Painted Caves

Last updated April 30, 2019

Painted Caves was a cave containing a spring in Val Verde County, Texas, 20 kilometers southeast of Comstock, Texas.^[1] The cave accompanied a camp site along the San Antonio-El Paso Road on Painted Cave Spring Creek (now known as California Creek) and was named for the indigenous cave paintings found inside. It was located 2.54 miles northwest of the First Crossing of Devils River and 15.73 miles southeast of California Spring.^[2] The cave is now submerged under Lake Amistad.

A cave or cavern is a natural void in the ground, specifically a space large enough for a human to enter. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. The word cave can also refer to much smaller openings such as sea caves, rock shelters, and grottos, though strictly speaking a cave is exogene, meaning it is deeper than its opening is wide, and a rock shelter is endogene.

A spring is a point at which water flows from an aquifer to the Earth's surface. It is a component of the hydrosphere.

Val Verde County is a county located on the southern Edwards Plateau in the U.S. state of Texas. The 2014 population is 51,047. Its county seat is Del Rio. In 1936, Val Verde County received Recorded Texas Historic Landmark number 5625 to commemorate its founding.

History

The cave just beyond the First Crossing of Devils River was described by Robert A. Eccleston in his diary of his journey over the San Antonio-El Paso Road with the military expedition that pioneered the route in 1849:

Robert A. Eccleston (1830-1911), pioneer, forty-niner, diarist who recorded the discovery of the Tucson Cutoff and Yosemite Valley.

"Wednesday, July 11. ... After passing through a rocky country for about 3 miles, we came to water in a bed of rock. ... We here visited some caves in the rocks of considerable extent, in which were found Indian drawings, &c., such as buffaloes, men. They were colored."^[3]

These paintings were made by a people called the West Texas Cave Dwellers who lived in West Texas for more than 1000 years before the Lipan Apache arrived in the area.^[3]^[4]

West Texas is a loosely defined part of the U.S. state of Texas, generally encompassing the arid and semiarid lands west of a line drawn between the cities of Wichita Falls, Abilene, and Del Rio.

Lipan Apache are Southern Athabaskan (Apachean) Native Americans whose traditional territory included present-day Texas, New Mexico, Colorado and the northern Mexican states of Chihuahua, Nuevo León, Coahuila, and Tamaulipas prior to the 17th century.

Thirty years later Burr G. Duval described the site in his "Journal of a Prospecting Trip to West Texas in 1879":

Friday, Jan. 9. Pulled out of Devils River, 7 a.m. doubled teams up the hill. Moved only about 8 miles and camped near a water hole on the headwaters of Painted Cave Spring Creek. Painted Cave, two miles out of Devils River, is a noted camp and cave grotto, rather, which was formerly embellished with numerous Indian picture writings, no longer to be seen, but in their place appear the mysterious characters, "S. T. 1860", "X Plantation Bitters", "Tutt's Pills", "Sozodont," etc. showing that the Star of Empire still takes its way westward and that the peripatetic advertising agent is still aboard on "Devils River." ^[5]

The site was submerged by the construction of Lake Amistad in 1969.

Related Research Articles

Tunas Creek formerly known as Arroyo Escondido, is a Stream tributary to the Pecos River, in Pecos County, Texas. Its source is at 30°52′53″N102°34′59″W on the southwestern side of Big Mesa.

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. The road carried mail, freight and passengers by horse and wagon across the Edwards Plateau and dangerous Trans-Pecos region of West Texas.

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.

Leon Creek, is a tributary stream of the Medina River, in Bexar County, Texas.

Seco Creek, is a tributary stream of the Hondo Creek, in Frio County, Texas. Named Rio Seco in 1689 by Captain Alonso De León, governor of Coahuila, when his expedition crossed the creek.

Rancheros Creek is a tributary stream of the Sabinal River, in Medina County and Uvalde County, Texas.

California Spring, or Yellow Banks, a spring at the headwaters of Evans Creek, in Val Verde County, 4.8 miles northeast of Comstock.

Dragoon Wash, a stream tributary to the San Pedro River, in Cochise County, Arizona. It has its source just southwest of the town of Dragoon. 32°01′21″N110°02′46″W It runs southwesterly to meet the San Pedro River.

The First Crossing of Devils River was the first point at which the Devils River was crossed by the San Antonio-El Paso Road. It was located 10.22 miles west of San Felipe Springs at the mouth of San Pedro Creek on the Devils River. It was 2.54 miles southeast of Painted Caves, on California Creek, a noted camp location on the road. The crossing point and the gorge leading down to it from the east are now submerged under Lake Amistad.

Gillis Springs, formerly Willow Spring, is a historical spring, two miles, (3 km) northwest of California Spring in Val Verde County, Texas.

Pinto Creek, formerly known as Piedra Pinto Creek, a tributary to the Rio Grande in Kinney County, Texas. It has its source, at 29°30′53″N100°24′13″W.

Mud Creek, originally known as Maverick Creek, a stream in Kinney County, Texas tributary to Sycamore Creek and the Rio Grande. It has its source at 29°28′10″N100°36′24″W.

California Creek, formerly Painted Cave Spring Creek a stream in Val Verde County, Texas, formerly a tributary of Devils River it now flows into the north side of Amistad Reservoir at an elevation of 1119 feet. California Creek has its source at 29°37′29″N101°02′14″W.

Howard Springs, was a historical spring, located in the stream channel of Howard Draw at an elevation of 2031 feet, just north of the mouth of Government Canyon at its confluence with Howard Draw in what is now Crockett County, Texas.

Live Oak Creek, a stream with its source in Reagan County, Texas at 31°10′45″N101°42′01″W at an elevation of 2938 feet, that runs southward to its mouth at an elevation of 2001 feet on the Pecos River in Crockett County, Texas.

Head of Devil's River, a place on the Devils River where it has its confluence with Pecos Canyon at an elevation of 1722 feet, below Beaver Lake, nineteen and a half miles above the second crossing of Devils River. Here the San Antonio-El Paso Road left the Devils River to go northwest, 44 miles across Johnson Draw, Government Canyon and Howard Draw to Howard Springs, then 30.44 miles on to Live Oak Creek and Fort Lancaster, 3 miles further near the Pecos River.

Pecos Spring is a spring, 1.1 miles (3 km) northeast of Sheffield, in Pecos County, Texas. It lies at an elevation of 2060 feet. Pecos Spring was emitted from the Edwards and associated limestones of the Edwards-Trinity (Plateau) aquifer. On March 7, 1924, it discharged 0.7 cubic feet per second but by August 17, 1943, that had been reduced to 0.5 cubic feet per second. By 1961, its flow had ceased.

Beaver Lake was a small lake or beaver pond formerly found on the Devils River in what is now Val Verde County, Texas. It was located about 19 miles north of second crossing of Devil's River and 44 miles from Howard Springs.

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 Fredricksburg, 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.

References

↑ Gunnar M. Brune, Springs of Texas, Volume 1, Texas A&M University Press, 2002, p.455
↑ Table of distances from Texas Almanac, 1859, Book, ca. 1859; digital images, (http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth123765/ accessed November 12, 2013), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association, Denton, Texas
1 2 Robert Eccleston, Edited by George P. Hammond and Edward H. Howes, Overland to California on the Southwestern Trail, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1950, pp.63-64, note 7
↑ Federal Writers Project, Texas: A Guide to the Lone Star State, Texas State Highway Commission, 1940, North American Book Dist LLC, June 1, 1990, pp, 31, 613-614, 617
↑ The Burr G. Duval Diary, edited by Sam Woolford, The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 65, July 1961 - April, H. Bailey Carroll, editor, Journal/Magazine/Newsletter, 1962, Texas State Historical Association, 1962, p.495; from texashistory.unt.edu: accessed January 21, 2014), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association, Denton, Texas.

Coordinates: 29°14′29″N101°01′21″W / 29.24139°N 101.02250°W / 29.24139; -101.02250

Geographic coordinate system Coordinate system

A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are often chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position and two or three of the numbers represent a horizontal position; alternatively, a geographic position may be expressed in a combined three-dimensional Cartesian vector. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation. To specify a location on a plane requires a map projection.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[Springs-1] Gunnar M. Brune, Springs of Texas, Volume 1, Texas A&M University Press, 2002, p.455

[2] Table of distances from Texas Almanac, 1859, Book, ca. 1859; digital images, (http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth123765/ accessed November 12, 2013), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association, Denton, Texas

[Eccleston-3] 1 2 Robert Eccleston, Edited by George P. Hammond and Edward H. Howes, Overland to California on the Southwestern Trail, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1950, pp.63-64, note 7

[4] Federal Writers Project, Texas: A Guide to the Lone Star State, Texas State Highway Commission, 1940, North American Book Dist LLC, June 1, 1990, pp, 31, 613-614, 617

[5] The Burr G. Duval Diary, edited by Sam Woolford, The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 65, July 1961 - April, H. Bailey Carroll, editor, Journal/Magazine/Newsletter, 1962, Texas State Historical Association, 1962, p.495; from texashistory.unt.edu: accessed January 21, 2014), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association, Denton, Texas.