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Show CHAPTER FIVE Fig. 97. First View of the Big Colorado River from summit of mountain between Camps 31 and 32. Lithograph based on a drawing by Richard H. Kern. Lorenzo Sitgreaves, Report of an Expedition down the Zuni and Colorado Rivers (Washington, D.C, 1853). River (fig. 97). Before the day ended, they had made the rugged descent of the mountain and camped on the river, apparently near what is today Davis Dam, on the Nevada-Arizona border. While they spent a day resting their animals, Kern measured the width and depth of the river. From this point, Sitgreaves's original plans called for the party to ascend the Colorado to the Grand Canyon, and to locate the mouth of the Virgin River. But the mules were already exhausted and supplies were running low. The men had been on reduced rations for several days.57 Instead of going north, then, Sitgreaves decided to turn south, toward a military post at the Yuma crossing of the Colorado, near the mouth of the Gila River, that they desperately hoped would still be there. Over the next twenty-four days they covered 243 anxious miles along the eastern side of the Colorado, sometimes passing i 76 |
