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Show The Old Spanish Trail and the Slave Trade The Old Spanish Trail became the major trade route between the Spanish settlements of New Mexico and California. One of the most important parts of the trade was slavery. The New Mexicans made annual trips. They started out with a few goods and traded on their way with Navajos or Utes for horses. They then traded the horses to other Indians for children who had been stolen from poorer tribes like the Nuwuvi. The New Mexicans often raided Nuwuvi camps when they couldn't obtain children peacefully. The children then were traded in California for horses, goods, or cash. The traders then returned to New Mexico picking up more children on the way. The boys were sold on the average in New Mexico for $100. The girls were sold for $150 to $200 by the 1850's.1 Slavery once had been an occasional, unpredictable practice, but the Spanish Trail made it an annual threat to the Nuwuvi. It was a profitable and successful business. "The Mexicans were as fully established and systematic in this trade as ever were the slavers on the sea and to them this was a very lucrative business." ~ The driving of large herds of horses and mules along the Spanish Trail also disrupted the Nuwuvi economy by depleting grasses and other plant life along the route. The caravans, though varying in size, often were as large as 200 men on horseback, accompanied by mules laden with goods and returning with as many as 2,000-4,000 horses and mules.3 The result of all this activity for the Nuwuvi was cultural disruption. An important event in the establishment of the Old Spanish Trail was the trading expedition of Antonio Armijo. In the fall of 1829, Armijo led the first pack train from New Mexico to California. Though traveling on a route lower than that which was to become the Old Spanish Trail, Armijo's party of about sixty Mexicans began commercial traffic through Nuwuvi territory. The Mexicans transported hand-woven blankets and serapes, trading these for horses and mules in California which they brought back to New Mexico by the same route. 36 |