Jacob Snively

Jacob Snively (1809–1871) was a surveyor, civil engineer, officer of the Texian Army and the Army of the Republic of Texas, California 49er, miner, and Arizona pioneer.

Early life Jacob Snively was born in Greencastle, Pennsylvania along with his twin brother David. His family moved soon afterwards to Hamilton County, Ohio. Snively studied to become a surveyor and civil engineer.

Texas settler, Texas Revolution, Texas Ranger, and Army of the Texas Republic Jacob Snively moved to Nacogdoches, Texas, Republic of Mexico in April, 1835 where he was a surveyor of land grants for the Mexican government and received his own land in July, 1835. Commissioned on March 26, 1836, during the Texas Revolution he served as a first lieutenant of Company A, First Infantry Regiment under Henry W. Millard. In August he was promoted to captain and assigned to command of Company B. Sam Houston appointed him an ambassador to the Shawnee Indians on January 24, 1837, to sound out the tribe's intentions towards the Republic of Texas and Mexico. On May 13, 1837, he was appointed to the rank of colonel and made paymaster general of the Army, and for a short time was acting secretary of war, before resigning from the army in September 1837. During the time of his resignation from the army, he served as Captain, September 14–December 13, 1838, of a group of Texas Mounted Rangers in the 1st Regiment of Mounted Gunmen/Battalion of Volunteer Rangers commanded by Major Leonard H Mabbitt. Later in 1839, he once again served as paymaster general under Albert Sidney Johnston and in 1843 was quartermaster of the army and an assistant inspector general of the republic.

California, New Mexico, and Arizona Territory

During the California Gold Rush in 1849, Snively left his interests in Corpus Christi with his brother David and crossed northern Mexico, then sailed to the California gold fields from Mazatlán. After spending nine years searching for gold there, he moved to New Mexico Territory in 1858. There he led a group that discovered gold placers on the Gila River twenty miles east of Fort Yuma. The resulting gold rush created the short-lived boomtown of Gila City. Snively subsequently was involved in the discovery of the silver-lead ore of the Castle Dome silver mine in the Castle Dome Mountains to the north of Gila City. With Hermann V. Ehrenberg he created the Castle Dome mining district in spring of 1863. That same year, after the first territorial election in for the newly organized Arizona Territory, its Governor John Noble Goodwin appointed Snively a judge. From 1866 Snively's affairs prospered with the success of the Castle Dome mine and as he made and lost small fortunes in New Mexico and Nevada ventures.

Honors Snively Holes, a watering place in Arizona east of Bill Williams Mountain, in Coconino County, Arizona was named for him.