THE BACKGROUND OF THE CASE,

1888-1897.

How "THE ELEPHANT BUTTE DAM SUIT WAS INSTIGATED

BY BRIGADIER GENERAL ANSON MILLS."

(British Memorial, page 5.)

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Major Mills to the Secretary of State.

EBBITT HOUSE,

Washington, D. C., December 10, 1888. SIR: Agreeable to promise at our interview this a. m., I have the honor to submit the following general outline of my projected scheme for an international dam and water storage in the Rio Grande River, near El Paso, Tex., for the control of the annual floods and the preservation of the national boundary to the Gulf, and for other purposes.

The Rio Grande, 1,800 miles long, rises from an unusual number of tributaries in the very high altitudes of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico, where the rain and snow fall is extraordinary, and the ice formed therefrom in the long winter enormous. As it flows southward the precipitation gradually decreases for 600 miles, when the Mexican boundary is reached at El Paso, Tex., where there is neither snow nor ice and but 8 inches annual rainfall; from thence 1,200 miles south to the Gulf of Mexico the rainfall is only sufficient to compensate for the loss by evaporation (which latter is very great), and for these reasons the river has but few tributaries and no increase of flow below El Paso.

The annual floods, caused by the melting of snow and ice in the mountains, take place in May and last for about 75 days, during which period the average flow may be estimated at 200 yards in width by 2 yards in depth, with a velocity of 5 miles per hour, although in recurring periods of about seven years it is much greater. During the remaining 290 days of the year the average flow is perhaps not over 30 yards wide by 1 yard deep, with the same velocity; and in the same recurring periods, in the intervals between the high tides, the river goes dry for months, as it is at this time-or at least has no current, with not enough water in the pools to float the fish. There is at present popular opinion that this want of water comes from its diversion by the numerous irrigating canals lately taken out in Colorado and New Mexico, and while it is problematical what effect this may have, if any, I am of the opinion that most of this water returns to the stream again, either through the atmosphere, by evaporation and precipitation, or by the earth, through overflow and drainage, as from personal observation I know that these seasons of flood and drought were of about the same character 30 years ago.

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After leaving the mountains the river passes through low valleys of bottom lands from 1 to 12 miles wide and from 4 to 8 feet above low-water level, of a light, sandy alluvium formed during annual overflows by sedimentary deposits from silt, which the water always carries in a greater or less degree.

In meandering along the Texan bank of the river as a land surveyor, from the New Mexican line to a point below Fort Quitman, in 1858, 1859, and 1860, I observed that the deposit was from onehalf inch to 3 inches annually, that during the floods the bed of the river was constantly changing by erosion and deposit, and that in regular cycles it shifted from one of its firm rocky or clay banks to the other, as the deposits had raised the side of the valley through which it then flowed above the level of the opposite side. Generally this change took place slowly, by erosion and deposit of matter entirely in suspension; but frequently hundreds of acres would be passed in a single day by a cut-off in a bend of one channel, and sometimes the bed would suddenly change from one firm bank to the other, a distance of perhaps 20 miles in length by 6 in width. For instance, when surveying "El Canutillo," a valley a short distance above El Paso, the river was moving westward, and about the middle of the valley, which was some 6 miles wide. Old Mexicans who had lived in the vicinity informed me that in 1821 the river ran close along the eastern bluff, where its bed was plainly to be seen, as was also a less plainly outlined bed along the bluffs on the opposite side, where the river flows at this date, and gives evidence of returning abruptly to the eastern bluffs again at the next greatest high tide, to its old channel along the bed of the track of the Santa Fe Railroad.

In another case, more recent and extensive, in the great valley below El Paso, some 12 miles in width and 20 miles long, the river, as was plainly evident at the time I was surveying the land, had made a sudden change from the bluffs on the eastern or Texan side to the western or Mexican side of the valley.

Mexicans who had been residents continuously in that vicinity informed me that this change took place in 1842.

Again, in 1884, in this vicinity, the river swept suddenly from the Mexican side, crossed the Southern Pacific Railroad, and destroyed both track and bed for a distance of 15 miles, stopping traffic for a period of three months and causing the removal of the road to hills above the valley.

Though these are the most extensive changes that came within my personal observation, similar ones are being made annually from El Paso to the Gulf which not only prevent the settlement and development of such of the lands as are sufficiently above the overflow (were the banks and boundaries secure) but, by reason of the river being

the national boundary between the United States and Mexico for over 1,200 miles, cause fatal embarrassments to the citizens and officials of both Republics in fixing boundaries and titles to lands, in preventing smuggling, collecting customs, and in the legal punishment of all crimes and misdemeanors committed near the supposed boundary line, it being easy at almost any point in its great length to produce evidence sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors as to which side of the line the arrest was made or the act committed.

At the last session of Congress the House passed a joint resolution (No. 112) requesting the President to appoint a commission, in conjunction with a similar one from the Republic of Mexico, to consider the matter above referred to. While surveying these lands in 1858 and prospecting for a crossing of the Rio Grande for the Memphis, El Paso & Pacific Railroad, which was then projectedand, in fact, in course of construction-I examined the pass about 3 miles above the present city of El Paso, and discovered that it had solid rock bed and walls, the latter but about 400 feet apart, and that the valley above which came close down to the spur of the Rocky Mountains which crossed the river and formed the pass was from 4 to 8 miles wide, with a fall of about 4 feet to the mile, so that it would be an easy matter to build a dam in this pass and create an immense lake.

The water coming through this pass for ages has deposited at its lower end a great mass of rocks, over which is formed rapids with about 12 feet fall, and the aborigines of prehistoric ages made use of this to carry the water on to the lands below, no one knows how long ago, but it is known that the Mexicans have used it for 200 years under most disadvantageous and unsatisfactory circumstances.

I have witnessed each succeeding year hundreds of Mexicans piling loose stones on the top of this drift of rocks to raise the level to that carried away by the floods of the preceding year; and it has been estimated by a Federal engineer sent from the City of Mexico that, had the labor thus expended been reduced to silver, the dam could have been built of the solid metal. The difficulty has been and always will be that there is neither bedrock nor solid earth in the bottom or banks, each being composed of quicksand.

In other places in the valley temporary willow dams 1 or 2 feet high are made at convenient places, and the water carried several miles below on to the lands that are above the usual overflow; but these dams are carried away annually and have to be rebuilt, and frequently the river bed moves miles away from the mouth of theditch or acequia, rendering it useless; but even if these difficulties in carrying the water from the bed of the river to the lands are overcome in the usual manner, it is evident that by reason of a great