The Salt Flats

West of the Guadalupe Mountains lies a stark and striking expanse known as the Salt Flats - remnants of a prehistoric lake that once filled the basin during the Pleistocene Epoch nearly two million years ago. Over time, streams carried minerals into the lowland graben formed by ancient faulting, leaving thick layers of salt as the lake gradually evaporated about 10,000 years ago. These natural deposits later became a vital and contested resource for the communities of the El Paso region.

The El Paso Salt War

Beginning in the late 1860s, conflict erupted over control of salt deposits near Guadalupe Peak, east of El Paso. Republican leaders W. W. Mills and Albert Fountain backed efforts to bring title of the salt lakes under U.S. or local control, but opposition came from Louis Cardis and Father Antonio Borrajo in San Elizario, who defended the Mexican community’s notion that the salt was public under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

Tensions escalated through the 1870s. In 1877 Charles Howard (backed by Judge power) filed claims on the salt beds, triggering outrage among locals and riots. After various arrests and a siege in San Elizario, Howard ultimately was killed in El Paso in 1877, allegedly by Cardis’ allies. In December of that year, a mob in San Elizario executed Howard, his agents, and bondholders. U.S. troops and Texas Rangers intervened, but few perpetrators were ever held accountable.

Although legal claims continued, little changed until authorities allowed regulated commercial access to the salt without contest. The conflict had lasting effects on authority in the region and helped lead to the reactivation of Fort Bliss to restore order.

The El Paso Salt War of 1877 (also known as the San Elizario Salt War) was a violent struggle over control of valuable salt lakes at the base of the Guadalupe Mountains in far West Texas. What began as a political and legal dispute among Anglo businessmen and Tejano residents erupted into armed conflict when attempts were made to privatize the salt, long considered a community resource.

When local resistance rose, the Texas Rangers were sent to enforce the new claims, but their presence deepened tensions. The conflict reached its peak when a large force of Tejano and Mexican residents surrounded and captured twenty Rangers in the town of San Elizario. Order was eventually restored with the arrival of the African American 9th Cavalry and a New Mexico posse, whose presence forced hundreds of Tejanos to flee across the Rio Grande.

The Salt War ended with the establishment of private ownership over the salt lakes - marking both the end of community control and a turning point in the region’s social and political balance.