Location of Name
On the walls of Spaulding's Cavern inside North Gateway Rock. There is also a "Mills, 1866" on the southeast side of North Gateway Rock. The name is below and just to the left of the "E.S. Imes" name. This Mills name is one of only two historic names in the Garden that were carved into the sandstone not once, but twice. The other name is that of W. Nelson, 1866."
Condition of Name
The exterior Mills name is still legible; only the "8" in the date has worn away. The area to the left of the name, where one would normally expect to find distinguishing initials, seems to be a water trough when the rains come, and is consequently swept clean of carvings. The name inside the cavern is written "D.W. Mills" and is followed by the date "1866." When the entrance to the cavern was re-discovered in 1935, a photographer for the Gazette and Telegraph took a picture of this name. The letters seem to have been carved after the same fashion as those of the Mills name on the southeast side of North Gateway
There was a D.W. Mills listed in the El Paso County 1867 Tax Schedule.