22 Facts About Tom Jeffords

Thomas Jefferson Jeffords was a United States Army scout, Indian agent, prospector, and superintendent of overland mail in the Arizona Territory.

Tom Jeffords first met Cochise when he rode alone into Cochise's camp in 1871 to request that the chief come to Canada Alamosa for peace talks.

In October 1872, Tom Jeffords led General Oliver O Howard to Cochise's Stronghold, believed to be China Meadow, in the Dragoon Mountains.

Tom Jeffords embarked on a series of ventures as sutler and postmaster at Fort Huachuca, head of the first Tucson water company trying to bring artesian water to that city, and as prospector and mine owner and developer.

Tom Jeffords died at Owl Head Buttes in the Tortolita Mountains 35 miles north of Tucson.

Tom Jeffords was born in Chautauqua County, New York, where his father was trying to earn enough money to purchase a farm.

When Tom Jeffords was seven, the family moved to Ashtabula, Ohio, in the Western Reserve.

Jeffords and his brothers sailed the Great Lakes, Tom becoming a captain while still in his early twenties.

Bored and in search of wealth, Tom Jeffords followed the gold rush to Pike's Peak in 1859, working on the road from Leavenworth to Denver.

Tom Jeffords soon moved on to the mines in Pinos Altos, New Mexico.

Tom Jeffords accepted an assignment from Colonel Edward Canby to ride over 500 miles alone across Apache country to Fort Yuma, California, where Colonel James Carleton was arriving with the California Column.

Tom Jeffords returned east to Arizona Territory in 1862 as a scout with the lead companies of the California Column.

Tom Jeffords remained with the Army as a civilian scout throughout the war as the Army engaged Navajo, Apache and Comanche Indians and kept the Texans out of New Mexico.

Tom Jeffords was awarded the Medal of Honor 32 years later for this action.

Between 1867 and 1869, Tom Jeffords was the superintendent of a mail line from Tucson to Socorro.

Tom Jeffords apparently gave people to understand that he had met Cochise during this period and negotiated a peace for his mail riders.

General Howard enlisted the help of Tom Jeffords in concluding these treaties.

Cochise requested that his people be allowed to remain in the Chiricahua Mountains and that Tom Jeffords be made Indian agent for the region.

Tom Jeffords staked claims in the Huachuca, Dos Cabezas, and Chiricahua Mountains.

Tom Jeffords was a partner in a mine in Santa Rita, NM and head of a company trying to supply water to the city of Tucson, AZ.

Tom Jeffords lived out the last 22 years of his life in the Tortolita Mountains north of Tucson, at a homestead near the Owlhead Buttes.

Tom Jeffords died on February 19,1914, and was buried in Tucson's Evergreen Cemetery.