Across America; Or, The Great West and the Pacific Coast

by James Fowler Rusling

As a means of a water communication, from the Gulf of California into the very heart of the continent, it would seem, that this great river ought to have become more useful to civilization, than it has. But the difficulties of navigating it, even to Callville, were reported great; and beyond that, was the insuperable obstacle of the Big Cañon of the Colorado, which nobody then knew anything about, except as a geographical mystery, but which Prof. Powell has since explored so gallantly. At Yuma, the river was a turbid, rolling flood, broad and deep; and, judging by what we saw of it there, it would seem, that steamers of proper draught and build ought to be able to stem its current, and be of great service hereafter to all the upper country. The rates then current on the river were as follows: From the mouth of the Colorado to Yuma or Arizona City, 150 miles, twenty dollars per ton, coin; to La Paz, 300 miles, forty dollars per ton; to Fort Mojave or Hardyville, 450 miles, sixty dollars per ton. The rates from San Francisco to the mouth of the river, some 2000 miles, were then from twelve to fifteen dollars per ton, coin, besides; so that every load of freight put down at Arizona City or Hardyville, cost say thirty-five dollars and seventy-five dollars per ton, coin, respectively, for transportation alone. This may have been good business for the transportation companies; but it was death to mining, and other private enterprises, and operated practically as a prohibition to business, over most of the country there. It made Arizona substantially inaccessible, to population and trade, by this route (and there was no other so advantageous), and the whole country was hoping against hope, with prayers without ceasing, for a sometime oncoming railroad.

March 2d, while still at Arizona City, inspecting the depot there, we saw something of a Yuma sand-storm. The whirlwinds we had observed in the distance, when crossing the Colorado Desert a day or two before, seemed to have been only its precursors. It struck Yuma on the 2d, and promised to be only a passing blow, lulling away at eventide; but on the 3d, it resumed its course, with increased violence, and all day long rolled and roared onward furiously. We had heard much of these Yuma sand-storms, and on the whole were rather glad to see one, disagreeable as it proved. The morning dawned, hot and sultry, without a breath of air anywhere. Along about 9 a. m., the wind commenced sweeping in from the Desert, and as it increased in power uplifted and whirled along vast masses of sand, that seemed to trail as curtains of tawny gossamer from the very sky. As yet, it was comparatively clear at Yuma, and we could see the sweep and whirl of the storm off on the Desert, as distinctly as the outlines of a distant summer shower. But, subsequently, the Desert itself seemed to be literally upborne, and sweeping in, on the wings of the wind. The heavens became lurid and threatening. The sun disappeared, as in a coppery fog. The landscape took on a yellowish, fiery glare. The atmosphere became suffocating and oppressive. Towards noon, the wind rose to a hurricane; the sand, if possible, came thicker and faster, penetrating into every nook and cranny; the air became absolutely stifling, until neither man nor beast could endure it passably. People kept within doors, with every window closed, and animals huddled in groups with their noses to the ground, as if the only place to breathe. As night approached, the tempest gradually ceased, as if it had blown itself out; but it followed us on a minor scale, for a day or two afterwards, as we journeyed up the Gila. The ill-defined horror, and actual suffering of such a day, must be experienced to be appreciated. Out on the Desert, in the midst of the storm, the phenomenon no doubt would amount much to the same thing as the simooms of the Sahara. Travellers or troops caught in these sand-storms have to stop still, and instances are not rare where persons have lost their lives, in attempting to battle with them. They obliterate all signs of a road, where they actively prevail, whirling the sand into heaps and ridges, like New England snow-drifts; and the next travellers, who chance along, have either to go by the compass, or employ a guide, who understands the lay of the mountains, and country generally. Col. Crittenden, of the 32d Infantry, who crossed the Desert with a portion of his command some time after, was detained two days by such a storm, and his men suffered greatly, especially for want of water.

These sand-storms, it appears, are pretty much the only storms they ever get at Yuma, and they would not be unwilling there to dispense with even these. In the spring and summer, they frequently prevail there, sweeping in from the south and southwest, and it is not too much to say, that they are simply execrable. They have done much to make the name of Fort Yuma proverbial on the Pacific Coast, as the hottest place in the Union; and in San Francisco there was a story current about a soldier, who died at Yuma in a customary spree, and of course went to tophet. Subsequently, however, the story ran, his ghost came back for his blankets, because as alleged he had found the climate there much colder than Yuma—a sort of Alaska to California! The Post stands on a high gravel bluff, facing to the east and south, exposed to the blazing sun throughout the day; and, consequently, becoming saturated through and through with heat, retains it for months together. Hence, in the summer months, for weeks together, the thermometer there ranges from 100° to 125° in the shade, and the chief end of the garrison becomes an effort to keep cool, or even tolerably so. A tour of duty there was commonly regarded on the Coast, as a kind of banishment to Botany Bay; and yet we found the officers a very clever set of gentlemen, and spent some days there quite delightfully. Col. W., the commandant, proved to be an old acquaintance of the Army of the Potomac; and Dr. J., the surgeon, an old school-mate.

The Post here was established about 1857 to overawe the Yumas, then a stalwart and numerous tribe of Indians, occupying both banks of the Colorado for a hundred miles or more. Though much reduced, they still numbered over a thousand souls; and physically speaking, were the finest specimens of aborigines we had seen yet. They cultivate the river-bottoms to some extent, and raise barley, wheat, beans, melons, etc.—for their surplus of which, when any, they find a ready market at Fort Yuma and Arizona City. Some chop wood for the river-steamers, and others indeed we found employed on the steamers themselves, as deck-hands, firemen, etc. Altogether, these Yumas seemed to have more of the practical about them, than any savages we had met yet, and no doubt they might be saved to the race for generations to come, were proper efforts made to protect and care for them. They had been peaceable for years, and scores of them thronged the Post and the depot, every day we were there. The men wore only a breech-cloth, with long ends fluttering fore and aft; the women but little more, though some of them affected a rude petticoat. Both sexes, as a rule, were naked from the waist up, and many of each were superb specimens of humanity; but all seemed corrupted and depraved, by contact with the nobler white race. The open and unblushing looseness and licentiousness of the riff-raff of Arizona City, with these poor Indians, was simply disgusting, and it is a disgrace to a Christian government to tolerate such orgies, as frequently occur there, under the very shadow of its flag. Great blame attaches to the army, in former years, for ever admitting these poor creatures within the precincts of the Post there at all. Some time before, it was said, the commanding officer sent for Pasquol, their head-chief, and bade him order his squaws away.

"My squaws?" he indignantly responded; "no my squaws now! White man's squaws! Before white man come, squaws good—stay in wigwam—cook—fish—work in field—gather barley—heap good. But now squaws about Fort all day—City all night—and Yumas no want 'em. White man made squaws a heap bad. White man keep 'em!"

And with this, old Pasquol, a stately old savage, wrapped his blanket about his shoulders, and strode haughtily away. As far as we could learn, there had never been a missionary, or teacher of any kind, among these poor Yumas; and to all who feel a call in that direction, we would suggest the place as a superb field, for earnest missionary work. Will not some of our religious organizations, now that they have got the Red Man so fully in their hands, make a note of this, and try to look a little after these splendid savages, degraded though they be, as well as the Cheyennes and Sioux, and other more eastern tribes?

At Fort Yuma we overhauled Gov. McCormick and wife, who had left San Francisco in advance of us, and who were now about to leave for Prescott, then the capital of Arizona. On reflection, however, rather than lose such good company, they decided to journey with us to Tucson, and thence somewhat back to Prescott; whence we designed returning to Los Angelos again, via Fort Mojave. Accordingly, we left Arizona City, March 4th, our route lying up the Gila easterly two hundred miles to Maricopa Wells, and thence southerly one hundred miles to Tucson, the oldest and most considerable town in the Territory, and now again the capital. Much as we had "roughed it," while en route from Wilmington to Fort Yuma, according to all reports we would have to rough it much worse before reaching Tucson, if we trusted to the wayside ranches; and, therefore, before setting out, we secured a joint cook, and provided ourselves with a tolerable larder. Our "outfit" consisted of two four-mule ambulances, into which and outside we stowed and strapped ourselves, baggage, rations, forage, cooking utensils, etc., as best we could. Expecting to "camp-out" at night, we also took along two extra wagon-sheets, to pitch as tents, if necessary; but never found occasion to use them, except as beds, beneath those exquisite skies. There was no cavalry then at Yuma, and the road as far as Maricopa Wells being reported comparatively safe, we decided to proceed thither without escort, depending upon our own courage and vigilance. Nevertheless, we took the precaution before starting to arm our cook and both drivers with Springfield muskets, while we ourselves were equipped with a Spencer or Remington rifle apiece, as well as our revolvers.

With a host of "adios" and "good-byes," from our Yuma friends, we swung out of Arizona City late that morning, through sand knee-deep, and thus were fairly off for Tucson. The roads proved heavy all that day, and the remains of the sand-storm kept us company; yet we succeeded in making thirty-one miles, and went into camp before night-fall on the banks of the Gila. Some twenty miles out we passed Gila City, consisting of two adobe huts and an abandoned mine, then famous as the spot where Gen. McD., and some San Francisco friends, had recently made rather "permanent investments." Thence on to Maricopa Wells, indeed all the way from Arizona City, the road ascends the south bank of the Gila, and confines itself pretty closely to it, except here and there where it strikes across the mesas, to avoid some bend in this most tortuous of streams. The Gila itself ordinarily is an insignificant river, apparently famed more for quicksands than water; but just now its banks were full with the spring freshet, and its usual fords dangerous if not impassable. Its valley is of uncertain breadth, from one to five miles, though its river bottoms—its only really valuable land—are of course much narrower. Beyond the valley, on either side, are high mesas or plateaus, covered often with barren volcanic rocks, like the table-lands of Idaho; and, beyond these still, are substantial mountain-ranges. The range on the north, day after day, was a constant wonder and delight. Instead of ridges and peaks, it seemed to be rather a succession of domes, and towers, and castellated ramparts, sharp and well-defined against a peerless sky, chief among which was Castle Dome—a superb dome-like mountain, that dominated the landscape for two or three days together. These dome-shaped mountains are a feature of Arizona, and abound everywhere in the Territory, especially in the northern part of it.

As already intimated, we found the Gila very high and still rising. In several places, it had just washed the banks away, destroying the road, and we had to pick our way across the bottoms, through the chemisal and mesquite, to the connecting part, the best we could. In this way, it seems, its channel is constantly shifting, and this was said to be one of the chief drawbacks to constructing acequias, and cultivating its fine bottom lands by irrigation. The head of an acequia to-day, tapping the river well, a month hence may be three feet or more out of water, and then all the work of excavating ditches, damming the river, etc., has to be done over again. The bed of the Gila itself, in the main, seems to be pure quicksand. At one point, a station-keeper showed us where a year before piles had been driven down fifty feet, in making a wing-dam to divert a portion of the river into an acequia; but at the first freshet, the cross currents had underbored everything, and left the head of the acequia high and dry. No doubt the river-bottoms are all exceedingly fertile, and would produce well, if irrigated; but not otherwise. Of these, there is a considerable breadth, at many points along the Gila, and, here and there, there had been some attempts at cultivation, but scarcely any worth mentioning.

These bottoms nearly everywhere abound with bunch-grass and mesquite-timber—the one the delight of horses and cattle, the other invaluable in that treeless region. The mesquite has but little height; but its trunk is often two and three feet in diameter, though only about as many high, from which point it throws out great, sturdy, black, gnarled limbs for a distance of thirty or forty feet all around. We saw many of them, that I think could not have been more than five or six feet in height, the bend of the branches included; nevertheless, with their crooked and gnarled limbs, they sprawled over the ground for a diameter of fully seventy-five or one hundred feet. At first they strike you as dwarfs, puny in aspect and purpose; but afterwards, as stunted giants, massive in strength and power, writhing in very anguish, because unable to tower higher. For lumber purposes, the mesquite amounts to but little; but for fuel, it is invaluable, and the future settlers on the Gila will prize it highly. It occurs pretty much all through Arizona, on the best river-bottoms, and everywhere seems a providential institution. It makes a fire-wood scarcely inferior to oak or hickory, and bears a bean besides, which constitutes a large part of the subsistence of the Mexicans and the Indians there. These mesquite beans make a very sweet and palatable dish, and horses, mules, cattle, etc. are especially fond of them. The Mexicans we met en route to California, were subsisting upon them almost entirely, and subsequently in wandering through a Pimo village, we found them in every storehouse. A Pimo belle, for a bundle of cigarritos, cooked us a dish of them, and we have eaten worse things in New York and Washington. Said an old Arizonian one day, "Wherever you see mesquites, strangers, look out for good land, you bet!" and we found it so invariably. Indeed, with a moderate amount of enterprise, and a small amount of capital, we saw no good reason why the valley of the Gila should not eventually be dotted with excellent farms. The land is all there, and plenty of water to irrigate it (if only the Gila can be subdued, and surely it can), and the climate the year round must be delicious. But, as a rule, we found the country desolate and forsaken, with the exception of a starving ranch here and there, whose dirty and dilapidated proprietor cared more to swear at his snarling half-cayote dogs, and sell an occasional glass of mescal or whiskey, than to do an honest hard day's work. The truth is, the most of these settlers, as well as too many throughout Arizona generally, were exiles or emigrants from Arkansas and Texas, with little in them of the kind of stuff that founds states and builds empires. They knew how to drink, and swear, and "shoot a Red Skin, sir, on sight;" but were strangers to honest toil and steady industry, and therefore missed their logical and golden fruits—prosperity and thrift. Of course, like all such everywhere, they were opposed to "Chinese cheap labor;" and, like the good William Nye, hated the "Heathen Chinee," even worse than the negro.