View source for Mexican–American War

==Legacy==
[[File:Obelisco a los Niños Héroes 03. Castillo de Chapultepec.JPG|thumb|150px|Obelisk to the Niños Héroes, Mexico City, 1881]]
[[File:Lula in Chapultepec.jpg|thumb|Memorial to the Mexican cadets killed in the [[Battle of Chapultepec]], 1952]]
[[File:Placa conmemorativa del batallón de San Patricio.jpg|thumb|150px|Commemorative plaque to the [[San Patricios]], Mexico City, 1959]]

=== Mexico ===
Once the French were expelled in 1867 and the liberal republic was re-established, Mexico began reckoning with the legacy of the Mexican-American war. The story of the ''[[Niños Héroes]]'' became the narrative that helped Mexicans to come to terms with the war. Boy cadets sacrificing themselves for the patria as martyrs in the Battle of Chapultepec was inspiring, but their sacrifice was not commemorated until 1881, when surviving cadets formed an organization to support the [[Heroic Military Academy (Mexico)|Military Academy of Mexico]]. One of the cadets taken prisoner designed the monument, a small [[cenotaph]] was erected at the base of Chapultepec hill on which the castle is built.

Annual commemorations at the cenotaph were attended by General [[Porfirio Díaz]], who saw the opportunity to build his relationship with the [[Federal Army]]. Even during the [[Mexican Revolution]] (1910–1920), the commemoration was continued and attended by contemporary presidents. After the end of the military phase, the Mexican government renewed the narrative of the boy heroes as the embodiment of sacrifice for the patria. Plans were drawn up for a much larger commemoration of their sacrifice, which was built at the entrance to Mexico City's [[Chapultepec Park]]. The Monument to the Heroic Cadets was inaugurated in 1952. By then, the relations between the U.S. and Mexico had improved so much that they had been allies in World War II and their postwar economies became increasingly intertwined. Some war trophies taken by the U.S., such as Mexican battle flags, were returned to Mexico with considerable ceremony, but captured U.S. flags remain in Mexico.

In 1981, the Mexican government established the ''[[:es:Museo Nacional de las Intervenciones|Museo Nacional de las Intervenciones]]'' (National Museum of Interventions) in a former convent that was the site of the Battle of Churubusco. It chronicles the attempts by the Spanish to reconquer Mexico after its independence as well as the French interventions. The museum has an exhibition on the ''Intervención norteamericana de 1846–1848'', which chronicles the Anglo–American settlement of Texas and their rebellion after characterizing themselves as victims of Mexican oppression. It goes on to blame the war on Polk and Santa Anna. "The [museum's] interpretation concedes U.S. military superiority in arms and commanders while disparaging General Santa Anna's costly mistakes and retreat from the capital city."<ref>Connors, Thomas G. and Raúl Isaí Muñoz, "Looking for the North American Invasion in Mexico City." [[American Historical Review]] vol. 125, no. 2, April 2020, p. 502.</ref>

=== United States ===
[[File:Palmetto Regiment Monument.jpg|thumb|150px|[[Palmetto Regiment]] Monument, State House grounds, Columbia, S.C. Wrought iron 1858. Sculptor: [[Christopher Werner]]]]
[[File:American Army Entering the City of Mexico - USCapitol - Flickr.jpg|thumb|"American Army Entering the City of Mexico" by [[Filippo Costaggini]], 1885. Architect of the Capitol]]
[[File:Fort Moore Pioneer Memorial.jpg|thumb|Mormon Battalion monument, Fort Moore Pioneer Monument (1950), showing raising the U.S. flag in Los Angeles, 1847]]
In the U.S. the war was almost forgotten after the cataclysm of the Civil War.<ref>Van Wagenen, Michael.  ''Remembering the Forgotten War: The Enduring Legacies of the U.S.-Mexican War''. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press 2012.</ref> However, one of the first monuments was erected on the State House grounds in South Carolina in 1858, celebrating the Palmetto Regiment. As veterans of the Civil War saw the scale of commemorations of that war, Mexican war veterans sought remembrance for their service. In 1885, a tableau of the U.S. Army's entry into Mexico City was painted in the [[U.S. Capitol Building]] by Filippo Constaggini. The [[Marine Corps Hymn]], which includes the phrase "From the Halls of Montezuma" is an acknowledgment of the war, but there are no major monuments or memorials.

Mexico City is the site of a [[Mexico City National Cemetery|cemetery]] created in 1851, still maintained by the [[American Battle Monuments Commission]]. It holds the remains of 1,563 U.S. soldiers who mainly died in the conflict and were placed in a mass grave. Many more U.S. soldiers died in Mexico, but to transfer bodies there from shallow graves was expensive. A few of those interred died in Mexico City long after the war. The Mexico City military cemetery "signaled a transition in what the United States understood to be its obligations to its war dead," a pressing issue with the dead of the Civil War.<ref>Connors and Muñoz, "Look for the North American Invasion in Mexico City," pp. 511–12.</ref>

The [[Mormon Battalion]], the only faith-based unit in the war, raised several monuments commemorating their contributions to the war. At the time of the war, most Mormons had been forced out of the jurisdiction of the U.S. and had relocated to Utah. The Mormon leadership realized that stressing their contributions to the war and to realizing manifest destiny was a way to be included in the nation's narrative. A monument to the battalion was dedicated in 1927 on the grounds of the Utah State Capitol grounds in 1927 and one erected in Los Angeles in 1950.<ref>Van Wagenen, ''Remembering the Forgotten War'', pp. 123–24.</ref>