supposedly acting, he claimed to have descended the Colorado some three hundred miles on a raft in the spring of 1 864, and reported that the river was navigable. He made his way to San Francisco, where, acting as a selfappointed chamber of commerce for Arizona, he succeeded in arousing interest in trade with Utah. Just when his voyage was made, or whether it was made at all, is a matter questioned by many. It is known, however, that, on January 8, 1 864, at a meeting of San Francisco merchants interested in "increasing the facilities for steam navigation on the Colorado," a committee of six, with Caleb S. Hobbs as chairman, was appointed to investigate the subject of transportation on the Colorado.'^^ A week later the committee reported that it had found evidence of monopolistic practices on the part of the Johnson Company, that provisions and tools had accumulated at the mouth of the river until there were then twelve hundred tons lying exposed to the weather, some of which had been there four months, and that ten to fifty tons of ore were awaiting shipment at each of the river landings. On January 25 the Aha California carried the committee report that the barque Hidalgo J then at the mouth of the river, would be detained some ninety days with three hundred tons of freight for want of river transportation inland.
As a result of these investigations the committee recommended an independent organization; consequently a company was formed. Thomas E. Trueworthy, then engaged in steam transportation on the Sacramento, was interviewed and agreed to begin operations on the Colorado within sixty to seventy-five days. Trueworthy acted immediately, and on February 1 7 his combination barge-schooner Victoria sailed for the Colorado, where she was to act as a store ship for freight until it could be sent to the interior. '^^ The first river steamer belonging to the new company put out from San Francisco shortly after the Victoria. She was the 130-foot, 50-ton Esmeralda, which had been constructed in San Francisco in 1862 and was operating on the Sacramento.^^ By March she reached the Colorado. Trueworthy was ready for business, and on the eleventh of that month, the Alta California carried the first advertisement of vessels scheduled to sail for the "New Union Line" to the Colorado.
In August, the Philadelphia Mining Company, engaged in mining at EI Dorado Canyon, placed a second rival steamer, the Nina Tilden, on the river. She was a larger boat than the Esmeralda, with a capacity of 107 tons.^^ Under the command of Captain Paddy Gorman, she left San Francisco on the sixth of August and began operation on the Colorado before the end of the month.^^ Thus the picture of steam navigation on the river was completely altered by August 1864. Whereas in March, four months earlier, there was only one company in complete control of the river trade, there were now three advertising "immediate dispatch" to the river. '^^ Business was not sufiicient to justify the maintenance of such an increase in trading facilities, and consequently vessels often waited weeks before a sufficient cargo
