Pecos County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 census, its population was 15,193. The county seat is Fort Stockton. The county was created in 1871 and organized in 1875. It is named for the Pecos River. It is one of the nine counties that comprise the Trans-Pecos region of West Texas.
Fort Stockton is a city in and the county seat of Pecos County, Texas, United States. It is located on Interstate 10, future Interstate 14, U.S. Highways 67, 285, and 385, and the Santa Fe Railroad, 329 mi (529 km) northwest of San Antonio and 240 mi (390 km) southeast of El Paso. Its population was 8,466 at the 2020 census.
The Butterfield Overland Mail in Indian Territory was part of the overall Butterfield Overland Mail service (1857–1861) created by Congress March 3, 1857. The route crossed Indian Territory from Colbert's Ferry to Fort Smith, Arkansas which was the Center for the Overland Mail's' 7th Division. Fort Smith was also the junction point of the south bound coaches with the Memphis mail and its passengers. From Fort Smith the 7th Division route crossed the Poteau River into Indian Territory into the Choctaw Nation at Skullyville and left the Chickasaw Nation at Colbert's Ferry into Texas. There were 12 stage stations in Indian Territory, located from 13 to 19 miles (31 km) apart. The total length of the route across the territory was approximately 197 miles (317 km). The Butterfield route met with the Texas Road near Geary's Station and followed it southward to the Red River.
Fort Chadbourne was a fort established by the United States Army on October 28, 1852, in what is now Coke County, Texas, to protect the western frontier and the Butterfield Overland Mail route. It was named after Lt. T.L. Chadbourne, who was killed in the Battle of Resaca de la Palma. It was defended by Companies A and K of the 8th U.S. Infantry. During the early days of the American Civil War, the fort surrendered to the Confederates on February 28, 1861, even before the Confederate shelling of Fort Sumter, South Carolina, but was reoccupied by federal troops from 1865 to 1867.
Horsehead Crossing is a ford on the Pecos River in Crane County, south of Odessa, Texas. Historically, it was a major landmark on the trail west as one of a few fordable sections of the Pecos in West Texas, and as the first reliable source of water for about 75 miles on the route from the east.
The San Antonio–El Paso Road, also known as the Lower Emigrant Road or Military Road, was an economically important trade route between the Texas cities of San Antonio and El Paso between 1849 and 1882. Mail, freight, and passengers traveled by horse and wagon along this road across the Edwards Plateau and dangerous Trans-Pecos region of West Texas.
The Butterfield Overland Mail in California was created by the United States Congress on March 3, 1857, and operated until June 30, 1861. Subsequently, other stage lines operated along the Butterfield Overland Mail in route in Alta California until the Southern Pacific Railroad arrived in Yuma, Arizona in 1877.
Southern Emigrant Trail, also known as the Gila Trail, the Kearny Trail, Southern Trail and the Butterfield Stage Trail, was a major land route for immigration into California from the eastern United States that followed the Santa Fe Trail to New Mexico during the California Gold Rush. Unlike the more northern routes, pioneer wagons could travel year round, mountain passes not being blocked by snows; however, it had the disadvantage of summer heat and lack of water in the desert regions through which it passed in New Mexico Territory and the Colorado Desert of California. Subsequently, it was a route of travel and commerce between the eastern United States and California. Many herds of cattle and sheep were driven along this route and it was followed by the San Antonio-San Diego Mail Line in 1857–1858 and then the Butterfield Overland Mail from 1858 to 1861.
The San Antonio–San Diego Mail Line, also known as the Jackass Mail, was the earliest overland stagecoach and mail operation from the Eastern United States to California in operation between 1857 and 1861. It was created, organized and financed by James E. Birch the head of the California Stage Company. Birch was awarded the first contract for overland service on the "Southern Route", designated Route 8076. This contract required a semi-monthly service in four-horse coaches, scheduled to leave San Antonio and San Diego on the ninth and the 24th of each month, with 30 days allowed for each trip.
The Butterfield Overland Mail was a transport and mail delivery system that employed stagecoaches that travelled on a specific route between St. Louis, Missouri and San Francisco, California and which passed through the New Mexico Territory. It was created by the United States Congress on March 3, 1857, and operated until March 30, 1861. The route that was operated extended from where the ferry across the Colorado River to Fort Yuma Station, California was located, through New Mexico Territory via Tucson to the Rio Grande and Mesilla, New Mexico then south to Franklin, Texas, midpoint on the route. The New Mexico Territory mail route was divided into two divisions each under a superintendent. Tucson was the headquarters of the 3rd Division of the Butterfield Overland Mail Company. Franklin Station in the town of Franklin,, was the headquarters of the 4th Division.
Pinery Station, or The Pinery, was built as a relay station on the Butterfield Overland Mail stagecoach route, located at the crest of Guadalupe Pass in what is now Guadalupe Mountains National Park in the U.S. state of Texas. The station, now in ruins, was built in 1858 and was abandoned the next year. It is located close by U.S. Routes 62/160 and is accessible for tourists.
The Stockton–Los Angeles Road, also known as the Millerton Road, Stockton–Mariposa Road, Stockton–Fort Miller Road or the Stockton–Visalia Road, was established about 1853 following the discovery of gold on the Kern River in Old Tulare County. This route between Stockton and Los Angeles followed by the Stockton–Los Angeles Road is described in "Itinerary XXI. From Fort Yuma to Benicia, California", in The Prairie Traveler: A Hand-book for Overland Expeditions by Randolph Barnes Marcy. The Itinerary was derived from the report of Lieutenant R. S. Williamson on his topographical survey party in 1853, that was in search of a railroad route through the interior of California.
Cornudas is an unincorporated community in Hudspeth County, Texas, United States. Cornudas is located near the intersection of Ranch to Market Road 2317 and the concurrent U.S. Highways 62 and 180, 42 miles (68 km) northwest of the county seat, Sierra Blanca. Cornudas was located in 1929 strategically on the most direct route between El Paso and Carlsbad, New Mexico as a natural rest and resupply station. It was directly or indirectly named for the Cornudas Mountains that can be seen behind the Cornudas Cafe.
Tejon Creek, originally in Spanish Arroyo de Tejon, is a stream in Kern County, California. Its headwaters are located on the western slopes of the Tehachapi Mountains, and it flows northwest into the southern San Joaquin Valley.
The Butterfield Overland Mail route in Baja California was created as a result of an act by the United States Congress on March 3, 1857, and operated until June 30, 1861 as part of the Second Division of the route. Subsequently other stage lines operated along the route until the Southern Pacific Railroad arrived in Yuma, Arizona.
Birchville, or Smith Ranch, now a ghost town, was located in what is now Hudspeth County, Texas, United States. Birchville was a settlement on the San Antonio-El Paso Road in what was El Paso County. Birchville lay 35 miles northwest of the First Camp on Rio Grande and 24.8 miles southeast of San Elizario, according to the table of distances for the San Antonio-San Diego Mail Line in the Texas Almanac of 1857. Later used as a station on the Butterfield Overland Mail, the distances to the station for that line were given as 241⁄2 miles from San Elizario, 33 miles from Fort Quitman.
Leaving of Pecos was originally a camping place along the west bank of the Pecos River, on the wagon road called the Lower Emigrant Road, Military Road or San Antonio-El Paso Road in Texas. It was located 38 miles north of the Lancaster Crossing of the Pecos, and 16 miles east of the first crossing of Escondido Creek. It was also located a mile north of where the wagon road had its junction with a cutoff to the north to the wagon road called the Upper Emigrant Road between Fredericksburg, Texas and Comanche Springs, now Fort Stockton, Texas, where it joined the Lower Emigrant Road. It was later a stopping place on the route of San Antonio - El Paso Mail and the San Antonio-San Diego Mail Line.
Limpia Creek, originally known as the Rio Limpia, is a stream that heads in Jeff Davis County, Texas and its mouth is in Pecos County, Texas. Limpa is the Spanish word for "clear or clean water". The creek has its head in the Davis Mountains at an elevation of 7,160 feet, at location 30°38′27″N104°09′42″W on the northeast slope of Mount Livermore. The creek flows 42 miles down Limpia Canyon past Fort Davis and Wild Rose Pass to the canyon mouth, where it turns eastward to its mouth at its confluence with Barrilla Draw, where it disappears into the ground at an elevation of 3,533 feet / 1,077 meters.
Comanche Springs was an aquifer of six artesian springs geographically located between the Edwards Plateau and the Trans-Pecos regions of West Texas. The military fortification Camp Stockton was built around the springs, eventually growing become the city of Fort Stockton.
Pope's Crossing was a ford on the Pecos River located one mile south of the New Mexico–Texas border on the modern Loving–Reeves county line. Discovered by members of an 1855 expedition tasked with drilling artesian wells east of the Pecos led by U.S. Army topographical engineer John Pope, the ford quickly became the primary crossing of the river on the "upper" military or emigrant road between San Antonio and the ford on the Rio Grande opposite the Mexican town of El Paso del Norte. Heavily used by emigrants, soldiers, traders, and freighters eager to avoid the more difficult and unpredictable crossings further south, Pope's Crossing became a well-traveled part of the network of transcontinental wagon roads that developed across Texas in the 1850s to facilitate settlement and commerce in the southwestern lands recently acquired as a result of the Mexican–American War.
