Whitmire Pass is a gap in the

Animas Mountains The Animas Mountains are a small mountain range in Hidalgo County, within the " Boot-Heel" region of far southwestern New Mexico, in the United States. Location They extend north–south for about 30 miles (50 km) along the Continental Div ...

Hidalgo County, New Mexico Hidalgo County () is the southernmost county of the U.S. state of New Mexico. As of the 2020 census, the population was 4,178. The county seat and largest city is Lordsburg. A bill creating Hidalgo from the southern part of Grant County was p ...

. It lies at an elevation of . The pass was named after J. B. Whitmire, a rancher in the 1880s, owner of the

Whitmire Ranch Whitmire Ranch is a locale in Hidalgo County, New Mexico. The ranch was named after its owner, J. B. Whitmire, a rancher in the 1880s. Its headquarters was located nearby Whitmire Spring on the western shore near the center of Playas Lake.Robert ...

that lies to the east of the pass, on the west shore of

Playas Lake Playas Lake is a dry lake or playa in Hidalgo County, New Mexico, United States. It lies at an elevation of . It consists of a long dry lake running north northwest south southeast within the Playas Valley between the Animas Mountains on the west ...

, nearby

Whitmire Spring Whitmire Spring is a spring in Hidalgo County, New Mexico. Correctly named on the Playas Lake South U. S. topographic map, it is mistakenly called Whitmore Spring on the U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System. The spring was nam ...

.Robert Julyan, The Place Names of New Mexico, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, 1998, pp.379-380 Whitmire Creek flows from the west slope of the pass, into

Animas Creek Animas Creek is an intermittent stream in the Animas Valley within Hidalgo County, New Mexico. Is source is located at the confluence of Foster Draw and Taylor Draw, at an elevation of . Its mouth is in the Animas Valley, in at an elevation of . H ...

in the

Animas Valley The Animas Valley is a lengthy and narrow north–south valley 85 miles (137 kilometres) long, located in western Hidalgo County, New Mexico, in the Bootheel Region; the extreme south of the valley lies in Sonora- Chihuahua, in the extreme north ...

. Another, unnamed arroyo runs eastward down into the

Playas Valley The Playas Valley is a lengthy and narrow 60-mi (97-km) long, valley located in Hidalgo County, New Mexico in the New Mexico Bootheel, Bootheel Region; the extreme south of the valley lies in Chihuahua (state), Chihuahua. Playas, New Mexico is loc ...

, toward Playas Lake at Whitmire Spring.

History

Whitmire Pass was the pass used by the expedition of Lt. Col.

Philip St. George Cooke Philip St. George Cooke (June 13, 1809 – March 20, 1895) was a career United States Army cavalry officer who served as a Union General in the American Civil War. He is noted for his authorship of an Army cavalry manual, and is sometimes calle ...

and the

Mormon Battalion The Mormon Battalion was the only religious unit in United States military history in federal service, recruited solely from one religious body and having a religious title as the unit designation. The volunteers served from July 1846 to Jul ...

to cross the Animas Mountains into the Animas Valley from Whitmire Springs, on November 25, 1846. The expedition's route became known as

Cooke's Wagon Road Cooke's Wagon Road or Cooke's Road was the first wagon road between the Rio Grande and the Colorado River to San Diego, through the Mexican provinces of Nuevo México, Chihuahua, Sonora and Alta California, established by Philip St. George Coo ...

, and was part of the southern route of the 49ers to

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

during the

California Gold Rush The California gold rush (1848–1855) began on January 24, 1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California. The news of gold brought approximately 300,000 people to California from the rest of the U ...

.Report from the Secretary of War, Communicating a Copy of the Official Journal of Lieutenant Colonel Philip St. George Cooke, PUBLIC DOCUMENTS PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, DURING A SPECIAL SESSION BEGUN AND HELD AT THE CITY OF WASHINGTON, MARCH 5, 1849, Congressional Edition, Volume 547, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, 1849. pp.1-85
/ref> After the early 1850s this part of Cooke's route was replaced by the shorter Tucson Cutoff, to the north, as the main route of east–west travel. Toward the end of the

Apache Wars The Apache Wars were a series of armed conflicts between the United States Army and various Apache tribal confederations fought in the Southwestern United States, southwest between 1849 and 1886, though minor hostilities continued until as l ...

, during the 1880s, J. B. Whitmire was the first settler at the springs and made them the site of his ranch house until he sold out.

References

Mountain passes of New Mexico Landforms of Hidalgo County, New Mexico Cooke's Wagon Road History of Hidalgo County, New Mexico {{NewMexico-geo-stub