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Show 20 The Southern Utes retreated in a running fight toward Cochetopa Pass and most of that band escaped. However, another band of Utes was surprised near Salida. About forty of them were killed and some livestock recovered on April 19, 1855. Throughout the remainder of April and for the next two months, running battles and skirmishes occurred, but the Utes recognized that they could not continue to fight the forces of the United States and asked for peace. A meeting was held at Abiquiu, mainly with the Capote Utes, and a treaty of peace was arranged in the fall of 1855.15 Also in 1855, a treaty was negotiated with the Mouaches at Abiquiu. Had that treaty been ratified by the United States Senate, the Mouaches would have been placed on a reservation of 1000 square miles in the extreme northern part of the Territory of New Mexico with the Rio Grande as the eastern boundary and the mountains between the drainages of the Rio Grande and the San Juan River as the western boundary.10 Even before the Ute War, some Anglo-Americans were active in the lands of the Utes. In 1848, John C. Fremont attempted to cross the San Juan Mountains to find a suitable route for a transcontinental railroad. Many of his party met disaster near La Garita before being rescued by former mountain men from Taos. In 1853, Captain John W. Gunnison was ordered by Secretary of War Jefferson Davis to survey the most practicable route for a transcontinental railroad. The huge party which accompanied Captain Gunnison explored and mapped Ute territory to a greater extent than ever before. Captain Gunnison was killed by the Utes in western Utah, but Lt. E. G. Beck-with continued in command and wrote an account of the expedition. Both Captain Gunnison and Lt. Beckwith were of the opinion that the Ute lands west of San Luis Valley were of no value for settlement of Anglo-Americans.17 However, less than five years later, gold was discovered near the present location of Denver and the "Rush to the Rockies" was on. Thousands of Anglo-Americans from the Missouri and the Mississippi Valleys with "Pike's Peak or Bust" painted on the canvas of their wagons poured into the area of Colorado. Many re- 15 Rockwell, The Utes, pp. 65-6; Schroeder, "Brief History," pp. 67-8; Covington, "The Ute Indians and the United States," pp. 35-42; LeRoy R. Hafen, "The Fort Pueblo Massacre and the Punitive Expedition Against the Utes." Colorado Magazine, IV, (March 1927), 49-58. 16 Cummins, "Social and Economic History," pp. 311-12. 17 Rockwell, The Utes, pp. 66-68. |