because my PEP also big. Now, Miles,
you know whose pp is also big? One of our sponsors.
This egg's absolutely I know this show. Listen to these

(30:05):
big swinging dick ads. We're back, Miles. In eighteen forty six,
the United States went to war with Mexico. William was
skeptical of this venture and called it a type of fever.
In a letter to a friend, he noted that quote

(30:26):
for a little time, the patient was far gone, and
a delirium of joy and destruction. War was preached as
being the noblest and sublimest of all states and conditions
of men, a spectacle of delight for gods and demi gods.
He evinced a particular disgust that the people of Mexico
were being treated as pagans by many of his fellow Americans,
and not the good Christians that they were. The war
sparked a deep interest in current events and William and

(30:49):
a growing obsession with the news that increasingly pulled him
away from his nascent law career. He passed the bar
in eighteen forty seven, but his young practice saw a
little success. He got a gig working briefly at the
Commercial with You, a local paper. The work didn't last long,
but William found journalism appealing. In early eighteen forty nine,
he put together a thousand dollars of probably mostly his
parents money, and bought an interest in the Daily Crescent newspaper. Now,

(31:12):
The Crescent was at the time a moderately liberal publication,
which meant then that they accepted ads for slave markets
but didn't attack abolitionists. Literal demons deserving a violent murder.
Oh so like MSNBC. Yeah, yeah, they're the MSNBC of
the time. Absolutely, yeah. Uh in eighteen forty nine, New Orleans,
this was a pretty progressive attitude for a rich white

(31:33):
guy to take. Now, eighteen forty nine proved to be
a pretty bad year for Walker. He'd fallen in love
with a young woman, Ellen Martin, a socialite and a
deaf mute whose parents had, unusually for the time, insisted
on letting their daughter live in normal life. Uh. That summer,
a horrific bout of yellow fever hit New Orleans, afflicting
William and forcing him to temporarily flee the city. It
reaped a more vicious toll on the Martin family, killing

(31:55):
first Ellen's cousin and then taking hold of her. She
spent several miserable weeks battling the illness until on April eighteenth,
it finally claimed her. Walker was devastated by this, and
his friends would later claim that it marked a turning
point in his life. He became cold, calculating, and increasingly violent.
His coverage in The Daily Crescent turned over and over

(32:15):
to confrontational, attacking his fellow journalists for, among other things,
reporting on corruption within a local bank. Walker's angle seemed
to be that by reporting on this, journalists were damaging
public confidence in the bank and revealing personal details about
the lives of several bankers. This new Walker was also
more inclined to support colonialist ventures. In the late eighteen forties, Nearrisco, Lopez,

(32:37):
a Spanish general and a former governor of Trinidad, Cuba,
began agitating for the island to rebel against Spanish control
and join the United States. Lopez did not do this
for reasons of Cuban self determination. He was worried that
the island would be taken by a slave uprising like
the one that had liberated Haiti, and he wanted the
military backing of the United States to protect he and
his fellow property owners. Spanned into slavery and most of

(32:58):
its domains in eighteen a and so Lopez and his
fellow people owners were worried that they would lose their
ability to own people. Lopez initially sought the help of
the U. S Government in this, but President Polk's administration
was unable to start a war with Spain. He became
convinced via delusion that the United States would step in
if he could spark an uprising on the island, and
so he hatched a plan to recruit hundreds of random

(33:21):
Americans with guns and use them as an army to
invade Cuba. By eighteen forty nine, he was recruiting men
directly from the streets of New York City. Uh now
Zachary Taylor, the president who followed Polk, issued Proclamation fifty
one to warn Americans against participating in Lopez scheme. He
promised that they would face charges at home and would
receive no aid in their endeavors. And it's kind of

(33:41):
a mark of where we are right now that I
think if the same thing happened today, the President of
the United States would be completely on board. I uh,
it's so many things. Even what you're saying like just
mirror the positions of so many people. It's also really
interesting to know that the I was like, when's the
fork in the road moment come for this guy? And

(34:03):
it's when he lost it was his girlfriend or his wife,
his girlfriend, his girlfriend to yellow fever. And that is
like when he this sounds like the beginnings of the
end for him. What was yellow fever exactly? I don't know.
Some horrible fever kills you as guessing it's a fever.
I think it's one of those poop yourself to death fevers.

(34:24):
Oh god, you hate one? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, no, good,
yeah yeah. I'm not a yellow fever expert though, um
and you never claimed to be. I think, just um
oddly enough, I am. I don't know. I don't have
a joke for that. Um anyway, Yeah, let's move along here,
so uh yeah. Lopez succeeded in gathering up several hundred

(34:46):
armed men, boats and eighty thou dollars in funding, which
was enough money to run a war at that point
in history. Uh to avoid arrest, he and his men
disguised their endeavor as a trip to California to mind Gold.
This did not fool anyone, and Lopez's army was broken up.
He fled from New York down to New Orleans, reasoning
that the lawless swamps of Louisiana would be friendlier to

(35:07):
someone trying to raise an army to invade a sovereign
state in order to further the cause of human bondage,
and he was not wrong in this um William Walker,
for his part, loved General Lopez and supported his efforts.
He justified this by pointing out that a slave uprising
in Cuba so close to Florida might spread the contagious
disease of wanting to be free to enslaved black Americans.

(35:29):
Quote from one of his editorials, If, for example, the
great number of Negroes now being carried into Cuba should
end in a second Haitian insurrection and an establishment of
a Negro state on the island, it would be very
injurious and dangerous for US Southern partners to have such
a neighbor. Of course, we have the right and ought
to exercise it of preventing any policy that would lead

(35:49):
to such a disaster. Oh boy, it's funny how disaster
freedom these moments where like class power structures are about
to be disrupted and then the the dominant class has
to go all right, so how are we gonna suck
in make sure this doesn't happen here? It's like we're
gonna make sure this freedom thing doesn't spread it. Yeah,

(36:09):
And then like with Haiti, it's like, okay, well, we'll
just punish them forever monetarily with the banks. Uh, and
we'll make sure not they will never prosper and we'll
keep them like indebted to this other system. We'll keep
punishing them right up until the modern era, and no
one will talk about it because like we'll just assume
at that point that Haiti has always been fucked up

(36:30):
for an explicable reason. And then City City Bank is like,
oh wait what what? Oh is that us back the Okay,
we gotta get a real Haiti episode up in here.
Oh my god Jesus, Yeah, I mean, because that's really weak.
All those slave uprisings really had people shook, like in
this way you're talking about where they're like, wait, we
can't we don't want people get an ideas about like

(36:52):
like liberation over here. They had so many different ways
to combat it that weren't like, hey, if you stop
owning people, they won't want to murder you, right, Just
just just a pitch, just to try that. Yeah, yeah,
so um Walker claimed that he supported an invasion of
Cuba on humanitarian grounds, arguing that the US could stop

(37:14):
Cuba from importing new slaves and then slavery on the
island would take the mild and comparatively inoffensive form and
which it exists in the Southern States. Oh fuck right off,
I just love again, same pattern. Okay, this country is
doing something that we don't want to give ideas to

(37:35):
our people that might be a good thing. Therefore, we
were just going to force our way in with this
weird lay mass subtrafuge of like, no, we care about
the people. It's about the people. Yeah, it's really about
the people. Um it's not about like humanitarian, not about
preserving these power structures that we need to like extort
and you know, exploit the week. But anyway, it's fine.
It's called a humanitarian humanitarian humanitarian. In his constant editorials,

(37:58):
William began to explicitly endorsed the practice of filibustering or freebooting.
Now this is not a term we used today often
in its original form filibustering, like it's the congress thing
where you talk for a long time and probably have
to wear a diaper. But back in the eighteen fifties,
according to the book Filibusters and Financiers, filibusters were basically
people who would have been described as pioneers if they

(38:19):
turned their attentions toward colonizing parts of North America already
controlled by the government. Quote If, on the other hand,
they happened to direct their attention towards another nation whose
sovereignty was formally recognized by their own, they were called filibusters.
The term filibuster was originally one of a probrim banned.
Its use in the fifties was much resented by those
to whom it was applied, inasmuch as it was regarded

(38:41):
as synonymous with pirate or buccaneer. And it stops meaning
pirate in this period because a lot of people like filibusters,
but really it is piracy. It's just grander than normal piracy.
They're just fucking around in switching labels around to make
it see them different. Yeah, it's just the label. They're like,
oh God, please don't call me a buccaneer. I yeah,

(39:02):
I prefer genocidal. I'm I mean, um, filibuster yea friend
decide ship. No, that doesn't work. So I find that
book Filibusters and Financiers really interesting because it was published
in nineteen sixteen, an age in which most white people
considered colonialism to be a clear good, in an age
in which a lot of people still remember the eighteen fifties. Um.

(39:24):
It credits the growth of filibustering and its support by
men like William Walker, to the fact that the blank
map of North America was rapidly being filled. In quote,
there was a proverb current among Frenchmen to the effect
that the appetite comes with eating, and in the case
of the land hunger of the American people, the truth
of this assertion seems well established. As soon as they
set foot on American soil, the colonists from Europe were

(39:46):
compelled to rest their lands from the savages, many of
whom resisted the invaders to the death. Nature as well
as the natives, had to be subdued. Rodent Field were
cleared with acts and spade. Pioneers built their log cabins
far in the wilderness, and like the advanced guard of
a march army, kept always ahead of the main body
of westward moving settlers. There was no arrest of this
westward progress till the pioneer stood on the shores of

(40:07):
the Pacific. In eighteen o three, the boundary was moved
from the Mississippi to the Rockies, and the next generation
saw it extending from the Rockies to the sea. A
whole continent had been one, but the land hunger seemed
keener than ever. The appetite had increased with the eating,
And you know, it's, uh, I think that's pretty accurate,
Like obviously they're kind of pro that, but it still

(40:29):
doesn't mean it's an inaccurate assessment of what's going on.
It's funny too, because I was just reading this study
about how um like when people who aren't used to
the American diet um come to the United States and
begin eating like typical foods, like you know, people like
that normal people would eat like not gormation all the time. Yeah,
like nineteen pounds of bacon wrapped up in fat sugar.

(40:52):
Diet it leads to a normal breakfit, it leads to
more eating. So like it's still like seemed like the
metaphor even holds for the way in which we even
consumed food in this garden is also like yeah, and
then that also extends to aggressive land grabs where you
get a little bit and then you get such a
boner for boundary pushing. Uh, they just keep going to

(41:12):
you get to a body of water that apparently you
can't put a flagon. Yeah, it's amazing, Like the the
American culture is very much like if you, I don't know,
somehow like magically were to take like the collective hunger
of like all past generations of human beings who struggled
with like the wilderness and the seasons and and the tides,

(41:33):
and then just like lumped that into a relatively small
chunk of human beings like like like we're just filled
with this insatiable need to consume that's almost metaphysical and
it's it's yeah, boundaries anyway, the hunger. Yeah, So we're
talking about this guy Lopez trying to conquer Cuba. Um.

(41:53):
He carried out a couple of different unsuccessful expeditions to Cuba.
He was eventually, like executed and ship Um, it didn't
work out. But this didn't not dissuade Walker from breathless
support for the idea of filibustering. He was in general
more aggressive after the death of his girlfriend than he
in all spheres of his life. In late eighteen forty nine,
he got into a dispute with the editor of New
Orleans largest Spanish language newspaper over the arrest or kidnapping

(42:16):
of a Cuban citizen by the Spanish government. The dispute
was based mainly on a misunderstanding by both men, but
and since by an editorial that had insulted him. William
Walker found the other publications editor and beat him with
his cane. So he is like, and he's not really
He's never before this like a violent physically person. So
this is like he's there's really a change going on

(42:37):
in this dude. Oh wow, yacking him up over maybe
what the whole thing I thought. I thought you're talking
about Ellien Gonzalez for a second. In the beginning for
kidnapped Cuban national, completely different time, very similar to, very
different story. But then he solves his beefs by just

(42:59):
kine whip and somebody. He gets really comfortable with violence
after this point, and it's one of those things it's
totally plausible that like the death of a loved one
could lead to that kind of change. I also wonder
maybe maybe just got hit in the head at some point,
And that's like a part of this story that's just
not reported because nobody thought it was a big deal.
Whatever I hear about like a personality change that leads
to violence, I wonder maybe a t V I yeah, yeah,

(43:22):
or something yeah going on with your brain, Yeah, some
cte up in air, jeez, or just or hey, maybe
you were called, you know, a feminate your whole life,
and or an old celery stick arms and now you
just have had it and now your toxicity is now
the world's problem. Yeah, maybe this was something that was
just simmering inside him his entire childhood and it finally

(43:44):
blew over. And yeah, maybe the death of a loved
one was a catalyst. Who knows either way. He is
a very aggressive man from this point forward. In eighteen fifty,
Walker left New Orleans and his job at the Daily
Crescent for the Windy City that Never Sleeps sand from Cisco.
His journey there was nightmarish by modern standards. He had
to take a series of boats down to Panama. He

(44:06):
had to hike through the mountains for days, and then
book passage on a steamer headed for the West coast.
It took around five months. Um so long would it
have taken over land? I guess worse? Probably because it's
like there, there's it's very much less developed, you know
at that point, I mean a lot more dangerous. You
take the ten west, you can take that from Jacksonville

(44:29):
all the way. Well, I don't know. The ten at
this point is a series of gun fights with bandits
and there's no car bowling. Yeah. Uh. Now in sconstin California,
William got another job at another newspaper, the Daily Herald.
He had immediately set to work waging a personal war
with the entire Citi's justice system, which, in fairness, was
incredibly corrupt and fucked up. Crime was rampant in San Francisco,

(44:53):
which at that point was a nigh lawless frontier town.
William viciously attacked the district Judge Levi Parsons or his
failure to adequately prosecute criminals. After a local businessman was
murdered during a robbery gone wrong, William began to advocate
armed crowds of murderous vigilantes is a good solution to
San Francisco's crime problem. Oh boy, he he wanted armed

(45:16):
mobs to clean up the streets. Who doesn't Miles that
old fashioned armed mobs so weird. I just feel like
this could be a headline we're gonna read in like
three months from now. Yeah it is. I mean there
it is like a focus of right wing grifters right now,
the fact that there's poop in the streets of San Francisco. Sometimes. Yeah,
it's like, putty, I got some news about Dallas for you.

(45:36):
Um hey, just get some hires, some Pinkerton's and it's
like what. So Here's how Walker wrote about his desire
for vigilante murder squads. Quote. When citizens are murdered and
robbed in their houses, are feloniously entered in the most
populous portions of the city, is it not time that
there were some action taken to vindicate the law. We
have urged the formation of a volunteer night patrol. Until

(45:59):
such a body be organ nice, we doubt if there
can be any security. A summary example must be made
of the first person detected in the commission of these crimes.
So we just we just got to go out and
shoot us one criminal and that will scare the rest straight. Ah,
it's it's it's good to know that those terrible ideas
people have been having those for centuries now, yep, because

(46:19):
people never learned a single thing ever, not one severistory.
Has anyone learned a single lessons that we don't learn. Yeah,
we'll create order by creating more fear. I'm pretty sure
that's how it's gonna work. Walker was particularly furious when
Judge Parsons ruled in the case of another judge who
had been accused of bribery. Uh. He felt, probably accurately,

(46:40):
that the judge had just done a favor for his buddy.
Walker was further outraged when this judge, a guy named Morrison,
assigned the property of a dead man to one of
his colleagues, even though the deceased had family back in Boston.
Walker attacked these corrupt judges with admirable ferocity, eventually provoking
one of their proteges to attack Walker as a liar,
a poltroon coward. This prompted William to challenge the man

(47:02):
to a duel, which was accepted by another one of
the judges protegees. The terms were set as revolvers fired
at ten paces. Uh back back when there was honor,
right before we just cancel people. Exactly when we would
cruelly cancel people. Instead, we would nobally stand ten feet

(47:23):
away and shoot each other with handguns. Oh my god,
ten paces, sir. Not a sembless William lost and received
a bullet in his leg for his trouble. He kept writing, though,
and eventually earned himself a charge for contempt of court.
He was basically he posted through it um. He was
fined five dollars, which he refused to pay. The people

(47:45):
of San Francisco mostly seemed to back William in this,
seeing his crusade against the corrupt judiciary is fundamentally just next.
According to the book Filibusters and Financiers. A mass meeting
was held on the Plaza on March nine, with several
thousand citizens and attendance, whereas a sutions were quickly adopted,
approving Walker's conduct, calling on Parsons to resign his seat,
and asking the local representatives in the legislature to initiate

(48:06):
impeachment proceedings. After adjourning, the citizens marched in a body
to the jail and made Walker a visit of sympathy
habeas corpus. Proceedings were next instituted before a judge of
the Superior Court, who held that Parsons might institute a
suit for libel, but that his punishment for the contempt
alleged in a newspaper statement was inconsistent with the freedom
of the press and a violation of the Constitution. Walker
was thereupon set free. He had once presented a memorial

(48:29):
to the legislature, and the committee to which it was
referred recommended on March twenty six that Parsions should be impeached.
A special committee was that appointed to investigate the charges, and,
upon its reporting insufficient grounds for impeachment, the case was ended.
Had Walker possessed anything like personal magnetism, he might have
made of this episode the foundation of a successful career
in California politics. He was indeed not without political ambition,

(48:50):
but in the prime requisites of a successful politician he
was woefully lacking. So it's just unable to turn this
into any kind of political I mean, what how more
could you fail upward? As a white man you're like, look,
I started some ship with a judge. I got clapped.
I had to take that l Then suddenly I became
like I got a lot of sympathy. I could have

(49:11):
turned that into something, but then I just didn't even
know how to do that. So I'm just gonna rob people. Hey, Robert, Yeah, Robert, Yes,
you know what isn't woefully lacking? Robert, I feel I
felt like it got he wanted to let you sit
with that one. What a cruel man, And now you

(49:34):
at home can sit with these products and services. That
was shameful, Robert. I know. As we're back, quick question
about duels. Did you or you only allowed to shoot
one shot when you turned like it was like no, no, no,
you could want one at a time, all six at once. No, no,

(49:57):
it's one at a time. Though, Like I think you
have to like wait for the other person to do
their second shot if you miss. Oh my god, Yeah,
it's pretty cool. It's pretty cool. I'm surprised people just
didn't cheat that, Like, you know what, I'm just gonna
unload this whole clip when I turned. Yeah, I'm sure
people did cheat. Yeah, and then it would just be

(50:18):
like it would be a terrible It would be a yeah,
dishonorable Jackson cheated at a duel and killed a guy
and it ruled. Um. But anyway, we'll get We'll talk
about that some other day. So um. William's time in
California turned him into a powerful supporter of manifest destiny.
You'll remember he was kind of like on the edge

(50:38):
about the Mexican American War at first, but like he's
on board at this point. Over his months in San Francisco,
he switched from writing about crime to authoring more and
more essays about the necessity of American expansionism. He could
see the writing on the wall. The old United States
was filling in, and one entire massive continent was, in
his view, not enough for the awesomeness that was America.

(50:59):
He believed that Wes needed to annex not just Cuba,
but Nicaragua and probably parts of Mexico too. He also
felt that the annexation of Central American states might eventually
provide the US with more slave states, which would be
pretty cool in his view. Um, there it is there.
It is, yeah, West debated, but it seems to scan. Yeah, oh,

(51:19):
that's debatable whether that's what his actual intent was yeah, yeah, yeah,
you know you. We'll talk about that a little later too. Yeah,
I mean yeah, I was like, let's what does he
think you're gonna do with all this land. He's not
the only person who believe that there was actually like
a Southern like Confederates after the Civil War who moved
to I forget it might have been Costa Rica. I
forget exactly where to like try to start a new
confederacy in Latin or in Central America. Um So, this

(51:43):
is like, he's not the only guy with this basic
idea and all they all they were able to do
is create Cancun. Yeah. Well, actually Cabo San Lucas comes
up in this quite a lot. Um So, as William's
career in journalism petered out in his brief career as
a lawyer proved unfulfilling, attention drifted more and more to
the possibility of filibustering himself and possibly adding new territory

(52:05):
to the glorious United States. Perhaps he wasn't inspired to
this work by the example of his arobic grandfather and
i achieving family full of soldiers and politicians and newspaper owners.
Conquering a sovereign nation was just about the only way
to stand out. He found an opportunity lurking just a
few hundred miles south of San Francisco and the untamed
wilds of northern Mexico. At that point, the Sonora Desert

(52:26):
and the place we now call Baja was still largely unsettled.
It was occupied by numerous indigenous people, of course, but
by the standards of racists in the US and Mexican government,
it was essentially empty the few villages that existed there.
This is just the way people thought. That's like what
they modern racism at that time just meant and nobody's there. Well,

(52:47):
and it's it's funny because like the big problem Mexico
has is that the villages that are there have all
these problems with like apaches and comanches raiding them. So
it's like this place is too empty for us to control.
And this is a problem because all of people that
are there want to kill us, all of the people
that are there in this empty place, and there's kind
of they're not worth it. Um. So the first kind

(53:09):
of freebooters who sort of sailed in to try to
deal with this problem, we're actually French, a guy named
Charles de pendre Um and like a bunch of French
San Franciscan's um like traveled to uh guy Mus, which
is like sort of like the big city and Sonora
apport Um, and they developed an agricultural settlement to like
essentially try and provide um a base of people that

(53:32):
would like allow them to like basically provide some sort
of order against the Apache raiders, right, so like that's
the goal here um, and it doesn't work out. Pendre
is eventually murdered after getting into allowed argument with the
Sonoran government. So like the Mexican government kind of wants
these French people there because they're having trouble like controlling
the territory and fighting off these native tribes. But at

(53:54):
the same time, they don't really trust these people because
they're like, you're trying to steal this land from us,
Like we're pretty sure, so like it's it's it's fraught
and there's a complicated history here that we're not going
to get into enough. Like both sides are stealing, so
they have to be. They're like, we're trying to take
this land too, but we kind of need you, but
I feel like you're gonna steal it more what do

(54:14):
we do. Yeah, the colonizers Catch twenty two. Yeah, they
are both colonizers here. Um. I guess you could say
Mexico's less colonizery at this point, because there is at
least like they've been there longer. I don't know. I'm
not going to try to parse that out more. Yeah.
Another wave of French freebooters came next, led by a

(54:36):
French count, gas Dundrosseau boubone. I'm not going to pronounce
that right, but fuck him. He receive permission from the
Mexican government to do the same thing, basically to start
a settlement to try and like provide a defense against
the apache um. But again, these would be colonists in
the local government wound up at logger heads. Uh. The
count and his men eventually decided to settle their differences

(54:57):
with the Mexican government by marching on a nearby city
and conquering it at gunpoint. Uh. They succeeded in this,
but were eventually beaten by like a kind of a
grassroots insurgency, and the survivors were chased out of Mexico
in December eighteen fifty two. All this was closely observed
by William Walker who thought the whole mess sounded very exciting.
He'd actually put together a plan with a couple of

(55:19):
business partners to establish a settlement in Sonora with the
goal of protecting Mexican villagers and ranchers from Apache and
Comanche raiders. They had been unable to get the Mexican
government to give them permission, though, and Walker had shelved
the idea until the Count's efforts ended in bloody failure
at the end of eighteen fifty two. In June eighteen
fifty three, William Walker and two business partners traveled to Guaymas, Mexico,

(55:41):
with the goal of scouting out possible locations for a
border settlement. They received passes from the excellent Consulate to
visit the country, but they were most definitely not allowed
to go there in order to plot how they could
illegally build towns full of white settlers in Mexico. The
captain of the port was immediately suspicious of Walker and
his friends and sent this message off to the local
general out, Your excellency will perceive that there was undoubtedly

(56:03):
an intention to invade this portion of the Mexican territory.
There's like, yeah, everyone knows what's going on here? You're like,
you're not slick. Yeah, it's the same thing, like a
time shared, like pitch. It's like, yeah, yeah, you're you're
offering me a fucking free trip. What are you trying
to fucking steal? Yeah? Now, the governor ordered Walker and

(56:23):
his friends detained, and they spent the next month trapped
in Guy must trying to convince the governor that no, really, guy,
we're cool dudes, We're not trying to conquer part of
your country. And while they waited, Walker made a bit
of a name for himself around town for dressing like
a maniac. He was described as wearing a huge white
fur hat whose long nap waved with the breeze despite
the hundred plus degrees summer heat. Um okay, fucking big

(56:47):
fur white fur hat in the Mexican summer. Oh my god?
To do? What to let people know you're a pickup artist? Hell,
he's picking up the whole country. I'm negging the whole country, bro,
I'm neggat him right into my bedroom. Kinda is actually uh. Now,
Despite his best attempts at argument, the government held to
the heart of the line that William Walker was absolutely

(57:09):
not allowed to travel further into Mexico, and so at
the end of July, William and his friends left. Despite
their failure, he was optimistic for he had received some
very exciting news, which he related in an article published
shortly thereafter. Quote apaches had visited a country house a
few leagues from gay Mus, murdering all the men and
children and carrying the women into captivity. Worse than death.
The Indians sent where that they would soon visit the

(57:31):
town where water is carried on asses backs, meaning gay Mus,
and the people of that port, frightened by the message,
seemed ready to perceive anyone who would give them safety.
So he's like psyched about this, Like some apaches murder
a bunch of people, and he's like, fun, yeah, this
is my chance. Oh boy. The tactics are always the same,
right yea? What is there an atmosphere of fear there

(57:52):
I can exploit for my own game? Fantastic. Let me
hop right in, let me roll right up in that.
Are you guys fearing for your life? Okay? About come
through with the homies who have no training but willstely
no training. But we have guns, more guns than we
should have, despite the fact that literally no when he
had met in Mexico had wanted him there. William Walker

(58:14):
insisted to his readers that several women in the country
had begged him to repair immediately to California and bring
down enough Americans to keep off the Apaches. Walker was
not the least bit dissuaded by the Mexican government's refusal
to work with him. He felt that the ease with
which those French settlers had captured a whole town meant
that a comparatively small body of Americans would surely see
even greater success. Enough Americans with guns could protect local

(58:38):
families from rampaging natives, and of course secure themselves significant
financial benefits. Walker wrote insistently that such an act would
be one of humanity no less than of justice, whether
sanctioned or not by the Mexican government, and so William
Walker returned to California intent upon the goal of invading Mexico.
He wrote that his plan was to establish as early

(59:00):
a time as possible a military colony not necessarily hostile
to Mexico on the frontier of Sonora, with a view
of protecting that state from the Apaches. It's like, we're
not necessarily hostile no. I mean, yeah, we have guns
and we're shooting people that like don't agree with us,
but like that's not the point though we're here, like
that's only hostile if you don't agree with us. It's
just it's pretty simple. I'm pretty sure we laid it out.

(59:22):
You disagree with me, I shoot you. It is the
geopolitical equivalent of that scene in Simpson's where Bart walks
forward swinging his fists in a windmill and if I
hit you, it's not my fault, exactly. You're the Actually
you're the aggressor because you knew it was coming your
way and you've got in the line of fire. Now,
what Walker was doing was wildly illegal, um and so
we had to hide his activities. But he was really

(59:43):
bad at secrecy, and almost immediately local papers started commenting
on the rumors that he was going to invade Mexico.
There was criticism for the idea in some papers, but
at the time many Americans supported the idea of conquering
more Mexico. One of Walker's fellow Californians wrote this in
an eighteen fi defour op ed, speaking for a sizeable
chunk of the territory. Quote, it is the fate of

(01:00:05):
America ever to go. She is like the rod of
Aaron that became a serpent and swallowed up the other rods.
So will America conquer or annex all lands that is
her manifest destiny, only get her time for the process
to swallow up. Every few years of province as large
as most kingdoms of Europe is her present rate of progress.
Sometimes she purchases the mighty morsel. Sometimes she forms it
out of waste territory by the natural increase of her

(01:00:27):
own people. Sometimes she annexes, and sometimes she conquers it.
Oh boy, waste territory. Yeah, this is the attitude common
at the time. I mean, in fact, yeah, you realize,
Like whenever I think about this, I'm like, how people
so callous and like brazen in this time. It's like, yeah,
I get it. The language you're using is just sort
of it's merely looking at it like you're you know,

(01:00:49):
at a fucking like a parking lot swap meat, and
you want to make sure you get there early enough
to get the good spot. We don't often talk about
that with manifest destiny. It was not I won't say
the major ploraty of Americans felt this way, but not
insignificant number of Americans were like, Oh, no, we're supposed
to take the whole fucking world, or at least all
of South and Central Yeah. If I can walk there

(01:01:11):
and I don't need a boat, I think it should
be ours for as long as that goes. Now, Walker,
in a growing circle of comrades, raised money for their
venture by selling five hundred dollar bonds at half face
value for the Independence Loan Fund of the Republic of Sonora.
They promised that purchasers of these bonds would receive seven
square miles of Mexico's sovereign soil once their new country

(01:01:31):
was established. In conversations with his supporters, Walker did not
even bother to pretend that his goal was to create
a settlement for humanitarian reasons. Now he was openly raising
funds to conquer Mexican territory and establish his own country.
In order to avoid running a foul of the Neutrality Act,
Walker carefully worded his sales pitch to prospective soldiers. Rather
than outright saying I'm recruiting mercenaries, he would talk up

(01:01:53):
all the wealth and spoils and excitement to be gained
in the venture. In the hopes that his target would
ask if they two could join. For some reason, lost
of time, Walker felt that people volunteering to invade Mexico
with him was more legal than him hiring people to
invade Mexico. So it wasn't he would just have like
a really cool pitch, and like the whole play was like, dude,
beat him in with such a dope pitch that they're

(01:02:16):
going to be like, yes, i would like to join
this illegal expedition. I'm not raising an army. An army
asked me if they could help me invade Mexico. That's
totally different, so different, your honor, Are you kidding me?
I was like, this is how it started. I'm like, yo, Brett,
this place Mexico is fucking cool. I'm gonna check it out.
I don't know what you're thinking. Next thing, you know,

(01:02:37):
he's coming with like a bunch of home he's out
of guns. What do you want me to do? Yeah,
it just sort of happened. Yeah Wow, what a pitch though, too.
And you're like, also, can you put in like five
bucks on my fucking like colonizer fund and you will
get you will secure your own piece of land. This
all does kind of make me want like an eighteen
fifties like version of The Hangover, where like they all

(01:02:59):
wait up having conquered Baja Mexico, and like what had happened?
What happened? Where's William Walker? You can make a fun
movie out of that um. Walker hired a ship called
the Arrow to carry he and his men to Sonora,
and of course both the Mexican and US government's almost
instantly realized what was happening. The boat was seized while

(01:03:20):
full of guns in San Francisco. Walker responded by suing
the government to release his boat, arguing that it had
no authority to take possession of a ship without evidence
of a criminal act. He loudly denied he was planning
any kind of invasion. A media storm enveloped the whole issue,
and Walker was once again successful in getting the people
of San Francisco on his side. Well, all this attention
was focused on the Arrow, William Walker went and chartered

(01:03:41):
another ship and filled it with guns and ammunition. A
little bit after midnight on October fifty four, the local
police caught some of Walker's men moving supplies into the boat.
They seized a bunch of m O prompting Walker to
panic and rouse all the men he could get his
hands on forty, most of whom were drunk, and rested
them aboard his new ship with whatever guns they had
on hand. The Minset sail later that night, severely underman

(01:04:03):
and under armed, but finally on their way to Sonora.
Oh yeah, fucking disaster. Get on the boat. Get on
the boat. I don't care how drunk you are. Hey,
we're going. Hey, Will's going on and there's a cops
are coming. Man, do you want to get on a boat?
I don't have my musket. That's cops are angry because

(01:04:24):
trying to invade. Get on the boat. Worry mother, there's
there'll be fucking booze on the boat. Just get on,
bring your gun now. Walker named his small army, slightly
larger than a platoon, the first independent Battalion. He declared
himself colonel because it was the eighteen hundreds and everybody
was a colonel. And then, shockingly, he succeeded in using

(01:04:46):
his small force to conquer the town of Lapaz, population
six thousand. This was less impressive than it sounds. There
was no one to defend the town. Walker and a
bunch of his men just stumbled, probably drunk, into the
Governor's office waving guns and terrorized every when they're into
giving them control. As soon as the governor surrendered, William
Walker ordered the Mexican flag taken down and replaced with
the new flag he had designed himself, the flag of

(01:05:09):
the Republic of Sonora. Looking out from his new base
of operations, his ambitions expanded. No longer was he content
in creating a small republic of Sonora. Lapaz had fallen
so easily that he now desired to conquer the entire
Baja Peninsula. Within days of capturing the town, he renamed
his new country, issuing a declaration that the Republic of
Lower California is hereby declared free, sovereign, and independent, and

(01:05:31):
all allegiance to the Republic of Mexico is forever renounced. Okay,
just like that, huh ambition, man, You just you gotta
fake it till you make it, just like that. And
also way to get slowly like deceived by how easy
one It's like, oh well that was pretty easy in
this small town easily. You know what, Fuck it, I'm
gonna do, you know what, Yeah, let's do the whole thing. Lesly,

(01:05:53):
this is the hardest thing will ever have to do.
Do you know what did that flag look like? I'm
always curious when people was pretty boring. Okay, it wasn't
like indulgent. I would talked about it if it was cool. No, no,
it wasn't. Damn it. That's when these guys fucking disappoint me.
When there's like a real opportunity for some just straight
up buffoonery, and it's like, you actually took flags very seriously,

(01:06:16):
very minimal design, very minimal design. It's a pretty Yeah,
it's not super crazy. Uh. Walker concluded his declaration by
announcing that he was now the president as well as
a colonel, which is a pretty impressive series of title
changes for a single week. Yeah, the President, I'm the
colonel of the Hair Club for men. President. Colonel Yeah,
Colonel President, Yeah, Colonel. President. Walkers set to work at

(01:06:38):
once giving a bunch of other people fancy titles, appointing
a Secretary of War who was by himself three percent
of the army. Most critically, he appointed a propagandist who
started mailing off dispatches to the San Diego Harold in
order to inform Americans about what Walker and his men
had done. He set to work at confiscating the arms

(01:07:01):
and ammunition of the citizens of Lapase so they could
not rise up against him. He attempted to fortify the city,
but eventually realized that it was indefensible if the Mexican
army attacked, and so he moved his forces to Cabo
San Lucas, which he felt would be an easier place
to draw Americans and to fight for his costs. He
moves to Cabo because he's like, this is where if
I want to get more Americans, I gotta go to Kabba.

(01:07:22):
This is where it's at. Lapa is so last year.
If you haven't been to Cabo, you really must. So
it's it's he makes the same decision as an insurgent
general as Jimmy Buffett does. Is Jimmy Buffett, come on, margarite,
does he um? Is he just thinking like because a location,
He's like, okay, yeah, this is this is an easier

(01:07:43):
place to get reinforcements, like he's relying on. He's not
an idiot. He knows that like forty five minut isn't
enough to take all of Baja, but he hopes that
like the stories that are spreading in the news will
send hundreds of Americans to join his army. And he
knows that Cabo San Lucas it's easier for people from Californi.
You get to right right right there, just going straight
down the coast. Yes, okay. I also I'm in my mind,

(01:08:06):
I'm also thinking of a dude who's like starting at
like a terrible vacation spot too, and he's like, Nah,
you know, we're not gonna get a lot of business here.
We gotta go to Cobbo. Man, They're gonna see these beaches.
They're gonna love it, and they'll fight my war. And
they'll fight my war. Uh so, yeah. Well, he and
his men were loading up their boat to flee the
capital of their new country for the new capital of
their new country, which they would have to conquer. Once

(01:08:27):
they got there, they ran into a passenger ship waving
the Mexican flag. Walker's men boarded the ship at once
and realized it held Juan Clemaco Riboletto, the new governor
of Lapaz. They arrested him immediately and took him prisoner
along with the old governor. The Americans hold up on
their boat for a few nights, with their prisoners waiting
in the harbor of the city they had conquered. When
a few of them landed to get firewood, they were

(01:08:48):
ambushed by Mexican soldiers and townspeople. Walker and his troops
responded to the ambush by returning fire, which is fair,
and also by lighting random people's houses on fire, which
is not fair. They made it back to the out
and told Walker what had happened. His first reaction was
to load his ship's cannons and open fire on La Pause,
which was again the capital of the new country he
had founded. Walker landed with thirty of his men after

(01:09:10):
this and took to the fight to the enemy for
ninety minutes or so. The ambushing Mexican forces fled, and
Walker were at a glowing report of their victory to
be shared in the newspapers back in California. The enemy's
lost was six or seven killed and several wounded. Areman
did not so much as receive a wound except from
cacti while pursuing the enemy through the chaparal in the
rear of town. Thus ended the Battle of Lapase, crowning

(01:09:32):
our efforts with victory, releasing Lower California from the tyrannous
yoke of declining Mexico and establishing a new republic. Oh
my god, man. Yeah, he he got into a gunfight
over firewood, burned down a quarter of the town, and
then called at the Battle of lapase n't see. And
this goes back to fucking Grandpa too, where you're like, yeah,

(01:09:52):
that motherfucker, he's got a few stories and then he's
having to like self mythologize when he writes back because
he's like, well, I'm never gonna do that. Um so,
let me just really pump this story up so it
sounds a lot way cooler. Yeah, and Miles, that's where
the story is going to have to remain for the

(01:10:12):
end of part one, and we're gonna we're gonna talk
about what happens next with William Walker and his men
in part two. On Thursday, you get some plug doubles
to to drop in the p zone. You know, I
do dailies that want to colonize this podcast. I want
to I want to put the flag deep into the
fertile soil of behind the Bastards right now. I do

(01:10:34):
want to shout out my new show for twenty Day
Fiance that I co host with one of your other
esteemed guests, Sophia Alexandra, where like we just get high
and talk about ninety day Fiance. It's like, excellent if
you need a break from life, you know. That's that's
sort of like why we do it. It's like I'm talking,
we're talking about all kinds of serious. I'm like, can
we just talk about my favorite show? But like get
faded before? That sounds great? And that's all. Well, I

(01:10:59):
have no plugs to plug because I do nothing but
this episode of this podcast, which is the entirety of
my breadth of work. Um, so the episode is now done. No,
it's not, Robert, is it not? Do I do other things?
You do other things? You almost worst your disappointing with
our good friends Katie Stole and Cody Johnston. I guess

(01:11:20):
so yeah. You can also find Robert on Twitter at
I right, okay, and you can find us on the
Twistagram at at Bastard's Pod, and we have a tea
public store, and to be honest, I don't know about
all that. But if Sophie says so, I guess I'm
not gonna argue. I'm gonna thank you so much. That's
so kind of me now the episode is over. Excellent,