The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 26, July 1922 - April, 1923 Page: 33
324 p. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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History of West and Northwest Texas Since 1845
When Texas was admitted to the Union, the extreme western
posts were located at Fort Jessup, in Louisiana; Forts Towson,
Washita and Gibson, Indian Territory; Forts Scott and Leaven-
worth, in Kansas; Forts Atkinson and Snelling, in Minnesota,
and Fort Wilkins, on Lake Superior. In 1849 there was a chain
of United States Army forts across Texas, running from Fort
Duncan on the Rio Grande, by Fort Marvin Scott at Fredericks-
burg, Fort Croghan in Burnet County, Fort Gates in Coryell
County, Fort Graham in Hill County on the Brazos, and Fort
Worth in Tarrant County.
Several of these had just been established, but as a result of a
survey of "Western Texas" made in the fall of 1849 by Lieutenant
Whiting, between that time and 1853, the imaginary line between
Texas belonging to the white man, and Texas given over to the
Indian, was moved westward, and Forts Marvin Scott, Croghan,
Gates and Worth were abandoned, and Forts Belknap, in Young
County, and McKavett, in Menard County, Mason, in the county
of the same name, Chadbourne, now in Coke County, Phantom
Hill, in Jones County, and Stockton, in Pecos County, were estab-
lished, in addition to several other posts on the Rio Grande.
According to the United States Quartermaster General of the
army in 1851 there was not then in all of Texas, New Mexico,
California or Oregon, a steamboat line, or a railroad, or even a
turnpike road, and all transportation over nearly the whole region
west of the Mississippi River was by the slow moving wagon train,
drawn by oxen or mules. When supplies had to be gotten to the
new frontier forts, in Texas and elsewhere, the increase in the
cost of transportation was so great as to alarm the officers of the
army; and thereupon this cost problem was investigated.
Fort Leavenworth had steamboat navigation on the Missouri
River, and had been a frontier fort before the Mexican war.
Indianola was then the leading port on the Texas coast. The
army conducted a series of experiments from Indianola and from
Fort Leavenworth to El Paso and the forts of New Mexico, by
regular army wagon trains and by contract, and ascertained that
the cost was about the same either way, and found that the cost
of transporting army supplies between these points amounted to
about $22 per hundred pounds. A large part of this cost, where
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 26, July 1922 - April, 1923, periodical, 1923; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101084/m1/39/: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.