REPORT TO HON. A. V. BROWN, POSTMASTER GENERAL, (continued 2)

January 4.—A fine morning, with the sun bright and pleasant, the ground covered with snow to the depth of several inches, rendering it almost impossible to roll our coach to-day. The snow would have clung to the hoofs of our mules and to the tire of our coach so as to render our progress very slow. Under these circumstances I deemed it best to send the mail forward on mules in charge of one of the two hired men, accompanied by a passenger equally familiar with the road, who very kindly volunteered to accompany the mail and rider. They each took a riding mule, also a third mule packed with the mail, provisions, and a few small articles. These animals they were to change at Fort Clarke, with yet another change, if possible, at Dharris. (They made the trip to San Antonio in good order and in time, delivering the mail at 6 a. m. the morning of the 9th.) This morning, after the mail was gone, I sent our mules back to Fort Lancaster with directions to have them well fed with grain, returning them to our camp by night with an additional supply of grain and provisions if the snow melted so that we could proceed. In the course of the afternoon, the weather looking threatening, I sent one of my clerks, who volunteered to go on foot, to the quartermaster with a request that he would send out a team of mules and haul us back to the fort; this request he promptly acceded to, and we reached there about 10 o’clock at night. Having despatched the mail, there was now no cause for our immediate haste; I, therefore, determined to recruit my animals at Fort Lancaster before continuing our journey. With this view I remained there for three days.

January 7.—This morning we left Fort Lancaster the second time. We had for company a party under escort to Fort Hudson. This evening we met the mail coach which left San Antonio December 24. It had been detained several days by high water in the Medina river at Castroville, being afterwards caught in the same snow storm that had delayed our coach; like us they were compelled to lie by and wait a day or two for the snow to disappear. As they had but commenced their journey to Birchville, they could not send their mail forward on pack animals as we did. Again, as the up mail contains newspapers it is much heavier than the down mail.

Nothing of special interest occurred on the road to San Antonio differing from the usual routine which I have sketched from day to day. I staid at Fort Hudson and at Fort Clarke long enough to attend to the business of the line at each of those posts. I did this in the absence of any one to take my place, though I was yet in doubt as to my own position.

January 17.—Reached San Antonio to-night.

January 18.—Received to-day a revocation of my authority from Mrs. Birch, the revocation dated the 26th of last October; I ceased at once to act for the line and prepared to come north, giving the new local agent every information the limited time permitted.

January 19.—I left for Washington.

The question is frequently asked as to whether we have a well defined road all the way from San Antonio to San Diego. To this I answer that it is as plain a road as any stage route over which a mail is carried in coaches for your department. An emigrant would find it as impossible to miss his way when once on our road either going to or returning from California, as he would if traveling in a country where guide posts marked every cross-road.

An examination of my table of distances will show four military posts between San Antonio and Birchville; from Birchville to La Mesilla we have a settled country all the way; from La Mesilla to Tucson, we have not at present any military posts, but I am informed that the War Department contemplates placing two forts in this portion of Arizona, immediately on the completion of the Fort Yuma and El Paso wagon road. In the whole distance of 460 miles from Tucson to San Diego, one hundred and fifteen miles is the longest distance at present between any of our mail stations.

An emigrant passing over our route will meet or be overtaken by a mail party four times every month, while from our mail conductors he can always obtain the reliable information as to road, wood, water, grass, camping places, with directions where to find safe valleys in which to feed his stock for a few weeks, and transmit messages, letters, or any desired intelligence from friends before or behind him. I have received many expressions of satisfaction from emigrants I met on the road, and, also, from others in California, who, last season, on the trip, realized, in a small way, the advantages of the mail, in these respects to overland emigration.

When camping, after a drive of about ten miles, we unharness in the middle of the road, and from one end of our route to the other, from San Antonio to San Diego, the road can almost be measured by the ashes of our camp fires.

From Fort Hudson, in Texas, to Tazotal, on the Gila, a distance of 1,200 miles, nearly the whole of our route is over an elevated, dry country. When but a small amount of labor was requisite at first to make a road suited to staging, only a portion of this has ever had any labor bestowed on it beyond that of passing trains. From San Antonio to El Paso, a distance of 651 miles, the road was opened in the year 1849, by a government train of several hundred wagons, en route to El Paso; since that time, the continual passage of government and freighting trains, as also of the Santa Fé and San Antonio mail coaches, had beaten down an excellent road, before the labors of the El Paso and Fort Yuma wagon road expedition commenced.

That portion of our route situated between El Paso and the Pimos villages has never had even a government train to open it. Col. Leach’s labors will be of great service in straitening it, finding new watering places, enlarging others, and in constructing tanks, if the appropriation will admit of such an expenditure. A consultation of the items of my own journey, where I have put down each day’s advance, will tend to show the excellent condition of our roads, for we used a coach all the way from San Antonio to San Diego, sometimes drawn by six, never by less than four mules.

There are a number of formidable looking ranges of mountains upon all the maps, running across Arizona, north and south, which look to be barriers almost impassable without a great expenditure of time and money. Our road we found to be through, rather than over, these mountains; although they appeared formidable at a distance, yet, on approaching, they generally proved to be isolated buttes, with our road winding around them by easy grades through the valleys, or else passing over some low span or saddle, no way impeding staging. These passes in the mountains seemed to be formed by nature on purpose for a road. The speed our coaches are making through these mountain ranges is the best evidence of their easy and expeditious passage. By my journal of August 25, it will be noticed that the speed we made from Cook’s spring, through the Sierra Madre mountains to and beyond the Mimbres river, was 21 miles in five hours; through all the other mountain passes we made much the same rate of speed.

Having formed my ideas of mountains and mountain roads from a pretty extensive experience among the Sierra Nevada of California, was very forcibly struck by the fact of not meeting a regular chain of mountains all the way from San Antonio until I reached the coast range of California, eighty miles from San Diego. I wish to call particular attention to the distinction between ranges of mountains like the Alleghanies and Sierra Nevada, and the system of isolated buttes scattered over portions of our line and around which we pass by valley roads well adapted to speed. The mountains south of the Gila, and its immediate neighborhood, do not interfere with our road; they come up close to the river in many places, but leave an ample passage way for our road around the bases. These mountains are mostly what the Mexicans term Mesas; high hills, flat on their tops. It appears as if the plain had formerly been level with the tops of the hills, some hundreds of feet higher than it is now. This same appearance of Mesas is found along the Pecos.

On the 15th of November, looking northward from our station at the Maricopa Wells, I could plainly see that the high mountains to the north of the Gila, standing in a bold relief against the sky, were covered at their summits with a cap of snow, glistening in the pleasant sun of the valley, where we were. Abundance of rain had fallen throughout the Gila valley this season, but no cold weather had come as yet; we naturally concluded that the rain of the valley was snow on the tops of the mountains. In the day time we found it so pleasant that bathing was our constant practice, though the nights were cool and damp from heavy dews. I am informed that all or most of these valleys north of the Gila have a rich soil, capable of sustaining a large population. I trust, on some future trip, to be able to explore them, as they are situated within what is likely to become a portion of the new Territory of Arizona, through the whole length of which our line passes. It was among some of the valleys to which I refer, that John R. Bartlett, esq., found evidences of a race of men long since extinct, who must have been superior to the present Indians of the country.

At present we have no good road directly over the coast range of mountains from Lassator’s ranch to Vallecito on the desert, but the enterprise of the people of San Diego will secure us one at an early day. When I came over the mountains on my way east, there was a large working party of Indians, under Mr. Lassator, diligently using the means which had been subscribed in the county for a road over the mountains.

Wood, water, and grass, are the emigrant’s necessities in crossing our continent. Over our route we have enough of these for all purposes of staging or emigration. Through the country over which we pass, though there is enough water for emigration and staging, yet there is but one river not usually fordable; I refer to the Colorado of the West. This is a great deal in its favor as a stage road. If it were a heavy timbered country, it would not be likely to be so well grassed, as it would be sure to have large rivers troublesome to cross, and need an immense labor cutting down timber to open a road. As to grass, it is wonderfully provided all the way to our Maricopa station. Wood is generally scarce on our route. From San Antonio to San Felipe creek, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles, there is an abundance of wooded country; post oaks and mezquit flats are quite numerous. Along Devil’s river, for a distance of twenty miles, there is plenty of wood.

At Forts Lancaster and Davis, oak wood is hauled from a distance of seven miles to supply the military posts. Along the Rio Grande universally the fuel is the root of the mezquit tree, a sort of underground forest; it burns with as hot a fire as hickory wood, and makes superior charcoal. Cotton-wood is used along the Rio Grande valley, being the fuel used in some places. We found wood scarce all the way from the Rio Grande to the Maricopas; from thence to Fort Yuma along the Gila abundant; then it is scarce over the desert; at the watering places, however, enough can be found in spots not remote from the wells; once among the San Diego mountains there is wood enough. Over these portions of our road where we find no wood at the springs or watering holes, and for want of time cannot wander off among the mountain gulches to look for it, we secure enough for all purposes of cooking from the great abundance of roots generally found just cropping out of the ground; these make an excellent fire.

An examination of my table of distances will show no want of water along the route; all my measurements are to and from well known watering places. From San Antonio our road is extremely well watered until we reach the head of the San Pedro or Devil’s river, a distance of 218 miles; going west thence, we have a jornada of forty-four miles; thence another of thirty miles, between permanent roads, on to the Pecos. In the rainy season there are plenty of places in this distance where the water stands in natural tanks in the rocks, or in cañons. This stretch of forty-four miles is the longest we have on the road between permanent water stations; it forms however no great obstacle to staging. We haul water for ourselves in kegs, and the mules, having to go about twelve to sixteen hours without it, do not suffer in consequence. We have no scarcity of water in Arizona for our present purposes.—(See schedule of distances.) Our watering places on the desert west of Fort Yuma are by no means far apart, but the supply is limited at all times. It will be a matter of absolute necessity to enlarge them before the overland emigration of this spring reaches the desert. The improvement of those now used, as well as the digging of others, will be very easily accomplished.

I am of opinion that the chances of procuring water by boring artesian wells on the elevated table lands, over which our road runs, may be considered as very limited. At any rate, as a practical mode of procuring water for us, it will not do. Supposing Captain Pope should demonstrate the feasibility of boring these artesian wells, even then private individuals cannot afford to make them, neither can they wait for government to do so. We should be compelled, in staging across the continent at a rate of speed necessitating the erection of stations, to adopt the old Mexican method of building tanks wherever the natural formation of the country admits of it which it does in numerous places along our road.

As for grass, the country through which our road runs is unequalled as a grazing country, in the opinion of practiced men acquainted with the subject. I have heard farmers pronounce the gramma and mezquit grass nearly equal to clover. There is a peculiarity of the grass of this section which adapts it most admirably to our purpose; when appearing dried up and dead, it contains life and nutriment; an examination will show this on plucking it. When the rains come, instead of our having to wait wholly for new grass to spring up, we find the old dried grass renewing its life, becoming green again, until in a few days the country is covered with an excellent crop of grass, as good as if it had been growing many weeks.

Many of the finest ranches or grazing farms in the State of Sonora were once located in what is now called Arizona; the buildings are at present deserted; the inhabitants have fled from the Apaches, who stole their cattle, as far as possible destroyed the buildings, and murdered or carried into captivity the inhabitants.

The section of the country along the Gila river is commonly pronounced by emigrants the worst portion of the whole southern road across our continent; but even along this river, though it is not superabundantly supplied with grazing lands, no one need let their animals suffer for the want of food. Travellers must take some care in examining to the right and left of the road. To those who have just been passing over the finest grazing lands in the world, where a range of a few hundred yards would suffice for their teams anywhere along the road, the Gila naturally seems a desert. As a fair illustration of the grazing in Arizona, I would state that an overheated horse or mule will actually founder on the rich gramma grass as he would on clover. On nearly all the hills found along the Gila river spots of gramma and quinta or bunch grass are scattered in places. Young willows also grow along the river banks, which are good food for animals. A weed much liked by them and very nutritious is found in many places along the bottoms. Mules are also fond of the fallen leaves of the mezquit tree. By crossing the river and making a little exploration, spots of good grazing can be found on the north side of the Gila. Lastly, there is in the season an abundant supply of excellent food for animals in the mezquit beans which are found on our road along the Gila, from Tezotal to Fort Yuma. These beans fall from the tree as soon as ripe; animals will leave their corn to eat them, as I have proved.

The Indians make a kind of flour from these beans by roasting and then pounding them; they contain a large portion of saccharine matter, so much so that the Pimos manufacture from them a species of syrup. They commence falling in August; we found a great many under the trees in November, after the emigration had passed down the river.

On my return trip from San Diego I brought my mules into our Maricopa station in a much better condition than when I left Fort Yuma with them. My practice was this: while one of my two teams of mules was working in the coaches for a couple of hours at a walk, I would have the other team under charge of an experienced man, either ahead or behind the coaches, eating their fill of grass, beans, or whatever they could find. At the end of two hours we would change teams, giving the other set of mules their chance for loitering behind to eat.

Sometimes emigrants who are going to California pasture their cattle on the bottom lands of the Colorado river for a few weeks before attempting to cross the desert; others again put on at once, in order to reach as soon as possible the excellent grazing on the coast range. We keep a mulada at Fort Yuma for our changes, which we send out every day to feed in the river bottom, under charge of a Mexican herder, bringing them in at night for safety.

In crossing the Colorado desert of ninety-five miles from Fort Yuma to Carissa there is but little for animals to eat. In some few places arroyos make up to the northward, containing mezquit trees full of beans, but these are limited in number, while they are not situated at the watering places.

In the mountains near Carissa, or at Vallecito, good grazing commences again. I am assured by men familiar with this section of country that good hay can be cut on the mountain sides, a few miles south of the present desert, and hauled on to the line of our road at a fair price. Mezquit beans can also be procured sufficiently near the road to be sold to travellers at reasonable rates. One advantage of our road is, that any emigrant who may be en route to California can now leave his stock in Arizona to recruit, while he takes passage for San Diego or along the road to explore for himself the country over which he intends to pass.

The country we stage over is a grazing and mineral country, rather than an agricultural one, though I found no lack of grain along the road. In seasons of rain an abundance of grain is raised all the way from San Antonio to Fort Clarke; from there to Birchville there are no settlements, and the grain has to be hauled from either end to the military posts between these two points; along the Rio Grande the whole country is capable of cultivation. Wheat, corn, beans, pumpkins, and onions of very superior flavor are all raised in great abundance by the Spanish population.

Flour of an excellent quality is made at a mill on the Rio Grande, a couple of miles above El Paso; it is owned and managed by Simeon Hart, esq., who is the contractor for supplying with flour all the forts in that section of the country.

In many places along the Rio Grande our road lies through cornfields miles in length. At Tucson we found no difficulty in purchasing corn and barley for our mules; flour from wheat grown in the Santa Cruz valley, and ground at Tucson by the Mexicans; also beans and onions.

At Maricopa station we bought, of the Indians, flour, beans, peas, green and dried pumpkins, chickens, eggs, corn, and wheat. At Fort Yuma every thing has to be imported. There is a considerable importation there of flour, pinola, pounded parched corn, jerked beef, and sugar, called pinoche, all of which comes on pack animals from Sonora; no doubt a large trade will spring up from this when Colorado City becomes of consequence. Nearly everything is now brought from San Francisco by way of the Gulf of California and steamer up the Colorado river.

Arizona ought to be supplied through Guyamas, a Mexican port on the Gulf of California.

Ours is emphatically a stage road. If it were a rich agricultural country all the way from San Antonio to San Diego, it would be impossible for a stage line to cross it in schedule time until some remote day, when the whole distance shall have been settled, and towns built at convenient distances, with good roads connecting them. Our present road would be called a superior one in any State for thirteen hundred miles of its length, and a fair road the remainder of the distance, save twenty-two miles of sand in the Colorado desert, from Cook’s Wells to Alamo Mucho.

In the valley of the Rio Grande I had an application from an old mountain man, who wanted a situation as guide. This man had trapped beaver in all the principal streams falling into the Gila and Colorado rivers. He said the trappers pronounced our present route across Arizona a good one at all seasons of the year.

I had a good opportunity of knowing the nature of the climate we have to contend with. Leaving San Antonio in August, and going directly through, I passed over the road in the hottest months of the year. Then, leaving San Diego October 23, and spending nearly three months returning, I experienced the winter weather over the same country. It was very warm in San Antonio in July; but when we had once commenced ascending to the table lands of Texas, the heat became comparatively moderated, with nights particularly pleasant. In going down the Gila, where we were descending toward the level of the sea, the heat was very great, so much so that, for comfort, and having a full moon, we travelled by night and lay by during the middle of the day. In my experience of the heat on the Gila, which looks so formidable, as marked by the thermometer, I suffered much less with that instrument indicating a hundred and over than I have suffered in the Atlantic States with the thermometer at 85 or 90. The air was pure and clear, the heat produced a copious perspiration, and gave no feeling of oppression in breathing.

In my plans for returning across the continent, the recollection of the hot days along the Gila, or on the Colorado desert, never present themselves to me as any serious inconvenience. The heat does not oppress animals any more than it does men. Our mail carriers, who regularly cross the desert, frequently complain of the blinding influence of the sun reflected in their eyes from the bright sands; I never heard any of them complain of unpleasant effects from the heat, and we have a number of men employed who have traversed this desert for several years past. In returning to San Antonio, through Arizona and Texas, I experienced the northers a number of times, having been delayed once by snow; but none of our party ever suffered anything more than the natural annoyances incidental to wet feet and damp blankets. I make here some few extracts from my journal about the cold I experienced on our route:

December 5.—At El Paso have had a week of cold weather, with an occasional strong north wind during the time. Ice formed in a pond 100 feet across in the rear of the house; ice also made in the acequias, but the river was barely skimmed over once very early in the morning. Only once in a great many years, in El Paso, has the ice been thick enough to put up a few tons in an ice house.

December 9.—The mail coach came into El Paso from Tucson, and the conductor reported a norther, accompanied by snow, in the Mimbres. It fell on them the same day we had a norther at El Paso, the 5th, as above; the snow melted as it fell, so that by making a longer morning drive than common he reached the shelter of the trees at the Mimbres; none of his mules were chilled by being exposed without blankets, after unharnessing. The same conductor reports a snow squall on the previous trip, without any detention in either case to the mail, and without the snow lying on the ground at all; it melted as it fell both times.

A letter per this mail from our train going west reports the weather cold enough in the night to freeze water in the canteens, but no one suffering from cold by sleeping on the ground. During the day it was bright and warm, forming a pleasant contrast to the night.

At El Paso, December 9, we received advices of the northern wagon road expedition having returned for the winter. I consulted Colonel Leach, superintendent of the El Paso and Fort Yuma wagon road as to his movements; he assured me he had no intention of going into winter quarters, but, on the contrary, should continue on the road through the winter months; in fact, he deemed them the best suited to his purposes of shortening and improving the road.

The surgeon of Fort Lancaster, who keeps a meteorological journal, said they had not as much snow in that part of Texas during the whole of the past six years taken together as had fallen during the present winter. The snow which fell on the 3d had so far disappeared from the ground as to allow the animals to graze sufficiently, but I waited in order to accompany a detachment of mounted infantry going on a scout as far as Fort Hudson.

January 6.—The snow had entirely disappeared.

January 7.—We camped to-night on the Llano Estacado, about half way across it; there was not a particle of snow on the ground. We found one advantage from the snow, it had melted and run into a natural stone tank, giving us abundance of water for ourselves and stock; it will last some weeks. An expense of a few hundred dollars in building up the sides of the tank would make it capable of holding several millions of gallons of water.

The Llano Estacado is here very narrow; we cross the extreme southern portion of it immediately south of us. Not a mile distant, I saw the cañons and broken gulches running eastward to the Devil’s river, and westward to the Pecos.

I never had a case of sickness among either men or passengers during my whole trip, excepting a little annoyance from an over indulgence in fruit in the valley of the Rio Grande. The salubrious air must be conducive to health. Such is the purity and clearness of the atmosphere that the stars shine at night with a brilliancy unknown in this section of the country; cloudy days or nights are an exception, and the stars at night actually give light enough to enable us on our night drives, of which we have a considerable number, to find the road. It can be seen, for some distance ahead of the mules, very plainly.

Climatic boundary on the west.

October 24.—The coast range of mountains, which approaches the sea in San Diego county, is the climatic boundary between California and Arizona. Our stock is kept at Lassator’s, 48 miles, nearly due west, from San Diego, in a beautiful valley among the mountains; in San Diego they have a charming climate the year round, while among the mountains snow falls occasionally during the winter, which in the valley below turns to rain. The snow remains on the ground but a day or two. In California there is no rain from March until October, but showers occasionally fall in these valleys during the summer months, when it is the rainy season in Sonora.

The exploring party I sent over the mountain on the 15th of September were rained on all one night. We saw clouds to the westward, but not one drop of rain fell upon us.

By reference to my journal it will be noticed that rain fell on us at intervals all the way from the opening of the Rio Grande valley until I came near to Fort Yuma. While the coast along the Pacific was, in September and October, parched with a drought, compelling rancheros to send their cattle into the mountains; our contractor was cutting hay to send over to our station on the desert. Lassator’s is twelve miles from the top of the coast range, which we there descend by a mule path for several miles on our way to Vallecito, though a good road can be made with a moderate amount of money. After crossing the desert, emigrants usually give their stock a run of the excellent grazing valleys in these mountains, before proceeding further on their journey.

It is hardly possible for me to do more than sketch a few of the changes which our road has produced in the country through which we pass.

The War Department uses the facilities offered by our line for a regular semi-monthly correspondence with seven military posts.

Persons interested in mining pursuits are now looking with great interest towards the silver and copper mines of Arizona. Our mail not only carries the correspondence which takes the money to the mining parties, but regularly bring reports of their success, while passengers are, all the while, taking our line to Arizona; our stations afford stopping places, and our agents information to all who prefer their own mode of conveyance; such travellers are numerous.

The newly appointed consul for Guyamas takes our stage as far as Tucson, starting from San Antonio, Texas.

Our line is already forming the basis of a new State, rich in minerals, half way between Texas and California.

Very respectfully,

I. C. WOODS, Superintendent S. A. & S. D. Mail Line.

Hon. A. V. Brown, Postmaster General.

Accompanying this please find the measurements from point to point on the whole road from San Antonio to San Diego, with names of the watering places.

Table of distances, and from one watering-place to another from starting point.

From San Antonio to Leon river 6.53

From Leon to Castroville, “Medina” river 18.00

From Castroville to Dharris “Saco” river 25.28

From Dharris to Ranchero creek 8.38

From Ranchero creek to Sabinal creek 3.94

From Sabinal creek to Camanche creek 5.00

From Camanche creek to Rio Frio 8.46

From Rio Frio to Head of Leona “Uvalde” 6.08

From Uvalde to Nueces 9.04

From Nueces to Turkey creek 10.27

From Turkey creek to Elm creek 15.23

From Elm creek to Las Moras river, Fort Clarke 7.13

—— 123.34

From Fort Clarke to Piedra Pinto 7.00

From Piedra Pinto to Maverick creek 8.86

From Maverick creek to San Felipe 12.61

From San Felipe to first crossing of San Pedro or Devil’s river 10.22

From First Crossing to Painted Caves 2.54

From Painted Caves to California Spring 15.73

From California Spring to Willow Spring 2.00

From Willow Spring to Fort Hudson, or second crossing of San Pedro or Devil’s river 16.39

—— 75.35

From Fort Hudson to Head of San Pedro or Devil’s river 19.50

From Head of river to Howard Springs 44.00

From Howard Springs to Live Oak creek 30.44

From Live Oak creek to Fort Lancaster 3.00

—— 96.94

From Fort Lancaster to Pecos 4.29

From Pecos Crossing to Pecos Spring 6.00

From Pecos Spring to Leaving of Pecos 32.26

From Leaving of Pecos to Arroyo Escondido 16.26

From Arroyo Escondido to Escondido Spring 8.58

From Escondido Spring to Camanche Spring 19.40

From Camanche Spring to Leon Hole 8.88

From Leon Hole to Hackberry pond 11.00

From Hackberry pond to Limpia creek 32.00

From Limpia creek to Fort Davis 18.86

—— 157.53

From Fort Davis to Point of Rocks 10.00

From Point of Rocks to Barree Springs 8.42

From Barree Springs to Deadman’s Hole 13.58

From Deadman’s Hole to Van Horn’s Wells 32.83

From Van Horn’s Wells to Eagle Springs 19.74

From Eagle Springs to first camp on Rio Grande 31.42

From first camp on Rio Grande to Birchville 35.00

—— 150.99

From Birchville to San Eleazario 24.80

From San Eleazario to Socorro 5.45

From Socorro to Isletta 3.10

From Isletta to El Paso 14.14

—— 47.49

From El Paso to Cottonwood 22.00

From Cottonwood to Fort Fillmore 22.00

From Fort Fillmore to La Mesilla 6.00

—— 50.00

From La Mesilla to Cook’s Spring 65.00

From Cook’s Spring to Rio Mimbres 18.00

From Rio Mimbres to Ojo La Vaca 17.00

From Ojo La Vaca to Ojo de Ynez 10.00

From Ojo de Ynez to Peloncilla 34.00

From Peloncilla to Rio Saur or San Domingo 18.00

From Rio Saur to Apache Springs 23.00

From Apache Springs to Dos Cabesas Springs 9.00

From Dos Cabesas Springs to Dragon Springs 26.00

From Dragon Springs to mouth of Quercos cañon 18.00

From mouth of Quercos cañon to San Pedro crossing 6.00

From San Pedro to Cienega 20.00

From Cienega to Cienega creek 13.00

From Cienega creek to Mission San Xavier 20.00

From Mission to Tucson 8.00

—— 305

From Tucson to Pico Chico mountain 5.00

From Pico Chico to first camp on Gila 35.00

From first camp on Gila to Maricopa Wells 29.00

—— 99.00

From Maricopa Wells to Tezotal, across Jornada 40.00

From Tezotal to Ten-mile camp 10.00

From Ten-mile camp to Murderer’s grave 8.00

From Murderer’s grave to Oatman’s Flat, 1st crossing of Gila 15.00

From Oatman’s Flat to 2d crossing of Gila 25.00

From 2d crossing of Gila to Peterman’s station 32.00

From Peterman’s station to Antelope Peak 20.00

From Antelope Peak to Little Corral 24.00

From Little Coral to Fort Yuma 16.00

—— 190.00

From Fort Yuma to Pilot Knob 7.00

From Pilot Knob to Cook’s Wells 13.00

From Cook’s Wells to Alamo Mucho 21.94

From Alamo Mucho to Indian Wells 20.94

From Indian Wells to Carissa creek 32.24

—— 95.12

From Carissa creek to Vallecito 18.00

From Vallecito to Lassator’s ranch 18.00

From Lassator’s ranch to Julian’s ranch 7.00

From Julian’s ranch to Williams’ ranch 7.00

From Williams’ ranch to Ames’ ranch 14.00

From Ames’ ranch to Mission San Diego 16.00

From Mission to San Diego 5.00

——— 85.00

Recapitulation.

San Antonio to Fort Clarke 123.34

Fort Clarke to Fort Hudson 75.35

Fort Hudson to Fort Lancaster 96.94

Fort Lancaster to Fort Davis 157.53

Fort Davis to Birchville 150.99

Birchville to El Paso 47.49

——— 651.64

El Paso to La Mesilla 50.00

La Mesilla to Tucson 305.00

Tucson to Maricopa 99.00

Maricopa to Fort Yuma 190.00

Fort Yuma to Carissa 95.12

Carissa to San Diego 85.00

————

San Antonio to San Diego 1,475.76

========

Itinerary of my own journey across the continent.

August 1.—From San Antonio to Castroville 25 miles.

2.—From Castroville to 9 miles east of Uvalde 46 ”

3.—From camp to 11 miles west of Turkey creek 40 ”

4.—From camp to near San Felipe creek 40 ”

5.—From camp to 10 miles east of Fort Hudson 35 ”

6.—From camp to 10 miles west of San Pedro 44 ”

7.—From camp to 6 miles east of Live Oak creek 53 ”

8.—From camp to 6 miles above Pecos spring 28 ”

9.—From camp to Escondido creek, 8 miles east of the spring 44 ”

10.—From camp to 10 miles west of 46 ”

11.—From camp to Limpia creek 33 ”

12.—From camp to Fort Davis 19 ”

13.—From Fort Davis to 7 miles west of Dead Man’s Hole 42 ”

14.—From camp to 8 miles west of Eagle Springs 51 ”

15.—From camp to 10 miles south of Birchville 49 ”

16.—From camp to Socorro 40 ”

17.—From Socorro to Franklin, El Paso 17 ”

18, 19, 20, 21.—In El Paso.

22.—From El Paso to Fort Fillmore 44 ”

23.—From Fort Fillmore to Picacho village, 6 miles west of Mesilla 12 ”

24.—From Picacho village to 9 miles east of Cook’s Spring 50 ”

25.—From camp to mouth of Burro Mount cañon, near Ojo de Ynez 55 ”

26.—From camp to 9 miles east of River Saur 43 ”

27.—From camp to 9 miles west of Dos Cabesas Spring 50 ”

28.—From camp to ford of San Pedro river 40 ”

29.—From camp to Mission San Xavier 53 ”

30.—From Mission San Xavier to 30 miles west of Tucson 38 ”

31.—From camp to 1-mile camp on Gila 40 ”

Sept. 1.—From camp to Tezotal 69 ”

2.—From Tezotal to second crossing of Gila 58 ”

3.—From second crossing to Antelope Peak 52 ”

4.—From Antelope Peak to Fort Yuma 40 ”

5.—From Fort Yuma to Alamo Mucho 42 ”

6.—From Alamo Mucho to Carissa creek 53 ”

7.—From Carissa creek to Lassator’s 36 ”

8.—From Lassator’s to San Diego 49 ”

——

1,476 miles.

Making the trip personally from San Antonio to San Diego in thirty-eight days.

[From the San Antonio Herald.]

A few notes and distances from San Antonio to San Diego.

The following information in relation to the distances from this place to San Diego, has been obtained from the superintendent of the S. A. & S. D. Mail Stage Company, who has passed over the route and back, and the statements as to distances and the nature of the route may be implicitly relied on:

1. The distance from San Antonio to El Paso is 652 miles, and the character of the route is so well known to most of our readers that we deem it unnecessary to enter into any description of it. Grass and water are considered sufficiently abundant. The road passes by a number of the military posts, and though Indians are occasionally met with, they have seldom made any hostile demonstrations, and have never, but once, made an attack upon the train.

2. From El Paso to Messilla Valley in the Gadsden Purchase, the route running up the east bank of the Rio Grande to Fort Fillmore, (N. M.) where it crosses the river into the Messilla Valley, the distance is 50 miles.

3. From Messilla Valley to Tucson the distance is 305 miles. This portion of the route is remarkably fine travelling, with good grass and water. The streams on this section are the Mimbres and San Pedro, both fordable, and usually crossed with but little trouble. The Apache Indians are met with occasionally on this route, yet the mail party which here consists of eight men, has never been attacked in making some thirty-two trips over the route.

4. From Tucson to Maricopa Wells, (Pimos Villages,) is 99 miles. On this portion of the route the mail is carried by two men. Very few Indians are seen, and they are harmless. The Maricopa Wells are at the further end of a beautiful and fertile valley, occupied by the Pimos Indians, who raise corn and other grain in considerable quantities.—(See Journal.) On this portion of the route, and indeed, throughout the entire distance from San Antonio to San Diego, the road is well defined, and is a finely beaten level track, with just enough gravel for the most part to make it pleasant travelling.

5. From Maricopa Wells down the river Gila to Fort Yuma is 190 miles. On this portion of the route the grass, though not abundant, is yet sufficient for the maintainance of trains and herds.—(See Journal.) Few Indians on the route, and they not dangerous. The mail train between these points consists of three men. Fort Yuma is situated on the west bank of the Great Colorado of the West, and just opposite the junction of the Gila with that stream. There is a splendid large ferry-boat on the Colorado here, sufficient to cross a six-horse stage. The river is about as large as the Ohio at Wheeling. This portion of the road is travelled considerably by Californians who carry on mining operations in the Gadsden Purchase. It is the opinion of all who have seen that region that it possesses the finest silver mines in the world, together with fine quantities of gold on the streams north of the Gila. These mines are now little known and but slightly valued, because of the proximity of the Indians, and their remoteness from mining facilities.

6. From Fort Yuma to Carissa creek is 95 miles. This section embraces the “great bugbear” known as the “Great Colorado Desert.” Between the two points there are three watering places on the direct route, whilst there are others that may be reached by a slight deflection. The mail party here consists of two men.

7. From Carissa creek to San Diego is 85 miles, its whole extent. This is by a new route, and at present not open to wagons its whole extent, but which, by a little work in the mountain passes, can be made an excellent road. The mail is now carried over this new route. The old route, over which the stages have to pass, is 125 miles. Over this section the mail is carried by a single person.