At a public meeting of all the residents on the lands reserved for Indian purposes, held at Banning, in San Gorgonio Pass, San Bernardino County, California, it was resolved that a delegation from our inhabitants be appointed to proceed to San Bernardino, and lay before the commissioners a statement of the existing status of the lands reserved for Indian purposes as affecting the citizens resident on those townships known as 2 and 3 S., R. 1 E., and 2 S., R. 2 E., in San Bernardino meridian. Believing that it is of the utmost importance that you should become conversant with facts affecting the condition and future well-being of the Indians whom it is designed to place upon these lands, we respectfully request a hearing. Among those facts as affecting the residents directly, and more remotely the Indians, are the following:
There is in San Gorgonio Township, of which these lands are a part, a population of two hundred and fifty souls. In township 3 S., R. 1 E., is the village of Banning, which is the business centre of the surrounding country, and has an immediately surrounding population numbering fifty souls. It has post and express offices, railroad depot, district school, church organization, general merchandise store, the flume of the San Gorgonio Fluming Company, two magistrates; and during the last year there was sold or shipped from this place alone fully 20,000 bushels of wheat and barley, over 200 tons of baled hay, a large amount of honey, butter, eggs, poultry, live stock, &c., besides 200 cords of wood. Although more than half of the area of this township is in the mountains and uninhabited, from the remaining portion which is surveyed land, there is at this time fully 1,200 acres in grain, and the value of the improved property is over $50,000, exclusive of railroad property. Vested interests have been acquired to all the water available for irrigation under the code of laws existing in this State. Wells have repeatedly been dug without success in this township. United States patents to lands were granted in this township long anterior to the Executive order reserving the lands for Indian purposes, and since then the population has not increased. No Indian has, within the memory of man, resided in this township. There are not over two entire sections of land in the entire area left available for cultivation; and on these, without abundance of water, no one could possibly succeed in earning a livelihood. One of these sections was occupied and was abandoned, the attempt to raise a cereal crop having failed. The extreme aridity of the climate renders the successful growth of cereals problematical, even when summer fallowing is pursued, and the amount of human casualty possessed by the average Indian does not usually embrace the period of two years. To intersperse Indians between white settlers who own the railroad land or odd sections and the remaining portions of the Government sections, where a "no fence" law exists, as here, would not be conducive to the well-being of the Indians, and would result in a depreciation of our property alike needless and disastrous. In township 2 S., R. 2 E., there are not over eighty acres available,—that in Weaver Creek cañon, where the water was acquired and utilized before the Executive order and the legal right well established. In township 2 S., R. 1 E., settlements were made many years before the issue of the order of reservation, especially on odd-numbered sections or railroad lands as then supposed to be, and these bona-fide settlers have acquired claims in equity to their improvements. On one ranch in this township,—that of Messrs. Smith & Stewart, who have cultivated and improved the mesa or bench lands,—there was produced several thousand sacks of grain; but this involved such an outlay of capital and knowledge, beside experience in grain-growing such as Indians do not possess. In this township, embracing the three mentioned, there are upward of forty voters; and these unanimously and respectfully ask you to grant us a hearing, when we can reply to any interrogatories you may be pleased to make. If you will kindly name the time when to you convenient, the undersigned will at once wait upon you.
W. K. Dunlap,
Ben. W. Smith,
S. Z. Millard,
Welwood Murray,
Geo. C. Egan,
D. A. Scott,
G. Scott.
There is upon this San Gorgonio Reservation a considerable amount of tillable land. There are also on it several small but good water-rights. One of these springs, with the adjacent land, is occupied by an Indian village, called the Potrero, numbering about sixty souls,—an industrious little community, with a good amount of land fenced and under cultivation. These Indians are in great trouble on account of their stock, the approaches to their stock-ranges having been by degrees all fenced off by white settlers, leaving the Indians no place where they can run their cattle without risk of being corralled and kept till fines are paid for their release. All the other springs except this one are held by white settlers, who with one exception, we were informed, have all come on within the past five years. They claim, however, to have bought the rights of former settlers. One of the largest blocks of this reservation lies upon the San Bernardino Mountain, and is a fair stock-range. It is now used for this purpose by a man named Hyler. The next largest available block of land on the reservation is now under tillage by the dry system by the firm of Smith & Stewart. There is also a bee-ranch on the reservation, belonging to Herron & Wilson. One of the springs and the land adjacent are held by a man named Jost. He is on unsurveyed land, but claims that by private survey he has ascertained that he is on an odd-numbered section, and has made application to the railroad for the same. He requested us to submit to the Department his estimate of the value of his improvements. It is appended to this exhibit. It seems plain from the above facts, and from the letter of the Banning gentleman, that a considerable number of Indians could be advantageously placed on this reservation if the whites were removed. It would be necessary to acquire whatever titles there may be to tracts included in the reservation; also to develop the water by the construction of reservoirs, &c., probably to purchase some small water-rights. Estimating roughly, we would say by an expenditure of from $30,000 to $40,000 this reservation could be rounded out and put into readiness for Indians. It ought to be most emphatically stated and distinctly understood that without some such preparation as this in the matter of water-rights and channels the Indians cannot be put there. It is hardly possible for one unfamiliar with the Southern California country to fully understand how necessary this is. Without irrigation the greater portion of the land is worthless, and all arrangements for developing, economizing, and distributing water are costly. This is an objection to the San Gorgonio Reservation. There are two others. The Indians for the most part have an exceeding dislike to the region, and will never go there voluntarily,—perhaps only by force. The alternative of railroad sections with the sections of the reservations will surely lead to troubles in the future between the white settlers and the Indians. These are serious objections; but it is the only large block of land the Government has left available for the purpose of Indian occupancy.