Opposition of the Missouri Fur Company.-Blackfeet Indians.--
Pierre Dorion, a Half-Breed Interpreter.--Old Dorion and His
Hybrid Progeny--Family Quarrels.--Cross Purposes Between
Dorion and Lisa.--Renegadoes From Nodowa.--Perplexities of
a Commander.--Messrs. Bradbury and Nuttall Join the
Expedition.-Legal Embarrassments of Pierre Dorion.--
Departure From St. Louis.--Conjugal Discipline of a Half-
Breed.--Annual Swelling of the Rivers.-Daniel Boone, the
Patriarch of Kentucky.-John Colter.-His Adventures Among the
Indians.-Rumors of Danger Ahead.-Fort Osage.-An Indian War-
Feast.-Troubles in the Dorion Family.--Buffaloes and Turkey-
Buzzards.
ON this his second visit to St. Louis, Mr. Hunt was again impeded in his
plans by the opposition of the Missouri Fur Company. The affairs of
that company were, at this time, in a very dubious state. During the
preceding year, their principal establishment at the forks of the
Missouri had been so much harassed by the Blackfeet Indians, that its
commander, Mr. Henry, one of the partners, had been compelled to abandon
the post and cross the Rocky Mountains, with the intention of fixing
himself upon one of the upper branches of the Columbia. What had become
of him and his party was unknown. The most intense anxiety was felt
concerning them, and apprehensions that they might have been cut off
by the savages. At the time of Mr. Hunt’s arrival at St. Louis, the
Missouri Company were fitting out an expedition to go in quest of Mr.
Henry. It was to be conducted by Mr. Manuel Lisa, the partner already
mentioned.
There being thus two expeditions on foot at the same moment, an unusual
demand was occasioned for hunters and voyageurs, who accordingly
profited by the circumstance, and stipulated for high terms. Mr. Hunt
found a keen and subtle competitor in Lisa, and was obliged to secure
his recruits by liberal advances of pay, and by other pecuniary
indulgences.
The greatest difficulty was to procure the Sioux interpreter. There was
but one man to be met with at St. Louis who was fitted for the purpose,
but to secure him would require much management. The individual in
question was a half-breed, named Pierre Dorion; and, as he figures
hereafter in this narrative, and is, withal, a striking specimen of the
hybrid race on the frontier, we shall give a few particulars concerning
him. Pierre was the son of Dorion, the French interpreter, who
accompanied Messrs. Lewis and Clark in their famous exploring expedition
across the Rocky Mountains. Old Dorion was one of those French creoles,
descendants of the ancient Canadian stock, who abound on the western
frontier, and amalgamate or cohabit with the savages. He had sojourned
among various tribes, and perhaps left progeny among them all; but his
regular, or habitual wife, was a Sioux squaw. By her he had a hopeful
brood of half-breed sons, of whom Pierre was one. The domestic affairs
of old Dorion were conducted on the true Indian plan. Father and sons
would occasionally get drunk together, and then the cabin was a scene of
ruffian brawl and fighting, in the course of which the old Frenchman
was apt to get soundly belabored by his mongrel offspring. In a furious
scuffle of the kind, one of the sons got the old man upon the ground,
and was upon the point of scalping him. “Hold! my son,” cried the old
fellow, in imploring accents, “you are too brave, too honorable to
scalp your father!” This last appeal touched the French side of the
half-breed’s heart, so he suffered the old man to wear his scalp
unharmed.
Of this hopeful stock was Pierre Dorion, the man whom it was now the
desire of Mr. Hunt to engage as an interpreter. He had been employed in
that capacity by the Missouri Fur Company during the preceding year, and
conducted their traders in safety through the different tribes of the
Sioux. He had proved himself faithful and serviceable while sober; but
the love of liquor, in which he had been nurtured and brought up, would
occasionally break out, and with it the savage side of his character.
It was his love of liquor which had embroiled him with the Missouri
Company. While in their service at Fort Mandan, on the frontier, he had
been seized with a whiskey mania; and, as the beverage was only to be
procured at the company’s store, it had been charged in his account at
the rate of ten dollars a quart. This item had ever remained unsettled,
and a matter of furious dispute, the mere mention of which was
sufficient to put him in a passion.
The moment it was discovered by Mr. Lisa that Pierre Dorion was in
treaty with the new and rival association, he endeavored, by threats as
well as promises, to prevent his engaging in their service. His promises
might, perhaps, have prevailed; but his threats, which related to the
whiskey debt, only served to drive Pierre into the opposite ranks. Still
he took advantage of this competition for his services to stand out with
Mr. Hunt on the most advantageous terms, and, after a negotiation of
nearly two weeks, capitulated to serve in the expedition, as hunter and
interpreter, at the rate of three hundred dollars a year, two hundred of
which were to be paid in advance.
When Mr. Hunt had got everything ready for leaving St. Louis, new
difficulties arose. Five of the American hunters from the encampment at
Nodowa, suddenly made their appearance. They alleged that they had
been ill treated by the partners at the encampment, and had come off
clandestinely, in consequence of a dispute. It was useless at the
present moment, and under present circumstances, to attempt any
compulsory measures with these deserters. Two of them Mr. Hunt prevailed
upon, by mild means, to return with him. The rest refused; nay, what
was worse, they spread such reports of the hardships and dangers to be
apprehended in the course of the expedition, that they struck a panic
into those hunters who had recently engaged at St. Louis, and, when the
hour of departure arrived, all but one refused to embark. It was in vain
to plead or remonstrate; they shouldered their rifles and turned their
backs upon the expedition, and Mr. Hunt was fain to put off from shore
with the single hunter and a number of voyageurs whom he had engaged.
Even Pierre Dorion, at the last moment, refused to enter the boat until
Mr. Hunt consented to take his squaw and two children on board also. But
the tissue of perplexities, on account of this worthy individual, did
not end here.
Among the various persons who were about to proceed up the Missouri with
Mr. Hunt, were two scientific gentlemen; one Mr. John Bradbury, a man
of mature age, but great enterprise and personal activity, who had
been sent out by Linnaean Society of Liverpool to make a collection
of American plants; the other, a Mr. Nuttall, likewise an Englishman,
younger in years, who has since made himself known as the author of
Travels in Arkansas, and a work on the Genera of American Plants. Mr.
Hunt had offered them the protection and facilities of his party, in
their scientific research up the Missouri River. As they were not ready
to depart at the moment of embarkation, they put their trunks on board
of the boat, but remained at St. Louis until the next day, for the
arrival of the post, intending to join the expedition at St. Charles, a
short distance above the mouth of the Missouri.
The same evening, however, they learned that a writ had been issued
against Pierre Dorion for his whiskey debt, by Mr. Lisa, as agent of the
Missouri Company, and that it was the intention to entrap the mongrel
linguist on his arrival at St. Charles.
Upon hearing this, Mr. Bradbury and Mr. Nuttall set off a little
after midnight, by land, got ahead of the boat as it was ascending the
Missouri, before its arrival at St. Charles, and gave Pierre Dorion
warning of the legal toil prepared to ensnare him.
The knowing Pierre immediately landed and took to the woods, followed by
his squaw laden with their papooses, and a large bundle containing their
most precious effects, promising to rejoin the party some distance
above St. Charles. There seemed little dependence to be placed upon the
promises of a loose adventurer of the kind, who was at the very time
playing an evasive game with his former employers; who had already
received two-thirds of his year’s pay, and his rifle on his shoulder,
his family and worldly fortunes at his heels, and the wild woods before
him. There was no alternative, however, and it was hoped his pique
against his old employers would render him faithful to his new ones.
The party reached St. Charles in the afternoon, but the harpies of the
law looked in vain for their expected prey. The boats resumed their
course on the following morning, and had not proceeded far when Pierre
Dorion made his appearance on the shore. He was gladly taken on board,
but he came without his squaw. They had quarreled in the night; Pierre
had administered the Indian discipline of the cudgel, whereupon she had
taken to the woods, with their children and all their worldly goods.
Pierre evidently was deeply grieved and disconcerted at the loss of his
wife and his knapsack, whereupon Mr. Hunt despatched one of the
Canadian voyageurs in search of the fugitive; and the whole party,
after proceeding a few miles further, encamped on an island to wait
his return. The Canadian rejoined the party, but without the squaw; and
Pierre Dorion passed a solitary and anxious night, bitterly regretting
his indiscretion in having exercised his conjugal authority so near
home. Before daybreak, however, a well-known voice reached his ears from
the opposite shore. It was his repentant spouse, who had been wandering
the woods all night in quest of the party, and had at length descried it
by its fires. A boat was despatched for her, the interesting family
was once more united, and Mr. Hunt now flattered himself that his
perplexities with Pierre Dorion were at an end.
Bad weather, very heavy rains, and an unusually early rise in the
Missouri, rendered the ascent of the river toilsome, slow, and
dangerous. The rise of the Missouri does not generally take place until
the month of May or June: the present swelling of the river must have
been caused by a freshet in some of its more southern branches. It could
not have been the great annual flood, as the higher branches must still
have been ice-bound.
And here we cannot but pause, to notice the admirable arrangement of
nature, by which the annual swellings of the various great rivers which
empty themselves into the Mississippi, have been made to precede each
other at considerable intervals. Thus, the flood of the Red River
precedes that of the Arkansas by a month. The Arkansas, also, rising in
a much more southern latitude than the Missouri, takes the lead of it
in its annual excess, and its superabundant waters are disgorged and
disposed of long before the breaking up of the icy barriers of the
north; otherwise, did all these mighty streams rise simultaneously, and
discharge their vernal floods into the Mississippi, an inundation would
be the consequence, that would submerge and devastate all the lower
country.
On the afternoon of the third day, January, 17th, the boats touched
at Charette, one of the old villages founded by the original French
colonists. Here they met with Daniel Boone, the renowned patriarch
of Kentucky, who had kept in the advance of civilization, and on the
borders of the wilderness, still leading a hunter’s life, though now in
his eighty-fifth year. He had but recently returned from a hunting
and trapping expedition, and had brought nearly sixty beaver skins as
trophies of his skill. The old man was still erect in form, strong in
limb, and unflinching in spirit, and as he stood on the river bank,
watching the departure of an expedition destined to traverse the
wilderness to the very shores of the Pacific, very probably felt a throb
of his old pioneer spirit, impelling him to shoulder his rifle and join
the adventurous band. Boone flourished several years after this meeting,
in a vigorous old age, the Nestor of hunters and backwoodsmen; and died,
full of sylvan honor and renown, in 1818, in his ninety-second year.
The next morning early, as the party were yet encamped at the mouth of
a small stream, they were visited by another of these heroes of the
wilderness, one John Colter, who had accompanied Lewis and Clarke in
their memorable expedition. He had recently made one of those vast
internal voyages so characteristic of this fearless class of men, and of
the immense regions over which they hold their lonely wanderings; having
come from the head waters of the Missouri to St. Louis in a small canoe.
This distance of three thousand miles he had accomplished in thirty
days. Colter kept with the party all the morning. He had many
particulars to give them concerning the Blackfeet Indians, a restless
and predatory tribe, who had conceived an implacable hostility to the
white men, in consequence of one of their warriors having been killed
by Captain Lewis, while attempting to steal horses. Through the country
infested by these savages the expedition would have to proceed, and
Colter was urgent in reiterating the precautions that ought to be
observed respecting them. He had himself experienced their vindictive
cruelty, and his story deserves particular citation, as showing the
hairbreadth adventures to which these solitary rovers of the wilderness
are exposed.
Colter, with the hardihood of a regular trapper, had cast himself loose
from the party of Lewis and Clarke in the very heart of the wilderness,
and had remained to trap beaver alone on the head waters of the
Missouri. Here he fell in with another lonely trapper, like himself,
named Potts, and they agreed to keep together. They were in the very
region of the terrible Blackfeet, at that time thirsting to revenge the
death of their companion, and knew that they had to expect no mercy at
their hands. They were obliged to keep concealed all day in the woody
margins of the rivers, setting their traps after nightfall and taking
them up before daybreak. It was running a fearful risk for the sake of a
few beaver skins; but such is the life of the trapper.
They were on a branch of the Missouri called Jefferson Fork, and had set
their traps at night, about six miles up a small river that emptied into
the fork. Early in the morning they ascended the river in a canoe, to
examine the traps. The banks on each side were high and perpendicular,
and cast a shade over the stream. As they were softly paddling along,
they heard the trampling of many feet upon the banks. Colter immediately
gave the alarm of “Indians!” and was for instant retreat. Potts scoffed
at him for being frightened by the trampling of a herd of buffaloes.
Colter checked his uneasiness and paddled forward. They had not gone
much further when frightful whoops and yells burst forth from each side
of the river, and several hundred Indians appeared on either bank.
Signs were made to the unfortunate trappers to come on shore. They were
obliged to comply. Before they could get out of their canoe, a savage
seized the rifle belonging to Potts. Colter sprang on shore, wrestled
the weapon from the hands of the Indian, and restored it to his
companion, who was still in the canoe, and immediately pushed into the
stream. There was the sharp twang of a bow, and Potts cried out that he
was wounded. Colter urged him to come on shore and submit, as his only
chance for life; but the other knew there was no prospect of mercy, and
determined to die game. Leveling his rifle, he shot one of the savages
dead on the spot. The next moment he fell himself, pierced with
innumerable arrows.
The vengeance of the savages now turned upon Colter. He was stripped
naked, and, having some knowledge of the Blackfoot language, overheard
a consultation as to the mode of despatching him, so as to derive the
greatest amusement from his death. Some were for setting him up as a
mark, and having a trial of skill at his expense. The chief, however,
was for nobler sport. He seized Colter by the shoulder, and demanded if
he could run fast. The unfortunate trapper was too well acquainted with
Indian customs not to comprehend the drift of the question. He knew
he was to run for his life, to furnish a kind of human hunt to his
persecutors. Though in reality he was noted among his brother hunters
for swiftness of foot, he assured the chief that he was a very bad
runner. His stratagem gained him some vantage ground. He was led by the
chief into the prairie, about four hundred yards from the main body of
savages, and then turned loose to save himself if he could. A tremendous
yell let him know that the whole pack of bloodhounds were off in full
cry. Colter flew rather than ran; he was astonished at his own speed;
but he had six miles of prairie to traverse before he should reach the
Jefferson Fork of the Missouri; how could he hope to hold out such a
distance with the fearful odds of several hundred to one against him!
The plain, too, abounded with the prickly pear, which wounded his naked
feet. Still he fled on, dreading each moment to hear the twang of a bow,
and to feel an arrow quivering at his heart. He did not even dare to
look round, lest he should lose an inch of that distance on which his
life depended. He had run nearly half way across the plain when the
sound of pursuit grew somewhat fainter, and he ventured to turn his
head. The main body of his pursuers were a considerable distance behind;
several of the fastest runners were scattered in the advance; while a
swift-footed warrior, armed with a spear, was not more than a hundred
yards behind him.
Inspired with new hope, Colter redoubled his exertions, but strained
himself to such a degree, that the blood gushed from his mouth and
nostrils, and streamed down his breast. He arrived within a mile of the
river. The sound of footsteps gathered upon him. A glance behind showed
his pursuer within twenty yards, and preparing to launch his spear.
Stopping short he turned round and spread out his arms. The savage,
confounded by this sudden action, attempted to stop and hurl his spear,
but fell in the very act. His spear stuck in the ground, and the shaft
broke in his hand. Colter plucked up the pointed part, pinned the savage
to the earth, and continued his flight. The Indians, as they arrived at
their slaughtered companion, stopped to howl over him. Colter made the
most of this precious delay, gained the skirt of cotton-wood bordering
the river, dashed through it, and plunged into the stream. He swam to
a neighboring island, against the upper end of which the driftwood
had lodged in such quantities as to form a natural raft; under this he
dived, and swam below water until he succeeded in getting a breathing
place between the floating trunks of trees, whose branches and bushes
formed a covert several feet above the level of the water. He had
scarcely drawn breath after all his toils, when he heard his pursuers on
the river bank, whooping and yelling like so many fiends. They plunged
in the river, and swam to the raft. The heart of Colter almost died
within him as he saw them, through the chinks of his concealment,
passing and repassing, and seeking for him in all directions. They at
length gave up the search, and he began to rejoice in his escape, when
the idea presented itself that they might set the raft on fire. Here
was a new source of horrible apprehension, in which he remained until
nightfall. Fortunately the idea did not suggest itself to the Indians.
As soon as it was dark, finding by the silence around that his pursuers
had departed, Colter dived again and came up beyond the raft. He then
swam silently down the river for a considerable distance, when he
landed, and kept on all night, to get as far as possible from this
dangerous neighborhood.
By daybreak he had gained sufficient distance to relieve him from the
terrors of his savage foes; but now new sources of inquietude presented
themselves. He was naked and alone, in the midst of an unbounded
wilderness; his only chance was to reach a trading post of the Missouri
Company, situated on a branch of the Yellowstone River. Even should he
elude his pursuers, days must elapse before he could reach this post,
during which he must traverse immense prairies destitute of shade, his
naked body exposed to the burning heat of the sun by day, and the dews
and chills of the night season, and his feet lacerated by the thorns of
the prickly pear. Though he might see game in abundance around him, he
had no means of killing any for his sustenance, and must depend for food
upon the roots of the earth. In defiance of these difficulties he pushed
resolutely forward, guiding himself in his trackless course by those
signs and indications known only to Indians and backwoodsmen; and after
braving dangers and hardships enough to break down any spirit but that
of a western pioneer, arrived safe at the solitary post in question. *
(* Bradbury, Travels in America, p. 17.)
Such is a sample of the rugged experience which Colter had to relate
of savage life; yet, with all these perils and terrors fresh in his
recollection, he could not see the present band on their way to those
regions of danger and adventure, without feeling a vehement impulse
to join them. A western trapper is like a sailor; past hazards only
stimulate him to further risks. The vast prairie is to the one what
the ocean is to the other, a boundless field of enterprise and exploit.
However he may have suffered in his last cruise, he is always ready to
join a new expedition; and the more adventurous its nature, the more
attractive is it to his vagrant spirit.
Nothing seems to have kept Colter from continuing with the party to
the shores of the Pacific but the circumstances of his having recently
married. All the morning he kept with them, balancing in his mind the
charms of his bride against those of the Rocky Mountains; the former,
however, prevailed, and after a march of several miles, he took a
reluctant leave of the travellers, and turned his face homeward.
Continuing their progress up the Missouri, the party encamped on the
evening of the 21st of March, in the neighborhood of a little frontier
village of French creoles. Here Pierre Dorion met with some of his old
comrades, with whom he had a long gossip, and returned to the camp with
rumors of bloody feuds between the Osages and the loways, or Ayaways,
Potowatomies, Sioux, and Sawkees. Blood had already been shed, and
scalps been taken. A war party, three hundred strong, were prowling
in the neighborhood; others might be met with higher up the river;
it behooved the travellers, therefore, to be upon their guard against
robbery or surprise, for an Indian war-party on the march is prone to
acts of outrage.
In consequence of this report, which was subsequently confirmed by
further intelligence, a guard was kept up at night round the encampment,
and they all slept on their arms. As they were sixteen in number, and
well supplied with weapons and ammunition, they trusted to be able to
give any marauding party a warm reception. Nothing occurred, however, to
molest them on their voyage, and on the 8th of April they came in sight
of Fort Osage. On their approach the flag was hoisted on the fort, and
they saluted it by a discharge of fire-arms. Within a short distance of
the fort was an Osage village, the inhabitants of which, men, women, and
children, thronged down to the water side to witness their landing. One
of the first persons they met on the river bank was Mr. Crooks, who
had come down in a boat, with nine men, from their winter encampment at
Nodowa to meet them.
They remained at Fort Osage a part of three days, during which they were
hospitably entertained at the garrison by Lieutenant Brownson, who held
a temporary command. They were regaled also with a war-feast at the
village; the Osage warriors having returned from a successful foray
against the loways, in which they had taken seven scalps. They were
paraded on poles about the village, followed by the warriors decked out
in all their savage ornaments, and hideously painted as if for battle.
By the Osage warriors, Mr. Hunt and his companions were again warned to
be on their guard in ascending the river, as the Sioux tribe meant to
lay in wait and attack them.
On the 10th of April they again embarked their party, being now
augmented to twenty-six, by the addition of Mr. Crooks and his boat’s
crew. They had not proceeded far, however, when there was a great outcry
from one of the boats; it was occasioned by a little domestic discipline
in the Dorion family. The squaw of the worthy interpreter, it appeared,
had been so delighted with the scalp-dance, and other festivities of the
Osage village, that she had taken a strong inclination to remain there.
This had been as strongly opposed by her liege lord, who had compelled
her to embark. The good dame had remained sulky ever since, whereupon
Pierre, seeing no other mode of exorcising the evil spirit out of her,
and being, perhaps, a little inspired by whiskey, had resorted to the
Indian remedy of the cudgel, and before his neighbors could interfere,
had belabored her so soundly, that there is no record of her having
shown any refractory symptoms throughout the remainder of the
expedition.
For a week they continued their voyage, exposed to almost incessant
rains. The bodies of drowned buffaloes floated past them in vast
numbers; many had drifted upon the shore, or against the upper ends
of the rafts and islands. These had attracted great flights of
turkey-buzzards; some were banqueting on the carcasses, others were
soaring far aloft in the sky, and others were perched on the trees, with
their backs to the sun, and their wings stretched out to dry, like so
many vessels in harbor, spreading their sails after a shower.
The turkey-buzzard (vultur aura, or golden vulture), when on the wing,
is one of the most specious and imposing of birds. Its flight in the
upper regions of the air is really sublime, extending its immense wings,
and wheeling slowly and majestically to and fro, seemingly without
exerting a muscle or fluttering a feather, but moving by mere volition,
and sailing on the bosom of the air, as a ship upon the ocean. Usurping
the empyreal realm of the eagle, he assumes for a time the port and
dignity of that majestic bird, and often is mistaken for him by ignorant
crawlers upon the earth. It is only when he descends from the clouds to
pounce upon carrion that he betrays his low propensities, and reveals
his caitiff character. Near at hand he is a disgusting bird, ragged in
plumage, base in aspect, and of loathsome odor.
On the 17th of April Mr. Hunt arrived with his party at the station
near the Nodowa River, where the main body had been quartered during the
winter.