The Story of Arizona

              THE OCA:TILLA
THE
STORY OF 'ARIZONA
BY
WILL H. ROBINSON
Author of ''The Man from Yesterday·," ''The
Golden Palace of Never/and," ''The
Knotted Cord," Etc.,
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ILLUSTRATED
THE BERRYHILL COMP ANY
.PHOENIX, .ARIZONA.
Publ'ishers
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COPYRIGHTED, 1919
BY
THE BERRYHILL COMPANY
All rights re􀀎􀹥erved
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HAMM.0NO PRESS
W B. CONKEY Ca:OMPANY
CHICAGO
TO THE
PATRIOTIC MEN OF ARIZONA
•
WHO IN TnIS G·RAV E CRISIS OF THE WORL;>J'S HISTOI{Y,
THOUGH COUNTING T:S:E COST YET WITH EYES EVER
EAGER .AND HEARTS FULL OF HIGH PURPOSE, H.AV E
CROSSED CONTINENT .AND SE.A AND TODAY .A'.RE WRITING - .
ON THE BATTLEFIELDS OF FRANCE WHAT MAY WELL BE
THE MQST GLORIQUS PAGE OF THE STATE'S Hf 8T0RY,
THIS BOOK IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED. OCTOBER, 1918.
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I
I.
- II.
III.
IV.
v.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.
-X.
XI.
XII.
XIII.
XIV.
xv.
XVI.
XVII. .
XVIII.
XIX.
xx.
XXI.
CONTENTS
House and Canal Builders of the Desert-
Clif Dwellers of the Uplands - - 13
The Coming of the Spaniards - 33
Spanish Mission Days - - 53
The Arrival of the A n1ericans - 77
The War with Mexico - 86
'fhe Boundary Survey - - 97
'The G􀃃􌍤dsden Purchase - 103
Mining and Transpottation from the Gadsden
P11·chase to the Civil War - 113,
Attempts to Establish Territorial Government - 122
Filibusters in J\1e:xico - War Depa1-tment
Camels 127
The Vengeance of Coohise - - 133
The Civil Wa:r 139
Prospecting Parties in Civil War Times - - 152
Arizona a Political Entity - 157
1\!lilita1-y and the Indians - - 183
Saloons and ''Bad Men" -The Bogus Baron of
the Colorados - - - 223
Transportation After the War-Pack-trains,
Stages and Sixteen-mule Freighters - 24
Arizona Mines After the Civil War - 250
Labor - 287
Tilling the Soil􀃄􌐠 The Roosevelt Reservoir-
Verde Reservoir Sites-The Laguna Proj­ect-
Irrigation Resources of Arizona­Crops-
Gotton Growing-Stock Raising-
OstriGhes;-Bison - 296
Churches and Schools-'l'he Mormons-The
Re􀃅􌕴toration of San Xavier-Other Churches
-Y. M. C. A. -Scho·ols-The State Univer­sity-
1\1:odem Indians a.nd Indian Schools - 323
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6 CONTENTS
XXII. The Spanish-American War-The Rough
Riders - - - - - - 346
XXIII. Arizona at Last a State-Anthem, Flower
and Flag· - - - - - - - - 351
XXIV. Scenic Arizona-The Grand Canyon-Auto-mobile
Roads-Hotels - - - - 367
XXV. Arizona Cities of Today-Tucson-Phoenix-
- Pres0ott-Bisl;>ee-Dougl􀁶􇘭-Other Towns - 379
XXVI. Arizona's Part in the World's War - - - 403
XXVII. Arizona Plant Life (Written in collaboration
with John J. Thorber, A. M.) - - - 416
XXVIII. Some Arizona Beasts atid Birds - 436
PREFACE
S every one knows, the real purpose of a
pref ace to a history is to give the author
an opportunity-quite casually, of course­to
toss modest floral tributes at himself as he tells
you not only what a Matchless Volume he has just
written, but as well calls attention to the erudition
employed by himself in going only to original
sources for hls information, and in so doing con­sulting
freely the works of Confucius, Tatistchev
and Sheherazade-all in their original tongues.
If this is done with suficient dash and elan, as
the gentle reader holds the M. V. in her hands,
tears of grief will gather in her left eye at the
thought o-f all the people dead and gone who will
never have the opportunity of reading the M. V.,
while in her right eye crystal drops of joy will
glisten over the feast of reason that will soon be
hers.
Now, as to our erudition as the author of THE
STORY OF ARIZONA, permit us to say that the lan­guages
employed by the early chroniclers of the
Southwest were Spanish, Injun and Mediaeval
Arizonese. Just to show our familiarity with the
liquid vowels of Castile we here modestly sta􀁐􅁥e
that we can remark in Spanish, ''The shoes of our
uncle's cousin are two sizes too large to be worn
by our brother-in-law's stepson,'' with all the grace
7
8 PREFACE
of a Cervantes. '''Me hace V. e.l favor de oasarme
el chili con c.arne," as De Tornos so truly says. In
Injun we can call to a Pima as we meet him in
the road, ''Pap t' hay!'' as nonchalantly as a Salt
River missionary, and when it ·come-s to Arizonese,
we look only with sadness 11pon the tenderfoot
who calls a reata a lariat and thinks a remuda is
a new H@ove.rized war bread.
If there is any doubt iu. the minds of the· gentle
reader about ou.r access to Original Sources we
can only say that when we arrived in Arizona,
John Hance was still engaged in digging the Grand
Canyon and Herbert Patrick had barely completed
the hump o,n Camelback Mountain, from which
it will be seen tha,t at least a part of what has been
here indited bas the authority of contemporaneous
observatio.n; as for the rest, we have sp-ared our­selves
no labor in always going to the fact faGtory
for facts.
While we may seem to be wasting a good deal
of high-priced paper on this preface, we mQ;st say
that in t:rying to c.ompress the events of nearly four
centuries into a single volume we found that o·ur
space would ngt permit any elaborate system of
notes and citations. Many of our sources of
information will be found in the bibliography con­tained
herein. We also obtained much valuable
information from bulletins issued by diferent
branches of the University of Arizona and the
United States Forestry Service, as well as from
the proceedings of the State Legislatures and from
diferent Arizona oficials, including the Secretary
PREFACE 9
of State, the Superintendent of Public Instru.ction,
the Adjutant General and the State Ganie Warde·n.
To come down to the primary purpose of this
M. V., while we have seriously endeavored to make
the story a comprehensive, if brief, s·urvey of the
evolution of the land of Father Kino into the Com­monwealth
we now know as Arizona, 1naking it in
a way a pageant of cowled friars, steel-capped
Spanish conquistadores, painted Indians, be,vhis­kered
miners, swaggering _cowboys, and finally,. the
prophetic-eyed reclaimers of the desert, its first
object is to give entertainment to the reader­something,
after all, that should not wholly be
lost sight of on the p-art of the author.
Also, we have kept in mind that when Mrs.
Emerson de Moliere Browning, of Phoenix, or
Mrs. Many Horses, of the Navajo Reservation, is
called upon to prepare a ''paper'' to be read before
her respective woman's club, she has the right to
e,xpect that when she turns to THE STORY OF ARI­ZONA
she may do so in the 'Un Wavering faith that
the1·e is an authority somewhere for all that has
been set down therein. In retelling stories that
have more than one version, like the account of
the Oatman tragedy􀁱􇄠 the killing of Mangas Colo­rado
or the Penole Treaty, we have used the one
that seemed to bear the most evidence of accuracy.
Under the weight of our responsibilities to
Mrs. Many Horses, we regret that we have had to
be, at times, statistical; that in spite of our most
stringent quarantine regulations, figures and dry
facts would creep in. In consequence, while there
10 PREFACE
are ch apters that even we are willing to admit are
not wholly wit h out interest, there are others th at
read in places wit h the jocund sprightliness of an
abstract of title. We would like to mark th ese
arid spots wit h danger signals, but our skeptical
publish er fears we migh t get th ·em in th e wrong
place, and comfortably assures us th at the reader
will find th em soon enoug h as it is ..
Finally, if we sh ould be accused of putting
more emph asis upon th e picturesque th an upon
the ponderous, of spending more time wit h Padre
Garces and th e young man wh o dropped his sweet­heart
into the :rpuddy waters of an irrigation ditch
th an with h im who sit$ in the seat of the mig,hty,
we can only say that we never intended writing a
Who's Wh o. We'd lots rath er be accused of writ­ing
Wh o's Interesting-and vital.
It would probably be suspected, even if ,ve
didn't mention it, th at another pen th an ours h ad
a prominent part in writing th e ch apter on Arizona
Plant Life. Personally, our relations with trees
and flo,vers are entirely friendly. We can tell a
pine from an oak at a glance, know the bank
where th e Wild Th yme runs her overdraft, and
h ave watch ed beds of poppies metamor_ph ose dull
brown earth to tl cloth of gold for inany springs;
but wh en it comes to introducing the public to th e.
plants of th e State, no ·t only by th eir nicknames,
like ''Johnny Jump-ups'' or ''Owls' Clover,'' but
also occasio-nally droppin,g s11ch awful noms de
flora as Bacc h aris sarath roides, just to s how one's
familiarity wit h the language of the horticultural
Horace, we know it is time for us to call for h elp.
PREFACE 11
Now, we believe that when one is loo.king for a
dentist or a photographer to operate on him, the
best is none too good. We also believe that when
one has found one that can keep him from looking
like either Mutt or Jef-or can fill an aching void
,vith concentrated comfort-he ·has discovered a
blessing straight from the gods.· That is the way
,ve felt when Professor Thornber said he would
help us out.
If John J. Thornber, A. M., ne.eded an introdu,c­tion
to nature lovers of our section of out-of-doors,
we would simply say that he is the professor of
botany at the University of A1􀁖􅙩izona and ''the'' pre­eminent
authority on his specialty in the South­west.
As that isn't necessary, we will only mention
that he is the kind of a man who likes above· all
things to get out into the wilds during vacation
where he will sit down with his shru.bs a,nd plants
and hold conversation with them as he does with
his students in classroom. Do they reciprocate
his afection? Do they? Why, within twenty-f·our
hours they are telling him how the four-o'clocks
managed with the advanced time; how Miss Iris
Douglasiana got overheated and almost had a
sunstroke; and how Old Man Cactus got his feet
too wet during the last rain and had dreadful
spinal rheumatism.
So you see, Gentle Reader, with an authority
like this, statements mention.ed in the Plant chap­ter
have upon them a most incontrovertible seal
of authority. WILL H. ROBINSON.
CHANDLER, AltIZONA,
June 30, 1918.
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THE STORY OF ARIZONA
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CHAPTER I
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS OF
THE DESERT-CLIFF DWELLERS
OF THE UPLANDS
HE recorded history of primitive man begins
not with the written "\7ord or page, but
when he fashions and leaves behind him
weapons, tools and utensils of a time-resisting sub­stance,
or protects his dead by interment, so
within the confines of the territory now known as
Arizona the earliest people of whom we have any
real knowledge are the builders of canals and
adobe houses in the Salt and Gila valleys, the cave
and clif dwellers and the stone house builders of
the highlands of the State, and while their history
is of necessity largely veiled from the investigator,
still hy study the ethnologist has learned much
concerning their habits, and finally has been able
to make shrewd conjectures as to what ultimately
became of them.
In spite of the extravagant theories ot· imagina­tive
romancers who would have us believe that
these folk possess,ed a culture comparable to that
13
14 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
of Nineveh or Philae, we must keep in mind that
they were Indian-s, and although they attained a
civilizatio-n that was far above that of the savage
tribes surrounding theni, yet theirs were the lim­ited
lives neces.sitated by an existence in an age ot·
stone.
Nearly all of these ancient pe.ople were farmers.
In the lower Salt and Gila River valleys-, on ac .
count of the aridity of the climate, they raised their
crops by irrigation. According to surveys made by
Herbert R. Patrick, James C. Goodwin and otl1ets,
they constructed in the Salt River Valley 150 miles
of· main irrigatin.g canals (in one place through
solid rock), besides the ne.c·essary lateral ditches.
These canals received their water from Salt River,
which was raised to the required height by dams,.
doubtless built of brush and rock somewh·at lil{e·
those const, ructe.d by the early white settlers in the
same region.
All canals and their laterals, it must be remem­bered,
were dug by h.and without the aid of either
ho·rses or metal implements. Stone hoes and
wooden shovels made of the trunks of ironwood
trees were perhaps the tools most employed, and
the dirt was carried away in baskets, probably by
the women.
Irrigating thus, these ancient people raised corn,
beans, cotton and squash, also, probably, diferent
native grasses, not as we would for stock, but for
the: edible se.eds, which still form part of the
Indian's diet. The growth of' cacti, too, may have
been stimulated by the application of w·ater, for
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HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 15
many varieties of fruit from this thorny plant were
highly pr. ized by the aborigines. Nor must the
possibilities of the mesquite be-an and the squaw­berr
·y as articles of diet be forgotten, and the trees
and bushes_ which produce them were left on the
farms to bear valuable crops for the husbandman.
Fields were cultivated by these primitive farm­ers
and crops planted with the aid of sharpened
sticks fashioned, as were the shovels, with tl1e stone
ax, assisted perhaps with fire. In addition to the
more temporal dwellings made of reeds and brush
with thatched roofs which housed some of the
farmers on or near their own fields, they had towns
that could almost be ealled. cities, compose·d of
substantial adobe houses exceedingly well built
and of ten rising in pyramidal form to three or four
stories in height. While many of them may have
been used as c-ommunal dwellings or tenements,
some were doubtless designed as storehouses for
grain and various su·pplies and o-thers were us,ed
as citadels or dedicated to devotional or civic pur­poses,
as there is abundant evidence that religious
and administrative :tctivities occupied no incon­siderable
portion ot· their time.
In 1887, Frank Hamilton Cushing, a member
of the Hemenway-Southwestern archaeological
expedition, explored the ruins ot· a community ot·
these early people, which lie five mile.s west of
the present town of Chandler. Here he found the
remains of a veritable city, which he called ''El
Pueblo de los Muertos''-''The City of the Dead''­in
the center of which he uncovered many large
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16 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
communa,l houses a·nd beyond them found the '
remains of more sparsely settled suburbs extend-ing
for the distance ot· two miles.
The largest of these houses had even greater
dimen$ions than the famous Casa Grande, and
must have, for its time, 1nade a most imposing
appearance. It was surrounded by smaller edi­fices,
and the entire group was enclos·ed by an
adobe wall, whieh, it is evident, was built as pro­tection
against marauding enemies as well as to
insure privacy to its occupants.
As further evidence that these people lived in
constant danger from surrounding savage. tribes,
to whom ·pillage was one ot· the natural occupa­tions
of life, it may be noted that while there were
windows and portholes in the outer walls of their
hollses, there were no doors. The dwellers and
peaceable visitors entered and made their exit
by means of ladders against the outer wall and
trap doors in the roofs leading to the rooms within,
which is the procedure in many of the modern
pueblos.
The walls of the houses were made of adobe,.
and built not of sun-dried brick, but by piling _on
more an.d more clay until the top was reached. It
was always seen to that the wall of the house was
of suficient thickness to insure at the same time
protection against hostile tribes as well as the
fierce summer heat of the desert. In the better .
finished houses the clay surt·ace of the inner walls
was rubbed by hand until it attained a high polish.
The rafters between the stories were made of'
w
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HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 17
small tree trunks upon which was laid a layer of
reeds, which in turn was covered with a coating
of cement-like clay.
In the yards or streets of El Pueblo de los
.Muertos, Mr. Cushing found public ovens and large;
cooking pits lined with clay or natural cement.
The largest of these pits was fifteen feet across
and seven feet deep.
Within the houses were found the remains of·
many dishes and utensils of a pottery not unlike
that fashioned by some of the modern Indians;
also, there were stones t·or grinding corn, stone
axes, hammers a;nd hoes, cotton cloth, skin­dressing
implements, bone awls, and a score of
other articles of the chase and of war and of
domestie and religious usage, including various lit­tle
images, some not over an inch lon.g, carved
from stone-fetishes and what not.
All this, you see, is of the Stone Age, these peo­ple
knowing nothing of the refining or smelting of
ores. It is true that a roughly fashioned cutting
instrument of copper was found by Fra-nk Cushing
in a small cave near Tempe, but it was doubtless
smelted accid.entally from a piece of ore that hap­pened
to line a cooking pit. Also, in a ruin west
of Phoenix, William Lossing discovered three little
copper bells, like sleigh bells, with pebbles inside
to serve as clappers. Their appearance shows
them to be of unquestioned Mayan manut·acture.
One of them, now owned by Dr. E. H. Parker, of
Los Angeles, is of beautiful design and fashioned
out of fine copper wire coiled into shape and
fused into one solid piece.
2
18 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
In the corners of certain rooms at El Pueblo
de los Muertos what were taken to be remains of
persons of importance were found buried in
vaults. Others of their dead were first incinerated,
and the remaining ash and charred bones were
interred in urns made of pottery with inverted
saucer-like lids.
Two of the skeletons found in Los Muertos were
nearly six feet in length. Most oi them, however,
were short in stature.
In 1694, Father Eusebio Francisco Kino, a Jes,uit
friar, visited the now fan1ous ruin called ''Casa
Grande''-Big House-which lies about twelve
miles from the present city of Flore,nce and about
three miles from the Gila River, and said mas.s
there. Lieut. Juan Mateo Mange, who accom­panied
the friar on a second visit, describes the
principal ruin as but little more extensive than
it is today, though at least one of the surroundin.g
buildings, now nearly obliterated, then had not
only walls but remains of. ceiling beams as well.
The number of these aboriginal people who
lived in the Salt and Gila valleys at any one time
is largely a matter of conjecture. The 150 miles
or more of irrigating eanals which comprise the
Salt River Vall􀁚􅩹y system could have irrigated ap­proximately
240,000 acres of land, which would
have been suficient for the support of a hundred
thousand people. Besides this there were canals
on the Gila which could have provided sustenance
for the support of a hund􀁛􅭥ed thousand more.
However, it is unlikely that all these canals were
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 19
in use at any one time or that all of the fields
under them were continually tilled.
The courses of the Salt and Gila rivers are, to
some degree°' ever changing. A spring flood might
so cut the channel of the river at the intake of the
canal that it may have taken a year or more to re­pair
it, or it may ha,,e led to the abandonment of
the canal in favor of a better location. Continuous
cultivation in one spot might partially exhaust
the soil, or in low lands alkali might rise to the
surface.
Also, we do not know that all of the various
centers of population, large and small, were oc.cu­pied
at the same time. Scientists like Bandelier
and Mendelif remind us that the modern Pueblan
Indians frequ,ently move an entire -village. Speak­ing
of the New Mexican Indians, in his ''Final
Report,'' Bandelier says, ''With the exception of
Acoma, there is not a single pueblo standing where
it was at the time of Coronado;'' and we read
in Mendelif's ''Aboriginal Remains,􀁛􅬧' ''A band of
500 village-building Indians may leave the ruins
of fifty villages in the course of a single century.''
Still we. must remember that the Hopi villages,
except for the destruction of Awatabe, were pretty
much in their present location at the time of
Coronado, and that like them and Acoma, the
larger aboriginal cities of the Salt and Gila coun­tries,
as things temporal go,. ,were reasonably per­manent.
At Casa Grande the excavations made by Dr.
J. W. Fewkes showed that in some cases com-
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20 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
munal l1ouses were built upon the ruins of one or
two earlier buildings. In its present form Casa
Grande has been l{nown since the seventeenth cen­tury.
For how many centuries previo·usly was the
house as we now see it occupied? For how many
centuries n1ore were the earlier houses used?
One tnay easily be pardoned for believing that
it "\V@uld tal{e considerable of an upheaval to
induce the inhabitants of either Casa Grande or
the Pueblo de los Muertos to abandon it.
So to go back to our original theme, even if the
smaller villages could change their locations from
tin1e to time, and there might always be idle land
und.er some of the canals, the total population of
Casa Grande, El Pue"fulo de los Muertos, Casa
Blanca, Snake Town, the Mesa Ruin, the Cross Cut
Ruin and othe1·s that we have not even space to
mention_,these people who tilled the desert acres,
who worshiped their gods in the sancti1aries, who
danced on the hard earth of their plazas so many
years ago-might easily have reached a very con­side
·rable number.
Clif dwelliags are found in all that portion of
Arizor·a lying east of a lon,gitudinal line bisecting
Prescott and north of the latitude of Phoeni;x; occa­sionally,
too, they are found in other parts of the
State.
They are especially numerous along the upper·
reaches of the Gila and Salt, in the walls of the
Canyon de C.helly, in and about Navajo Mountain,
-and other places where friable clifs with natural
recesses eould be enlarged and chambers added to
the original niches.
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 21
The perfe.cted clif dwelling consisted of a
house of masonry built within these caves.
The simplest of the habitations might consist
of but one small room, with the original rock form­ing
all the sides but tl1e front, while the more
elaborate wo·uld be veritable castles-communal
houses, perhaps five stories in height, and contain­ing
as many as 140 rooms.
These various eyries occur at all levels, some
only a few feet from the base of the clif, others
several hundred feet up its face, access to, which
could be had only by means of rude s·tairways cut
in the rocks or by means of ladders, some of which
are still in existence-well made with rounds tied
to the two poles with stout pieces of bark.
In the better class of buildings the workman­ship
is excellent. -The stones from which the walls
were made, while rarely dressed, were carefully
selected and skillfully laid in mortar, with both
outside and inside surfaces regular and even. The
walls were often plastered on the inside and occa­sionally
on the outside as well. Sometimes the
inner surfaces were covered with clay p·aint. All
of the plastering was done by hand, and frequently
the original finger prints can easily be discerned.
One of the best known clif dwellings in Ari­zona
is the one styled '􀁙􅥍Montezuma's Castle.'' This
ancient communal dwelling, five stories in height
and containing many rooms, is built in a large
recess in the face of a precipitous limestone clif
facing Be.ave·r Creek, a tributary of the Verde.
The bottom of the building is forty feet above
22 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
the bas.e of the clif, and the natural rock which
overhangs it gives admirable protection from
wearing storms. Thus presetved from the ele­ments
and inaccessible to visitors save by means
of ladclers, it is in comparatively good repair and
presents a sharp contrast to the buried communal
houses of the desert.
Ladders were also used as means of passage
from floor to floor, and, as is the case in all aborigi­nal
dwellin􀁊􄨬, the doorways are small; this is for
excellent reasons. In the winter a small door
admits less cold air than a large one and is more
easily covered by a skin curtain or a stone. Also,
it must be remembered, that the aborigine was
ever more or less at war with l1is neighbor. If a
friend, upon enterj.ng the house, must of necessity
bow liis head, it n1.ay be ascribed to courtesy; if an
enemy is forced to assume the same posture in
n1aking his entry, he is in an admirable position
for you to crack him over the head with your
stone a􀁋􄬮.
In addition to those in Arizona, clif dwellings
in large numbers, many of them most interesting
- -
and elaborate, have been found in New Mexico
and Southern Colorado and Utah, and from them
altogether have been taken such a variety of arti­cles
that we have even a better conception of
their inhabitants, perhaps, than in the case of the
desert c.anal builder.
Many o·f the articles, especially stone imple­ments,
were similar to those founo in the Pueblo
de los Muertos. Special mention, however, should
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 23
be made of some of the highland pottery, beautiful
in color and design, and with a glaze that has
never been equalled by the modern Indian. A
curious feather cloth has been found, in addition
to diferent cotton weaves; also, fiber mats and
sandals, as well as bone awls, beads and the like.
From the clifs we learn that the leaves of the
meseal were used as an article of food as well as
the usual squash, corn and beans.
Dessicated bodies􀁢􆈠 or mummies, in good state·
of preservation have been exhumed from care­fully
sealed tombs. The bodies had first been
wrapped in cotton cloth of fine texture, then in a
piece of coarser cotton cloth or feather cloth, and
finally all enclosed in matting tied with a cord
made of the fiber of cedar bark.
The clif dwellers, though to a less extent than
the canal builders of the desert, also were farmers.
Leading from ''Montezuma's Well,'' a small,
curious basin of very deep water, ten miles north
of Montez11ma's Castle, an ancient canal of these
people can easily be fallowed. The water was and
is strongly impregnated with lime ahd made a
coating of natural cen1ent which remains to mark
the sides and bottom of this waterway of an all­but-
Torgotten day.
In considering th-ese people it must be remem­bered
that not all of the tribesmen of the clif
dwellers lived i:u clifs. In the famous ruin􀁣􆌠 in
the Rito de Ios Frijoles (Bean Canyon) in New
Mexico, the ancient city of Ty-u-on-yi, all the part
of one tremendous communal dwelling, resting on
•
24 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
the canyon floor, ac-cording to Bandolier, was occu­pied
by a portion of the same people who at the
same time were dwelling in the clifs of the Rito·'s
sides. There was also a.type of small stone house
that was built on the New Mexican plateau whose
antiquity is supposed to antedate the clif dwell­ings.
The larger communal house of the New
1VIexican plateau came later. Stone houses in Ari­zona;
like the one whose ruins now stands on the
brink of Montezuma's Well, were doubtless built
and occnpied by the clif dwellers.
As a little sidelight on the manners of these
peonle, it is interesting to note that near many of
the clif dwellings, as well as in diferent places
near the old desert habitations, aboriginal artists
have carved smooth surfaces of the clifs and large
boulders with a variety of drawings, pricked into
the surfa.ce of the rock by means of stone imple­ments.
Some of these, like the pictographs which adorn
the elif abovg Apache Springs on the s011th side
of the Superstition Mountains, are, for the most
part, outlines of animals-mountain sheep, deer,
antelope, mountain lions and the like. Clearly
this was simply an open-air gallery where the
artists of the tribe produc.ed evidences of their
skill for the pleasure and admiration of their fel­low
tribesmen.
Other arawings, like some of those found in
San Tan Canyon, near the Gila, doubtless have a
symbolic meaning. Here we find the conventional
drawings of a deity, the sun with rays, and various
.
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 25
geometrical designs, all of which seem to have had
an esoteric significance.
There is abundant evidence that the tribes of
these ancient people, as is the case with many of
the modern Pueblo Indians of the Southwest, were
divided into various 􀁓􅍬lans, eaoh of which had its
own private ceremonies, and it is thought that
some of these drawings were symbolic of their
ritual.
Just who the various peoples were-the canal
and the house builder of the desert, and the eave,
clif and house dweller of the highlands-is a
matter of more or less conjecture.. Diferent
'- groups of them doubtless talked diferent lan­guages
and in some cases were possibly of difer­ent
stock, yet all seemed to be linked together by
a similar culture and a si1nilar state of civilization.
Tlie accepted theory is that these people came
from the south, but whether their culture was the
result of some connection with other advanced
tribes is obscure.
The Mayan bell found by William Lossing cer­tainly
indicates that articles of trade had found
their way up from the Mayan country. In the
University of Arizona, Prof. Byron Cummings has
a number of stones found in the Salt River Valley
on which faces and other designs are etched that
bear strong resemblance to Toltec work, and
although the contrary has often been stated to be
the case, at least one image bearing the Aztec char­acteristics
has been found in the Salt River Valley;
so it would-seem well within the limits of po􀁔􅑳sibili-
26 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
tie-s that not only did our people have knowledge
of the higher cultural tribes mentioned, but also
1nay have had their tribal blood enriched by them.
Conservative as they are, In·dian blood changes
steadily, if but slowly. Members of friendly tribes
intermarry in the usual way. Male members of
hostile tribes steal women from one another­also
in the usual way. Navajos are said to have
learned blanket weaving from stolen Pueblan
women-their descendants inh·eriting the inclina­tion
and aptitude.
As has always been the case since our knowl­edge
of man commenced, a group of humans,
stin1ulated by new conditions of environment or
changed by some new infusion of blood suddenly,
in this respect or that, :ris-es head and shoulders
above its fellows, and afterwards its descendants,
influenced further by envir-onment or habit as well
as heredity, add to and crystallize these traits into
·form, and a new people takes its place in evolu­tion's
long match upward. Thus it may have
with the tribes we, are
As to when they first made tlieir appearance in
Arizona the question, naturally, is a most interest­ing
one. In speaking of the 􀁥􆕬lif dwellers, George
A. Dorsey, curator of anthropology at the Field
Museum, says :
''. . . It must be admitte.d i n regard to cer­tain
ruins, there is no evidence that they were not
occupied several thousand years ago,,.' while Ralph
Emerson Twitchel, in his ''Leading Facts of New
Mexican History,'' writes, ''Just when the occu-
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 27
pancy of the clifs began, whether five hundred or
five thousand years ago, will probably always
remain a mooted question."
Persistent stories are heard of ruins found
where lava has flowed over built walls or ollas,
giving proof of an antiquity that reaches back to
no one can say how many thousan.ds of years.
There is just one thing that keeps us from repeat­ing
here some of the most interesting of these.
Prof. Byron Cummings, of the University of Ari­zona,
who has for years been making scientific
investigations of Arizona ruins, said every time
he heard of a ruin thaf had been covered by lava
he had visited it-but be had never found the lava.
. . Some of the writers are of the opinion that the
ruins in the Salt River Valley are even older than
the clif dwellings. Frank Cushing was of the
opinion that the people who built ''Los Muertos''
were there considerably over a thousand years
ago.
That the tribes into which these people were
divided lived for a long period in their various
places of abode may be easily deduced from the
range of antiquity shown in the condition of the
diferent ruins. The walls of the present Casa
Grande, for example, both in the upper and lower
floors, were in fairly good condition centuries after
other communal houses along the Salt were re­duced
to mounds of earth, while with the clif
dwellings., if one did not know better, an observer
might fancy that Montezuma's Castle was peopled
a decade ago, it is in such good repair.
28 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
No less interesting than the question of who
these people wer:e is the one, what became of them
all? The old, popular theory was that at a time
long ago the desert, canyon and mountain-top were
all teeming with countless multitudes of people
when suddenly, all in a day perhaps, some awful
catastrophe, some dire cataclysm occurred, and
to the. last man, woman and child they were wiped
from the faee of the earth! Dramatic, truly; only
it can scarcely be so.
As to just what did happen,, wl1ile there was no
aboriginal Gibbon to write in graphic sentences of
their decline and exit, let us see if by keeping in
mind all we know we can not place a picture
before our eyes that will not be wholly remote
from the truth.
To begin with, lel us turn our mental calendars
back to the time when the Moors ruled Spain and
Pepin was King of the Franks, and conjure a
vision of the irrigated farms an.d communal dw·ell­in.
gs of the desert people of the Salt River Valley.
It is late summer, and in a field our aboriginal
farmer, clad only in sandals and breech clout
(additional clothing is for a cooler se.ason), gathers
his rather runty ears of corn and big pods of beans.
Working with him is his broad-backed spouse,
wearing possibly a kilt of antelope skin, with a
cotton garment of some sort cov·ering the upper
part of her body. She piles the corn and beans
into her basliet, and on her head carries load after
load to the family granary.
On an adjoining farm, perhaps, the woman
•
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 29
may be kneeling at the grinding stones making
meal of the blue and white kernels of corn piled
beside her, putting quite as much muscle into her
· work as do the men near by who are dressing
skins or polishing hand axes.
If we. shift our point of view some eighty miles
to the northeast to the Verde River we. shall see, on
the same day perhaps, a distant kinsman of o,ur
desert rancher, climbing by means of well built
ladders up the face of a precipitous clif a hun­dred
feet or more, carrying a basket full of flat
, stones to where his waiting spouse, standing. on
the edge of a niche in the rock, mortars the stones
in the wall that will make the front of their domi­cile.
Still on the same day, if our mental vision
holds out, we can look down upon a highland vil­lage
on the Mogollon plateau and see in front 􀁋􄭦f a
house resernblin.g in shape the des·ert dwelling, but
made of stone, a woman before a primitive loom
weaving cotton cloth, while the men make arrow
heads of pieces of obsidian, or, if we drop in later,
and enter one of the ceremonial chambers, we
might see some of the older members of the tribe
debating matters of tribal importance or taking
part with the p.riests in a ceremonial petition to
''Those Above'' for rain, or succ.ess in battle.
Years, even centuries, of such life go on; there
is water for the farmer and game for the hunter.
Then comes a change, and drought follows
drought. Down in the desert country the corn in
the granaries is almost exhausted. There comes
a day when the prede.cessors of the savage Ute or
•
30 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
Apache attack the village on the Salt and carry it
by storm. They kill the defenders, fire the roofs
and ,vatch the walls topple over on the bodies of
th.eir victi1ns. What corn there is left they carry
away.
Is it dificult to imagine after ah experience
like this that the fleeting rem.nant from the village
thus sacked would go by night, a frightened band
of fugitives, to j,oin their kinsmen who lived in
the fastnesses of the rocks? What if the tillage
of the soil would be less fruitful; it was enough if
the caverns in the lofty clifs would give them
sanctua1-y.
However, we need not imagine that all of the
inhabitants of the desert 1·anches went at one time
or tnat war was always the impelling force. We
have already seen how such calamities as pesti­lence,"
loss of irrigation water,. or deterioration of
the soil might ca.use. a community to move from
one spot to another in the sam·e region. These
and similar happenings might induce a people to
leave their former surroundings altogether.
Still more centuries pass and we witness the
final abandonment of· the clif's. Why did they
leave? Perhaps it slowly developed that the
eyries were no· t as impregnable as first appeared.
Certainly it must have bee·n dificult to store water
enough in their caves to withstand a long siege,
and always there must have been auxiliary meth­ods
of defense and counter aflack.
Presumanly wiTh the changes in fighti11:g tactics
it appeared that a village on a mesa top fronting
a high escarpment ofered as much protection and
HOUSE AND CANAL BUILDERS 31
•
far more conveniences than a shallow recess five
hundred feet up a precipitous clif. Po:ssibly the
time came when the dwellers in these retreats felt ' .
strong enough to cope with their enemies on difer-ent
term.s.
Two things we may be positive about: they
did not go because they had to go, and they were
not -annihilated. Scourged by pestilen.ce they
doubtless were, and ravaged by war, but a rem­nant
ev􀁗􅝲r remained. The clif dwellers left their
eyries because they wanted to, and moved to the
'- table-lands because they thought the change would
be an improvement on their former way of living􀁘􅠠
Indeed, as we look at the ruins of the villages
up and down the Little Colorado and th1·oughout
Tusayan, we can see th.at they did very consider­able
moving during the many years before the
Spaniards ca·me, and, also, to some extent after­wards.
Here we arrive at the answer to our problem.
The people we have been considerin,g never were
exterminated. Their descendants are living today,
and their relation with the ancient people is
shown no, t only by the similarity of their building,
their pottery and the patterns in their cloth, but
by studying the ruins of the ancient ceremonial
chambers and bits of sacerdotal paraphernalia
found within them and fitting them to what we
know of the modern tribes, the co-nnection between
the two is undeniable.
It is not to be expected that the stock has been
kept pure all the centuries from the Pueblo de los
•
,
32 THE STORY OF .ARIZONA
Muertos er Montezuma's Castle to the present, but
-the characte.ristics of the people and much of its
culture has been kept intact, and the Hopi of Ari­zona,
and the inhabitants of such pueblos as Zuni,
Acoma and Cochiti in New Mexico, in all likeli­hood
are the direct descendants of both the canal
builder of the desert and tlie clif dweller of the
hills.
•
-
'
CHAPTER II
THE COMING OF THE SPANIARDS
.
-
LTHOUGH Fray Marcos of Niza was the first
white man, so far as authenticated records
go, to enter the land that is now known as
Arizona, there is a possiBility that the distinction
'Should belong to another, who, like De Niza, was
also a member of the Order of St. Francis.
Early in 1538 the provincial of the Franciscans
of New Spain sent Juan de la Asuncion and Pedro
Nedal on a mission beyo􀁠􆁤d the borders of New
Galicia (Sinaloa), and although it has never been
satisfactorily verified, it is believed by some au­thorities
that Asuncion, at least, may have reached
either the Gila or Colorado rivers near the con­fluence
of those streams, though ih s11mming up
the matter the careful Bandolier says the evidence
does not come up to the requirements of historical
certainty.
The immediate events leading up to the famous
journey of De Niza may Be said to have had their
genesis with the arrival of Alvar Nunez Cabeza de
Vaca and his companions in Culiacan at the end of
their perilous trip across the continent.
De Vaca, it will be remembered, was treasurer
and ''high con􀁡􆅴tafile'' of tbe ill-starred e.xpedition
of Don Panfilo Narvaez, who was authorized by
83
8
/
•
34 THE STORY OF A&IZONA
the Council of the Indies to sail for the New World
and conquer the country from the Rio de las
Palmas to the Cape of Florida.
From its start the histo:ry of the e,:xp􀁰􇁤dition is a
continuous narr􀁱􇅴tion of disaster. Landing on the
west coast of Florida, Apri114, 1528, the four hun­dred
men that made up the company decreased in
numbers with appalling inevitableness. Two hun­dred
and forty-seven was the count, when, after
losing their ships and facing starvation in a hos­tile
country, they embarked in rude boats of their
own manufacture. In a stoPmy voyag􀁲􇈠 along the
northetn coast line of the Gulf of Mexico their
numbers decrea$ed to eighty, and later to four by
add'itional disasters. These four, however, De
Vaca, Alonzo del Castillo Maldonado, Andres
Dorantes and his negro slav-e, Estevan, a native
of Moroc-c!o, have made enduring names for them­selves
in history.
After many attempt$ they succeeded in escap­ing
from the natives who held them in semi­captivity
near the eo·ast, when they struck out
boldly toward tlie west through wh.at was to them
an absolutely unknown wilderness, hoping tba t
sbmehow they would find the settlements of New
Spain.
Doubtless even with their wonderful endurance
and intrepid ·courage they would have failed had
it not been for the reputation that Castillo and De
Vaca achieved as medicine men, both themselves
and the Indians believ.in·g that they cou: ld cure all
diseases and even raise the dead by supernatural
powers.
THE COMING OF THE SPANIARDS 35
The first of their cuuntrymen they met was a
small scouting party encountered after many
months of arduous traveling through Texas (pos􀁙􅥩i­bly
New Mexico), Chihuahua and Sonora. Here,
soon after they had crossed the Rio Yaqui, they
came up with Capt. Diego de Alcaraz, who, with his
men, was engaged in the common occupation of
Spanish soldiers under the cruel Guzman, of har­rowing
and enslaving the natives.
April 1, 1536, eight years after they h.ad landed
'in Florida., the four refugees arrived in Culiacan,
where ''with tears and praising God," they were
received by tlie alcalde, Melchior Diaz.
De Vaca was the historian of the party, and
although his account was in the main temperate
and conservative, it made a profound sensation in
New Spain, the more so as it was coupled witl1
fabulous rumors then current in Mexico concern­ing
a wonderful country to the north. The most
persistent of these tales, started by stories of
Indians and romantically emb·ellished, concerned
the seven wonderful cities of Cibola, which in the.
end finally proved to be seven Indian villages in
the Zuni country, New Mexico. In the stories,
however, thes·e towns were larger than the City of
Mexico itself, and in the center of a land so, rich
in gold and silver that cooking utensils were made
of these precious metals.
The year before De Vaca reached civilization,
Antonio de Mendoza, an able and deeply religious
man, had been appointed viceroy; and upon the
arrival of the refugees at the capital he entertained
36 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
them royally, and detevmined, upon hearing their
story, that f'.or the glory o.f the church and emperor,
he would add this country of the north to their
dominion.
After consulting with Bishop Bartolome de la&
Casas and Francisco Vasquez Coronado, the vice­roy
decided that instead o,f sending at the outset, a
la·rge force of soldiers, he would dispatch one or
two friars to spy out the land.
Fria􀁨􆡳s were always good travelers, resourceful,.
and, where there was a chance of winning souls,
wholly fear less. With their piety and tact they
might easily make a better impression upon the
natives of the country than the soldiers, and hav­ing
n o worldly interests to bias their reports, they
could be believed implicitly.
At that time Marcos de Niza, a me)lber of' the
Fra- nciscan brotherhood, was holding the office
of vic.e eommissioner of New Spain and engaged,
under the viceroy's· order:s, in instructing a large
number of friendly Indians in the tenets of the
church as well as teaching them the Spanish lan­g
·uage. He was held in high esteem by his own
order, and had been with Pizarro in Peru..
Impressed with the fitness of the man, the
viceroy selected him to undertake. this perilous
excursion into th·e Northwest. With the friar he
would send Estevan, the negroid Moo·r (whom
Mendoz·a had already purchased from Andres
Dnrantes) ·and a number of the Christian Indians
that baa been with De Vaca and who might be
able to act as interpreters with part at least of the
northern tribes •
•
THE COMING OF THE SPANIARDS 37
Thus, without ostentation, the excursion
started, Coronado accompanying it as far as Culi­acan.
From that point on March 7, 1539, Fray
Marcos having a companion in a Friar Onorato,
the party journeyed northward.
For a while everything went most auspiciously,
the natives being specially friendly, as word had
been sent out, that the viceroy had ordered that
the Indians should not thereaf-ter b e enslaved but
treated with all kindness. However, when they
ieached the Indian village of P'etatla.n, Onorato
was taken ill, and Fray Marcos was obliged to go
on without him.
The expedition followed the line of the_ coast
for several leagues, but after crossing the Rio
Mayo turned inland, and upon reaching the im­portant
village of Vacapa, the friar decided to
remain for a time, sending Estavan ahead to make
• a reconnaissance.
He to-Id the negro to go north fifty or sixty
leagues, and if he made any dis·coveries of m.o.ment,
either to return in person or to, send a mess. age and
stay where. he was until he should arrive.
As the negro had no knowledge of writing, the
message was to be 􀁣􆍥ent by a cross. One the size of
a man's hand would indicate the discovery to be
of small importance, while if the matter was of
very great moment, indeed, one twice that size
might be sent. Imagine the good friar's state of
mind when, four days later, the Indians returned
bearing a cross as tall as the friar himself, and
with it came not alone the old story of Cibola, but
38 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
accounts of three other magnificent cities which
lay beyond them, Mara ta, Acus and Totonteac, ·
whose glories even outshone those of Cibola.-
It may be said -here that such towns really
ex:isted, much as th.ey, or similar Indian pueblos,
exist today, interesting undoubtedly, but scarcely
glorious; Marata being, like Cibola, in the Zuni
country, while Acus is the high-perch.ed Acoma,
and Tot0nteac o-ne of a group of Hopi towns now
• •
1n ruins.
Glowing as was the report that his servant sent
him, the worthy Fray Marcos does not seem to
have been specially stampeded, for he waited two
days longer and then continued his journey, going
up the beautiful Sonora Valley, of which he ''took
possession'' in the name of the viceroy and the
emperor.
The Indians he found here, whom he called the
'􀁧􆝐Painted Ones," and who may have been the Pimas
or Papagos, received tl1e reverend traveler with
all kindness; presenting him with quail, rabbits
and pine nuts. They also told him that the people
of Totonteac wore garments made of stuf like his
woolen frock which they obtained from animals
abol.lt the size of gFeyhounds.
When they 1·eached the head of the valley the
friar and his party passed over the divide. and
descended into the valley of the San Pedro, where
a short journey brought them into wl1at is now the
border of Arizona.
All along the Rio n P o, Fray l\{ar¼os __
repo:r􀁨􆡤d that he found a most prosperous people
-
􀀁􀄠 THE COMING OF THE SPANIAR,DS -􀁸􇠠
who lived in villages a quarter to a half a league
apart, and were well 9.ressed and wearing many
turg:uoise.s.
When he reached the mouth of the San Pedro,
h􀁹􇤠 crossed the Gila above the confluence of the
two streams, and, while camping there, received
his first word from Estavan since the message of
the cross. The negro, it seemed, was having what
may be described as a tour de luxe through the
'country, for the Indians reported_ that he had
decked himself out with feathers about hi􀁺􇨠 wrists
and ankles, and, like a field marshal might carry
a baton, bore with him a gourd adorned with two
f eather-s, one of red and one of white, besides a
string of bells.
Certainly he had succeeded in impressing the
natives with his importance, for they had given
him as an escort of honor, three hundred or more
men and women. He was not waiting for orders
from his pious master., as he had been instructed.
Quite the contrary. He was the conquering hero
going through the country in state, while his bare­foot,
brown-gowned master might follow as he
would. He left word that he was on his way to
Cibola,_ which lay beyond the mountains.
On lv,ray 9, 1539, }:ray Marcos again set out on
his journey, followingffiepath"Estavan bad taken,
selecting only thirty men of the large number of
natives who wanted to accompany him. After
they had left the camp, to his great surprise, his
guides soon led him into a well-beaten trail which
they followed for much of their journey, and each
40 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
night he found a shelter which had been prepared
by members of his own party who had gone ahead.
For twelve days they journeyed through the
White and Mogollon mountains, whose peaks were
covered with snow, living well on the deer, rabbit
and quail with which his hos·pitable guides pro­,
rided him; then, when near the Continental divide,
they were met by an Indian who had been with
Estavan, and who brought the direful infor111ation
that while the negro had indeed reached Cibola,
instead of meeting with the co·rdial welcome he
had hoped for, he had been slain.
At this, naturally, the friar's escort was much
alarmed, but with the aid of gifts, De Niza induced
them to proceed with him. The next day they
came across two more of Estavan's escort who
gave him the details of his servant's murder.
It seems that when Estavan had come in sight
of Cibola he had sent his mueh adorned gourd
ahead to the chiefs of the town, and doubtless
rememb.ering what prestige the claim had given
De Vaca, instructed his envoys to say that he was
a great medicine man.
Whether the Cibolans may have thought that
Estavan's ''medicine'' was bad, and that he prac­ticed
an art as black as his skin, or whether, as
some commentators suggest, the gourd was a syrn­bol
of a people with whom the city was at enmity,
or whether it was simply the arrogance of the
man, in any event the chiefs received the deputa­tion
with every indication of enmity, and throwing
the gourd to the ground, told their visitors to say
•
THE OOMING OF THE SP ANTARDS 41
to their chief that he must leave at once or ''not
one of them would be left alive.''
However, no matter how much Estavan may
have lacked in tact and obedience, he seems to
have had no want of courage, for, decked with
feathers and bells􀁫􆬠 he advanced confidently to the
town, which was the usual pueblan community
made up of adob·e pyramidal ho-uses-anything but
\ the magnificent city of the Cibolan traditions.
When the negro reached the edge of the vil­lage,
which was situated on a sharp rise of ground,
the chiefs would allow neither him nor his escort
to enter, but stripped the negro of his trappings
and robbed him of his possessions.
The discomfited visitors spent the night out­side
of the walls, and in the morning, while trying
to esoape, tlie Cibolans pursued and killed not
only Estavan but some of his followers.
It may be noted here that Cibola was, in all
probability, Hawaikuh, one of the cities of the
Zunis just across the border from Arizona in New
Mexico. A tradition is still current there that a
long time ago a very bad ''Black Mexican'' from
the south visited them, and they killed him with
stones and buried him under them. A variation
of the tale is that the ''Wise Men'' of the pueblo
escorted him to its edge and gave him a kick so
pov.rerf11l that he never struck earth again until he
reached the country from whence he came.
The possibilities of what the Cibolans in thei1·
present state of mind might do to a second ·for­eigner
might well have daunted even Fray Marcos'
,
42 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
strong l1eart, but instead of retreating, with gifts
and brave words to eneourage his escort, h e went
resolutely forward, determined to have a look, at
least, at the city of his dreams, no matter what the
cost.
\Vhen he came in sight of the pueblo he was
much afected. From a distance the several stories
of its perhaps two hundred dwellings did n1ake
something of an appearance, especially when an
observer had an imagination stro,ng enough to
supply what vision failed to record.
With due solemnity and deliberation, though
every minute must have been fraught with danger,
Fray Marcos of Niza raised a mound of stones,
planted a cross on it and in due form ''took: pos­ses,
sion'' of all the country he could see, in the
name of the viceroy and the emperor.
However􀁏􄼠 when the ceremony was over, ''with
more fright than food,'' as he frankly put it, he
hastily started on his return journey to New Spain.
When several months later he reached the
City of Mexico and had audience with Mendosa,
he had a great tale to unfold. Coronado after­wards
very flatly said that the most he told was
not so at all, and tlie little that was so was ex­tremely
highly colored, but we must remember
that when the gallant captain said that he was a
greatly disappointed man.
It is far more likely that the good Fray Mar­cos-
whose excellent reputation co-vered many
years-was simply a glorious and unreliable
optimist. Much of his conversation with Arizona
•
•
THE COMING OF THE SPANIARDS 43
Indians had doubtless been confined to signs,
and he translated what they really did mean into
what he wanted them to mean. Other enthusiasts
have done the same thing. In any event, he
spun a great yarn. The buildings were not only
many stories in height and built of stone, but
the walls were se.t-with. turqJ10-ises. The women􀁪􆨠 -
' wore strings of gQld beads, and the men girdles
of gold.- and White woofen Qre§$eS, and they had
sheep and cows and partridges aria- slaughter­houses
and iron forges. And as if this were not.
enough, he added, ''They use vessels of gold and , ·
silver, for they have no other metal, whereof there,
is greater use and more abundant than in Pe􀁫􆬠
It is wholly possible that de Niza did not tell
the viceroy all the things that are attributed to
him, but what he did tell was enough to make
Mendosa immediately decide upon the conquest of
the country.
Although he gnjoined the greate-st secrecy upon
the friar, the story was too sensational to keep,
and within a few days the capital was aflame with
excitement. Here was a chance for such captains
as Cortez, Guzman and Alvarado to conquer more
worlds; here w􀁬􆱳s an opportunity for the scores of
young nobles lounging about the plazas of the city
to gain both gold and glory.
The captains took the first ship for Spain,
where they hoped to get permits for exploration
from the Emperor Charles, while the young blades
daily besieged Mendoza for commissions.
The viceroy was a man of quick action, and
44 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
while his rivals were still across the sea petitioning
their mona,rch, Mendoza completed his plan:s.
Don Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, a young
Sp.anish nobleman, and for a short time governor
of New Galicia, was to be captain general, and
Peqro de Castaneda de Nacera, also of good birth,
historian.
The army of conquest, which was to be of sufi­cient
size to absolutely insuFe success, was mobil­ized
at Compostella, on the Pacific Coast, and on
the morning of February 23, 1540, the most splen­did
body of troops ever brought together in New
5pain passed out of the city before the admiring
eyes of Mendoza and his staf.
First came three hundred cavaliers, young men
of the best blood of Spain, mounted on the pick of
the horses of the country, with Coronado, clad
from head to foot in a glittering coat of mail, at
their head. Other cavaliers, too, wore armor, and
all had their heads protected with i1·on helmets
or vizored head-pieces. of bullhide. Each carried
a lance in his right hand, whil􀁯􆼠 a sword clattered
at his belt. To add a finishing note to the mag­nificence
of these young gallants, bright-colored
blankets hu.ng gorgeously from shoulder to ground.
The cavalry was only the first battalion, and
back of them walked footmen with crossbow or
arquebus, or with sword and .shield, and still be­hind
them came the light artillery with wicked­looking
field pieces strapped to the backs of stout
mule-s.
The final division of all_ was composed of ser-
THE COMING OF THE SPANIARDS 45
vants and slaves leading extra horses and pack
animals loaded with the belongings of the elegant
young horsemen, and driving before them herds
of oxen, cows and sheep. No wonder the people
cheered and the viceroy was congratulated upon
\ the country of gold that would be added to his
domain.
The distance to Culiacan, their first objective,
wa·s eighty leagues, but so impeded were the move­ments
of the army by the herds and paek animals
that they did not arrive at their destination until
March 28th.
The November before, Melchior Diaz, with a
small escort􀁢􆈠 had been sent north on a reconnais­sance
to verify; if possible, <;le Niza's report. He
had gone forward as far as the Gila River country,
and upon his return had met Coronado before the
captain general had arrived at Culiacan.
His reports verified many of the details Fray
Marcos had given of the early part of his journey,
and as he had not penetrated far enough into the
country to prick the Cibola bubble, Coronado com­pleted
his energetic plans for contin-uing his enter-
• prise.
At Culiacan, influenced doubtless by what Diaz
had said regarding the dificulties of traveling
through the land to the north, Coronado now di­vided
his forces. The first section was to consist
of seventy-five or eighty cavaliers, thirty foot sol­diers
and four priests, one of which ,vould be de
Niza. The second division would include the pack
animals and the herds.
Two weeks were consumed in reorganizing the
46 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
forces, and at the end of that time Coronado ad­vanced
with the lighter battalion, leaving the
others to follow more leisurely.
To further insure tl1e su.ccess of the great enter­prise,
the viceroy meanwhile was outfitting two
supply ships wl1ich ultimately sailed from Nativi­dad
on May 9th under the command of Hernando
de Ala1,con. These sl1ips were joined by a third,
and with great dificulties sailed up the Gl1lf of
California, whicJ1 had alreaay been explored by
Ulloa. At the mouth of the Colorado, Alarcon left
the ships and with t·wo small boats made two dif­ferent
trips up the river in search of some tidings
from Coronado. On the second trip he went a
considerable distance above the mouth of the Gila
River where he erected a great cross and buried
letters for Coronado, with a notice on a conspicu­ous
tree telling where they could be found. How­ever,
they heard nothing of the expedition, and
sailed for home.
In the meanwhile Coronado and his men, in
spite of rough going, advanced along a route not
greatly diferent from that taken by Fray Marcos,
and on July 7th finally came in sight of Hawaikuh.
Alas for the gol<;len stories of the friar! These
soldiers of fortune, in their present state of mind,
had no rosy spectacles of romance through which
to view th-e Indian viltage that lay before them.
Castanada said, ''It looked as though it had been
all crumpled up together.''
When they saw the advancing company of
Spaniards a numbet of the Indians came out of
•
THE COlVIING OF THE SP .A.NIARDS 47
their houses to meet them. Coronado sent for­ward
part of his cavalry and two of the prie·sts to
parley with them, but ·the Indians greeted their
visitors with a volley of arrows. At this the Span­iards
raised their battle cry of ''Santiago," and
charged; and the Indians, dismayed at the steel
􀁔􅑯ords and the hoofs of the hor-ses, fled back to
their walls. The invaders then advanced in force
up a steep pathway leading to the village, which
was perched upon the mesa. As the white men
came up, the Indians stood on the terraces of their
pyrainidal houses and hurled stones and shot
arrows at them.
On came the Spaniards, with Coronado at their
head. Bis shining armor made a conspicuous tar­get
for ·the missiles of the Indians, and a few
minute:S later he was felled to the earth. His fol­lowers
quickly rallied to his aid, and soon took the
place by sto.rm, with none of their men killed and
but few injured.
They immediately possessed themselves of the
town, searching vainly for jewels and precious
metals. But even if there proved to be no stew
pots of gold, no frying pans of silver or pieces of
turquoise sef in the walls, there was plenty of corn
and a place to rest, which after all was what they
most needed.
Had they not been expecting so much, both the
people and the town ought to have been full of
interest for the soldiers. The Indians, culturally,
were far ahead of any others they had seen since
leaving Mexico. Their houses were built of stone
48 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
and the people themselves were clothed in beau­tifully
dressed skins and cotton cloth. Besides
corn, they raised on their primitive farms squash
and be.ans.
Coronado remained· at Cibola, making if his
headquarters for some c0nsiderable time. Shortly
after his arrival he sent Don Pedro de Tovar, with
an escort of cavalry, on into the Hopi country􀁶􇘠 of
which he had heard much from the Cibolans.
When Tovar arrived at 0ne of the prinoipal
Hopi towns, the inhabitants ref used to allow him
to enter., when Friar Juan de Padilla urged the
Spaniards to attack. One charge with the horses
and guns tho:tot1ghly cowed the Hopis, who there-
11po11 sued for peace, and loaded their conquerors
w&th pine nuts, turkeys and other food.
l When the expedition retu.rned to Cibola, Coro­na:<l
o took a number of semi-p·re, eious stones they --- ...: - - 􀀁􀄠 .
bad collected, and with a p-ainted deer skin, mad􀁷􇜠
up a package for the viceroy, which he dispatched,
together with a letter, by Ju·ap de Gallego. With
Gallego went Fray Marcos, now decidedly unpopu­lar
as well as unhappy in tl1e camp. Melchior
Diaz, who was. to send forward the. sec. ond divi­
·sion of th·e army, also accompa·nied
After a· n uneventful jounrey the three returning
travelers foupd the army in a comfortable camp
on the Sonora River, reaching there about the
middle of September.
Soon the army went north, when Diaz, who had
been left in command of the camp, which was to
be made permanent, decided to try to find the sup .
ply fleet and Alarcon.
THE COMING OF THE SPANIARDS 49
With twenty-five men he traveled northwest
until he reached the Colorado River, but though
he found the letters Alarcon had left, the fleet had
already departed. Thee expedition came to an ab­rhpt
end when, upon aD; inauspicious day, Diaz
was accidentally transfixed with a lance and died.
His followers immediately returned to the military
camp on the Sonora River.
When To-var had reti1rned fro1n the Hopi coun­try
he told Coronado that the natives had told h'.im
o.f a great riv􀁼􇱲r that lay to the northwest, whose
banks were peopled with a race of giants. The
captain g.eneral tbere,upoii sent Don Garcia Lopez
de Cardenas and twelve cavaliers to explore it.
At the Hopi villages Cardenas found guides,
and from thenGe proceeded over the plateau coun­try,
which they found cold in spite of the summer
season, ·and after severa,l days were rewarded by
seeing the Grand Canyon of the Colorado.
Coming une􀁽􇵰pectedly upon this tremendous
marvel of Nature, it is no wonder that they were.
filled with amazement at its magnitude and majes­tic
beauty. For several days they explored the
rim, trying vainly to find a trail leading to the
river, which to them looked like a silver thFead,
and which the Indians insisted was half. a league.
wide. Three of the most active of the men did
make one efort to climb down the sides, but hours
after returned to say that they had attempted the
impossible, for ''rocks which from the tops had
appe􀁾􇹲red to be no taller than a tnan, were found
upon reaching them to be taller than the tower of
the cathedral at Seville.''
.,
50 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
The discovery of the Grand Canyon of the Colo­rado
practically ended the explorations of
Coronado in Arizona.
After the return o,f Cardenas, the c,aptain gen­eral
ma.rched eastward into New Mexico, where
the record of his expl0rations was sadly marred
by the bad faith and cruelty shown by the Span­iards
to the Indians.
Ever lured on _by the will-of-the-wisp stories of
gold told them .by the Indians, wh0 soon discov­ered
the white ma·n's n1adness for the yellow metal,
they journeyed into Texas, Oklahoma and even
Kansas, where their farthermost point seems to
have been reached somewhere beyond the Arkan­sas
River.
Finally, following many disasters, two years
fro-m the time they had started so auspiciously
from Compostella, Coronado led his a.rmy back to
Mexico. With the ranks of his army depleted by
death, his men dressed in tattered skins of animals,
worn by hardships and privations, their leader
entered the capital of New Spain, ''very sad and
very weary, completely worn out and shame­faced,"
feeling that he was held responsible not
only for their failure to find gold, but also for the
fate of ·those who had died on the inhospitable
deserts of the north. Nevertheless, though the
viceroy received him with coldne.ss, and though
his name is tarnished with the treatment his men
showed the natives, yet by reason of his splendid
courage and dogged persistence in continuing his
ex1>lorations in the face of constant perils, Coro-
THE C01\'1ING OF THE SP .A.NIARDS 51
nado and such captains as Melchior Diaz have
won for themselves enduring and justly earned
fame.
The inability of Coronado to find any trace of
gold in the country to the north efectively ended
all eforts at exploration in that direction until in
1582 (forty years after Coronado's return), when
Antonio de Espejo led a small expedition int-0 New
Mexico with the double purpose o·f looking for two
missing Franciscans and searching for precious
minerals. They made one trip into what is now
Arizona, Espejo with nine followers going west to
the Hopi villages and afterwards prospecting for
1netals in a section that probably included Yavapai
County.
In 1598 Do}?. Juan de Onate organized a large
expedition, consisting of 400 men, 130 of which
we.re accompanied by their families, 10 Franciscan
friars, 83 wagons and 7,000 head of cattle, with a
view of permanently colonizing the fertile country
along the upper Rio Grande. Like Espejo, he
made one exploring trip into Arizona, where, after
visiting the Hopi and other Indian villages, he did
some fruitless searching for minerals. At a later
time On ate went as far west as the Colorado River
down which he journeyed to its mouth.
The battles with the Indians of this really re­markable
commander, his troubles with members
of his army, his success in establishing colonies,
belong to the annals of New Mexico rather than to
those of Arizona, still it should be mentioned that
Onate's expedition marked the beginning of the
52 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
settlement of New Me:xico by the Spaniards, and
with the excepti􀀱􃅮n o􀀲􃈠 􀀳􃌠 . ief _period f oll_owing the
revolt of the natives ll\ 168. its occupation by the
white race was thereaff continuous .
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CHAPTER III
SPANISH MISSION DAYS
PANI􀁭􆵈H mission activities among th.e Indians
of Arizona began early in the seventeentl1
centt1ry when friars fr-om the colonies on
the Rio Grande first visited and later took resi­dence
among the Hopis in the pueblos east of the
Painted Desert. However, at the time of the New
Mexican Revolt in 1680, four Franciscans, who
were ministering i:μ. fi􀁮􆸭-e of the to·wns of Tusayan,
were killed by their parishioners and thereafter
all through the Spanish rule the Hopis ref used to
have anythjng to do with the white man's religion.
Among the Indians to the south the Spaniarcls
were much more successful. The work here began
with the arrival of the Jesuits in 1690. The padres
of this order continued' in cilarge... o f-the field for
seventy-seven years, when, in J7 67, th􀁯􆼠 wer􀁰􇁟_S!..:l£
ceeded by the Franciscan,s, who for sixty years
more, like th.eir p:red􀁱􇅥ecessors, tafiored􀁲􇈰01l1gehtly
and unselfishly for the salvation of their charges,
until, in 1827, Mexico becoming inaependent of
Spain, the Franciscans were banishe·d from the
country.
The southern missionary field covered all of
what was then known as Pimeria Alta, which,
roughly, was bouncled on the north by the Gila
58
•
54 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
and on the east by the San Pedro. On the south
it ran well into Sonora, and on the west extended
to the Rio Colorado and the Gulf of California.
Although both Jesuits a,nd Franciscans in this dis­trict
tried to reach the northern tribe.s, their eforts
were barren of success. Even in Pimeria Alta
north of the present Mexican line hut two missions
of any permanency were established by the Jesuits
and but two more were added by the Franciscans.
1.,he first and greatest of the Jesuit missionaries
was Father Eucebio Kino. Re was a native of
Trent in the Austrian Tyrol, and believing that he
owed his recovery from a serious illness to the
intercession of St. Francis 􀁚􅩡avier, resigned a pro­fessorship
at the College of Ingolstadt in Bavaria
to devote his life to the salvation of the Indians
in the New World.
In February, 1687, we find him near the present
town of U.res in Sonora, where he founded his first
mission, Nuestra Senora de los Dolores, which
place he made his headquarters up to the tim􀁛􅬠 of
his death, and from which he made his many mis­sionary
journeys to Arizona.
In December, 1690, Father Juan Maria de Sal­vatierra,
superior and visitador, came to Dolores,
and as he and Father Kino were inspecting the
diferent missions and visitas which the latter had
established in the district, they were met at Tucu­babai
on the Rio Altar by a delegation of Sobai­puris
Indians. These natives had journeyed south­ward
from about the locality of San Xavier to ask
if missionaries could not be sent to their own
country.
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 55
Gladly a.cceding to their request, shortly after­wards
the two Jesuits journeyed northward, cross­ing
the border at or near the Santa Crt1z River,
being the first white men to enter what is now
Arizona f1·om the south since Coronado's visit
one l1undred and fifty years before.
Salvatierra immediately returned to Mexico,
leaving Kino, who remained a little "\vhile longer,
investigating the possibilities of the country as a
missionary field.
Although he had little encouragement from the
superiors of his order, Father Kino took a great
interest in the Papagos, Pimas and other friendly
tribes of Indians living in that part of Pimeria
Alta, now known as Arizona, and during the re­maining
sixteen years of his administration of
missionary afairs from Dolores, made no less than
fourteen journeys through diferent parts of that
country.
At this time the most northerly of the precidios
or garrisons of the Spaniards was at Fronteras,
situated near the San Pedro River, i n northern
Sonora. From this presidio there operated a fly­ing
-squadron whose purpose it "'as to defend the
missions and missionaries from hostile Indians,
particularly the Apaches, who about a half century
before first appeared in Arizona, cornfng from the
north, and from the time of their arrival gave
evidences of the predatory and m11rderous charac­teristics
which later turned Arizona into a verita­ble
charnel house.
However, in spite of manifold dan.gers, some-
56 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
times guarded by an escort of soldiers, sometimes
only accompanied by a companion friar or Indian
guides, and often traveling alone, Father Kino jour­neyed
up and down the. Santa Cruz, the San Pedro
and Gila rivers, preaching and ministering to
Papagos, Pimas, Sobas, Coeo-Maricopas and
Yumas who lived in that distriot. The good father
1nust have possessed a wond􀁑􅅲rf ul personality and
adaptability as well as great eourage, for nearly
everywhere the Indians seem t o have received
him gladly, listened to his teachings and given him
their children to be baptized.
Knowing of the missions farther to the south,
the natives were anxiou.s to have like communities
established in their own country, and although
Father Kino's greatest desire was to see this accom­plished,
he was unable to get the support to carry
out the plan. Nevertheless, at many of the villages
the natives built little adobe churches where
Father Kino and his few associates might hold
mass on their all too infrequent visits.
Th.e padres􀁒􅈠 be-sides ministering t o their charges
spiritually, also looked after their temporal well
being. These people were semi-agricultural, liv­ing
in villages and having little fields of maize,
beans, squash and cotton.. The padres gave them
seeds of new varieties of grain and vegetables, and
even helped them make a start raising horses,
sheep and cattle. The success thus gained may be
gathered by a letter written by Father Kino him­self:
''The greater the means, the greater our obliga-
I SPANISH MISSION DAYS 57
tion to seek the salvation of so many souls in the
very fertile lands and valleys of these. new con­quests
and conversions. There are already rich
and abundant fields, plantings and crops of wheat,
maize, frijoles, chickpel}s, beans, lentils . . . in
them vineyards, . . . reed brakes of sweet
cane for syrup and panache. . . . There are
many fruit trees, as figs, quinces, oranges, . . .
with all sorts of garden stuf, . . . garlic, let­tuce,
. . . Castilian roses, white lilies."
Mining in Arizona, too, had its first slight begin­ning
in early Jesuit times, for our diligef!t and
practical father mentions more than once veins
of minerals which he had seen in various parts of
the c.ountry.
In 1694, acting on information he received from
the Indians, our Padre Kino visited the since
famous pre-historic ruin$ on the Gila, now known
as the Casa Grande, being doubtless the first white
man to see them. It is also interesting to note that,
although the present church building at the mis­sion
of San Xavier del Bae was not coinmenced
until many years afterwards, it is recorded that
in 1701 Father Kino laid the foundation for a large
church at that place.
In 1710, at the age of seventy, while still actively
engaged in this work, this intrepid old soldier of
the cros·s passed to his rewa1'd. It is told that dur­ing
his mission work he baptized no less than
forty-eight thousand Indians. Of him Calvijero
says: ''In all of his journeys he carried no other
food than roast.ed corn; he never omitted to cele-
58 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
brate Holy Mass and never slept on a mattress.
As he wandered about he prayed incessantly or
sang hymns or songs. He died as saintly as he
lived."
At the time of Father Kino's death the only
permanent mission existing in what is now Ari­zona
was at Guevavi, and what ,vith the hostility
of the Apaches and the weakness of the garrisons,
the padres were unable to do missionary work
north of that place for the next twenty years.
Indeed􀁒􅈠 it is quite likely that no Spaniards what­ev€
r entered the district unless it was an occa­sional
expedition of the soldiers from 'Fronte-ras.
By 1732, however, conditions had so changed that
the Jesuits were able to tnake San Xavier del Ba_ c
a permanent mission, placing Father Felipe Seges􀁓􅌠
ser in charge, while Juan Bautista Grasshoffer was
made the resident priest at Guevavi. From that
time on there were gathered at these two places
Indian neophytes who received spiritual instruc­tion
from the padres and labored under their
direction.
As we know, the Spaniards were ever in search
of the precious me-tals. An attempt, at least, at
mining in Pimeria Alta was made early in 1726,
and ten years later, at Arizonae, southwest of Gue­vavi
and just south of the Arizona line, the famous
Planehas de Plata were discovered. Here great
plates or balls of native silver were found; one
immense lump, it is said, weighed nearly three
thousand pounds. In fact, the mine was so rich
that when the fame of the strike reached Spain
the king promptly appropriated it for himself.
I SPANISH MISSION DAYS 59
·- . :..;, ,.,.;:,-. -.. -=,
-􀀃􀎷·􀀄􀐢"
.; ,.,􀀐􁀀􀀑􁄀􀀒􁈀􀀓􁌭-..i--􀀔􁐠
In the meantime afairs at the missio-ns, both -
in Arizona and Sonora, were going in a way not at
all idealistic. The Pima and Papago Indians, from
which tribes were gathered most of the neophytes,
althougn comparatively tractable and peace-lov­ing,
were wholly unused to discipline and the
white man's standard of labor. The zealous fathers -
.
seemed to have pushed them rather far, for on
November 21, 1751, through the entire district of
Pimeria Alta, the Pimas and Papagos joined the
Ceres in a bloody revolt. The two priests in charge
of San Xavier and Guevavi fled to Suamca in
Sonora, which was protected by a nearby presidio.
Two other of the padres were killed at their mis­sions
in Sonora, as were about a hundred other
Spaniard.s. Smelting furnaces that had been
erected were destroyed by the Indians, and mine
shafts filled in wherever found.
By some means, within the next two years,
priests and parishioners were reconciled; possibly
the presidio, or garrison, which was established at
Tubae in the Santa Cruz Valley, 1752, may have
been a potent influence to that end. In any event
the friars returned to Guevavi and San Xavier,
and in 1754 established an important visita at
Tumacacori, conveniently near the soldiers of the
new garnson.
We now read of Spanish colonists beginning
to come up from the south, and see mentioned the
name of Tucson, which is spoken of as an Indian
village the fathers visited from San Xavier.
The friars seemed to have attained some suc­cess
in regaining the confidence of their charges
60 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
when suddenly, in 1767, King Cha1·les III expelled
all of the Jesuits from his kingdom. Several rea­sons
are given for this act: that it was the influ­ence
of the Freemasons in the Spanish court; that
the Pima uprising showed incompetency on the
part of the fathers in charge; that the enemies of
the order had showed the king a forged letter
purporting to be from the J es·uit superior general
and containing allegations that seriously afected
the monarch's title to the crown. In any event a
devoted and zealous body of earnest workers who,
,vhatever mistakes they may have made, labored
unselfishly in the face of grave dangers, were
abruptly discharged with no, thanks from the coun­try
whose frontier they had t1·ied so hard to civil-
. ize. The church records show that altogether
there were nineteen of the order who worked in
this field.
Immediately upon their removal the mission
property ,vas tur11ed over to the royal comisario,
and the Marquis de Croix, then viceroy of Mexico,
sent an urgent appeal to the Franciscan college at
Queretero., J\llexico, asking for at least twelve
priests of th.at order.
In response to this request fourteen Francis­cans
\-Vere seot to Sonora and there assigned to the
diferent missions thPoughout the district. The
church property was formally turned over to the
order, and each friar was allowed by the crown
the meager stipend of $30'0 a year towards defray­ing
the expens·es of his work.
A year had elapsed since the Jesuits had gone,
I
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 61
and the two missions in Arizona, Guevavi and
San Xavier, were in a deplorable condition. Not
only had the property been sadly neglected by the
civil custodians, but also the year of freedo,m from
restraint enjoyed by the neophytes made the dis­cipline
imposed upon them seem very irksome.
Gradually, however, some of the Indians returned;
some, who were wholly under the care of the
padres, were furnished food and clothing for them­selves
and families; others simply worked for pay
by the day.
Of all of the Franciscans in Pimeria by far the
most conspicuous figure was Father Francisco
Garces, who w·as assigned to San Xavier with the
Indian village of Tucson as a visita. He was a
younger man on entering his work than Father
Kino, but no one could have been more zealous
in his labors,, more unmindful of the dangers of a
hostile frontier, or more undaunted by the poverty
of the missions. His faith and courage lifted him
to a plane where failure could not reach him.
So great were his zeal and piety that it was felt
even by the Indians, who venerated him as an
o.racle and a holy man. However, he could be a,s
stern with those who were hostile to his teachings
as he was patient and kindly to those who listened.
, As an object lesson, he had a servant carry
before him a large ·banner, which on one side
po·rtrayed the ·likeness of the Virgin Mary, and on
the other a picture of a lost soul, writhing in" the
flames of hell. If, on visiting a new community,
the natives were hospitable, he turned to them the
62 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
picture of the mother of Jesus·; if unfriendly, the
lost soul was exhibited as a warning of their own
inevitable fate.
The first missionary journe􀁈􄠠 of Father Garces
was- made to the Gila country within a few months
of his arrival at San Xavier. The young padre
kept a very complete diary, and what he tells of
the various tribes is full of interest. The Pimas
and Coco-Maricopas lived in much the same co·un­try
they do now, and Father Garces was especially
impressed with the amount of cotton they grew,
which they wove into blankets for both their men
and women. The men also wore a cotton breech­cloth,
while the women clad themselves in a short
skirt made of the same material.
While the Pimas, Papagos and Coco-Maricopas
treated the priests with uniform kindness, the
Apaches continued to be a perpetual menace, raid­ing
the missions whenever the opportunity ofered
and. ready at all times for both thievery and
murder.
Early in his ministry Father Garces became
ill, and Fray Gil, who was in charge of Guevavi,
came to assist him. In Gil's absence, the Apaches
sacked· Guevavi, damaged the mission building
and killed all but two of the little band of soldiers
that was guarding it.
Later the s-ame year the Apaches attacked San
Xavier, destroying the mission buildings􀁉􄤠 but under
Garces' direction it was quickly repaired.
In spite of continuous obstacles and dange.rs,
the mission showed steady improvement. In 1772
•
I
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 63
there was at San Xavier a fairly capacious adobe
church building with, including men, women and
children, two hundred parishioners. They had cul­tivated
fields and cared for considerable live stock. '
At the visita of San Jose del Tucson there were
aQout two hundred people, but no place of wor­ship,
so some time during the year the zealous
Fray Francisco Garces built at the foot of a hil1,
called ''El Cerro del Tucson,'' a stone church, a
-mission house with a wall of adobe around it, as
a protection against the Apaches. The pueblo
stood about half a mile west of the present city of
Tucson.
At this time Guevavi bad eighty-six people, the
Indians there doing a little farming! Tumacacori
had a population of ninety-three, but though there
were both church and priest house, there was no
minister in charge. There was also a small unfin­ished
church at San Ignacio, just east of Guevavi
Calabasas, i n the same district, was a visi ta with
sixty-four people but no church. Add to this a
little military post at Tubae, with less than fifty
soldiers, and we have practically all of the mission
communities of Arizona.
As early as Father Kino's time it had been the
ambition of both the padre and the military au­thorities
to establish an overland route between
the missions of Pimeria Alta and those of Cali­fornia.
Finally, to this end, in 1774, Captain Juan
Bautista de Anza, comandante of the presidio at
Tubae, undertook the establishment of a trail. On
January 8th he left Tubae with thirty-four soldiers,
64 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
going by the way of Caborca on the River Altar,
then northwest t0. the junction of the Gila and
Colorado, a11d then, after a dificult mar.ch across
the desert, on to San Gabriel, near Los Angeles.
On _this expedition the church was represented by
Padres Garces and Juan Diaz, both of whom were
interested in the Yu1na and other Indian tribes liv­ing
on ,the Colorado·, and a1nong whom there had
been mueh talk of establishing a mission.
In September, 1775, De Anza led a second party
into California, starting froin Horoasitas, and going
through San Xavier down the Gila. This expedi­tion
journeyed as far as the Golden Gate in Cali­fornia,
where they founde.d a settlement, which in
time became San Francisco.
Early in. the year of 1776, while Adams, Han­cock
and their associates on the Atlantia Coast
were occupied with ev􀁹􇥮nts leading up to a famous
Declaration of Independence concerning one King
George􀁺􇨠 Father Garce􀁻􇬬, with his banne. t bonre
before him, thinkin.g of very different matters in­deed,
was journeying .northward up the west bank
of the Colorado River into unknown country, hop­in.
g to reach the Hopis, to whom he was especially
anxious to preach the gospel. He encounlered the
Mohave and Chemehuevi Indians, probably near
the present town of Parker, who received him cor­dially.
After :making a casual side trip of a hun­dred
miles or so to SQUth central California, he
retur-ned to Arizona and journeyed trails hereto­fore
untrodden by white men into Gentral Arizona.
Somewhere ne·ar Prescott he met the Yavapai
I
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 65
tribe, and induced five of them to act as his guid·es
to Hopi land.
En route to the pueblos they visited the Havasu
Indians, who lived then as they do now, down in
the depths o·f the pict11resque and beautiful Cata­ract
Canyon, and marveled much ove.r the charn1
of the spot.
When h.e reached Oraibe, the clif city of the
Hopis, he found the natives still most antagonistic
to the religion of the Spaniards. While ofering
the sorely disappointed Father Garces no violence,
they would neither receive the simple gifts he had
brought them, nor allow him to remain. They had
no objection to the friar as a man, and permitted
him to take his :burros to the sheep corral and
wander through the town, which he did with much
curiosity, recording what he did and saw most
minutely in his diary.
The people gave every evidence not only of
superior intelligence, but of considerable material
prosperity. The houses, he said, were of more
than one story in l1eight, with doors closed by bolts
and keys of wood.
They had sheep, which, of course, came from
the Spanish settlements on the Rio Grande, and
Father Garces notes with interest that the ewes
we.re larger than those of Sonora. Also,. he said,
they raised chickens, had gardens in which grew
all of the common vegetables, and besides that,
little orchards of peach trees. Their clothing was
both picturesque and well made, the women wear­ing
woolen smocks made of blanketing, sleeveless
6
66 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
and reaching to ·the 'heels. Over this was worn a
second smock of black or white with a girdle of
various colors. Some of the men wo.re leathern
jaek:ets fitted with slee-ves, and they completed
their apparel with trous·ers and moccasins.
That night evidently belie:ving that the friar's
presence would make '''bad medicine,'' the Pueb­lans
would not allow Father Garces to enter their
houses, so, forced to sleep in the street,. he writes
that his rest was disturbed by the harangues of
cliff erent local orators and the playing of a flute.
Af te:r remaining at the Hopi villages for three
days, he was toltl de1lnitely that it was time for
him to depart. With erucifix raised before him,
he made a final appeal, but the I.ndians would
have nothing of his teaehing, an.d gently but firmly
escorted him to the edge of the town.
Sadly disheartened by his failure, he returned
to the Colorado River, journeying southward
through the land of the Mojaves, and then east­,
vard, again visiting the Coao-Maricopas and
Pimas.
He reached San Xavier September 17th, after
a journey of over twenty-five hundred miles, in
the course of which he visited nine tribes and met ' - · -'
some twenty-five thousand Indians.
Since the establishme:nt of the church at the
''Pueblito del Tucson'' four years earlier, this set­tlement
seems to have steadily grown in impor­tance.
Spa:p.ish settlers c·ame there and the same
year that Father Garces made his long journey to
the Hopi country military quarters were erected
\
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 67
there, and the soldiers moved north from 􀁖􅙵ubac to
occupy them. About this time the settlement
seems to have taken unto itself a new patron saint,
for hereafter, instead of being known as San Jose
del Tucson, it was called San Ag.ustin del Pueblito
del Tucson. Fancy a Southern Pacific brakeman
announcing such a name to a car of passengers!
Naturally the settlers at Tubae made a vigorous
protest against the aba.ndo.nment of their military
p.ost, but they seem to have received scant satis­faction
from the authorities, who not only did not
return the soldiers, but insisted that certain set­tlers
who wis-hed to leave fo-r Me)dco must stay
where they were.
The Franciscans were ever desirous of reaching
farther into the frontier with their missions, and
the crown administrators ap·preeiated thoroughly
that no other pioneers could, at so little cost to the
State, so suc.eessfully enlarge their country's bor­ders.
So it was that when Padre. Garces and
accompanying friars had, with Captain de Anza,
visited the rich delta country of the Colorado
where the Yuma Indians had their productive
fields, both the representatives of the church and
the military had been impressed with the thought
that this would make an ideal spot for a new
religious center.
However, both Captain de Anza and Father
Garces were of the opinion that it would be dan­gerous
to establish a mission unless it could be
strongly guarded by soldiers, for while the Yumas
were agricultural, they were far more warlike
68 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
than either the Pimas or Papagos, and the upris­ing
of 1751 had not been forgotten. The powers
l1igher up finally gave orders for the establishment
of such a mission, but there were many things that
made for delays, and it was not until early in 1779
that Father Garces and Father Juan Diaz were
given orders to hold themselves in readiness to
proceed to the country of the Yumas as soon as
the necessary military force and supplies could be
obtained. Then came more waiting when, finally,
an army of twelve privates and a sergeant were
furnished as the military equipment of the peril­ous
undertaking and the intrepid dozen and one,
together with the two priests, made th􀁱􇄠 journey
to the Colorado.
The executive head of the Indians at that time
was one Chief Palma, a dignital')r of no mean sta­tion,
for he had not only received a military deco­ration
from Captain de Anza, but had been to the
City of Mexico and been baptized in the cathedral.
The loaves and fishes of the religion of the
Spaniards had been very attractive to this Indian
warrior. Coincident with the establishment of the
proposed missi-on, Palma had been promised an
unlimited amount of smoking tobacco, which he
very much enjoyed; and a fine suit of clothes,
entirely superfluous, considering the climate of
Yuma and the sartorial ha.bits of his tribe, but
adding greatly to his dignity and standing. There­fore
he w·as very anxious for the mission to be
established.
Naturally, the amount of gratuities which the
\
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 69
two priests were able to brin.g with them was very
small, and the disgruntled aboriginal executive
1·eceived the ecclesiastical arrivals with tempered
cordiality. Nevertheless, the tact of Father Garces
seems to have tided things over pretty well until a
)1ear later, when twenty-one soldiers, twelve
- -
labore.rs and twenty colonists journeyed over the
dese1•ts to the new settlement, each bringing with
him a wife and a family of children.
To make their welcome at the b.ands of the
expectant savages dol1hly sure, these new colonists
calmly took possession of what Indiat1 fields they
wanted, and asked the natives the old question,
''What are you going to do about it?'' For the
time being it seemed nothing was done about it,.
and a pueblo was established on the west sid.e of
the river at the mouth of the Gila, which was
called Concepcion, and a second village was laid
out three leagues f arthe.r south and christened the
unassuming name of San Pedro y San Pablo de
Bicuner.
For nearly two years the colonies maintained
a precarious existence. The Yumas, next to the
Apaches, were considered the most dangerous In­dians
of the Southwest; add to that fact that the
soldiers wer-e brutal and licentious and we find a
condition that made disaster a little less than
inevitable.
The padres, who realized fully the harvest that
all this was leading to, did all they could to restrain
their countrymen and placate the Indians, but the
trouble was past mending.
70 THE ,STORiY OF ARIZONA
The proverbial last straw was laid upon the
none too patient camel's b·aek in June of 1781
through the aggressions of a new arrival of sol­diers.
Captain Fernando Rivers, lieutenant­governor
of Lower California, with a party of sol­diers
and emigrants, stopped at Concepcion on his
way to Santa Barbara. Pa.rt of ·his expe.dition he
sent on to California, part back to Sonora, while,
with a hand·ful of s·oldiers, he remained, camping
on the east side of the Colorado, where l1e pastured
his horses and cattle-nearly a tho,usand head-
; u·pon the mesquite beans on which the Yumas
largely depended f·or food.
On Tuesday, June 17, 1781, the lightning struck!
At Conc.epcion, while in the very act of celebrating
mass, Father Garces, was clubbeq to death by the
natives for whom he had labored so earnestly.
The comandante of the village, who was also in the
. church at the time, was killed in trying to .reach
his command, as was the corporal who followed
him. It is recorded that the heroic Garces gave
the. dying soldier absolution even' though he was
at the point of death hims.elf.
At Bicuner, the two p1iests, Diaz and Moreno,
were killed, and, after ha,ving desecrated the
images and altar, the savages destroyed th,e church.
They he:¥t attacked the force of Captain Riv-era,
and although the Spaniards entrenched themselves
and made a valiant defense, within a few hours
the last man. was killed.
Two friar.s, through the aid of Chief Palma,
who it ·seems w􀁘􅡳s not wholly in accord with his
•
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 71
bloody tribesmen, succeeded in getting clear of
the settlement, but were finally pursued 􀁏􄽮nd killed.
When th.e news of the massacre reached the
comandante of the military forces, General de
Croix, he at once began plans for the severest
retributive measures. Though chafing under the
delay, it was a year before he could spare the nec­essary
f Oree, but in September, 1782, he sent a
hundred and sixty soldiers, who, combining with
a company of Spaniards and allied friendly In­dians
from California, engaged the Yumas to
deadly purpose. They did thorough work, one
hundred and ten of the. Yumas were killed, with
eighty-five capture.d a·nd ten Christian prisoners·
recovered.
The story was told by the liberated captives
that after the massacre the Yumas would not live
in the vicinity of Concepcion, for every night a
ghostly procession of the slain worild wend its way
about the mission, each carrying a candle, while a
tall figure in white walked at its head, bearing a
cross.
It must be remetnbe·red that, however much
the Spaniards sutf e:red from the Yumas, there had
been prov0cation fop their ghastly work. No s·uch
extenuation could be cFedited to the Apaches.
With them raids upon weaker people, either red
men or white, for the pt1rpose of plunder, was part
of the plain matter of living, and the murders
which accompanied these predatory acts were
often committed in pure wanto·nness. So persistent
were they in their attacks upon the settlements in
72 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
the Santa Cruz Valley and other parts of Pimeria
Alta that, in 1786, General Ugarte, the comandante,
began a vigorous campaign against them i:n whicl1
work he was gladly aided by organized companies
of Pima and Opata allies,.
Diplomacy as well as military prowess seems
to have had a part in these operations, for at the
end of an energetic campaign a treaty was made
)vherein the Indians were to be f11rnished ratiot1s
which cost the crown from $18,. 000 to $30,000 a
year, and a policy adopted thereafter wl1ich surely
should meet ,vith the approval of those who con­sider
that the gentle Apaches would never have
given Arizona any trouble had it n.ot been for the
unkind treatment aforded them by the whites.
Tl1e old chronicle says that they were furnished
,vith st1pplies, encouraged to form settlements near
the presidios, and as a crowning consideration,
taught to qtink intoxicating liquors.
Still, even with all this thoqghtfulness, occa­sionally
not only the Apaches, but €Ven independ­ent
groups of the younger Pimas and Papagos went
raiding. However, the military forces seem to
have been strong enough to promptly bring them
back to the paths of peace and mes,cal, and so
quiet was the time in comparison with what went
b·oth before and after that from 1787 to 1815 may
b.e considered almost the golden period of mission
history-or at least gilded well enough so in look­ing
back through the vista of a century it reflects
a golden glamour not wholly unpleasant. Not only
,vere the missions prosperous, but settlers came in
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 73
from Mexico, and stock raising and farming were
engaged in in favored localities. Trade was car­ried
on with Sonora by means of pack trains.
Strongly gt1arded by armed escorts, the arieros
would load their pack mules ,vith · hides, wool,
buckskin and rich ore, and take the long journey
over hills and deserts to Hermosillo or Ciuaymas
and bring back zarapes, mantillas, cloth, sugar,
imported wines, jewels and silver coins.
Cattle and horses were raised along the Santa
Cruz and the San Pedro,. and in such ranchos as
the San Bernardino, and driven dow11 to the port
of Guaymas and turned into Spanish gold.
It was probably just prior to this time that a
beginning was made on the present beautiful mis­sion
of San Xavier. Padre Baltasar Carillo was - . - .
in charge of the mission from 1780 to 1794, and it
is fairly well established that the work was started
early in his administration.
There is a date, ''1797,'' cut on one of the inner
doors of the church, ,vhich very likely records the
year of the structure's completion. This was dur­ing
the administration of Padre Carillo's former
assistant, Padre Narciso Gutie·rres, who in tt1rn
,􀁡􆅡as assisted at diferent times by Mariano Bardoy,
Ramon Lopes and Angel Alonzo de Prado.
It will be noticed that all, with perhaps one
exception, are very characteristic Spani􀁢􆉨h names,
and it is to these men who built for the glory of
God rather than for their own aggrandizement
that the honor of making possible this beautiful
structure erected in the midst of the desert is due.
74 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
Under the administration of these devoted
fathers we may picture Arizona mission life at its
best. We ea:n hear the mellow tones of the bells
in the tower of San Xavier filling the little valley
of the Santa Cruz with their mtl'sic. We can see
in the early morning the Indian neophytes, stolid,
but wholly devout, with uneovered heads and san­daled
feet, assemble for matutinal prayers, and
the rite once over, wa,tch them with clear con .
science shufling of to breakfast of corn eakes and
frijoles to discuss the cock-fight scheduled for the
following Sunday afternoon.
As the day proc.eeds we witness an animated
picture. At a brickyard a vigorous padre, with his
gown tucked up o·ut of the way of his feet, is di­recting
the firing of a kiln; at the smithy, .a friar
blacksmith is cunningly fashioning h-inges for a
door to the church or putting a bolt in an ox bow,
which, by the way, will be tied to the beast's· horns.
Woodworkers are making boards with hand saws
from timbers brought down from the Santa Cata­lina
Mountains on the backs of mules or burros,
a.nd in the fields are Indians irrigating or weeding
the mission gardens. At noon there are more corn
cakes, prayers and frijoles; in the afternoon, more
work; in the evening, mission bells again bring in
the tired 'workers to spiritual and material nour­ishment.
The day, especially if it is Saturday, may
be closed by a baile where the Indians dance on
the h·ard ground to the music of the harp and the
guitar. Yet we hear that some of the neophytes,
preferring paganism with indolence to piety cou­pled
with labor, would occasionally run away!
SPANISH MISSION DAYS 75
At Guevavi, the oldest mission of Arizona, there
never -seems to have been more than a small adobe
church, but at Tumacacori a v·ery beautiful mission
building was erected. Fray Beltasar Carillo was
at T􀁵􇕭macacori from 1794 to 1798, and Fray Gu tie1·­res
from that time until 1820, and it is likely to
these men, who did the building at San Xavier,
should be given the credit for Tumacacori as well.
'l'he mission of San Xavie1􀁶􇘠 del Bae, beyond all
question the most beautiful edifice in the South­west,
is kept in fairly good rep.air. On the other
hand, Tumacacori, which was not only more beau­tiful
but far more ambitious than many of the
California missions of nation-wide fame, is now,
through most deplorable neglect, in sad decay.
Beginning with the Mexican wars of independ­ence
against Spanish rule, the short years of tl1e
prosperity of the missions of' Pimeria Alta came
swiftly to an end. From 1811 on, money and food
were inadequately and irregularly supplied the
soldiers at the garrisons, and the military force
became thoroughly disorganized. Rations to the
Apaches also were cut down􀁷􇜠 and in consequence
the redskins promptly resumed their old habits of
stealing stock, raiding ranches and murdering
settlers.
The padres did the best they could to hold their
neophytes together, but on September 2, 1827, came
the encl of mission days. With the independence
of Mexico achieved, orders were given at the capi­tal
for the expulsion of the Franciscan.s, and they
soon left the country.
76 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
San Xavier was placed under the ch,arge of the
secular parish priest at Magdalena, but that was
n1iles away, and naturally visits could be made
put rarely.
In a letter written in 1835, Don Ignacio Zuniga,
former commander of the northern presidios,
stated that since 1820 no less than five thousand
lives had l>een lost in Pimeria, and that at least a
hundred ranchos, haciendas, n1ining camps and
other settlements had been des'troyed; and from
three thousand to fou1· thousand ,settlers had been
obliged to quit the northern frontiers. He also
speaks of the hostility of the Pimas and Papagos,
who had doubtless sufered at the hands of the
military, as well as from the usual raids of the
Apaches.
A melancholy ending, surely, for a period that
had promised so much-Guevavi, Tumacacori and
San Ignacio deserted, a squalid town at Tubae,
another but little better at Tucson, where the in­habitants
depended more on the adob,e wall for
protection than on the soldiers, and San Xavier
with priestless altar and silent bells.
But the one bright ray perhaps in all this
depres,sing cloud was the fact that the Papago
neophytes did not forget-but hid securely the
altar furniture for the time wh􀁓􅍮n their simple
faith told them the fathers would return, and kept
the afection for them in their hearts. - - - 􀀃􀍗
We shall see later that this faith was not unre-warded.
CHAPTER IV
THE ARRIVAL OF THE AMERICANS
•
HE eforts of Mexico to free herself from the
rule of Spain had their beginning in 1810
"'itl1 the revolution inspired by Hidalgo,
the fearless, libe:rty-lo-ving c11rate of D11rango.
Although after brief suecesses Hidalgo sufered
death at the hands of the king's soldiers, the cause
triumphed, and in 1822, with the treaty signed by
General Iturbide for Mexic.o and Viceroy O'Donoju
for Spain, the independence of the country was
achieved.
However, even independence does not solve all
of a nation's civil problems. In 1822, witl1 great
acclaim, Iturbide was crowned emperor; in -1823
he was compelled to give back his crown; in 1824
he was executed by the new republic. What makes
this of special interest to the Arizonan is that his
state within those three years was a colony of the
king of Spain, ail outlyfng district of a New
World monarch and a territory of the Republic
of M􀁚􅩸xico.
In 1824 the new constituent congress joined New
Mexico to Chihuahua and Durango in one ''Estado
Inferno del Norte." As the capital was to be lo­cated
in Chihuahua, Dura·ngo objected to the
arrangement, whereupon the obliging law-makers
77 '
78 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
made a territory of New Mexico and fonned
Chihuahua a·nd Durango into states.
The capital of New Mexico was, of co·urse,
Santa Fe, which then contained a population of
about forty-five hundred people, and while the
houses were of adobe, tbey were comfortable and
picturesque, being built around a central court or
patio. They were furnished simply, and bright­ened
with Navajo blankets.
Altogether that part o.f New Mexico had a popu­lation
of ove-r twenty thousand whites and eight
thousand friendly P·ueblo Indians. Along the
upper Rio Grande were irrigated ranc.hos, rich in
horses, cattle, grains, sheep and fruit. A good
wine was made and there was a steady commerce
between the territory and Chihuahua City.
In contrast to this prosperity, in the western
part of the territory􀁖􅙴the present Arizona-by rea­son
of the constant menace of the Apaches, things
were in a sad condition. All the ranches had been
abandoned, and, the only Spanish settlements wer􀁗􅜠
the villages of Tubae and Tue.son, whose existence
was made possible by small garrison,s of soldiers.
At Tucson there was the additional protection of
a surrounding adobe wall.
The only miaes that were worked to any extent
in this section under Spanish or Mexican rule were
the Planchas de Plata already mentioned and the
Santa Rita del Cobre copper mines, which were.
located at the foot of Ben Moore Mountain, nine
miles from the modern Silver City.
The Santa Rita was worked as early as 1804,
ARRIVAL OF THE AMERICANS 79
and the ore extracted was so rich that it was sent
by pack animals to Chihuahua, where it was con­verted
into the copper coinage of the country.
Three mines were included in the Planchas de
Plata group, the Las Cruces, the Tupustetes, and
the Arizona or Arizuma, fro.m which great chunks
of pure silver were taken, one mass alone weigh­ing
2,700 pounds! Both the Santa Rita and the
Planchas de Plata mines had to be deserted from
time to time on account of attacks by the Apaches.
The first citizen of note from the United States
to penetrate into the Southwest was Lieut. Zebulon
M. Pike, who, in 1806, with twenty-two men, was
sent by hi,B superio1·s to explore the country of tl1e
Arkansas and Red rivers. In January of 1807 he
built a small fort on the upper waters of the Rio
Grande, in Spanish territory, believing, as he after­wards
e,xplained, that he w,as on the American side
of the Red River.
He was arrested by Spanish dra,goons and taken
to Governor Alencaster at Santa Fe, who treated
him as a guest rather than a prisoner, but never­theless
took him on to Chihuahua to explain mat­ters
to the military chief, General Salceqo.
When Pike returned to the States his account
of the richness of the Spanish settlements in New
Mexico created much excitement not only among
the adventurers, but also among the enterprising
frontier merchants who were always ready to send
argosies into danger where there was a chance
for large profit.
The romantic story of the ''Trail'' that was
80 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
made from Independence􀁕􅔠 Missouri, to Santa Fe
and the great caravans of mule and ox teams that
went over it is well known.
From 1822 to 1844 were the haleyon days of
dangers brave.cl-, adventu.res encountered and for­tunes
won. The an1ount of merchandise carried
over the trail the first yea1· was $15,000; the last,
$450,000.
Natt1rally, many of the bolde1· spirits among
those who -went to Santa Fe ultimately made their
way yet farther west. As a result, early in 1824,
while the Franciscans were still holding mass at
San Xavier and Tumaeacori, American trappers
and hunters wete exploring the Gila, Salt, Colo­rado
and other rivers, finding in favorable locali­ties
plenty of beaver and an abundance of game
almost everywhere they went.
There were at that time fourteen o·r more tribes
of Indians in Arizona, which ·were scattered pretty
rnuch all over the state. Many of these tripes, like
the Pimas, were uniformly hospitable to the new­comers;
others, like the Mojaves, were friendly
enou.gh if" treated with tacti but quick to :resent ill
treatment; and still a third class, as was the case
with the Yum.as, were almost always either sus­picious
or actively hostile.
The Apaches were divided into a number of
small clans, including the Chiticahuas, Mimbres,
Pin.alenos, Coyoteros, Aravaipas, Tontos, San Car­los,
the Mojave Apaches and the Yuma Apaches.
To understand the Apache one mt1st get his
point of view. To him life was a perpetual war-
ARRIVAL OF THE AlVIERICANS 81
fare. If a neighboring tribe had something that
he wanted, 􀁗􅝮nd he was strong or cunning enough
to get it, there was no reason why he sllould not
take it; and, as we have seen before, the slaying
of an antagonist 6n a raid was simply an incident
of the business in hand-a sort of Frederick the
Great or Napoleon point of view. Add to this that
the Apache was ever ready to avenge a wrong ten­fold,
and one can begin to understand why, down
to as la·te as 1886, l1e was the perpetual Sw·ord of
Damocles that hung o:ver the Arizona pioneer.
In j11stice to the Indian, however, it 1nust be
said that in his trouble with the whites he was not
always the aggressor. Sometimes the white man
was as bad as the Apache with less excuse for his
depravity.
There is an old story, the scene of which is laid
at the Santa Rita copper n1ine, of which many
variations are told, and in ,vhich there is probably
enough truth to be an illuminating commentary
on conditions in the South,vest at that time. Dur­ing
1838, so one account gives the date, the Mim­bres
Apaches, under their chief, Juan Jose, who
lived alo,ng the present Arizon􀁗􅜭-New Mexico
boundary, were giving so much trouble to the trap­pers
and the Mexicans who were working the
Santa Rita mines that drastic retaliatory measures
were decided upon. At this time there were sev­eral
parties of trappers on the headwaters of the
Gila. The captain of one of these was an English­man
by the name of James Johnson, who sug­gested
a plan whereby the Mimbres would be
6
82 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
''settled'' for all time. After arranging the matter
with the mana.gers of the Santa Rita, he invited
Juan Jose and his people to come to the mine for
a big feed. Within a hundred yards of the place
selected for the feast, and pointing directly at the
spot, Johnson concealed a six-pound howitzer,
loaded to the muzzle with slugs, musket balls and
nails, under a pile of pack saddles. A. sack of flour
was given the Indians to divide, and while the
Indians crowded about it Johnson touched his
lighted cigar to the vent of the gun, killing and
wounding a score or more, among them Juan Jose.
The massacre, so the stories go, was co1npleted by
other trappers and Mexicans.
The surviving members fled, but only to plot a
fearful revenge. The copper mines were wholly
dependent on Chihuahua for supplies, which were
brought in guarded p.ack trains. After the mas­sacre
the time for the train came and pa&,sed with
no '\7ord concerning it. Finally, the provisions
were all but exhausted. The only hope the miners
and their families had of escaping starvatio1n was
to cross the deserts that lay between the mines and
the settlements. They started, but the Apaches,
who had destroyed the train, attac:ked and killed
them all but four or five, who, after §Ufering
incredibl-e hards.hips, finally reached Chihuahua.
Many stories, differing wholly in detail, but
agreeing in essential parts, are told of John Glan­ton,
another candidate for perpetuation in the
halls of infamy. About 1845 depredations by the
Apaches became so continuous that the Mexican
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ARRIVAL OF THE .AMERICANS 83
authorities, joined by wealthy rancheros, ofered
$100 for the scalp' of every Apache warrior, $50 for
the scalp of a squaw and $25 for that of a child.
Glanton beca:rne covetous for some of this blood
money, but disliking the dangers incident to track­ing
the wary Apacl1e, decided that the hair cover­ing
fhe peaceful Pima did not greatly difer f1·om
that of the quarry upon whom the reward had
been set, so took to pot-shooting not only friendly
Indians, but even Mexicans themselves, exchanging
the scalps for money at Chihuahua. However, it
was a business that any conservative life insurance
company would have classed as extra hazardous,
and finally Glanton and his acc.omplices were
caught red-handed while scalping Mexicans they
had murdered. Glanton escaped to New Mexico,
but was latel' killed by the Yuma Indians, who took
his "'orthless life in payment for gold he had
stolen from them.
Prominent among the early trail makers of the
state were Sylvester Pattie and his son, James,
who entered the country in 1824. In an account
afterwards written by James their adventures are
graphically set forth and include many battles
with the Indians, sufering from heat and thirst on
the desert, perils by tidal waves on the Colorado,
and finally the death of the elder Pattie in a Cali­fornia
Spanish prison.
The most picturesque of the pioneer adven­turers
was undoubtedly Bill Williams, for whom
Bill Williams Mountain and Bill Williams Fork
were named. We hear of him in 1825, in the Far
84 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
Northwest, from which point he trapped and
fought Indians as far south as Sonora. Long,
sinewy and bony, witl1 nose and chin almost megt­ing,
he was the typical plainsman of the dim.e
novel. H _ e always rode ah Indian pony, and his
l\1exican stirrups were as big as C'oal scuttles. His
buckskin suit was bedaubed with grease until it
had the appearanee of polished leather; his feet
were never incased in anything but mo􀁷􇝣casins, and
his buckskin trot1sers had t11e traditional frin.ge on
the ot1ter seam. Naturally, Indian signs were an
open book to him, and he was eve·n readier to take
a scalp than an Apache, who preferred to crush
the heads of his victims and let the hair stay. At
the age of sixty he died a natural death caused by
a bullet from a Ute Indian.
A far diferent type of tnan ,vas Kit Carson, who
was the -ablest plainsman of them all, and more
than once rendered valuable aid to the nation. He
was Fremont's g11ide throughout his explorations,
and to him rather th.an to his chief sho-uld have
· · been given the t1tle of ''Pathfinder."
He was a boy of seventeen when we first hear
of him with a party of trappers on the Gila, and
soon thereafter was a member of Ewing Young·'s
party, where he gave a good account of himself in
a b.attle with the Apaches. Originally fro1n Ken­t11eky,
after 1832 he made his ho111e in New Mexico,
but was often in A1·izona, where the Indians re­spected
his- character as well as l1is daring and skill
with the rifle. Withal he was the most unassum­ing
of men, never boasting, and with a voice as
I
ARRIVAL OF THE AMERICANS 85
soft as a woman's. In appearance he was rather
below the average in height, but muscular and of
almost incredible endurance.
'
CH.APTER V
THE WAR WITH MEXICO
F the events causing the trans·fer of title of
the present Arizona from Mexico to the
United States the territory saw but little.
By proclamation, May 30􀁛􅬠 1846, President Polk
announced the existence of a ''state of war'' with
Mexico, and in carrying out the plans for the inva­sion
of New· Mexico, Chihuaht1a and California, the
Army of the West was organized, and its command
given to Stephen W. Kearny. This army, as it
moved westward from Bent's Fort on the Arkan­sas,
numbered about fifteen huntlred men, and
included a regiment of Missouri cavalry, Colonel
Doniphan; three squadrons of dragoons, Major
$u1nner; two batteries of artillery, Major Cla:rk;
and two co·mpanies of inf an try, Captain Angney.
It was, of course, the desire. of the administra­tion
at Washington to occupy this western terri­tory
with as little bloodshed as possible, and to
that end arts of diplomacy were invoked as well
as the force of arn1s; so accompanied by Capt.
Philip St. George Cooke, with an es·cort of soldiers,
went James Magofin on a ''secret mission'' to Gov­ernor
Manuel Armijo at Santa Fe.
Magofin was a man of great tact and good fel­lowship
who for years had been in the Santa Fe
86
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'rHE WAR WITH MEXICO 87
trade and was well liked in New Mexico. Just
what influence Magofin brought to bear on the
governor was never revealed, but it was conspicu­ously
successful. Only a few days before, Armijo
had issued a florid proelan1ation calling upon the
people to rally in repulsing the American invaders.
After his conference with Magofin, although his
people ofered him substantial support, when the
Americans reached Apache Canyon, which could
have been defended by the Mexicans with half
their resources, Armijo had fled to· Cl1ihuahua.
Magofin had more difi-culty in winning over
-
.
Archuleta, the secoud in command, yet by appeal-ing
to his ambition and cupidity succeeded in over­coming
his active opposition. As a result, when
Kearny can1e up with his army, the Mexican forces
had faded away.
On August 18th, without any oppositio-n what­ever,_
the American.s entered the city of Santa Fe,
where they were cordially 1·eceived by Lieutenant­Governor
Virgil. Accompanied by a salute of thir­teen
guns, the American flag was raised over the
palacio of the Spanish governor.
Without any dela)r, Kearny commenced work
on the military post, Fort Ma1·ey, and on Septem­ber
22nd announced his plan of civil government.
Charles Bent, an American, who was married to
an estimable Mexican lady, was appointed gov­ernor,
with Donaci􀁧􆝮no Virgil, a native New Mexi­can,
secretary. For United States attorney, Francis
P. Blair, Jr., afterwards famous as a statesman
and soldier, was chosen.
8􀁶􇘠 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
Fou.r days after the new o-ficers had been sworn
in􀁷􇜭- Kearny, now a brigadier-ge, neral, with tw·o, hun­dred
dragoons, commenced his march to Califor­nia.
fle left behind him Colonel Donipha11, who
a-fterwards captur-ed Chihuahua. Col. Sterling
Price, now on his way with the Mormon Battalion,
was to stay witl1 the aFmy at Santa Fe.
Before Donip.han started so11th to commence
his can1paign in Chil1ual1ua, he went to Be·ar
Springs in the Navajo country, where he had a con­f
erene,e with the leading chief·s of that tribe. The.
Navajos were, then as now, the strongest Indian
nation of the Southwest, and although never show­ing
the wanton, blood-thirsty-characteristies of the
Apa.ches, for several years had been the traditional
- enemies of the Pue·blan Indians and the Mexicans
alike. They had stolen their flocks and herds, and
had even at times carried away Pueblan women.
In greeting Doniphan -and his associates the
Navajo- chiefs displayed every cordiality, express­ing
their friendship and admiration for the Ameri­cans,
but were equally outspoken regarding their
detestation of the Mexieans, and could not under­stand
why Doniphan sho11ld object to their raiding
them. However, finally, fourteen of the chiefs
signed' a treaty agreeing to :be pea-ceable, which
treaty, it may be ad.ded, as was characteristic of
the Navajo, they soon broke.
In January, a little over th1·ee rtonths after
Kearny had left, a revolt, heade'd by Don Thomas
Ortiz and Diego Archuleta, who had failed to re­ceive
the honors and emolu.men.ts vaguely sug-
\
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I
•
THE WAR WITH MEXICO 89
gested to him by Magofin, was plotted against the
Americans. The plan was discovered, however,
before it reached its consum1nation, and the lead­ers,
like Armijo, fled precipitously into Mexico.
Almost immediately afterwards a second revolt
was planned and executed, many Pueblo Indians
joining the disafected Mexicans. Governor Bent,
who was visiting in Taos, and other A1nerican offi­cials
were mu1·dered in a most barbarous manner·.
A vigorous campaign against tl1e rebels was
immediately begun by Colonel Price, in the course
gf whicl1 several small but desperate e.ngagements
were fo11ght. The insurgents were finally deci­sively
beaten and the leaders executed.
In the meanwhile, on October 6, 1846, ten days
out of Santa Fe, General l{earny n1et l{it Carson,
with fifteen men, carrying important dispatches
for Washington. From him General Kearny first
learned the 111on1entous news of tl1e subjugation of
Califo1·nia by Commodores Stockton and Sloat and
Captain Ftemont. After undertaking tl1e forward­ing
of Carson's pape1·s oh to Washington, l{earny
induced the guide to accomp􀁸􇡮ny him to Califo1·nia.
In addition to his dragoons Kearny had with
him a train of pack n1.11les and two mountain
howitzers, but no wagons.
On resuming his march, Kea1·ny, now abo11t
two l111ndred and thirty miles below Santa Fe, went
west,vard to the copper mines on the Gila River,
and from thence followed down the course of the
river.
Soon after he entered what is now Arizona l1e
• •
90 THE STORY OF ARIZONA
encountered a ban,d of Mitnbres Apaches headed
by Mangas Colorado; an Indian of -gigantic stature,
who later was almost continuously on the warpatl1
against the whites. Although the Apaches made
no attempt to rob or harass the Americans, the
impression they made wa.s not favorable. Later,
when meeting a b·and of ''Gilan·d'' Apaches, one of
the chiefs suggested to Kearny that if he would
raid the Mexican settlements of Sonora, in return
for loot they wot1ld gladly give them plenty of rein­forcements.
Upon being stopped by the precipitous walls of
the box canyon of the· Gila River, the Aravaipa
T·rail was taken to the San Pe·dro Valley, from
wh: ence the army returned to the Gila along a well­beaten
Indian trail, probably the same one fol­lowed
by Fray Marcos three hundred years before.
Fro1n there on, in a gene.r:al way, they followed the
river to the Pima cot1ntry, where the Indians re­ceived
them 111ost hospitably, ofering melons,
grains and provisions for sale.
In the journal of Capt. A. R. Johnston, who
accompanied the e:-s:pedition, he says:
''The India.ns exhibit no sentiments of taciturn­ity;
but, on the contrary, give ve11t to their thoughts
and feelings without reason, laughing and ehat­ti11g
together; and a parcel of young girls, witl1
long hair streaming to their waists, and no other
covering than a clean white cotton bla1J.ket fold,ed
around their middle and extending to their knees,
were as merry as any group of like age and sex to
be met with in ou, r o,vn country.''
'
)
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I
THE WAR WITH MEXICO 91
The Colorado River was crossed by the expedi­tion
on November 24th, and on December 6th they
encountered a superior force of Mexicans at San
Pascual, well towards the Pacific. After a sharp
engagement they drove them from the field in dis­orde1
·. However, the army of the Californians
re-formed the· next day, and although the attack
they made on the Ame1·icans w,as unsuccessful,
they cut of tl1eir further advance.
As Kearny's men were wholly without supplies,
the situation was desperate. To get word to the
Americans, whon1 they believed to be in San Diego,
tl1at night Kit Carson, Lieutenant Be-ale and a
friendly Indian crawled through the e.nemy's lines,
and although sick with hunger and thirst, and their
feet lacerated with cactus nee.dies, they finally
reached San Diego,. where they found Commodore
Stockton, who promptly sent back reinforcements
with provisions. A day later the Americans
entered San Diego i n triumph.
The Mormon Battalion, one of the divisions of
Kea1·ny's army which crossed Arizona on its w