CHANGE OF CUSTOMS DISTRICT—SAMUEL J. JONES. (1863.)
My last military service was as quartermaster and commissary at District headquarters at Santa Fe, in 1862. In the summer of that year, General Canby granted me a leave of absence for sixty days, and I visited Washington City and received from President Lincoln my commission as collector of customs along with his personal thanks and good wishes.
The collection district of Paso del Norte then comprised only the Territories of New Mexico and Arizona, the collector’s office being at Las Cruces, N. M. El Paso county belonged to the Galveston District, with a deputy at El Paso—A. B. O’Bannon, a Confederate. But Congress, at my suggestion, passed an act, approved March 3, 1863, attaching El Paso county to that district, “Provided that the collector should reside at El Paso.” Thus, by my efforts, El Paso became the permanent residence of collectors of customs, and as a result, later on, obtained its fine Government building! Col. Samuel J. Jones was then collector of customs at Las Cruces. This Jones was prominent and in some respects a remarkable character. He was the notorious “Sheriff Jones” during the border troubles in Kansas in 1856, when the attempt was made to make Kansas a slave State, and was then called a “border ruffian.” Jones was a man of education, of fine personal appearance, and with a reputation for courage which had never been questioned. It fell to my lot to be the first to call him down, and I did it successfully and still have the hostile letters which passed between us, but I refrain from recording the particulars of that incident in my life. Jones had been appointed collector of customs by President Buchanan, but had taken the side of secession.
On my return from Washington, Jones refused to deliver to me the books and property of the office, and correspondence, quarrels and threats followed, and we became bitter enemies. But he yielded what I demanded. Twenty years later I met Colonel Jones at Silver City, old, poor and paralyzed, just able to walk about, but only able to articulate the words “yes, yes,” and “no, no.” Knowing his condition, I gave him my hand, which he grasped eagerly, and that night he signified to me that he desired me to occupy the same room with him, which I did.
