USA > Arizona > Arizona, prehistoric, aboriginal, pioneer, modern; the nation's youngest commonwealth within a land of ancient culture, Vol. I > Part 16
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J. R. Walker
George Lount
PIONEERS OF PRESCOTT
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known as "Comanche Jim"-the two men who had previously resened Olive Oatman from the savages. We thus and finally, reached the old volcano crater nearly opposite an old renegade camp in the cordillera, known as Pinos Altos, where our expedition captured Mangas, and close to another old temporary soldier camp, dignified by the name of Fort McLean, where the soldiers killed old Mangas, our prisoner.
GOLD DIGGINGS ON THE HASSAYAMPA
Then came a season of long trips through the mountains, ever looking, unsuc- cessfully, for the golden sands. There must have been some intimation that gold really lay to the westward, for the party finally started on a rather straight course that led through Tucson and the Pima villages. "Thence across the great desert to the mouth of the Haviamp (misnamed Hassayampa) ; thence to the final haven in the woods at Prescott in June, 1863; thence back to the Pimas to leave letters with the friendly Indians, for military escorts east and west, describing the way to our camp. We went back and held those woods and camp for eleven months longer alone before they found the way. Old Henry Wiekenburg was the first white man to follow our trail across the Gila desert. But when the outside world heard of that camp the result settled a government, population and all. That camp was the foundation of Arizona's present government."
On several of the northern trips the party was joined by squads of Federal soldiery, possibly suspicious of Walker's pacific explanations. One such joint expedition consumed fully two months and covered more than 200 miles of coun- try. Another command of California volunteers eut the Walker trail and followed it to the Gila, where tents were erected and the temporary post dubbed "Fort West." From this there was prospecting all over the hills. Some of the soldiers went with Walker from Camp West on a six-weeks trip, as far northward as White River, west of the San Francisco. Soon after return, the Apaches made two daring descents upon the camp, in the second driving away seventy-eight cavalry horses. Two other joint actions. with the troops against the Indians were on the Mimbres, in southwestern New Mexico.
The return to the Pima villages was forced by keen necessity for provisions, though from the Indians could be secured little more than "pinole," which was corn or mesquite bean meal, sometimes sweetened. It had been determined that safety demanded a larger population, so letters were left at Maricopa Wells, addressed to friends east and west, telling where gold was to be found in a new and beautiful land to the northward. Little more than continued explora- tions in force could be done till, months thereafter, the letters brought a flood of gold-seekers and with them the military and then the new territorial government.
Even after the original party disbanded, Walker retained the leadership that seemed natural with him, wherever he might be placed. Sol Barth drifted into Walker Gulch from Ehrenberg, one winter day, with a burro train loaded with flour. Snow was falling fast and within a few hours the passes were practically closed. The addition of the flour supply was nothing short of providential. But Barth's vision of sudden wealth through trust methods was dispelled most rudely. for Walker proceeded to seize the flour and to divide it equitably among the miners. The packer thought himself robbed. But within a few hours and absolutely without negotiation, Walker reappeared to pay for the flour in gold dust at the rate of $25 per 100 pounds. This allowed Barth no very large profit,
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for he was receiving about that time 20 cents a pound for freighting barley into Whipple from San Bernardino, Cal.
Walker was a native of Tennessee. He came to the far west in 1833, as a member of the Bonneville trapping party, making his way to California by the Yellowstone route. He guided an emigrant party to California by the southern route in 1843 and in 1845 started as guide for the Frémont expedition through Walker Pass. Though noted by Frémont as having "more knowledge of these parts than any man I know," Walker in his later years was bitter in denouncing the claims of the Pathfinder, who, he said, had only followed in the paths the old trapper had made. There is a tale that Walker planned to capture Fort Whipple soon after the establishment of the post and that he secured promises of assist- ance from many southern men in the locality, to the end that Arizona be landed iu the Confederacy. It is told there even had been made a division of the offices when it was found someone had betrayed the plot to the post commandant, who had redoubled vigilance. About 1867 Walker joined relatives in Contra Costa County, Cal., there dying in 1876, aged 78.
PEEPLES' STORY OF THE WEAVER PARTY
Contemporaneous with the Walker expedition was that of Pauline Weaver, that gained fame in the discovery and working of the wonderful Antelope Hill placers. The Editor is fortunate in being able to present the story of one of the principal members of this party, secured in a personal interview in 1890, a short time before the narrator's death.
Among those who followed the "Pathfinder" in '49 was A. H. Peeples, a native of North Carolina, and a veteran of the Mexican war. He engaged in mining on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevadas, until in the spring of 1863 he found himself washing very poor gravel on Kern River. Dissatisfied, a craving for adventure overcame him and, inducing two partners, Joe Green and Matt Webber, to accompany him, started southward with the deliberate intention of prospecting in Apache Land. Arrived at Fort Yuma, and being more fully informed of the difficulties of their undertaking, the adventurers cast about for companions. The first and most important acquisition was Pauline Weaver. Weaver was at that time a man well advanced in years. He had spent a long time in southern Arizona, since 1832, following for the most part the occupation of a trapper. He was held in much esteem by both the Colorado River Indians and by the Pimas and Maricopas and was able to converse fluently in several Indian tongues. According to Peeples :
We were delighted to gain Weaver for one of our party, though he had never dared to visit Central Arizona. where we proposed going, he was so familiar with the ways of the country that we knew we had struck just the right man for our purpose. He very rarely came to the settlements, but just then he was completing a treaty of peace between the Pimas and Maricopas and the Mojaves, being implicitly trusted as an arbitrator of the differences between the two parties. He was anxious to go, but we had difficulty in making up any considerable force. Finally we induced to accompany us an educated German, named Henry Wickenburg, a stout negro, called "Ben," a young Mexican, and three Americans, whose names I cannot call to mind. I had a complete diary of the trip, but it was burned up about ten years ago. I know one thing, however, and that is, including the Mexican and the negro, it was a fine lot of men, ready and fully equipped to meet any danger.
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CHARLES D. POSTON
A. F. BANTA, 1863
SOL BARTH Pioneer American Freighter
D. E. CONNOR Historian of Walker Expedition
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The party started from Fort Yuma about April 1, 1863, and traveled north- ward along the Colorado River until was struck Bill Williams' Fork. Eastward they traveled along its course about fifty miles, prospecting as they went. They had left the stream but a few days when they camped on the slope of a mountain, located about eighty-five miles northwest of where the city of Phoenix now stands. Here, in Peeples' own language,
I killed three antelope and we gave the peak the name it now bears of Antelope Moun- tain. I jerked the meat and while it was drying a few of us went prospecting in the near neighborhood. As luck would have it, we struck it rich in the creek bed the very first day. It does seem odd that we had made as straight a course as could be run to the very richest placers that ever have been discovered in Arizona. Curiously enough, though, the best ground was right on the top of the mountain. Of course there was no water there, so we sorted over the ground for the coarser pieces of gold and packed the finer dirt down to the creek to wash in California style. To show how rich that ground was, I remember one day that only three of us were at work, by just scratching around in the gravel with our butcher knives, we obtained over $1,800 worth of nuggets before evening. We didn't do that well every day, of course, but the amount that was taken out was something immense.
It wasn't long before supplies began to run short and it was determined to go to Maricopa Wells for more. Another thing to be noted was that the Apaches were getting rather numerous and it was felt that it was hardly safe with their small force of ten to hold down the diggings alone. Weaver, who had been elected captain, knew the general direction of the Wells, but the intermediate country was a blank to all. Following down the Hassayampa Canon, they left the stream below the site of Seymour and struck across the sixty-mile desert in the night, passing to the left of the White Tank mountains and coming to Salt River near its junction with the Gila. Pimas were seen, and the miners were soon at the Wells. This was a station on the Butterfield route, only about twelve miles north- west of the present Maricopa. Here were found a number of men, among them the famous Jack Swilling, only too anxious to return with the placeros. Word was spread along the stage line of the discovery and before long "Weaver Dis- trict," as it began to be called, was well filled with miners, who gave defiance to the Indians and found much profit in washing the sands of the Hassayampa and its tributaries.
Pauline Weaver, despite his alliance with the Indians, was shot by Apaches in 1865 on the Copper Basin trail, possibly by mistake. Two years before he is said to have saved his life under similar circumstances by simulating insanity. He died at Verde, about 1866, a scout attached to the post, which then was at the mouth of Beaver Creek. Refusing to go to the hospital or into a house, the soldiers erected over him a tent, under which he passed away, old in years and worn with hardship.
When Rich Hill was found, from Ehrenberg Sol Barth was sent to the strike with Aaron Barnett, the two establishing a store for Michael Goldwater at the new town of Weaverville. Weaver and all his crew would come in once a week to weigh up their gold dust on the scales of Barnett & Barth's store and to pur- chase supplies, in which a very large item always was whiskey. Gold dust was the common commodity, and the output of each of the different fields was readily distinguished by reason of different colors. That from Lynx Creek was the best and purest. The Weaver party usually brought in about twenty-five pounds of
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gold a week. This was generally coarse, most of it dug out by butcher knives. On the proceeds the miners would spend a day or so each week in the wildest dissipation afforded by the rough tent village, which stood not far from the present settlment of Stanton. One nugget brought in by a Mexican named Clemente was valued at $900.
CHAPTER VIII AMERICAN SURVEYS
Work of the Boundary Commission-Sitgreaves, Aubrey and Whipple on the Thirty- fifth Parallel-Beale's Wagon Road-Experiences with Camels-Surveys along the Gila.
Possibly the largest work ever printed on the Southwest was the Report of the Boundary Commission, issued in 1857. Quite correctly it has generally been called the Emory report, for the whole work is dominated by the personality of Maj. Wm. H. Emory, who carried the survey through to completion. It is evident from his writings that Major Emory was a man of fullest appreciation of his own high character and abilities and likewise that he was an officer of rare courage that did not stickle even at sharp criticism of his superiors in rank. He was fortunate in the character of men of scientific acquirements detailed to his expedi- tion, for the chronicle of their journeyings and researches across the then almost untrodden southwestern wastes checks out closely with the more general knowl- edge of these later days.
On account of his acquaintance with the country, through service in the Mexican War, with Kearny's column, Major Emory was made astronomer and escort commander and, later, Commissioner of the Boundary Commission.
San Diego was reached by Emory's party via Panama, June 1, 1849, but the Mexican commissioners, headed by General Conde, with their escort of 150 troops, failed to show up before July 1. One of the Mexican officers was Lieut. Porfirio Diaz, later President of Mexico. On the 9th of the same month astronomical work was started on the line eastward. In September word was received that Com- missioner Weller had been removed and that John C. Frémont had been appointed in his stead. But Frémont never joined the expedition and later declined appointment, for he had been chosen Senator from California, with Wmn. M. Gwin. Thereafter to the office successively were appointed John R. Bartlett and Robert H. Campbell, the field work of the first survey being com- pleted under the latter in December, 1853. There appeared to have been trouble all through the intervening period, due mainly to lack of funds, but the surveying parties were disorganized by the departure of members for the gold fields, and the Commissioners appear to have viewed their work largely in the line of a pleasant trip of western exploration that led them as far afield as the California geysers. Emory had to make a couple of trips back to Washington to hustle funds for the payment of dishonored drafts he had drawn for necessary expenses and became so disgusted that on one occasion his resignation was offered, and accepted, but he was ordered back almost immediately.
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One determination reached by Major Emory, following an inquiry of Con- gress in the matter, was that he decided, "Beyond all question, a practicable and, indeed, a highly advantageous railroad route from the upper basin of the Rio Bravo (Rio Grande Bravo) to the valley of the Gila exists through the new terri- tory. At no point on the line of survey high elevations exceed 4,000 feet." .
This determination was reached, however, after the acquirement by the United States of the territory south of the Gila, for, in another place, Emory recites: "The Treaty of Guadalupe, therefore, fixes the line north of the parallel 32 deg., which cut off entirely the communication by wagons between the two rivers, leaving out of view the consideration involved in securing a railway route to the Pacific. It was a line which, sooner or later, must have been abandoned. No traveler could pass nor could a dispatch be sent from a military post on the Rio Bravo to one on the Gila, without passing through Mexican territory. . . I am now of the opinion that the Mexican commissioner was impressed with the importance of the advantage to his government of making a boundary which would not only exclude the railway route, but which would cut off the communi- cation between our military posts in New Mexico and those we might establish on the Gila. Any other attempt to construe the words of the treaty so as to embrace the railway and wagon route would have been abortive."
Very justły, high praise was given to the character of the semi-civilized Indians along the Gila, the Pimas and Coco-Maricopas, who were considered as forming a most efficient barrier for the people of Sonora against the incursions of the savages who inhabited the mountains to the north of the Gila and who sometimes extended their incursions as far south as Hermosillo. While the expe- dition was at Los Nogales, Major Emory was visited by a number of chiefs and headmen, some of whom had come 200 miles to consult as to the effect upon them and their interests of the treaty with Mexico, by which they were transferred to the jurisdiction of the United States. Major Emory recites: "They have undoubtedly a just claim to the land, and if dispossessed will make a war on the frontier of a very serious character. I hope the subject will soon attract the attention of Congress, as it has done that of the Executive, and that some legis- lation will be effected, securing these people in their rights. They have always been kind and hospitable to emigrants passing from the old United States to California, supplying them freely and at moderate prices with wheat, corn, melons and cotton blankets of their own manufacture.
The date of the conference at Los Nogales was June 26, 1855, and the Indians participating, each known as "Captain," were Antonio Azul, head chief of the Pimas; Francisco Luke and Malai, Coco-Maricopa chiefs; Ojo de Burro, Pima war chief; Shalan, Tabaquero and Boca de Queja, Gila Pima chiefs; José Vic- toriano Lucas, José Antonio, San Xavier Papago chiefs. These in reality were Spanish nicknames. The Indians were informed that all the rights they pos- sessed under Mexico had been guaranteed them by the United States and that, in the course of five or ten months, perhaps sooner, the authorities of the United States would come into the ceded territory and relieve the Mexican authorities; until that time they must obey the Mexican authorities and co-operate with them, as they had done theretofore, in defending the territory against the savage Apaches. All good American citizens were called upon to respect the authority of Azul and his chiefs.
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EMORY NAMED AS COMMISSIONER
August 15, 1854, Major Emory at last had things placed in his own hands, very much to his own satisfaction, as expressed in his personal narratives, and prob- ably very much for the benefit of the service. He was named as Commissioner and given the largest latitude in the new task of establishing the amended bound- ary line under the terms of the Gadsden purchase of December, 1853, which affected only the region south of the Gila River and west of a point where the easternmost tributary of the Gila intersected the southern boundary line of New Mexico.
The first memorandum of his work, under this new survey, was made at Paso del Norte, December 4, 1854. In conjunction with the Mexican Commissioner, José Salazar Larragui, an initial point was established where the parallel of 31 deg. 47 min. north latitude cuts the Rio Grande. Throughout there appears to have been nothing but courtesy and good-will between the American and Mexican sections of the international party, the Mexicans, who seem to have been rather poorly equipped with instruments, accepting the computations and surveys of the Emory parties.
The service of running that part of the boundary liue eastward from the Colorado River, from a point twenty English miles south of the river's junction with the Gila, was entrusted to Lieut. N. Michler, Corps of Topographical Engi- neers. He made his observation camp, December 9, 1854, at Fort Yuma.
Before the party had completed its initial work, in April the spring rise of the Colorado started, and from 1,500 feet the river widened to at least five miles, but the work, which had been started by swimming broad sloughs, thereafter was dry enough, as the line was stretched out over the desert to the eastward. The first water was forty-five miles distant, at the famous Tinajas Altas, in natural wells within a mountain gully, filled during the rainy season. Michler wrote : "There are eight of these Tinajas, one above the other, the highest two extremely difficult to reach. As the water is used from the lower one, you ascend to the next higher, passing it down hy means of buckets. It is dangerous to attempt the highest, as it requires a skillful climber to ascend the mountain, which is of gran- ite origin, the rocks smooth and slippery."
Within the country acquired under the Gadsden treaty, Major Emory refers in his work to the San Pedro and Santa Cruz rivers and to a small rivulet lying to the east of both, varionsly called the Suanca, San Domingo or Rio Sauz, the San Simon of to-day, to the rich lands that lie in the valley of Tucson, and to the beautiful valleys along the San Pedro, with casual reference to "the remains of large settlements, which have been destroyed by the hostile Indians, the most conspicuous of which are the mining town of San Pedro and the town of Santa Cruz Viejo; there are also to be found herein the remains of spacious corrals and in the numerous wild cattle and horses, which still are seen in this country, the evidences of its immense capacity as a grazing country." The San Bernardino ranch is said to have had 100,000 head of cattle and horses, which were killed or run off by the Indians, and the spacious buildings of adobe had been washed nearly level with the earth at the time of the passage of the expedition. Every- where were seen the remains of mining operations, conducted by the Spaniards. and more recently by the Mexicans.
A number of Californians, who had taken to themselves the name of the Arizona
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Mining Company, were working a mine in the Sierra del Ajo, west of Tucson. It is notable that these were about the only Americans. On the Santa Cruz River, a few miles north of the boundary, were found the remains of a mill for crushing gold quartz, and tales were heard of the picking up of silver nuggets in mining fields below Tucson.
Settlement appears to have been at its lowest ebb; the largest was in the Mesilla Valley of New Mexico proper, containing about 1,500 inhabitants of mixed Spanish and Indian races. Tucson was inhabited by two Mexican troops and their families, about seventy persons, together with some tame Apache Indians, who did most of the labor in the field. Nothing but civility was received from Captain Garcia, who commanded the place. Lieutenant Michler found Tubac deserted : "Wild Apaches lord it over this region and the timid husbandman dare not return to his home. The mission of Tumacacori, another fine structure of the mother church, stands in the midst of rich fields, but fear prevents its habitation, save by two or three Germans, who have wandered from their distant fatherland to this out-of-the-way country."
From Los Nogales the work was completed westward to a junction with the line extended from Yuma. The town of Sonoita was passed, called the door of the State of Sonora, a resort for smugglers and a den for a number of low, abandoned Americans, who had been compelled to fly from justice, "a miserable, poverty-stricken place, it contrasts strangely with the comparative comfort of an Indian village of Papagos within sight."
THE ITINERANT COMMISSIONER BARTLETT
Commissioner Bartlett's connection with the Survey was of value to posterity chiefly in the publication, in 1854, of two volumes of memoirs. During the greater part of his official life in the West he appears to have been exploring rather than surveying, his journeys leading to the hot springs of Calistoga, north of San Francisco, and into Mexico, through Chihuahua and Sonora, as far south as Mazatlan. These absences met with rather severe comment from his associates, however entertaining and instructing thereafter were found his descriptions of the new southwestern lands. It was charged that much of the limited appropria- tion for the Survey went to the equipment of the Commissioner's personal entour- age, and Surveyor A. B. Gray, who made his own report in 1853, referred to the employment by Bartlett of forty assistants and about 100 servitors, including artisans of all sorts, most of whom were found useless and later had to be sent back.
Bartlett's principal headquarters in the field were at the Santa Rita copper mines, where, in July, 1851, Gray made formal protest against the Commissioner's acceptance of the line west of El Paso of 32 deg. 22 min., the Surveyor demand- ing a change to 31 deg. 52 min. Though Gray was recalled November 4 and his work transferred to Emory, he practically triumphed in the end, for in the following August, after investigation, the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations reported that Bartlett had departed from the treaty understanding. So the line was established as at present known, 31 deg. 54 min. 40 sec. of north latitude.
The controversy was one of complication and affected the present Arizona to the extent that the eastern end of Cochise County would have been in Mexico had Gray's contention failed.
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TINAJAS ALTAS (HIGH TANKS) WHERE YOU CLIMB FOR WATER
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In the fall of 1851 Commissioner Bartlett, sent a party under Whipple and Gray to survey the Gila, which theretofore had only been more or less roughly marked by Emory while marching with the Kearny column in 1846. Emory had not platted the big bend of the river north of the Sierra Estrella, for his expedi- tion had marched far to the south of it, but this omission caused slighting refer- ence to him in Bartlett's report. Whipple stated his opinion that down the Gila Valley should be built either a railroad or a canal.
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