Steamboats in Utah

By H. P.*

HEN Lieutenant N. Michler was working on the United States-Mexican boundary survey in 1856 he was for some time at Fort Yuma, southeastern California and at the junction of the Colorado and the Gila. The site of the post was a bleak hill, having no vegetation except the euphorbia, “a rank poison,” but which, he says, was used by Indians as an antidote for rattlesnake bite. At that time it was proposed to establish steamboat service on the Colorado—under a Government appropriation—for the purpose of opening water communication with the Mormon Territory—Utah—and do away with the long and dangerous plains trip.

That this plan for penetrating the Mormon country at the headwaters of the Colorado and bring the exports of the territory down the river into the Gulf of California was favorably considered and deemed possible is shown by the activity of speculators. While Micheler was at Fort Yuma, “Colorado City” was laid out—on paper—situated across the river from the military post. It was surveyed and the streets and blocks marked out, and what was worth while to the enthusiastic promoters many lots were sold.

Near the post was Chimney Peak, a solitary rock rising five hundred feet above the range on which it stands. The Indians call it Avie Mil-li-ket, after one of their chiefs, who became a deity after his death, says Michler. This is unusual as there is no evidence to show the American Indians were ever ancestor-worshipers.

Their implicit belief that they were swayed and controlled by external forces, by magic powers and spirits, would seem to make it impossible for their minds to conceive of one of their own weak, helpless people attaining to the dignity of a god.

However, Mil-li-ket sleeps in a large cavern, a raccoon in the entrance, and foot prints can be seen—so it’s said—in the path from the cave to the river. When his people sin his slumbers are disturbed and he turns over, and white men foolishly call it an earthquake. The mountain grave is the Mecca of the Indians of that locality; rather, it was threescore years ago.