Gregg had previously planned to enter business with Susan Shelby Magoffin's husband Samuel, so he left his effects and collections in Saltillo and traveled to the east in 1847 to buy merchandise; upon arrival he received a message from Magoffin, who had changed his mind.Horgan, Paul, Of America East and West: Selections from the Writings of Paul Horgan, Macmillan, 1 July 1985. Quote: "He unfortunately became in love—desperately so—and what was more remarkable for a man of his intellect, with a little girl (13 years old) without any special beauty or merit—and still less talent and intelligence." Gregg traveled to Washington, D.C., where he was unimpressed after meeting President James K. Polk, and took a series of steamships down the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico, then up the Rio Grande and back to Saltillo at the end of 1847. Through the spring of 1848 he actively practiced medicine for the first time since earning his degree. He complained that his medical partner, Dr. G. M. Prevost, was disorganized and "in love" with a 13-year-old girl.
