Abandoned in August 1873, Fort Cummings was reoccupied in 1880, and then again abandoned in October 1886. Later it was used as a cattle corral by the Carpenter-Stanley Cattle Company. The spring was walled and covered, and the water piped to Florida.
Little remains of Fort Cummings today. A few weathered walls here and there among the mesquite and creosote bushes mark the site. The spring still flows, supplying water for the stock which now graze upon this “protector of the trail.”
Fort Bayard
Fort Bayard, established in 1865 to protect the miners and settlers moving into the area following the Civil War, allowed the orderly development of what was to become New Mexico’s most important mineral-producing area. Named for Capt. George D. Bayard who was wounded repeatedly during Indian forays and who died of wounds received in the Battle of Fredricksburg (Va.) during the Civil War, the fort was located about five miles southeast of Pinos Altos and about midway between the mining towns of Pinos Altos and Santa Rita. The site is about nine miles east of present-day Silver City, just north of State Highway 90.
The original fort consisted of log and adobe buildings forming a square around the parade ground. During its thirty-four year history as an army post, many changes and additions were made to the fort, including the building of two-storied officers’ quarters. In 1899, the line troops were removed and the fort was officially designated as a U.S. Army General Hospital to treat tubercular soldiers. In 1920, the hospital was turned over to the Public Health Department; in 1922, to the U.S. Veterans Administration; and again, in 1966, to the State Health Department as a facility for the care of the aged and of tuberculosis cases. It can now accommodate more than 300 patients. The modern buildings are a far cry from the dirt-floored log and adobe buildings of the original fort.
HISTORY
Pre-Civil War Period.
The period 1846 to 1861 was characterized by constant Indian warfare. Treaties were made, then broken. Forts were established, then abandoned, and new forts built as the military tried in vain to cope with the problem. Punitive expeditions proved ineffective as the Indians separated into small and predatory bands which overran the country.
Forts Union, Marcy, Fauntleroy, Craig, and Stanton were established during this period. Additional forts, whose sites have returned to the desert, are Fort Conrad (1851), on the Rio Grande about twenty-five miles south of Socorro; Fort Thorn (1853), on the Rio Grande about five miles north of Hatch; Fort Fillmore (1851), on the Rio Grande about seven miles south of Las Cruces; Fort Webster (1852), on the Mimbres River about one and one-half miles northwest of San Lorenzo; Fort McLane (1860), at Apache Tejo about four miles south of Hurley; and Fort Floyd (1857), on the Gila River about two miles south of Cliff.