Santa Fe, in a report written on February ?8th, after referring to the
"critical condition" of affairs, went on to say that "a force of Colorado
volunteers is already on the way to assist us, and they may possibly arrive
in time to save us from immediate danger".
This organization of volunteers was Colorado's First Regiment. Xews
of the advance of the greater portion of Sibley's troops from Fort Bliss to
Mesilla had been received at Denver City before the middle of January,
and immediately an effort was made to have General David Hunter, in
command, at Fort Leavenworth, of the military division of which Colorado
was a part, order the regiment to go to the aid of Colonel Canby. But Feb-
ruary was half gone ere General Hunter called upon the Territory for
further assistance in opposing Confederate operations in Xew Mexico.
Hunter's instructions, dated February 10th, and received at Denver by
Acting Governor Weld on the 14th. were as follows:
"Send all available forces you can jiossibly .spare to reinforce Coloney Canby,
commanding Department of New Jlexico, and to keep open his communication
through Fort Wise. Act promptly and with all the discretion of your latest infor-
mation as to what may be necessary and where the troops of Colorailo can do most
service. ' '
Seven companies of the First Regiment had been at Camp Weld since
tlieir organization early in the previous autumn, and the three that had
been sent to Fort Wise in November still were there. As all had chafed
and fretted, to the verge of mutiny, under the monotonous and vexatious
routine of camp dutj-, they hailed General Hunter's instructions with de-
light and enthusiasm. The seven companies marched from Denver on
Februai-y 22d, the day offer Canby "s defeat at Valverde: and the three at
Fort Wise set out from tliat post on March 3d. They were ordered to move
with all possible despatch, unite in the southern part of the Territory, and
thence to proceed to Fort Union. The two columns came together near
Trinidad, with all the men in a state of feverish anxiety to press forward,
as they already had heard tidings of Canby's disaster. When they were
descending the southern slope of the Raton Rass, they were met by a courier
HISTOEY OF COLOKADO 39;?
from Fort Union with the news of General Siblej''s victorious advance from
Fort Craig up the Eio Grande, and with an appeal from the commandant
of Fort Union for the regiment to hasten to that post. By forced marches,
one of which practically was continuous for a distance of sixt3'-seven miles,
the entire command reached the fort in the evening of March 10th.
By virtue of the seniority of his commission, Colonel Slough, first
officer of the Colorado regiment, now took command of Fort Union, and
completely equipped and supplied his men from the post's stores. In in-
structions dated March 16th, and brought by a courier who managed to
escape Confederate attention. Colonel Canby, who seems to have been in
ignorance of the movements of the Colorado regiment, ordered the com-
mandant of Fort Union to hold that post at all hazards, but directed that
Fort Garland be al)andoned and destroyed should Sibley menace it by an
advance from Santa Fe on up the Rio Grande Valley.
On March 22d, Colonel Slough, with his regiment. Captain Ford's
Colorado company, one incomplete company of the Fourth 'Eegiment of
New ]\Iexico Volunteers, a weak battalion of Federal infantry, three small
detachments of Federal cavalry, and two light batteries of four guns each —
in all, 1,342 men, of whom three-fourths were Colorado volunteers — moved
from Fort Union upon an advance toward Santa Fe. In the afternoon of
the 24th the troops went into camp at Bernal Springs, on the Santa Fe
Trail, and about forty-five miles southwesterly from Fort Union. In op-
position to the judgment and advice of the officer whom he had superseded,
Slough had determined not to wait for the Confederates to come to him, but
to go forth to meet them and fight them wherever he found them.
Ere this time, the Confederates had prepared to move forward to the
capture of Fort Union, the construction of which, several years before the
war, had been superintended by General Sibley. While most of his troops
still were at Galisteo, an advanced force of Sibley's army now was encamped
some thirt3'-five miles northwesterly from Bernal Springs, in a locality
at the western end of La Glorieta Pass, which was traversed by the Santa
Fe Trail. Colonel Canby yet was at Fort Craig, with his defeated troops,
and did not start northward in pursuit of Sibley until April 1st. As in
the case of Canby, the Confederate commander appears to have been with-
out knowledge of the Colorado regiment's presence in the Territory. He
anticipated no serious difficulty in taking Fort Union, with its great stock
of military equipment and supplies, and in securely quartering his army
within its defenses, there to await the coming of Canby. Indeed, Sibley
seems now to have regarded the latter and his troops as constituting a
quantity that was almost negligible.
After noon of March 2oth, Major Chivington, of the First Colorado,
with 268 enlisted men of his regiment (eighty-eight of whom were
mounted) and 150 Federal cavalry-men, the total of the force, including
officers, being about 440, but having no artillery, left Bernal Springs with
the intention of rescuing Santa Fe from the invaders, and which was re-
ported then to be occupied by about one hundred Confederates, with two
pieces of artillery. Of the commander of this expedition, Whitford says:
"Chivington developed extraordinary ability, although he had had no military
tniining before he abandoned the pulpit for the battlefield. In action he became the
incarnation of war. The bravest of the brave, a giant in stature, and a whirlwind
in strife, he had. also, the rather unusual qualities that go to make soldiers personally
394 HISTORY OF COLOEADO
love such a leader and eager to follow him into the jaws of death. The admiration
and devotion of his men became unbounded. He was their ideal of a dashing, feiir-
less, fighting commander. ' '
When encamped for the night of the 25th, at Martin Kozlowski's
ranch-house, on the Santa Fe Trail, and about half-way between Bernal
Springs and the eastern entrance to La Glorieta Pass, Chivington was told
that some Confederate scouts had been there early in the evening, and had
gone in the direction of the pass. Forthwith, he sent a detachment of
twenty-fme of his Colorado volunteers in search of them, and which cap-
tured the party before daybreak, without having fired a shot, in a ranch-
house that stood in the entrance to the pass, and which was owned by a
Frenchman named Valle, but who was popularly known as "Pigeon". Chiv-
ington learned from these prisoners that the advance division of Sibley's
army, which they said numbered 800 men, was at the eastern end of the
pass, and was to move toward Fort Union on the morrow.
Chivington resolved to go forward and attack the enemy with the
force now under his command. By eight o'clock in the ne.xt morning his
troops were in motion and presently entered La Glorieta Pass, the summit
of which they crossed about two o'clock in the afternoon. An hour later,
in the section of the pass that is known as Apache Caiion, they collided at
a bend in the trail with Sibley's advanced division, commanded by Major
Pyron, confidently marching up the caiion on the way to Fort Union, but
not in strength so great as the captured scouts had stated, although out-
numbering Chivington's men and having two howitzers. The Confederates
still were in the dark as to the Colorado regiment's presence in the Terri-
tory, but had heard that a force from Fort Union, which they understood
to consist of about 200 Eegulars and 200 Mexican volunteers, was ahead of
them somewhere to oppose their advance.
Here, in this canon, was fought the first of the two engagements that
constituted the Battle of La Glorieta Pass, the "Gettysburg of the South-
west" ; and here, before night came on, the Texans had been defeated and
routed for the first time in their campaign. Fire was opened immediately
by both sides, but as the Confederates soon found their situation "untena-
ble", they retreated about a mile farther down the caiion and there made a
stand in a more favorable position. Chivington handled his men with great
skill in his pursuit and defeat of the enemy. When the latter halted, the
unmounted Colorado volunteers were ordered to take to the mountainsides
of the caiion, from which presently they were pouring "a most galling and
destructive fire'' upon the Confederates. Finally the mounted Colorado vol-
unteers with a detachment of the Federal cavalrymen charged in a body
upon the broken ranks of the Texans, who were scattered by the furious
onslaught and now retreated in disorder down the caiion, toward the camp-
ing-place from which they had set out in the morning, leaving their dead
and their severely wounded upon the field, and about eighty of their number
prisoners in Chivington's hands. Late in the evening. Major Pyron sent
back, under a flag of truce, a request that he be permitted to bury his dead
and remove his wounded. Chivington consented to an armistice that
should cease at eight o'clock in tlie morning of the second day thereafter —
March 28th.
According to a report written by Chivington within two or three hours
after the engagement, the Union loss in the Apache Canon was five killed
HISTOEY OF COLORADO ;j:i.5
and fourteen wounded. But it appears that there were several casualties,
including one that was fatal, of .which he had not heard at that time. Four
of the killed and seven of the wounded were Colorado volunteers. Captain
Samuel H. Cook being among the wounded. After the fight was over,
Lieutenant William F. Marshall, of Cook's company, was accidentally killed
by the discharge of a prisoner's musket, fl'hich he was breaking by striking
it upon a rock. The total of the Confederate loss is unlcnowu, but it is
probable that it was three times as great as that of the Union troops, both
in killed and wounded. Among the Confederate killed were seven officers.
Having learned that a Confederate force much larger than Pyron's was
encamped at Galisteo, and anticipating that it would advance immediately
after the expiration of the truce, C!hivington, after gathering his dead and
mand back to Pigeon's Eanch, where he encamped and buried his dead. In
his wounded and several of the Confederate wounded, marched his com-
Pyron despatched a courier to Lieutenant-Colonel William B. Scurry, the
the afternoon of the 27th he moved to Kozlowski's Ranch, to which place
Colonel Slough with the remainder of the Union force in the meantime
had advanced.
At the beginning of the engagement in the Apache Canon, Major
commander of the Confederate troops encamped at Galisteo (General Sibley
then being at Albuquerque), with an urgent request for reenforcements.
£n his report of the second engagement in La Glorieta Pass, fought on the
28th, Colonel Scurry said that "the critical condition of Major Pyron and
his gallant comrades was made known to the command, and in ten minutes
the column was formed and the order to march given". By daylight in
the next morning. Scurry's entire command, with his wagon-train carrying
his supplies, baggage, and camp-equipment, had joined Pyron, at the west-
ern entrance to La Glorieta Pass, which was about fourteen miles from
Galisteo. Jn the morning of the 28th, the united Confederate forces, which
after having detached nearly 300 men to guard the camp and wagon-train,
numbered about 1,100, marched up the pass, in cheerful confidence in their
ability to sweep before them any opposition they might encounter, and to go
on and take possession of Fort Union. By this time. Scurry's scouts had
reported to him the presence of about 1,500 Federal troops at Kozlowski's
Ranch, but he supposed them to be Regulars and Xew Mexico volunteers.
Having anticipated the Confederate advance. Colonel Slough and his
officers had formed a daring plan of action. In accordance therewith. Major
Chivington, with aliout one-third of the Union force, was, by a flank move-
ment, which had to be made by a rough and circuitous route, to ascend the
mountain-ridge on the southward side of La Glorieta Pass to a point from
which he could descend into the pass and strike the Confederates in their
rear: while Colonel Slough with the larger part of his little army should
move directly forward and engage them wherever he met them. A small re-
enforcement of Regulars, including two light batteries of aitillery, had been
ordered from Fort Union, and which arrived late in the evening of the 37th.
Leaving a detachment of about 250 men to guard the wagon-train and
camp-property, the two divisions set out from the encampment at Kozlow-
ski's. Eanch in the morning of the 28th. Colonel Slough's marched to the
eastern end of La Glorieta Pass, and halted at Pigeon's Ranch for a re-
plenishment of water. About ten o'clock, Slough's pickets discovered the
Confederate vanguard at a short distance farther up the pass. The Union
39C HISTORY OF COLORADO
force advanced instantly, but liad not gone more than lialf a mile ere the
enemy ojiened a furious fire of musketry and artillery.
I shall not attempt to describe in detail the bloody conflict that now
followed. The battle began in a section of the pass that was a gulch-
like widening of the narrow valley, and continued upon the ground be-
tween the gulch and Pigeon's Ranch until nearly five o'clock in the after-
noon, each side fighting desperately. In his reports of the engagement,
Colonel Scurry said "the conflict Was terrible"; that the Fnion troops were
"the flower of the U. S. Army"; and that all of his field officers "were
either killed or touched". The Confederates greatly outnumbered the
Union force, but Slough's skillful disposition and management of his
troops caused Scurry to believe that he was confronted by the former's
entire command, as it was not until late in the afternoon that the Con-
federate leader heard of Chivington's movement. About the middle' of
the afternoon. Scurry was reenforced by uf)ward of a hundred men from
his camp-guard. These, excited by the booming of the artillery, had, in
disregard of orders, hurried away from the camp to take part in the
battle.
About five o'clock in the afternoon, Slough began to withdraw his
men from the field and to move them into a more open position, just
below Pigeon's Ranch, and which Scurry had expected to occupy before
he should meet his enemy. Having held the Confederates at bay for full
seven hours, Slough had given Chivington time to accomplish the purpose
of the latter's flank movement. Shortly after five o'clock, one of Colonel
Scurry's officers appeared, under a flag of truce, with a communication
from his commander asking for a suspension of hostilities until noon of
the next day, to enable the Confederates to care for their wounded and
burj^ their dead. Colonel Slough, who was yet without knowledge of the
result* of JIajor Chivington's movement, complied with the request, and
both armies rested from the sanguinary work of the day. Late in that
evening, at the instance of Colonel Scurry, the armistice was extended to
the morning of the second day.
It seems certain that ere Scurry sent his flag he had heard of the
disaster that Chivington had inflicted upon him. The flank movement
had been successful in degree that was far beyond all anticipations. Chiv-
ington's division consisted of "about 430 officers and picked men", four-
fifths of whom had been drawn from the Colorado volunteers, including
Ford's company : the rest being Regulars. Before two o'clock in the aft-
ernoon, and by most difficult clamliering, the division reached the summit
of the mountain-ridge on the .soutliward side of La Glorieta Pass at a
point from which the men looked directly down upon the Confederate en-
campment. Descending the steep declivit}', Chivington's force quickly
overpowered the reduced guard and was in possession of the camp and all
it contained. A part of the gaiard escaped by flight, and doubtless some
of these lucky ones carried tidings of the camp's capture to Colonel Scurry.
Seventeen Confederates, including two officers, were made prisoners : and
five Union soldiers, who had previously fallen into Confederate hands,
were released.
The work of destruction now began. All the wagons, nearly a hun-
di'ed in number, with their loads of ammunition, provisions and other
supplies, together with much baggaga, and all the camp equipment, were
HISTOEY OF COLORADO 397
burned ; everything in the form of a hand-weapon was made useless, and
the one piece of artillery that had been left with the guard was ruined.
A number of saddle-horses belonging to Scurry's officers, and all the draft-
animals, of which there were between 500 and 600, were killed. In short,
the encampment was completely wrecked and all the property the Con-
federates had left there was reduced to a condition in which it could
be of no further utility.
Having effected his purixise, Cliivington started upon his return
march about dusk, taking a route that was shorter tlian that liy which
he had come; and at ten o'clock in tliat night rejoined Slough"s command,
at which time he and his men first heard of the results of the battle at
the eastern end of La Glorieta Pass. His only casualty in the day's
operations was the wounding of one man — a Colorado volunteer.
The effects of the day's events abruptly terminated aggressive action
by the Confederates. The ambitious purposes that had animated them
thus far in their movements had lieen shattered beyond all possibility of
repair, and the great political project that had prompted and inspired
their campaign had been tumbled into the utmost depths of hopelessness.
The vast domain of the Southwest was not to become Confederate terri-
tory, nor should a '"Western Confederacy" arise upon the Pacific slope.
The only course that was left to the brave but demoralized Texans was
that of attempting to escape from Xew Mexico as best they might.
iSTo satisfactory data as to the total of the ITnion losses in -the battle
of March 28th are available. In a report dated March 30th, Colonel
Slough said that twenty-eight men of his command had been killed and
/orty wounded. But the official records of Colorado's First Regiment,
which formed the backbone and saving strength of the I'nion force, but
of which about one-third had been with Chivington on the day of the
battle, show that its dead, including a few who died of their wounds shortly
afterward, numbered forty-three; and that fifty-eight others were wounded.
Among the dead were Lieutenant Clark Chambers, of Company C, and
Lieutenant John Baker, of Company I. Company D had sixteen killed
and twenty wounded; and Company I fifteen killed and fifteen wounded.
The aggregate of the losses borne by these two companies was nearly two-
fifths of the strength with which they had entered the battlefield. The
Union dead were buried at Pigeon's Ranch, near the graves of their com-
rades who had been killed in the first day's fight. Xothing definite can
be told as to the Confederate losses. In his report on March 30th, Colonel
Slough said that the killed "amount to at least 100, and the wounded at
least 150". The Governor of Xew Mexico reported on April 6th that the
Confederate loss "does not fall short of 400 men in killed, wounded and
missing", and that "near 200" of the wounded still "were at the battle-
field."
When Chivington returned late in the evening of March 28th and re-
ported his destruction of Scurry's materials of war, the first thought of the
officers of the Colorado volunteers was that of taking full advantage of the
Fnion successes by moving upon the dismayed Confederates as soon as the
armistice expired, and either to force them to surrender or to disperse them
as an organization. But on the next day. Colonel Slough received from
Colonel Canby a peremptory order, written immediately after the latter
heard of Slough's arrival at Fort L'^nion, and therefore without knowledge
3f»8 HISTORY OF COLOEADO
of his victories, directing liim to remain at that post and to hold it "'at all
hazards, and leave nothing to chance". It was said afterward that Canby
feared that a Confederate force might advance upon a more easterly route
than that which Sibley had followed and attempt to take Fort Union. But
his conduct throughout the campaign was distinguished only by incompe-
tency. It is beyond doubt that had either Slough or Chivington held su-
preme military authority in Xew Mexico, General Sibley's broken army
would have been captured or scattered within a week thereafter.
Canby's order produced great indignation among Slough's troops, but
as it left nothing whatever to their commander's discretion he had to obey
it. He started upon the retreating march in the afternoon of the 30th,
and when he and his men arrived at the fort they found that it was not
in the least danger. Exasperated by the arbitrary order and the conse-
quences that it obviously would entail, Slough now resigned his commission
and returned to Denver. In here taking leave of him, I may mention that
he went to Washington later in that year, and in the spring of 1863 was
given a Brigadier-General's commission by President Lincoln and placed
in command of the Military District of Alexandria, Virginia. He survived
the war, and shortly after its close was appointed Chief Justice of New
Mexico. By what practically was the unanimous preference of the men
of the First Colorado, Major Chivington was appointed to succeed Slough
in command of the regiment; and Captain Wynkoop, of Company A, was
advanced to Chivington's former position.
Colonel Scurry's defeated and impoverished troops made their way to
Santa Fe, hungry and dispirited. Upon their arrival there, preparations
immediately were begun for the retreat of the entire Confederate force
down the Rio Grande Valley to Fort Bliss, Texas. Sibley evacuated Santa
Fe on April 5th and 6th, but most of his helpless sick and wounded were
left in the town and some of his artillery was abandoned and buried there.
In the meantime. Colonel Canby, with a force of 1,200 men, of which a
large number were Regulars, and that also included Captain Dodd's com-
pany of Colorado volunteers, having left Fort Craig on April 1st, was ad-
vancing up the valley, and had despatched an order to Fort Union for the
Colorado regiment to come to his assistance. On April 8th, Canby en-
countered the retreating Confederates at old Albuquerque, and after some
skirmishing together with an intermittent exchange of artillery-shots dur-
ing that day and the next, withdrew to Tijeras, about fifteen miles to the
northeast, leaving the Confederates in possession of Albuquerque. On the
12th, the larger part of Sibley's troops crossed the Rio Grande and pro-
ceeded on to Los Lunas, twenty miles below, there to await the coming of
the remainder of the force. In the morning of the next day, Sibley, in
utter indifference to Canby's proximity, evacuated Albuquerque, and with
the rear of his decimated army marched down the valley, but on the east-
ward side of the river, and encamped at Peralta, which was nearly op-
posite Los Lunas. He had abandoned and buried more of his artillery at
Albuquerque, was short of provisions, and hampered by the care of sick
and wounded men. But he still kept the six field pieces he had captured
from Canby at Valverde, although he now had no ammunition for them.
The Colorado regiment, which had moved from Fort Union promptly,
joined Canby at Tijeras in the evening of April 13th. On the morrow,
he set out in "pursuit" of the Confederates, and after a march of some
HISTORY OF COLORADO 399
thirty-five miles down the eastward side of the Rio Grande halted in the
evening almost within hearing-distance of Sibley's encampment at Peralta.
Colonel Chivington urged that an attack lie made at once, but Colonel
Canbv would not consent, saying that a night-assault usually was disas-
trous to the assailants, and intimating his preference that the Texans
should succeed in getting out of the country rather than to have tliem
captured and become consumers of his ju-ovisions, which he thought were
not sufficient to his own requirements. On the next day (the 15th), Canby
advanced upon the Confederates, a movement that brought on a desultory
engagement that lasted until the dusk of the evening, and which in the
main consisted of skirmishing and some artillery fire, but was without im-