Alamocita (initially called New Alamosa) was a late 19th-century native New Mexican frontier settlement along the east bank of the Rio Grande and is now a ghost town in Sierra County, New Mexico, United States. The town is now submerged beneath the Elephant Butte Reservoir.
History
Alamocita was settled by some of the people from nearby San Ygnacio de la Alamosa, an earlier New Mexican settlement founded nearby in 1859. Alamosa, as it was commonly known, was located three miles upriver from the future site of Alamocita, on the west bank of the Rio Grande, at its confluence with Alamosa Creek (then named Arroyo or Rio Alamosa). The move by some of the population followed the 1867 destruction of the acequias (irrigation canals) and fields along the flooding creek and river. Historically, it was a Spanish settlement, and most of its residents were farmers.
After flooding destroyed Alamosa in 1867, many of its residents moved up the valley to farm near and live in a new town called Canada Alamosa, which had been organized sometime between 1864 and 1866. Others moved across the river and downstream a couple of miles to start a new town called New Alamosa, which became known as Alamocita, to farm on the opposite side of the river.
Alamocita was located six miles north of Fort McRae, which was established in April 1863 to protect these new settlements along the Rio Grande from the Apache, as well as traffic along the river and the old road to the east in the Jornada del Muerto. By 1868, residents of Alamocita were growing crops on Cuchillo Negro Creek, irrigated with the waters of the creek in the vicinity of modern Cuchillo. Some would go on to begin the new settlement of Cuchillo Negro there in 1871. The 1870 census listed the population at 40 persons.
Decline and Demise
Alamocita ceased to be a town in 1880, following a flood that changed the course of the Rio Grande, washing away or leaving most of the irrigable lands on the west bank of the river. Most of the population moved away to other villages in the Rio Grande Valley. By 1885, the Territorial Census found only two ranches remained there, one owned by José Perfecto Garcia and the other by Pedro Montoya.
The end of Alamocita came when 24 persons, of the four families that lived there in houses among the remaining fields at the time of the 1910 Census, sold their land to the Department of Reclamation. Three of the families had the surname Garcia. Some of these families may have lingered on there until the waters of the Elephant Butte Reservoir began to rise in the early 1900s, submerging the town.
Etymology
The name "Alamocita" is a diminutive form derived from "Alamosa," which itself refers to the cottonwood trees (Spanish: álamo) common in the area. The suffix -cita or -ita indicates "little," so the name roughly translates to "Little Alamosa" or "Little Cottonwood Grove."
