The Rough and Tumble Travel by Stagecoach

A "Concord Stage" built by the Abbot Downing Company.

Anyone that knows the American Old West, will surely recognize the iconic shape of the horse drawn stagecoach, as a tall silhouette with a wooden cabin perched on top of four open spoke wheels.  A series of horses set two abreast with a minimum of four, but typically six would pull the stagecoach at a steady pace of five miles per hour. These horses would be exchanged for a new team every 3 hours at changing stations that had been built along the route, and 45 miles was the typical distance covered by the stage each day. For paying customers, the stagecoach was the primary method of overland travel in the Old West until the railroad laid down its tracks.

The stagecoach had its origins in Great Britain during the 13th century, with the first commercial stage route not in operation until 1610. In America, the 18th century brought the first stagecoaches of transporting people and mail delivery throughout the New England colonies. With the opening of the way westward in the mid 1800’s, companies such as American Express, Wells Fargo, and the Overland Mail Company began offering passenger, mail and freight services from Missouri to California. 

The dominant manufacturer of the American stagecoach was the Abbot Downing Company of New Hampshire. Through clever engineering, Abbot instituted the leather strap suspension system in place of metal springs. This resulted in a more comfortable ride over the undeveloped western trails, and gave longevity to the coach from being shaken apart by the terrain. Each Abbot, “Concord Stage” as it was named, had a cost of $1,500 to $1,800 each.

Seating conditions inside the coach was tight, typically holding 9 passengers that sat three across on either the front, back or middle seat. To keep from bouncing up and down, a rider would normally lock knees with the passenger sitting across from them. The coach could also handle another 6 or more passengers riding on the cabin’s roof, but most often this space was reserved for luggage and freight. 

Two operators handled the stage on the forward perching seat. One drove the horses, while the other sat with a rifle or “shotgun”, protecting any valuable cargo, and ready to fire upon anyone that might try their luck at holding-up the stage and its passengers. Stagecoach travel west was said to be difficult, dusty, hot, and particularly dangerous at times. One such document posted on the station wall of the Overland Mail Company, even went so far as to remind the boarding passengers,

YOU WILL BE TRAVELING THROUGH INDIAN COUNTRY AND THE SAFETY OF YOUR PERSON CANNOT BE VOUCHSAFED BY ANYONE BUT GOD.

The Navajo Long Walk to Bosque Redondo

Navajo Captivity at Bosque Redondo.

The Navajo Long Walk to Bosque Redondo was the first attempt to institutionalize the Native Americans to a land reservation by the United States government. Between the years of 1864 to 1866, the scattered Navajo tribes, situated in their ancestral homelands of eastern Arizona and western New Mexico, were forced to march a distance of over 400 miles on foot to Bosque Redondo, near Fort Sumner, New Mexico. In total, some 54 individual marches were conducted in an attempt to move the full Navajo population over this two year period.

It was the government in Washington that devised this relocation plan as a means to quell the continual hostilities between maundering bands of Navajos with American settlers and Army troops within the southwest. Instead of dealing with the issue at its source, i.e., realizing that the much of the conflict was driven by multiple broken peach treaties and injustice to the Navajos, the federal government believed the final solution was to resettle the entire tribe to a completely different part of the country - one that would also be presumably out of the way – from the teaming American settlers, migration to the west.

The first Long Walk marches were begun in the spring of 1984. Groups of Navajos were rounded up by the United States Army and driven over the arid desert region of the southwest. It was recorded that even if you were physically young and strong, the walk was daunting enough, especially considering the Army did not provide you with provisions, or sympathy along the way. If you were middle aged and older, the march was devastating. It is estimated that 200 Navajos died during the nearly 3-week long journey.

The reservation at Bosque Redondo, situated on the Pecos River in southern New Mexico was initially planned to handle 5,000 Navajos, but by the time the Long Walk marches were completed, the land was forced to contain nearly 10,000 resettled Navajos. In addition to the over populating the land, the natural environment also proved to be limiting. An infestation of insects, and seasonal flooding of the river, easily destroyed growing crops along the Pecos River, thus stifling any ability of the Navajos to live off of the land.

By 1868, the internment camp at Bosque Redondo was viewed as a failure. Initially thought of as the grand scheme for containing the Native Americans on set aside reservations, Washington relinquished in favor of the Navajo people to return to their ancestral homeland in eastern Arizona. On June 18th 1868, the Navajos set off again on the Long Walk home to their original lands, where 3.5 million acres were set aside for them within the boundaries of their four sacred mountains. Today, the Navajo reservation encompasses over 16 million acres.

As a testament to the will and strength of the Navajo people during the Long Walk and the hardships that were experienced during this period of time, Howard Gorman, a Navajo and historian summed it up by saying,

“As I have said, our ancestors were taken captive and driven to Hweeldi (the Navajo name for Bosque Redondo), for no reason at all. They were harmless people, and even to date, we are the same, holding no harm to anybody. Many Navajos who know our history and storuy of Hweeldi say the same.”

Who were the Texas Rangers?

Texas Rangers  |  circa 1885

It’s probably more appropriate to ask the question, “who are the Texas Rangers?”, since this law enforcement organization is still in existence today more than a 180 years later. That’s right, one of the first groups to fight on the side of justice in the old west were the Texas Rangers. 

Dating back to 1823, ten men became employed under Stephen F. Austin as a protection force for newly arriving settlers in the territory of Texas. Their first mission, protect 600 to 700 homesteaders against hostile Indian and bandit attacks. 

By 1835, the Texas Rangers as they became known, were formally constituted, and within two years their ranks swelled to an impressive force of over 300 men. During the years to follow, the size of the Rangers would also ebb and flow from over 50 men, to a fighting force of 150 under Sam Houston, the first President of the Texas Republic, where their services found them fighting in the Mexican-American War on the side of the United States.

Once the war ended in 1848, the Rangers were for the most part dismissed from duty. That was until 1857, when governor, Hardin Richard Runnels of the now, State of Texas, allocated $70,000 to rearm the organization as a deterrent to the continual Indian raids, particularly from the Comanche on the Texas settlers. When the Civil war broke out, Texas joined the Confederacy in 1861, meaning many of the Rangers changed allegiance from the northern federal government to fighting on the side of the southern cause.

1873 brought in a new recommissioned organization of the Texas Rangers that were once again aligned with the federal government. Expanding on their role of dispensing justice, the Rangers forged a solid reputation for capturing and killing notorious criminals, including those in the trade as bank robbers and gunfighters. Their decisive victories over the Comanche, the Kiowa, and the Apaches brought an end to the decades old American and Indian wars. 

There is no doubt that the Texas Rangers brought a stabilizing enforcement of the law to the lawless old west, even if it may have been one part fiction, and one part truth as extolled by the media of their day. Sensationalist writing by the press, idealized the role of the Texas Rangers as tough talking, quick shooting, and rough living in the minds of the American citizen, but in a quote attributed to, John “Rip” Ford - one of the most prominent of the early Texas Ranger Captains - his view was probably closer to the truth,

"A large proportion …were unmarried. A few drank intoxicating liquors. Still it was a company of sober and brave men. They knew their duty and they did it. While in town they made no braggadocio demonstration. They did not gallop through the streets, shoot and yell. They had a specie of moral discipline which developed moral courage. They did right because it was right."

Calico Chloe

Calico Chloe

For more than 35 years I’ve had the privilege of practicing my profession as a writer and architect in the footprint of the American Old West. Living and working in New Mexico, has afforded me with the opportunity to design and manage projects that crisscross the state, including those in Albuquerque, Alamogordo, Clovis, Gallup, Las Cruces, and Santa Fe to name just a few. I’ve often traveled through many of the small towns where history was written, such as Fort Sumner, the resting place of Billy the Kid, and the site of the first Native American reservation at the Bosque Redondo.

Many of my clients with surnames of Spanish, Anglo and Native American are the descendants of those that settled the west, and even before. Undoubtedly, you get to know these people as friends, where conversations of their past generations make for some interesting discussions and a first hand, learning of history.

New Mexico is a true microcosm of the Old West. It was settled by the Native Americans, conquered by the Spaniards, became a state of Mexico, and finally a territory of the United States through war. New Mexico entered as the 47th state of the union on January 6th, 1912.

It’s been called the ‘Land of Enchantment’ as a means of attracting tourists. The natural landscaping of flat mesas, contrasted by rugged mountains, adobe colored soil, and ample amounts of tumble weeds that roam with the wind, have become all too familiar through the many Hollywood westerns that have been filmed here.

The Old West is picturesque, sometimes exciting, sometimes tranquil, but always interesting when you realize the tales that came from this unique period of time. So, why not Join me, …along with one infamous little doggie known as Calico Chloe, as we discover together, the stories, and the legends, that made the American Old West an important part of our culture.