Book, Where to Emigrate and Why

Trascribed by Kathy Sedler

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives 
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm

These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit 
or presentation by other organizations. Persons or organizations 
desiring to use this material for non-commercial purposes, MUST obtain 
the written consent of the contributor, OR the legal representative of 
the submitter. All persons donating to this site retain the rights to 
their own work.



Where to Emigrate and Why - Frederick B. Goddard, Peoples Publ. Co., 1869
 
NEW MEXICO.
 
        NEW MEXICO is bounded north by the Territory of Colorado, east by Texas, 
south by Texas and Mexico, west by Arizona. It is divided into ten counties, 
viz.:—Bernalillo, Donna Anna, Mora, Rio Arriba, San Miguel, Santa Anna, Santa 
Fe, Socorro, Taos, and Valencia.
        An approximate idea of the number of its present population, may be 
inferred from the total vote for delegate to Congress in 1867, which was 17,685.
        The greater portion of the Territory is mountainous, embracing some of 
the largest mountain ranges in North America. There is comparatively little 
agricultural land as, owing to the dryness of the seasons, artificial irrigation 
must be resorted to, to produce crops.
        This can only be accomplished by damming streams, and leading the water 
over the bottom lands in ditches. Where this can be successfully done, the soil 
is marvelously productive, especially along the valley of the Rio Grande, the 
largest river of the Territory. New Mexico is better adapted to stock-raising 
than agriculture, but will probably eventually rank higher as a mining region 
than for either.
        The fiendish Apache roams at will over the vast arid plains and among 
the lonely mountain gorges of a large portion of the Territory, ever on the 
watch for booty and blood.
        The whole Territory is healthy. Both hot and cold mineral springs 
abound, some of which are known to possess rare healing virtues. The Territory 
was ceded to the United States, by Mexico, in 1848.
 
        We copy from Mr. A. D. RICHARDSON'S interesting work, "Beyond the 
Mississippi," the following respecting New Mexico:—
 
        Leaving the trans-continental route, I turned northward from El Paso, 
taking the weekly mail-coach for Santa Fe, 350 miles, fare $40, exclusive of 
meals. * * Soon entering New Mexico, we saw no habitation for 20 miles until we 
reached our adobe dinner station. A little Mexican village hard by had just been 
ravaged by the Apaches, who entered in broad daylight, stealing every horse and 
mule they could find, and unresisted by the terrified natives.       *          
*          All day, without meeting a human being, we rode among dreary wastes, 
with clumps of Spanish bayonet, grease-wood, faint tufts of grass, and solitary 
delicate flowers variegating the ashen landscape, and the wonderful mirage 
painting the far horizon.          *          *          *          *
        Leaving the "Desert," day broke upon fleecy clouds drifting up from the 
valleys and half hiding the rugged peaks in floating draperies. *     *     * 
Each town, with its plaza, old Catholic church, narrow streets, and. naked 
children, is like every other. At every ranch sheep and goats graze the hills. * 
    *     On the road beyond, farmers were treading out their wheat with horses 
and oxen, precisely as did the children of Israel three thousand years ago. 
Others were cutting corn with long, clumsy poles, and mowing grass with sickles. 
   *          *          After spending a night at Algondes, a lonely mountain 
journey of a few hours brought us to Santa Fé,    *          *          the 
highest town of any importance in the United States, nestling among the 
mountains seven thousand feet above sea-level. The overlooking peaks are white 
with snow.       *          *          It is the political and business 
metropolis, boasting four thousand inhabitants, of whom three or four hundred 
were Americans. *         *         The old men of Mexican towns look older than 
any other in the world; according to a local proverb, New Mexico is so healthy 
that its aged inhabitants dry up and are blown away.     *          *
        New Mexico abounds in mineral treasures, and before it was Americanized 
the Mexicans dug gold from its mountains to the amount of $300,000 per year. 
Now, most Americans are engaged in trading, but ere long a mining excitement 
will cause immigrants to pour in and revolutionize the country, socially and 
politically. *      *          *          *          *          *          *     
       *          *
        The few white residents of the Territory find a strange fascination in 
its isolation, lawlessness, and danger. Whenever I asked if they did not find it 
lonely, they indignantly replied that no temptation could induce them to return 
to their former homes. *            *          *          *          Here as in 
Arizona and Idaho, the Indians
are always troublesome. *         *         The whole Desert and mountain 
region, from the British possessions to New Mexico, and westward to the Pacific, 
is one of the healthiest in the world.  *         *         *         *         
In such an air, lung and throat complaints have no chance. I have known persons 
supposed to be hopelessly consumptive, and only able to travel lying upon 
feather beds in ox wagons, who, after crossing the plains and sleeping in the 
open air, enjoyed for years a comfortable degree of health.
 
        Commissioner TAYLOR'S Report (May 2, 1868) thus refers to New Mexico:—
 
        MINERALS.—The results of exploration have established that gold, silver, 
and copper mines are as numerous and valuable as in Colorado; and also that beds 
of lignite coal occur around the western end of Raton Mountain, and the 
neighboring foot-hills of the Rocky Mountains, while a formation of early 
cretaceous coal has been discovered in the valley of the Rio Grande. The first 
coal basin consists of an immense thickness of coarse sandstones, first 
manifesting themselves in some of the ravines of the Raton, about 20 miles east 
of Raton Pass, but soon becoming visible on the flanks of the mountain, 
continuing through the pass, and to an unknown distance west of it. This 
formation lies nearly horizontally against the base of the Raton and Rocky 
Mountains, extending at the latter from the Arkansas River at Cańon City to the 
valley of the Little Cimarron on the south. In the Raton Pass the coal beds, 
which are quite thin in the Manco del Barro Pass, begin to assume importance. 
About six miles from Trinidad, a locality exhibits a total thickness of about 
five feet of good coal, separated into four beds, placed near together. Near the 
top of the pass are also beds of the same thickness, but at the southern exit of 
the pass, in canons connected with the upper waters of the Canadian, there 
called Red River, these beds occur in still greater magnitude, being eight feet 
thick. All these are, however, of trifling nature compared with the great beds 
found in the cańon of the Vermejo valley, which show in one locality 10 feet of 
coal in two beds, separated by 10 inches of slate. The same strata was found on 
the other side of the cańon, one-half mile distant, and in other cańons several 
miles westward. Farther south, other thinner beds were seen near Vermejo of the 
thickness of three and four feet of good coal. Beyond the Pernego the high 
table-lands containing the coal beds disappear entirely, and the only 
sedimentary rock in view is the early cretaceous limestone. As the high 
table-land of tertiary sandstone extends north of the Raton, it is probable that 
similar beds exist in that direction. Coal has also been discovered on the Rio 
Grande in various places above Piedras Negras, as well as below in the vicinity 
of Laredo, Gurrero, and Roma. *          *          *          *          *      
    *          *          *
        Twenty miles south of the boundary line of Colorado are the Moreno 
mines, which attracted much attention during 1867. They are situated near, but 
west of, the Raton mountains, about thirty miles north of Taos, Mora County, New 
Mexico. Four pounds of the ore, from a well-defined quartz vein recently opened, 
are said to have yielded seventy-eight cents of gold, or at the rate of $390 to 
the ton. An important circumstance is added, that the quartz contains only free 
gold, without sulphurets. In a specimen taken from the vicinity of the surface, 
and forwarded to Colorado, thread gold could be traced through the mass of 
quartz. The opportunities for gulch mining have already attracted a considerable 
American population. The Placer Mountain, about thirty miles from Santa Fé, 
within the past year has been worked under an efficient organization and with 
satisfactory results. The average yield of the auriferous rock is $30 to the 
ton. The veins are numerous, well-defined, and accessible within a district of 
ten miles square. Another locality of much interest is Pinos Altos, under 
latitude 33°, longitude 108°. The enterprise of working these mines seems to be 
under efficient direction. Upon one of the lodes a tunnel has already been 
drifted 713 feet, and when completed to the distance of 1,600 feet, will have 
passed from the Atlantic to the Pacific slopes of the Sierra Madre. Midway it 
passes under the crest of the mountain, from which a shaft of 121 feet connects 
the summit with the tunnel.  The ore contains gold, silver, and a small 
proportion of copper. The village of Pinos Altos is at an elevation of 5,000 
feet above the sea. The vicinity presents unusual advantages of wood, water, and 
surface for mining operations, and with the fullest allowance for exaggeration 
as to the number and richness of the lodes there seems but little doubt that, 
with the pacification of the Indian tribes and further facilities of 
transportation, it will become an important mining center.
        The foregoing seem to be the most prominent gold-bearing districts of 
New Mexico; but some twenty localities are mentioned by mining journals, among 
which are quartz veins at San José, in the Sierra Madre, intersecting each other 
in all directions for a mile in width and three miles in length; a similar 
formation near Fort Davis, Texas, and extensive placer mines on the San 
Francisco and Mimbres rivers.
        Silver, however, with its many combinations, is the most abundant 
mineral of the Territory. The prominently argentiferous districts are the Placer 
mountains, near Santa Fé; the Organ mountains, near the Mesilla Valley; and the 
Sierra Madre, at Pinos Altos. The first and last of these localities are, as we 
have seen, gold-producing also. In the Organ mountains over fifty silver mines 
have been discovered, the ore being generally argentiferous galena. The district 
near Mesilla Valley, in the Organ Mountain, has a mean altitude of 4,400 feet, 
and is intersected with ravines, affording favorable opportunities for 
horizontal drifts in opening the veins. The country bordering on the north 
portion of Chihuahua is a rich silver district. Immediately adjoining the 
Mexican boundary are the mines of Corralitos, the most successful silver mines 
in the State of Chihuahua, having been mined for forty years in a region most 
exposed to Indian hostility. Near the old town of El Paso tradition places the 
locality of one of the richest silver mines known to the Spaniards, but its site 
was lost during the Indian insurrection of 1680.
        Copper is found in abundance throughout the country, but principally at 
Los Tijeras, Jemas, Abiquin, Guadelupita de Mora. Iron is equally abundant. 
Gypsum, both common and selenite, is found in large quantities, extensive layers 
of it existing in the mountains near Algodones, on the Rio Grande, and in the 
neighborhood of the celebrated Salinas. It is used as common lime and the 
crystalline or selenite is a substitute for window glass About one hundred miles 
southeast of Santa Fé, on the high table-land between the Rio Grande and Pecos, 
are some extensive salt lakes or salinas, from which the inhabitants of New 
Mexico are supplied.
        The leading copper mines of New Mexico may be thus enumerated and 
described: 1. Hanover, discovered in 1860; situated on the head-waters of the 
Mimbres River, about six miles east of Fort Bayard; ore a virgin copper, found 
in extensive pockets in the bed rock, varying in quantities from one hundred to 
three hundred pounds, and combined with sufficient gold to defray the expenses 
of working. 2. Santa Rita, in the same vicinity, worked by the Spaniards nearly 
a century and a half ago; ore a rich oxide, and found in veins of varying 
thickness, the lower being virgin copper, which can be drawn under the hammer as 
it comes from the mine; supposed to be an extension of the Hanover. 3. Pinos 
Altos, associated with the extensive gold and silver formation previously 
mentioned; a very extensive copper deposit, and favorably situated in respect to 
wood and water. 4. Arroyo Honda, situated north of Taos and close to the 
Colorado line, from which specimens of copper have been exhibited at the United 
States Mint, and pronounced equal to the amygdaloid of Lake Superior. 5. 
Naciemento, situated about forty miles south-southwest from Santa Fé, in the Los 
Valles mountains the same range as the Placer Mountain; vein from thirty and 
forty feet wide, and occasionally intersected by deposits of white sandstone; 
assay of ore: copper, 71; silver, 4; iron, 12; unexamined scoria, 13. 6. Ocate, 
near Santa Fé; vein twelve to twenty feet wide; and assays sixty-four per cent 
of pure copper. 7. Tijera, situated in the Tijera Cańon, near the line of the 
35th parallel; surface ore alloyed with silver, but in descending the copper 
combines with gold. 8. New Mexico, a formation of the Placer Mountain, very 
extensive, and under the same administration as the gold mines in that locality. 
For many years much of the copper ore of New Mexico has been transported to 
Indianola, Texas, a distance of one thousand miles, and the amount of the gold 
associated with the copper has always been sufficient to defray the expenses of 
transportation.
 
        From Commissioner CAPRON Report, June, 1868:―
 
        1. Our returns from the Territory of New Mexico embrace the counties of 
Mora and Valencia. Mora County reports twenty-five per cent advance in the price 
of farm land since 1860. In Valencia there appears to be no settled price. If a 
person wants to purchase, he is asked an exorbitant price, and whoever wants to 
sell must sell for almost nothing.
        2. The wild lands in Mora are of no value except where timber is plenty; 
they are chiefly mountain and prairie, good for hay and pasture only.
        In Valencia, lands held by private parties fluctuate in accordance with 
the necessities of the holder or the wants of the purchaser. There are large 
tracts of land, however, subject to entry under the homestead laws, or purchase 
at Government prices. They are at some distance from settlements, and are 
visited by hostile Indians. The country is very mountainous, but has rich 
valleys in which almost any thing will grow to advantage, when water can be 
procured for irrigation.
        3. Gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, cinnabar, gypsum, quicksilver, and 
coal abound in the districts reporting. The Moreno mines (gold) are in the 
northern part of Mora County, about fifty miles m the town of Mora. A company 
has been organized, with a capital of $100,000, to work these mines. Coal is 
found in great quantities in Valencia County, in addition to gold, silver, iron, 
lead, copper, and quicksilver, all of which may be worked to advantage as soon 
as the Government gives reliable and permanent protection against the Indians. 
The mountains are rich in timber, mostly pine and ash, with some oak, and in the 
valley of the Rio Grande a great deal of cottonwood is encountered.
        4. The special crops in Valencia are corn and wheat; and in Mora, corn, 
wheat, oats, beans, and peas, the profits in the latter county being about fifty 
per cent, with very little labor. The farming implements used are, for the most 
part, a century behind the age. The plow in general use consists of a wooden 
pole, with a sharp iron point, and with a wooden handle to it. The thrashing of 
wheat is done by horses, mules, sheep, or goats, kept running over it until the 
wheat is thrashed out, by which process the straw gets chopped up and is left to 
decay.
        5. Spring wheat is chiefly grown in New Mexico, because they have no 
fences to protect winter wheat, and the winters being very soft, the snow is 
very light, and remains on the ground but a short time. There are two kinds of 
wheat reported; one is called the New Mexico wheat, which is a dark, small 
grain; and
the other of lighter color, called the Sonora wheat. Some prefer the former, as 
heavier and more substantial; while others prefer the Sonora, because it ripens 
earlier and yields a whiter flour. The sowing is mostly done in Valencia in 
March, and the harvesting in July and August; and in Mora County it is sown from 
15th of March to 1st of May, and harvested from 25th of August to 10th of 
November. None drilled.
        6. The grasses in the Rio Grande valley are not of so much account as 
upon the hills and elevated plains, where there are four kinds of very rich 
gramma grass. There are also different kinds of herbs, upon which sheep thrive 
well during the different seasons of the year. On the pasture lands off from the 
settlements, stock can feed and remain fat all the year round, without shelter. 
The cost is only the wages of the herdsmen, who receive from $10 to $20 per 
month and rations. Indians often kill the herders, however, and drive off the 
stock.
        7. Fruits have not received much attention in Mora County, but apples, 
peaches, plums, and apricots are best adapted to the climate.
 
        GEO. W. MARTIN, Esq., Postmaster at Santa Fé, writes:―
 
        In the vicinity of Santa Fé, the capital of New Mexico, land is very 
good, and can be had at low prices. The climate is healthful, and the seasons 
mild and delightful. Labor commands from $1 to $5, according to skill.  All the 
useful as well as the precious metals are found in New Mexico. Gold, silver, 
cinnabar, iron, coal, &c. Grains of all kinds yield liberally, and there is a 
ready market for all products. The prevailing religion of the Territory is Roman 
Catholic, but Protestant churches have been established. The majority of the 
population of the Territory is Mexican.