advised the Government that our neutrality was so inadequate, or laxly
administered, or both, that nearly all the insurrectos then in arms in
Mexico were organized in the United States, and practically all the
arms and munitions of war were unlawfully or at least unrighteously
introduced from this country. Living in El Paso during much of the
hostilities, I knew that many secret service men, detectives and
others in the employ of the Government, were seeking something. But
neither I, nor so far as I know, either of my brothers were ever
approached regarding conditions in Mexico.
The original Francisco I. Madero, said to be of Jewish descent,
as a young man lived near Matamoras, when General Taylor crossed
the Rio Grande for Monterey. The army was unable to procure wagon
transportation, and Madero suggested pack animal transportation to
General Taylor as more feasible because of difficult sandy roads.
Our Government gave Madero large contracts to transport the baggage
and supplies of Taylor's army to Monterey and Saltillo, by which he
accumulated a considerable fortune. After the war he received large
concessions from the Mexican Government.
The family was very prolific, Francisco I having twelve or thirteen
children, Francisco II about the same number, and Francisco III,
presidential candidate, having many, as did nearly all his brothers,
sisters, uncles and aunts. When the revolution against Diaz broke out,
the Madero family embraced four or five hundred souls, nearly all more
or less wealthy. Madero II was a Diaz supporter, as were about half
his brothers. The rest were adherents of Madero III. The family is now
dispersed and many have died.
I was personally acquainted with Francisco Madero III, and his father,
Madero, Jr., was an extreme agitator similar to our Debs. The greatest
qualification friends in each case claimed for their candidates for
the presidency was that they had been confined in jail by their two
countries for violations of laws!
Mr. Madero stated in all sincerity that he hoped to be to his country
what Washington was to mine. I never met Mr. Debs, but I dare say he
had similar ambitions and with about the same reason! Debs received
relatively as many American votes when candidate for president as
Madero did when he claimed election.
Our assistance given to such men as Madero, Orosco, and Villa in
driving Diaz, the greatest ruler Mexico ever had, from his tranquil
government to exile, set back for fifty years the advancement that
Diaz had given in his twenty-seven years of authority. Until Mexico
discovers another such noble man as Diaz, it will never have the
tranquil and stable government it had. Some day Mexico will erect
a monument to his memory as resplendent as that of Guatemozin or
Montezuma. Were it not that our country is now so absorbed in the
greater war in Europe, our jingoes might ere this have caused another
war of conquest, subjugation and exploitation in Mexico.
I also knew Huerta personally. A graduate of their military academy,
an officer of forty years' service in the army, I do not believe it
possible that he had guilty knowledge of Madero's murder.
EQUITABLE DISTRIBUTION OF THE WATERS OF THE RIO GRANDE
Because settlements in Colorado and New Mexico appropriated so much
water from the Rio Grande in the flood season the river ran dry before
it passed through the arid region around El Paso. Thus grapevines
and fruit trees perished, and because it was impossible to cultivate
vegetables, wheat, corn and other cereals, the settlers on both sides
of the river were abandoning the country. In 1888, the city council of
El Paso asked me to devise some remedy for their distress.
I recommended the construction of a dam three miles above the city,
where the formation in the valley gave ample room for immense water
storage. At the council's request I went to Washington and presented a
statement of their distress to the Secretary of State.
I saw Mr. Bayard on the 9th of December, and on the 10th, at his
request, presented the following communication:
EBBITT HOUSE,
Washington, D. C., December 10, 1888.
SIR: Agreeable to promise at our interview this a.m.,
I have the honor to submit the following general outline of my
projected scheme for an international dam and water storage in
the Rio Grande River, near El Paso, Tex., for the control of the
annual floods and the preservation of the national boundary to
the Gulf, and for other purposes.
The Rio Grande, 1,800 miles long, rises from an unusual number
of tributaries in the very high altitudes of southern Colorado
and northern New Mexico, where the rain and snowfall is
extraordinary, and the ice formed therefrom in the long winter
enormous. As it flows southward the precipitation gradually
decreases for 600 miles, when the Mexican boundary is reached
at El Paso, Tex., where there is neither snow nor ice, and but
8 inches annual rainfall; from thence 1,200 miles south to the
Gulf of Mexico the rainfall is only sufficient to compensate for
the loss by evaporation (which latter is very great), and for
these reasons the river has but few tributaries and no increase
of flow below El Paso.
The annual floods, caused by the melting of snow and ice in the
mountains, take place in May and last for about seventy-five
days, during which period the average flow may be estimated at
200 yards in width by 2 yards in depth, with a velocity of 5
miles per hour, although in recurring periods of about seven
years it is much greater. During the remaining two hundred and
ninety days of the year the average flow is perhaps not over
30 yards wide by 1 yard deep, with the same velocity; and in
the same recurring periods, in the intervals between the high
tides, the river goes dry for months, as it is at this time--or
at least has no current, with not enough water in the pools to
float the fish.
There is at present popular opinion that this want of water
comes from its diversion by the numerous irrigating canals
lately taken out in Colorado and New Mexico, and while it is
problematical what effect this may have, if any, I am of the
opinion that most of this water returns to the stream again,
either through the atmosphere, by evaporation and precipitation,
or by the earth, through overflow and drainage, as from personal
observation I know that these seasons of flood and drought were
of about the same character thirty years ago.
After leaving the mountains the river passes through low valleys
of bottom lands from 1 to 12 miles wide and from 4 to 8 feet
above low-water level, of a light, sandy alluvium formed during
annual overflows by sedimentary deposits from silt, which the
water always carries in a greater or less degree.
In meandering along the Texan bank of the river as a land
surveyor, from the New Mexican line to a point below Fort
Quitman, in 1858, 1859, and 1860, I observed that the deposit
was from one-half inch to 3 inches annually, that during the
floods the bed of the river was constantly changing by erosion
and deposit, and that in regular cycles it shifted from one
of its firm rocky or clay banks to the other, as the deposits
had raised the side of the valley through which it then flowed
above the level of the opposite side. Generally this change
took place slowly, by erosion and deposit of matter entirely in
suspension; but frequently hundreds of acres would be passed
in a single day by a cut-off in a bend of one channel, and
sometimes the bed would suddenly change from one firm bank to
the other, a distance of perhaps 20 miles in length by 6 in
width. For instance, when surveying "El Canutillo," a valley a
short distance above El Paso, the river was moving westward, and
about the middle of the valley, which was some 6 miles wide.
Old Mexicans who had lived in the vicinity informed me that in
1821 the river ran close along the eastern bluff, where its bed
was plainly to be seen, as was also a less plainly outlined bed
along the bluffs on the opposite side, where the river flows
at this date, and gives evidence of returning abruptly to the
eastern bluffs again at the next greatest high tide, to its old
channel along the bed of the track of the Santa Fe Railroad.
In another case, more recent and extensive, in the great valley
below El Paso, some 12 miles in width and 20 miles long, the
river, as was plainly evident at the time I was surveying the
land, had made a sudden change from the bluffs on the eastern or
Texan side to the western or Mexican side of the valley.
Mexicans who had been residents continuously in that vicinity
informed me that this change took place in 1842.
Again, in 1884, in this vicinity, the river swept suddenly
from the Mexican side, crossed the Southern Pacific Railroad,
and destroyed both track and bed for a distance of 15 miles,
stopping traffic for a period of three months and causing the
removal of the road to hills above the valley.
Though these are the most extensive changes that came within
my personal observation, similar ones are being made annually,
from El Paso to the Gulf, which not only prevent the settlement
and development of such of the lands as are sufficiently above
the overflow (were the banks and boundaries secure), but by
reason of the river being the national boundary between the
United States and Mexico for over 1,200 miles, cause fatal
embarrassments to the citizens and officials of both Republics
in fixing boundaries and titles to lands, in preventing
smuggling, collecting customs, and in the legal punishment of
all crimes and misdemeanors committed near the supposed boundary
line, it being easy at almost any point in its great length to
produce evidence sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt in the
minds of the jurors as to which side of the line the arrest was
made or the act committed.
At the last session of Congress the House passed a joint
resolution (No. 112) requesting the President to appoint
a commission, in conjunction with a similar one from the
Republic of Mexico, to consider the matter above referred to.
While surveying these lands in 1858, and prospecting for a
crossing of the Rio Grande for the Memphis, El Paso and Pacific
Railroad, which was then projected--and in fact in course of
construction--I examined the pass about three miles above the
present city of El Paso, and discovered that it had solid rock
bed and walls, the latter but about 400 feet apart, and that
the valley above which came close down to the spur of the Rocky
Mountains which crossed the river and formed the pass was from
4 to 8 miles wide, with a fall of about 4 feet to the mile, so
that it would be an easy matter to build a dam in this pass and
create an immense lake.
The water coming through this pass for ages has deposited at its
lower end a great mass of rocks, over which is formed rapids
with about 12 feet fall, and the aborigines of prehistoric ages
made use of this to carry the water on to the lands below, no
one knows how long ago, but it is known that the Mexicans have
used it for two hundred years under most disadvantageous and
unsatisfactory circumstances.
I have witnessed, each succeeding year, hundreds of Mexicans
piling loose stones on the top of this drift of rocks to raise
the level to that carried away by the floods of the preceding
year; and it has been estimated by a Federal engineer sent from
the City of Mexico, that, had the labor thus expended been
reduced to silver, the dam could have been built of the solid
metal. The difficulty has been and always will be that there is
neither bed rock nor solid earth in the bottom or banks, each
being composed of quicksand.
In other places in the valley temporary willow dams 1 or 2
feet high are made at convenient places, and the water carried
several miles below on to the lands that are above the usual
overflow; but these dams are carried away annually and have to
be rebuilt, and frequently the river bed moves miles away from
the mouth of the ditch or acequia, rendering it useless; but
even if these difficulties in carrying the water from the bed of
the river to the lands are overcome in the usual manner, it is
evident that by reason of a great overflow, say, every seventh
year, and a dry river in a like period, no system of irrigation
for the Rio Grande can prove satisfactory that does not embrace
a grand storage system sufficient both to restrain, to a great
extent, at least, the tidal flow and maintain a constant annual
flow, especially since the great immigration and settlement in
its valley is constantly doubling the demand for water.
Being on leave of absence in the city of El Paso recently,
where I was a citizen before the war, having surveyed the first
plat of the town and being well known to most of its citizens, I
was invited by the city council to submit to it a plan for water
supply and irrigation that would overcome the difficulties above
referred to.
It at once occurred to me that as the Rio Grande was the joint
property of the two nations, and especially as the Mexicans
had used its waters since time when "the memory of man runneth
not to the contrary," that any plan to be acceptable and
satisfactory must be international in character, and the works,
both before and after completion, under the joint federal
control of the two nations, the more so as riparian rights in
this country, so far as regards irrigation, are not well defined
by law, and could be best brought about in this instance by
treaty stipulations between the two countries.
The matter of restraining the tidal flow by storing the water,
and thus protect the constantly changing national boundary,
occurred to me--if it could be introduced into the project--as
likely to secure encouragement and substantial aid in money from
both governments.
And further, that El Paso, being now a city of over 11,000
population, and having every prospect of being a large
manufacturing city at no distant day--there being no place
within 500 miles likely to compete with it--the subject of water
power ought also to enter into the problem, which of necessity
is of such vast proportions as to require all incidental aid
possible to attach to it to insure its success.
It will be apparent, from what has been written, that the Rio
Grande is one of the first magnitude, not only in length and
breadth, but for short annual periods in devastating flow of
waters, and that its general characteristics, as compared with
other rivers with reference to irrigation, are so abnormal as to
require different or more heroic treatment.
I therefore projected a scheme which may be briefly outlined as
follows:
To build a strong dam of stones and cement--say, 60 feet
high--in the pass before referred to, and by submerging about
60,000 acres of land now subject to overflow and of little
comparative value, create a vast lake 15 miles long by 7 wide,
with a probable storage capacity of 4,000,000,000 cubic yards of
water; place gates on each side of the river in the dam at the
50-foot level for waste-weirs and irrigating canals to supply
each side of the river and keep up a flow in its bed which would
bring the water in the canals 70 feet above the streets in the
cities of El Paso and Juarez, respectively.
The gates at the 50-foot level would give an available reserve
of water of 10 feet over the entire surface of the lake--over
2,000,000,000 cubic yards--which would be exhausted during the
long season of little flow for the purposes of irrigation and
other needs, as well as maintaining a constant stream in the
river beds so arranged as to exhaust the reserve about the
period of annual flood, which would be checked and held in
reserve for the next season of little flow, and in this manner
produce a comparatively constant and unvarying flow of water
for each entire year below the dam, redeeming many times the
number of acres submerged above in the lake from overflow below,
and fixing permanently the national boundary, the banks of the
river, as well as the boundaries and titles to private lands,
and making it an easy matter to collect duties and prevent
smuggling, detect crimes and misdemeanors generally, arrest and
punish criminals, as it is along other national boundaries.
The assumed flow given for the 75 days of high-water will give
about 6,500,000,000 cubic yards, and that for the remaining
290 days 1,500,000,000, making an aggregate annual flow of
8,000,000,000 cubic yards. If we allow 2,000,000,000 of this
for loss by evaporation and other wastes, which former in
this dry atmosphere is very great, perhaps 80 inches, we have
6,000,000,000 cubic yards remaining. This should be divided
into three equal parts, one for each side of the river, for
irrigation and other needs, and the third for overflow, through
water motors, to furnish power to the future manufacturing
cities on each side and to maintain a constant flow in the river
below to the Gulf, as would no doubt be demanded by the people
there as their right ere they would permit the scheme to be
carried out.
The 2,000,000,000 cubic yards falling a distance of 50 feet
over the dam, estimating the weight of a cubic yard of water
at 500 pounds, and 1 horse-power the energy required to lift
33,000 pounds 1 foot in a minute, would expend energy equal
to over 10,000 horse-power for 8 hours every day in the year,
and produce a constant stream in the bed of the river 26 yards
wide by 1 foot deep, running with a velocity of 5 miles per
hour, to say nothing of the probability that the greater part
of the other two-thirds would find its way again to the river
bed through the earth and air, the whole flowing in a steady,
continuous stream to the mouth of the river, to be used as
required at any season of the year, instead of, as is now the
case, three-fourths of the entire mass of the annual flow going
rapidly to the Gulf in the short period of 75 days untaxed.
Estimating the amount of water required for annual irrigation
at 20 inches, the water reserved for that purpose would be
sufficient for 100,000 acres on each side of the river--all that
could be reclaimed from the desert for 100 miles below.
To carry out this project I recommended to the people on each
side of the Rio Grande that they petition to the executive
authority of their respective nations for the creation of a
joint commission to draw up the necessary treaty stipulations
to protect the work and the rights of all interested in them,
the fundamental feature of which should certainly be that each
nation should have the right to divert no more than one-third of
the flow at any period, and that one-third of the flow should be
maintained in the bed of the river; and that this international
commission have charge and control of the work after completion
as well as during construction.
That the legislative authorities of the two nations be asked to
appropriate, after complete investigation and estimates have
been made, money sufficient to complete the work, probably
$100,000 for the dam proper, $100,000 for the condemnation of
the 50,000 acres of land to be submerged, and $100,000 for the
removal of some 15 miles of the road-bed of the Atchison, Topeka
and Santa Fe Railroad to bluffs above the old bed of the river,
where the track now lies, subject to annual damage, and sooner
or later total destruction, unless removed.
It will also be apparent that the waters of this great lake will
be clear and fresh, the silt held in suspension in the current
of the river being precipitated as soon as it enters the still
water of the lake, doing away with the great trouble and expense
now necessary in keeping the canals and ditches cleansed of
sedimentary deposits, and a further great benefit derived from
using water reduced in temperature by exposure for months in
a warm climate far below that used in the early spring, which
comes in three days from snow and ice and is immediately applied
to the young and tender sprouting plants, chilling and checking
their growth.
I know of no point in the Rio Grande between Albuquerque and the
Gulf of Mexico where nature has provided both the natural basin
and rim for a lake of such great dimensions, for, indeed, it
can be made 100 feet deep if desired, and it may be questioned
whether a depth of 60 feet, with 10 feet reserve to draw from,
will afford sufficient storage to control perfectly the tide at
its highest flow.
This project was well received by the people and has been
earnestly discussed in the public press of the locality ever
since with general approbation and a disposition to endeavor
to carry it out as quickly as possible. The only question
exciting any general distrust is that the sedimentary deposit
in the lake, it is held by some, will shorten the life of the
reservoir by filling the lake at such an early period as to
render the scheme of doubtful expediency, and opinions differ
very widely upon this subject, which is, indeed, a problematical
one, and can only be determined, even approximately, by actual
measurements of a great majority of the annual flow, for the
quantity of sediment changes with flow and season.
That the bed of the river will eventually be filled, of course,
is only a matter of time, but whether in fifteen or one hundred
and fifty years can only be ascertained by prolonged, actual
measurements; but even if filled in the near future it seems
to me that the difficulty may be overcome by raising the dam,
unless, indeed, that should be required too often.
The matter has already been referred to Major Powell, chief of
the Geological Survey, who has sent Captain Clarence Dutton,
of his Department, to El Paso to investigate and report on the
feasibility of the scheme; but as the initial steps, should it
be pronounced feasible, must come from your Department in the
nature of international treaty stipulations, I have thought it
proper to thus early acquaint you with the grand project.
I beg to refer you to Hon. Mr. Lanham, member of Congress from
Texas, who is acquainted with me personally and my projected
scheme.
ANSON MILLS,
_Major Tenth Cavalry, Brevet Lieutenant Colonel,
United States Army_.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE,
Washington, D. C.
In April, 1888, at the instance of Major Powell, I had received
orders from the War Department to report to the commanding officer
at Fort Bliss, with instructions to lend whatever aid I could to the
Interior Department and its Geological Survey party, investigating the
redemption of irrigable lands in the Rio Grande Valley.
Major Powell also wrote, asking me to act as advisory agent of the
survey, and to give it my opinions and advice regarding this work,
as well as to supervise a gauge station they were to construct for
measuring the annual river flow, evaporation, etc.
The Geological Survey was authorized to investigate the feasibility
of reclaiming arid lands by dams and water storage. Colonel E. S.
Nettleton, of Denver, Colorado, was appointed supervising engineer
of the southwestern district, and I was appointed his assistant, as
supervising engineer of the district of El Paso, with money to employ
engineers and other assistants to make plans and estimates for the
proposed international dam at El Paso. With Mr. W. W. Follett, one
of the best hydraulic engineers in the United States as my aid, I
proceeded to carry out the work as speedily as possible. The Senate
Committee on Irrigation, of which Senator Stewart was Chairman,
intended to visit El Paso later and examine the location, plans,
specifications and estimates, so that, if approved, they could
recommend an appropriation to construct it.
While engaged in this investigation an apparently unrelated incident
occurred which had a most unfortunate effect upon our labors.
[Illustration: MAJOR JAMES W. POWELL.]
[Illustration: COLONEL E. S. NETTLETON.]
[Illustration: W. W. FOLLETT.]
The Secretary of War, Mr. Proctor, ordered me to Fort Selden.
Here an irrigation company, represented by Mr. W. H. H. Llewellyn,
held a revocable license to construct a canal through the Selden
Reservation. The Mexican citizens, assembled in force with arms,
had forbidden the workmen to construct the canal, and I was to make
a thorough investigation as to the trouble, and report to the
Secretary personally in Washington.