Today in Manhunting History -- May 14, 1916: Patton versus Pancho Villa (sort of)

Although by May the trail Pancho Villa's trail had gone cold, Pershing's Punitive Expedition enjoyed some success in hunting Villa’s subordinates.  On May 14, Pershing placed an aide in command of an expedition to buy corn from nearby haciendas.  Lieutenant George S. Patton, 30, was a tall, thin, reedy-voiced officer already renowned as one of the Army’s best athletes and pistol shots.  When he learned in March that his regiment would not go to Mexico, Patton literally begged Pershing to take him along, offering to perform any job, no matter how menial.  As Patton recalled the encounter, Pershing replied: Everyone wants to go. Why should I favor you?"

"Because I want to go more than anyone else," Patton said.

"That will do," Pershing said, dismissing the supplicant.

Undeterred, Patton went home and packed his gear.  At 5AM the next morning his phone rang, and when he answered it heard Pershing's voice on the other end.  "Lieutenant Patton," the General asked, "how long will it take you to get ready?"

Patton replied that he was already packed, to which Pershing exclaimed "I'll be G-d damned.  You are appointed aide."

(Of course, Patton neglected to mention that the recently widowed Pershing was seeing Patton's sister Nina socially at the time . . .)

Lieutenant George S. Patton during the 1916 Punitive Expedition

While purchasing feed in Rubio, Patton noticed a group of 50 or 60 unarmed Mexicans.  One of the guides, an ex-Villista named E.L. Holmdahl recognized “a number of old friends” among them.  Although Villa was still in hiding somewhere south of Parral, the commander of his Dorados (Villa's elite bodyguard), General Julio Cardenas, was believed to be in hiding in the vicinity of Rubio.  Patton and his party – a corporal, six privates, Holmdahl and another civilian interpreter – drove to Las Ciengas, where Patton interrogated Cardenas’ uncle.  The uncle’s nervousness aroused Patton’s suspicions, and on a hunch, he ordered his convoy to drive six miles to San Miguelito Ranch, where Cardenas’ family was rumored to be residing.

As Patton’s car sped toward the house, he saw three old men and a boy skinning a cow in the front yard east of the house.  One of the men ran into the house, but quickly returned and resumed his work.  Patton’s car halted at the house’s northwest corner, and the other two cars took up positions at the southwest.  Pershing jumped out and, carrying a rifle and pistol, raced along the ranch’s northern edge.  Two soldiers made a similar dash along the southern wall while the privates covered the windows in case any Mexicans jumped out.  Patton reached the eastern side first and moved toward the gate.  When he was 15 yards from the large arched door, three armed men on horseback burst out from the house.  Seeing Patton standing with his pistol drawn, they dashed toward the southeast corner until they saw the soldiers coming from the south.  The Mexicans turned and rode straight at Patton.  “All three shot at me,” Patton recalled, “one bullet threw gravel at me.  I fired back . . . five times” from a range of 20 yards.  Two of Patton’s shots hit their targets, one entering a horse’s belly, the other breaking the rider’s right arm. 

Patton’s soldiers began firing from the southeast corner, putting him in the line of fire.  Patton ducked behind the corner and reloaded as three bullets hit a foot above his head and covered him in adobe dust.  Consequently, he did not see the man he had shot turn back into the house’s courtyard.

When Patton came around the corner again he was nearly stampeded by a horseman.  Patton fired and broke the horse’s hip, bringing it crashing down on the rider.  When the Mexican disentangled himself and rose to fire, Patton and several other Americans cut him down at a range of about 10 yards.  The third rider had made it 100 yards east of the hacienda before the soldiers fired at him.  He pitched forward dead in the sand near a stone wall.

Two of the three Mexicans were now dead.  The first man, who had reentered the inner patio and climbed out a window, was spotted running from a gate in the southwest corner toward the nearby fields when a fusillade brought him down.  When Holmdahl approached him, the man “held up his left hand in surrender, but when H[olmdahl] was 20 feet from him he raised his pistol and shot at H[olmdahl] but fortunately missed him and H[olmdahl] blew out his brains."

A search of the hacienda turned up no further Villistas, only Cardenas’ family.  Nobody would identify the bodies, however, so the corpses were strapped across the hoods of the three automobiles like hunting trophies.  As they prepared to leave, Patton saw some 40 men on horseback racing toward the hacienda, likely intending to rescue Cardenas.  Outnumbered, the Americans retreated toward Rubio, where the first man Patton had shot was identified as Cardenas.

Pershing allowed Patton to keep Cardenas’ saddle and saber as trophies, began referring to him as “the Bandit,” and promoted him to First Lieutenant.  The Rubio exploit quickly appeared in the U.S. press, and newspaper readers were thrilled to have an attractive, young hero with whom they could associate the Punitive Expedition.  Meanwhile, in Mexico, the Americans buried the rapidly decomposing Mexicans.  Against the backdrop of a blood-red sunset, a veteran sergeant offered an impromptu eulogy: “Ashes to ashes, and dust to dust/ If Villa won’t bury you, Uncle Sam must.”