Lieutenant Ives Explores to Fortification Rock—By Trail to Diamond
Creek, Havasupai Canyon, and the Moki Towns—Macomb Fails in an Attempt
to Reach the Mouth of Grand River—James White’s Masterful Fabrication.
Steam navigation on the Colorado was now successfully established, and
when Lieutenant Ives was planning the exploration of the river there
were already upon it two powerful steamers exactly adapted, through
experience of previous disasters, to the peculiar dangers of these
waters, while Johnson, the chief owner and pilot, had become an expert
in handling a steamboat amid the unusual conditions. He had succeeded
in making a truce with the dragon. And he had secured the friendship of
the tribes of Amerinds living along the banks; his men and his property
were safe anywhere; his steamers often carried jolly bands of Cocopas
or of Yumas from place to place. In arranging a government expedition
to explore to the farthest point practicable for steamboats, the
sensible course would have been to advise with Johnson and to charter
his staunch steamer _Colorado_, together with himself, thus gaining at
the very outset an immense double advantage: a boat perfectly modelled
for the demands to be made upon it, and a guide entirely familiar with
the tricks of the perfidious waters. Especially important would this
have been because Lieutenant Ives, who was instructed to direct this
work, was ordered to accomplish it at the lowest and worst stage of the
stream. Ives had been Whipple’s chief assistant in 1853-54, and
therefore well understood the situation. But he states that the company
was “unable to spare a boat except for a compensation beyond the limits
of the appropriation.” As a boat was spared, however, for the less
important matter of going far up the river to ferry Beale across, it
would appear that either the negotiations were not conducted in a
proper spirit, or that Ives rather preferred a boat of his own. The
cost of building in Philadelphia the boat he used, and sending her in
sections to San Francisco, and thence to the Colorado, must have been
very great. The steamer was ordered June 1, 1857, and had to be at the
mouth of the Colorado by December 1st of the same year. After a trial
on the Delaware, a mill-pond compared with the Colorado, she was
hastily shipped, with all her defects, by way of Panama, there being no
time to make any changes. The chief trouble discovered was radical,
being a structural weakness of the hull. To, in a measure, offset this,
timbers and bolts were obtained in San Francisco, the timbers to be
attached to the _outside_ of the hull on putting the sections together,
there being no room within. It requires little understanding of naval
architecture to perceive that a great handicap was thus imposed on the
little vessel. Yet Lieutenant Ives says, on the trial trip she was
“found satisfactory”! By November 1st, the party was on board the
schooner _Monterey_, bound for the head of the Gulf. Though the vessel
was loaded down with supplies for Fort Yuma, room was made for the Ives
expedition and they arrived, passing through a heavy gale in the gulf,
at Robinson’s Landing on November 30th. The schooner was anchored over
a shoal, and was soon aground, as the fierce tide ran out, a
circumstance that enabled her to stay there and stem the torrent. A
deep booming sound was presently heard, growing louder and nearer, and
“in half an hour a great wave several feet in height, could be
distinctly seen flashing and sparkling in the moonlight, extending from
one bank to the other and advancing swiftly upon us. While it was only
a few hundred yards distant, the ebb tide continued to flow by at the
rate of three miles an hour. A point of land and an exposed bar close
under our lee broke the wave into several long swells, and as these met
the ebb the broad sheet around us boiled up and foamed like the surface
of a cauldron, and then, with scarcely a moment of slack water, the
whole went whirling by in the opposite direction. In a few moments the
low rollers had passed the islands and united again in a single bank of
water, which swept up the narrowing channel with the thunder of a
cataract.”
Part of Map No. 1, by Lieut. J.C. Ives, 1858. Part of Map No. 1, by
Lieut. J.C. Ives, 1858.
From the Gulf to the Mouth of the Gila.
Scale of this reduction is about 12 miles to 1 inch.
This was the great tidal bore once more, which, at the occurrence of
the spring tides, makes the entrance of the river extremely dangerous.
It is due to the narrowing of the Gulf of California forcing the tides
into close quarters, and its violence is augmented by collision with
the equally furious current of the Colorado. The battle between this
tidal wave and the Colorado continues for many miles, till at last the
sea tide gradually loses its power and succumbs to the flood of the
river.[1] The latter falls at the mouth, according to Ives, about
thirty feet in a few hours after the ebb begins. The shallower the
water as the tide rushes in against the ebb, the angrier the wave
becomes, sometimes reaching a height of ten or twelve feet.
[1] The tide ascends thirty-seven miles. Lowest stage of water about
three feet, average six feet, and highest about twenty feet.
Robinson’s Landing Robinson’s Landing.
Mouth of the Colorado River. Starting-point of Lieut. Ives’s
Exploration.
Photograph by Lieut. IVES. Redrawn by J.J. YOUNG.
At Robinson’s Landing, a mere mud flat, a camp was established and
preparations made for the voyage to the extreme limit of navigation.
The parts of the steamer were put ashore and a suitable spot selected
whereon to set her up. The high tides were over for a month, and the
mud began to dry, enabling the party to pitch their tents. It was an
uncomfortable spot for expedition headquarters, but the best that could
be had, as the _Monterey_ was not permitted by her owners to venture
farther up the river. But this delay, discomfort, and difficulty, to
say nothing of expense, might have been avoided could a contract have
been made with the existing steamboat company. As the bank on which the
boat was to be reconstructed was not likely to be overflowed more than
a foot by the next high tide, a month later, an excavation was made
wherein to build the steamer that she might certainly come afloat at
the desired time. Sixty holes had to be made in the iron plates so that
the four stiffening timbers could be attached to the bottom to prevent
the craft from breaking in two under the extra-heavy boiler. Inside,
cross timbers were also added to resist the strain. On, December 17th,
two steamers appeared from the fort, in command, respectively, of
Johnson and Wilcox, to transport the army supplies to their
destination. Robinson, after whom the landing was called because he had
a cabin there, was with the steamboats, and, as he knew the river,
especially as far as Yuma, Ives engaged him for pilot.
By the end of the month, the _Explorer_, as the Ives boat was named,
was ready for the expected high tide. She was fifty-four feet long over
all, not quite half the length of Johnson’s Colorado. Amidships she was
open, but the bow was decked, and at the stern was a cabin, seven by
eight feet, the top of which formed an outlook. For armament, she was
supplied on the bow with a four-pound howitzer, though this weapon was
not likely to be of much service. When the anticipated flood arrived on
the night of December 30th, steam was turned on at the critical moment,
the engines worked the stern-wheel, and Lieutenant Ives had the
satisfaction of seeing the _Explorer_, under the bright moonlight,
slowly back out of the pit which had been her cradle into the swirling,
seething current. As the tide continued to rise, Ives feared the whole
flat would soon be inundated, so everything belonging to the expedition
was stowed on board till the _Explorer’s_ gunwales were no more than
six inches above the surface. Through this circumstance, the expedition
came near a disastrous end the next night, when the steamer proceeded
up the river on the flood tide. A squall was met and the boat shipped
water alarmingly, but fortunately the wind died away as quickly as it
had come up. The _Explorer_ was saved, and the journey was continued
over the swiftly gliding torrent.
The Steamer “Explorer” in which Lieut. Ives in 1857 Ascended the
Colorado to Foot of Black Canyon. The Steamer “Explorer” in which
Lieut. Ives in 1857 Ascended the Colorado to Foot of Black Canyon.
Sketch by H.B. MOLLHAUSEN.
As they went on after this in daylight, some Cocopas they met grinned
rather contemptuously, and called this the “chiquito steamboat.” A
considerable amount of stores was left on the bank in their care, to be
picked up by Captain Wilcox, who, going down on one of the fort
steamers, had passed the _Explorer_, and offered to take these extra
stores to the fort on his return. They were placed with the Cocopas by
his direction, an arrangement that better describes the relations of
the steamboat people and the natives than anything that could be said
about them. The fuel used was wood, of which there was great abundance
along the shore, the hard, fine-grained mesquite making a particularly
hot fire. The routine of advance was to place a man with a
sounding-pole at the bow, while Robinson, the pilot, had his post on
the deck of the cabin, but the sounding was more for record purposes
than to assist Robinson, who was usually able to predict exactly when
the water would shoal or deepen. Later, Ives says: “If the ascent of
the river is accomplished, it will be due to his skill and good
management.” Besides the ordinary shifting of the sands by the
restless, current, there was another factor occasionally to guard
against. This was earthquakes. Sometimes they might change the depth of
water on the lower river in the twinkling of an eye. On one occasion, a
schooner lying in a deep part was found suddenly aground in three feet
of water, with no other warning than a rumble and a shock. Heintzelman,
in one of his reconnoissances, discovered the adjacent land full of
cracks, through which oozed streams of sulphurous water, mud, and sand,
and Diaz, in 1540, came to banks of “hot ashes” which it was impossible
to cross, the whole ground trembling beneath his feet. At low water,
even in the lower reaches of the river, a boat is liable to run aground
often, and has to be backed off to try her fortune in another place.
The bottom, however, is soft, the current strong, so no harm is done
and the rush of water helps to cut the boat loose. One does not easily
comprehend how sensitive a pilot becomes to every tremor of the hull in
this sort of navigation. The quality of the boat’s vibration speaks to
his nerves in a distinct language, and the suck of the wheel emphasises
the communication.
Looking down the Grand Canyon from the Mouth of the Kanab. Looking down
the Grand Canyon from the Mouth of the Kanab.
Depth about 4000 feet.
Oil sketch by F.S. DELLENBAUGH.
The _Explorer_ at length arrived at Yuma. Here the remainder of the
party, including Dr. Newberry, having come across country, joined the
expedition, and further preparations were made for the more difficult
task above. The craft was lightened as far as possible, but at the best
she still drew two and one-half feet, while the timbers bolted to the
bottom were a great detriment, catching on snags and ploughing into the
mud of the shoals. There were twenty-four men to be carried, besides
all the baggage that must be taken, even though a pack-train was to
leave, after the departure of the boat, to transport extra supplies to
the end of the voyage, wherever that might be. It is not easy to
understand why so large a party was necessary. Some few miles above
Yuma they came to the first range of mountains that closes in on the
water, suddenly entering a narrow pass several hundred feet deep. Seven
miles farther on, they went through a small canyon where another range
is severed. This was called Purple Hill Pass, while the first one was
named Explorer’s Pass, after the steamer. The first approach to a real
canyon was encountered a short distance above. Emerging from this,
called Canebrake, from some canes growing along the sides, the
_Explorer_ ran aground, resting there for two hours. They had now
passed through the Chocolate Mountains, the same range that Alarçon
mentions, and as he records no other he probably went no farther up
than the basin Ives is now entering, the Great Colorado Valley. Alarçon
doubtless proceeded to the upper part of this valley, about to latitude
thirty-four, where he raised the cross to mark the spot. Two miles
above the head of the canyon, the power of the _Explorer_ was matched
against a stiff current that came swirling around the base of a
perpendicular rock one hundred feet high. With the steam pressure then
on, she was not equal to the encounter and made no advance, whereupon
she was headed for a steep bank to allow the men to leap ashore with a
line and tow her beyond the opposition. Above, the current was milder,
but the river spread out to such an extent that progress was
exceedingly difficult, and Ives expresses a fear that this might prove
the head of navigation, yet he must then have been aware (and certainly
was when he published his report) that Johnson at that very moment was
far beyond this with a steamer larger than the one he was on. It was
now January 17, 1858, and it was on January 23d, that Johnson was at
the point where Beale intended to cross. The steamer was used as a
ferry and then left the same day for Yuma. Captain Johnson with his
steamboat had been to the head of navigation. Ives and Johnson must now
pass each other before the end of this month of December, and the
meeting of the two steamers took place somewhere in this Colorado
Valley, for, under date of January 31st, Ives says: “Lieutenant Tipton
took advantage of an opportunity afforded a few days ago, by our
meeting Captain Johnson, with Lieutenant White and party returning to
the fort, and went back with them in order to bring up the pack-train.”
He does not mention, however, that Johnson was piloting a steamboat
larger than the _Explorer_. Indeed, I have been told that he failed to
reply to Johnson’s salute. Slowly they worked their way up, and on up,
toward their final goal, though the water was exceptionally low. At
last reaching Bill Williams Fork, Ives, who had seen it at the time he
was with Whipple about four years earlier, could not at first find it,
though, on the former occasion, in the same season, it had been a
stream thirty feet wide. It was now a feeble rivulet, the old mouth
being filled up and overgrown with willows. Approaching Mohave Canyon,
a rapid was encountered, necessitating the carrying forward of an
anchor, from which a line was brought to the bow, and this being kept
taut, with the boat under full steam the obstruction was surmounted
without damage. This was the common method of procedure at rapids. This
canyon, Ives, says was a “scene of such imposing grandeur as he had
never before witnessed,” yet it is only a harbinger of the greater
sublimity extending along the water above for a thousand miles. Mohave
Canyon and The Needles soon were left behind, and they were steaming
through the beautiful Mohave Valley, where the patient footsteps of the
padres and the restless tramp of the trappers had so long ago passed
and been forgotten. Probably not one of that party remembered that
Pattie on horseback had covered this same field over thirty years
before, or that rare old Garces guided his tired mule along these very
banks a full half century ahead of Pattie. To-day, the comfortable
traveller on the railway, crossing the river near The Needles, has also
forgotten these things and Lieutenant Ives as well.
Black Canyon—Looking Down. Black Canyon—Looking Down.
Photograph by WHEELER EXPEDITION.
Many Cocopas, Yumas, Mohaves, and Chemehuevis were met with since the
trip began, but there had been no trouble with any of them. Ives now
began to inquire for a former guide of Whipple’s, whom he pleasantly
remembered and whose name was Ireteba. Fortunately, he soon came across
him and engaged his services. Ireteba was a Mohave, but possessed one
of those fine natures found in every clime and colour. He was always
true and intelligent, and of great service to the expedition. The
_Explorer_ pushed on, encountering many difficulties, some due to the
unfortunate timbers on the bottom, which often became wedged in rocks,
besides increasing the draught by about six inches, a serious matter at
this extremely low stage of water. “It is probable,” says Ives, “that
there is not one season in ten when even the _Explorer_ would encounter
one fourth of the difficulty that she has during the unprecedentedly
low stage of water.” At one rapid, after the boat by hard labour had
been brought to the crest, the line broke and she at once fell back,
bumping over the rocks and finally lodging amidst a mass so firmly that
it required half the next day to pull her out. The second attempt to
surmount the rapid was successful, and they were then rewarded by a
fierce gale from the north, detaining them twenty-four hours, filling
everything with sand, and dragging the steamboat from her moorings to
cast her again upon the rocks. When, at last, they could go on they
came after a short time to a canyon deeper and grander than any they
had yet seen, called Black Canyon, because it is cut through the Black
Mountains. Ives was uncertain, at the moment, whether this was the
entrance to what was called Big Canyon (Grand Canyon) or not. The
_Explorer_ by this time had passed through a number of rapids and the
crew were growing expert at this sort of work, so that another rapid a
hundred yards below the mouth of the canyon was easily conquered. The
current becoming slack, the steamer went gaily on toward the narrow
gateway, where, “flanked by walls many hundreds of feet in height,
rising perpendicularly out of the water, the Colorado emerged from the
bowels of the range.” Suddenly the boat stopped with a crash. The bow
had squarely met a sunken rock. The men forward were knocked completely
overboard, those on the after-deck were thrown below, the boiler was
jammed out of place, the steampipe was doubled up, the wheelhouse torn
away, and numerous minor damages were sustained. The _Explorer_ had
discovered _her_ head of navigation! They thought she was about to
sink, but luckily she had struck in such a way that no hole was made
and they were able by means of lines and the skiff to tow her to a
sandbank for repairs. Here the engineer, Carroll, and Captain Robinson
devoted themselves to making her again serviceable, while, with the
skiff, Ives and two companions continued on up the deep gorge. Though
this was the end of the upward journey, so far as the _Explorer_ was
concerned, Johnson with his steamboat had managed to go clear through
this canyon.
Rations were at a low stage, consisting entirely, for the past three
weeks, of corn and beans, purchased from the natives, but even on this
diet without salt the skiff party, worked its way steadily upward over
many rapids through the superb chasm. “No description,” says Ives, “can
convey an idea of the varied and majestic grandeur of this peerless
waterway. Wherever the river makes a turn, the entire panorama changes,
and one startling novelty after another appears and disappears with
bewildering rapidity.” I commend these pages of Lieutenant Ives, and,
in fact, his whole report, to all who delight in word-painting of
natural scenery, for the lieutenant certainly handled his pen as well
as he did his sword.[2] Emerging from the solemn depths of Black Canyon
(twenty-five miles long) he and his small party passed Fortification
Rock and continued on two miles up the river to an insignificant little
stream coming in from the north, which he surmised might be the Virgen,
though he hardly thought it could be, and it was not. It was Vegas
Wash. This was his highest point. Turning about, he descended to the
steamboat camp and called that place the head of navigation, not that
he did not believe a steamer might ascend, light, through Black Canyon,
but he considered it impracticable. Running now down-stream in the
_Explorer_, the expected pack-train was encountered at the foot of
Pyramid Canyon, and a welcome addition was made to the supplies.
[2] It may be of interest to state that Lieutenant Ives became an
officer in the Confederate Army, and was killed in one of the battles
of the Civil War.
Fortification Rock. Fortification Rock.
Castellated Gravels at the foot. Near the head of Black Canyon.
Photograph by WHEELER EXPEDITION.
The Canyon of Diamond Creek. The Canyon of Diamond Creek.
Photograph by W.H. JACKSON.
The steamboat was now sent back to the fort and Ives prepared for a
land journey, which led him eastward over much the same route that
Garces had traversed so long ago on his march to Oraibi. Ireteba was
his guide. They went to the mouth of Diamond Creek, where they had
their first view of the Grand Canyon, or Big Canyon, as they called it,
of which Ireteba had before given them some description. The
illustrations given in Ives’s report of both Black and Grand Canyons
are a libel on these magnificent wonder-places, and in no way compare
with the lieutenant’s admirable pen-pictures. Crossing the Colorado
Plateau (which another explorer ten or twelve years later claims the
honour of naming, forgetting that Ives uses the name in his report),
they visited the Havasupai in their deep canyon home, just as Garces
had done, and then proceeded to the towns of the Moki. Ives was deeply
impressed by the repellant nature of the great canyon and the
surroundings, and remarks: “It seems intended by nature that the
Colorado River, along the greater portion of its lonely and majestic
way, shall be forever unvisited and undisturbed.” Late in the same year
that Lieutenant Ives made his interesting and valuable exploration,
another military post was established on the Colorado, and called Fort
Mohave, just about where the California line intersects the stream.
Lower down, Colorado City had been laid out several years before (1854)
under amusing circumstances. The Yuma ferry at that time was operated
by a German, thrifty after his kind, and on the lookout for a “good
thing.” A party of indigent prospectors, returning from the survey of a
mine in Mexico, reached the Arizona bank with no money to pay for the
crossing, and hit upon the ingenious plan of surveying a town site here
and trading lots to the German for a passage. Boldly commencing
operations, the sight of the work going on soon brought the ferryman
over to investigate, and when he saw the map under construction he fell
headlong into the scheme, which would, as they assured him, necessitate
a steam ferry.[3] The result was the immediate sale of a portion of the
town to him and the exchange of a lot for the necessary transportation
to the opposite bank. Afterwards, these parties did what they could to
establish the reality of the project, but up to date it has not been
noted as a metropolis, and the floods of 1861-2 undermined its feeble
strength. Another name for it was Arizona City.
[3] _Across America and Asia_, by Raphael Pumpelly, p. 60. The portion
of this admirable work relating to the vicinity of the Colorado River
will be found of great interest in this connection.
Fort Yuma and the Old Railway Bridge of the Southern Pacific. Fort Yuma
and the Old Railway Bridge of the Southern Pacific.
Photograph by C.R. SAVAGE.
The year following the Ives expedition, Captain Macomb (1859) was sent
to examine the junction of the Green and Grand rivers. For a
considerable distance he followed, from Santa Fé, almost the same trail
that Escalante had travelled eighty-three years previously. Dr.
Newberry, the eminent geologist who had been with Ives, was one of this
party, and he has given an interesting account of the journey. The
region lying immediately around the place they had set out for is one
of the most formidable in all the valley of the Colorado. Looking about
one there, from the summit of the canyon walls, it seems an
impossibility for anything without the power of flight to approach the
spot except by way of the river channels. Macomb and Newberry succeeded
in forcing their way to within about six miles of the junction, there
to be completely baffled and turned back. Arriving finally at the brink
of the canyon of Grand River, Newberry says:
“On every side we were surrounded by columns, pinnacles, and castles of
fantastic shapes, which limited our view, and by impassable canons,
which restricted our movements. South of us, about a mile distant, rose
one of the castle-like buttes, which I have mentioned, and to which,
though with difficulty, we made our way. This butte was composed of
alternate layers of chocolate-colored sandstone and shale about one
thousand feet in height; its sides nearly perpendicular, but most
curiously ornamented with columns and pilasters, porticos and
colonnades, cornices and battlements, flanked here and there with tall
outstanding towers, and crowned with spires so slender that it seemed
as though a breath of air would suffice to topple them from their
foundations. To accomplish the object for which we had come so far, it
seemed necessary that we should ascend this butte. The day was
perfectly clear and intensely hot, the mercury standing at 92 degrees
in the shade, and the red sandstone, out of which the landscape was
carved, glowed in the heat of the burning sunshine. Stripping off
nearly all our clothing, we made the attempt, and, after two hours of
most arduous labor, succeeded in reaching the summit. The view which
there burst upon us was such as amply repaid us for all our toil. It
baffles description.”
At the Junction of the Green and Grand on the Surface. At the Junction
of the Green and Grand on the Surface.
Photograph by E.O. BEAMAN, U.S. Colo. Riv. Exp.
He goes on to say that, while the great canyon, meaning the Grand
Canyon, with its gigantic cliffs, presents grander scenes, they have
less variety and beauty of detail than this. They were here able to see
over an area of some fifty miles diameter, where, hemmed in by lines of
lofty step-like mesas, a great basin lay before them as on a map. There
was no vegetation, “nothing but bare and barren rocks of rich and
varied colours shimmering in the sunlight. Scattered over the plain
were thousands of the fantastically formed buttes to which I have
referred... pyramids, domes, towers, columns, spires of every
conceivable form and size.” There were also multitudes of canyons,
ramifying in every direction, “deep, dark, and ragged, impassable to
everything but the winged bird.” At the nearest point was the canyon of
the Grand, while four miles to the south another great gorge was
discerned joining it, which their Amerind guides pronounced to be that
of Green River. Finding it utterly impossible for them to reach this
place, they returned.
Thus, after all these years of endeavour, the mighty Colorado foamed
away amidst this terrible environment as if no human element yet
existed in the world. And as it continued to baffle all attempts to
probe its deeper mysteries, the dread of it and the fear of it grew and
grew, till he who suggested that a man might pass through the
bewildering chasms and live, was regarded as light-headed. Then came
the awful war of the Rebellion, and for several years little thought
was bestowed on the problem.[4]
[4] The troops that were so foolishly and feebly sent against the
Mormons in 1857 had some experience in Green River Valley, but it was
not directly connected with this story and I will not introduce an
account of it here.
Some few prospectors for mineral veins began investigations in the
neighbourhood of the lower part of the Grand Canyon, and the gorge was
entered from below, about 1864, by O. D. Gass and three other men. I
met Gass at his home at Las Vegas (see cut, page 137) in 1875, but I
did not then know he had been in the canyon and did not hear his story.
It was not till 1866 that any one tried again to navigate the river
above Mohave. In that year Captain Rodgers, who for four years had been
on the lower Colorado, took the steamboat _Esmeralda_, ninety-seven
feet long and drawing three and one-half feet of water, up as far as
Callville, near the mouth of the Virgen, which was several miles beyond
the highest point attained by Ives in his skiff, but little, if any,
farther than Johnson had gone with his steamboat. He ascended the most
difficult place, Roaring Rapids in Black Canyon, in seven minutes, and
was of the opinion that it could as easily be surmounted at any stage
of water, except perhaps during the spring rise. It does not matter
much now, for it is not likely that any steam craft will soon again
have occasion to traverse that canyon. The completion of the railways
was a death blow to steam navigation on the Colorado, yet, in the
future, when the fertile bottoms are brought under cultivation, small
steamboats will probably be utilised for local transportation.
The Barrel Cactus Compared with the Height of a Man. The Barrel Cactus
Compared with the Height of a Man.
Photograph by C.R. SAVAGE.
The journey of the _Esmeralda_ added nothing to what was already known.
The following year, 1867, a man was picked up at Callville, in an
exhausted and famishing condition, by a frontiersman named Hardy. When
he had been revived he told his story. It was that he had come on a
raft through the Grand Canyon above, and all the canyons antecedent to
that back to a point on Grand River. The story was apparently
straightforward, and it was fully accepted. At last, it was thought, a
human being has passed through this Valley of the Shadow of Death and
lived to tell of its terrors. Hardy took him down to Fort Mohave, where
he met Dr. Parry,[5] who recorded his whole story, drawn out by many
questions, and believed it. This was not surprising; for, no man ever
yet having accomplished what White claimed to have done, there was no
way of checking the points, of his tale. “Now, at last,” remarks Dr.
Parry, “we have a perfectly authentic account, from an intelligent
source, from a man who actually traversed its formidable depths, and
who, fortunately for science, still lives to detail his trustworthy
observations of this remarkable voyage.” The doctor was too confiding.
Had I the space I would give here the whole of White’s story, for it is
one of the best bits of fiction I have ever read. He had obtained
somehow a general smattering of the character of the river, but as
there were trappers still living, Kit Carson, for example, who
possessed a great deal of information about it, this was not a
difficult matter. But that he had no exact knowledge of any part of the
river above the lower end of the Grand Canyon, is apparent to one who
is familiar with the ground, and the many discrepancies brand the whole
story as a fabrication. In the language of the frontier, he “pitched a
yarn,” and it took beautifully. Hardy, whom I met in Arizona a good
many years ago, told me he believed the man told the truth, but his
belief was apparently based only on the condition White was in when
rescued. That he was nearly dead is true, but that is about all of his
yarn that is. White was thirty-two years old, and from Kenosha,
Wisconsin. He said that, with two others, he was prospecting in
Southwestern Colorado in the summer of that year, 1867, when, on Grand
River, they were attacked by the Utes. Baker, the leader, fell mortally
wounded. Of course, White and the other man, Strole, stood by their
leader, in the teeth of the enemy’s fire, till he expired. What would
the story have been without this example of devotion and fortitude?
Then, holding the pursuers in check, they slowly retreated down the
side canyon they were in to the main gorge, where they discovered an
abundance of driftwood, and decided to make a raft with which to
escape. This raft consisted of three sticks of cottonwood about ten
feet long and eight inches diameter, tied together with lariats. They
had abandoned their horses above, bringing only their arms, ammunition,
and some food. Waiting for midnight to come so that their pursuers
might not discover their intention, they seized their poles and, under
the waning moon, cast off, and were soon on the tempestuous tide,
rushing through the yawning chasm. “Through the long night they clung
to the raft as it dashed against half-concealed rocks, or whirled about
like a plaything in some eddy.” When daylight came they landed; as they
had a smoother current and less rugged banks, though the canyon walls
appeared to have increased in height. They strengthened their raft and
went on. In the afternoon, after having floated about thirty miles from
the starting point they reached the junction of the Grand and Green. So
far all is well, but here he makes his first break, as he had no
conception of the actual character of the rivers at the junction. He
says the canyon now far surpassed that of either of the forming
streams, which is not so. For five or six miles below the junction
there is little change, yet he describes the walls as being four
thousand feet high, an altitude never attained in Cataract Canyon at
all, the highest being somewhat under three thousand, while at the
junction they are only thirteen hundred. Then he goes on to say that
detached pinnacles appeared to rise “one above the other,” for one
thousand feet more, giving an altitude here of five thousand feet,
clearly an impression in his mind of the lower end of the Grand Canyon,
which he had doubtless become somewhat familiar with in some
prospecting trip. He fancied the “Great Canyon” began at the junction
of the Grand and Green, and he did not appreciate the distance that
intervened between Callville and that point. They tied up at night and
travelled in the day. No mention is made of the terrific rapids which
roar in Cataract Canyon, but he speaks of the “grey sandstone walls”
the lower portion smooth from the action of floods. There exist some
greyish walls; but most are red except in the granite gorges of the
Grand Canyon, where, for a thousand feet, they are black. Below the
junction, forty miles, they came to the mouth of the San Juan! Yet
Cataract Canyon and Narrow together, the first canyons of the Colorado
proper, are fifty miles long and the San Juan comes in at least
seventy-five miles below their end. The walls of the San Juan he
describes as being as high as those of the Colorado, which he has just
been talking about, that is, five thousand feet, yet for these
seventy-five miles he would have actually been passing between walls of
about one thousand feet. He says he could not escape here because the
waters of the San Juan were so violent they filled its canyon from bank
to bank. In reality, he could have made his way out of the canyon (Glen
Canyon) in a great many places in the long distance between the foot of
Narrow Canyon and the San Juan. There is nothing difficult about it.
But not knowing this, and nobody else knowing it at that time, the yarn
went very well. Also, below the San Juan, as far as Lee’s Ferry, there
are numerous opportunities to leave the canyon; and there, are a great
many attractive bottoms all the way through sunny Glen Canyon, where
landings could have been made in a _bona fide_ journey, and birds
snared; anything rather than to go drifting along day after day toward
dangers unknown. “At every bend of the river it seemed as if they were
descending deeper into the earth, and that the walls were coming closer
together above them, shutting out the narrow belt of sky, thickening
the black shadows, and redoubling the echoes that went up from the
foaming waters,” all of which is nonsense. They were not yet, even
taking their own, or rather his own, calculations, near the Grand
Canyon, and the whole one hundred and forty-nine miles of Glen Canyon
are simply charming; altogether delightful. One can paddle along in any
sort of craft, can leave the river in many places, and in general enjoy
himself. I have been over the stretch twice, once at low water and
again at high, so I speak from abundant experience. Naively he remarks,
“as yet they had seen no natural bridge spanning the chasm above them,
nor had fall or cataract prevented their safe advance!” Yet they are
supposed to have passed through the forty-one miles of Cataract
Canyon’s turmoil, which I venture to say no man could ever forget. They
had been only four days getting to a point below the San Juan, simply
drifting; that is about two hundred miles, or some fifty miles a
daylight day. Around three o’clock on the fourth day they heard the
deep roar as of a waterfall in front of them.
[5] Parry’s first record of White’s story is in _Report of Surveys for
a Railway across the Continent_ by Wm. J. Palmer, 1868. Dr. C. C.
Parry was assistant geologist of the Survey.
Canyon of San Juan River Looking West at Honiket Trail, Utah. Canyon of
San Juan River Looking West at Honiket Trail, Utah.
2000 feet deep.
Photograph by CHARLES GOODMAN.
A Glen of Glen Canyon. A Glen of Glen Canyon.
These are numerous, hence the name.
“They felt the raft agitated, then whirled along with frightful
rapidity towards a wall that seemed to bar all further progress. As
they approached the cliff the river made a sharp bend, around which the
raft swept, disclosing to them, in a long vista, the water lashed into
foam, as it poured through a narrow precipitous gorge, caused by huge
masses of rock detached from the main walls. There was no time to
think. The logs strained as if they would break their fastenings. The
waves dashed around the men, and the raft was buried in the seething
waters. White clung to the logs with the grip of death. His comrade
stood up for an instant with the pole in his hands, as if to guide the
raft from the rocks against which it was plunging; but he had scarcely
straightened before the raft seemed to leap down a chasm and, amid the
deafening roar of waters, White heard a shriek that thrilled him to the
heart, and, looking around, saw, through the mist and spray, the form
of his comrade tossed for an instant on the water, then sinking out of
sight in a whirlpool.”
Cataract Canyon Rapid at Low Water. Cataract Canyon Rapid at Low Water.
Photograph by E.O. BEAMAN, U.S. Colo. Riv. Exp.
On the fifth day White lashed himself to the raft. He then describes a
succession of rapids, passing which with great difficulty he reached a
stream that he afterward learned was the Little Colorado. He said the
canyon was like that of the San Juan, but they are totally different.
The current of this stream swept across that of the Colorado, “causing
in a black chasm on the opposite bank a large and dangerous whirlpool.”
He could not avoid this and was swept by the cross current into this
awful place, which, to relieve the reader’s anxiety, I hasten to add,
does not exist. There is no whirlpool whatever at the mouth of the
Little Colorado, nor any other danger. But White now felt that further
exertion was useless, and amidst the “gurgling” waters closed his eyes
for some minutes, when, feeling a strange swinging sensation, he opened
them and found that he was circling round the whirlpool, sometimes
close to the terrible vortex, etc. He thought he fainted. He was
nothing if not dramatic. When he recovered it was night. Then for the
first time he thought of prayer. “I spoke as if from my very soul, and
said: ‘Oh, God, if there is a way out of this fearful place, show it to
me, take me to it.’” His narrator says White’s voice here became husky
and his features quivered. “I was still looking up with my hands
clasped when I felt a different movement of the raft and turning to
look at the whirlpool it was some distance behind (he could see it in
the night!), and I was floating on the smoothest current I had yet seen
in the canyon.” The current was now very slow and he found that the
rapids were past. The terrible mythical whirlpool at the innocent mouth
of the Little Colorado was the end of the turmoil, though he said the
canyon went on, the course of the river being exceedingly crooked, and
shut in by precipices of white sand rock! There is no white “sand-rock”
in the Grand Canyon. All through this terrific gorge wherein the river
falls some eighteen hundred feet, White found a slow current and his
troubles from rapids were over! For 217 miles of the worst piece of
river in the world, he found no difficulty. The gloom and lack of food
alone oppressed him, and he thought of plunging from the raft, but
lacked the courage. Had he really entered the Grand Canyon his raft
would have been speedily reduced to toothpicks and he would not have
had the choice of remaining upon it. Finally, he reached a bank upon
which some mesquite bushes grew, and he devoured the green pods. Then
sailing on in a sort of stupor he was roused by voices and saw some
Yampais, who gave him meat and roasted mesquite beans. Proceeding, he
heard voices again and a dash of oars. It was Hardy and at last White
was saved!
Looking up the Grand Canyon from Mouth of Kanab Canyon. Looking up the
Grand Canyon from Mouth of Kanab Canyon.
Pencil sketch by F.S. DELLENBAUGH.
We have seen various actors passing before us in this drama, but I
doubt if any of them have been more picturesque than this champion
prevaricator. But he had related a splendid yarn. What it was intended
to obscure would probably be quite as interesting as what he told. Just
where he entered upon the river is of course impossible to decide, but
that he never came through the Grand Canyon is as certain as anything
can be. His story reveals an absolute ignorance of the river and its
walls throughout the whole course he pretended to have traversed.
NOTE.—Mr. R. B. Stanton in 1907 discovered that White was alive in New
Mexico. With a stenographer Mr. Stanton visited him and concludes that
White was not responsible for the tale, and that Parry’s imagination
filled in the details. Mr. Stanton proves absolutely that White never
went through the Grand Canyon and that his route was from the foot of
the Grand Canyon to Callville.