Note I'-8 — Chapter I · ITINERARY: THROUGH NEW MEXICO ON THE RIO GRANDE TO EL PASO, FEB. 27TH-MAR. 21ST, 1807.

Santa Fé is not "on the Rio Grande," as often loosely said, but at least 20 m. (direct) E. of that river, and considerably further than this up from the mouth of the small stream on which it is situated, in a rather out-of-the-way place. This creek, Rio de Santa Fé, or Rio Chacito, comes down from the lofty Santa Fé mts. under which the town nestles, and runs with a general S. W. course into the Rio Grande between the town of Peña Blanca and the old pueblo of Cochiti—places 3 m. apart. Cochiti is a Keresan pueblo on the W. bank of the Rio Grande; present pop. perhaps 250. Peña Blanca, often called Piña Blanca, on the E. bank, is a place where the Rio Grande can be forded, to take the old road from Santa Fé to Fort Wingate.

Santa Fé was first entered and occupied by the Army of the West under General Stephen Watts Kearny, Aug. 18th, 1846—his cowardly Excellency Don Manuel Armijo having blustered and promptly evacuated the place on the approach of our forces. The site of Fort Marcy was selected by Lieutenants W. H. Emory and J. F. Gilmer, in a commanding position 600 yards from the plaza of the town, and the work began on the 23d. On Sept. 22d General Kearny issued his manifesto for the government of New Mexico, under the authority of the President of the United States; appointing as governor Charles Bent (soon afterward cruelly massacred at Taos), and as secretary Donaciano Vigil; other territorial officers appointed were Richard Dallum, Francis P. Blair, Charles Blummer, Eugene Lertensdorfer, Joab Houghton, Antonio José Otero, and Carl Bavbien—the last three as judges of the supreme court. A copy of the original document, in Spanish, is given in Lieutenant J. W. Abert's report Ex. Doc. No. 41, 30th Cong., 1st Sess., pub. 1848, p. 453. The population of Santa Fé at that time was somewhere about 3,000; it is now only a little over 6,000. It was probably the site of a pueblo before 1500; but the present town has no authentic history back of 1608, when it was founded by Juan de Oñate as a capital or seat of government. The town may boast an unbroken record as such from that day to this, in spite of changing hands several times.