Bonneville Dropped from the Army—Indian Shooters—The Mythical
Rio Buenaventura—Bonneville Twice to the Columbia—Wyeth
Again—The Oregon Trail—The Big Thunder Canoe—A Wilderness
Whiskey Still—Missionaries to Oregon—The North-West Boundary
Settlement—Decline of the Beaver—Through the Canyon of Lodore on
the Ice—Frémont, the Scientific Pathfinder—The Spanish Sentinel
Turned to the Wall—Fortune's Blindfold.
After forwarding his meagre collection of furs, Bonneville prepared to
try his luck in the Wilderness once more. Although his orders were to
avail himself of every opportunity of informing the War Department of
his position and progress, he gave this matter no attention whatever,
and without an extension of leave plunged into another year's trapping
and trading as lightly as if army orders and obligations had no
existence. His furlough he had obtained ostensibly for exploration, but,
of course, it is clear, his real object was the fur trade; exploration
was not even a secondary consideration. Had he met with Ashley's success
he might have ignored the War Department entirely. As it was, he ignored
it for the time being, and making no report, he was dropped from the
rolls.
Meanwhile, some of his plans were being executed and there was prospect
of a good harvest. He sent one large party under his first assistant
Walker, to California, though the Captain afterwards claimed the great
object of this expedition was the exploration of Salt Lake, upon which
he said his heart had been set. Walker has consequently been severely
censured for disobeying his instructions, but Chittenden declares the
Salt Lake project was an afterthought, and he seems to be right. "If
this ambitious explorer [Bonneville] were really so absorbed in his
desire to learn all about the great Salt Lake, how happened it that
he remained three years in the country and passed repeatedly within
fifty or a hundred miles of the lake but never went to see it?" he
inquires. Salt Lake was then well known, it was easy to reach, and
there was absolutely no reason why Bonneville himself should not have
gone there and explored it if he really had its examination at heart.
The conclusion is inevitable that at the time he did not consider it a
matter of great importance; yet he may have intended Walker to explore
it on the way to California.
[Illustration: Elk in Winter.
From _Wonderland _—Northern Pacific Railway.]
At any rate, Walker, with his forty men, started July 24, 1833, and,
after suffering somewhat from thirst in the region west of the lake,
abandoned it for pastures new, and falling upon the head of Mary's,
or Ogden's, River, now the Humboldt, of which he must of course have
had some previous information, he followed its more inviting valley,
and there pursued a career toward California which emulated the Forty
Thieves in the stirring story of _Ali Baba_. They were in the country
of the "Shoshokoes," some of whom took the liberty of appropriating
certain traps. One trapper who so suffered, declared he would kill
the first native he saw, innocent or guilty. He soon came upon two who
were fishing and instantly shot one and threw the body into the river.
This crime naturally caused the party to feel that they might expect
retaliation, and hence when a few days later they saw a large body of
the natives around them, they believed a battle was at hand. Thirty-two
of Walker's men thereupon surrounded about eighty of the supposed enemy
and shot them mercilessly down, leaving thirty-nine dead on the field.
"The remainder," says Leonard, who was one of the shooters, "were
overwhelmed with dismay, running into the high grass in every direction,
howling in the most lamentable manner." Farther on, Nidiver, another of
the trappers, noticing two natives running accidentally towards him and
away from Walker, supposed they had committed some crime, and shot both
with one ball.
Such was the mad progress of this triumphal band. Similar work was
being accomplished in other directions. It was about this time that the
afterwards famous mountain man Joe Meek came to the Wilderness. One day
he shot a "Digger" who was prowling about a stream where Meek had some
traps. Wyeth, who was with the party, asked why he had shot the man.
"To keep him from stealing traps," replied Meek.
"Had he stolen any?" inquired Wyeth.
"No," said Meek, "but he looked as if he war going to."
There were some men who seemed to take pleasure in shooting natives
without any reason. Captain Bidwell[97] called these "Indian shooters."
"One of the Indian shooters," he writes, "seeing an Indian on the
opposite bank of the river swam over, carrying a butcher knife in his
mouth.... The Indian ran. The man with the knife crippled him with a
stone and then killed him.... Another Indian followed later. One of the
Indian killers hid and shot him." Another time a man missed his bridle.
He swore an Indian had stolen it. "He fired at an Indian who stood by
a tree one hundred yards or so distant. The Indian fell back into the
brush and the other Indians in sight fled in terror." The bridle was
found later under some blankets in camp.
[Illustration: In the Sierra Nevada.
On the Merced—Yosemite Valley. Walker, 1833, was probably the First
White Man Here.
Copyright, C. C. Pierce & Co.]
Walker passed the sink of the Humboldt and then struck into the Sierra
Nevada. It took twenty-three days to cross and they suffered for food,
seventeen horses being used up for this purpose and seventeen others
being absolutely lost. There was no game and they finally were reduced
to almost nothing and were glad to get a basket of acorns which a
frightened native dropped. Arriving at last on the western edge they
met with rocks so steep that it was with difficulty they were able to
descend. Here they killed three deer and a bear and began to find a
less inhospitable region, although at one place they were obliged to
lower the horses by ropes over a long slope of loose rocks. On October
30, 1833, they reached the foot of the range and appear to have passed
through the now famous Yosemite Valley, perhaps the first white men to
enter it.
They were soon in Monterey where they found the people so agreeable that
they had the jolliest kind of a winter. The season passed, however,
and the time to go back came. Reluctantly they started in February,
1834, went up the San Joaquin valley with native guides, and crossed
the Sierra at a more southern point than the outward passage; by Sonora
Pass, Chittenden believes, and he is doubtless correct. Then they worked
north-east till they came to their outward trail. On the way they had
further amusement killing natives, whom they hunted down as a species
of rare game. Several Mexicans in this sport exhibited their skill at
horsemanship and lassoing by charging at full speed and throwing the
rope over the necks of the terrified runners. The noose tightening, the
victims were dragged and strangled to death. Some of the men joined a
party under a trapper named Fraeb, who hunted in the mountains of what
is now Colorado, and they ranged from the Gila to North and Middle
Parks. Walker went to the rendezvous on Bear River to settle his affairs
with Bonneville.
Walker had made a trip similar to Jedediah Smith's, but with a smaller
circuit, and it was now certain that the river Buenaventura, which
heretofore had been vaguely supposed to flow from Salt Lake or from
near it, to the Pacific, was a myth. Bonneville, in a letter written
long afterwards, claims this as one of the great results geographically
of his expedition, yet he condemns Walker for not having explored Salt
Lake, a much easier task and one which, to a certain extent, had already
been accomplished though not placed on record.
Captain Bonneville himself, when he had arranged his permanent camp the
previous autumn on the Portneuf, a branch of the Snake in south-eastern
Idaho, set out December 25, 1833, with only three companions to visit
the Columbia River region. Crossing the barren valley of Snake River
about on the route which by this time may be called the usual one, for
besides Hunt and Stuart, and recently Wyeth, the Hudson Bay Company men
often passed that way—the Oregon Trail in fact,—through a thick layer
of snow, he arrived at last, without any unpleasant encounter with the
bands of Amerinds he met, in the valley of the Grande Ronde, on the
eastern foot of the splendid Blue Mountains. This fair basin was free
from snow, and was obviously the place from which to make an extensive
and thorough reconnaissance before attempting to cross the Blue range,
whose mighty summits lay between him and the Columbia. But instead
of doing this Bonneville wandered on and presently was back on Snake
River amid a wild array of rocks and canyons, where, after desperate
ventures, he was forced to fall back. He tried to surmount the range
and failed. Farther back they tried again and butted their way across
with the usual starvation and fatigue incident to advancing without
proper investigation. At last they floundered down to a tributary of the
Snake where a solitary Nez Perce was encountered who speedily led them
to the camp of his friendly tribe. Here their troubles for the moment
were over, and Bonneville gained the chief's high favour by curing his
daughter of an illness by means of a dose of gunpowder dissolved in
water. On March 4th they reached the Columbia at Fort Walla Walla, a
post of the Hudson Bay Company, which, in the Columbia River region,
had entire control of the trade, as Bonneville, as well as Wyeth, soon
discovered. Pambrune, the agent, was cordial and treated them well
as long as they were in a measure his guests, but when they wanted
provisions with which to return he declined to sell any, on the ground
that it was not fair to his company to encourage competing traders.
He advised them to return in company with one of his men about to cross
the Blue range by the regular trail on a visit to the upper tribes of
the Nez Perces, but Bonneville declined and once more butted his way
haphazard across the great ridges, arriving at last on the Snake after
much unnecessary privation. At one point a horse approached too near
an icy precipice, and sliding down more than two thousand feet was
literally dashed to pieces, as they found on going to the spot to secure
the carcass for food. By May 12, 1834, he was again at the Portneuf,
where he found his camp removed to the Blackfoot River not far away.
[Illustration: A Wilderness Waggon Road.
Photograph by F. S. Dellenbaugh.]
Not satisfied with this trip to the Columbia, Bonneville again started
for that river on July 3, 1834, with twenty-three men. He had not been
on the way a week, before he received word that the indefatigable Wyeth
was at his heels, also bound for the lower Columbia. About the same
time a Hudson Bay Company party appeared, so the prospects for company
were too good to suit the objects of the Captain. The Oregon Trail was
rapidly becoming popular in spite of its hardships, and perhaps Wyeth's
enthusiasm did as much as any other single factor to advertise this
great road to the Oregon country.
Wyeth was again on his way to put into execution his vast scheme
to combine fur trading with salmon fishing, for the benefit of his
"Columbia River Fishing and Trading Company." He had with him sixty
men, veterans of the mountains many of them, and two naturalists,
Thomas Nuttall, the same who had gone up the Missouri with Hunt, and J.
K. Townshend, an ornithologist. There were also several missionaries
under Jason and Daniel Lee. Wyeth had made a contract the previous
year to bring out a quantity of goods for the Rocky Mountain Company,
but the managers repudiated their obligation. When he arrived on the
Portneuf he built a trading-post to utilise these goods, and called it
Fort Hall. A flag, made of unbleached sheeting, red flannel, and some
blue patches, was raised above the fort, and twelve men well armed were
installed there. Wyeth reached the Columbia in good order, and there
made another post on Wapatoo Island, but though his ideas were practical
and deserved success, he met with disasters and the Hudson Bay people
had such complete control of the whole Oregon country that, while his
personal relations with them were cordial, he finally gave up, sold
out, and returned to Fort Hall, which he also sold to the Hudson Bay
Company. Thence by way of Taos and the Arkansas, he went back to Boston,
arriving home in the autumn of 1836. He had conducted all his affairs
with admirable skill, intelligence, and perseverance, but in business
the Hudson Bay Company was a rock, and he was crushed against it.
Bonneville went on down the Snake and over the Blue range to Fort Walla
Walla, being much impeded in the mountains by a vast conflagration which
made the air dark with smoke and added a new danger to the difficulties
of the great mountains in his path. But his efforts to start trade on
the Columbia were foredoomed to failure by the power of the Hudson Bay
Company. This company had revived old Astoria in 1830, they had Fort
Vancouver, Fort Walla Walla, and others, covering every branch of the
trade, and the natives were loyal. Bonneville found it impossible to
buy anywhere the simplest articles or food of any kind. The Hudson Bay
Company was tolerably fair and just with the Amerind and he appreciated
this kind of treatment. At Fort Walla Walla Bonneville's effort to
buy food met with the same repulse from the manager as on the former
occasion. He therefore could but retrace his steps to Bear River Valley
where he passed the winter of 1834-35.
In the summer of 1835 he met his parties on Wind River and, adjusting
the accounts, started for the settlements, where he arrived on August
22d, his great enterprise over with very meagre results to show. As a
trading venture it was a dire failure. As a geographical exploration it
had little that was new to present. The maps Bonneville made were partly
copied from Gallatin and others. Yet when all that is against him is
admitted, he remains a dominating figure of the time, a high light in
the picture of breaking the Wilderness. His name, which he applied to
Salt Lake, has by geologists been given, as mentioned, to the ancient
sea which once lashed the Rocky Mountains with its waves, so that in
geology, in geography, in history, and in literature, it is permanently
fixed.
"As a soldier by education and profession," says Chittenden, "Captain
Bonneville committed an unpardonable breach of discipline in overstaying
his leave of absence. It was more than a simple lapse of duty, it was an
act of ingratitude to his superiors, considering their great indulgence
in granting him so long a leave." By special order of President Jackson
he was finally reinstated. He served in the Seminole and in the Mexican
wars and was made Brevet Brigadier-General. He bought a farm at Fort
Smith, Arkansas, and there, after 1865, ended his days, dying June 12,
1878, at the ripe age of eighty-two.
[Illustration: Steamer "Yellowstone" Ascending the Missouri in 1833.
From _Travels_, etc., 1832-3-4, by Maximilian, Prince of Wied, 1843.
From _Wonderland _, 1904—Northern Pacific Railway.]
The year after Bonneville went out to the mountains (1833), a
distinguished foreigner, Maximilian, Prince of Wied, made the journey up
the Missouri[98] with Kenneth McKenzie, on the steamboat _Yellowstone_
to Fort Pierre and thence to Fort Union on the new _Assiniboine_. The
_Yellowstone_ was a boat with the distinction of having been the first
steamboat to go above Council Bluffs. In 1831 she was taken to Fort
Tecumseh, a little above where Pierre, South Dakota, now stands (named
from Fort Pierre, which was named for Pierre Chouteau, Jr.), and in
1832 went as far as the mouth of the Yellowstone. On board at this time
was Catlin, the artist whose paintings of Amerinds and whose extensive
travels through the Wilderness have made him forever famous.[99] The
natives called the boat the "Big Thunder Canoe," and the "Big Medicine
Canoe with Eyes." It was an object of wonder with them for a time, but
they soon accepted in a matter-of-fact way the new things the whites
brought to them. The steamboat on the Missouri was a great boon to
the traders and fur companies as it enabled goods to be taken into the
North-west with far greater ease and consequently at less price. There
was much rivalry among the companies as heretofore. New ones were formed
and the competition was great. All sorts of methods were adopted, many
of them questionable, often dishonourable, to secure advantage. As
whiskey was prohibited by the Government, and a rigid examination was
made of every ascending boat, there were many schemes for smuggling it;
for every trader used it, if he could, in his dealings with the natives.
It was the most profitable medium of exchange, and by means of it a
tribe could be literally skinned for a song. The traders were there to
take every advantage of the natives, and, except the Hudson Bay Company,
they hesitated at nothing that would bring them money. They would have
been perfectly willing to exterminate the whole Amerind population in
twenty-four hours if they could have done it with great profit. In other
words, their sole care was to fleece the native for a company's benefit.
The beaver by 1835 were beginning to be alarmingly scarce and attention
was turned more and more to buffalo robes and other furs, but there was
yet much money to be made in this field.
McKenzie set up a whiskey still at Fort Union, to get ahead of the
inspectors. Ramsay Crooks, who had long been prominent in the American
Fur Company, opposed the scheme, fearing trouble with the Government,
and he was right, but it was put in operation. Wyeth and Cerré, passing
Fort Union, learned of it and reported to the Government, and William
Clark, of Lewis and Clark, who was still superintendent for the Western
tribes, was instructed to stop it. The matter was finally allowed to
pass without punishment, but it came near bringing the American Fur
Company to disaster. The persistence with which the respectable fur
companies forced whiskey into the Wilderness and debauched the tribes
there, in spite of every effort of the Government to prevent it, is a
permanent disgrace to these companies and to their managers, every one
of whom, from chief down, knew that the wealth they were accumulating
by it was largely a swindle, and meant the impoverishment and wrecking
of the people of the Wilderness. It was bad enough to charge the
poor natives outrageous prices for cheap articles, but deliberately
to intoxicate them for profit can never be considered anything but
dishonour for every man, high and low, who permitted it to go on without
hindrance or protest, or who abetted it, and received the money from
such base sources.
Famous travellers now went for a turn in the Wilderness, though most of
them contented themselves with the part east of the Rocky Mountains.
Among these was Washington Irving, in 1832, with several congenial
spirits, one of whom was Charles Latrobe, an Englishman, who wrote an
interesting book. This adventure of Irving was of value afterwards when
he came to write _Astoria_ and _Bonneville_, albeit it was brief. He saw
the buffalo, however, and, as described, experienced the excitement of
the chase. Francis Parkman, at a later time, followed Irving's example,
and then gathered notes for his _Oregon Trail_.
Various American and English sportsmen also sought this fascinating
field, but this volume is too small to record the doings of the great
numbers who now began to swarm into the Wilderness. Many of them have
written valuable books which may be found in all good libraries.[100]
The missionaries began to turn more attention to the Oregon country,
and in 1836 Samuel Parker was sent by the Presbyterians to that region.
He took with him a medical man, Doctor Marcus Whitman, and these two
were practically the breakers of the Oregon Trail for the gentler side
of civilisation. They went out as far as the Black Hills under the
guidance of the veteran trapper Fontenelle, a man as widely known as
Fitzpatrick, Sublette, or any of the other prominent mountain men of
the time. Fitzpatrick himself escorted them on to Green River. Whitman
was able to give medical attention to many of those in the Wilderness,
and he seems to have been the first American doctor, or indeed the first
doctor of any nationality, who ventured there. In Green River Valley he
took from the back of Bridger an iron arrow-head, which had been there
three years. It was the custom of the mountaineers to do their own
surgery. Sometimes it was successful, as in the case of Pegleg Smith,
sometimes the patient did not survive the camp operation more than a day
or two. Sometimes they let "well enough alone," as in Bridger's case,
who allowed the arrow-head to remain. No anæsthetic was thought of at
that time, and Whitman performed the operation under the admiring gaze
of a crowd of natives and whites, while Bridger never winced. Another
arrow-head was taken from under the shoulder of a hunter, where it had
been for two and a half years.
Whitman became so much interested in the missionary side of the
prospective Oregon work that he returned from Green River to secure
more help, leaving Parker to continue. Parker says of the trappers:
"Their demoralising influence with the Indians has been lamentable, and
they have imposed upon them in all the ways that sinful propensity can
dictate. It is said they have sold them packs of cards at high prices,
calling them the Bible."
Of the rendezvous he remarks:
"These days are the climax of the hunter's happiness.... A
hunter who goes technically by the name of the great bully of the
mountains mounted his horse with a loaded rifle and challenged any
Frenchman, American, Spaniard, or Dutchman, to fight him in single
combat. Kit Carson, an American, told him if he wished to die he
would accept the challenge. Shunar defied him. Carson mounted his
horse and with a loaded pistol rushed into close contact, and both
almost at the same instant fired. Carson's ball entered Shunar's
hand, came out at the wrist, and passed through the arm above the
elbow. Shunar's ball passed over the head of Carson, and while
he went for another pistol Shunar begged that his life might be
spared. Such scenes, sometimes from passion and sometimes for
amusement, make the pastime of their wild and wandering life."
[Illustration: Before the Sawmill Comes.
Photograph by F. S. Dellenbaugh.]
Parker reached Oregon safely, while Whitman was making the eastward
journey. On reaching New England, Whitman, who was only thirty-two,
married. With his wife and another newly married couple, the Reverend
H. H. Spalding and wife, he set out once more for Oregon, with the
settlement of which his name was now to become forever associated, even
to the extent of being called the "Saviour of Oregon."[101] It must be
remembered that the British Hudson Bay Company still maintained almost
complete control of the Oregon country, notwithstanding the provision
made by the two Governments that the region was to be free to both
nations. It was free nominally, but, as has been seen in the case of
Bonneville and in that of Wyeth, as well as other Americans, the freedom
was a mere form. American trappers could pass through the country
without direct molestation, but it was an impossibility for them to
accomplish anything there. As the fifth decade of the century opened,
the question of boundary so long left in the air became pressing. The
time set for adjustment had arrived. It was particularly in relation
to this that it is said Whitman made a winter journey to Washington by
way of Santa Fé in 1842-43. During his absence the natives grew more
insolent. Mrs. Whitman was obliged to flee to the Methodist mission
for protection. The natives were also suspicious of the missionaries:
the latter often held themselves superior to the trappers who would
have been their best friends; and the Hudson Bay Company continued its
opposition to American settlement. A troublous condition all round was
the result. A horrible massacre by the Cayuses finally took place at
the Whitman mission, November 28, 1847, eleven years after the Doctor
began his enthusiastic work for Oregon. Doctor and Mrs. Whitman with
many others were most cruelly murdered, some of the chief criminals
being those whom they had often befriended.
Doctor McLoughlin, the Hudson Bay Company governor, while refusing aid
to Americans, came to have much sympathy for, and was later accused
by the managers of the great corporation of having promoted, American
settlement. He was even charged an enormous sum as damages the Company
had suffered in consequence of the course of action of which he was
accused. He resigned, settled himself in Oregon, and eventually became
an American citizen. The British desired an adjustment of the boundary
by following the course of the Columbia River, but this was not accepted
by the United States, and it was not till 1848 that the line was
placed permanently where it now is; a continuation of the line on the
forty-ninth parallel, which had been adopted east of the mountains long
before.
[Illustration: The Great or Lower Fall of the Yellowstone.
From _Wonderland _, 1904.—Northern Pacific Railway.]
One of the trappers intimately connected with the development of Oregon
was Joe Meek, who had ranged the Wilderness for many years. He was
possessed of a full share of the qualities which abounded in men like
Jedediah Smith, Sublette, Bridger, and others of that type, and was
seldom taken unawares. One anecdote will exhibit his temper and at
the same time present a picture of the dangerous circumstances which
sometimes surrounded such men and over which they triumphed. Meek was
captured by a party of Crows in the Yellowstone country. His captors
numbered 187 men, nine boys, and three women. Meek calmly counted them
while they were discussing his case. At last the chief, called "The
Bold," said to him: "I have known the whites for a long time and I know
them to be great liars, deserving death, but if you will tell the truth
you shall live. Tell me where are the whites you belong to; and what is
your captain's name." Meek replied that his captain was Bridger, and to
an inquiry as to the number of men Bridger had, he answered forty, which
was a lie, as Bridger had six times that number. The Bold laughed and
said: "We will make them poor, and you shall live, but they shall die."
For four days they travelled to attack Bridger, and Meek was forced to
do the menial work of the camp under the ridicule of the squaws.
"On the afternoon of the fourth day," he says, "the spies, who war
in advance, looking out from a high hill, made a sign to the main
party. In a moment all sat down. I war as well up in Indian signs
as they war; and I knew they had discovered white men. What war
worse, I knew that they would soon discover that I had been lying
to them. All I had to do then war to trust to luck. Soon we came to
the top of the hill which overlooked the Yellowstone, from which I
could see the plains below extending as far as the eye could reach,
and about three miles off, the camp of my friends. My heart beat
double quick about that time and I once in a while put my hand to
my head, to feel if my scalp war thar. While I war watching our
camp, I discovered that the horse guard had seen us, for I knew the
sign he would make if he discovered Indians. I thought the camp a
splendid sight that evening. It made a powerful show to me, who did
not expect ever to see it after that day. And it war a fine sight
anyhow from the hill where I stood. About two hundred and fifty
men, and women and children in great numbers, and about a thousand
horses and mules. Then the beautiful plain and the sinking sun;
and the herds of buffalo that could not be numbered; and the cedar
hills covered with elk,—I never saw so fine a sight as that looked
to me then! When I turned my eyes on that savage Crow band, and
saw the chief standing with his hand on his mouth,[102] lost in
amazement, and beheld the warriors' tomahawks and spears glittering
in the sun, my heart was very little. Directly the chief turned to
me with a horrible scowl. Said he: 'I promised that you should live
if you told the truth; but you have told me a great lie.' Then the
warriors gathered round with their tomahawks in their hands."
[Illustration: Jim Bridger in his Latter Days.
Photograph from Montana Historical Society.]
Bridger's horse guard now approached to drive in the horses. The Crow
chief ordered Meek to tell him to come up, but instead Meek shouted for
him to keep away and to tell Bridger to try to treat with them. In a
little while Bridger came on a large white horse to within three hundred
yards and asked for a council. Little Gun, the second chief, finally was
ordered to go and smoke with Bridger, while the whole band prepared for
war. When Little Gun and Bridger were within about a hundred yards of
each other they halted and stripped, according to Crow rules, proceeding
the remaining distance in a nude state, to kiss and embrace. Meanwhile
five of Bridger's men crept along in a dry ravine and were able to cut
off Little Gun from his friends. Now there was a great commotion among
the Crows. At this moment about a hundred of Bridger's men came up and
he called to Meek to propose an exchange of himself for Little Gun. To
this the chief sullenly consented, remarking that he could not afford to
give a chief for one white dog's scalp. Meek thereupon was allowed to go
toward his friends as Little Gun approached his, and in a few moments
the exchange was accomplished. That same evening, the head chief with
forty of his men visited Bridger's camp and made a treaty of peace to
endure three months, in order that they might join together to fight the
Blackfeet. They gave Meek his mule, gun, and beaver packs, and told him
his name should henceforth be Shiam Shaspusia, as he could outlie the
Crows.
The growing scarcity of beaver toward the end of the thirties threw
many trappers out of work. The fur companies disbanded, and the men were
left in the mountains not knowing what to do. They therefore scattered
in small bands in search of profit and adventure. Meek was in Brown's
Hole in the winter, about this time, at Fort Davy Crockett. It will
be remembered that Ashley had come through Flaming Gorge, etc., and
Red Canyon from Green River Valley, and went out to Salt Lake from
Brown's Hole. Meek joined a party to go down on the ice through the
next canyon, now called Lodore. The entrance to this gorge is very
abrupt and magnificent, the rocks rising suddenly and sheer to a height
of over two thousand feet, forming a monster gateway which can be seen
for miles out in the valley. Into this gateway, Meek and his companions
entered, doubtless the first whites ever to go far within the solemn
chasm. He says they travelled nearly a hundred miles down this "awful
canyon without finding but one place where they could have come out,
and left it at last at the mouth of the Uintee." That is, they went
through Lodore, about twenty-one miles, Echo Park, one mile, Whirlpool
Canyon, about fifteen miles, Island Park, nine miles, and Split
Mountain Canyon, eight miles, or in all a distance through canyons of
about fifty-four miles. The remainder of their journey was in the open
Wonsits Valley. The place where they thought they could have come out
was Island Park, which is a small valley enclosed on the west only by
slopes of the Uintas. There are also other places but more difficult.
About ten years later a party attempted the descent in boats through
this particular series of canyons and was wrecked in Lodore. The descent
in Lodore is 420 feet, and, in the distance that the Meek party went
on the ice, about 750 feet. A band of Catholic missionaries, according
to Farnham,[103] attempted the descent of the Colorado, presumably from
the point where the trail to Los Angeles crossed Grand or Green River.
They were never heard of again. The name "Julien—1836" is cut in three
places on the canyon walls, one in what is called Labyrinth Canyon,
one near the foot of Cataract Canyon, and another near the head of the
same canyon. So far as the records known to me go, the canyons below
Lodore remained absolute wilderness till 1869, unless this Julien passed
through Cataract, as is suggested by the occurrence of his name.
[Illustration: Green River from Green River Valley to Wonsits Valley.
The Uinta range extends across from left to right. The canyons through
its eastern flank are shown by the very dark portions. Brown's Park
lies between two series. The first, or upper, series was traversed
in 1825 by Ashley; the second, by Meek and party on the ice in 1838;
partially by an unknown band about 1850; and all of the canyons finally
by Powell in 1869, clear down to the Virgin River.]
A trapper made famous by Ruxton's romantic account[104] of his doings
was La Bonté. The Arapahos having killed four trappers and run off with
La Bonté's animals, he and his partner, Killbuck, were after them. They
discovered the camp where the scalps of the trappers were stuck on
a spear in the centre of the circle. While spying out the situation,
one of the mules perceived them and gave forth a whinny. La Bonté and
Killbuck immediately fired killing two Arapahos, whereupon the three
survivors rushed upon them with loud yells. The trappers, "drawing their
pistols, charged at once, and although the bows twanged and the three
arrows struck their mark, on they rushed, discharging their pistols at
close quarters. La Bonté threw his empty one at the head of an Indian
who was pulling his second arrow to its head at a yard's distance, drew
his knife at the same moment and made at him. But the Indian broke and
ran, followed by his surviving companion; and as soon as Killbuck could
ram home another ball he sent a shot flying after them as they scrambled
up the mountain side, leaving, in their fright and hurry, their bows
and shields on the ground."
La Bonté now pulled an arrow out of his arm, while Killbuck took his
whetstone from the little sheath on his belt and put an edge on his
knife. Then, examining the first body to see if any life remained, and
finding the man dead, he proceeded to the business of scalping.
"Seizing with his left hand the long braided lock on the centre of
the Indian's head, he passed the point edge of his keen butcher
knife round the parting, turning it at the same time under the
skin to separate the scalp from the skull, then with a quick,
sudden jerk of his hand he removed it entirely from the head, and
giving the reeking trophy a wring upon the grass to free it from
the blood, he coolly hitched it under his belt and proceeded to
the next; but seeing La Bonté operating upon this, he sought the
third, who lay some little distance from the others. This one was
still alive, a pistol ball having passed through his body without
touching a vital spot.... Thrusting his knife for mercy's sake into
the bosom of the Indian, he likewise tore the scalp lock from his
head and placed it with the other."
[Illustration: Snow-bound in the Wilderness—1875.
Pencil sketch on the spot by F. S. Dellenbaugh.]
Killbuck up to this moment had been walking about with an arrow through
his thigh. The point being near the surface on the other side, he pushed
it entirely through, and cut the head off below the barb, after which
he could pull the shaft out. A tourniquet of buckskin soon stopped the
bleeding, and he "brought in his old mule, lavishing many a caress and
most comical terms of endearment upon the faithful companion of his
wanderings." After a hasty meal on the venison which the Amerinds had
been cooking, they hurried away from the locality to a camp of Utes.
The latter were enemies of the Arapahos, and when La Bonté told them
the Arapahos were coming the whole village was speedily in commotion:
the squaws began to lament and tear their hair; the warriors, to paint
and arm themselves. A band of a hundred soon left for the field, and
La Bonté and Killbuck would have gone too, but the chiefs forbade this,
as their wounds were stiff and painful and they were well worn out. So
buffalo robes were placed in a warm roomy lodge and they were left to
rest and recuperate.
On the Mexican frontier trouble had for some time been brewing
concerning the status of Texas in the Mexican political arrangement.
The Texans, who were now mainly Americans, having followed the lead of
Austin, desired to have Texas a sovereign Mexican state, but a military
government was proposed by the Mexicans and a revolt occurred in 1835,
which resulted in a proclamation of entire independence, March 2, 1836.
The Texans triumphed the same year under Houston at the battle of San
Jacinto. The western boundary was laid without any just reason along
the Rio Grande from its mouth to the source and thence due north to the
forty-second parallel; but the Mexicans refused to consider any line
beyond the Nueces River, when the independence of Texas was finally
allowed. Therefore the boundary on the Rio Grande never having been
agreed to by the owner of the soil, Mexico, it has no rightful place on
any map. It never had any existence, and as it is usually given without
qualification on historical maps, it is entirely misleading.
[Illustration: Canyon of Lodore—Green River.
The first on record to go through this and the canyons immediately
below it—that is, from Brown's Park to Wonsits Valley—was Joe Meek,
and a party of trappers, on the ice in the winter of 1838-39.
Photograph by E. O. Beaman, U. S. Colo. Riv. Exp.]
In the troublous times which now for a period fell upon the Wilderness,
a new figure comes to the front and dominates the epoch with a force
that resulted in attaching his name to it forever and at the same time
in rousing a great amount of opposition and condemnation. This was John
C. Frémont, called the Pathfinder, though, as the reader perceives
from the preceding pages, the main paths had long before been found.
Nevertheless, Frémont was the first of his kind—the first to follow
paths for the sake of the paths themselves—the first to record them
properly—the first who looked at the Wilderness beyond the peaks of
the Rockies with sole reference to the geographical problems that might
lie there—the first to pay attention to the botany and geology. He has
been ridiculed for likening himself when looking down on Salt Lake,
to Balboa but the injustice of this is apparent when we find that he
did not compare himself to the Spanish explorer, but merely said he
was "doubtful if the followers of Balboa felt more enthusiasm" when
they saw the Pacific for the first time. Frémont, as a lieutenant, and
about twenty-five, began his work with Nicollet on the Mississippi and
the Missouri in 1838-40. In Washington he met Senator Benton; and also
his daughter, Jessie, whom he married in 1841. In 1842 he was selected
to explore the region of South Pass and on this journey he climbed
the peak named for him,—the highest of the Wind River Mountains. In
1843 he was out again, remaining fourteen months, with a large party
of frontiersmen. He made a third journey in 1845-47, resigning from
the army on his return. His fourth, last, and disastrous trip was in
1848. In his several expeditions he went to Oregon by the Bear River,
Fort Hall, and Snake River route; to Klamath and Pyramid lakes; to San
Joaquin Valley; to southern California; back over the Jedediah Smith
(outward) trail from Salt Lake; crossed the Rocky Mountains and Green
River from Utah Lake, and so back and forth in a number of directions.
[Illustration: A Chance Meeting.
Photograph by F. S. Dellenbaugh.]
In 1845 Texas was admitted into the Union as a State. President Polk,
on what ground is not apparent, agreed with the Texans that the western
limit of their domain was certainly the Rio Grande. He might as well
then and there have agreed that it was the Pacific. General Taylor was
ordered to occupy the region west of the Nueces and he pushed on to the
Rio Grande. There was nothing left for the Mexicans to do but fight, and
this they accordingly did. Scott was ordered with his army to Mexico,
Kearney to New Mexico and California. Santa Fé was easily captured in
1846, and the navy speedily took the California coast towns. Frémont
being in California engaged actively in the insurrection there, and was
much censured for what he did. The Mexicans were vanquished. In 1848 a
treaty was entered into between them and the United States, by which
in consideration of $15,000,000, and the United States assuming all
claims, New Mexico and California were ceded to the Americans—that is,
all below the forty-second parallel to the Gila and the Rio Grande. The
latter river now was admitted to be the western boundary of Texas; a
boundary afterwards adjusted with the Federal Government. The Mexicans
were left with nothing north of the Gila; the British with nothing south
of the forty-ninth parallel, west of the Mississippi. The immense area
which once had formed the basis of so many broad and indefinite claims
was now held by a nation which had no being when the European countries
began their wrangling over this splendid domain. From Atlantic to
Pacific, from the Lake of the Woods to the Rio Grande, one power was in
control, and that power the very youngest in all the world. The American
nation had secured for itself the most fertile, most diversified, and
altogether the finest and richest area on the entire globe. The Spanish
sentinel had been turned with his face to the wall; the British sentinel
was equally overwhelmed; the natives were cheerfully poisoned with cheap
whiskey; and it was now only a question of settlement and communication
between the widely separated parts of the Republic.
The beaver was gone. Buffalo robes formed the bulk of the fur trade.
Even the buffalo were diminishing in numbers. It seemed as if little
incentive remained to lead people to brave the discomforts and dangers
of the western Wilderness. It appeared as if the young Republic for
centuries to come would have a wilderness on its hands.
But under the very feet of the trapper struggling to earn his small
wage by exterminating the beaver, rich metals were hidden; and Fortune
was almost ready to remove the blindfold, and lure the next set of
Wilderness breakers into the field.
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES:
[97] _Early California Reminiscences_, by General John Bidwell, in
_Out West Magazine_, March, 1904, p. 286.
[98] _Travels in the Interior of North America_, by Maximilian,
Prince of Wied, translated from the German by H. Evans Lloyd.
[99] See Catlin's _Eight Years_.
[100] In the works of H. H. Bancroft may be found lists of books
on the Wilderness.
[101] _How Marcus Whitman Saved Oregon_, by O. W. Nixon. It is
now stated that the importance ascribed to Whitman's labours is
exaggerated, and that he had little to do with "saving" Oregon.
[102] The method of expressing astonishment was to cover the mouth
with one hand.
[103] _Travels in the Great Western Prairies_, etc., by Thomas J.
Farnham.
[104] _Life in the Far West_, by George Frederick Ruxton.
[Illustration]