This ruin takes its name from the earliest known description of it by Morgan,[16] which was compiled from notes by Mr. Mitchell, one of the early settlers in Montezuma Valley. Morgan’s account is as follows:
“Near Mr. Mitchell’s ranch, and within a space of less than a mile square, are the ruins of nine pueblo houses of moderate size. They are built of sandstone intermixed with cobblestone and adobe mortar. They are now in a very ruinous condition, without standing walls in any part of them above the rubbish. The largest of the number is marked No. 1 in the plan, figure 44, of which the outline of the original structure is still discernible. It is 94 feet in length and 47 feet in depth, and shows the remains of a stone wall in front inclosing a small court about 15 feet wide. The mass of material over some parts of this structure is 10 or 12 feet deep. There are, no doubt, rooms with a portion of the walls still standing covered with rubbish, the removal of which would reveal a considerable portion of the original ground plan.”
The author paid a short visit to the Mitchell Spring village and by means of Morgan’s sketch map was able to identify without difficulty the nine mounds and tower he represents. The village at Mitchell Spring differs from that at Mud Spring and at Aztec Spring mainly in the small size and diffuse distribution of the component mounds and an absence of any one mound larger than the remainder. It had, however, a round tower, but unlike that at Mud Spring village, this structure is not united to one of the houses. The addition of towers to pueblos, as pointed out by Doctor Prudden[17] several years ago, marks the highest development of pueblo architecture as shown not only in open-air villages but also in some of the large cliff pueblos, like Cliff Palace. Isolated towers are as a rule earlier in construction.
The unit type mound uncovered by Doctor Prudden is one of the most instructive examples of this type in Montezuma Canyon, but the author in subsequent pages will call attention to the existence of the same type in Square Tower Canyon. All of these pueblos probably have kivas of the pure type, practically the same in structure as Far View House on the Mesa Verde National Park.
Mud Spring (Burkhardt) Ruin
The collection of mounds ([pl. 3, b]), sometimes called Burkhardt Ruin, situated at Mud Spring, belongs to the McElmo series. This ruin, in which is the “triple-walled tower” of Holmes, for uniformity with Mitchell Spring Ruin and Aztec Spring Ruin, is named after a neighboring spring. Like these, it is a cluster of mounds forming a village which covers a considerable area. The arroyo on which it is situated opens into the McElmo, and is about 7 miles southwest from Cortez, at a point where the road enters the McElmo Canyon.
The extension of the area covered by the Mud Spring mounds is east-west, the largest mounds being those on the east. These latter are separated from the remainder, or those on the west, by a shallow, narrow gulch. There are two towers united to the western section overlooking the spring, the following description of one of which, with a sketch of the ground plan, is given by Holmes.[18]
“The circular structures or towers have been built, in the usual manner, of roughly hewn stone, and rank among the very best specimens of this ancient architecture. The great tower is especially noticeable.... In dimensions it is almost identical with the great tower of the Rio Mancos. The walls are traceable nearly all the way round, and the space between the two outer ones, which is about 5 feet in width, contains 14 apartments or cells. The walls about one of these cells are still standing to the height of 12 feet; but the interior can not be examined on account of the rubbish which fills it to the top. No openings are noticeable in the circular walls, but doorways seem to have been made to communicate between the apartments; one is preserved at d.... This tower stands back about 100 feet from the edge of the mesa near the border of the village. The smaller tower, b, stands forward on a point that overlooks the shallow gulch; it is 15 feet in diameter; the walls are 3½ feet thick and 5 feet high on the outside. Beneath this ruin, in a little side gulch, are the remains of a wall 12 feet high and 20 inches thick.... The apartments number nearly a hundred, and seem, generally, to have been rectangular. They are not, however, of uniform size, and certainly not arranged in regular order.”
Morgan[19] gives the following description of the same ruin which seems to the author to be the Mud Creek village:
“Four miles westerly [from Mitchell ranch], near the ranch of Mr. Shirt, are the ruins of another large stone pueblo, together with an Indian cemetery, where each grave is marked by a border of flat stones set level with the ground in the form of a parallelogram 8 feet by 4 feet. Near the cluster of nine pueblos shown in the figure are found strewn on the ground numerous fragments of pottery of high grade in the ornamentation, and small arrowheads of flint, quartz, and chalcedony delicately formed, and small knife blades with convex and serrated edges in considerable numbers.