David C. Robinson (c. 1833 – 1874), was a steamboat captain on the Colorado River from 1857 to 1873.
A ships carpenter, David C. Robinson, came to the Colorado River in 1850 on the army transport schooner, Invincible commanded by captain Alfred H. Wilcox. He accompanied Lieutenant George Derby when he attempted to reach Fort Yuma with supplies by boat. He returned in 1854 serving as mate on the crew of George Alonzo Johnson's steamboat General Jesup. He commanded Ives steamboat Explorer on Ives' expedition up the Colorado River in 1857. Ives attributed much of the success of his expedition to Robinson's efforts.
Subsequently, Robinson became captain of George A. Johnson & Company steamboat Cocopah in 1859. He later ran the boatyard at Port Isabel, Sonora where he maintained the company steamboats and built the Gila, launched in January 1873, (later rebuilt in 1899 as the Cochan). later in 1873, he quit the Colorado River, moving his family to Northern California, and captained a boat on Clear Lake. He died of a lung hemorrhage on July 17, 1874, at the age of 41. [1]
Robinson's Landing was a location in Baja California, Mexico. It lay on the west bank of the Colorado River northwest of the north tip of Montague Island in the Colorado River Delta, 10 miles above the mouth of the river on the Gulf of California. Named for David C. Robinson, it was the place where cargo was unloaded in the river from seagoing craft on to flatbottomed steamboats and carried up to Fort Yuma and points further north on the river from 1852 onward. Joseph C. Ives, described it as it was in 1858, in his 1861 Report upon the Colorado river of the West The river here was subject to a severe tidal bore that formed in the estuary about Montague Island and propagated upstream and could on occasion swamp barges, boats and ships. By 1865, a better location was found, ships offloaded their cargos on the east bank of the river at Port Isabel, Sonora, northeast of Montague Island. 17 miles from Robinson's landing and 57 miles below Port Famine.
Joseph Christmas Ives was an American soldier, botanist, and an explorer of the Colorado River in 1858.
George Alonzo Johnson (1824–1903) was an American entrepreneur and politician.
Steamboats on the Colorado River operated from the river mouth at the Colorado River Delta on the Gulf of California in Mexico, up to the Virgin River on the Lower Colorado River Valley in the Southwestern United States from 1852 until 1909, when the construction of the Laguna Dam was completed. The shallow draft paddle steamers were found to be the most economical way to ship goods between the Pacific Ocean ports and settlements and mines along the lower river, putting in at landings in Sonora state, Baja California Territory, California state, Arizona Territory, New Mexico Territory, and Nevada state. They remained the primary means of transportation of freight until the advent of the more economical railroads began cutting away at their business from 1878 when the first line entered Arizona Territory.
The Yellowstone Expedition of 1873 was an expedition of the United States Army in the summer of 1873 in Dakota Territory and Montana Territory, to survey a route for the Northern Pacific Railroad along the Yellowstone River. The expedition was under the overall command of Colonel David S. Stanley, with Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer second in command.
Explorer was a small, custom-made stern-wheel steamboat built for Second lieutenant Joseph Christmas Ives and used by him to carry the U. S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers expedition to explore the Colorado River above Fort Yuma in 1858.
Cocopah, was a stern-wheel paddle-steamer, the fifth steamboat on the Colorado River, first put on the river in August 1859.
General Jesup was a side-wheel paddle-steamer, named for General Thomas Jesup then Quartermaster General of the United States Army, and was the second steamboat launched on the Colorado River, in 1854.
Cocopah II, was a stern-wheel paddle-steamer, the tenth steamboat on the Colorado River, first put on the river in 1867.
Esmerelda, was a stern-wheel paddle-steamer, built for the Sacramento River trade, in 1864 it became the first of the opposition steamboats on the Colorado River. It was also the first steamboat to tow large cargo barges on that river, in May 1864 and to reach Callville, Nevada in 1866.
Benjamin Minturn Hartshorne (1826–1900) was a California businessman who immigrated during the California Gold Rush. He was involved in Sacramento River and Colorado River steamboats as well as maritime shipping.
Mohave was the first stern-wheel steamboat of that name running on the Colorado River between 1864 and 1875.
Nina Tilden, one of the two opposition stern-wheel steamboats that ran on the Colorado River from 1864 to 1868. Purchased by George A. Johnson Company it ran on the Colorado River from 1868 until 1874.
Drift Desert is a former ranch and steamboat landing on the Colorado River, now a ghost town, in La Paz County, Arizona.
Fortification Rock, once a landmark hill on the Colorado River before it was inundated, now known as Rock Island, southernmost and tallest of the Boulder Islands in Lake Mead, Clark County, Nevada. It has an elevation of 1284 feet. Fortification Rock appears on the 1861 Geological Map No. 1; Rio Colorado of the West, explored by 1st Lieut. Joseph C. Ives, which shows Fortification Rock, Ives Camp #59 and the course of the Colorado River from its mouth on the Gulf of California to Las Vegas Wash and the location of its features and other expedition camps along the way.
Gila, a stern-wheel steamboat of the Colorado Steam Navigation Company running on the Colorado River between 1873 and 1899.
Alfred Henry Wilcox (1823-1883), sea captain, later Colorado River pioneer and steamboat and steamship entrepreneur, partner in the George A. Johnson & Company and of the Colorado Steam Navigation Company, banker and director of the California & Mexican Steam Ship Line.
Explorer's Rock was a large rock in the Colorado River that was a hazard to navigation at the mouth of the Black Canyon of the Colorado between Arizona and Nevada during the 19th century. It got its name from incident where the iron hulled steamboat Explorer struck it doing some damage, during the expedition of Lieutenant Joseph C. Ives, Corps of Topographical Engineers to explore the Colorado River of the West in 1857 and 1858.
George A. Johnson & Company was a partnership between three men who pioneered navigation on the Colorado River. Benjamin M. Hartshorne, George Alonzo Johnson and Alfred H. Wilcox. The George A. Johnson & Company was formed in the fall of 1852, and was reorganized as the Colorado Steam Navigation Company in 1869.
Port Isabel Slough was a deep slough in the Colorado River Delta near the mouth of the Colorado River during the 19th century, within the state of Sonora, Mexico.