Fort Thorn, New Mexico


Fort Thorn or Fort Thorne, originally Cantonment Garland, was a settlement and military outpost located on the west bank of the Rio Grande, northwest of present-day Hatch, and west of Salem in Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States. It was named for 1st Lt. Herman Thorn of the 2nd U.S. Infantry drowned in the Colorado River in 1849. He had previously been an aide to General John Garland, the new commander of the Ninth Military District, that encompassed New Mexico Territory in 1853.

Location

In a September, 1856, Sanitary Report - Fort Thorn, Assistant Surgeon T. Charlton Henry described the location of Fort Thorn:
The Geographic Names Information System has no coordinates listed for the location of Fort Thorne, nor for its elevation. However, there is one given in the September 1858 Sanitary Report - Fort Thorn, by Assistant Surgeon P. A. Quinan, that gave the location of the fort and described it:
Unfortunately the coordinates Quinan gave for Fort Thorn there in his Sanitary Report are incorrect, the location given, being on a mountain ridge, not located along the west bank of the Rio Grande River as noted above, but farther west, nor is the elevation correct, land along the river being more near the 4,100 foot level.
However Quinan went on to describe the location of the fort and its surroundings:
Subsequently, during the American Civil War, Lt. Col. Edward E. Eyer, 1st Regiment California Volunteer Cavalry, gave precise mileage directions to the fort when he reported from there on July 6, 1862 on his march there on July 4–5, 1862 from Cooke's Spring on Cooke's Wagon Road:
In a subsequent report on August 30, he gave the mileage from Fort Thorn, down river past Santa Barbara to the southwest of the fort to the San Diego Crossing where he intended to cross the west bank of the river as 18 miles.
Fort Thorn was built midway between the village of Santa Barbara and the head of the wagon road that led westward toward the Santa Rita Copper Mines. This wagon road would have been Cooke's Wagon Road 3 miles up river from the fort that led westward to where the wagon road to the copper mines crossed it. This also means the location of Santa Barbara, was 3 miles down river below the fort.
After the Fort was abandoned, the location appeared on the 1860 and 1861 Public Surveys In New Mexico Territory sketch maps of the U.S. General Land Office. The 1860 map seems to show the military reservation around it more accurately.

History

On November 11–12, 1846, 3 miles above what was later the site of Fort Thorn was the camp of Major Philip St. George Cooke and the Mormon Battalion who were tasked by Brig. Gen. Kerney with explore a route and building a wagon road from the Rio Grande valley to recently captured Alta California. This camp was the place where the road left the river to the southwest. This road would come to be called the Cooke's Wagon Road. According to Cooke, his camp lay across the river from the New Mexican settlement of San Diego, and was 258 miles southwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Cooke wrote that a road should be constructed running along the west bank of the river to the San Diego Crossing and from that crossing lead to the southern end of where the El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro began crossing the Jornada del Muerto, 5 miles to the east over a pass beyond it just below the San Diego Mountain. From the time of the 1849 California Gold Rush, a road through this gap in the mountains led from the Jornada road to the San Diego Crossing to the west bank of the river then followed it up river and west to Cooke's Wagon Road. Santa Barbara a New Mexican village was first established along that road west of the vicinity of modern Hatch in 1851.

U. S. Army Fort

Originally called Cantonment Garland, Fort Thorn was established December 24, 1853 by Captain Israel B. Richardson, under orders of General John Garland, with a garrison of 3rd U.S. Infantry from abandoned Fort Webster, on the right bank of the Rio Grande midway between Santa Barbara and the point where Cookes Wagon Road turned west from the Rio Grande. After Fort Craig was built, supplies came to the fort down from Santa Fe by the Fort Craig - Fort Thorn wagon road that closely followed Cooke's route down the west bank of the Rio Grande below Fort Craig. The post was built of adobe bricks, and included an enclosing wall, only the hospital being located outside it. The fort also had a 3.5 mile long acequia that brought water from the Rio Grande to irrigate the post's farms and powered a sawmill. It served to protect settlers and travelers against attacks by the Apaches and outlaws, before being closed in 1859. It had its own post office from 1855 to 1859. Besides the 3rd Infantry Regiment the main units operating from Fort Thorn were companies of the 1st United States Dragoons and later the Regiment of Mounted Rifles.
Fort Thorn was located near an extensive marsh, and malaria among the garrison became a serious problem there. Following many complaints and reports about the conditions and the debility of the garrison caused by malaria, the last of which was Quinan's, the post was closed in 1859.

Indian Agency (1859-1860)

An agency for the Apache Indians operated at the fort from 1854 and nearby even after the fort was closed into the early 1860s. Its agent was Dr.Michael Steck, trusted by Apache leaders and of whom Army officers in the New Mexico command wrote in a letter to president Peirce recommending his appointment, as having "knowledge of the country, and of the Indians, their language and habits." Also writing: "his appointment would give entire satisfaction to the military authorities." During the 1860 census taken on August 3rd and 5th, 1860, 32 persons were counted at the Fort Thorn township.
However the agency and the settlement of Santa Barbara nearby were abandoned in October 1860, following a Navajo raid on the agency reported in the October 25, 1860, Mesilla Times:

Use in the American Civil War (1861-1862)

During the American Civil War a site 15 miles upriver from Fort Thorn was the scene of the Skirmish near Fort Thorn. The engagement was between three companies of the Regiment of Mounted Rifles and Bethel Coopwood's cavalrymen of the Confederate Army on September 26, 1861. Subsequently, General Henry Hopkins Sibley, used the fort as an assembly point for his Sibley Expedition before invading northern New Mexico. In July and August 1862, detachments of the California Column used the fort, after Lt. Col. Edward E. Eyer, 1st Regiment California Volunteer Cavalry occupied it July 5th, before crossing over the flooded Rio Grande two weeks later at San Diego Crossing to occupy Mesilla, New Mexico Territory and Franklin, Texas.

Commanders

Most of the site of the fort was washed away in 1889, by a flooding of the Rio Grande that changed the course of the river. The remains of a post cemetery remain, an object of looting in recent years.

In film

Fort Thorn was depicted in the 1950 film Two Flags West.