Quotes About Fort Yuma

In early 1856 a California rancher named Duff Weaver wrote to Lorenzo to say an American woman was living with Mohave Indians and claimed that Fort Yuma's new commander, Martin Burke, had refused an offer to trade her back for a few blankets. Southern California's first newspaper, the Los Angeles Star, ran the story, reprinting Weaver's letter and fulminating about the commanding officer's refusal to ransom "two American women from worse than negro slavery.

The investigating officer, Col. George Nauman, went to Fort Yuma, verified that Burke had never entertained — much less refused — such a proposal, and the two sent runners out to local tribes promising ransoms for the white captives. Word arrived that one of the girls, probably Mary Ann, had died, and Lorenzo, with the support of his neighbors in El Monte, petitioned Governor J. Neely Johnson in Sacramento, asking for help in rescuing Olive.