Arizona weekly citizen., 1891-07-18
THRILLING EXPERIENCE.
Trip OF San Diego Prospectors on the
Desert.

The San Diego Sun gives the following
experience OF two prospectOrs who were
caught on the desert by the food from
the Colorado:
w. w. Webb and L. n Gridley are two
San Diego men who started from this
city on the 23d of May with a light
wagon, two horses and two burros,
together with the necessary supplies and
on the desert. Then they were fair
return from the Colorado basin, they
are tanned like Indians. They are also
minus wagon, two burros and most Of
| their camp impedlments.
Some two weeks or more ago Messrs,
| Webb and Gridley were in camp in dry
slough of the New River, about on hun
dred and twenty miles northeast of this
city. A small pool near by furnished
stagnant water, and they Set about ma
king a filter for it. While doing this,
| fresh water, and before they knew 1t,
almost they we're 10 danger of drowning.
| The great Colorado food had begun.
The prospectors...s shook their traps
together and started for dry land, which
they found some three miles away. But
tney had scarcely made a camp when
the flood was on them and they tad to
move again, and still again, swimming
their horses over deep streams where but
| the day before had been blisterlng sands
They went this way and that to escape
the freshet, their horses and burros
swimming or wading, and finally got
TO the sandhIlls about twenty miles from
Yuma. Here another river was met, SO
wide and deep that it could not be eros
sed. The sandhllls themselves had been
torn up and among them the prospectors
found the remains of an Indian rancho
RE, some petritied human bones, ollas,
| petrified wood, and the hair of an Indian
brave from which the scalp had long
since rotted. These they put into their
wagon and started to renew ti.eir search
for dry road to civilization.
The next course lay west. but the
young men found the sand hills hard to
. ct out Of with the wagon and animals.
By sheer good luck the thing was done
without accident, and in the course OF a
day or two they made camp on piece
of high ground and were joined by three
Indian bucks, squaw and ia children,
who were also trying to escape. These
natives examined the relics and prom
Ounced the hair to have come from the
head of an ancient Cocopsh.
After this it was still more serious
question wether Webb and Gridley could
escape the water. which still rose around
them, but the march-or wade-was che
erfully resumed, and on the 24th of June
they reached an elevation and were
surprised to find rude fort. This was
twenty five or thirty miles north and
east OF Indian Wells. The fort, which
had long been abandoned, was 300 feet
square, IFS walls six feet high, and inside
Of it were the ruins OF a house and the
charred remains of some heavy wagons
Near by was pool of water fed by
spring, i'll which were fish. Some mes
quite trees grew near by, and about the
locality were honey bees, coons and
various other animals. Some game re-
plenished the larder, such as suipe and
a red Mexican duck, both of which were
very abundant.
But there was no abatement of the
flood, and the next day the fort was
pretty we'll surrounded by the great but
shallow lake. Then the prospectors set
about making boat. They took cracker
boxes and fastened them together with
mesquite sticks ard stretched their tent
over the improvised raft, tying it down
at the corners. Then they embar ked,
pushing the rude craft with long handled
shovels. The horses were led behind,
but the wagon and the burros were
abandoned. The voyage began on June
%, and last Friday the party landed at
Coyote Holes, on the eastern slope of
the Cuyamaca range. The heat expe-
rienced on the latter part of the journey
was 140 degrees.