The Death of a Soldier in Sonata

Walker's army was in full collapse at this point. He left in Sonata with 140 men, but he had less than 100 left by the time he got to San Vicente. Walker grew furious with the constant desertions and on February 28th, some of his men caught a group of volunteers planning to desert before they could actually get away. Two were sentenced to lashing and two were executed immediately. The fifth was pardoned because he was a good cattle driver and they needed no one knew how to do anything. So observing his men murdering their comrades, William Walker wrote that this was quote, a good test of military discipline since killing your fellow soldiers was the hardest thing a soldier could