Building a State in Apache Land

by Charles D. Poston

Seven hundred leagues, or 3,000,800 acres, is a large tract of land in a single body, and the attorney of the heirs considered it more convenient to locate the land in small tracts of a league or two at a place. The government of Mexico conceded whatever was required, and the grant was made in all due form of Mexican law.

In the discussion at the Government Boarding House in San Francisco it was urged: That the Gulf of California was the Mediterranean of the Pacific, and its waters full of pearls. That the Peninsula of Lower California was copper-bound, interspersed with gold and minerals, illustrated with old Spanish Missions, and fanned by the gentlest breezes from the South Pacific. That the State of Sonora was one of the richest of Mexico in silver, copper, gold, coal and other materials, with highly productive agricultural valleys in the temperate zone. That the country north of Sonora, called in the Spanish history "Arizunea" (rocky country) was full of minerals, with fertile valleys washed by numerous rivers, and covered by forests primeval. That the climate was all that could be desired, from the level of the Gulf of California, to an altitude of 15,000 feet in the mountains of the north. That the Southern Pacific Railroad would soon be built through the new country, and that a new State would be made as a connecting link between Texas and California, with the usual quota of governors, senators, and public officials.

It was urged that the Iturbide Grant could be located so as to secure the best sites for towns and cities in the new State, and the rest distributed to settlers as an inducement for rapid colonization. The enthusiasm increased with the glamour of Spanish history and the generous flow of Sazerac.

It must be admitted that an alluring prospect was opened for a young man idling away his life over a custom house desk at three hundred dollars a month; and in the enthusiasm of youth I undertook to make an exploration of the new territory and to locate the Iturbide Grant. Who could have foreseen that the attempted location of the Iturbide Grant would upset the Mexican Republic and set up an empire in Mexico under French protection?

The first thing was to organize a "syndicate" in San Francisco, to furnish funds for expenses and for the location of the Iturbide Grant. This was easily accomplished through some enthusiastic French bankers.

The ex-member of Congress was dispatched to the City of Mexico to secure the approbation of the Mexican government, and I embarked at San Francisco for Guaymas with a rather tough cargo of humanity. They were not so bad as reckless; not ungovernable, but independent.

The records of the United States consulate in Guaymas, if they are preserved, show our registration as American citizens, fourteenth day of January, 1854. The Mexican officials were polite, but not cordial. They said Santa Ana had no right to sell the territory, as he was an usurper and possessed no authority from the Mexican people. As international tribunals had not then been established to determine these nice points of international ethics, we did not stop to argue the question, but pushed on to the newly acquired territory.

We were very much disappointed at its meagerness, and especially that the boundary did not include a port in the Gulf of California. A larger territory could have been secured as easily, but the American Minister had only one idea, and that was to secure "a pass" for a Southern Pacific Railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. The pass desired was the Guadaloupe Cañon, used as a wagon road by General Cook in his march from New Mexico to California in 1846, and strange to say, not subsequently occupied as a railroad pass.

The country south of the new boundary line is not of much consequence to us: it belongs to Mexico.

The country north of the Mexican boundary is the most marvelous in the United States. After many years of arduous investigation and comparison with all the other countries of the world, it is still nearly as great an enigma as when first explored in 1854. The valleys are as fair as the sun ever shone upon, with soil as productive as the valley of the Nile. The rigors of winter never disturb agricultural pursuits in the open. In fact, in the southern portion of the territory there is no winter.