USA > Arizona > History of Arizona, Vol. V > Part 11
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" 'In the summer of 1867 Charles Baker re- turned to Colorado and camped for a short time on Chalk Creek. With several other men he started south from there and wandered through the mountains prospecting. Their number dwindled down until only Baker, a man named White, and another, whose name is forgotten, remained together.'
"The particulars of the futile prospecting trip through the San Juan, the journey to the mouth of the Grand River, the murder of Baker, and White's voyage down the river are then re- counted, after which recital the News writer adds :
" 'In May last White was in Lake City, and it is believed that he is now in the southern part of the State. He is about 35 years of age, a plain, matter-of-fact, practical, adventurous man. There is not a shadow of doubt about his wonderful adventures and his marvellous es- cape through the Canyon of the Colorado.'
"The writer does not say in explicit words that Kellogg and Mrs. Pollock met Baker while engaged in his new prospecting enterprise, but he gives the impression that they were relating facts of which they were personally cognizant. As a matter of fact, however, Baker's presence
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in that region would have been the subject of common knowledge, as he was known as few other men there because of his identification with the history of the country; so that there can be no doubt that Mr. Kellogg and Mrs. Pol- lock knew just what they were talking about. Hence their testimony goes far toward corrobo- rating White's story of the party's visit to the San Juan prior to the adventure on the Rio Colorado. Incidentally, it is worth while to point out that this publication was made eight years after Powell's voyage. More significant still is the fact that it appeared in the Rocky Mountain News, whose editor was a close per- sonal friend of Maj. Powell's."
The testimony seems abundant that White did pass the winter in the San Juan country in a futile prospecting tour. Among those who vouch for the correctness of this story is T. J. Ehrhart, Commissioner of State Highways of Colorado, and among those who vouch for the character of Mr. White, who seems to have raised a family and to have always pursued a quiet life, not realizing at any time that he had done anything extraordinary in passing through the Grand Canyon, is Hon. D. L. Taylor, Mayor of the City of Trinidad, who has known White ever since he located in Trinidad; the Hon. S. W. De Busk, State Senator from the Trini- dad District ; the Hon. Julius Gunter, Governor of Colorado, and Eli Jeffryes, Cashier of the First National Bank of Trinidad, besides a number of others. Mr. Jeffryes said :
"I have known Mr. James White, of this city, for the past thirty-three years. In all that
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time I have known him to be a man of first-class reputation. He is the father of a very splen- did family of children, all of whom are a credit to the community. We consider him entirely honest, and he is of good credit locally."
George Wharton James in his work, "In and Around the Grand Canyon," says that White subsequently worked for Major Powell. White declares that at no time was he in the employ of the Major, nor did he know him, and that he had never seen the man. In a letter dated "Trinidad, Colo., April 20, 1917," to Mr. Daw- son, Mr. White says:
"I have come into knowledge of the fact that a charge has been made that I did not reach the Colorado river above the San Juan, but below it. You will notice from the account that I sent you of my trip that when our party started on our prospecting trip we were headed for the Grand River, as Baker said there was gold in that part of the country; but Baker was killed before reaching the Grand River in a canyon between the San Juan and the Grand. I knew nothing of the country, but Baker did, and he kept a memorandum; but we did not think of it after the Indians attacked us, as we had to make our escape as quickly as possible. Mr. Baker also carried a compass and kept us informed as to the directions we were travelling, and he told us that we were going north to the Grand River; that the Grand River and the Green River formed the Colorado River.
"Baker was killed after we crossed the San Juan River in a canyon between the San Juan and the Grand, being north of the San Juan.
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We camped in the canyon that night, and the next morning we had to go out the way we went in, and that is where the Indians attacked us and Baker was killed.
"George Strole and I went down the canyon, travelling all that day, reaching the Colorado River just below where the Grand River and the Green River meet, forming the Colorado River, and there we made our raft and began our descent down the Colorado.
"We did not travel down any small stream before reaching the Colorado River.
"Mr. Baker was a man who had prospected a good deal in the San Juan country, and surely he knew where he was going and in which direc- tion he was going.
"I guess the story will be attacked when printed, but I am willing to talk to anyone and convince them that I entered the Colorado River above the San Juan and not below it.
"I do not like to bother you so much, but I thought it best to let you know of this charge and to try and explain fully to you why I know that we entered the Colorado north of the San Juan river.
"Thanking you for your kindness, and hop- ing that some day I will have the pleasure of meeting you, I am,
"Very truly yours, "JAMES WHITE."
In view of this later evidence, as printed in a Senate Document, there seems to be no room to doubt that White actually made the journey, and that he was the first man to traverse the Colorado. Dellenbaugh has contributed sev-
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eral volumes, devoted to Major Powell's explo- rations of that gorge, which, of course, form a great addition to the history of the Grand Can- yon of the Colorado, but it should be remem- bered that Dellenbaugh was a partial biog- rapher, and his declaration that it would be impossible for any man to pass through the Colorado on a raft should be taken with many grains of allowance, because he was anxious, apparently, not only to give Major Powell due credit as being the first to explore the Grand Canyon, but also to rob White of the credit of being the first, by a force of circumstances, to pass through it, and it is not surprising that others have taken Dellenbaugh's statements that the entire story was a "base fabrication," and so proclaimed it to the world. The effects of such statements, once given currency, are hard to eliminate. It is like the story first printed by Bancroft that Jeff Davis introduced a bill into Congress to organize the Territory of Arizona, when, as a matter of fact, Jeff Davis never did anything of the kind, yet, to-day, it is circulated and believed by a great many of the people who have not the time and the patience to hunt up the record.
JOHN WESLEY POWELL.
Explorer of the Canyons of the Colorado, Founder, and, till his death, Director of the Bureau of American Ethnology, and long Director of the U. S. Geological Survey. As he looked during the decade following his two descents of the Colorado. Taken about 1876, in Washington. Major Powell died September 23d, 1902.
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CHAPTER VIII.
EXPLORATIONS AND SURVEYS (Continued).
MAJOR POWELL'S FIRST EXPLORATION OF THE
GRAND CANYON-CATARACT CANYON-DE- SCRIPTION OF WALLS OF CANYON-THREE OF PARTY LEAVE AND GO OVERLAND-END OF FIRST EXPLORATION - MORMONS-APPROXI- MATE DISTANCE BY RIVER-MAJOR POWELL'S SECOND EXPLORATION OF THE GRAND CAN- YON - WHITE'S STORY BRANDED FABRICA- TION BY DELLENBAUGH.
Two years later, in 1869, Major Powell organ- ized his first expedition for the exploration of the Canyon, a short sketch of which he gave to the press in 1869, as follows :
"For two or three years I have been engaged in making some geographical studies in the mountains to the east and north of the Colorado Basin, and while pursuing them the thought grew into my mind that the canyons of this region would be a book of revelations in the rock-leaved Bible of geology. The thought fructified, and I determined to read the book; so I sought for all the available information with regard to the canyon land. I talked with Indians and hunters; I went among the Mor- mons to learn what they knew of this country adjacent to the 'Kingdom of God,' the home of the 'Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints'; I read the reports of the United States' Surveys, and I explored canyons of the tribu- tary streams that I thought would represent
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somewhat the nature of the Grand Canyon, on account of similar geological and physical fea- tures. From the fabulous stories, the facts, and the reports, and from the knowledge of other canyons, I came to the belief that the 'Grand Canyon of the Colorado' could be ex- plored by descending the river in small boats. I also arrived at the conclusion that what was known as the 'Grand Canyon' was in fact a series of canyons, forming the banks or walls of the Upper Colorado and the lower portions of the Green and Grand, that unite to form it. These two streams unite in canyons, and some persons held that the vaguely defined 'Grand Canyon' was continued up the Green, and others that it was continued up the Grand, while others still asserted that these streams united in a val- ley. One man assured me that he, with several others, had laid out a city at the junction, but was driven away by Indians.
"Having made up my mind to explore the gorge, I came from the mountains to Chicago last spring, to procure outfit and build boats. Four of these were made on a model devised for the purpose of navigating canyon streams; and taking them out to Green River Station, where the Union Pacific Railroad crosses the Green, I was ready to embark. There I had a party of nine men awaiting my arrival, and anxious to enter the 'Great Unknown' with me-men all experienced in the wild life of the country, and most of them in boating on dangerous streams.
"On the 24th of May we started. For a few days our way was through a river of low canyons and small green valleys, until we reached the
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Uintah Mountains. Through this range the river has cut a winding channel, forming the Uintah system of canyons. Near the lower end of this series Yampa river enters the Green by a canyon. Further down, in a valley portion the Uintah and White rivers come in. About thirty miles below this point we enter another series of canyons. Low walls of grey, buff, and rust colored sandstone shut us in. These walls slowly increase in height as we advance ; the grey rocks are lost; dark red sandstone appears; the walls are broken down by lateral canyons, increasing in number until we are in the heart of the Canyon of Desolation. Sometimes these lateral canyons are so crowded, that the rock between them stands as a narrow wall hundreds of feet high, the end being, of course, towards the main canyon.
"Some lateral canyons have their own lateral canyons, then a fourth series, cutting the wall into sections, whose towering summits, though large enough to support cathedrals, seem scarcely to furnish footing for man. Two thou- sand feet-three thousand feet overhead is the summit of the walls, while rocks and crags, and peaks rise higher, and still higher away back from the river, until they reach an altitude of nearly five thousand feet. These rusty, grey, and dark red sandstones have no beauty of colour. A few greenish brown cedars are seen, looking not like shoots of evergreen spray, but like clumps of knotty war clubs bedecked with spines. These, with a little sage, constitute all the verdure. We next ran through Coal Can- yon, and passed the mouth of Little White
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River; then came a valley region, where we passed the mouth of the San Rafael, and soon entered Stillwater Canyon. The river winds through this with a quiet current, as if in no haste to leave this beautiful canyon, carved out of orange sandstone. All along its walls domed alcoves and amphitheatres have been cut out of the solid rock; grottoes and caves abound, nar- row lateral canyons, channels of rivulets, born of a shower, and born again of a shower, are cut as clefts in the rocks; and at every curve on the inner side is a spot of willow bordered meadow. Then the walls grow higher, the river swifter, and we glide down to the junction of the Green and Grand. Here the walls are nearly 1,300 feet high. But away back from the river are lateral canyons, and canyon val- leys, the floors of which are at about the same altitude as the immediate walls of the main canyon, and the walls of this upper set are hun- dreds of feet higher, and still further back again the country is cut into a labyrinth of canyons. The main walls at the junction are not vertical, but have the slope of broken rocks tumbled down, while the lateral canyons have mostly vertical walls with a sloping talus at the base. "We remained at the junction several days, and then rowed out into Cataract Canyon. Soon we heard the roar of waters, and came upon a succession of rocky rapids and cataracts. Over some of these we were compelled to make portage; usually only the cargoes were carried over the rocks and the boats were let down with lines; but now and then boats and all had to be carried. When these cataracts and rapids were
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unobstructed by rocks, or where there was any passage, we were able to run them, never finding any fall greater than nineteen feet in this can- yon. Sometimes the waves below would roll over a boat and fill the open part; but they could not sink it, as each was decked fore and aft, and so had a watertight compartment at either end. Now and then a boat would roll over; but, clinging to its sides until they could right it, the men would swim to shore, towing it with them. We found much difficulty in the whirlpools below; for at times it was almost impossible to get out of them. They would carry us back under the falls, they would dash us against the rocks, or they would send us whirling down the river. For twelve days we toiled through this canyon, stopping once to measure the altitude of its walls near its highest point, and finding it nearly 2,500 feet. This was at the axis of a vast fold in the strata, and from that point the upper rocks slowly came down with a gentle dip to the southwest until we reached the foot of the canyon, 45 miles from its head. A rocky valley canyon was found here on the left, and the river made a bend around a sharp point on the right, which point was set with ten thousand crags and rocks. We called it Mille-crag Bend, and sweeping around this in a rapid current, our boats shot into Narrow Canyon, down which we glided almost at railroad speed, the walls rising verti- cally from the water 1,300 feet at its head, and coming down to high-water mark at the foot, 7 miles below, where the Dirty Devil, a river of mud, enters from the right. Now we had come
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again to the red and orange sandstone, and the walls were of beautiful bright rock, low at first, but as we cut down through the strata, rising higher and higher. Now and then, on this and that side, the rocks were vertical from the water's edge; but usually they were cut into mounds and cones and hills of solid sandstone, rising one above the other as they stretched back in a gentle slope for miles. These mounds have been cut out by the showers from the bright orange rock, and glitter in resplendent beauty under the midday sun. Hour after hour have we gazed entranced on them, as they faded in the perspective and retreated to the rear; for the river was gentle, though swift, and we had but to steer our boats, and on we went through this land of beauty and glory.
"On the 31st of July we reached the mouth of the San Juan, at the foot of Mound Canyon, and went into camp for a day or two's rest. Then we started again. We had now run once more into dark red and chocolate coloured sand- stones, with slate coloured beds below; these usually formed vertical walls, occasionally ter- raced or broken down, and from the crest of these the orange mounds sloped back, bearing on the top of each mound some variegated monument, now vertical, now terraced, now carved by time into grotesque shapes, such as towers, pinnacles, etc. These monuments stood alone or in groups, and spread over the land- scape as far as the eye could reach. The little valley of the Paria River terminates this can- yon, making it about 100 miles long. We named it Monument Canyon.
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"By this time the river had cut through the sandstones and reached the limestones below them at this point, and as we advanced the chan- nel was cut into this new strata. We entered between walls, low but vertical, which gradually increased in altitude to the foot, where they were 2,900 feet high, terraced and broken down into crags above. Halfway down the canyon we found the lower strata appearing as marble ; the marbles were white, grey, and slate coloured, then pink, purple and brown; other strata ap- peared which were variegated with these colours intermixed, until at last we had 400 feet of marble wall, mostly variegated, from the water's edge. They were fretted by the water, em- bossed with strange devices, and polished into beauty. Where there were patches of marble floor left bare, large shallow water basins ap- peared, hollowed out by the whirlpools of the flood season, and filled with clear, sparkling water-a beautiful contrast to the red muddy river. Springs gushed from these limestone strata, forming fountains which plunged into marble fonts, and formed a strange contrast, after every shower, to the cascades of red mud which poured over the walls from the red sand- stone above, with a fall of hundreds of feet. We called this Marble Canyon; it terminated at the mouth of the Little Colorado (Colorado Chiquito), and was about 36 miles long.
"Here a short rest, and then we pulled out on the home stretch-not a very short one either- nearly 300 miles by river to the mouth of the Virgen. The lower members of this carboni- ferous formation are of dark rust coloured sand-
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stones, sometimes almost black. We soon ran through these, and through silurian red sand- stone, and about 15 miles below the mouth of the Little Colorado, struck the granite.
"From the mouth of that stream to the mouth of the Virgen, our objective point, the general course of the river is to the west; but it makes three great curves to the south and three cor- responding curves to the north. At the ex- tremity of the southern curves the walls are granite at the base, reaching to an altitude of 800 feet. This usually rises from the water in almost vertical cliffs, set above with ragged crags, then a sloping terrace 100 to 500 yards wide, then walls of sandstone and marble tower- ing 200 or 300 feet towards the heavens. In the northern bends the marble comes down to the water's edge. In the southern bends the river runs raging through a narrow gorge filled with rapids and cataracts, often falling at a plunge from 5 to 20 feet-the greatest being 22 feet. Over these we usually had to run, as the granite walls rarely gave foothold, though some port- ages were made. The roar of a cataract could always be heard for half a mile or more, so that we never came upon them unapprised of danger.
"In the last great bend to the south we came upon a series of cataracts and rapids crowded together into a distance of three-fourths of a mile; a stream came down through a narrow canyon on either side, and above their mouths we found a foothold to land, so we stopped to examine. On the river there seemed to be great danger, and no portage could be had. We arrived in the morning, and the day was spent
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in exploring and trying to decide some method of getting over the difficulty. I found that we could climb to the summit of the granite, 800 feet high, and passing along the terrace could descend to a point below; but it would require ten days to get our boats and cargoes over, and we had scant five days' rations. When I re- turned to camp at night I announced to the men that we must attempt to run it. After supper one of them came to me and asked if I was will- ing that he and two others should leave the river and walk out over the mountains; they thought that they could climb out of the canyon, up the channel of the right hand creek. Of course, I objected, but they were determined to go. An hour's talk failed to shake their resolutions; so I sat up all night, made observations for the latitude and longitude of that point, and then walked up and down a little sand beach until morning.
"On the morrow the men were still deter- mined to go, and I hastily fitted out the little party with guns, ammunition, and a small store of rations. In the meantime those going down the river were ready to start. Not being able to man it, I tied up one of the boats and abandoned it. When all was ready we shook hands, and some tears were started, as each party thought the other going to destruction. 'Goodby,' and away went our boat over the first cataract, then amongst the rocks and over the second to the left of a huge rock and whirlpool, and then leaping a third, it shot into an eddy below.
V-12
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"The boats were half filled with water, but that was of common occurrence ; we really found it less dangerous than a hundred we had run above. The men that were left sat on the cliffs and watched us go safely over, so we went into camp and waited two hours, hoping that they would join us with the boat left tied to the rock above. But we never saw nor heard of them since.
"The same afternoon we passed one more dan- gerous rapid, and then had fair sailing to the end of the canyon, where the river debouches into Mormon Valley, so named by our party.
"This ended the exploration of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado-its head at the con- fluence of the Little Colorado, its foot at the entrance of Mormon Valley, its length 238 miles, its altitude from 2,500 to 4,000 feet. A number of clear streams flow into it from either side, the largest coming down from the Buck- skin Mountains on the north, which we named Right Angle River.
"I have mentioned the terraces of the south- ern bends; these have been the sites of ancient Indian villages, inhabited by a race of diminu- tive people now almost extinct. Their little clusters of houses, found on the south side of the river, were 800 or 1,000 feet above the water. They were built of stone laid in mortar, and seem to have had reservoirs for water. Frag- ments of their pottery are found scattered about in great profusion, and deeply worn foot paths leading from village to village, or down to the river, or up to the summit plain, were fre- quently seen. On the northern bend their
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dwellings were near the river. Some of the ruins seem to be centuries old, and others to have been inhabited by the present generation- the latter were found near the mouth of the Little Colorado. Other ruins and fragments of pottery were found in the canyons above, and away up in the valleys of the Uintah. Only a few villages of these interesting people now remain in the country to the southeast.
"Below the Grand Canyon the river and ad- joining country had been explored by Mormon parties, and here ended the 'Great Unknown,' no longer thus to be designated. One party had crossed through Mormon Valley; another had brought a skiff down the Grand Wash just be- low it, and descended in it to the mouth of the Virgen-to Call's Landing, and still other par- ties have passed through the country whose re- ports I find quite correct, except that they a little over estimated the distances. Alternating valleys and canyons were passed till we reached the mouth of the Virgen, where we came upon three white men dragging a seine. They proved to be Mormons, who had been sent on to prepare for a large settlement of people, which will be sent here by the Church, to build up another of those wonderful villages seen only in the 'King- dom.'
"The whole region was one of great scenic beauty and grandeur; the constant change in geological structure made a constant change of scenery. The high walls enclosing a tortuous river, shut off the view before, and as we ad- vanced, it opened out, ever bringing into view some new combination of marvel or beauty.
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The impression of this scenery was the more vivified by a little anxiety-the shadow of a pang of dread ever present to the mind.
"Of my party, I should like to say that some left me at the start, cutting the number down to ten, including myself. One left me at the mouth of the Uintah, three left me as mentioned before, and five went through. These were Captain W. H. Powell, John C. Sumner, George T. Bradley, W. Rhodes Hawkins, and Andrew Hall."
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