ARIZONA TRAILS
THE CIVIL WAR

The few Americans who had settled in the Gadsden Purchase prior to the Civil War, being for the most part from the South, were not only ready but eager to make their section a part of the Confederacy. While the possession of the Southwestern deserts, with the pestiferous Apaches thrown in as an inalienable hereditament, would be of no vast value to the South, yet the possession of that amount of territory might be impressive to European nations, so it seems to have been considered worth while as a "pickup." Besides, the country itself would have some value as a highway over which troops might march to California.

Some time in 1861 a convention was held at Tucson declaring Arizona Confederate country; in August, Granville H. Oury was elected by citizens of Tucson as delegate to the Southern Congress. In March, 1861, a convention was also held in Mesilla, which called itself a "Convention of the people of Arizona," presumably, like the Tucson meeting, representing the southern part of New Mexico, from its eastern border to the Rio Colorado. One of the Mesilla resolutions was: "We will not recognize the present black Republican administration, and we will resist any officers appointed to the Territory by said administration with whatever means in our power."

Most of the army officers, like a majority of the settlers, were Southerners and took the first opportunity of leaving their commands to join the Confederate army, though the enlisted men, on the contrary, for the most part remained firm in their allegiance to the Union.

The military posts at Breckenridge, Mojave and Buchanan were all abandoned early in the war, the order for such action coming to Buchanan from Maj. Gen. Isaac Lynde in June, 1861. It is said that there was a large amount of stores at Buchanan which had been ordered there earlier by the secretary of war in the expectation that afterwards it would fall into the hands of the new Confederacy, which it was felt would inevitably be formed. However, be that as it may, the officers in charge of the post, Lieutenant Moore of the dragoons and Lieutenant Lord of the infantry, left little of value behind. The field pieces were spiked and buried, and all supplies that could not be carried away were wrecked or burned. The troops were marched to Fort Craig, New Mexico, where they joined the Union forces.

Naturally, the settlers were very bitter over the abandonment of the post, and charged the local officers with cowardice and perfidy, but whatever odium was attached to their leaving the settlers without military protection against the Indians belonged to commanders higher up.

The Apaches watched the soldiers march away with grim complacency, believing that it was a sign of recognition that the Indians had proven themselves too strong to subdue, and therefore the whites had finally abandoned the country. Immediately they started in to finish their harvest of pillage and murder against the settlers. One of their first acts was to go to the Heintzelman mines where, in spite of the miners' guns, in a night attack, they succeeded in running off a hundred and forty-six horses and mules. At Tubac, so Hinton tells us, a score or so of Americans withstood two hundred attacking Chiricahuas under Cochise throughout one entire day, and that night, shielded by darkness, an express rider got through the Indian line and reached Tucson in safety. Under Grant Oury a relief party was organized, and twenty-five determined, well-armed men rode swiftly to Tubac, where, joining the beleaguered miners, they not only drove off the Apaches, but had the opportunity a little later of withstanding a party of Mexican bandits who came up from Sonora. The Mexicans fell back upon Tumacacori, where they murdered an old rancher whom even the Apaches had spared.

Having good cause to fear that the Chiricahuas would soon return in increased numbers, all of the whites, not only from Tubac, but from all of the mines and ranches in the southern part of present Arizona, made hasty flight to Tucson, while the Mexicans who did not accompany them fled to the settlements of Sonora.

Meanwhile in the Mesilla Valley, Maj. Isaac Lynde, the same man who had written the order to abandon Fort Buchanan, commander of the Union garrison at Fort Fillmore, with five hundred well disciplined men, allowed himself to be defeated by two hundred and fifty untrained and poorly armed Texans, commanded by Lieut. Col. John R. Baylor. Lynde withdrew his troops, and when Baylor overtook him, cravenly surrendered his entire command. It was a disgraceful affair. Later, for this cowardice or treachery, he was dismissed from the army.

Baylor reached Mesilla in July, 1861, and in a proclamation on August 1st organized the Territory of Arizona, which had its north boundary on the thirty-fourth parallel (which runs just north of the present town of Wickenburg) and extended entirely across present Arizona and New Mexico. He named Mesilla as the capital, with himself as military governor. Thereafter the Confederate Congress passed an enabling act for the Territory, which act was approved by Jefferson Davis, January 18, 1862, and on February 14th of the same year he issued the forming proclamation. Slavery, of course, was to be protected.

Early in 1862 a military organization, styled the Arizona Guards, with headquarters at Mesilla, was mustered in for the stated purpose of protecting the settlers against the Indians. In March of the same year Baylor wrote a letter to Captain Helm, commander, which, as a military order, it may well be hoped, is unique in American army annals, and which made Baylor eligible to a place on the rolls of infamy along with Johnson and Glanton. "

Sir:—I learn from Lieutenant Colonel Jackson that the Indians have been at your post for the purpose of making a treaty. The Congress of the Confederate States has passed a law declaring extermination of all hostile Indians. You will therefore use all possible means to persuade the Apaches, or any other tribes, to come in for making peace; and when you get them together, kill all the grown Indians and make the children prisoners, and sell them to defray the expenses of killing the Indians. "

Buy whisky and such other goods as may be necessary for the Indians, and I will order vouchers given to cover the amount expended. "

Leave nothing undone to assure success and have a sufficient number of men around to allow no Indians to escape. Say nothing about your orders till the time arrives, and be cautious how you let the Mexicans know it. If you can't trust them, send to Captain Aycock at this place and he will send you thirty men from his company. Better use the Mexicans, if they can be trusted, as bringing troops from here might excite suspicion with the Indians. "

To your judgment I entrust this important matter, and look for success against these cursed pests who have already murdered over one hundred men in this Territory."

Later, Baylor, in one of his campaigns against the Indians, is said to have poisoned a sack of flour which killed fifty or sixty natives. When President Davis learned of this episode he promptly deprived him of his commission in the Confederate army and his title of governor of Arizona.

Early in 1862 a troop of Texan cavalry, numbering between one and two hundred, in command of Capt. S. Hunter, had started west, reaching Tucson February 28th, where it was given a most cordial welcome by the inhabitants.

The Confederates seem to have had some hopes that Sonora would forswear her allegiance to the Mexican Republic and join the new cause, and soon after Hunter arrived at Tucson, Colonel Reilly, with an escort of twenty men under Lieutenant Tevis, was sent with a letter from General Sibley to Governor Pesquiera at Hermosillo; but other than arranging for the purchase of supplies, nothing came of it.

On March 3d, Hunter, with the rest of his command, proceeded to the Pima villages, where he confiscated fifteen hundred sacks of wheat, which a trader, A. M. White, who operated a flour mill in the village, had bought from the Indians for the use of the Union soldiers then at Fort Yuma. Instead of destroying the wheat, Hunter returned it to the Indians. It was reported, but erroneously, however, that a large wagon train was on its way eastward for the wheat, and while waiting for its arrival Hunter's pickets noticed, through the chaparral, the approach of a squad of mounted Unionists, nine members of the First California Cavalry, under Captain McCleave.

The Confederate pickets surprised and captured them without firing a gun, and McCleave, together with the trader White, was sent in charge of Lieut. Jack Swilling to Baylor.

Hunter then dispatched a squad of men westward to destroy supplies of hay that had been deposited at several stations on the old Butterfield stage line for use of the Union army advancing from California. This squad reached a point fifty miles from the Colorado, the farthest point westward penetrated by the Confederacy.

At this time the Union forces in southern California consisted for the most part of volunteers under the command of Col. James H. Carleton of the First California Cavalry. The main body of this army had left Los Angeles and concentrated at Fort Yuma in April, where it consisted of ten companies of First California Infantry directly commanded by Colonel Carleton, five troops of First California Cavalry under Lieut. Col. E. E. Eyre, and field artillery with four brass field pieces under Lieut. John B. Shinn.

Following the McCleave party, a stronger force was sent east from Yuma consisting of one company of infantry, a part of a company of cavalry and two small howitzers, with Capt. William P. Calloway in command. The party passed the Pima villages, and, on April 15, 1862, they were apprised by their Indian scouts that a force of Confederate cavalry was just ahead of them, which was Hunter's command returning to Tucson. A detachment of cavalry under Lieutenant Barrett was ordered to make a wide detour and strike the enemy on the flank, by which time it was thought the main column would be there to make a simultaneous attack from the rear. However, Barrett and his men traveled faster than was anticipated, and reaching its objective at Picacho Pass, made a sharp attack before the supporting column arrived. In the engagement Barrett and two of his men were killed and three wounded. Two of the Confederates also were wounded and three taken prisoners. This skirmish was the only engagement of any kind between the Federals and the Confederates in what is now Arizona.

Although the force led by Galloway was much superior to Hunter's, he fell back to Stanwick Stage Station, eighty miles from Yuma, where he joined the advancing California column under Lieutenant Colonel West. When this army reached the Pima villages, defensive earthworks were thrown up around White's mill, and, in honor of the officer who had been killed at Picacho, named Fort Barrett. A force under Lieutenant Colonel Eyre was sent to occupy Fort Breckenridge, and the main column under Lieutenant Colonel West, moved forward to Tucson, where it arrived April 20th.

Buchanan was also occupied and the name Breckenridge changed to Fort Stanford.

Before the Unionists had reached Tucson, Hunter had already passed through the town and was on his way to Mesilla, together with a number of the most prominent Tucson Confederates. When the command reached Dragoon Springs it was set upon by a large force of Apaches, who evidently thought that the soldiers must be given another decisive lesson. Four of Hunter's men were killed and thirty-five mules and twenty horses lost. Soon after this Carleton arrived at Tucson, where he established his headquarters. En route he stopped at the Pima villages and was so impressed by the appearance of the Indians that he recommended that a hundred muskets be given them as a defense against the Apaches.

Tucson at that time was the rendezvous for as malodorous a lot of criminals and desperadoes, fugitives from both Texas and California, as is often found in one place. Carleton at once proclaimed martial law, and announced himself military governor. Then he proceeded to clean up the town, so, as he said, "When a man does have his throat cut, his house robbed or his field ravaged, he may at least have the consolation of knowing that there is some law that will reach him who did the injury." As a start he sent nine of the "cutthroats, gamblers and loafers" to Yuma for imprisonment. This action won him much praise, more than another official act which he performed soon afterwards, when he caused the arrest for treason of Sylvester Mowry, principal owner of the Mowry mine and delegate to the Confederate Congress. The arrest was made upon information furnished by the metallurgist at the Mowry mine. Mowry was brought to Tucson and tried by court martial, headed by Lieutenant Colonel West. He was found guilty of having had treasonable correspondence with well known Secessionists, and was taken to Yuma for confinement. The imprisonment seems to have been only nominal, and after six months, his case being investigated by General Wright, commander of the Pacific Department, he was released.

As a sidelight on Tucson life during those days we learn from Carleton's orders that "every gambling house in Tucson must pay a tax of a hundred dollars a month and every keeper of a bar must pay a similar amount."

In June, Carleton was advanced to the rank of brigadier general. That same month he started Lieutenant Colonel Eyre eastward with a hundred and forty cavalrymen to join General Canby's Union forces in New Mexico. At Dragoon Springs they were met by about a hundred Apaches who insisted upon a peace talk and tobacco. While that was going on, three soldiers were ambushed and killed. The murderers, though pursued, were not captured.

On July 20th, under Carleton's orders, Colonel West, with five companies of infantry, started for New Mexico, and two days later was followed by Lieutenant Shinn's battery with two companies of infantry, and, after another two days' wait, four more companies proceeded eastward under Lieutenant Colonel Rigg. As a vanguard went Capt. Thomas Roberts with Company E, First California Infantry, who, on reaching Apache Pass, was intercepted by Chiricahuas, whereupon followed  the most serious battle ever fought in Arizona between Americans and Indians.

Cochise, with rancor still eating into his heart from Lieutenant Bascom's insults, had never stopped his bloody business of revenge, and when

Mangas Colorado wanted his help to drive out a hundred and forty miners from Pinos Altos, Cochise gave his consent provisional upon the great Mimbres coming over to help him wipe out the American soldiers. Mangas had fully as bitter hatred against the whites as Cochise, for the miners at Santa Rita del Cobre, discovering the chief in a plot to kill them, had tied him to a tree and whipped him. As a result of all this there were five hundred Chirica- huas and two hundred Mimbres waiting at Apache Pass to dispute the passage of the American troops.

Captain Roberts, wholly unsuspecting an attack, entered the defile without making any preliminary reconnoissance whatsoever, and was two- thirds of the way through when a terrific volley of musket fire was directed at his men from Apaches hidden behind rocks and trees on the towering canyon sides. Cremony says, "Every tree concealed an armed warrior, and each warrior boasted his rifle, six-shooter and knife." The soldiers fired in return, but in their exposed position, shooting at an enemy whom they could not see, made retreat the only alternative of extermination. The troops retired in good order and re-formed at the mouth of the canyon.

As the men had marched forty miles without water, it was absolutely necessary that they reach the spring in the heart of the pass. There was an overland stage station house made of stone about six hundred yards from the spring, and this Captain Roberts made his objective. On the high hills overlooking the spring the Indians had built stone breastworks from which they kept up an ever- increasing fire at the again advancing soldiers. After some bungling on the part of the artillerymen, the howitzers were put into action. The Apaches were quite accustomed to rifles by this time, but these belching wagons that hurled great fire balls which, exploding, could kill a dozen men, were too much for their nerves. They abandoned their fortifications and fled pellmell in all directions. To again quote Cremony: "

In this fight Roberts had two men killed and three men wounded, and I afterwards learned from a prominent Apache who was present in the engagement that sixty-three warriors were killed outright by the shells, while only three perished from musketry fire. The Indian said, 'We would have done well enough if you hadn't fired wagons at us.'"

The next day, with Cremony's cavalry added to the white men's force, the Apaches again sought to engage the soldiers, but after the howitzers once more shelled the hills, Cremony's rough riders charged straight at them, and a few minutes later the landscape was covered with fleeing, thoroughly frightened Indians. This time the Chiricahuas had had enough and did not return.

Two miles beyond Apache Springs the soldiers found the remains of nine miners from Pinos Altos whom the Apaches had murdered, one of which had been burned at the stake. It is said that at this time, for fourteen miles on either side of the pass, the bones of slain oxen, horses and mules and the wreckage of wagons were so thick that one could almost travel the entire distance without setting foot upon the ground, and the graves that lined the road gave mute testimony as to what had become of the people to whom the caravans belonged.

When he learned of the battle, General Carleton established a military post in Apache Pass which he called Fort Bowie, and garrisoned it with a hundred men of the Fifth Infantry and
thirteen men of the First Cavalry.

In September, 1862, Carleton succeeded General Canby as commander of the Department of New Mexico, and Maj. Davis Fergusson was put in charge of the soldiers that were left in Arizona.

PROSPECTING PARTIES IN CIVIL WAR TIMES

The principal occupations of the citizens of Arizona during Civil War days were fighting, mining and gambling. Sometimes these vocations were conducted separately, usually the three went together. With hostile Apaches scattered from the eastern border nearly to the Colorado, prospecting, if engaged in by small groups of men, was apt to be an invitation to sudden death; nevertheless there were bold spirits who were so insistent in their quest for the Golden Fleece that even the menace of the Tontos or Coyoteros could not deter them. The most important of the mining expeditions which prospected in Arizona during this period was known as the Walker party and was notable not only for the fact that its members were the first men to systematically prospect for gold in the central part of the Territory, but also for the reason that their explorations had an important bearing upon the location of Arizona's first capital.

In 1862 "Capt." Joseph Walker came to the Southwest from Colorado at the head of a party of forty adventurers. The men were well armed, and although they stated that their one purpose in the country was to search for valuable minerals, the Federal authorities watched them closely, evidently fearing that they were really Secessionists who were planning some coup to aid the Confederate cause.

The story of their long journey through regions heretofore unknown, the hardships they endured, the many perils they overcame is too extended to be recorded here. Space, however, must be claimed to mention the capture of Mangas Colorado through their aid and the death of the great chief at their camp. There have been many conflicting stories told of the event, but the narrative of D. E. Conner, the historian of the expedition, bears the marks of truth. When in February, 1863, they were camped at Fort McLean, fifteen miles southwest of Silver City, Walker was told by a Mexican that Mangas Colorado, with five hundred Apaches, was on the west side of the Cordilleras not far from Pinos Altos. The old chief and his warriors had been dogging the steps of the party all winter, ambushing them at water holes, and otherwise harassing them, so Walker boldly decided to try to capture Mangas and hold him as a guarantee of good behavior by his followers. A half a company of California volunteers, with Capt. Ed Shirland, chanced to visit the Walker camp that day, and when Shirland heard of the plan to get Mangas he promptly agreed to take an active part.

In order to avoid having their intention conveyed to the old chief by smoke signals from Apaches near the camp, about half of the Walker party and half of the soldiers slipped away on their mission before daylight. At Pinos Altos, just before the summit was reached, Walker picked up the ubiquitous Jack Swilling, whom the party had chanced upon at Mesilla, and put him in charge of an advanced guard, while he with the rest of his men and the soldiers were to hide themselves in the old buildings of the camp and the chaparral. Swilling, with his handful of men, walked up the trail leading to the summit. To quote Conner: "

All was silent; not a human being was seen. Suddenly Swilling issued a warwhoop that might have made an Apache ashamed of himself. There was a short delay when Mangas, a tremendously big man, with over a dozen Indians for a body guard, was seen in the distance walking towards us. ... Jack left us and walked to meet Mangas. . . . Swilling, though six feet tall, looked like a boy beside the chief." At a sign from Swilling, his companions covered Mangas and his bodyguard with their rifles. The other Indians were sent back, but the chief was forced to accompany his captors. As they led him over the brow of the hill, the soldiers suddenly came out from their hiding places, "disgusting Mangas beyond measure."

Although momentarily expecting pursuit, the party got the old chief over the fifteen miles to the Walker camp without molestation. The prisoner was dressed in a cheap, checkered shirt and ordinary overalls cut off at the knees. In dignified silence he strode among his white captors, towering head and shoulders above them. That night the chief slept on the ground near the camp fire. Conner, who was on guard, noticed, about nine o'clock, that the soldiers were "doing something to Mangas," but quit when Conner came to the fire. Afterwards, observing them from the darkness, Conner saw them heat their bayonets and apply them to the Indian's feet and legs. At this the old chief rose on his elbow, crying out that he was no child, to be played with. Thereupon the two soldiers fired at the chief with their Minic muskets, and followed that with two more shots from their navy revolvers. "Mangas fell back into the same position he had occupied and never moved."

From the camp where the great chief was slain the Walker party journeyed over the mountains prospecting en route. Ultimately they reached Tucson, from which point they went, first to the Pima villages and then north, through mountainous country, to the headwaters of the Hassayampa, near the present town of Prescott, where they located, thoroughly prospecting the hills and valleys of the region, finding gold in many places.

Another group of miners, which about that same time entered central Arizona, was known as the Weaver party, from Pauline Weaver, one of its members. The party, which seems to have consisted of eleven men, left Fort Yuma early in April of 1863, journeying up the Colorado to Bill Williams Fork and continuing along that stream fifty miles or so; then, leaving the fork, it reached what is now known as Antelope Mountain, and, after finding gold in a creek bed, continued prospecting up to the top of the peak, where it found the richest surface diggings ever discovered in the State. On one day three of the men, scratching around in the gravel with their butcher knives, as they tell it, obtained over $1,800 in nuggets.

Word of the strike was carried to Maricopa Wells, a station on the old Butterfield stage line, and there was an immediate rush of miners to the Weaver district, as it was then called, who later mingled with members of the Walker party and shared their prosperity.

At Lynx Creek one nugget was found which was worth $900. Rich finds were also made on the Hassayampa and Granite Creek. Later, placer mining gave way to the working of lodes.