ALEXANDER HENRY (THE YOUNGER)
I
Among the north men who overran the country long known as the Hudson’s
Bay Territory, Alexander Henry, the younger, was a commanding figure.
He was a nephew of that other Alexander Henry whose adventures have
been described earlier in this book. To Alexander Henry, the younger,
we owe the most curious and complete record ever printed of the daily
life of the fur trader in the north.
Alexander Henry, the younger, was a diarist; he kept a journal in which
he set down, in the most matter-of-fact way, everything that happened
to him, and, as has been said by Dr. Coues, “it mirrors life in a way
Mr. Samuel Pepys might envy could he compare his inimitable diary with
this curious companion piece of _causerie_, and perceive that he who
goes over the sea may change his sky, but not his mind.”
The wonderful journal of Henry’s slept for nearly a century. Where the
original may be we do not know, but a copy was made by George Coventry
about the year 1824, and this copy about seventy years later came
under the notice of Dr. Elliott Coues, whose studies of the old West,
have furnished so great a mass of material from which the student of
history may glean information.
The diary covers a period of about fifteen years, from 1799 to 1814,
during which time Henry travelled from Lake Superior to the Pacific.
He lived in and travelled through, at various times, the Canadian
Provinces of Ontario, Manitoba, Assiniboia, Keewatin, Saskatchewan,
Alberta, and British Columbia; while in the United States his travels
were through Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, Idaho, Oregon, and
Washington. In these long journeys he met many different tribes of
Indians, and saw much of the Chippewas, the three tribes of the
Blackfeet, the Crees, Assiniboines, Sioux, Sarcees, and other northern
tribes, while in his southern journeyings he reached the Mandans, the
Minitari, the Rees, and even the Cheyennes, south of the Missouri
River, and on the west coast saw many tribes of the Columbia.
The journal begins in the autumn of 1799, when he was camped on the
White Earth River, near the foot of what is now known as Riding
Mountain, in Manitoba, a little west of Portage La Prairie. Here he had
stopped after his journey from Montreal, to trade with the Indians the
liquor, blankets, strouding, and various trinkets the Indians liked.
He made that fall a clear profit of seven hundred pounds. This was his
first trial in the Northwest.
In the summer of 1800 Henry was on his way westward, with a brigade
of canoes, each of which carried twenty-eight pieces of goods, ten
of which were kegs of rum of nine gallons each; loads which sunk the
canoes to the gunwales. He was proceeding by the Grande Portage to Lake
Winnipeg, over the road which, even then, was being travelled by many
fur traders. Wherever he found Indians, they were usually drunk, and
when drunk always troublesome. They crossed the Lake of the Woods, and
ran down the river Winnipic. At Portage de Lisle one of the canoes, to
avoid the trouble of making this portage, passed down near the north
shore with a full load. “She had not gone many yards when, by some
mismanagement of the foreman, the current bore down her bow full upon
the shore against a rock, upon which the fellow, taking advantage of
his situation, jumped, while the current whirled the canoe around. The
steersman, finding himself within reach of the shore, jumped upon the
rock, with one of the midmen; the other midman, not being sufficiently
active, remained in the canoe, which was instantly carried out and
lost to view among the high waves. At length she appeared, and stood
perpendicularly for a moment, when she sank down again, and I then
perceived the man rising upon a bale of drygoods in the midst of the
waves. We made every exertion to get near him, and did not cease
calling out to him to take courage, and not let go his hold; but alas!
he sank under a heavy swell, and when the bale arose the man appeared
no more. At this time we were only a few yards from him; but while we
were eagerly looking out for him, poor fellow, the whirlpool caught my
canoe, and before we could get away she was half-full of water. We then
made all haste to get ashore, and go in search of the property. The
canoe we found flat upon the water, broken in many places. However, we
hauled her ashore, and afterwards collected as many pieces as we could
find. The men had landed a few packages above the rapid, otherwise our
loss would have been still greater.”
On August 16 they entered Lake Winnipeg, and were almost wrecked by
a storm, the wind blowing violently over a shoal flat, and raising
a tumbling sea. Wild-fowl were plenty; so were also Rocky Mountain
locusts, which Henry said were thrown up on the beach to a depth of
six to nine inches. He shot a white pelican, of which many were seen.
From here Henry went up the Red River to establish a trading-fort, and
on the way up he divided his goods, one-half of which were to be sent
to Portage La Prairie on the Assiniboine River. The Indians here were
chiefly canoe and foot people, and had few horses. Pigeons were very
numerous, as were also fish, and the Indians had some dried buffalo
meat, which was purchased from them. Fruit was abundant along the bank;
plums of three different sorts, pembinas, and grapes.
A number of Indians had joined him, all of whom wanted liquor and
supplies. He gave them more or less liquor, with the result that most
of them were drunk much of the time, and showed no disposition either
to hunt or to trap. As they proceeded up Red River, they approached
the country ranged over by the Sioux, between whom and the Ojibwas
there was everlasting war. The Indians were therefore in a continual
state of alarm, and every time a shot was heard they thought that the
enemy were about to attack them. They were now close to the country of
the buffalo, and the Indians were bringing in fresh meat. Henry speaks
of the abundance of these animals at his camp of August 26, where, he
says, “The ravages of the buffaloes at this place are astonishing to a
person unaccustomed to these meadows. The beach, once soft black mud,
into which a man would sink knee-deep, is now made hard as pavement by
the numerous herds coming to drink. The willows are entirely trampled
and torn to pieces; even the bark of the smaller trees is rubbed off in
many places. The grass on the first bank of the river is entirely worn
away. Numerous paths, some of which are a foot deep in the hard turf,
come from the plains to the brink of the river, and vast quantities of
dung gives this place the appearance of a cattle yard. We have reached
the commencement of the great plains of Red River, where the eye is
lost in one continuous level westward. Not a tree or a rising ground
interrupts the view.” Here he had his first experience in running
buffalo, and merely for the amusement of it killed not a few.
The Indians continued drinking and fighting among themselves. No one
as yet had been killed, but more than one had been severely injured.
Now, however, they had used up all their liquor, and Henry refused to
give them any more; so that while many continued to loaf about and beg
for drink, some went hunting. Keeping on up the Red River, he pushed
on southward, being anxious to reach a country where the beaver seemed
to be plenty. Game was very abundant--buffalo, elk and bears. “Whilst
we were arranging camp I saw a bear on the east side of the river, a
little above us, coming down to drink. I crossed over and followed him;
he instantly stopped within a few paces, and ran up a large oak. I shot
him between the shoulders, and he fell to the ground like a rock, but
in a moment was scampering away as fast as he could. I traced him by
the blood, and soon found him sitting under a brush heap, grumbling and
licking his wounds. A second shot dispatched him. By the hideous scream
he uttered when he fell from the tree, I imagined he was coming at me,
and was waiting for him with my second barrel cocked, when he ran off.
I went for my two men, and it was hard work for us three to drag him to
the canoe; he was very fat. I found that my first ball had gone through
his heart. I was surprised that he should have been so active after a
wound of that kind.”
Early in September, Henry, having passed up Red River as far as the
mouth of Park River, decided to build there, and began the work of
cutting house logs and erecting his stockades. Game was astonishingly
abundant, bears being so plenty that they were killed almost daily.
Three men came in with twelve bears; a hunter returned with four bears,
and so on. Now that they were settled, Henry began to give out to the
Indians their debts; by which is meant that he furnished them the
articles that they needed for hunting and for their life during the
winter, charging them with the articles, which were to be paid for by
skins--that is, the value of a beaver skin. He prepared a seat in a
tall oak, which he used as a lookout station, and from which he had
an extensive view. Every morning he used to climb to the top of this
oak and look over the country, not only to see where the game was, but
also to see if people were moving about. After the stockade had been
finished, the houses were built, and then came the task of preparing
food for the winter. Meantime, the Indians had persuaded Henry again
to give them liquor, and they were once more drunk and quarrelling.
Happily, when fighting, they did not use their guns or bows, but only
their knives; and so, although men and women were frequently severely
stabbed and cut, there were no immediate fatalities.
Henry was a good deal of a hunter, and much of his journal is given
up to accounts of what he killed. Indian alarms were as frequent as
ever, but none of them amounted to anything, being causeless panics.
In October Henry made a journey down the river, to look up some of
the people that he had sent off to establish small trading-posts. On
his return, about the middle of October, he found that his hunter
had killed a large grizzly bear, about a mile from the fort, and
mentions that these bears are not numerous along Red River, but are
more abundant in the Hair Hills. This is one of the most eastern
records for the grizzly bear, although Long--_Voyages and Travels_,
London, 1791--speaks as if they were sometimes found a little further
eastward, even east of the west end of Lake Superior.
A little later Henry, with one of his hunters and another man, set off
in search of the Red Lake Indians, whom he wished to inform that he
had established a trading-post here. The journey was long, and much of
it through thick woods and underbrush, and it almost proved fruitless.
However, he at length came across a young Indian, who was very much
frightened at seeing them, but finally realizing that they were
friends, talked freely to them. The Indian reported that his people
were at Red Lake waiting for traders, and Henry tried to persuade him
to bring them into his fort. Henry then returned to his post.
Winter was now approaching. The Indians were making the mats with which
they covered their huts in winter, while many of the men were preparing
to go to war. An interesting note on wolves appears here, under date
of Sunday, November 2: “Last night the wolves were very troublesome;
they kept up a terrible howling about the fort, and even attempted to
enter Maymiutch’s hut. A large white one came boldly into the door,
and was advancing toward a young child, when he was shot dead. Some of
them are very audacious. I have known them to follow people for several
days, attempt to seize a person or a dog, and to be kept off only by
firearms. It does not appear that hunger makes them so voracious, as
they have been known to pass carcasses of animals which they might have
eaten to their fill, but they would not touch flesh, their object
seeming to be that of biting. The Canadians swear that these are mad
wolves, and are much afraid of them.”
Another note of interest to the zoologist is this: “We saw a great
herd of cows going at full speed southward, but on coming to our
track, which goes to Salt Lake, they began to smell the ground, and
as suddenly as if they had been fired at, turned toward the mountain.
It is surprising how sagacious these animals are. When in the least
alarmed, they will smell the track of even a single person in the
grass, and run away in the contrary direction. I have seen large herds
walking very slowly to pasture, and feeding as they went, come to a
place where some persons had passed on foot, when they would instantly
stop, smell the ground, draw back a few paces, bellow, and tear up the
earth with their horns. Sometimes the whole herd would range along the
road, keeping up a terrible noise, until one of them was hardy enough
to jump over, when they would all follow, and run some distance.” On
November 8, with an Indian, Henry started in search of Indians about
Grand Forks. Although the weather had been cold and snowy, it had now
turned warm again, and they had much trouble in crossing streams and
sloughs. They went south, to what Henry’s Indian told him was the
border of the Sioux country, and old camping-grounds were pointed out,
which the Indian said were Sioux. Beaver appeared to be very numerous,
but they killed nothing, making no fire, and firing no guns, and
keeping their horses always close to them.
In describing the country passed over, Henry speaks of the Schian
River, a tributary of the Red River, which flows into it about ten
miles north of Fargo. This, he says, “takes its name from a formerly
numerous tribe of Indians who inhabited its upper part. They were a
neutral tribe between the Sioux and Saulteurs for many years, but
the latter, who are of a jealous disposition, suspected that they
favored the Sioux. A very large party having once been unsuccessful in
discovering their enemies, on their return wreaked their vengeance on
those people, destroying their village, and murdering most of them.
This happened about sixty years ago, when the Saulteurs were at war
with their natural enemies, the Sioux, of the plains, who are the only
inhabitants of St. Peter’s River. The Schians, having been nearly
exterminated, abandoned their old territory, and fled southward across
the Missouri, where they are now a wandering tribe.”
This story agrees very well with the traditions related by the
Cheyennes to-day, except that the modern stories put back these wars
with the Saulteurs much further than 1740. On November 13 Henry
reached the post again, having failed to find any of the people that
he looked for. Moreover, when he got here he received a messenger from
Langlois, one of his clerks at a trading-post at the Panbian (Pembina)
Mountains, reporting that a number of more or less turbulent Crees and
Assiniboines were gathering there, and that Henry’s presence was needed
to quiet them. Two days later he set off, stopping at Bois Percé, where
“I remained about an hour with the worthless vagabonds, who do nothing
but play at the game of platter. Nothing is heard but the noise of the
dish, and children bawling from hunger; their scoundrelly fathers are
deaf to their cries until necessity obliges them to kill a bull for
their sustenance.” On his arrival at the post, he found all his people
well, and the trouble apparently over.
The weather was now very cold. Swans were passing south in astonishing
numbers. Now the men took no more raccoons with their traps, for these
animals had begun to hibernate in the hollow trees, where they would
remain like the bears until spring, without any sustenance.
Some time before, an Indian named Crooked Legs, while drunk, had very
severely stabbed his young wife, who now, however, had perfectly
recovered. At a drinking-match, held at the post, just after Henry’s
return, this woman, in revenge, gave her old husband a cruel beating
with a stick, and afterward burned him shockingly with a brand snatched
from the fire.
Rum was constantly desired by the Indians, and was begged for on every
pretext. If a woman’s husband died, or a man’s wife, they came to Henry
to beg, or buy, rum to cheer their hearts in their sorrow. A curious
trapping incident is reported November 28. “La Rocque, Sr., came in
with his traps, with a skunk, a badger, and a large white wolf, all
three caught in the same trap at once, as he said. This was thought
extraordinary--indeed a falsehood--until he explained the affair. His
trap was made in a hollow stump, in the center of which there was a
deep hole in the ground. He found the wolf, just caught, and still
alive. He despatched him, and, on taking him out, noticed something
stirring and making a noise in the hole in the ground. Upon looking in
he perceived the badger, which he killed with a stick, and upon pulling
him out, smelt the horrid stench of the skunk, which was in one corner
of the hole. He soon despatched him also. From this the Indians all
predicted some great misfortune, either to the person to whom the traps
belonged, or to our fort.”
Two days later some of the men went raccoon hunting, the weather being
warm. “They returned in the evening with seven, which they had found in
one hollow tree. The size of this tree was enormous, having a hollow
six feet in diameter, the rim or shell being two feet thick, including
the bark. Raccoon hunting is common here in the winter season. The
hunter examines every hollow tree met with, and when he sees the fresh
marks of the claws, he makes a hole with an ax, and then opens the
hollow place, in which he lights a fire, to find out if there be any
raccoons within, as they often climb trees in the autumn, and, not
finding them proper for the purpose, leave them, and seek others. But
if they be within, the smoke obliges them to ascend and put their heads
out of the hole they enter. On observing this, the ax is applied to
the tree; with the assistance of the fire it is soon down, and the
hunter stands ready to despatch the animals while they are stunned by
the fall. But sometimes they are so obstinate as to remain at the
bottom of the hole until they are suffocated or roasted to death. The
bears, both grizzly and common black, which reside on Red River, take
to hollow trees also, and are hunted by the Indians in the same manner
as raccoons. But the bears in the Hair Hills and other places never
take to the trees for their winter quarters; they reside in holes in
the ground, in the most intricate thicket they can find, generally
under the roots of trees that have been torn up by the wind, or have
otherwise fallen. These are more difficult to find, requiring good
dogs that are naturally given to hunt bears. The reason why the bears
differ so widely in the choice of their winter habitations is obvious.
The low lands along the river, where the woods principally grow, are
every spring subject to overflow, when the ice breaks up. The mud
carried down with the current and left on the banks, makes their dens
uncomfortable. On the Hair Hills and other high lands, where the ground
is free from inundation, the soft and sandy soil is not so cold as the
stiff black mud on the banks of the river, which appears to be made
ground. Frequently, on digging holes in winter, we found the frost had
penetrated the ground nearly four feet, like one solid body of ice,
while in high, dry, sandy soil it seldom exceeds one foot in depth.”
Winter had now set in, as well by the calendar as by temperature. It
was ushered in by a great prairie fire, which seemed likely to burn
over the whole country. At first it was supposed that the Sioux had
fired the prairie, but later it appeared that the Crees had done it by
accident. These Crees reported that they had seen a calf as white as
snow in a herd of buffalo; and Henry mentions how greatly white buffalo
are esteemed among the nations of the Missouri, but that they are not
valued by the Crees and Assiniboines, except to trade to other tribes.
Occasionally buffalo are seen that are dirty gray, but these are very
rare. Christmas and New Year passed, these holidays being celebrated
by drinking, so that for New Year’s Day Henry says: “By sunrise every
soul of them was raving drunk--even the children.” Buffalo were now
seen in great abundance, and came within gun-shot of the fort. A day
or two later it was necessary to go out only a short distance from
the fort to kill buffalo, but the cold was so intense that it was
impossible to cut up those killed. On January 2 there arrived at the
fort, Berdash, a man who, as used to be not very uncommon, wore the
dress and busied himself with the occupations properly belonging to
women. He was a swift runner, and was considered the fleetest man
among the Saulteurs. “Both his speed and his courage were tested some
years ago on the Schian River, where Monsieur Reaume attempted to
make peace between the two nations, and Berdash accompanied a party
of Saulteurs to the Sioux camp. They at first appeared reconciled to
each other, at the intercession of the whites, but on the return of
the Saulteurs, the Sioux pursued them. Both parties were on foot, and
the Sioux had the name of being extraordinarily swift. The Saulteurs
imprudently dispersed in the plains, and several of them were killed,
but the party with Berdash escaped without any accident, in the
following manner: One of them had got from the Sioux a bow, but only
a few arrows. On starting and finding themselves pursued, they ran a
considerable distance, until they perceived the Sioux were gaining fast
upon them, when Berdash took the bow and arrows from his comrades,
and told them to run as fast as possible, without minding him, as he
feared no danger. He then faced the enemy, and began to let fly his
arrows. This checked their course, and they returned the compliment
with interest, but it was so far off that only a chance arrow could
have hurt him, as they had nearly spent their strength when they fell
near him. His own arrows were soon expended, but he lost no time in
gathering up those that fell near him, and thus he had a continual
supply. Seeing his friends some distance off, and the Sioux moving to
surround him, he turned and ran full speed to join his comrades, the
Sioux after him. When the latter approached too near, Berdash again
stopped and faced them, with his bow and arrows, and kept them at bay.
Thus did he continue to maneuver until they reached a spot of strong
wood, which the Sioux dared not enter. Some of the Saulteurs who were
present have often recounted the affair to me. It seemed the Sioux
from the first were inclined to treachery, being very numerous and
the others but few. The Saulteurs were well provided with guns and
ammunition, but on the first meeting were surrounded, and the guns
taken away from them, in return for which the Sioux gave them bows and
arrows; but in a manner to be of little use, giving one a bow and no
arrows, another a quiver of arrows, but no bow.”
On January 14 he was awakened by the bellowing of buffalo, and found
the plains black, and apparently in motion. An enormous herd of buffalo
surrounded the fort, and were moving northward, extending south as
far as the eye could see. “I had seen almost incredible numbers of
buffalo in the fall, but nothing in comparison to what I now beheld.
The ground was covered at every point of the compass as far as the eye
could reach, and every animal was in motion. All hands soon attacked
them with a tremendous running fire, which put them to a quicker pace,
but had no effect in altering their course. The first roads beaten in
the snow were followed by those in the rear. They passed in full speed,
until about nine o’clock, when their numbers decreased, and they kept
further off in the plains. There was about fifteen inches of snow on
a level, in some places drifted in great banks. Notwithstanding the
buffalo were so numerous, and twelve guns were employed, we killed only
three cows and one old bull, but must have wounded a great number.” The
next day the plains were still covered with buffalo, moving northward;
and this continued for a day or two. The stock of winter provisions was
now all laid in--an abundance of good, fat buffalo meat. In February
the buffalo began to get poor, as they always do at that time, and
toward the end of the month some of the men caught a cow on the ice of
the river, the dogs having surrounded her, and the men entangling her
legs in a line, so that she fell on her side; they then dragged her,
still alive, to the fort, when she jumped to her feet and ran to attack
the dogs. Two men mounted on her back, but she was as active with this
load as before, jumping and kicking at the dogs in most agile fashion.
On February 28 an Indian brought in a spring calf, which he had found
dead, an unusually early birth. The Indians declared that this meant an
early spring.
The first outarde--Canada goose--was seen March 12, and on the same day
a swan. On this day, too, it was noted that the sap of the box-elder
began to run; this yields a fine white sugar, but not so sweet as
that from the real sugar maple (_Acer_), He notes that bittersweet is
abundant along the Red River, and that the Indians eat it in time of
famine.
Now the river, on account of melting snow, began to rise, and to lift
up the ice. Henry began to get out his canoes and mend them up for the
summer use. Wildfowl made their appearance in great numbers, and on the
23rd young calves were seen by the men. And now, the ice of the river
coming down, carried with it great numbers of dead buffalo from above,
which had been drowned in crossing the river while the ice was weak.
Their numbers were astonishing. Often they were drifted to the shore,
where the women cut up some of the fattest for their own use, the
flesh seeming to be fresh and good. On the 7th of April one of his men
brought in to Henry three wolves born this spring; another had brought
in six, which he had found in one hole, and which were now very tame.
It was proposed to keep them for sledge dogs in winter.
A little later the odor of the decaying buffalo lying there along the
river was terrible. In fact, on his journey down the river with his
goods, which were now to be despatched to Montreal, the stench of the
drowned buffalo was such that Henry could not eat his supper.
At last he despatched his goods, and about the first of June left for
the Grand Portage. The proceeds of the winter’s trade amounted to
nearly two thousand pounds, Halifax currency.
[Illustration: TWO MEN MOUNTED ON HER BACK, BUT SHE WAS AS ACTIVE WITH
THIS LOAD AS BEFORE.]