In early winter 1852, some Yuma Indians took one look at the strange craft on the Colorado River and ran away in fear. ‘The devil is coming!’ they cried. One of them might even have suggested that this devil was ‘blowing fire and smoke out of his nose and kicking water back with his feet.’ These Yumas, or Quechans, had seen various boats on the river before, but never a paddle-wheeler, with its smokestack belching smoke and sparks and its paddle wheel tossing the water into the air.

For years, the river steamboats had performed enormous service in the development of the West. In 1809 Robert Fulton, inventor of the first successful steamboat, founded the Mississippi Steamboat Company and began commercial river transportation from Pittsburgh to New Orleans. By 1814 steamboats had entered the Red River, followed by the Arkansas and the Minnesota. But the longest and by far most important river for opening the Western frontier was the Missouri, along with its tributaries. More than 3,000 miles of water connected St. Louis with the head of navigation of the Missouri at Fort Benton, in what is now Montana. Much of the trade on the Missouri in the first half of the 19th century was beaver pelts and buffalo skins headed back to civilization. Return trips found the holds filled with manufactured goods directed at upriver Army forts and frontier settlements.

The paddle-wheeler California first entered San Francisco Bay on February 28, 1849, steaming from New York around the tip of South America. Paddle-wheelers transported gold seekers and mail to California, both around Cape Horn and from the Panamanian overland route, and carried ore and gold bricks back to the East Coast. Paddle-wheelers could navigate the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers from San Francisco Bay, and passengers booked transport to Sacramento and Stockton for closer jumping-off points to the gold fields.

Further gold discoveries meant a large increase in overland treks, and Indians preying on westbound wagon trains meant Army forts needed to be established to protect travelers. The first paddle-wheeler on the Colorado River came as a direct result of the founding of Fort Yuma late in 1849. Provisions for the California fort, located on the west bank of the Colorado across from the mouth of the Gila River, were hard to get. Wagon and pack-mule trains across the mountains and deserts from San Diego to Fort Yuma were slow and costly at $500 to $800 per ton.

In an attempt to determine the feasibility of using steamboats to supply the fort, Lieutenant George H. Derby received orders from Maj. Gen. Persifor F. Smith, commander of the Division of the Pacific, to test the navigability of the Colorado. In the fall of 1850, Derby, a topographical engineer by training, sailed his 120-ton schooner Invincible from San Francisco around Baja California and up the Gulf of California (also known as the Sea of Cortez) to a point about 30 miles above the mouth of the Colorado. The water was too shallow to proceed, so from there the supplies for Fort Yuma were carried on barges for the rest of the trip, nearly 90 miles more. The garrison appreciated the goods, but even more valuable was the information Derby provided — stating that the Colorado River could be navigated. He recommended stern paddle-wheelers that drew less than 3 feet of water, so they could go over the many sandbars that impeded the progress of deeper vessels.

In 1852 a contract awarded to Captain James Turnbull established the beginning of riverboat trade. Turnbull purchased a small steam tug, broke it down and shipped it, along with his first load of supplies, on the schooner Capacity from San Francisco to the mouth of the Colorado. It took two months to reassemble the tug, but in November, Turnbull’s 65-foot side-wheeler, renamed Uncle Sam, started upriver with 32 tons of freight and generated enough steam to appear devillike and scare off some Yuma Indians. Not all. In fact, on board with the captain were three Indian passengers — one Yuma and two Cocopahs. One of the soldiers at the fort, Lieutenant Thomas W. Sweeny, described the arrival in his diary: ‘The steamer Uncle Sam, so long expected from below, arrived at the post on the 3rd [of December] with about twenty tons of commissary stores. She was fifteen days coming up the river.’

Turnbull’s river commerce flourished, and he soon improved on the time it took to make the trip, regularly completing the round trip in 12 days. But at that rate, it took more than four months to unload Capacity, anchored at the mouth of the Colorado, and transport the goods to Fort Yuma. Turnbull continued the effort until Uncle Sam sank in May 1853. At that point, he decided to give up the Colorado River trade.

For the rest of 1853, the fort again was supplied overland by mule train from San Diego until Captain George A. Johnson picked up the challenge. He dismantled a steamboat in San Francisco and transported the parts to the mouth of the Colorado. By January 1854, the 104-foot side-wheeler General Jesup was ready to start upriver, propelled by a powerful 70-horsepower engine. General Jesup carried 50 tons of goods with a mere 30-inch draw. Johnson’s steamer made the trip from the Gulf of California to Fort Yuma and back in four to five days. At $75 a ton, Johnson saw a gross of around $4,000 per trip, proving that river trade could be highly profitable.

In addition to using a more powerful boat, another thing helped the speed of the trip — the improved availability of fuel. The Cocopah Indians, longtime enemies of the Yumas, were not intimidated by the noisy paddle-wheelers. In fact, they saw the river traffic as an opportunity and worked at wood yards spaced at a day’s voyage, about 30 miles. The Indians cut and hauled wood from nearby mountains to the river’s edge. The first ‘yard’ above the mouth of the Colorado was called Port Famine, but it and the other landings proved profitable for the Americans and Cocopahs involved in their operation. In the years to come, Cocopah men would find employment as river pilots and navigators. The Cocopahs called themselves Xawil Kunyavaei (’Those who live on the river’).

General Jesup proved to be so profitable that Johnson added another ship to the fleet, Colorado, a 120-foot stern-wheeler with an 80-hp engine. By December 1855, Colorado began operations on the river for which it was named. Because of its powerful engine, Colorado was able to pull two large barges, more than doubling the payload. In another way, it clearly demonstrated the effectiveness of the stern paddle wheel. When faced with a sandbar too high to steam over, Colorado merely turned around and used the paddle wheel to chew its way across the obstacle.

With two boats on the river, Johnson began to look for ways to expand his business. He heard rumors that an old French trapper, Antoine Leroux, had rafted down the Colorado all the way from the mouth of the Virgin River (not far from present-day Las Vegas) and claimed that steamboats could reach that point, too. Johnson decided it was worth investigating. The forts in the interior of what would become Arizona and the Mormon settlements of Utah Territory needed mail and supplies — and water routes would theoretically get them their things more quickly.

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