b'THE GREAT SIEGE AT FORT YUMABy Bill Roberts Reprinted from The TravelerI T WAS SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1877, at Fort Yuma on the California side of the Colorado River. The old fort had seen better days. It had been established as a remote outpost on the river in 1849 as Camp Calhoun and then changed to Camp Yuma in 1852. Supplies in those years had come across the desert by wagon from the Presidio at San Diego. In 1852, supplies were sent by ship from San Francisco to the mouth of the Colorado where they were transferred onto steamboats that brought them upriver to the fort.NEVER ATTACKED take over and operate the railroads with federal troops. Hecommand. The major also retired for the night.In all of its 28 years of existence before that Septemberresisted and avoided a confrontation between the strikers Saturday in 1877, 28 years when it stood guard over Yumaand federal forces. At about 2 a.m., Dunn was shocked out of his sleep by a Crossing and the junction of the Gila and Colorado rivers,loud ring. It was the sound of a rail being dropped on the Fort Yuma had never been under siege. It was SeptemberThese goings on in Washington and the east apparentlybridge. Dunn mustered his garrison. The sergeant was 29th. Not by Mohave, Yuma, or Cocopah Indians who livedprompted the secretary of war in his decision to stop theordered to post himself on the bridge and let no man pass. in the area. Not by Mexican bandits who often followed theSouthern Pacific tracks at the borders of the Fort YumaThe enemy was coming in from the east and had to be river north into California and Arizona Territory. Not byreservation despite permission from Congress for thestopped. The sergeant fixed his bayonet and stood resolute, miners, ruffians, and rowdies who lived on the Arizona siderailroad to cross the reservation to reach the river. Theready to stop any onslaught of enemy forces. The railroad of the river in the frontier town of Yuma. secretary might as well have ordered Major Dunn tosuperintendent, a man named Green, decided to call up his invade the Apache lands of Arizona Territory. Dunn hadmechanized forces.No, Fort Yuma was this day under siege by a gang of trackno garrison. Fort Yuma as a military outpost was winding layers rapidly approaching the forts lands after runningdown in 1877. It would close entirely six years later. SOUND THE RETREATthe Southern Pacific tracks across California to the river.Suddenly the sergeant saw a carload of rails bearing down Major Dunn of the 12th infantry was in command of theSUPPLY CENTER FOR ARIZONA on him. He decided to hell with his orders and beat a hasty fort, and he knew he was in trouble. Not only was theThe fort had done its job well. It had supplied the entireretreat rather than be run over. Major Dunn rushed up to enemy approaching from the west, but it had also alreadymilitary outpost in Arizona Territory in the 1860s andGreen and told the railroad man he could consider himself established itself on the east, building a railroad bridgeearly 1870s. Shipments from Fort Yuma, up the Coloradounder arrest and a prisoner of the military. That said, Dunn, across the river and preparing the roadbed down Madisonby steamboat, and then by wagon to the various militarywith only his sergeant to carry out the arrest of Green, St. of the ramshackle town of Yuma. outposts in Arizona were proving too expensive. Cheaperlooked around at the burly track-laying crew and decided to transportation for supplies could be obtained by railretire to the fort.ORDERS ARE ORDERS shipments to railheads east of Arizona and then by wagon Dunn held in his hands orders directly from Presidentto the various Arizona military posts. The old fort hadGreen ordered his men to continue laying the track. By Rutherford Hayes secretary of war. Those orders said thebeen the staging area for the California Volunteers duringsunrise, the construction train was on the Arizona side Southern Pacific had failed to get the War Departmentsthe Civil War when they rode to Tucson to drive outof the Colorado River. By 7 a.m. the track was laid down permission to cross the Fort Yuma military reservationConfederate forces. Madison Ave. in downtown Yuma. The locomotive pulling and Dunn was to stop the railroad track laying crew at thethe construction train stopped, belched out a shrill blast border of the reservation. Dunn knew Congress had passedSKELETON FORCE ON HAND on its whistle, and awoke anyone in town who was not yet an act and Hayes had signed it that gave the SouthernBut that fall of 1877, you could say Fort Yuma had alreadyawakened by the noise of track lying.Pacific permission and the right of way to push its railroadwound down. The garrison under Dunns command across California and into Arizona Territory. consisted of one sergeant and one enlisted man who wasThe Southern Pacific had scheduled the first regular train in fact a prisoner. The prisoner, locked in the guard house,from San Francisco to Yuma that Sunday morning and VICTIM OF POLITICS could not be mustered out. Dunn was merely a caretaker ofGreens orders were to have the track ready for its passage. Hayes was noted for his opposition to much of thea post that had no troops. Nonetheless, orders are orders. He did just that. Engine No. 22, draped in flags and bunting, legislation Congress passed. He was, in 1877, embroiled in apulled up to the crossing at First and Madison in downtown battle with Congress and the railroads involving the massiveMOVES TO DEFEND POSITION Yuma on time to unload passengers, freight, and mail.railroad strike of that year. Congress was pressuring him toMajor Dunn posted a sentry at the point where the track layers had stopped work just before theFORT YUMAS MISSION OVERborder to the military reservation. TheMajor Dunn, housed in his quarters, knew that the arrival sentry, the sergeant, was to stand guardof this train was the end of Fort Yuma. No longer was there until 11 p.m. that night. Dunn suspecteda need to sail supplies from San Francisco to the mouth of an attack under the cover of darkness.the Colorado and bring them upriver by steamer. The need Why else had the railroad superintendentfor Fort Yuma was over. It was entering its death throes for stopped work in midday when the track hadcertain with the arrival of the railroad.reached the border of Fort Yumas land?A few days later, the track crew, having rested following The lone guard stood his ground untilits victory, started pushing east across land claimed by the 11 that night and then retired. NothingTexas Pacific Railroad toward Tucson. The battle to build had happened. Perhaps, thought Dunn,the railroad had moved from direct confrontation with the railroad did not want a confrontationthe military garrison at Fort Yuma to the courts, where the with military authority. Perhaps hisSouthern Pacific was challenging the claims to the right of orders would not be that difficult to carryway made by Texas Pacific across Arizona Territory. We all Yuma Rail Crossing out, after all, even with no force at hisknow the Southern Pacific won that one.54 August 2023'