about twenty miles west of Fort Gilpin to go to some timber near a
point then called Dry Fork, now called Big Dry. I took the lead and
Chambers brought up the rear. Soon I heard a dog barking, saw a dim
light in the distance and in front of us, I concluded at once we were
running into a nest of Indians. I gave Chambers the danger signal (a
smothered whistle sound); this he returned, and, turning around, we
retraced our route back to the hills and then made a circle around the
Indians undiscovered by them, arriving at Fort Gilpin just at daybreak.
While at breakfast, soon afterwards we heard the report of a cannon,
and knew at once that our boat was near by; that the men on board were
attacked by Indians, and that a fight was on. The very Indians that
Chambers and myself avoided were at that time in hiding, waiting to
capture this boatload of goods. As we subsequently learned they got
these goods without much fighting, and, of course, all the blame for
the loss of them was thrown on me, by the owners, just because I did
not do as instructed or as was expected of me, which was to stay with
the goods. It seems the party was attacked while moving along in the
boat and the men ran it to land, took the cannon out and fired one
shot at the redskins, then ran to the brush near by. The Indians,
being satisfied with their capture of the goods, did not follow them,
and they reached the fort unharmed, except a few scratches received
in the scramble to get away from danger. I remember we all stood at
the gate watching eagerly to learn the outcome of the fight, when,
suddenly, a man came out of the willows; he was hatless and his hair
stood pompadour, one foot shoeless and his clothes torn in strips. This
was Colonel Spikes; following him came the six others before mentioned.
They reported that a large party of Indians, probably a hundred and
fifty strong, had attacked them with results as stated above. Our
force was too small to go out and fight them, so we stayed in the fort
until they left. We then went out and found that all there was left of
seventeen thousand dollars’ worth of goods was the cannon. The Indians
had taken away, and otherwise destroyed, everything else. The robes
and furs were thrown into the river and the other goods carried away.
Major Dawson was coming up along the river from Fort Berthold with an
extra wagon train of goods bound for Fort Benton. Chambers and myself
went out and met him, and Chambers informed him of the loss of the
goods. Dawson looked at me and said: “Where in hell were you, John?” I
explained to him that I was compelled to bring the horses, as no one
else would do it. He said: “That accounts for the loss of seventeen
thousand dollars’ worth of goods and not a man killed,” and he added:
“If you had stayed with the goods they would not have been lost.”
We joined the men with the train here and went up the Milk river part
of the way, thence to Fort Benton. This was about the last days of
October, 1864. We had many Indian encounters on our way up to Benton,
but reached there in safety. I stayed here about fifteen days, and then
pulled out for Virginia City. This was a long trip to make, taken in
the winter as it was, and at a time when the road agents were bad, a
description of which would make interesting reading, but this was to be
a short sketch of my first days in Montana, so I must quit.
Your friend,
JOHN LARGENT.
Sun River, May 10, 1899.
* * * * *
There are not many men in the state that I am more familiar with than
John Largent, having been neighbors for nearly thirty years. He is six
feet two inches in height, raw-boned, and of sanguine temperament.
Though he is over sixty years of age, he has a good head of hair and
not a single gray one. He is a Virginian by birth.
It is easy for those that know him to understand why the American Fur
company depended upon and trusted so much to John Largent. It was
because he was always honest, trustworthy, had good judgment to carry
out the part of the work assigned him, and could stand any amount
of fatigue, besides he feared nothing. In his earlier days he was
a remarkably good shot with the rifle; few men equaled him in this
respect. He became versed in the language of most of the northern
tribes of Indians, and was feared and respected by them. It was a fact
that many of the young warriors feared him because he was so remarkably
quick and accurate with his old “Kentucky rifle.”
ROBERT VAUGHN.
Great Falls, May 15, 1899.
A VISIT TO FORT BENTON.
It was in the early seventies I visited Fort Benton, the town at the
head of navigation of the Missouri river. It was a busy place then, for
it was in the summer and during the boating season, and the time the
traders were bringing their collections of robes, pelts and furs, and
shipping them, principally to Sioux City and St. Louis. Fort Benton, no
doubt, is the oldest town in Montana. It was built in 1846 by Alexander
Culbertson, who was at the head of a fur trading company. The buildings
were occupied by this company for many years. It was two hundred and
fifty feet square and built of adobe. At one time since then it was
occupied by the military; parts of the walls still stand (1898).
In the volume for 1876 of the Historical Society of Montana there is
a very interesting sketch of the fur traders and trading posts under
the title of “Adventures on the Upper Missouri,” in which Fort Benton
is spoken of. This sketch was written by the late James Stuart, after
obtaining his information from the best authorities. I cannot think of
anything more interesting or more appropriate at this time than to give
the following extracts from Mr. Stuart’s writings:
“Fort Union was the first fort built on the Missouri river, which is
above the mouth of the Yellowstone. In the summer of 1829 Kenneth
McKenzie, a trader from the upper Mississippi, near where St. Paul,
Minnesota, is now located, with a party of fifty men came across to the
upper Missouri river looking for a good place to establish a trading
post for the American Fur Company. (McKenzie was a member of that
company.) They selected a site a short distance above the mouth of
the Yellowstone river, on the north bank of the Missouri, and built
a stockade two hundred feet square of logs, about twelve inches in
diameter and twelve feet long, set perpendicularly, putting the lower
end two feet in the ground, with two block-house bastions on diagonal
corners of the stockade, twelve feet square and twenty feet high,
pierced with loop holes. The dwelling house, warehouses and store were
built inside, but not joining the stockade, leaving a space of about
four feet between the walls of the buildings and the stockade. All
the buildings were covered with earth, as a protection against fire
by incendiary Indians. There was only one entrance to the stockade--a
large double-leaved gate, about twelve feet from post to post, with a
small gate three and a half by five feet long, in one of the leaves of
the main gate, which was the one mostly used, the large gate being only
opened occasionally when there were no Indians in the vicinity of the
fort. The houses, warehouses and store were all built about the same
height as the stockade. The above description, with the exception of
the area enclosed by the stockade, will describe nearly all the forts
built by traders on the Missouri river from St. Louis to the headwaters.
“The fort was built to trade with the Assinnaboines, who were a large
tribe of Indians ranging from White Earth river, on the north side of
the Missouri, to the mouth of Milk river, and north into the British
possessions.
“In 1832 the first steamboat named the ‘Yellowstone,’ arrived at
Fort Union. From that time, every spring, the goods were brought up
by steamboats, but the robes, peltries, etc., were shipped from the
fort every spring by Mackinaws to St. Louis. In the winter of 1830
McKenzie, desirous of establishing a trade with the Blackfeet and Gros
Ventres (the Minatarees of Lewis and Clarke), sent a party of four
men--Burger, Dacoteau, Morceau, and one other man in search of the
Indians and to see if there was sufficient inducement to establish a
trading post. The party started up the Missouri river with dog sleds
to haul a few presents for the Indians. They followed the Missouri
to the mouth of the Marias river, thence up the Marias to the mouth
of Badger creek, without seeing an Indian, finding plenty of game of
all kinds and plenty of beaver in all the streams running into the
Missouri. Every night when they camped they hoisted the American flag,
so that if they were seen by any Indians during the night they would
know it was a white man’s camp; and it was very fortunate for them
that they had a flag to use in that manner, for the night they camped
at Badger creek they were discovered by a war party of Blackfeet who
surrounded them during the night, and, as they were about firing on
the camp, they discovered the flag and did not fire, but took the
party prisoners. A part of the Indians wanted to kill the whites and
take what the party had, but through the exertions and influence of a
chief named ‘Good Woman,’ they were not molested in person or property,
but went in safety to the Blackfoot camp on Belly river and stayed
with the camp until spring. During the winter they explained their
business, and prevailed upon about one hundred Blackfeet to go with
them to Fort Union to see McKenzie. They arrived at Fort Union about
the 1st of April, 1831, and McKenzie got their consent to build a
trading post at the mouth of the Marias. The Indians stayed about one
month, then started home to tell the news to their people. McKenzie
then started James Kipp, with seventy-five men and an outfit of Indian
goods, to build a fort at the mouth of the Marias river, and he had
the fort completed before the winter of 1831. It was only a temporary
arrangement in winter, in order to find out whether it would pay to
establish a permanent post. Next spring Colonel Mitchell (afterwards
colonel in Doniphan’s expedition to Mexico) built some cabins on Brule
bottom to live in until a good fort could be built. The houses at
the mouth of the Marias were burned after the company moved to Brule
bottom. Alexander Culbertson was sent by McKenzie to relieve Mitchell
and to build a picket stockade two hundred feet square on the north
bank of the Missouri river, which he completed during the summer and
fall of 1832. This fort was occupied for eleven years, until Fort Lewis
was built by Culbertson on the south side of the Missouri river, near
Pablois Island, in the summer of 1844. Fort Brule was then abandoned
and burned. In 1846 Fort Lewis was abandoned, and Fort Benton was built
by Culbertson, about seven miles below Fort Lewis, on the north bank
of the Missouri river. It was 250 feet square, built of adobe laid
upon the ground without any foundation of stone, and is now standing
(1875) and occupied as a military post. The dwellings, warehouses,
stores, etc., were all built of adobes. The Piegans, Blackfeet and
Blood Indians, all talking the same language, claimed and occupied the
country from the Missouri river to the Saskatchewan river. Prior to the
building of the winter quarters at the mouth of the Marias, they had
always traded with the Hudson Bay Company and the American Fur Company.
The Hudson Bay Company often sent men to induce the confederated
Blackfeet to go north and trade, and the Indians said they were offered
large rewards to kill all the traders on the Missouri river and destroy
the trading posts. McKenzie wrote to Governor Bird, the head man of
the Hudson Bay Company in the north, in regard to the matter, and Bird
wrote back to McKenzie, saying: ‘When you know the Blackfeet as well
as I do, you will know that they do not need any inducements to commit
depredations.’
“In 1832 McKenzie sent Tollock, with forty men, to build a fort at the
mouth of the Big Horn river. Tollock built the fort named Van Buren, on
the south side of the Yellowstone, about three miles below the mouth of
the Big Horn river. It was 150 feet square, picket stockade, with two
bastions on diagonal corners. In 1863 I saw the location. The pickets
showed plainly that they had been burned to the ground, and several of
the chimneys were not entirely fallen down. The fort was built to trade
with the Mountain Crows, an insolent, treacherous tribe of Indians.
They wanted the location of their trading post changed nearly every
year, consequently they had four trading posts built from 1832 to
1850, viz.: Fort Cass, built by Pollock on the Yellowstone, below Fort
Buren, in 1836; Fort Alexander, built by Lawender, still lower down
on the Yellowstone river in 1848, and Fort Sarpey, built by Alexander
Culbertson in 1850 at the mouth of the Rose Bud. Fort Sarpey was
abandoned in 1853, and there have not been any trading forts built on
the Yellowstone since up to the present time (1875). Kenneth McKenzie,
after Lewis and Clarke, was the pioneer of the upper Missouri. He
was a native of the Highlands of Scotland. When young he came in the
service of the Hudson Bay Company, and started to explore the country
from Hudson’s Bay to Red river to Lake Winnipeg; thence to the Lake
Superior country; finally concluded to locate on the upper Mississippi.
In 1822 he went to New York and got an outfit of Indian trade goods on
credit and established an Indian trading post on the upper Mississippi
and remained in that part of the country until 1829, when he came
to Missouri and established Fort Union. He was in charge of all the
Northwestern fur trade until 1839, when he resigned to enter the
wholesale liquor trade at St. Louis, Mo. He resided at St. Louis until
his death in 1856 or 1857. Alexander Culbertson assumed his position as
fur trader in 1839.”
The town of Fort Benton was first surveyed by Colonel De Lacy in 1859.
Choteau county was established by the legislature in an act approved
Feb. 2, 1865, with the county seat at Fort Benton. The county was named
in honor of Pierre Choteau, Jr., the president of the American Fur
Company. Major George Steell, now of Dupuyer, Teton county, was one
of its first county commissioners. Fort Benton was named in honor of
Thomas H. Benton, United States Senator from Missouri.
In 1864 the American Fur Company sold their interests to the
Northwestern Fur Company. After that many other traders erected
posts throughout the territory. Those in the northern part had their
headquarters at the town of Fort Benton. Many steamboats loaded with
furs, pelts and robes left the wharf of this old town during the
period from 1860 to 1880. At the time of the visit referred to there
were many representatives of the large fur companies on their annual
visit from the East to inspect the business of their respective
companies. There were also Indian commissioners who had been sent by
the government from Washington to close some deal with the Indians; of
course all the Indian chiefs were there, besides many other Indians,
“ox-drivers” (bull whackers) and steamboat hands. One day, when these
Eastern visitors were in town, a pack train arrived from one of the
trading posts. On the back of one of the mules was a small brass cannon
(mountain howitzer); it was lashed on with the muzzle towards the rear
end of the mule. The government representative seized the opportunity
to show the Indians what a terrible weapon that was on the back of the
mule. The animal, with his burden, was led to Front street, and a crowd
of two or three hundred followed, half of which were Indians. It was
decided to fire a few shots from the cannon while it was on the back
of the mule at a high-cut bank that was half a mile away and across
the river. A certain spot was shown to the Indians where the shot was
supposed to hit, and, to strike the spot designated on the clay bank,
which loomed up like some old castle, an extra heavy load was put in.
Finally the man in charge of the mule stood in front of the quadruped
with the rings of the bit in each hand. Now he has the business end
of the mule where he wants it; another man was adjusting the cannon,
and, taking aim, while the third one took a match from his vest pocket,
scratched it on the hip of his pants and touched the fuse. The hissing
sound of the burning fuse made the mule lay down his ears and began
putting a hump in his back; next thing he whirled round and round, in
spite of his manager trying to get him back to his first position. By
this time everybody was going for dear life, and the mule was making
the circle faster than ever, and the gun was liable to go off at any
moment. There was a perfect stampede; many went over the bank into the
river, others were crawling on their hands and knees, while many laid
flat on the ground, broadcloth and buckskin alike--the man held to the
bridle and the mule held the fort. Luckily, on account of the bend in
the mule’s back, the shot struck the ground but a short distance from
his heels. Many of the Indians never moved, thinking that the maneuvers
of the mule were a part of the performance.
J. J. Healy (now Captain Healy, the manager of the North American
Transportation and Trading Company) was there. Healy had fought
Indians and assisted in arresting some of the worst desperadoes in the
Northwest, who were terrorizing the country about that time. But the
mule was too much for him, as he was seen going for dear life over the
bank into the river. It was the first time anyone ever saw Healy “take
water.”
The same cannon is now owned in Great Falls and was used to celebrate
the Fourth of July, 1898. The mule could not be found.
[Illustration: “THE MULE AND THE MOUNTAIN HOWITZER.”]
It was a common occurrence then at Fort Benton to see from six to eight
steamers tied at the wharf at the same time and loaded for their return
trips with robes, furs and pelts. The principal articles the traders
had for traffic with the Indians were blankets, blue and scarlet cloth,
calico, domestic goods, ticking, tobacco, knives, fire steel, arrow
points, files, brass wire of different sizes, beads, brass tacks,
wide leather belts, silver ornaments for the hair, shells, axes and
hatchets. Many articles were smuggled and traded to the Indians which
the law prohibited. The articles brought by the Indians for trade were
elk, deer, antelope, bear, wolf, beaver, otter, fox, mink, marten, wild
cat, skunk and badger skins, and principally buffalo robes. At the time
when the country was literally covered with buffaloes, and before the
traders were in the country to supply the Indians with guns or even
steel arrow points, the Indians would move from place to place with two
or three hundred lodges or tepees, with from five to seven people to
the lodge. The tepees were made of tanned skins and a few small poles
and so constructed that they could be taken down and put up in a few
minutes.
[Illustration: INDIANS WITH TRAVOIS.]
With the poles, that were about fifteen feet long, they would make
their travois by placing a number of poles on each side of a pony
and tying one end of them to the girth of the saddle from which a
strap reached across the breast of the animal. Then two cross-sticks,
about four feet apart, were tied to each bunch of poles and close
to the horse, and on these sticks a buffalo rawhide was stretched
in a basket-like manner on which a stack of robes, pelts and furs
was lashed. Each family had one or more of these simple conveyances,
arranged as the one to the left in the illustration. In these they
would carry their small trinkets, young pappooses, and the old people
that were too old to ride a pony. In this way they would move from camp
to camp with perfect ease and without delay, following the great herds
of buffalo. When they needed meat the chief would give orders to make
“a round.” Under the direction of the war chief several hundred would
turn out, some on horses, others on foot, and would quietly surround a
herd of the buffaloes, and, closing up the circle, the buffaloes would
run round and round in a circle, and as the outside ones would go by
the Indians killed them with their arrows. The buffalo, the same as
sheep, would follow the leaders, and, after getting them started in one
direction, they would all follow that way. I know a place near where
I used to live on Sun river where the Indians a long time ago used to
surround the buffalo and run them over a precipice, and at a point
where there was but room for one at a time to go in safety. The Indians
would get a few to start, then close up on the big herd and rush them
over the cliffs pell-mell; hundreds would be killed and many crippled,
and those they would kill with the bows and arrows. They called this
manner of hunting “a run.”
There are now on this spot great quantities of decayed bones, and
hundreds of flint arrow points have been picked up by settlers.
Professor Mortson, of this city, has in his cabinet now several
hundreds of these points which he found. There is another place of this
kind near St. Peter’s Mission, where these runs were made.
Now the buffaloes are extinct. Where they used to roam, flocks of sheep
and herds of cattle now graze. And the Indians’ mode of living, since
they are on their reservation, is entirely different. “Now” they live
in houses, and the old Indian tepees made of skins cannot be found.
Until but a few years ago, the “Old Town at the head of navigation”
was a great Indian trading post; her stores and warehouses were filled
with Indian goods and their trade was exclusively with Indians. Today
Fort Benton is a modern city with brick blocks, has a fine courthouse,
public schools and churches, and many attractive homes. She has a
railway depot, water works and many other modern improvements.
At the entrance of one of the main avenues of the city a steel
drawbridge spans the Missouri river. And now her business houses carry
the same kind and as fine goods as Eastern firms; her warehouses are
filled with miners’ tools, machinery, and all kinds of agricultural
implements for the trade of hundreds of thrifty farmers, who are
cultivating the land which was but a short time ago the red man’s
hunting ground.
ROBERT VAUGHN.
July 11, 1898.
[Illustration: THEN.]
[Illustration: NOW.]
[Illustration: THEN.]
[Illustration: NOW.]
JOHN D. BROWN.
A NARRATIVE OF HIS EARLY EXPERIENCE IN THE WEST.
One day last December, when standing on the corner of Central avenue
and Third street, Great Falls, I saw a lame old man coming towards me.
Though his hair was white as snow, his cheeks were as rosy as those of
a schoolboy, and, as he came to me and grasped me by the hand, he said:
“Well, Mr. Vaughn, I came to town to pay my taxes, and as you have
already asked me to come and stay at your house, I shall now accept the
invitation and tell you the story of my early days in the West.” The
old gentleman referred to was John D. Brown, one of the first pioneers
in the part of the country which now comprises the state of Montana.
That evening Mr. Brown related to me the following experiences:
I left St. Paul, Minnesota, in September, 1858, in company with George
Wakefield, William Fairweather and others. We had decided to go to
Colville, Washington territory, crossing the Rocky mountains through
the Kootenai pass in the British possessions. At Sauk Rapids we met
several Frenchmen, among them being the three Mauchoirs boys, the two
Besoits, Shirlepeau and Felix Odell, all Canadian Frenchmen. On the
eighth of October we crossed the Mississippi river at Crow Wing among
floating ice, then we made a big campfire, and slept with our feet to
the fire. Bill Fairweather was my bedfellow. We awoke in the morning to
find a foot of snow on top of us. After breakfast we traveled through
the deep snow and were overtaken by Tom McDonald, a Scotchman, an old
fur trader, and with whom we camped at Otter Tail for a few days in
order to rest our animals. There were but very few settlers at Otter
Tail at that time. The Frenchmen had ox teams and we had horses. We had
with us a year’s supply of provisions.