I was born on a farm near Thorntown, Indiana, in 1836, and labored alongside of my father and brothers and the hired men during the crop season, attending the village school during the winter months, till I was seventeen years old, when my father sent me for two years to an academy in New York State. While there he secured for me an appointment as a cadet at the Military Academy at West Point, but I gave way to my brother, Anson Mills, who is now a Brigadier General in the United States army. After returning home for a year, I came to Texas with my brother Anson. We came down the Mississippi at the time of the great flood in 1857, to New Orleans, and thence up the Red River to Jefferson, Texas. From Jefferson we walked to McKinney, in Collin County, where my brother had previously resided, and I secured a school at Pilot Grove, in Grayson County, and spent a year there happily, and, I trust, usefully. During that year my brother was appointed surveyor on the part of Texas to the joint commission which located the boundary line between Texas and the United States, Col. William R. Scurry being the commissioner on the part of Texas.

At the suggestion of my brother, I joined this expedition at Horsehead Crossing on the Pecos River, and accompanied it to El Paso. When we arrived at Waco Tanks, twenty-six miles east of El Paso, we failed to find water, and were somewhat distressed in consequence. Colonel Scurry said that young men on foot could make the trip to El Paso for relief better than any of our worn-out animals, and my brother and I volunteered for the tramp. We left the tank, thirsty, at sunset and reached the river below El Paso before daybreak, and after slaking our thirst, slept on the ground till morning, when we sent out a relief party, with water. Soon thereafter I went to Fort Fillmore, in New Mexico, forty-five miles above El Paso, where I clerked in the sutler’s store of Hayward & McGrosty, for nearly a year, when I returned to El Paso, and was employed in the same capacity by St. Vrain & Co., merchants. This firm had a branch store at the Santa Rita copper mines near where Silver City now stands, and I made two journeys to and from that place, the first time on horseback and alone. There was no habitation between La Messilla and Santa Rita, and the country was full of hostile Indians; but of them later on. I remember camping alone over night at the place now known as Hudsons Hot Springs. The second journey I made as wagonmaster of our train laden with merchandise for the Santa Rita store, and brought back a load of copper, which we sent by wagons to Port La Vaca, eight hundred miles, and thence to New York by Gulf and Sea.

While at the copper mines, three prospectors—Tayor, Snively and another—came to my camp and reported that they had discovered placer gold at Pinos Altos, near there, and, as they were out of provisions and money, I gave them what was called a “grub stake”—that is, provisions to continue their explorations. That was in 1859, and I am told that gold is still being washed out at Pinos Altos, in 1900.