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Show AGRICULTURE I'NDER IRRIGATION IN BASIN OF VIRGIN RIVER. 211 temporarily abandoned. The same year a few acres was watered by William Ham-Win about one-half mile below the present town of Gunlock. Prior to the settlement of Washington, in 1857, a military post, for protection against the Indians, had been established on the cast side of Ash Creek, northwest from what is now known as Kelseys. and called Fort Harmony. There a small stream of water was diverted for irrigation. Later the fort was moved across Ash Creek and known as Old Fort Harmony. A larger field was watered there until the winter of lstil-02, when the settlement was washed away and present Harmony established, and the irrigated acreage still further increased. Next after Harmony. Toquerville was founded, followed bv Virgin City, with rive or six families. After Virgin City came the old Grafton, which was later washed away and superseded by the present Orafton. After these settlements, and prior to 1861, came in order Kockville. first known as Adventure, Shunesburg, Northup, just above Kockville, and Springdale. With the breaking out of the civil war in the spring of lKtil, the Mormon leaders foresaw a possible cutting off of the American cotton supply, and hence a renewed cause for making their people self-supporting. Accordingly, this year saw redoubled efforts to utilize the waters of the Virgin and its tributaries. Three hundred families started from Salt Lake to this river in the fall of 1861. In November a body of oo or UO Swiss people founded Santa Clara on its present site. In December the majority of the 3oo families pitched their tents a short distance from where St. George now is, moving in a body to the present site a month later. At the same time the upper river settlements of Toquerville, Virgin City, Grafton, Kockville, Springdale, and Shunesburg were strengthened. Soon after the arrival of these colonists a severe flood undid much of the work of the earlier settlers. The pioneer dam built by Hamblin and the Indians on the Santa Clara was torn out and the settlements of Gunlock, Old Fort Harmony, and Grafton, as well as much of the bottom land along the Virgin Kiver, washed away. The former narrow and somewhat regular channels of both the Virgin and the Santa Clara rivers were torn and widened. In the opinion of many of the old settlers who witnessed the Hood, the flow of both streams, as well as of some of the other tributaries, was permanently increased by the opening of springs theretofore closed. Notwithstanding this discouraging beginning, a ditch leading from Virgin Kiver was commenced before the settlers had been located a month, and was carrying water 0 miles by the end of 1862. It had a width of 0 feet and a depth of 3 feet and passed through a timbered tunnel 900 feet long. The work of construction was necessarily so hurried that some of it was not lasting. In the first four years and eight months after St. George was founded $20,till.5!) was spent in repairing and replacing dams and sections of the ditch, which had thus far watered -kio acres, making a tax of over #03 per acre for water alone. In 1804- the water tax per acre was $lo.S<s; in ix<!5, $12; in 1806, It), and in 1867, $9. Hut for the fact that these taxes were largely paid in labor it would have been impossible for the settlers to meet them. To reduce the burden somewhat, 5o wild-grass lots along the Virgin Kiver, directly south of St. George, were sold at auction, netting $4,300, and this sum placed in the fund for completing and enlarging the tunnel. Nor did these severe conditions give way to better conditions at once. For a number of years after 1807 the annual water tax in the Virgin Field, to which the first ditch led, was $18 per |
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Original book: Utah exhibits [of the] State of Arizona, complainant, v. State of California, Palo Verde Irrigation District, Imperial Irrigation District, Coachella Valley County Water District, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, City of Los Angeles, City of San Diego, and County of San Diego, defendants, United States of America and State of Nevada, interveners, State of New Mexico and State of Utah, parties |