The Butterfield Overland Mail Through Temecula

For three years beginning in eighteen fifty eight, one of the most important mail and passenger routes in the United States passed through the Temecula Valley. The Butterfield Overland Mail Company, awarded a federal contract to carry mail between Saint Louis and San Francisco, chose a southern route that swung through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Southern California before climbing north to San Francisco. The Temecula Valley was a key stop on that route.

The Butterfield stage ran through Temecula twice a week in each direction, on a schedule of twenty five days for the full journey, the fastest reliable overland connection yet achieved between the eastern and western United States. The Temecula stop was at a local store where passengers could rest while teams were changed. The Civil War ended the Butterfield Overland Mail in eighteen sixty one.

The federal government rerouted mail along a more northerly route through territories less exposed to Confederate disruption. The Butterfield trail through Temecula represented a moment when this inland valley was on the main artery of American communication, connecting the young state of California to the rest of the country at the speed of horses.