I really like to "nail down" the location of historic sites on modern maps, such as on Google Maps, Google Earth, etc. One such historic site for the Western Beale Wagon Road crossing of the Colorado River was at the ferry crossing at Hardyville, AZ Terr. from 1864-1883. This ferry crossing site at Hardyville was shown in the David Rumsey map of 1875, as was given below in the above linked post:
8. Beale's Crossing, AZ (35 02 46.5 N, 114 37 40.4 W) crossing of Colorado River west from Camp Mojave into Nevada, then along Mojave Road west across Mojave Desert to near Barstow, CA. Rumsey map shows that scarce water sources were critical to this military and immigrant route location across desert. Later the Southern Pacific Railroad and much later old historic US 66 did not closely follow the Mojave Road, but took a more direct southern route. See the Hardyville map, near the California, Nevada, Arizona intersection boundary point on the Colorado River at
https://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet/workspace/handleMediaPlayer?lunaMediaId=RUMSEY~8~1~263120~5524028
Few people that live in the modern resort city of Bullhead City, AZ likely know that just west of their Safeway Store on AZ 95 lay the ferry crossing for the Beale Wagon Road-Mojave Road to Los Angeles from 1864-1883, and just across AZ 95 to the east (above the car-wash) lies the related Hardyville (Pioneer) Cemetery. Search Google for "Hardyville Pioneer Cemetery), or see its location on Google Maps at:
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Hardyville+Cemetery/@35.1160877,-114.5930881,15z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0xd036d4e6b4ec6149!8m2!3d35.1206764!4d-114.587397
Beale's Crossing, from 1857-1861, was located in the prior post, but today is located about five miles south of Hardyville Cemetery west of AZ 95. The west side is more accessible (see Mojave Rd Trail in Google Maps), but the east side is pinched in by the Fort Mohave mesa. The exact location of Beale Crossing probably lay very near the modern "Colorado River Nature Center," just north of the mesa, and just north of the riverside hamlet of Mojave City, AZ. Fort Mohave (1859) probably sat very near the eastern bank of the Colorado River, but up on the high mesa (plateau). It is believed that the U.S. Army agreed in a peace treaty with the Mohave Indians in 1859 to keep all of the immigrant traffic (along the Beale Wagon Road) north of the fort (and mesa), toward Hardyville, and along the existing Mojave Road on the West side.
There never was a wagon bridge built across the Colorado River to serve the Beale Wagon Road. All traffic either swam across at Beale Crossing, or was ferried across at Hardyville, and later ferried across at another site a few miles north as new mining operations were established in the next mountain range east of Union Pass (and north of Kingman, AZ).
It was not until 1883, when the A&P railroad bridge was built across the raging Colorado just south of Needles, California that a more dependable transportation mode was provided for Beale Wagon Road traffic to cross the mighty Colorado. But when the railroad finally came, Hardyville and the Beale Wagon Road died a sudden death..
The bridges that later were built across the Colorado south of Needles to serve the rapidly developing railroad and automobile traffic (NTR, US 66 & I 40) started by the Beale Wagon Road across Northern Arizona are in themselves a historically significant and fascinating story, of which I would like to tell, but how??