EMHS Program: Civil War History in the East Mountains

Guest speaker, John Taylor, speaks on Civil War history in the East Mountains and the impact on New Mexico.

Location: Tijeras Village Hall, 12 Camino Municipal, Tijeras, NM 87059. 

Program: Civil War History of the East Mountains. Guest speaker, John Taylor, is excited to speak to us about Civil War history in New Mexico and in the East Mountains. For those of you familiar with our historical places map, “Mapping Our Vanishing Past”, we show the route of Union and Confederate forces through Tijeras Canyon and north on what is now the Turquoise Trail (Highway 14). The Confederate forces headed north to what became known as the Battle of Glorieta Pass, then returned heading south pursued by Union forces after the Confederate defeat. This was one of the longest campaigns of military history.

About our speaker: John Taylor has researched and published several books on New Mexico history, including “Bloody Valverde: A Civil War Battle on the Rio Grande, February 21, 1862” (University of New Mexico Press, 1999) and “The Battle of Glorieta Pass: A Gettysburg in the West, March 26-28, 1862” with Thomas S. Edrington (University of New Mexico, 2000), “Dejada a Los Niños a Mi: Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, Penalta” (Rio Grande Books, 2005), “Samuel Bowman Watrous: Transitional Frontiersman” (Rio Grande Books, 2019), and many others. John is a retired engineer and national defense historian from Sandia National Laboratories, and currently featured on the Historical Society of New Mexico’s Speakers Bureau.

We thank the Historical Society of New Mexico’s Speakers Bureau for this presentation.