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Title: History of Early Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River, Volume I (of 2) - Life and Adventures of Joseph La Barge
Author: Chittenden, Hiram Martin
Language: English
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NAVIGATION ON THE MISSOURI RIVER, VOLUME I (OF 2) ***
IV
AMERICAN EXPLORERS SERIES
=Early Steamboating on Missouri River=
_VOL. I._
[Illustration: CAPTAIN JOSEPH LA BARGE.]
HISTORY OF EARLY
STEAMBOAT NAVIGATION
ON THE
MISSOURI RIVER
LIFE AND ADVENTURES
OF
JOSEPH LA BARGE
PIONEER NAVIGATOR AND INDIAN TRADER
FOR FIFTY YEARS IDENTIFIED WITH THE COMMERCE OF THE
MISSOURI VALLEY
BY
HIRAM MARTIN CHITTENDEN
_Captain Corps of Engineers, U. S. A._
AUTHOR OF “AMERICAN FUR TRADE OF THE FAR WEST,” “HISTORY
OF THE YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK,” ETC.
_WITH MAP AND ILLUSTRATIONS_
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. I.
NEW YORK
FRANCIS P. HARPER
1903
COPYRIGHT, 1903,
BY
FRANCIS P. HARPER.
=Edition Limited
to 950 Copies.=
TO
THE MEMORY
OF THE
=Missouri River Pilot=
CONTENTS.
PAGE
PREFACE, xi
CHAPTER I.
ANCESTRY OF CAPTAIN LA BARGE, 1
CHAPTER II.
CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH, 13
CHAPTER III.
ENTERS THE FUR TRADE, 22
CHAPTER IV.
CHOLERA ON THE “YELLOWSTONE,” 32
CHAPTER V.
FURTHER SERVICE AT CABANNÉ’S, 40
CHAPTER VI.
LAST YEAR AT CABANNÉ’S, 49
CHAPTER VII.
CAPTAIN LA BARGE IN “OPPOSITION,” 59
CHAPTER VIII.
THE MISSOURI RIVER, 73
CHAPTER IX.
KINDS OF BOATS USED ON THE MISSOURI, 90
CHAPTER X.
STEAMBOAT NAVIGATION ON THE MISSOURI RIVER, 115
CHAPTER XI.
THE STEAMBOAT IN THE FUR TRADE, 133
CHAPTER XII.
VOYAGE OF 1843, 141
CHAPTER XIII.
VOYAGE OF 1844, 154
CHAPTER XIV.
CHANGED CONDITIONS, 167
CHAPTER XV.
INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1845–50), 177
CHAPTER XVI.
INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1851–53), 189
CHAPTER XVII.
ICE BREAK-UP OF 1856, 200
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE HEAD OF NAVIGATION REACHED, 216
CHAPTER XIX.
FORT BENTON, 222
CHAPTER XX.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN ON THE MISSOURI, 240
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
_VOL. I._
CAPTAIN JOSEPH LA BARGE, _Frontispiece_
_Facing page_
CAPTAIN JOSEPH LA BARGE (when young), 1
A NEW “CUT-OFF” IN THE RIVER, 77
MAP OF THE MISSOURI RIVER CHANNEL, 79
SNAGS IN THE MISSOURI RIVER, 80
THE INDIAN BULLBOAT, 97
MISSOURI RIVER KEELBOAT, 102
THE FIRST “YELLOWSTONE,” 137
ALEXANDER CULBERTSON, 228
FORT BENTON LEVEE, 238
PREFACE.
In the summer of 1896 the author of this work, while engaged in
collecting data for a history of the American Fur Trade of the Far
West, met the venerable Missouri River pilot, Captain Joseph La Barge,
at his home in St. Louis. In the course of several interviews he became
deeply impressed with the range and accuracy of the old gentleman’s
knowledge of early Western history, and asked him if he had ever taken
any steps to preserve the record of his adventurous career. He replied
that he had often been urged to do so, but that lack of familiarity
with that kind of work had hitherto caused him to shrink from it, and
he presumed he should die without ever undertaking it. Believing that
his memoirs were well worth preserving, as a part of the history of the
West, the author proposed to prepare them for publication if he would
consent to dictate them. After some hesitation he concluded to try it,
and the work was forthwith begun. Full notes were taken in the rough,
and a clean copy was then submitted to Captain La Barge for revision.
He went through the whole with painstaking care, and the record was
left as complete as a memory of extraordinary power could make it. The
intention was, at the time, to put the notes into shape for publication
at once; but the Spanish-American war interfered with the author’s part
of the work, and before it could be resumed Captain La Barge died.
This event led to a material change in the plan of the work, and it was
decided to make it, not merely a narrative of personal experiences,
but a history of steamboat navigation on the Missouri River. Very
few people now have any conception of the part which this remarkable
business played in the upbuilding of the West. There is no railroad
system in the United States to-day whose importance to its tributary
country is relatively greater than was that of the Missouri River to
the trans-Mississippi territory in the first seventy-five years of the
nineteenth century. The business of the fur trade, the intercourse
of government agents with the Indians, the campaigns of the army
throughout the valley, and the wild rush of gold-seekers to the
mountains, all depended, in greater or less degree, upon the Missouri
River as a line of transportation.
[Sidenote: AN IMPORTANT BUSINESS.]
It is not alone from a commercial point of view that the record of
this business is an important one. From beginning to end it abounds
in thrilling incident, and the life which it fostered was full of
picturesque and even tragic details. The circumstances surrounding a
voyage up or down the Missouri, whether by canoe, mackinaw, keelboat,
or steamboat, were quite out of the line of ordinary experience. No
other river in this country has a record to compare with it.
Captain La Barge’s life embraced the entire era of active boating
business on the river. He saw it all--from the time when the Creole and
Canadian voyageurs cordelled their keelboats up the refractory stream
to the time when the railroad won its final victory over the steamboat.
He was on the first boat that went to the far upper river, and he made
the last through voyage from St. Louis to Fort Benton. He typified in
his own career the meteoric rise and fall of that peculiar business. He
grew up with it, prospered with it, and was ruined with and by it. He
saw and shared the wonderful metamorphosis that came over the Missouri
Valley in the space of fourscore years, and his reminiscences are a
succession of living pictures taken all along the line.
[Sidenote: HISTORICAL METHOD ADOPTED.]
It is hoped that the method adopted, of weaving the story which it is
here attempted to relate around the biography of its most distinguished
personality, will not detract from its value as historical material. It
is not the bare narration of events that gives history its true value,
but those intimate pictures of human life in other times that show what
people really did and the motives by which they were actuated. To this
end, biography, and even fiction, possess distinct advantages over the
ordinary method of historical writing.
[Sidenote: SOURCES OF INFORMATION.]
In the preparation of this work valuable personal aid has been received
from many sources, particularly from the Hon. Phil E. Chappelle of
Kansas City, Mo.; Messrs. N. P. Langford and J. B. Hubbell of St. Paul,
Minn.; Hon. Wilbur F. Sanders of Helena, Mont.; and General Grenville
M. Dodge of New York City.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN JOSEPH LA BARGE
(When a young man)]
HISTORY OF
EARLY STEAMBOAT NAVIGATION
ON THE MISSOURI RIVER
CHAPTER I.
ANCESTRY.
In the far-reaching operations of the French Government upon the
continent of America, by which its western empire at one time embraced
fully half of what is now the United States and Canada, two streams of
colonization flowed inward from the sea. The course of one was along
the valleys of the St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes to the upper
Mississippi and its tributaries. That of the other was along the lower
Mississippi northward from the Gulf of Mexico. The two streams met at
the mouth of the Missouri, where their blended currents were deflected
westward toward the unknown regions of the setting sun. Near this place
of meeting there arose, more than a decade before the birth of the
American Republic, a village which has now become one of the greatest
cities in the western world. Here, in the early days, the Canadians
from the north and the Creoles from the south, kindred in language and
tradition, mingled in common pursuits and enterprises, and for many
years bore an important part in the great movement which proceeded
onward from this common starting-point.
Among the well-known families identified with this movement was one
whose ancestral line represented both the northern and the southern
blood, and was a pure type of their united quality. This was the family
of Captain Joseph La Barge, the subject of the present sketch. The
father of Captain La Barge was a typical representative of the French
peasantry of Quebec. His mother was a Creole descendant of both the
Spanish and French elements in the settlement of the Mississippi Valley.
[Sidenote: ROBERT LABERGE.]
On the paternal side the ancestors of Captain La Barge came from
Normandy, France. Robert Laberge was a native of Columbière in the
diocese of Bayonne, and was born in 1633. He came to America early in
life and settled in the county of Montmorency, below Quebec, where he
was married in 1663. He is said to have been the only person of the
name who ever emigrated to America. His descendants are now of the most
numerous family in the district of Beauharnois, if not in the entire
province of Quebec, where it has held important positions both in
Church and State. Its ramifications in the United States have likewise
become very extensive. The true spelling of the name was _Laberge_, and
this form still prevails in Quebec; but the St. Louis branch of the
family has for many years spelled the name in two words, _La Barge_.
[Sidenote: JOSEPH MARIE LA BARGE.]
Captain La Barge was of the sixth generation from his Norman ancestors.
His father, Joseph Marie La Barge, was born at Assomption, Quebec,
July 4, 1787.[1] He emigrated to St. Louis about 1808, just as he was
arriving of age. He traveled by the usual route, up the Ottawa River
and through the intricate system of waterways in northern Ontario which
leads to Georgian Bay and to Lake Huron. Thence he went by way of
Mackinaw Strait and Lake Michigan to Green Bay, and along the Fox and
Wisconsin rivers to the Mississippi, which he descended to St. Louis.
He used a single birch-bark canoe all the way, with only eight miles of
portaging.
The elder La Barge led a varied career in St. Louis, as did most of the
pioneers in those days, when fixed callings were few and men turned
their hands to whatever fell in their way. A good deal of information
has survived concerning him, and all to his credit. He was evidently
a man of good parts, of strict integrity, loyal in his business
relations, and a bold lover of the adventurous life which characterized
the early history of this new country.[2]
[Sidenote: IMPORTANT SERVICES.]
At the time when the Sac and Fox Indians were giving the government
so much trouble, and endangering human life all along the upper
Mississippi, La Barge senior was employed in the perilous business
of carrying dispatches to Rock Island, having volunteered for this
service when others refused to go. He served in the War of 1812, and
was present in the battle of the River Raisin, or Frenchtown, January
22, 1813, and was there shot in the hand, losing two fingers. He also
received a tomahawk wound on the head, and carried the scar through
life. He became naturalized as a result of this service in the army.
Although entitled to a pension under the laws of the United States, he
never asked for nor received any.
La Barge married in 1813, and some two years afterward acquired a
farm at Baden, a small village a few miles north of St. Louis, and
now within the limits of that city. His main business here was the
manufacture of charcoal, which he hauled to St. Louis for sale. He soon
moved to town, where he had gained quite an extensive acquaintance,
particularly among the Canadian voyageurs. Here he opened up a
boarding-house, which developed into a regular hotel or tavern, with
a livery attachment, at that time one of the most important in the
city. It was while engaged in this business that he served the English
traveler, James Stuart, already referred to.
[Sidenote: ENGAGED IN THE FUR TRADE.]
La Barge senior was, to a considerable extent, identified with the
early trapping business in the Far West, and has left his name on
geographical features in widely separated localities. There is a _La
Barge_ or _Battle Creek_, a tributary of the Missouri, which took its
name from some affair with the Indians in which La Barge bore a part;
but the details are apparently lost. The same is true of _La Barge
Creek_, a tributary of Green River in Wyoming, which was named before
1830. La Barge was present in General Ashley’s disastrous fight with
the Aricara Indians on the Missouri River in 1823, and was the man who
cut the cable of one of the keelboats so that it might drift out of
range of the fire of the Indians.[3]
[Sidenote: DEATH OF THE ELDER LA BARGE.]
La Barge senior lived to a good old age, and was sound and healthy to
the last. As a remarkable evidence of this, it was long remembered by
his acquaintances that he practiced in old age his favorite winter
pastime of skating. His death was the result of accident. He had heard
that a brother-in-law, Joseph Hortiz, was ill, and he resolved to go
to see him. It was a cold wintry day, and Captain La Barge tried to
dissuade him, but to no purpose. He slipped on the icy sidewalk at the
corner of Olive and Fourth streets, in St. Louis, struck the curb, and
received injuries from which he died two days later, January 22, 1860.
Many interesting anecdotes of the elder La Barge have come down to us,
some of which are worth relating as illustrating the character of the
man in different situations. One of these comes from General Harney,
who was long an intimate friend of Captain La Barge. In the later years
of General Harney’s life, when physical ailments prevented his leaving
the house, he used to send for Captain La Barge, if the latter happened
to be derelict in his visits, to come and talk over old times. On one
of these occasions, not long before his death, he gave the Captain the
following story:
[Sidenote: THE CAPTAIN AND THE LIEUTENANT.]
“Your father,” he said, “was the only man who ever scared me. We were
ascending the Missouri River on a keelboat laden with troops and
supplies, he in charge of the boat, and I, a lieutenant, on duty with
the soldiers. In one place the boat had to round a sharp point, where
there was an accumulation of driftwood. The current was very strong,
and it required the utmost efforts of the men to stem it. When we
reached the most difficult place, the Captain stimulated his men by
calling out to them (in the French language), ‘_Hale fort! Hale fort!_’
(‘Pull hard! Pull hard!’). I didn’t understand French, but thought I
detected in the Captain’s language something like the military command,
‘Halt.’ As some of the troops were on the line with the voyageurs,
and as they might not understand, I thought I could help the Captain
by repeating to them his command. This created some confusion, for
my men began to slacken while the Captain’s were pulling harder than
ever. Again he commanded, ‘_Hale fort!_’ and again I called to the
men to halt. The situation was extremely critical when the Captain
thundered a third time, ‘_Hale fort!_’ in a voice and manner not to be
misunderstood. The men all bent to the line and finally extricated the
boat from its perilous position. The Captain then came over to where
I was standing and told me that if I ever dared interfere again with
his management of the boat he would pitch me into the river. I knew
he meant what he said, and thereafter confined myself to my military
duties.”
[Sidenote: ASSAULT AND BATTERY.]
One fine morning in the early twenties a man called at the house of Mr.
La Barge, who met him at the door and asked him what he wanted. The man
said: “I applied to you a short time since for employment, having heard
that you were hiring men for the Ashley Expedition.[4] I was refused,
and I would like to know the reason.”
“Simply because you did not suit,” replied La Barge.
“I am as good a man as you are or any you have employed, and I take the
liberty of telling you so,” rejoined the six-footer.
“I want no trouble,” replied La Barge, “and therefore will request you
to get out, or I will be compelled to put you out.”
“Just what I want you to undertake,” was the retort. Scarcely were the
words out of his mouth when La Barge seized a rawhide riding whip and
started for the fellow and laid him about the back and shoulders so
vigorously that the man soon gave up the contest and took to his heels.
The next morning a constable came and arrested La Barge on the charge
of assault and battery, with directions to bring him at once before
Esquire Garnier, Justice of the Peace.
[Sidenote: FUN CHEAP AT FOUR DOLLARS.]
“Lead the way, and I will follow,” said La Barge, taking down his
rawhide and starting along with the constable. La Barge told the people
he met on the way to come and see the fun. In due course the trial came
off and La Barge was fined four dollars. He thanked the Justice, but
handed him eight dollars, saying that the fun was cheap at that price,
and he would give the fellow another dose. He then seized his whip and
started for him, chasing him out into the street, where he gave him a
second drubbing, to the great delight of the crowd, who stood around
shouting and setting him on.
[Sidenote: NOT A THIEF.]
Another incident, which occurred late in life, exhibits the sterling
integrity of the man who could withstand the temptations of wealth
rather than do the smallest act of injustice. About the time that the
elder La Barge was married he purchased from Joseph Morin, for the
sum of twenty-five dollars, a small tract of land on Cedar Street,
between Second and Third. Land was then of very little value, and
transfers were often made without deed and with no more formality than
in exchanging cattle or horses. In this way La Barge traded off his
lot on Cedar Street to Chauvin Lebeau for a horse, with which he moved
to his Baden farm, only recently purchased. Here, as already narrated,
he manufactured charcoal and hauled it to town, where he sold it to
Theodore Bosseron and Vilrais Papin, then the principal blacksmiths
of the village. Long years afterward, when these transactions were
almost forgotten, and the property had become very valuable, a lawyer
presented himself to the old gentleman and asked him if he had ever
owned any property on Cedar Street. La Barge replied in the affirmative
and described its locality. The lawyer then asked him when and how
he disposed of it. He could not at first recall, but Mrs. La Barge
remembered the circumstances and related them to the lawyer, at the
same time remarking to her husband that that was the way they got their
horse to set themselves up on the farm with. The lawyer then assured
La Barge that the title to this property was still in him, and that he
could hold it against all comers, for there was absolutely no record
of the conveyance in existence. The old gentleman, with a look of
indignation, asked the lawyer if he took him for a thief. “I traded
that land,” said he, “to Chauvin Lebeau for a horse, which was worth
more to me then than the land was. I shall stand by the bargain now.
If Chauvin Lebeau’s heirs have no title, tell them to come to me and I
will make them a deed before I die.”
Such are some of the glimpses we still have through the mists of time
of the father of Captain La Barge.
[Sidenote: MOTHER OF CAPTAIN LA BARGE.]
On the maternal side he was likewise descended from creditable
ancestry. Among the early mechanics in the village of Fort de
Chartres, near the mouth of the Ohio River, when to be a mechanic
was to be a leading citizen, were Gabriel Dodier and Jean Baptiste
Becquet, blacksmiths. The younger of these two men, Becquet, married
the daughter of the other. They had three children, the eldest being
a daughter, Marguerite Marianne. On the 27th of January, 1780, this
daughter was married to Joseph Alvarez Hortiz, who was the son of
François Alvarez and Bernada Hortiz, and was born in the town of
Lienira, in the Province of Estremadura, Spain, in the year 1753.
Alvarez was a private soldier in the military service of Spain, and
came to St. Louis after Spanish authority had been established there
in 1770. He attained the rank of sergeant, and being a man of some
education, was for several years detailed as military attaché to
the Governor. He finally became Secretary to the last two Spanish
Governors, Trudeau and Delassus, and had charge of the public archives
down to 1804. He had nine children, of whom the eighth was a daughter,
of the name of Eulalie. This daughter was married to Joseph Marie La
Barge in St. Louis, August 13, 1813.
[Sidenote: HISTORIC DATA.]
The parents of Captain La Barge thus represented the best traditions of
French and Spanish occupancy of the Mississippi Valley. Their marriage
took place after their country had become American territory, and
their offspring, the subject of our present inquiries, was born an
American citizen.[5]
CHAPTER II.
CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
Joseph La Barge, son of Joseph Marie La Barge and Eulalie Hortiz, was
born in St. Louis, October 1, 1815. He was the second child in a family
of seven children, three boys and four girls, who all grew to adult
years. The two brothers were Charles S., who was killed in a steamboat
explosion in 1852, and John B., who dropped dead at the wheel in 1885
while making a steamboat landing at Bismarck, N. D.
[Sidenote: INDIAN AND INFANT.]
Soon after the birth of Captain La Barge the parents moved to the
newly acquired farm in Baden. There is but one incident relating
to the young child while living here that need detain us. Although
this place was distant only six miles from where the courthouse of
St. Louis now stands, it was at that time unsettled and uncleared,
and Indians not infrequently roamed in the vicinity. The Sac and Fox
tribes were particularly troublesome, and many were the outrages which
they committed upon the isolated settlement. The incident in question
occurred one day just before the father had started on his usual trip
to town. He was loading his cart at some distance from the garden,
where Mrs. La Barge had gone to dig some potatoes to send to her mother
in the village. Housewives in those days seldom enjoyed the luxury
of nurses, and Mrs. La Barge was obliged to carry her child with her
into the garden. Depositing him between the rows of potatoes, she was
proceeding with her work, when suddenly the house dog set up a cry
of alarm. Looking up, Mrs. La Barge was horrified to see an Indian
approaching. She uttered a scream and started for the house, forgetting
in the suddenness of her alarm the baby in the garden. Meanwhile the
father had heard the dog’s bark and his wife’s screams, and hastened
to see what was the matter. His first question was about the baby, and
Mrs. La Barge, more terrified than ever, rushed back to where she had
left him. Fortunately the dog had held the Indian at bay, and when
the father arrived, gun in hand, he beat a prompt retreat. Captain La
Barge’s father often reminded him of this incident in after years,
predicting that he would always escape harm from the Indians, for they
had had their opportunity and had failed. In his many experiences with
the Indians throughout a life spent in their country, he never suffered
personal injury at their hands, and came to have faith in his father’s
prediction.
Captain La Barge was not yet two years old when the first steamboat
came to St. Louis, nor four when the first one entered the Missouri
River. It is said that his father used to take him to the river bank to
see these early boats, and that they always had a great attraction for
his youthful fancy. To be a steamboat master was his ambition, and he
spent much of his time as a child in drawing boats and making models,
and thus unwittingly training himself for his after career.
The boy was a leader among his fellows, and an expert in all youthful
games practiced at the time. In contests of skill among the boys of the
village each side was anxious to secure Joe La Barge. “He could jump
higher,” says one authority, “run faster, and swim farther than any
other lad in the town.”
[Sidenote: LAFAYETTE’S VISIT.]
[Sidenote: BOTH FRENCHMEN.]
Among the noteworthy events of Captain La Barge’s childhood, the memory
of which clung by him even in old age, was the visit of Lafayette to
St. Louis in 1825. This venerable patriot, whom, next to Washington,
Americans in that day delighted to honor, arrived in St. Louis on
board the steamer _Natchez_, at 9 A. M., May 29. He was met at the
wharf by a committee of leading citizens, and an address of welcome
was made by the Mayor, to which Lafayette responded. He then entered a
carriage with the Mayor and Mr. Auguste Chouteau and Stephen Hempstead,
a soldier of the Revolution, and was driven to the house of Mr.
Pierre Chouteau, Sr., which had been prepared for his reception. He
was escorted by a company of light horsemen, and also by a company
of uniformed boys, of whom Captain La Barge, then ten years old, was
one. The Captain always remembered the venerable appearance of the
General and his review of the youthful troop. He shook hands with them,
indulged in the pleasant questions which age delights to ask of youth,
and doubtless himself took a keen pleasure in the incident, because
most of his youthful auditors could reply in his own tongue.[6]
An interesting sequel of Lafayette’s visit to St. Louis occurred
in that city in 1881, on the occasion of the visit of Lafayette’s
grandson with General Boulanger and party, who had come to America
to attend the centennial celebration of the surrender of Yorktown.
Captain La Barge was sent for, to meet the distinguished company at
the Merchants’ Exchange. When introduced to the members of the party,
the grandson of Lafayette came forward, and taking La Barge by both
hands, looked at him a moment and said: “You have seen one whom I wish
it were my lot to have seen, and that is my revered grandfather.” He
cordially urged the Captain to come to his home if he should ever visit
France, and in other ways showed an almost affectionate interest in
this individual who had once, though but a boy, beheld the face of his
distinguished ancestor.
[Sidenote: EARLY SCHOOLING.]
Captain La Barge’s schooling was necessarily very limited, for the
educational facilities of St. Louis in those days were of a truly
primitive order. He first went to a schoolmaster of considerable local
renown, Jean Baptiste Trudeau, at the latter’s private residence on
Pine Street, between Main and Second. Here he studied the common
branches, all in French. He went for a time to Salmon Giddings, founder
of the First Presbyterian Church, in St. Louis, and later to a more
pretentious school kept by Elihu H. Shephard, an excellent teacher.
At both of these schools instruction was given in English. Captain
La Barge’s parents foresaw that their native tongue could not long
survive in common use, and felt it to be their duty to equip their son,
so far as their slender means would permit, with the language of his
country. The pupil found the task a tedious one, and was a long while
in mastering it. He never forgot the almost insurmountable obstacle
he found in the English “th.” He used his native language in common
intercourse down to nearly 1850, and retained a fluent command of it
to his death. He also acquired a very perfect command of English, in
which there was no trace of foreign accent, but in which the mellowing
influence of the softer tongue had produced a modulation of the voice
that was very pleasant to listen to.
[Sidenote: IN COLLEGE.]
In 1819 there was established in Perry County, Mo., a Catholic School,
St. Mary’s College. Young La Barge was sent there at the age of twelve,
and remained three years. On their way to the college himself and
father traveled by the steamer _Tuscumbia_. It was Captain La Barge’s
first ride in a kind of boat with which most of his after life was to
be connected. The desire of the young man’s parents was to educate
their son for the priesthood, and his course at college was shaped
somewhat to that end. But the boy did not fall in with their plans, as
his tastes ran in a different direction. He did not finish the course,
for his career at the school was summarily cut short by a delinquency
which is the only one we have to record in a life of more than
fourscore years. He became involved in intrigues with young women to an
extent which barred him from a further continuation of his course.
[Sidenote: IN HARD LUCK.]
Associated with him in this unfortunate episode was Edward Liguest
Chouteau, a youth of about the same age as himself. The young men
walked to St. Genevieve, on the Mississippi. Chouteau was without
funds, and La Barge nearly so, having scarcely the amount of a single
steamboat fare to St. Louis. They found the _De Witt Clinton_ at the
bank on her way up the river. La Barge told the captain of the boat the
straight story of their misfortune: that they had only enough money
for a single fare to St. Louis, and would have to walk unless they
could make some arrangement with him. He laughed, and told them to get
on board and he would see them home. This incident, in which the two
young men were companions in misfortune, was not forgotten by either,
and we shall have occasion to refer to it again in the course of this
narrative.
After La Barge left college his father placed him in the office of
John Bent, a leading lawyer of St. Louis, and one of the noted Bent
brothers. He soon became disgusted with his new situation on account of
his preceptor’s habit of excessive drink. He then went into a clothing
store, and after remaining about a year, left that.
[Sidenote: ATTRACTIONS OF THE FUR TRADE.]
The restless ambition of the young man was now directed toward a
kind of life which, in every portion of the country, has filled up
the period between discovery and settlement--the business of the fur
trade. At this particular time it was the only business carried on in
the trans-Mississippi territory beyond the few scattering settlements
along the lower Missouri. Large parties of hunters and trappers
remained constantly in the wilderness, wandering all over those vast
regions in quest of beaver and other fur. Each spring expeditions set
out for various points in the Far West from Santa Fe to the British
boundary, carrying supplies and recruits and bringing back the furs
collected during the previous year. The great bulk of this business was
done along the Missouri River, where trading posts were established
throughout the entire valley. The annual journeys to these posts were
always made by water. In the keelboat days they consumed an entire
summer, but after the steamboat came they were completed by the middle
of July.
[Sidenote: CHOICE OF CAREER.]
From its very nature this business was one of adventure and excitement,
and particularly attractive to those who were fond of an independent
and out-of-door life. We can but faintly imagine at this day how strong
was the attraction for youth in this wild life. Now it is considered a
great piece of good luck for a boy to get on a common surveying party
in the mountains, where he may see something of the wildness of nature,
and perhaps catch sight of some surviving specimens of the larger game.
In those days a trip to the mountains meant adventure of the genuine
sort--absence from civilization, ever-present danger from the Indians,
game of all kinds in abundance, and the grandeur and beauty of nature
in a region still unknown except to a very few.
Being now at the impressionable age of sixteen, young La Barge became
infatuated with the tales of adventure related by those who came back
every year from the distant mountains. He told his father that, for
the present, his mind was made up. He would join one of the fur-trade
expeditions and see something of the Indian country. This decision met
a responsive chord in the adventurous nature of the father, who said
he had no objection if the mother were willing. The matter was laid
before her, and after much entreaty and expostulation, her consent was
secured. This was in the year 1831.
CHAPTER III.
ENTERS THE FUR TRADE.
Captain La Barge did not immediately find an opportunity to visit
the Indian country. The annual expeditions for the year had all
gone. The _Yellowstone_ was already far away on her historic first
trip up the Missouri for the American Fur Company, and nothing was
left for the impatient youth but to await a later opportunity. When
the _Yellowstone_ returned from her voyage, she was sent down the
Mississippi to pass the time until the following spring in the Bayou
la Fourche sugar trade. La Barge was engaged as second clerk on this
voyage and found himself in constant demand as interpreter during the
winter. The people of the Bayou la Fourche district spoke only French,
which most of the officers of the boat did not understand. La Barge,
who knew both French and English well, was of great use in carrying on
the trade.
In the spring of 1832 the _Yellowstone_ returned to St. Louis to
prepare for her second voyage up the Missouri. This boat had been
built as an experiment, to determine if it would be practicable to
substitute steamboats for keelboats in the trade of the upper river. In
the summer of 1831 she had gone as far as Fort Tecumseh, which stood
on the opposite shore from the present capital of South Dakota. It was
now proposed to take her as far as the mouth of the _Yellowstone_. The
attempt was completely successful, and the voyage has ever since been
considered one of the landmarks of the early history of the West.
[Sidenote: ENTERS AMERICAN FUR COMPANY SERVICE.]
Although La Barge was only in his seventeenth year he signed a contract
binding himself to the service of the American Fur Company, as
voyageur, engagé, or clerk, for a period of three years, at a salary
of seven hundred dollars for the whole time.[7] He did not go as part
of the boat’s crew, but as an employee of one of the posts. No place
was specified in his engagement, but his assignment was left to the
bourgeois of the different posts, who came down to the boat when it
arrived, looked over the new engagés, and selected such as they thought
would suit them. Young La Barge was a promising-looking lad, and did
not get above Council Bluffs, where he was taken off and put to work at
Cabanné’s post, a few miles above the modern city of Omaha.
[Sidenote: BATTLE OF BAD AXE.]
When the _Yellowstone_ returned from Fort Union, John P. Cabanné, the
bourgeois in charge of the post, went down to St. Louis and took La
Barge with him. While waiting to return to the upper country the young
engagé took temporary service on the steamboat _Warrior_, Captain
Throckmorton, bound for the seat of the Blackhawk, or Sac and Fox,
war. She was loaded with government stores for Prairie du Chien,
and La Barge went along in some subordinate capacity. It happened
that she arrived at the scene of the Battle of Bad Axe just as that
decisive conflict was going on. Captain Throckmorton saw a number
of Indians trying to make their escape by swimming the river and he
fired into them, killing several. They proved to be all women, and the
over-zealous captain long had reason to regret his hasty action. After
this adventure the _Warrior_ returned to St. Louis.
[Sidenote: CABANNÉ AND LECLERC.]
When Cabanné went back to his post at the Council Bluffs young La Barge
went with him to commence in earnest his life in the Indian country.
His initiation into the business of the fur trade was such as to leave
a lasting impression on his mind. He had not been at Cabanné’s post
very long when he had a lively experience of the evils of competition
in that business, and of the extreme measures to which unrestrained
rivalry sometimes led. Narcisse Leclerc, at one time an employee of
the American Fur Company, had saved a little means, which certain
parties in St. Louis eked out to a respectable sum, and he resolved to
go into the trading business on his own and their account. Under the
style of the Northwest Fur Company he carried on a prosperous trade in
a small way for two or three seasons. The American Fur Company, jealous
of all opposition, always treated these petty rivals with the utmost
severity, and, if possible, crushed them by sheer force. When it could
not do this it bought them out. Leclerc, who was a shrewd fellow, and
as unscrupulous as any of the company’s agents, had developed staying
qualities which caused the company a good deal of uneasiness. He went
up the river in the autumn of 1832 with a larger outfit than ever,
and the company determined that something must be done to arrest his
career. The problem was left for Cabanné to solve, and he was given
authority, as a last resort, to offer Leclerc outright a thousand
dollars if he would not carry his trade up the river beyond a specified
point.
[Sidenote: RUDE INITIATION.]
Circumstances, however, threw in Cabanné’s way what he considered a
better means of dealing with Leclerc. Congress had lately passed a
law prohibiting the importation of liquor into the Indian country.
Cabanné found out in some way that Leclerc had smuggled a considerable
quantity past the military authorities at Leavenworth. Here was his
opportunity. He would stop the expedition, and confiscate the property
on the ground that Leclerc was violating the law of the land. It did
not seem to occur to him that the enforcement of the law is intrusted
to duly constituted officials, and that he, not being one of these,
could not legally do more than inform against Leclerc. He did not
trouble himself about fine distinctions of that sort. Exultantly he
wrote to the house in St. Louis: “Have no fear; leave the matter to me,
and I will make our incapable adversary bite the dust.”
Cabanné laid his plans well for the capture of Leclerc’s outfit. As
soon as the boat passed his post he organized a party under charge of
Peter A. Sarpy, clerk at the post, to go and arrest Leclerc. Sarpy
picked out about a dozen men, among whom was the new engagé, La Barge.
They were all well armed and carried besides a small cannon. Going
to a point near old Fort Lisa, where the channel of the river came
in close to a high impending bank, Sarpy stationed his men there and
awaited Leclerc’s arrival. At the proper time, when the voyageurs were
cordelling the boat along a sandbar just opposite, scarcely a hundred
yards off, he ordered Leclerc’s party to surrender or he would “blow
everything out of the water.” Although Leclerc had some thirty men,
they were mostly unarmed, and could make no effective resistance. They
surrendered, and the whole outfit returned to Cabanné’s post, where the
liquor was confiscated and the expedition broken up.
[Sidenote: SERIOUS COMPLICATIONS.]
This drastic measure came near proving fatal to the company’s business
upon the river. Leclerc immediately returned to St. Louis, where he
began suit against the company and lodged a criminal complaint against
Cabanné. The matter bore a very serious aspect for a time. It was with
the utmost difficulty, and with an evident resort to misrepresentation,
that the company’s license was saved; and doubtless it would have been
revoked but for the influence of Senator Thomas H. Benton. As it was,
it cost the company a large sum of money, increased the public distrust
of this powerful concern, and banished Cabanné, one of its most
efficient servants, permanently from the country.
[Sidenote: THE PAWNEES.]
At Cabanné’s post La Barge was employed in the various duties of
engagé, and was frequently sent out to surrounding bands of Indians
with small outfits of merchandise to trade for their furs. His most
interesting and valuable experience in this line was with the Pawnees,
who resided on the Loup Fork of the Platte, about one hundred miles
west of the Missouri. They were what are called permanent village
Indians; that is, they had fixed villages made of large, strong houses,
where they regularly lived; while many of the tribes, like the Sioux,
Crows, and Blackfeet, lived only in tents, and were always moving from
one place to another. The Pawnees, it is true, roved about a great deal
on their hunting and war expeditions, but they had a fixed place of
abode to which they always returned from their wanderings. Their houses
were circular in form and quite large, being sometimes sixty feet in
diameter, and, to judge from pictures of them, resembled in appearance,
when seen from a distance, a group of oil tanks in a modern petroleum
district.
Near to their villages the Pawnees cultivated extensive fields of maize
or Indian corn. After the spring planting was over they generally went
on long excursions to hunt buffalo, to make war, or to secure wood and
other materials for the village. Their cornfields were left to shift
for themselves during this period, and their enemies sometimes took
advantage of this fact; but on the whole the latter were very cautious
about what they did, for they knew that the wily Pawnee would learn who
the robbers were and would not fail to exact full retribution. When the
corn was ripe the Indians gathered it and remained in their villages
a considerable part of the winter. Their business, however, compelled
them at this season to make their hunts for robes and furs, which were
salable only when taken during the cold weather. When the skins were
brought into the villages the squaws took them, scraped them down,
rubbed them with brains or pork, and otherwise manipulated them until
they were soft and flexible and ready for the trade.
The custom of the traders was to send over from their posts near the
old Council Bluffs one or more clerks, with a few men and the necessary
merchandise, to reside in the villages until the trade was over. The
clerk generally lived in the lodge of the principal chief, kept his
goods there, and also such furs as were received in trade. After the
season’s business was over the furs were loaded into bullboats, in
which they were floated down the Loup and the Platte rivers to the
Missouri. Here they were reshipped in large cargoes to St. Louis.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE WITH THE PAWNEES.]
It was on a business of this kind that young La Barge spent his first
winter in the Indian country--1832–33. His party consisted of four
men, who, with the merchandise, were accommodated in the lodge of the
chief Big Axe. Here they settled down to genuine Indian life--not half
so uninteresting and repulsive as one might be disposed to think. The
business of the trade, the ceremonials, the games and gambling, and the
never-failing attractions of the gentler sex, which, one may easily
believe, are as potent in the wilderness as in the city, all operated
to make the time pass agreeably during the long and severe winters. The
huts were very comfortable, and Captain La Barge always remembered
them as the coolest habitations in summer and the warmest in winter of
any that he had ever occupied. He noted as a remarkable peculiarity
that mosquitoes never entered them.
[Sidenote: LEARNING PAWNEE LANGUAGE.]
During his winter sojourn among the Pawnees La Barge applied himself
assiduously to learning their language. The interpreter would give him
words and sentences in Pawnee and he would write them down and learn
them. He practically mastered the language in the course of the winter,
to the great astonishment of the natives and even of the whites. To the
Indians the process of writing was a great curiosity, a “big medicine,”
and when they saw young La Barge write down something and then read it
off, they would put their hands to their mouths in their characteristic
manner of expressing wonder.
[Sidenote: THE CROW PRISONER.]
There were numerous Indian scares during the winter, and Captain La
Barge fully expected to see something of Indian warfare before he left
the villages, but nothing of the sort actually occurred. In the spring
of 1833, before he left for the Missouri, Major John Dougherty, Indian
agent residing at Bellevue, about ten miles below the modern city of
Omaha, arrived at the villages for the purpose of ransoming a female
prisoner of the Crow nation, who had been sentenced to be burned at
the stake. He prevailed, through Big Axe, chief of the Pawnee Loups,
upon having her given up on payment of the ransom. He then started
back with her to Bellevue, accompanied by an escort, until at a safe
distance from the villages. When about ten miles on their way they were
overtaken by a Pawnee chief, Spotted Horse, who came riding up at a
gallop, and when opposite the woman, shot an arrow through her heart.
When the high water of spring arrived the furs were loaded into
bullboats and shipped down to the mouth of the Platte. La Barge
returned to Cabanné’s, and after a short time started for St. Louis
with a fleet of mackinaw boats loaded with furs. He reached St. Louis
in the latter part of May, 1833.
CHAPTER IV.
CHOLERA ON THE “YELLOWSTONE.”
Before La Barge arrived in St. Louis the company had dispatched two
boats to the upper river--the _Yellowstone_ and the _Assiniboine_. The
voyage of 1833 is particularly noteworthy as the one on which Prince
Maximilian of Wied made his celebrated visit to the upper Missouri--a
visit which has done more than any other one thing to preserve a true
picture of those early times. The _Yellowstone_ went only as far as
Fort Pierre, whence she returned immediately, and as soon as another
cargo could be shipped, started on a trip to Council Bluffs.
[Sidenote: CHOLERA ON THE “YELLOWSTONE.”]
Captain La Barge went back up the river on this second trip of the
_Yellowstone_ to return to his post. It proved to be a most trying and
pathetic voyage. The cholera, which was then epidemic throughout the
country, broke out with great virulence on the boat, and so many of
the crew died that Captain Bennett was forced to stop at the mouth of
the Kansas River until he could go back to St. Louis for a crew. His
pilot and most of his sub-officers were dead, and he was compelled to
leave the boat in care of young La Barge, who thus began his career
as a steamboat man on the Missouri. His several voyages had given him
considerable knowledge of the art of handling these boats, and he had
no misgivings in being left in charge, except the fear that the cholera
might take him off. It was a very trying moment. Captain Bennett, when
he started back to St. Louis, cried like a child. The terrible power of
the disease unstrung everyone’s nerves. Victims often died within two
hours after being attacked, and no one knew when his turn would come.
Scarcely had Captain Bennett left when a new difficulty arose. The
“graybacks,” as the scattered population of western Missouri were then
called, having learned that the _Yellowstone_ had cholera on board,
organized themselves into a _pro tempore_ State board of health and
ordered Captain La Barge to take the boat out of the State, or they
would burn her up. The engineer and firemen were dead, so Captain
La Barge fired up himself, and, acting as pilot, engineer, and all,
succeeded in getting the boat above the mouth of the Kansas and on
the west shore of the river, outside the jurisdiction of the State of
Missouri.
[Sidenote: A FRIEND IN NEED.]
The _Yellowstone_ had a quantity of goods on board consigned to Cyprian
Chouteau’s trading post, which was located some ten miles up the Kansas
River. Captain Bennett had directed La Barge to turn over these
goods to the consignees during his absence. Accordingly, at the first
opportunity, he set off alone on foot to find the trading post and tell
Mr. Chouteau to come and get his goods. When about a mile from the post
he was met by a man who had been stationed there to watch for anyone
coming from the Missouri. The news of the cholera was abroad and the
lonely post had quarantined itself against the civilized world. The man
would not permit La Barge to come nearer, and threatened to shoot him
if he persisted. La Barge agreed to stay where he was if the man would
return to the post and carry his message to Chouteau. This was done,
and Chouteau sent back word to store the goods on the bank and leave
them there. It was now too late to return to the boat that night after
a fatiguing day’s work, and La Barge would have had to go supperless
and coverless to sleep but for the kind offices of his old college
chum and former companion in misfortune, Edward Liguest Chouteau, who
happened to be at the post. Hearing of La Barge’s situation, he went
to find him. He reached his friend’s bivouac about midnight and found
him trying to pass the night in some comfort around a large bonfire. He
brought something to eat and a large buffalo robe to sleep on, and La
Barge got through the remainder of the night very well.
[Sidenote: DISTRESS SIGNAL UNANSWERED.]
While the _Yellowstone_ was lying above the mouth of the Kansas the
_Assiniboine_ passed down on her return trip.[8] La Barge signaled for
assistance, but Captain Pratt would not stop. “It was pretty hard,”
observed the captain, in narrating this affair. “I never refused
to answer a distress signal, even if the boat were engaged in the
strongest opposition; but our two boats were in the same trade, bound
to assist each other, and yet we were left there alone in the severest
straits, with no idea when we should be relieved.”
[Sidenote: BURIALS ALONG THE MISSOURI.]
When asked how these grave dangers, which were more or less his portion
through life, affected him, Captain La Barge replied that, if in
idleness and given time to think about them, they always depressed and
in a measure unnerved him; but he was generally actively engaged, and
the interest in his work and the responsibility resting upon him caused
him to forget the danger. Violence and death were a familiar feature
of the life in which he was engaged, and to some extent he became
hardened to them. Speaking of the great number of deaths along the
river, the Captain shook his head reflectively as he told of the many
burials that it had been his lot to make. “There is a spot just below
Kansas City--I could point it out now,” he said, “where I buried eight
cholera victims in one grave. I could easily name a hundred localities
along the river where I have buried passengers or crew. I generally
sought some elevated ground for this purpose, which the ravages of the
river could not reach. The graves were marked, if at all, with wooden
head-boards, for there was generally no other material at hand, and
if there were, time did not permit the use of it. It will never be
known, and cannot now even be conjectured, how many of these forgotten
graves there are, but enough to make the shores of the Missouri River
one continuous cemetery from its source to its mouth. Were every white
man’s grave along that stream distinctly marked, the voyageur would
never be out of sight of these pathetic reminders of futile contests
with the universal enemy. But, alas! no mark remains upon any but a
very few, and the names of those who are buried in them are forever
wrapped in oblivion.”
After a long delay Captain Bennett returned with a crew on the
steamboat _Otto_, Captain James Hill, an opposition boat in the service
of Sublette & Campbell. This was the year when Sublette & Campbell made
such a strong show of competition with the American Fur Company.[9]
Sublette himself was on board the _Otto_ at the time. As soon as
Captain Bennett resumed charge of the _Yellowstone_ the boat proceeded
on her way and reached Cabanné’s post in August.
[Sidenote: IN THE PAWNEE CORNFIELDS.]
Cabanné having been expelled from the Indian country, the post had a
new bourgeois, Joshua Pilcher, a man of long experience in the Indian
country, and former president of the Missouri Fur Company. Late in the
month of August Pilcher sent La Barge with a small outfit of goods
to the Pawnee villages to buy some buffalo meat. La Barge packed his
goods on five horses and set out. He found the Pawnees still absent,
and as war parties of their enemies might be lurking around the vacant
villages, he thought it prudent to await at a distance the return of
the Indians. In the meanwhile his party ran out of provisions, and
their situation was becoming serious when La Barge decided to go and
get corn enough from the fields to last them until the Pawnees should
return. He went with another man, and they soon loaded themselves
with ears and returned to camp. This process continued successfully
for several days, great pains being taken to levy tribute uniformly
throughout the cornfield, so that the Indians might not detect the
loss. They were not skillful enough in this, however, and finally had
to pay for the corn.
[Sidenote: STANDING OFF THE SIOUX.]
On the fourth day of their foraging expeditions they were discovered
by a small war party of Sioux about a mile off. They took to flight,
and tried to infuse some life into their mules, but the stolid animals
would not hurry. This was particularly the case with La Barge’s mule,
which could scarcely be driven into a slow gallop. La Barge saw that
at the rate they were going they would surely be cut off, and he told
his companion, who had the best mule, to hurry to camp for help, and
he would stand the Indians off with his rifle. The companion did not
like to do this, but La Barge insisted. He felt comparatively safe
for a short time, for he was in a perfectly open plain, where it was
impossible for the Indians to approach under cover. Whenever they
drew too near he would level his rifle at them and they would venture
no further. In the meanwhile he kept moving on toward camp, and soon
had the pleasure of seeing his companion riding up at full speed with
re-enforcements.
[Sidenote: COMPLIMENTARY OFFER.]
When the Pawnees returned La Barge bought a good supply of meat and
took it to Cabanné’s. There he found that veteran mountaineer, Etienne
Provost, who at that time probably knew the western country better than
any other living man. He had just come in for the purpose of guiding
Fontenelle and Drips, partners in the American Fur Company mountain
service, and owners of the trading post at Bellevue, to the Bayou
Salade (South Park, Colorado), where they intended to spend the winter
trapping beaver. Provost heard of La Barge’s adventure and complimented
him very warmly upon it. He was now an old man, but he came up to La
Barge, took him by both hands, and said to him: “I am glad you did not
show the white feather to those rascals. You are the kind of man for
this country. I am going to ask Major Pilcher to let you go with me.
I have need of such men.” La Barge was very anxious to go, filled as
he was then with the thirst of youth for adventure. But Major Pilcher
needed his services and would not consent. Pilcher was very kind to La
Barge, even permitting him to eat at his table--a great concession,
for none of the employees were allowed to eat with the bourgeois of
the post unless it was so stipulated in their contract of service.
Pilcher took a special pride in his young engagé, and tried to put
opportunities for distinction in his way.
CHAPTER V.
FURTHER SERVICE AT CABANNÉ’S.
[Sidenote: METEORIC SHOWER.]
In November, 1833, Pilcher sent La Barge down to a small trading post
at the mouth of the Nishnabotna (river where they make canoes), kept
by Francis Duroins for the convenience of a local band of Indians.
La Barge’s mission was to take two twenty-gallon kegs of alcohol to
Duroins. He was accompanied by a half-blood Indian, and they made the
trip in a canoe. The first night they encamped on Trudeau Island,
about two and a half miles above the mouth of the Weeping Water River.
This island was named after Zenon Trudeau, a trader, brother of the
noted schoolmaster, Joseph Trudeau, and was later called Hurricane
Island, from the circumstance of its having been swept by a tornado.
It has since been entirely washed away. This was the night of the
ever-to-be-remembered meteoric shower of 1833. La Barge was awaked
from his sleep by the brilliant light, and, though not apprehensive of
any impending calamity, was naturally awe-struck at the extraordinary
display. The meteors were flying, as it seemed to him, in all
directions, and their number and brilliancy made the night as light
as day. The half-breed companion was absolutely panic-stricken, and
declared that the day of doom was at hand. But he did not forget, in
his fright, the divine injunction to “eat and drink, for to-morrow we
die.” Rolling himself up in his blanket, he besought La Barge to open
the keg of alcohol and let him meet his fate as became a man in that
wild and lawless country.
As nearly as La Barge could recall, the heavier part of the shower
lasted about two hours. A singular incident occurred early in its
duration. A deer which had become frightened at the unusual sight came
bounding through the undergrowth and plunged directly into camp, coming
to a dead halt scarcely six paces from where La Barge was sitting. He
seized a shotgun and killed it with a load of buckshot.
[Sidenote: THE EXPRESS.]
In January, 1834, the winter express came up from St. Louis. The
express was a matter of great importance in the early fur trade. It was
sent from St. Louis every winter to all the posts. Usually an express
started downstream from the upper posts before the arrival of that
from below. They generally met at Fort Pierre, exchanged dispatches,
and each made the return trip from that point. By means of the express
an interchange of views was had between the house in St. Louis and
the partners in the field; and the latter were able to send down
statements of business, requisitions for supplies, with information as
to the prospects for the ensuing season’s trade at the upper posts, and
the condition of snow in the mountains. The carrying of the express
was a matter of great danger and hardship. It was generally done in
the dead of winter. Between Pierre and St. Louis it was carried on
horseback; above Pierre on dogsleds. The packages were put up with the
most scrupulous care, and were intrusted only to those in whom the
company had absolute confidence. The bearers were not permitted to
carry anything else, nor to do errands for others, but were required to
attend to the express only. The chief danger on the long journey was
from the cold, for at this season the Indians were not dangerous, being
generally huddled together in their villages for the winter. The route
above Bellevue was along the west shore to opposite Vermillion, where
it crossed the river and remained on the east shore the rest of the way
until opposite Fort Pierre.
Captain La Barge’s father brought up the express from St. Louis in the
winter of 1834. He was to return from Cabanné’s post, and Pilcher was
to provide for its carriage the rest of the way. A few days before
his arrival a brutal murder occurred at the post. A half-breed named
Pinaud, while in a state of drunkenness, shot and killed a white man
named Blair. Both of the men were hunters for the post. Pilcher
immediately put Pinaud in irons, to be held until he could be sent to
St. Louis for trial. When the elder La Barge arrived Pilcher asked him
if he would undertake to deliver the prisoner to the United States
authorities in St. Louis. He agreed to try it. When ready to start
he requested Pilcher to remove the irons and put Pinaud on a mule.
This astonished Pilcher a good deal, but La Barge explained that the
man could ride better with the free use of his limbs, which was also
necessary to keep him from freezing to death. He said he could catch
him if he undertook to run, for the mule was no match in speed for his
horse. He would take the irons and put them on in camp.
[Sidenote: TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE.]
The prisoner was delivered in due time to the proper authorities in
St. Louis, where he was held for trial. And now ensued one of those
miscarriages, or rather travesties, of justice which marked the
entire history of the American Fur Company on the Missouri River.
Although Pinaud’s crime was a cold-blooded and causeless murder, it
was nevertheless of vital importance that he be acquitted; otherwise
it would bring out the fact that the Company was violating the Federal
statutes by selling liquor at its posts. The company therefore took
good care that none of the people from the upper country who were
conversant with the facts should be in St. Louis when the trial came
off. The prosecution, consequently, could produce no witnesses, and the
man was acquitted.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE CARRIES EXPRESS.]
Two or three days after the elder La Barge left Cabanné’s post for St.
Louis, Pilcher summoned young La Barge to him and asked him to take the
express to Pierre. “There are old voyageurs here whom I can send,” he
said, “but I can’t trust them. I want you to go. What do you say to it?”
“Well, Major,” La Barge replied, “I have never been as far above this
post in my life, but if you have confidence in me I think I can get
through.”
“I believe you will,” said the Major. “I will trust you, at any rate.
Get ready and you shall have the best horse in the post.”
In fact Pilcher gave La Barge his own horse, a very fine animal.
Captain La Barge made ready and set out alone in a country entirely new
to him, uninhabited by white men, and now buried in the embrace of a
northern winter. He took a few pounds of hard bread and a few ears of
corn to parch, but for the rest subsisted on game. He followed the foot
of the bluffs as far as possible, and in due time reached Fort Pierre.
Fortunately, the day after his arrival the express from Fort Union came
in. Exchanges were made, and after a short rest La Barge set out on his
return trip. He reached Cabanné in good time. The exploit gratified
Pilcher highly, and he said to La Barge, “I knew I had made no mistake.”
[Sidenote: A MOMENTARY FRIGHT.]
Captain La Barge recalled only two incidents on this trip: He saw one
day, what he never saw before nor afterward, although he had heard
hunters and Indians relate similar experiences, two dead elk whose
horns had become interlocked in fighting, and who had died bound
together in that way. While in camp one night, just above Vermillion,
he had a good fire of dry cottonwood and willows, and was roasting a
prairie chicken in the flame. Happening to look up, he saw four gray
wolves only a little way off on the opposite side of the fire, looking
steadily at him. He was almost paralyzed at the sight, but nevertheless
did not leave his place, but quietly got his gun and pistols convenient
for action and sat still and watched his visitors. After looking at him
a few minutes, and concluding, apparently, that he was not the kind of
game they were after, they withdrew.
[Sidenote: AFTER HORSE THIEVES.]
In the month of April, 1834, La Barge was sent with a party under one
La Chapelle to go to the Pawnees and bring down the bullboats with the
winter’s trade. They were detained several days at the Pawnee Loup
village, waiting for some of the Indians to come in. During this delay
a band of horse-stealing Sioux slipped into the village one stormy
night, and, opening the corrals, let out some sixty head of horses and
got away without waking anybody up. When the theft was discovered the
following morning the chief called for volunteers to go in pursuit.
Some seventy-five men started, and with them La Barge and a companion
named Bercier. La Barge had never had an experience of this sort, and
thought the present opportunity a good one. On the second evening after
their departure they discovered the thieves and their horses encamped
on the Elkhorn River. There were about fifteen of the Indians. The
pursuers carefully reconnoitered the position, and next morning at
daybreak attacked it, killing eleven of the Indians and capturing all
of the horses. The man Bercier, who accompanied La Barge, met death at
the hand of another tribe of Indians thirty-one years afterward. In
1865 he went up the Missouri with Captain La Barge to Fort Benton, and
was killed by the Blackfeet on the Teton River near that post.
[Sidenote: RATTLESNAKES.]
On their way down the Platte from the Pawnees, on this trip, the party
were greatly annoyed by rattlesnakes at the camps on shore. If they
made camp before dark they carefully scoured the entire neighborhood
and killed or drove off these dangerous reptiles. But they often kept
on the river as long as they could see, and on such occasions could
not take the usual precaution. The snakes were not pugnacious, and
sought the camp only because of the warm nestling places they found
there. They liked to creep into or under the blankets, and the great
danger was that when the occupant of the bed awoke he might step on
or otherwise hurt the snakes and cause them to strike before he was
conscious of their presence. On one occasion Captain La Barge found
two of these snakes under his coat, which he had folded and used for a
pillow. In some places they were so numerous as to cause the Indians to
move their camps. An instance of this kind occurred at Red Cloud, below
what is now Chamberlain, S. D., where the site of the agency had to be
changed. As late as 1883, when Captain La Barge was pilot of a boat in
the service of a United States surveying party, he took some members
of the party to a point near the Bijoux hills, where he remembered
having seen long years before a colony of rattlesnakes. Sure enough,
there they were, still as thick as in former days. The party killed 130
within a few minutes. Captain La Barge could not recall a single death
from a rattlesnake bite in his whole experience on the river. He stated
that swine were the best exterminators of these reptiles.
As soon as the robes had been packed into mackinaw boats at the mouth
of the Platte, about the middle of May, 1834, La Barge started for St.
Louis. This was the last of his service with Pilcher, for before his
return the Major had left the post for some more important business
in St. Louis. He had taken a great liking to the young engagé and
undertook to secure him a promotion. He sent down by La Barge a letter
of recommendation to Daniel Lamont, one of the partners of the upper
Missouri department of the American Fur Company. Captain La Barge knew
nothing of the letter at the time. It eventually found its way into the
Chouteau archives, where it was discovered by the author of this work
and shown to Captain La Barge sixty-two years after it was written. It
read as follows:
[Sidenote: LETTER OF RECOMMENDATION.]
“NEAR THE BLUFFS, May 16, 1834.
“DEAR SIR: The bearer of this, Joseph La Barge, wintered
with me last winter, and has been faithful, active, and
enterprising. He wishes to get a clerkship on the Missouri,
but I have not employed him for the reason that I have no use
for him, nor do I suppose that Mr. Chouteau will employ him
for this post, as I have informed him that there is no use for
additional clerks. La Barge writes a tolerably good hand, and
if you have any place for him above, I can recommend him as a
modest and good young man who has done his duty here (as an
engagé) very faithfully, and I think him worthy of a better
situation.
“Your friend,
“JOSHUA PILCHER.”
CHAPTER VI.
LAST YEAR AT CABANNÉ’S.
After a few weeks’ visit among his friends in St. Louis in the spring
of 1834 La Barge started back on the steamer _Diana_ for Cabanné’s
post. Pilcher was no longer in charge, having been succeeded by Peter
A. Sarpy. During his service under Sarpy La Barge had an adventure
which came near cutting off his career on the river almost at its
beginning. Late in the fall of the year Sarpy sent him down to Bellevue
to take charge of a herd of horses which was being wintered there for
the mountain expeditions of Fontenelle and Drips. There were about
150 horses in the herd, and they were kept on the east side of the
river in the bottoms, where they subsisted mostly on the bark of young
cottonwood trees. This kind of forage was extensively used in those
days. It was an excellent food and was liked by the stock. Instances
are recorded where they have taken it in preference to grain. Horses
throve well upon it, and it is related that Kenneth McKenzie at Fort
Union fed it exclusively to his hunting stock.
[Sidenote: HORSE WOOD.]
The method of preparing the bark for forage along the Missouri River
was as follows: The trees were cut down and the trunk then cut into
short logs three or four feet long. In the winter time the bark was
frozen and had to be thawed out before using. To do this the logs were
stood up in front of a fire and turned around gradually until the bark
was warmed through. It was then peeled off with drawknives and cut
up into small pieces, after which it was ready for food. It was very
essential that the bark be thawed out when fed, for the sharp edges
of the shavings were like knife blades if frozen, and liable to cut
the throats and stomachs of the horses. Animals were occasionally lost
from this cause. After the logs had been stripped of their bark they
were split and piled on the river bank, forming an excellent fuel for
the next season’s steamboat. Traders at the various posts were under
standing instructions to gather up the “horse wood” in their vicinity
and pile it on the bank of the river, where it could be reached by the
boats.
[Sidenote: INTO AN AIR HOLE.]
It was while engaged in this work of caring for horses that La Barge
had the adventure just alluded to. It was mid-winter, 1834–35. The
Missouri was frozen deep, and a pathway led from the post at Bellevue
across the river on the ice to the east bottoms, where the herd was
kept. The path ran between two large airholes through the ice--one
just above and the other about a hundred yards below. The weather
was extremely cold, and there was every indication of an approaching
blizzard. Captain La Barge wrapped himself in a blanket coat, held
tight to his body by a belt, and was armed with a rifle, tomahawk, and
knife. He experienced no difficulty in crossing to the east shore, for
the wind was behind his back. But before he was ready to return the
blizzard was on in full force; the wind came from the west obliquely
across the river, and the drifting snow completely obliterated the
path. La Barge nevertheless felt confident of crossing all right,
for the distance was short, and he knew the way so well that he felt
as if he could follow it blindfolded. In fact, that was practically
his present situation, for the wind drove the snow into his face so
violently that it was impossible to look ahead. Getting his bearings
as well as he could, he started across on a slow run in face of the
blinding storm. It would seem in any case to have been a reckless
performance, considering the existence of the airholes near the path;
but La Barge was not given to enlarging upon future dangers, and forged
boldly ahead. For once his confidence deceived him. All of a sudden he
plunged headlong into the river. He instantly realized that he was in
one of the air holes--but which one? If the lower one, he was certainly
lost, for the swift current had borne him under the ice before he came
to the surface. If the upper hole, he might float to the lower. But
did the current flow directly from one to the other, and would he be
at the top at the critical instant? All these questions and many more
flashed through his mind with the rapidity of thought in the presence
of imminent peril. He soon rose to the surface and bumped the overlying
ice. Sinking and rising again he bumped the ice a second time. The
limit of endurance was almost reached, when suddenly his head emerged
into the open air. Spreading out his hands, he caught the edge of the
ice. He held on until he could draw his knife, which he plunged into
the ice far enough to give him something to pull against, and after
much severe and perilous exertion he drew himself out. He had stuck
to his rifle all the time without realizing the fact, and came out as
fully armed as when he went in.
[Sidenote: MIRACULOUS ESCAPE.]
But now a new peril awaited him. The storm was at its height, the cold
intense, and his clothing was drenched through. The bath which he had
received had not chilled him in the least, for the water was much
warmer than the air outside, and his exertion would have kept him warm
anyway; but out in the wind the chances were that he would freeze if
he did not quickly reach a fire. Hastily recovering his bearings, he
set out anew, and had the good fortune to reach the post without any
further delay.
It is needless to say that the inmates of the post were slow to credit
the Captain’s story, in spite of the proof afforded by his frozen
clothing. Martin Dorion, one of the most respectable of the numerous
family of that name, said to La Barge, “Your time hasn’t come yet. Your
work remains to be done.” It was not until after he had changed his
clothing and had settled down by a strong fire that the reaction from
the terrible strain came; but then for a little while he felt as if he
could not keep himself together.
[Sidenote: EXPERT SWIMMER.]
La Barge was an expert swimmer, having practiced the art from
childhood. He learned to swim in the old Chouteau pond, which filled
the hollow near where the Union Station of St. Louis now stands. It was
not an uncommon feat for him in his younger days to leap from a boat
when he saw an elk or deer crossing the river, outswim and catch it,
hold on to it until its feet touched the bottom, and then kill it as it
was ascending the bank.
In the year 1850 La Barge was making a voyage to the upper river on
the steamer _St. Ange_. Mrs. La Barge and some other ladies were on
board. One day a boy fell overboard from the forecastle. La Barge,
who happened to be near, instantly leaped in and seized him, keeping
him from the wheel (it was a sidewheel boat), and got him to shore
before the boat could get there. A lady sitting on the deck with Mrs.
La Barge asked her if she was not alarmed when her husband leaped
overboard. She replied that she was not in the least; that she knew
Captain La Barge’s qualities as a swimmer too well to doubt his ability
to rescue the boy.
[Sidenote: RECOVERING A YAWL.]
In the summer of 1838, when La Barge was serving as pilot on the
_Platte_, another incident occurred which illustrated his skill as a
swimmer. At a point some twelve miles below Fort Leavenworth one of the
guys of the yawl derrick broke, precipitating the yawl into the river.
This craft was so essential to the steamboat in navigating the Missouri
River that its loss would at any time be irreparable. The alarm was
instantly given that the yawl was overboard. Captain La Barge was in
his stateroom, but immediately hastened to the stern of the boat,
where he met Captain Moore, the master. The latter said he had ordered
the steamboat to the shore and would send men down the bank to try to
recover the yawl. Captain La Barge replied, “I will get the yawl; send
some men down to help me bring it back.” So saying, he plunged into the
river, overtook the yawl, and brought it to land half a mile below the
boat.
In the spring of 1835 Captain La Barge went down, as usual, with the
mackinaws to St. Louis. This terminated his three years’ engagement
with the company. He remained in St. Louis all summer except when
absent on short river trips in the vicinity. In the fall he went up the
Missouri to the Black Snake Hills (St. Joseph, Mo.), where he engaged
for the winter to the trader Robidoux, who was in charge. Nothing of
interest transpired, and in the spring he returned to St. Louis.
[Sidenote: PRACTICAL APPRENTICESHIP.]
The next four years of Captain La Barge’s life were a practical
apprenticeship in the business which he was to follow as a career. They
were spent almost entirely on the lower river in the various capacities
of clerk, pilot, and master on different boats. Not many events of
special note occurred, and the actual voyages made are now somewhat
uncertain. But the experience was a useful one, and by the time it
was over the Captain had won a reputation as a pilot which thereafter
insured him continuous service.
[Sidenote: LEAVES AMERICAN FUR COMPANY SERVICE.]
The Captain’s first service during this time was as assistant pilot
on the steamer _St. Charles_, but the boat was burned at Richmond
landing, opposite Lexington, Mo., July 2, 1836. He then engaged as
pilot on a new boat, the _Kansas_, and ran in the lower river the
rest of the season. In the spring of 1837 he shipped as clerk on the
steamboat _Boonville_, but this boat was wrecked on a snag early in
November near the mouth of the Kansas River, and was lost with a full
cargo of government freight. In the spring of 1838 he went as pilot on
the _Platte_, a boat built during the previous winter, and the first
double-engine boat that ever plied the river. He remained on this boat
for two years, mainly on the lower river. He made but one trip to the
far upper river, and started, in the fall of 1838, for the Bayou la
Fourche, to spend the winter in the sugar trade. The boat had gone
scarcely thirty miles below St. Louis when she ran upon a snag, which
tore an immense hole in the bottom and caused her to sink immediately.
In the spring of 1840 the Captain again entered the service of the
American Fur Company as pilot of the steamer _Emily_, which was to
make a trip to Fort Union. Before the season was over the company
assigned him to work on a new steamboat, the _Trapper_. For some reason
the Captain did not like this assignment and refused to accept it.
This incensed the company, who considered him bound to serve wherever
directed. Neither side would yield, and the Captain forthwith left the
service of the company.
[Sidenote: THE MORMONS.]
During these four years of apprenticeship several incidents of interest
occurred, some pertaining to the local history of the country and
others of a purely personal character. Captain La Barge saw a good deal
of the Mormons, who at this time were undergoing those persecutions
in western Missouri which finally drove them from the State. They
were frequently on the steamboats, and the Captain at one time or
another saw nearly all the leaders, including Joseph Smith and his
brother Hyrum, Sidney Rigdon, Orson Hyde, and others. Captain La Barge
never liked the appearance or demeanor of Smith, and never believed
in his sincerity. He thought more of Rigdon, who was a most pleasant
talker and who once preached a sermon on his boat. Captain La Barge’s
knowledge of the Mormons and their doings at this time led them to
request him, nearly sixty years afterward (1895), to appear for them
and give evidence as to their title to the land in Independence, Mo.,
on which their temple was built.
[Sidenote: DANIEL BOONE.]
Another incident which occurred about this time calls up one of the
famous characters of American frontier history--Daniel Boone. This
noted pioneer had passed most of his life in Kentucky, but when
settlement began to crowd upon his primeval domain he moved westward
and settled in Warren County, near St. Charles, Mo., where he died
in 1820. Some years later, by agreement between the governments of
Kentucky and Missouri, Boone’s remains were moved to the latter State.
A committee from the Kentucky Legislature went to Missouri on the
occasion of the removal and were taken up the river to Marthasville,
where Boone was buried, on the steamer _Kansas_. Captain La Barge, who
was serving on the _Kansas_ at the time, recalled the circumstances
perfectly. Many years later he was invited to go to Frankfort, Ky., to
attend an anniversary celebration pertaining to Boone’s career, but was
not able to accept. La Barge’s father knew Boone intimately, and La
Barge himself was a warm friend of his son Nathan Boone.
CHAPTER VII.
CAPTAIN LA BARGE IN “OPPOSITION.”
The term “opposition” in the early Missouri River fur trade had a
definite and specific meaning. It applied to any trading concern,
great or small, individual or collective, which was doing business in
competition with the American Fur Company. So powerful was this company
that it never permitted any other company or trader to occupy the same
field with itself except at the cost of ruinous commercial warfare.
There were many attempts to compete with it, but all of them ended in
failure.
The incident related in the last chapter, which led Captain La Barge
to quit the company’s service, induced him to try his own luck as an
opposition trader; but the result, which quickly developed, was quite
like that of his many predecessors and successors in the same line.
The Captain had laid by a few thousand dollars, which he put into the
venture, and secured additional capital from J. B. Roy and Henry Shaw
of St. Louis. The steamer _Thames_ was chartered to convey the cargo as
far as Council Bluffs, for, owing to the lateness of the season, it
was not thought safe to attempt to take the boat further. An outfit of
wagons was carried along, and it was expected that they would be able
to purchase enough horses and oxen to haul the goods the rest of the
way.
[Sidenote: EN ROUTE TO FORT LOOKOUT.]
It was late in the summer when the boat arrived at Council Bluffs.
She was promptly unloaded and turned over to her owners, and the
Captain immediately set about organizing his wagon train. October had
come before he was finally ready to start. His plan was to reach old
Fort Lookout before winter set in. He knew that that post had been
abandoned, but he understood that it was still in a good enough state
of preservation to winter in. At _L’Eau qui Court_ (Niobrara River) he
was compelled to abandon his wagons on account of the snow, and build
sleds. He traveled the rest of the way on the frozen surface of the
river.
[Sidenote: TROUBLE BEGINNING.]
Soon after leaving the Niobrara Captain La Barge had a foretaste of
what he must expect from the American Fur Company, and found that he
must be prepared to contend, not only with the long-established power
and unscrupulous methods of that great organization, but with the
petty trickery of small traders who were trying to make some headway
in the country. At the Niobrara he found Narcisse Leclerc, the same
whose expedition he had helped break up at Council Bluffs eight
years before. The Captain knew him well as a man acquainted with the
Indians and capable of rendering efficient service, but devoid of good
principle and ready for any underhand action that would promote his
interest. La Barge found him, with his family, entirely destitute, and,
counting on his well-known hostility to the company, he thought that if
he were to employ him he might depend on his loyalty. He accordingly
engaged him, but later bitterly regretted it.
Soon afterward, when Captain La Barge and Leclerc had passed Handy’s
old trading post, where Fort Randall later stood, they were met by
a party of ten Indians and a white man by the name of Bruyère, who
claimed that they were en route from Pierre to Vermillion. Leclerc
cautioned La Barge not to believe them, for he was certain that they
had been sent down from Pierre to spy out La Barge’s movements and
break up his expedition if possible. La Barge’s experience in the
Indian trade, and his strong backing in St. Louis, made his opposition
a matter of much importance. It was decided that it must be gotten
rid of in some way, by force if that were practicable, and if not, by
purchase or competition. The party that had come down the river was
evidently sent to find out what could be done.
[Sidenote: HAPPY EFFECT OF LIQUOR.]
A parley ensued and La Barge invited Bruyère and his party to go back
to Handy’s old post and he would give them a feast. This was agreed to,
and after reaching the post and fixing camp they were first treated
to coffee and hard tack. La Barge then gave Bruyère some liquor, and
asked him if he should give the Indians some. Bruyère assented, saying
the Indians liked it and he could take care of them. Bruyère’s party
numbered eleven in all. The Captain resolved to get them all deadly
drunk and then set out, leaving some liquor to keep them drunk the
longer. As the liquor began to work on Bruyère he became communicative,
and openly avowed his mission, which was the same as Leclerc had
sagaciously foreseen. “You treat me better than any trader ever treated
me before,” he said. “I was sent here to do you harm, but now I am for
you, and if any Indians attempt to harm you I will defend you.”
[Sidenote: THE UNARMED INDIANS.]
La Barge then went on to Fort Lookout without any further molestation
and took possession of the abandoned buildings, intending to conduct
his winter trade there. Shortly afterward he received, by the hands of
an Indian, a note from the agent at Pierre, inviting him in the most
polite and courteous terms to come to his post, as he had some business
to propose, and particularly wanted to have a friendly visit. Here
again La Barge’s suspicions were aroused. The Indian messenger, who
was a brother-in-law of the agent, had come to Fort Lookout totally
unarmed, a thing unheard of in the Indian country. He at once inferred
that the Indian hoped to allay any fears which La Barge might have of
traveling alone with him. La Barge received him kindly, said he would
decide in a day or two, and asked him to wait. At the first opportunity
the Captain strolled off with his gun, as if on a chicken hunt, and set
out on the route by which the Indian had come. He followed the trail
several miles, when he found the place where the Indian had cached his
gun under a tree top. La Barge confiscated the outfit, took it to camp,
and hid it. He then told the Indian that he was ready to go to Pierre,
and that they would start the next morning. They accordingly set out
at an early hour, intending to accomplish the journey in two days. The
distance was something over sixty miles by land, though one hundred by
river, for the great bend of the Missouri lay between the two places.
When they reached the place where the Indian had cached his gun the
latter excused himself for a moment, telling La Barge not to wait.
After a while he came up, but showed no signs of what his feelings must
have been. He behaved very well all the way. The first night was spent
on a sandbar of the river, and Fort Pierre was reached at a good hour
on the afternoon of the second day.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE UNSOCIABLE.]
The agent could not at first conceal his astonishment at seeing La
Barge, but quickly recovered himself, and feigned great pleasure at the
meeting, saying he was glad La Barge had gotten through safely--there
were so many scoundrels around the country that one’s life was in
danger, if unprotected. The agent then gave La Barge a good supper, and
after it was over insisted that he must sit up all night and talk about
things in St. Louis. Jacob Halsey was clerk at the time. They pressed
the Captain to join them in their drinks, but without success. The
agent then lost his temper, declared that La Barge was “unsociable,”
and that he was insulting his host by refusing his hospitality. La
Barge replied that if it was necessary to get drunk in order to be
sociable he would not be sociable.
[Sidenote: PROPOSITION FOR PURCHASE.]
“I had not been in the Indian country so many years for nothing,” said
Captain La Barge, when describing this affair. “I knew perfectly well
the unscrupulous methods of the company, for I had been an eyewitness
of them. They cared not how desperate the measure to arrive at their
end if only they could escape detection, and this was a comparatively
easy matter. ‘Killed by the Indians,’ and similar reports, were used
to veil deeds which were too black to expose to the world. It was no
uncommon thing for servants of the company who had started for St.
Louis, with a statement of the amount to their credit, to be heard
of no more. Knowing these things, I was confessedly distrustful of my
hosts. I knew that they dared do nothing openly, for that would lead to
prompt report and investigation; but if I were to join in their revels,
and lose my self-control, it would be easy enough to involve me in a
fray with an Indian and get rid of me in that way, or get me to sign
some agreement drawn up by themselves, which should rob me of my outfit
and drive me out of the country. Although a temperance man anyway, I
resolved to be particularly so on this occasion, and remain absolutely
sober. I knew well enough that a proposition would soon come to buy
me out, and I had no intention of losing my ability to drive a good
bargain.
“The expected proposition came from the agent on the morning of my
second day at Pierre. It was not as liberal as I thought it ought to
be, and I rejected it. Next day an express came from Lookout with
serious news for me. Leclerc, without the slightest authority, had
taken a third of my outfit and had gone to the Yanktonais Indians to
trade. This would seriously interfere with my plan, which was to hold
my outfit at Lookout until I knew what terms the company would offer.
I now felt that the quicker the matter was closed up the better, and
knowing the great hazard of attempting to oppose so powerful a company,
I accepted the proffered terms. These were that the company should
take my entire outfit at an advance of ten per cent. upon the cost to
me where it was, while I was to engage myself to the company for a
period of three years.
[Sidenote: SEEKING A SHORT CUT.]
“Even after this arrangement the agent subjected me to new and imminent
peril, as if still hoping that he would arrive at his end by a shorter
cut. Although he could just as well have instructed his trader on the
Little Cheyenne to receive and receipt for the goods in Leclerc’s
possession, he insisted that I should go to that post and either get
the goods or make a personal transfer to the trader there. He refused
me any escort, and the only thing that he would do was to lend me
a horse and sled. The mission was a particularly perilous one. The
Yanktonais were the most dangerous and hostile of all the Sioux tribes.
They knew the value of opposition in securing them better terms in
trade, and if they were to learn that my mission was to sell out to the
company, they would unquestionably undertake to wreak vengeance on me.
Notwithstanding the needlessness, as well as the peril, of the trip, I
was compelled to go, and accordingly set out.
[Sidenote: ZEPHYR RENCONTRE.]
[Sidenote: INDIANS INSOLENT.]
“The overland distance to the mouth of the Big Cheyenne was about forty
miles, and I made it in one day. Here the American Fur Company had a
wintering post under charge of a man named Bouis, who had with him as
interpreter a very valuable man by the name of Zephyr Rencontre.[10]
Zephyr was a good friend of mine and I resolved to practice a little
strategy to secure his company to the Little Cheyenne and his
assistance there. When I reached the post at the Big Cheyenne, Bouis
exclaimed, with a good deal of astonishment, ‘What! are you alone?’
I replied that I was, but that I had authority to take Zephyr to the
Little Cheyenne camp and return. Bouis was somewhat surprised at this,
but said that if such were the orders he would go. We set out at once,
and as soon as we were well on the way, I laid the whole matter before
Zephyr. He advised me by all means not to try to take the goods away,
for such an attempt would enrage the Indians. The thing to do was to
get an inventory of the goods from Leclerc, transfer it to the trader
there, Paschal Cerré, get his receipt, and thus transact the whole
business on paper without the knowledge of the Indians. We arrived
safely at the post and proceeded at once to our business. Everything
went well under Zephyr’s management for a time, but the suspicion
began to spread among the Indians that I was there either to remove
my goods or to sell out, and they began to assume a tone of insolence
and bravado. Leclerc was probably responsible for this, for he did
not relish at all the turn that things had taken. In the meanwhile I
took refuge in the lodge of an Indian who was a friend of Zephyr. The
latter said he would dispatch the business with all possible speed. The
Indians were feasting from lodge to lodge, and Zephyr said they might
try to annoy me at any time, but told me to remain right there, say
nothing to them, nor resent their actions if they became troublesome.
‘I am looking out for you,’ he said, ‘and have also some of my Indian
friends on guard.’ Along in the evening the Indians began to come
around, evidently in very bad temper, but none of them entered the
tent. They made things very uncomfortable, however, and several times I
concluded that all was over. They slashed the tent with their knives,
and stuck their guns through and shot into the fire, throwing the coals
all over me. They were trying to anger me to the point of resistance,
as Zephyr had said they would, and they came near succeeding. I could
hardly stand it. It seemed certain that I should be killed, and if
I failed to take off one or two of them I should die that much less
satisfied. I kept control of myself, however, and presently Zephyr came
to me announcing that the business was completed, the inventories
receipted, and that when a young Indian should come and tell me to
follow I was to get up and go. It was about midnight that the Indian
appeared and beckoned me to follow. I left the tent through one of the
openings which the Indians had slashed in it, and we immediately struck
out at a rapid pace down the Little Cheyenne. After proceeding four or
five miles I was joined by Zephyr, and the young Indian was sent back.
[Sidenote: NIGHT MARCH.]
“We then started straight across the hills for the mouth of the Big
Cheyenne, some forty miles distant. It was very important to get there
early the next day, lest we be cut off by the Indians. We ran a good
deal of the way, but such was the severity of the weather that we
almost froze. The thermometer must have reached thirty degrees below
zero. On the open hills the cold was terrible, and the side of my body
next to the wind became thoroughly numbed. The journey was not without
decided interest, however, for we were treated to one of the most
beautiful displays of the Aurora Borealis that I have ever seen.
“We reached the mouth of the Big Cheyenne a little after sunrise, and
I immediately got breakfast and set out for Pierre, where I arrived
about nightfall. When I reached the fort the agent could hardly believe
his eyes. ‘What! are you back already?’ he said. ‘I hardly thought you
would succeed in turning those goods over.’ I replied that I too was
astonished that I had got out of that scrape uninjured. ‘How did you
manage it?’ he asked. ‘I took Zephyr along with me.’ ‘Why, how could
Bouis spare him?’ ‘By your order. Didn’t you authorize me to take him?’
‘No, I never gave any such authority,’ said the agent, as he turned
away in anger that he had been so completely outwitted.
“The next day the agent detailed James Kipp, with three or four men and
a dozen Indians, to go with me to Lookout and receive the goods at that
point. The Indians were wholly unnecessary, and I can explain their
being sent only on the theory that the agent had not yet given up the
short cut for destroying this new opposition. But Kipp was a different
sort of man, and although he was sometimes compelled to do the bidding
of others to save himself, he never approved of such desperate measures.
[Sidenote: UGLY BUSINESS TERMINATED.]
“When we set out Kipp was on horseback and I on foot, and he said,
‘Well, let’s see who will get to Lookout first.’ Bercier and I were the
only ones who reached there that night, but I was so badly used up that
it was several days before I could walk naturally. Kipp did not get in
for two days. The rest of the property was then turned over and the
ugly business brought to a close.”
Such was Captain La Barge’s first experience in opposing the American
Fur Company; and if it resulted in a quick collapse the profitable
termination to himself, and the extreme opposition of the company,
showed that they did not regard his enterprise with an easy eye. The
whole affair made them set a higher value on La Barge’s services and
treat his opinions and rights thereafter with more consideration.
As soon as the business with the Fur Company was completed La Barge
set out for Bellevue, arriving there about April 1, 1841. He at once
went to the Pawnees, where he used to go seven or eight years before,
and brought down the bullboats. He was glad to make this trip, for he
always liked the Pawnees. Having arrived at the mouth of the Platte
with the bullboats and transferred their cargo, he set out for St.
Louis with the mackinaws.
[Sidenote: MARRIAGE OF CAPTAIN LA BARGE.]
[Sidenote: PELAGIE GUERETTE.]
The summer of 1842 was mostly spent on the lower river, without any
incident of especial note. This year was marked, however, by a very
important event in the life of Captain La Barge. On the 17th of August,
1842, he was married to Pelagie Guerette. His wife’s mother’s name was
Marie Palmer, one of a noted Illinois family of that name. Her father’s
name was Pierre Guerette, one of the Louisiana French, and he was born
in Kaskaskia, Ill. He was a millwright and architect. He built for
Auguste Chouteau one of the first grist mills run by water in St.
Louis. The mill was located at the old dam which extended from Chouteau
Avenue to Market Street, in the vicinity of Ninth Street. Pelagie
Guerette was born January 10, 1825, and was therefore nearly ten years
Captain La Barge’s junior. He had known her from childhood. She was a
beautiful woman, and although not robust in health, reared a family of
five boys and two girls, to adult years. She was a very sensible, noble
woman, and a constant help to her husband during their married life of
nearly sixty years.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE MISSOURI RIVER.
[Sidenote: DEPARTED GLORY.]
We have now followed the career of Captain La Barge through the various
experiences of youth and early manhood until he is finally settled in
the business of his subsequent life--the navigation of the Missouri
River. It is therefore a proper time to consider the nature of that
business, its features of peculiar interest, and its relation to the
growth of the western country. This is the more important because it
is a phase in the development of that country which has permanently
passed away, and in the general mind is already buried in oblivion.
Yet for fully a hundred years the history of the Missouri River was
the history of the country through which it flowed. Its importance
no one to-day can comprehend. Now the railroad has made accessible
almost every section of the country. Then there were no railroads to
speak of west of the Mississippi, nor, for that matter, any other
roads worthy of mention. The river was the great, and almost the only,
highway of travel and commerce. Everything was done with reference
to it. Commercial posts and military garrisons were established;
expeditions were undertaken, and all business operations were carried
on with careful reference to this mighty stream, which descended from
the distant mountains to the very heart of the continent and thence to
the sea, whence the road was open to every quarter of the globe. But
now its influence upon the growth of the western country has ceased to
exist. The mighty river, which was once alive with steamboats and other
craft, from the Great Falls to its mouth, cannot boast a single regular
packet. In the most absolute sense its glory has departed, and not a
trace is left to remind the modern observer of its former greatness.
In the following descriptions, therefore, we hope to be serving the
true purpose of history, in gathering together for preservation some
interesting features of a type of our frontier life which has long
since run its appointed course.
Of all the rivers on the globe the longest is the Missouri-Mississippi.
On the summit of the Rocky Mountains, above the upper Red Rock Lake,
some forty miles west of the Yellowstone National Park, and directly on
the boundary between the States of Montana and Idaho, Jefferson Fork
of the Missouri, finds its source. From this point, by a continuous
water course to the Gulf of Mexico, the distance is 4221 miles. The
river is formed by the confluence of three fine mountain streams which
unite at a point about fifty miles south of Helena, Mont. They were
named by their discoverers, Lewis and Clark, the Jefferson, Madison,
and Gallatin rivers, in honor of the national administration which set
on foot the expedition of these explorers. Two of these streams rise in
the Yellowstone National Park, and the other, as we have seen, a little
distance to the westward.
[Sidenote: THE YELLOWSTONE.]
Of the many tributaries of the Missouri the most important is the
Yellowstone, which rivals in size the main stream and joins it nearly
eight hundred miles below the Three Forks. Like the Missouri it finds
its source in and around that now famous region, where Nature has
lavished without stint her most marvelous handiwork, and which the
government of the United States has set apart for the common enjoyment
of the people. Both the Missouri and the Yellowstone rivers, in the
upper portions of their course, flow over immense cascades and rapids
which have become well known among the cataracts of the globe. The
Great Falls of the Missouri are located near the modern city of the
same name. They comprise several cataracts and rapids, the highest
perpendicular distance being 87 feet, and the total fall over 500 feet.
The falls of the Yellowstone are within the National Park, the highest
perpendicular distance being 310 feet, and the total descent from
Yellowstone Lake to below the first cañon near Livingston, Mont., being
about 3200 feet.
[Sidenote: ALLUVIAL CHARACTER.]
Upon emerging from the foothills of the mountains, both streams
begin to assume that peculiar character which distinguishes them
throughout the rest of their course to the sea. They flow through
alluvial bottoms, built up of the detritus from the highlands and
mountains, until the present bed of the river is in most places fifty
to a hundred feet above the original bed in the solid rock. The
usual characteristics of an alluvial river are here found in their
highest development--a muddy current, freshly formed islands, sandbars
innumerable, an unstable channel, and a shifting bed which is never in
the same place for two years in succession.
Among the most striking phenomena of a river like the Missouri is the
constant change that is going on in the location of its channel. This
seems to be in some places a periodical matter. The forces of the river
get to working on particular lines and push their devastations for
many years in one general direction. Being finally arrested by some
insurmountable obstacle, or turned, it may be, by trifling causes,
they work in another direction, and invade lands which have enjoyed
long immunity, and upon which the cottonwood, walnut, and cedar have
attained mature growth.
[Illustration: A NEW “CUT OFF”
Old course of river toward background
Old course of river from background]
[Sidenote: A WINDING WATERWAY.]
The river, in its unrestrained rambles from bluff to bluff, performs
some curious freaks. It develops the most remarkable bends, varying in
length from one to thirty miles, with distances across the necks but a
small fraction of those around. In time these narrow necks are cut in
two, and the river abandons its old course, which soon fills up near
the extremities of the bends and leaves crescent-shaped lakes in the
middle. This process is a never-ending one, and the channel distances
along the river are in a state of never-ending change. There is one
bend in the upper river, known from the earliest times as the Great
Bend, which was not formed in the way just described. The course of the
river here is comparatively permanent, and is evidently the same as
that of the original stream bed. The distance around is nearly thirty
miles, while that across is only a mile and a half. It was a regular
custom with travelers, when the Indians were not too dangerous, to
leave the boats at the beginning of this bend and walk across, going on
board on the other side.
The existence of so many bends increased the length of the channel,
but this drawback was more than offset by the reduction of the slope
which made the current less strong and enabled steamboats to overcome
it with greater ease. The river is like a great spiral stairway
leading from the ocean to the mountains. A steamboat at Fort Benton
is 2565 feet--two and one-half times the height of the Eiffel tower in
Paris--above the level of the sea; yet so gentle is the slope nearly
all the way that, in placid weather, the water surface resembles that
of a lake. This wonderful evening-up of the slope of the river by the
extreme sinuosity of its course is a fact not only interesting as a
natural phenomenon, but of the utmost importance in the behavior and
use of the stream.
[Illustration: CHANGES OF THE CHANNEL OF THE MISSOURI RIVER
THROUGH MONONA COUNTY, IOWA.
_Present Channel Distance, 44 Miles_
(COMPILED BY MITCHELL VINCENT, ONAWA, IOWA.)]
Not only does the general course of the river have these larger
windings, but in periods of low water they are multiplied many fold.
When a large proportion of the river bed between its banks becomes
exposed, as it does in the low-water season, the stream flows back
and forth across this bed until its length is largely increased over
that at high water. Here again is to be seen the wisdom of nature’s
methods. In periods of high water, when it is important to move the
floods rapidly down the valley, the river straightens out, shortens its
length, increases its slope, and accelerates its velocity of flow.
[Sidenote: ANNUAL TONNAGE.]
Of the immense carrying power and potential energy of this stream it
is difficult to form an adequate conception. It yearly carries into
the Mississippi 550,000,000 tons of earth, which has been brought an
average distance of not less than 500 miles. The work thus represented
is equivalent to 275,000,000,000 mile-tons, or tons carried one
mile. The railroads of the United States carried in the year 1901
141,000,000,000 mile-tons of freight.
[Sidenote: BEDS OF THE OLD RIVER.]
That such an exercise of power should leave its impress deep upon the
country through which the river flows is not to be wondered at. Every
year thousands of acres of rich bottom lands are destroyed. Forests,
meadows, cultivated fields, farmhouses, and villages fall before its
tremendous onslaught, and the changes that have been wrought in the
topography of the valley during the past one hundred years almost defy
belief.[11] To one familiar with its history, the many crescent-shaped
lakes and curvilinear benches show where the river once flowed and
where it may flow again. In recent years the government has seriously
undertaken to set metes and bounds to the migratory habits of the
stream; but it has found a most refractory subject to deal with. Even
with the expenditure of vast sums of money in the construction of the
most powerful dikes and improved bank protection known to engineering,
it can never feel certain that its prisoner will not break its bonds at
any moment and escape.
[Illustration: SNAGS IN THE MISSOURI RIVER
(After Maximilian)]
[Sidenote: SNAGS AND SAWYERS.]
As with most of our Western streams the principal arboreal growths
along the banks of the Missouri are the willow and cottonwood. The
willow matures very rapidly, and well-grown forests are constantly met
with in places where the river flowed but two or three years before.
The cottonwood requires more time to mature, but this is afforded
by those longer cycles of change in which the river passes back and
forth across the bottoms. On many of the islands along the central
portion of the river there were formerly extensive growths of cedar.
The walnut and other trees abound to a less extent. Every year great
numbers of trees that line the river bank are undermined and fall into
the stream. They are borne along by the current until they become
anchored in the bottom, where they remain with one end sticking up and
pointing downstream, sometimes above and sometimes below the surface.
These trunks or branches have always been the most formidable dangers
to navigation of the river. They are called snags or sawyers, though
sometimes, from the ripple or break in the surface of the water,
“breaks.” It is, in fact, only by the appearance of these breaks that
a submerged snag can be discovered by the pilot; and fortunately, in
a rapid current, like that of the Missouri, a snag will cause such a
break if it is near enough to the surface to touch the bottom of a
boat. These snags were the terror of the pilot, as well they might be.
The record of steamboat wrecks on the Missouri, and it is an appalling
one, shows that about seventy per cent. were due to this cause.
[Sidenote: THE MISSOURI IN WINTER.]
A large portion of the river is in a latitude where it freezes over
every winter. During the ice period it is indeed effectually enchained.
The banks are safe for a season, and the water itself becomes
comparatively clear. But as soon as the breezes of spring soften the
ice the river resumes its customary wanderings, with renewed vigor
after its long rest. By way of celebration of its release from its icy
prison it frequently gives exhibitions of power that far surpass all
its other manifestations. When the ice “breaks” and begins to “run,”
it is liable to strand like a steamboat on the shallow bars. Other ice
following, and finding the way obstructed, piles up on that before it.
Gradually, sometimes, and sometimes rapidly, the accumulation spreads,
cutting off the channel of the river, until, as often happens, it
forms a veritable dam across the entire stream. These ice “gorges”
develop a power that nothing can withstand, and the amount of property
destroyed by them in the history of the river has been very great.
There is almost nothing that can be done to break them. Dynamite
explosions are resorted to, but the ice piles up so rapidly and in
such vast quantities that the most powerful blast seems harmless. In
the face of this appalling danger man is forced to stand a helpless
spectator until the river itself accumulates sufficient force to burst
through the dam. It has more than once happened that, before the dam
has given way, the river has cut an entirely new channel.
[Sidenote: ICE GORGES.]
The moving of the ice, even when not accompanied by serious blockades,
is always an impressive sight. Usually the warm weather loosens it from
the shore before it begins to move, and even disintegrates it, so that
it is unsafe to cross upon. The softer it becomes before it begins to
run the less danger is there of its gorging. After the movement begins
it continues for several days, until the vast quantities of ice stored
in the river above have floated by, or melted away. During the height
of the movement the crushing of innumerable ice cakes upon each other
produces a continuous roar which can be heard for a long distance from
the river.
To the lonely dwellers of the valley in the early times the annual
“break-up” of the ice was the most welcome event of the year, for it
was the knell of the long and tedious winter, and the certain harbinger
of approaching spring.
[Sidenote: ANNUAL FLOODS.]
The river has two regular floods every year, one usually in April
and the other in June. The first flood is short, sharp, and often
very destructive. The second flood is of longer duration and carries
an immensely greater quantity of water, but does less damage than
the first. The April flood is due to the spring freshets along the
immediate valley as the snow melts off and the first rains come. The
June rise comes primarily from the melting snows in the mountains. The
great and exceptional floods, however, are not due to these regular
causes, but to periods of long and excessive precipitation in the lower
portions of the valley.
The slope of the river in the lower half of its course is less than a
foot to the mile, and the velocity of its current varies from two to
ten miles per hour, depending upon the stage of the water.
[Sidenote: BEAUTY OF THE RIVER.]
From an æsthetic point of view, the Missouri River has an unenviable
reputation. People who never see it except in crossing railroad
bridges, from which they look down into a mass of muddy, eddying water,
are liable to compare it unfavorably with other important streams.
But to him who is fortunate enough to travel upon it, and study it
in all its phases, it is not only an attractive stream, but one of
great scenic beauty. As seen in its more placid periods, near morning
or evening, when the slanting rays of the sun show the water mainly
by reflection, robbing it of its muddy tinge, and replacing it by a
crimson hue or silver glimmer that stretches away toward the horizon,
cut off again and again by the bends of the river, but ever and anon
reappearing until lost in the distance, there are few scenes in nature
that appeal more strongly to the eye of the artist.
Again, in its less peaceful moods, when the persistent prairie winds
blow day after day without ceasing, there is a peculiar attractiveness
about the weird scene. In all directions, as far as the eye can reach,
the air is filled with clouds of sand, drifting along the naked bars,
and changing their forms almost as rapidly as does the water those in
the bed of the river. The willows and cottonwoods bend complainingly
before the blast. The river is lashed into foam, and often becomes so
tempestuous that rowboats cannot live in it, while larger craft, making
a virtue of necessity, lie moored to the shore until the wind has
abated its fury.
[Sidenote: PRAIRIE STORMS.]
Perhaps the most frightful scenes on the river are the violent summer
storms of thunder, hail, and rain, with the characteristic tornado
tendencies so common in the central prairies. When these black storms
gather, and the incessant lightning seems to bind the clouds to the
earth, and the rolling and agitated vapors disclose the terrible play
of the winds, the river man discreetly makes for shore, and loses no
time in gaining the shelter of some friendly bank. The fury of these
storms as they break into the valley, pouring down wind and rain with
terrific violence, until the river yields up clouds of spray like
the vortex of Niagara, forms one of the wildest and most sublime
manifestations of the forces of nature. It cannot be truly enjoyed by
an eyewitness, because of the element of danger which is present, but
the impression produced upon one who is fortunate enough to pass safely
through it remains ineffaceable in the memory. These storms generally
come from the southwest, and it was a well-recognized rule on the river
in boating days to tie up for the night on the southwest, or right
shore of the river, so as to be under cover of a bank if a storm should
come before day. Accidents from these storms were numerous. Boats were
often torn from their moorings and driven upon the bars, where they
were as good as lost. Smokestacks, hurricane deck, and pilot-house were
frequently carried away and windows destroyed by the hail.
[Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF THE WEATHER.]
The condition of the weather had an influence upon the business of
navigating the river which was of the highest importance, yet would
never occur to one unless his attention were directed to it. The
excessively uneven and broken condition of the bed of the river, filled
as it was with ever-shifting sand-drifts or bars, sometimes called
reefs by the river men, produced an appearance upon the surface of
the water which was almost the only guide in tracing out the sinuous
channel. The experienced pilot could tell from this appearance, not
only where snags and other hidden obstructions were, but the outlines
of submerged sandbars, and the position of the deepest water. Anything,
like wind or rain or a slanting sun, which disturbed this normal
appearance, disturbed the serenity of the pilot’s mind. Wind was less
troublesome than rain, for it ruffled the deep water more than the
shallow, and thus left some indication of the locality of each. Rain,
on the other hand, reduced everything to a common appearance. The
sun, when below forty-five degrees from the horizon, was exceedingly
troublesome on account of the reflection from the water whenever the
boat was sailing toward it.
Captain La Barge records a curious fact in regard to the appearance
of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers as seen by night. He found the
Missouri much easier to “read,” and always experienced a feeling of
relief when he left the main stream and entered its great tributary.
The Mississippi seemed black in the night, and this appearance
aggravated the darkness. The Missouri, on the other hand, had a
distinct whitish tinge, and it seemed, as he entered the stream, as if
a faint light had been struck up along its surface.
[Sidenote: DISCOVERY OF THE MISSOURI.]
Such are some of the more striking physical characteristics of this
very remarkable stream. It is not surprising that, in the early times,
when it first came to be known, it produced a profound impression on
the minds of explorers and drew from them expressions of wonder and
awe. Marquette and Joliet, who discovered the river in 1673, were
floating down the Mississippi in a comparatively clear current, when
they came to a point where a mighty volume of water poured itself
into the Mississippi from the west shore, carrying trees, stumps, and
drift of all descriptions. It filled them with amazement, as it has
every person since who has stood at the confluence of these two mighty
streams, particularly when the Missouri is bringing down the great
floods of spring.
We do not know when the Missouri was first entered by white men, but
probably about the year 1700. The French had made sufficient progress
along its course in the early years of the eighteenth century to alarm
the Spaniards, who, in the year 1720, sent an expedition to destroy the
Missouri Indians, the allies of the French. This expedition was itself
destroyed by the Missouris, but the event caused the French to build
a post some two hundred miles up the river on an island opposite the
village of the Missouris. This was Fort Orleans, and was, so far as we
know, the first structure erected by white men along the course of the
stream.
[Sidenote: NAME OF THE RIVER.]
The name of the river comes from the tribe of Indians just mentioned,
who once dwelt at its mouth, but were driven from this position by
the Illinois Indians. The word means “dwelling near the mouth of the
river,” and has no reference to the muddy quality of the water.
The fact that the Missouri River is longer than the entire Mississippi,
and more than twice as long as that portion of the latter stream above
the mouth of the Missouri, has led to the frequent observation that
the name which applies to the lower course of the Mississippi should
apply also to the tributary. But this would evidently not be a fitting
nomenclature. The Mississippi is the trunk stream, receiving the
drainage from the Alleghenies on the east and the Rockies on the west.
It divides the continent into approximately symmetrical portions. This
division has entered into the very life of our national development,
and is so natural and convenient that the stream itself from north to
south is appropriately known by a single name. The Missouri is the
great tributary from the mountains on the west, as the Ohio is from
the mountains on the east. The characteristics of the Missouri are so
peculiarly its own that a separate name is more befitting than one
divided between itself and another and very different stream.
[Sidenote: EARLY EXPLORATION.]
During the eighteenth century the French gradually extended their
knowledge of the river. It is not likely that the voyageurs had
ascended as far as to the Mandan villages, a short distance above the
modern capital of North Dakota, when, in 1738–43, De la Verendrye
crossed over from the north and struck the river at that point. But it
is quite certain that at the time of the founding of St. Louis, 1764,
the river was well known for a thousand miles above its mouth. From
that time knowledge of it increased more rapidly, and when Lewis and
Clark went up the river in 1804, they found that white men had preceded
them almost to the mouth of the Yellowstone.
CHAPTER IX.
KINDS OF BOATS USED ON THE MISSOURI.
[Sidenote: RIVER BOATS.]
The swift and turbulent character of the Missouri River led to
exaggerated accounts by the early explorers of the difficulty of
navigating it. Such navigation was at first considered wholly out of
the question except in the simplest craft. Tradition says that Gregoire
Zerald Sarpy was the first to introduce keelboats on the river, but the
date of this essay is not very definitely fixed. It would seem that the
French must have used large boats at the time they were established at
Fort Orleans. In any event the advent of the keelboat on the Missouri
in connection with the fur trade could not have been long after the
founding of St. Louis, and probably antedated it. Gradually these boats
made their way to points farther and farther up the river, until in
1805 they were taken by Lewis and Clark to the head of navigation. A
similar experience was gone through with in the case of the steamboat.
It was at first thought impossible for such boats to navigate the
river at all, but in 1819 the attempt was made, and the _Independence_
entered the Missouri on either the 16th or 17th of May, and ascended
the river two hundred miles. The _Western Engineer_, a government boat,
went as far as the old Council Bluffs in the same year. From that
time on steamboats remained on the river, making farther and farther
advances toward the head of navigation, which was finally reached forty
years after the first boat entered the river.
The principal craft which have been used on the Missouri and its
tributaries are the canoe, mackinaw, bullboat, keelboat, and steamboat.
The yawl, a very important boat, was not much used for independent
navigation, but rather as an appurtenance to the steamboats.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE CANOE.]
The _canoe_ was the simplest and most generally used of all the river
craft. It was the wooden canoe, or “dugout,” and not the bark canoe
which was so much used where the proper material could be found.
The Missouri River canoe was generally made from the logs of the
cottonwood, though frequently from the walnut, and occasionally from
cedar. The cottonwood in the river bottoms attained immense size, ample
for the largest canoes, for these boats rarely exceeded thirty feet
in length and three and one-half in width. The ordinary length was
between fifteen and twenty feet. A suitable tree having been found, it
was felled and a proper length of the trunk was cut out. The exterior
was straightened with the broad-ax, and reduced to a round log shorn
of all roughness and irregularity. The top was then hewn off, so as to
leave about two-thirds of the log. The ends were given a regular canoe
model, and were sometimes turned up on bow and stern with extra pieces
for purpose of ornament. The log was then carefully scooped out from
the flat surface so as to leave a thin shell about two inches thick at
the bottom and one at the rim. To support the sides and give strength
to the craft the timber was left in place at points from four to six
feet apart, making solid partitions or bulkheads. A good-sized canoe
was easily built by four men in as many days. They had tools especially
adapted to the work, the most important being the _tille ronde_, or the
round adz.
These log canoes made excellent craft, strong, light, and easily
managed. A full crew generally consisted of three men, two to propel
and one to steer. The paddle (French _aviron_) was always used. A mast
was occasionally placed in the center and rigged with a square sail,
but this could be used only with an aft wind, for fear of capsizing the
canoe.
Sometimes these boats were made with a square stern, and were then
called pirogues; but this name was more frequently used where two such
boats were rigidly united in parallel positions a few feet apart and
completely floored over. On the floor was placed the cargo, which was
protected from the weather by the use of skins. Oars were provided in
the bow for rowing and a single oar in the stern between the boats for
steering. Sails could be used with a quartering wind on these boats
without danger of upsetting. Dubé’s ferry, on the Mississippi, one of
the earliest ferries of St. Louis, used a boat of this kind.
[Sidenote: BEAR’S OIL AND HONEY.]
The principal use of the canoe was for the local business of the
larger river posts. Often, however, they were used in making trips to
St. Louis, even from the remotest navigable points of the main stream
or its tributaries. Many such a journey has been made with a single
voyageur running the gantlet of hostile tribes all the way from the
mountains to the Mississippi. A common use of the canoe was for sending
express messages down the river, and there are several records of their
having been used to transport freight. An example of this last use was
the shipment of bear’s oil, which was extensively used in St. Louis
as a substitute for lard in the early days when swine were scarce and
black bears plentiful. The oil was extremely penetrating, and would
rapidly filter through skin receptacles. Barrels or casks not being
available, the center apartment of the canoe was filled with the oil
and tightly covered with a skin fastened to the sides of the boat.
Honey was also transported in this way. In those days bee trees were
exceedingly plentiful in the Missouri bottoms, and large quantities of
honey were taken from them.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE MACKINAW.]
The _mackinaw boat_, as the name implies, was an imported design,
having already been used on the Eastern lakes and rivers. It was made
entirely of timber, and before nails were carried up the river all
the parts were fastened with wooden pins. The bottom was flat, and
was made of boards about one and a half inches thick. On these rested
cross-timbers, to which, and to the bottom, were fastened the inclined
knees that supported the sides. The boats were sometimes made as large
as fifty feet long and twelve feet beam. The plan was that of an acute
ellipse, and the gunwale rose about two feet from the center of the
boat toward both bow and stern. The keel showed a rake of about thirty
inches from the bow or stern to the bottom. The hold had a depth of
about five feet at the two ends of the boat, and about three and one
half at the center.
The central portion of the boat was partitioned off from the bow and
stern by two water-tight bulkheads or partitions. Between these the
cargo was loaded, and piled up to a height of three or four feet above
the gunwale and given a rounded form. Over the cargo lodge skins were
drawn tight and fastened with cleats to the sides and gunwales of the
boat, so as to make practically a water-tight compartment. In the bow
were seats for the oarsmen, and in the stern an elevated perch for the
steersman, from which he could see over the cargo in front, and give
directions to the crew in the bow or study the river ahead.
The crew of the boat ordinarily consisted of five men, four at the
oars and one at the rudder. The latter had charge of the boat, and was
called the _patron_. Only experienced, courageous, and reliable men
were chosen for this responsible work.
[Sidenote: CHEAP TRANSPORTATION.]
These boats were only used in downstream navigation, and the labor
of handling them was not arduous. The men found ample time for song
and gossip, and every hour or so, after a vigorous pull, would take
advantage of a good stretch of river to rest their oars (_laisser
aller_) and take a smoke (_fumer la pipe_). Then they would let fall
their oars (_tomber les râmes_) and bend to their work for another
hour. They ran from fifteen to eighteen hours per day and made from 75
to 150 miles. The boats carried about fifteen tons of freight, and the
cost per day was about two dollars. Transportation by mackinaw boat was
therefore inexpensive.
These boats were cheaply made, and were intended only for a single
trip down to St. Louis, where they were sold for four or five dollars
apiece. After the advent of the steamboat the mackinaws were frequently
carried back to the upper rivers on the annual boat, for even steam did
not absorb the peculiar field of usefulness of these craft. They were
quite safe and were preferred to the keelboat for downstream navigation.
[Sidenote: THE CHANTIER.]
The lumber for the mackinaws was manufactured where the boats were
built, or rather the latter were built where suitable timber could be
found. There being no sawmills, the boards had to be sawed by hand,
and for this purpose the logs were rolled upon a scaffold high enough
for a man to work underneath. They were first hewed square, and were
then sawed by two men, one standing above and the other below. At all
important posts there was a _chantier_ (French for boatyard) located
where timber was to be had. Here all woodwork was done. The Fort Pierre
chantier, always called the navy yard, was some fifteen miles above
the post, and was a very active place. The Fort Union chantier was
twenty-five miles above the post, while that at Fort Benton was three
miles below at the mouth of Chantier (now Shonkin) Creek. At all these
workyards skilled artisans were employed.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE BULLBOAT.]
The _bullboat_ of the fur traders, in distinction from the tubs
which were used by some of the Missouri River tribes, was an outgrowth
of the conditions of navigation on such streams as the Platte,
Niobrara, and Cheyenne. The excessive shallowness of these streams
precluded the use of any craft drawing more than nine or ten inches.
The bullboat was probably the lightest draft vessel ever constructed
for its size, and was admirably fitted for its peculiar use. It was
commonly about thirty feet long by twelve wide and twenty inches deep.
[Illustration: THE INDIAN BULLBOAT
(After Maximilian)]
The frame of the bullboat was constructed by laying stout willow poles,
three or four inches in diameter, lengthwise of the boat, and across
these similar poles, the two layers being firmly lashed together with
rawhide. The side frames were made of willow twigs about an inch and
a half in diameter at the larger end and six to seven feet long. The
smaller ends were lashed to the cross-poles, and about two feet of the
larger ends were then bent up to a vertical position. Along the tops of
the vertical portions and on the inside was lashed a stout pole like
those forming the bottom of the framework. To this gunwale were lashed
cross-poles, at intervals of four or five feet, to keep the sides from
spreading. No nails or pins were used for fastenings, but rawhide
lashings only. The frame so constructed was exceedingly strong, and its
flexible quality, by which it withstood the continuous wrenching to
which it was subjected, was an important element of strength.
[Sidenote: METHOD OF CONSTRUCTION.]
The framework, being completed, was then covered with a continuous
sheet of rawhide formed by sewing together square pieces as large as
could be cut from a single buffalo hide. Only the skins of buffalo
bulls were used for this purpose (whence the name of the boat), for
they were the strongest and best able to resist abrasion from rubbing
on the bottom of the river. The pieces were sewed together with buffalo
sinew. Before this work was done the hides were carefully dressed by
the Indians so as to be free of hair and perfectly flexible. When the
covering was all sewed together it was thoroughly soaked and then
placed over the framework and the sides and ends made fast to the
gunwale of the boat. The hides would then dry and shrink until they
were drawn as tight as a drumhead.
The final operation in the work was to pitch the seams. The material
used was a mixture of buffalo tallow and ashes, and it was carefully
rubbed into all seams or cracks until the whole covering was
water-tight.
[Sidenote: NAVIGATION BY BULLBOAT.]
The boat so built was very light, and could be easily turned over by
two men. When in the water and ready for its cargo, a layer of loose
poles was laid lengthwise on the bottom so as to keep the cargo five
or six inches from the bottom and protect it from any water that might
leak in. The cargo nearly always consisted of furs, securely packed
in bales about thirty inches long, fifteen inches wide, and eighteen
inches deep. They were placed one bale deep over the bottom of the
boat, leaving space in bow and stern for the pole men. The bales were
always laid flatwise, so that if the water should reach them it would
injure only the bottom skins and not all, as it would if they were set
edgewise. The cargo rarely exceeded six thousand pounds.
The boat was handled by means of poles, and the crew generally
consisted of two men. The draft of the boat, when placed in the water
in the morning, was about four inches, but the boat hide becoming
soaked during the day, and possibly some water leaking in, it would
probably be as much as six or eight inches by night. Every evening when
camp was made the boat was unloaded, brought up on the bank, and placed
in an inclined position, bottom side up, to dry. In this position it
served as a shelter for both cargo and crew. In the morning the seams
were repitched, and any incipient rents or abrasions were carefully
patched. The boat was then launched and reloaded and the voyage resumed.
[Sidenote: FREAKS OF THE WIND.]
Low water, even on the Platte, was generally preferred to high water
for bullboat navigation, because in high water the current was too
strong. Every little while the boat would glide into deep pockets,
where the poles could not touch bottom, and it was then necessary to
drift with the current until a shallower stretch would give the men
control again. Sometimes in those wide and shallow expanses, which
give the Platte such a pretentious appearance in high water, the wind
would play vexatious pranks with the bullboat navigators. A strong
prairie gale blowing steadily from one direction during the day would
drift most of the water to the leeward side of the stream. The boat
would naturally follow the same shore, and the night camp would be made
there. If, as often happened, the wind changed before re-embarkation,
the river would very likely be wafted to the other side of its broad
bed, and the crew would find themselves with half a mile of sandbar
between them and the water.
[Sidenote: NOTED BULLBOAT VOYAGES.]
Bullboat navigation, as here described, was most frequently resorted to
in bringing the trade of the Pawnees on the Loup Fork of the Platte to
the Missouri, but it was likewise extensively used on the Cheyenne and
Niobrara and other tributaries. There were some very extensive bullboat
voyages. A good many were made from Laramie River to the mouth of the
Platte, but generally it was impossible to find enough water to make
a continuous voyage. In 1825 General Ashley loaded one hundred and
twenty-five packs of beaver into bullboats at the head of navigation
on the Bighorn River, with the intention of conveying them in that
way to St. Louis. But at the mouth of the Yellowstone he met General
Atkinson, who offered him the use of his keelboats for the rest of the
journey. In 1833 the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, Captain Bonneville and
Nathaniel J. Wyeth, embarked all their furs, the product of a year’s
hunt, in bullboats on the Bighorn River, and together went downstream
to the mouth of the Yellowstone. Sometimes these boats were actually
given names, and we have a record of the bullboat _Antoine_, in which a
free trapper, Johnson Gardner, shipped his furs from the “Crossings of
the Yellowstone” to Fort Union in 1832.
The boats just described were quite different from the hemispherical
tubs used so extensively by the Mandans and other tribes of the upper
Missouri. These little boats had a circular rim or gunwale, and the
willow supports passed from one side entirely under the boat to the
other. The frame was generally small enough to be covered with a single
hide, and was designed to carry ordinarily but one person. A fleet of
these boats, numbering a hundred or so, was one of the most singular
sights ever witnessed on the river. The squaws often used them, on
occasions of buffalo hunts above the village, to transport the meat
downstream. In fact the women rather than the men were the navigators
of this picturesque little craft.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE KEELBOAT.]
We now come to the _keelboat_, the representative river craft of
ante-steamboat days. It was in this boat that the merchandise for the
trade was transported to the far upper river, and it was used on all
important military or exploring expeditions. It was a good-sized boat,
sixty to seventy feet long, and built on a regular model, with a keel
running from bow to stern. It had fifteen to eighteen feet breadth of
beam and three or four feet depth of hold. Its ordinary draft was from
twenty to thirty inches. It was built in accordance with the practice
of approved shipcraft, and was a good, stanch vessel. Keelboats were
generally built in Pittsburgh at a cost of two to three thousand
dollars.
[Illustration: MISSOURI RIVER KEELBOAT
(After Maximilian)]
For carrying freight the keelboat was fitted with what was called a
cargo box, which occupied the entire body of the boat excepting about
twelve feet at each end. It rose some four or five feet above the deck.
Along each side of the cargo box was a narrow walk about fifteen inches
wide, called the _passe avant_, the purpose of which will be explained
further on. On special occasions when these boats were used for
passenger traffic, as on expeditions of discovery or exploration, they
were fitted up with cabins, and made very comfortable passenger boats.
[Sidenote: THE CORDELLE.]
For purposes of propulsion the boat was equipped with nearly all the
power appliances known to navigation except steam. The cordelle was the
main reliance. This consisted of a line nearly a thousand feet long,
fastened to the top of a mast which rose from the center of the boat
to a height of about thirty feet. The boat was pulled along with this
line by men on shore. In order to hold the boat from swinging around
the mast, the line was connected with the bow by means of a “bridle,”
a short auxiliary line fastened to a loop in the bow and to a ring
through which the cordelle passed. The bridle prevented the boat from
swinging under the force of the wind or current when the speed was not
great enough to accomplish this purpose by means of the rudder. The
object in having so long a line was to lessen the tendency to draw the
boat toward the shore; and the object in having it fastened to the top
of the mast was to keep it from dragging, and to enable it to clear the
brush along the bank.
It took from twenty to forty men to cordelle the keelboat along
average stretches of the river, and the work was always one of great
difficulty. There was no established towpath, and the changing
conditions of the river prevented the development of such a path
except along a few stable stretches. It was frequently necessary to
send men ahead to clear the most troublesome obstructions away. In some
places, where it was impossible to walk and work at the same time, a
few men would carry the end of the line beyond the obstruction and make
it fast, while the rest would get on board and pull the boat up by
drawing in the line. This operation was called warping.
[Sidenote: NAVIGATION BY CORDELLE.]
When the boat was being cordelled there stood at the bow, near where
the bridle was attached, an individual called in French a _bosseman_
(boatswain’s mate), whose duty it was to watch for snags and other
obstructions, and to help steer the boat by holding it off the bank
with a pole. There was selected for this place a man of great physical
strength, prompt decision, and thorough knowledge of the river.
The patron, or master of the boat, stood at the rudder, which was
manipulated by means of a long lever from the rear end of the cargo
box. This position gave him an elevated point of view, from which he
could overlook everything.
[Sidenote: NAVIGATION BY POLE.]
There were many places where the keelboat could not be cordelled at
all, as along sandbars where the water was too shallow for the boat
to get near the shore, or the alluvium too soft for the men to walk
in. At such times it was necessary to resort to the pole, as it was
called. This was a turned piece of ash wood regularly manufactured at
St. Louis. On one end was a ball or knob to rest in the hollow of the
shoulder, for the voyageur to push against; and on the other was a
wooden shoe or socket. In propelling the boat with these poles eight or
ten voyageurs ranged themselves along each side, near the bow, facing
aft, pole in hand, one in front of the other, as close together as
they could walk. The whole operation was under the direction of the
patron. At his command “_A bas les perches_” (down with the poles),
the voyageurs would thrust the lower ends into the river close to the
boat and place the ball ends against their shoulders, so that the poles
should be well inclined downstream. They would all push together,
forcing the boat ahead, as they walked along the _passe avant_ toward
the stern, until the foremost man had gone as far as he could. The
patron then gave the command “_Levez les perches_” (raise the poles),
upon which they would be withdrawn from the mud, and the men would walk
quickly back to the bow and repeat the operation. All steering was
done while the poles were up, for the boat could not change direction
while the men were pushing. It was always essential to give the boat
sufficient momentum at each push to keep her going while the men were
changing position. The _passe avant_ had cleats nailed to it to keep
the feet from slipping, and the men, when pushing hard, sometimes
leaned over far enough to catch hold of the cleats with their hands,
thus fairly crawling on all-fours.
In some places where the water was too deep for the poles and where
cordelling was impracticable, oars were resorted to. There were five or
six of these on each side of the bow. They often furnished assistance
also when the boat was being cordelled.
[Sidenote: NAVIGATION BY SAIL.]
A great reliance in propelling the keelboat, strange as it may seem
considering the nature of Missouri River navigation, was the wind. A
mast was rigged, with a square sail spreading about one hundred square
feet of canvas, which often gave sufficient power to propel the boat
against the swift current of the river. Unless the direction of the
wind were altogether wrong the sinuous course of the stream would every
now and then give an aft or quartering breeze. In some places the wind
seemed to follow the bends, blowing up or down the river clear around.
Thus Brackenridge relates that when Manuel Lisa’s boat, in June, 1811,
was going around the Great Bend below Fort Pierre, where in the course
of thirty miles the river flows toward every point of the compass, an
aft wind was experienced all the way, and the entire circuit was made
under sail. Some idea of sailing speed up the Missouri under favorable
conditions may be gleaned from the fact that, on the day of passing
the Great Bend, Lisa’s boat made seventy-five miles, a portion of
the distance being made at night by the light of the moon. And on
another occasion on the same trip Brackenridge records that “we had an
extraordinary run of forty-five leagues from sun to sun.”
[Sidenote: KEELBOAT SPEED.]
Thus, by means of the cordelle and pole, the oar and sail, the sturdy
keelboat worked and worried its way up the turbulent Missouri in the
early days. It was a slow and laborious process at best. A good idea
of its maximum accomplishment under rather unfavorable conditions is
furnished by Manuel Lisa’s voyage, already referred to. It was made
with an exceptionally fine boat, a picked crew, and the most untiring
and energetic commander that ever ascended the Missouri. There was
especial necessity for rapid progress, for it was of the greatest
importance to overtake the Astorian expedition, which was a long
distance ahead, before it should reach the dangerous Sioux country. The
difficulties from wind and storm were greater than the average, and the
rate of progress was not increased by any fortuitous aids. Lisa left
St. Charles, 28 miles above the mouth of the Missouri, April 2, 1811.
He overtook Hunt at 1132 miles, on the morning of June 11. He therefore
made about 1100 miles in sixty-one days, or about 18 miles per day.
This, however, was better than the average. A keelboat trip to the
upper river was practically an entire summer’s operation.
[Sidenote: LABORIOUS OCCUPATION.]
Above the mouth of the James or Dakota River keelboating was easier
than below, because the natural obstacles of all sorts were less; but
everywhere it was a very laborious process. Captain La Barge often
remarked that it would be wholly impossible in this day to get men to
undergo such exertions as were required of the keelboat crews. They
worked early and late, in water and out, and often to the very limit
of endurance. Their food was of the plainest description, consisting
mainly of pork, lyed corn, and navy beans. From this allowance, slender
as it was, meat was cut off as soon as the game country was reached.
The cooking was done at the night camp for the following day. On top of
the cargo box there was sometimes placed a cooking stove, in a shallow
box filled with ashes or gravel to protect the roof from fire. The
men’s baggage was stored in the front of the cargo box, where there
was also a place for anyone to lie down who might fall sick. It was,
however, a very poor place to be sick in. There were no medicines, no
physicians, no nurses or attendants, and nothing but the coarsest food.
The prospect itself was enough to frighten everyone into keeping well.
The hired laborers who did the work on these river expeditions were
called voyageurs, and were generally of French descent. They were an
interesting class of people, and presented a phase of pioneer life
on the Missouri which has become wholly extinct. They were a very
hard-working class, obedient, cheerful, light-hearted, and contented.
It was a marvel to see them, after a hard day’s work, dance and sing
around the evening campfire as if just awakened from a refreshing
sleep. The St. Louis Creoles were regarded as more desirable boatmen
than the French Canadians. The American hunter was not so useful in
river work as the French voyageur, but was far more valuable for land
work and in situations involving danger or requiring the display of
physical courage.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: DECAY OF ROMANCE.]
[Sidenote: NOTEWORTHY SCENES.]
[Sidenote: THE FIRE CANOE.]
Washington Irving, whose love of the romance of early Western history
was ardent and sincere, beheld with unfriendly eye the introduction of
the _steamboat_ upon the Missouri. He lamented the “march of mechanical
invention,” which was “fast dispelling the wildness and romance of
our lakes and rivers,” and “driving everything poetical before it.”
However well-founded this fear may have been in the general case, we
are inclined to think that the exact reverse was true of the Missouri
River steamboat. This remarkable craft introduced romantic features of
which the old keelboat and its Creole crew never dreamed. The incidents
of a single steamboat voyage from St. Louis to Fort Union would make
an entertaining chapter in any book of adventure. As to impressiveness
of appearance, certainly no craft on our Western waters, if upon any
waters of the globe, displayed more majesty and beauty, or filled
the mind with more interesting reflections, than these picturesque
vessels of the early days in the boundless prairies of the West. The
very surroundings lent a peculiar attraction to the scene. In every
direction the broad and treeless plains extended without water enough
anywhere in sight even to suggest a boat. Winding through these plains
was a deep valley several miles broad, with a ribbon of verdure running
through it along the sinuous course of the river. Everything was still
as wild and unsettled as before the advent of the white man, and there
was little or nothing to suggest the civilization of the outside world.
In the midst of this virgin wildness a noble steamboat appears, its
handsome form standing high above the water in fine outline against the
verdure of the shore; its lofty chimneys pouring forth clouds of smoke
in an atmosphere unused to such intrusion, and its progress against
the impetuous current exhibiting an extraordinary display of power.
Altogether it formed one of the most notable scenes ever witnessed upon
the waters of America. Naturally enough the wild Indian viewed with
feelings of awe this great “fire canoe,” whose power to “walk on the
water” had subdued the intractable current to its own will. It is said
to have been the advent of the steamboat which finally turned the scale
of the Indian’s favor toward the Americans as against the British.
In truth, the Missouri River steamboat was a most attractive-looking
craft. Unlike an ocean vessel, which is in large part buried beneath
the waves, the river boat drew only three or four feet of water, and
was therefore almost entirely above the surface. This gave it a great
apparent size compared with its actual dimensions and tonnage. Its
architectural design was pleasing to the eye. Its successive decks,
surmounted by the texas and pilot-house, all painted a clear, even
white, made it look like a veritable floating palace as it moved
majestically among the groves of cottonwood and willow, or through the
parched plains of the ashen-colored sage brush.
The criticism has been made that the river steamboat is one of the
few modern mechanical contrivances which have shown no particular
development, but remain to-day as they were long ago. The criticism
is a mistaken one. If comparison be made between the first river
steamboats and the best of to-day it will be found that progress in
this development is quite up to that in other lines, and it is doubtful
if any other machine is more perfectly adapted to its peculiar work.
In very recent years there has naturally been but little development,
for the steamboat business on Western rivers has largely passed away.
[Sidenote: THE FIRST “YELLOWSTONE.”]
The earlier boats were usually of the sidewheel pattern, with only one
engine, and an immense flywheel to keep it from stopping on the dead
point. Unlike the modern boat, most of the accommodations for freight
and passengers were abaft of the wheels. The stages for getting on
and off were located there. The forward part was mainly taken up with
machinery. The men’s cabins were in the hold. The shape of the boat was
ill adapted to its work. It had a model keel, which gave it fully six
feet draft with half of the load which has since been carried on three
feet.[12]
[Sidenote: THE MODERN STEAMBOAT.]
Far different from this early boat was that used in the later years
of business on the Missouri. The first-class modern river steamboat
was about 220 feet long and 35 feet wide, and would carry 500 tons.
It was built with a flat bottom, so that it would draw, say, thirty
inches light and fifty loaded. It was propelled by a stern-wheel, a
most excellent arrangement, which had become practicable through the
invention of the balanced rudder: that is, a rudder with a part of the
blade on each side of the rudder post. There were two engines of long
stroke, one on each side of the boat, communicating directly with the
wheel shaft and thus avoiding all loss from the friction of gearing. A
proper distribution of the weight required that the boilers be placed
well forward. This left a large space between them and the engine room,
which was well aft.
[Sidenote: FIGURATIVE DESIGN.]
The forecastle was equipped with steam capstans and huge spars, which
served a purpose similar to that of the poles on a keelboat in pushing
the boat over sandbars. Steam hoisting apparatus was used, and in the
hold were light tramway cars to convey the freight from the hatchway
to its place of deposit. Enormous stages, swung from derricks on
either side of the bow, facilitated communication with the high banks
of the river. The quarters of the crew and steerage passengers were
on the boiler deck. On top of the hurricane deck was the texas--a
suite of rooms for the officers of the boat. Above the texas stood the
pilot-house, high over the river--a very important consideration, for
the more directly the pilot could look down the better he could see the
channel. The hurricane deck, and particularly the pilot-house, were
favorite resorts for the passengers.
High above all towered the lofty smokestacks, carrying the sparks
from the wood fire well away from the roof of the boat and giving a
strong draft to the furnace. Between the two chimneys the name of the
company generally appeared in large initial letters, legible for a long
distance.[13] One or more flags displayed their colors to the breeze,
and a light armament, consisting of one or two small cannon, answered
the double purpose of firing salutes and terrifying Indians who became
too defiant.
CHAPTER X.
STEAMBOAT NAVIGATION ON THE MISSOURI RIVER.
The Missouri River pilot was beyond question the most skillful
representative of his profession. In no other kind of navigation were
the qualities of quick perception, intuitive grasp of a situation,
nerve to act boldly and promptly, coolness and judgment in times of
danger, so important and so constantly in demand. Navigation on the
ocean was child’s play in comparison. The Missouri represented in the
highest degree the peculiar dangers characteristic of alluvial streams.
Its current was swift, its channel full of snags, its surface nearly
always ruffled by the prairie gale, and never for five minutes in
succession in a condition which would permit the pilot to take his hand
from the wheel or the engineer to let go of the throttle. The elaborate
system of communication between the pilot-house and the engine room was
always in service, and the tinkle of signal bells in the engineer’s
ear was almost continuous. The position of pilot was responsible and
exacting, and called for a high order of ability. And so it resulted
that the better class of pilots were men of high standing and
character, in whose care business men unhesitatingly intrusted their
property and the lives of their families.
[Sidenote: THE TWO BARKS.]
The ever-shifting condition of the river channel[14] caused the pilot
to seek all available information as to its latest position. When
other boats were met there was an eager swapping of notes, for it was
a common practice in later years for pilots to assist each other by
keeping notes of the condition of the river over which they passed.[15]
The pilots thus came to know the river by heart from its mouth to the
head of navigation. The extraordinary knowledge of its topography and
nomenclature which Captain La Barge retained to the end of his life was
almost incredible. There was not a bend or rapid, a bed of snags, or
other feature in all of its twenty-six hundred miles that was not as
familiar to him as the rooms of his own house.
[Sidenote: THE FUEL PROBLEM.]
The most serious problem with which the Missouri navigator had to
deal was that of procuring fuel. Wood alone was used, and this was
obtained from the growths on the banks of the river. Cottonwood was
the main reliance, because of its greater abundance, but it was
not a first-class firewood. If green, it was next to impossible to
maintain steam with it except by the aid of rosin. It was often found
impracticable to carry the boat from one established wooding place to
another, and it was then necessary to gather drift logs, or anything
else that could be found. Whenever a trading post was abandoned its
palisades and buildings quickly found their way into the steamboat
furnaces, to the great, though transient, delight of the crew.
In the earlier years the fuel was cut by the crew itself as the boat
proceeded on her voyage. But as the traffic became more regular, wood
yards were established, either by the boat-owners or by others who cut
wood for sale. The Indians themselves found the business a profitable
one, and finally refused to let the whites cut wood at all. The sale
of their wood thus became a source of considerable revenue to them.
In later years, during the Sioux hostilities, the wooding of boats
was a most perilous matter. Crews were attacked at the landings and
only the most vigilant precaution prevented great loss of life at such
times.[16] To reduce this danger as much as possible, Captain La Barge
equipped one of his boats with a sawmill, and took along a yoke of
oxen. When he had to have wood he swung out a large stage, drove the
team ashore, and dragged several logs on board with the utmost speed.
As soon as this was done the boat proceeded on her way and the crew
then sawed up the wood.
The “wooding” of a boat was an interesting performance. The moment the
boat touched the bank for this purpose the mate called out “woodpile,”
and every available man leaped ashore, loaded himself with wood, and
hastened back to the boat. In an incredibly short time the work was
done and the boat was again on her way.
[Sidenote: STEAMBOAT HOURS.]
Steamboat hours were as long as the light of day would permit. It was
not customary to run at night, unless there was ample moonlight and the
business was extremely urgent. But every hour of daylight was improved.
In the higher latitudes morning and evening twilight almost touched
hands across the few hours of intervening darkness. Three o’clock A. M.
was a common hour of starting, and 9 P. M. of stopping. The crew were
divided into four watches, so that they could take turns in getting
sleep during the day.
[Sidenote: EFFECT OF WIND.]
The early morning run was liable to be the most successful of the
day, unless it were the late evening run. At both times the wind
was generally low enough to form no serious drawback. The landscape
likewise appeared at its best, and the sight of sunrise or sunset on
the river was one to be remembered. The water was comparatively calm at
those hours, particularly in the early morning. Later in the day the
wind generally began to rise, and the pilot always viewed as an evil
omen the first cloud of sand that he saw drifting over the valley. If
the wind increased beyond a certain point he was compelled to make for
the shore and wait for it to subside. The area of the boat exposed to
the wind was so great that in narrow channels it was impossible to keep
within them, and it was often necessary to lie at the bank for several
hours. This enforced idleness was generally improved in cutting wood
for present and future needs.
[Sidenote: SOUNDING THE CHANNEL.]
The danger from snags was always present and sometimes very great, and
the passage of these obstructions was a matter of anxious solicitude
on the part of both officers and passengers. Less dangerous, but not
less annoying, was the passage of shallow bars where there was not
sufficient depth to float the boat. This usually occurred at the
“crossings,” or places where the channel, after having followed one
side of the river-bed for a distance, crossed over to the other. In
these places the channel generally split up into chutes, none of which
might have the required depth of water. The pilot’s first step would
be to select the most promising channel. If this failed, he retreated
and tried another. Always at such times one of the deck hands was kept
at the bow on the forecastle sounding the channel--a function most
interesting and novel to one who had never witnessed it. On the shallow
Missouri a pole was used instead of a lead line. A deck hand seized
this pole and thrust it into the water every five seconds, at the same
time calling out the depth in a drawling, sing-song voice. The Canadian
boatmen would generally preface these calls with a snatch from some of
their native songs, winding up with the required information as a sort
of refrain. So novel was the performance to the uninitiated that an
expert sounder would attract around him an audience of listeners.
[Sidenote: WALKING OVER SANDBARS.]
In case no channel was found by direct trial with the boat, the pilot
sent the mate out in a yawl, or more generally went himself, and
carefully sounded the entire river over the shallow portion. Having
determined where the deepest water lay, he returned to the boat, and
if the obstacle were not too great, at once proceeded to move the
boat over it. Steaming in the proper direction, as determined from
the sounding, he would run the boat as far as she would go. The crew
then lowered the huge spars on either side, set them in the sand with
the lower ends pointing downstream so that a pull on the lines would
both lift the boat and crowd it ahead; then hauled taut the lines,
threw them around the capstans, and proceeded to “walk” the boat over
the bar. The process was often long and laborious, and instances were
not uncommon where one or two days were consumed in this way. An
occasional resource, which always puzzled the uninitiated, was to set
the wheel going with a reverse motion, as if trying to back the boat.
The object of this was to dam the river up slightly and relieve as much
as possible the pressure on the bar. The water was sometimes backed in
this way up to a height of four inches, and this meant a great deal.
The backward power of the wheel was so much less than the forward power
of the spars that it was not considered at all. This was one of the
scientific aspects of Missouri River navigation.
[Sidenote: WARPING OVER RAPIDS.]
The few rapids on the river which were too steep for the boat to stem
unaided were usually passed by the method of warping. As soon as the
boat reached the foot of a rapid she made for the shore. The moment
her prow touched the bank a dozen men leaped out and started on the
run up along the water’s edge. The foremost carried a pick and spade
and a few stakes, the second a stick of timber a little smaller than a
railroad tie, and the rest at proper intervals a strong line which was
rapidly uncoiled from the boat. Having arrived well beyond the head of
the rapid the men proceeded to plant a “dead man”: that is, they dug a
trench three or four feet deep in the hard prairie soil, large enough
to receive the stick of timber, and with the long dimension at right
angles to the river. The timber was then buried and firmly staked down,
and the line fastened to it at its middle, while the crew on the boat
threw their end of the line around the capstan, which was then slowly
wound in under the power of steam. The operation was a very slow one,
though less so as a general thing than sparring over sandbars.
Occasionally the pilots encountered genuine whirlpools of such
magnitude that steamboats could not cross them. In 1867 the _Bishop_
was swamped in an eddy caused by a new cut-off on the river. The boat
was caught at the point where the swift current of the cut-off entered
the old channel. At about the same time the _Miner_ narrowly escaped
disaster in a violent eddy not far below Sioux City, Ia. The whirl of
the water was so swift that the center of the eddy was nearly twelve
feet below its circumference. The boat was trying to pull itself by
with a line when it was caught by the eddy, swung out into the stream,
whirled violently around and careened over until the river flowed right
across the lower deck. Wood and all other movable material were swept
off, and two men were drowned. Only the mate’s presence of mind in
slacking off the line saved the boat.
[Sidenote: DANGER FROM INDIANS.]
One of the most formidable perils of Missouri navigation during the
period from 1860 to 1876 was the hostility of the Indians. The Sioux
tribes in particular terrorized the boatmen all along the valley from
the Niobrara to Milk River. Many were their actual attacks and many
were the lives lost. It became necessary on some voyages to barricade
the decks and staterooms, and the most careful vigilance night and day
was required in order to avoid disaster.
[Sidenote: STEAMBOAT EXPLOSIONS.]
An exciting and often dangerous pastime indulged in by the river boats
was racing. This was particularly true of the period about 1858,
when the boating business was rather overdone and there was great
competition in the trade. Racing on the Missouri was very risky in
any case, owing to the uncertainty of the channel and the abundance
of shags; but the chief danger arose from the temptation to raise
the steam pressure above a safe limit. Of all classes of steamboat
disasters, the most dreadful were those caused by boiler explosions.
There were six of these wrecks in the history of the river, although
it is not known that they were all caused by racing. In 1842 the _Edna_
was destroyed at the mouth of the Missouri, and forty-two German
emigrants were killed. The most terrible accident was that of the
_Saluda_, April 9, 1852, at Lexington, Mo. The boat was a sidewheeler,
with two large boilers, and was on her way up the river with a load of
merchandise and many Mormon passengers. The river was very high and
the current so strong that the boat could not round the point just
above town. After waiting several days without any improvement of the
situation, the captain, Francis F. Belt, ordered another trial. Going
into the engine room, he inquired how much steam was being carried.
The engineer replied that he was carrying every pound that the boilers
could stand. The captain recklessly ordered more steam to be made, and
declared with an oath that he would round the bend or blow the boat to
pieces. He then went above, rang the bell, and ordered the lines cast
off. The boat swung into the stream; the engines made but one or two
revolutions when the boilers burst with a terrific explosion that blew
the boat into splinters and scattered them far and wide. Nearly all the
officers were killed, among them the pilot, Charles La Barge, Captain
La Barge’s brother, and the second pilot, Louis Guerette, Mrs. La
Barge’s brother. It is said that over one hundred bodies were found.
Several children who escaped, but had lost their parents, were adopted
by the people of Lexington and grew up to be citizens of Missouri
instead of Mormon residents of the future State of Utah. The bell of
this boat was blown out on the bank while yet it was ringing under
the hand of Captain Belt. It was purchased with other wreckage by a
resident of Lexington, who sold it to the Christian Church in Savannah,
Mo., where it has done duty for the past fifty years.
[Sidenote: HUNTERS FOR THE BOATS.]
After the time when the boats began to carry passengers in considerable
numbers, much more attention was paid to the table fare than in the
days when the passenger list was made up almost entirely of men going
to service with the fur companies. In those days pork, lyed corn, and
navy beans made up the substance of the bill of fare. It was always a
rule, when in the Indian country, to rely on game for meat. For this
purpose hunters were regularly employed on the various boats, selected
for their skill, and never called upon for any other work. The hunter’s
custom was to leave the boat about midnight, some three or four hours
before she was to start, and to scour the bank of the river, keeping
well ahead. Whenever any animal was killed it was hung up in some
conspicuous place, and was brought in by the steamboat yawl as the boat
came along.
Captain La Barge had many of these hunters in his employ during his
career. Henry Chatillon, the same who appears in Francis Parkman’s
“Oregon Trail,” was one. He was a fine man, an excellent hunter, and
sensible and gentlemanly in all his relations. The Captain’s favorite
hunter, however, was Louis Dauphin, who was more fearless than
Chatillon and equally skillful as a hunter. He had a very long career
on the Missouri River. He seemed to delight in danger, and was never
afraid of the Indians; but his lack of prudence at last cost him his
life, and he was killed by the Sioux near the mouth of Milk River in
1865.
[Sidenote: PASSENGERS AND CARGO.]
Such are some of the peculiar features of Missouri River navigation
as it existed fifty years ago. To bring back more of the reality of
what has now become only a reminiscence, let us follow one of these
steamboats on a typical voyage up the river. The principal event on
the annual trip was the embarkation at St. Louis. The cargo consisted
of a heterogeneous assortment of goods, designed for the Indian trade
and for the equipment of hunting and trapping parties. It frequently
included also the government annuities for the various tribes, and
stores for the Indian agencies and military posts. The passengers
composed an even more heterogeneous mixture than the cargo itself.
There were, first, the regular boat crew, numbering from thirty to
forty. Very likely there were several Indians returning home from
St. Louis, or even from Washington. Then there were recruits for the
various trading companies, consisting of hunters, trappers, voyageurs,
and mountaineers, and possibly a company of soldiers for some military
service. Nearly always there were passengers distinguished for wealth
or scientific attainment, who were making the journey for pleasure or
research. Government exploring parties generally traveled by boat to
the initial point of their expeditions. In all there were from one
hundred to two hundred people on board, with sufficient variety to
insure vivacity and interest, however monotonous the journey might
otherwise be.
[Sidenote: DEPARTURE FROM PORT.]
The departure from port was always attended with more or less carousing
and revelry, particularly in the keelboat and early steamboat days,
when a trip up the river might mean years of absence. The kind of
farewell that captured the fancy of the average voyageur was a general
debauch, which often disqualified him from being ready when the hour
of departure arrived. Sometimes these delinquents who failed to appear
hied themselves across the country to St. Charles, and joined the boat
there. In order to protect itself from loss, the American Fur Company
made all its payments to the men conditional upon a certain amount
of service. It made an allowance of clothing and blankets, but never
delivered them until the men were on board and out of port. Wages were
never advanced except to trusted employees.
As the boat swung out into the stream a running salute of musketry was
kept up by the mountaineers and others until it was out of hearing.
The roll was then called, and the engagés were given their parcels of
clothing. Next began the work of putting the boat deck in order for the
trip. The bales of goods, which were strewn about in disorderly heaps,
were carefully stowed away, and before night the boat was reduced to
the appearance which it would wear during the remainder of the trip.
[Sidenote: SETTLING CHAMPIONSHIP.]
There still remained to be settled a final preliminary to a successful
and harmonious voyage--the championship for physical prowess among the
engagés on the boat. As in a herd of cattle, so here, someone must be
recognized as the strongest--able to whip anybody else in open contest.
The crew being largely strangers to each other in starting, there were
more or less friction and bickering until a settlement by fist force
was reached. Usually the contest would settle down to a small number in
a short time. It was a favorite pastime with that veteran mountaineer,
Etienne Provost, who was often sent up in charge of recruits, to
compel an early settlement which would determine all blustering and
quarreling. He would form a ring on the forecastle and compel every
braggart to make good his claims before the assembled passengers and
crew. One after another would succumb, until one man would emerge from
the contest victorious over all the others. He would then be awarded
the championship, and receive a red belt in token thereof.
[Sidenote: YANKEE JACK.]
Captain La Barge recalled an interesting incident of this kind in
which he himself had a hand. It was on the _Robert Campbell_, in
1863. He had on board a large quota of Irish engagés, in fact they
were mostly of this nationality; but there was one well-built, quiet,
rawboned American, whose full name he had forgotten, but who was
commonly known as Yankee Jack. In modern slang, the Irishmen “had it
in” for this Yankee, and made his life as uncomfortable as possible.
Two men in particular made it a point to harass and annoy him in every
conceivable way, until the Captain finally asked Jack why he did not
resent their conduct. Jack, who had a higher respect for authority than
his persecutors, had not felt at liberty to take the matter up on the
boat, but now told the Captain that, if he would permit it, he would
settle the matter once for all very promptly. The Captain told him to
go ahead, and himself arranged the preliminaries, and told the Irishmen
that they would have to stand up and “take their medicine.” With a good
deal of contempt for the Yankee they made ready for the fray. A place
was cleared on the deck and one of the men stepped out before Yankee
Jack, and the battle began; but before the Irishman knew “where he was
at” he lay sprawling upon the floor totally _hors de combat_. The next
man stepped up and was led to the slaughter with as little ceremony as
the other. For the rest of the voyage the Yankee was unmolested.
[Sidenote: INTERESTING DIVERSIONS.]
While the officers and crew were kept alert and active the livelong day
in getting their boat up the troublesome stream, the passengers whiled
away their time as best they could. Games of all practicable sorts were
indulged in. It was a common pastime to stand on the forecastle or
boiler deck and shoot at geese and ducks on the river. Now and then the
sight of deer and other animals enlivened the moment, and occasionally
the appearance of Indians on the bank caused a flutter of excitement.
To relieve the tedium of the voyage it was a common thing, when there
was no danger from the Indians, to land at the beginning of extensive
bends, and ramble across the country to the other side, rejoining the
boat when it came along.
[Sidenote: THE PILOT’S STORIES.]
The pilot-house was the favorite resort on the boat when the condition
of navigation would permit the passengers to be there. The pilot was
always an interesting personage to get acquainted with. When in the
proper mood and sailing along some easy stretch of river, he would
unloosen his tongue and entertain his listeners with tales of _his_
adventurous experiences, in reality the accumulated stories of many
years, but as new to the tenderfoot as if told for the first time. Here
he would point out a dry sand waste where the channel ran the year
before and where now a fine crop of willows was shooting vigorously
upward. The high bank yonder, with a grove of cottonwoods close to the
water’s edge, was where the boat was attacked by Indians a few years
before and two of the crew killed. The holes where bullets tore through
the pilot-house were still visible as tragic reminders of a hairbreadth
escape. A little further on was where the boat once had to stop to
let a herd of buffalo cross the river, for it would not do to try to
run through the herd lest their huge bodies become entangled in the
wheels and cripple it altogether. Sometimes these delays amounted to
several hours. In another place the Captain would point out the grave
of some Indian chief reposing in the arms of a tree, where it had been
placed by his people years before, and the sight would suggest many
thrilling experiences, and even tragedies, which marked the intercourse
of these primitive people with the navigators of the river. The recital
of these traditions appealed to the imagination of the traveler,
and helped allay the monotony of the voyage. If the landscape might
often be likened to the “uniform view of the vacant ocean,” there
were nevertheless a thousand features on every trip which the most
interesting ocean voyage lacks.
[Sidenote: ARRIVAL AT TRADING POST.]
Among the important events of every voyage were the arrivals at the
various trading posts. To the occupants of these remote stations,
buried in the depths of the wilderness, shut out for months from any
glimpse of the world outside, the coming of the annual boat was an
event of even greater interest than to the passengers themselves.
Generally the person in charge of the post, with some of the employees,
would drop down the river two or three days’ ride and meet the boat.
When she drew near the post, salutes would be exchanged, the colors
displayed, and the passengers would throng the deck to greet the crowd
which lined the bank. The exigencies of navigation never left much time
for celebration and conviviality. The exchange of cargo was carried on
with the utmost dispatch, and the moment the business was completed the
boat proceeded on her way.
These are some of the typical features of steamboat life as it used to
exist on the Missouri River. In later years, when the gold discoveries
in Montana gave the business such an astonishing impetus, other
features of interest developed. The business was always a romantic
one, and will stand in American frontier history as one of its most
picturesque and delightful memories.
CHAPTER XI.
THE STEAMBOAT IN THE FUR TRADE.
The most important early use of steamboats upon the Missouri River
was in connection with the fur trade, for this was the principal
business conducted along the valley in the first half of the nineteenth
century.[17] Steamboats had entered the river in 1819, but that early
experiment had not been very successful and had led to no regular
traffic as late as 1830. The American Fur Company, which monopolized
the fur trade of the Missouri Valley, continued to send its annual
cargoes of merchandise up the river in keelboats. The great difficulty,
heavy cost, and extreme delay by this method of transportation were a
serious handicap upon the business. It took an entire summer to reach
the far upper posts and not infrequently ice closed the river before
this could be done. A large crew was required for a comparatively small
cargo, and it was necessary to bring them all back in order not to
have more men in the field than were needed.
[Sidenote: A STEAMBOAT FOR THE FUR TRADE.]
It was from considerations of this character that the use of steamboats
was determined upon in the summer of 1830, and from that time the true
history of Missouri River navigation begins. The American Fur Company
then had its headquarters in New York. John Jacob Astor was the real
head of the company, although his son, William B. Astor, was its
president. The Western Department of the Company was established in
St. Louis and managed by the firm of Bernard Pratte & Company. Pierre
Chouteau, Jr., writing for the firm, August 30, 1830, to the house in
New York, thus describes the beginning of this new undertaking:
[Sidenote: DISADVANTAGES OF KEELBOATS.]
“Since the loss of our keelboat and the arrival of Mr.
McKenzie,[18] we have been contemplating the project of
building a small steamboat for the trade of the upper Missouri.
We believe that the navigation will be much safer in going up,
and possibly also in coming down, than it is by keelboat. The
only serious drawback will be the danger of breakage of some
important pieces of machinery, which it would be difficult
and perhaps impossible to repair on the spot. However, after
consultation with some of the ablest steamboat captains, we
think that by having spare parts and a good blacksmith outfit
on board, we may be able to overcome this difficulty. I imagine
that there will always be a little risk to run, but I also
believe that, if we succeed, it will be a great advantage
to our business. The expenses we are annually put to in the
purchase of keelboats and supplies, and in advances to engagés
before their departure, are enormous, and have to be repeated
every year. With the steamboat we could keep all our men in the
Indian country, where we could pay the greater part of their
wages in merchandise instead of making the large outlay of cash
which we are now constantly required to do.[19] The boat would
make the voyage to the upper river every spring. By starting
from here [St. Louis] at the beginning of April with the full
season’s outfit of merchandise, it would probably be back
early in June, and bring with it a portion of the peltries.
The finer furs could still be brought down in the ordinary
way. The merchandise would all reach its destination before
ice closed in the fall, which we now sometimes fail to do, to
our great loss. Furthermore, by having boats on hand at the
trading posts, we can always bring down the returns in case of
accident to the steamboat. After the return of the latter from
the annual trip it can be used in freighting on the lower river
during the balance of the season. Such a boat as we require we
think will cost in Cincinnati or Marietta about $7000, but as
we shall want a number of duplicate parts and extras the cost
may amount to $8000.
“Our plan, promising as it seems to us, has its difficulties,
and we submit it to you for approval before taking definite
action. We beg you to think it over and reply as soon as
possible, for, in case of your approval, we have no time to
lose in getting the work under way, if the boat is to be ready
by spring.”
[Sidenote: FIRST VOYAGE.]
Such is the clear statement of the origin of a business which thirty
years later assumed enormous proportions. The house in New York gave
its approval, the boat was built, and was named, most appropriately,
the _Yellowstone_, and in the spring of 1831 started on its first
voyage for the far upper river.
[Illustration: THE FIRST YELLOWSTONE
(After Maximilian)]
[Sidenote: CHOUTEAU BLUFFS.]
The boat did not get as far as was expected on this trip. A little
above the mouth of the Niobrara River it was stopped for a time by low
water. Pierre Chouteau, Jr., who, with McKenzie, was the soul of
the enterprise, was a passenger. Burning with impatience at the delay,
he sent to Fort Tecumseh for lighters to take off a portion of the
cargo. Every day he got out upon the high bluffs overlooking the river
and paced up and down, watching for the desired assistance and praying
for a rise in the river. The bluffs have ever since been known as the
Chouteau Bluffs.
At last three boats came down and relieved the steamer of enough of her
cargo to enable her to reach Fort Tecumseh, where Fort Pierre, S. D.,
now stands. No attempt was made to go farther, and in a short time she
returned to St. Louis.
In spite of the failure to reach the mouth of the Yellowstone
the experiment was considered enough of a success to justify its
repetition. Accordingly, in the spring of 1832, the _Yellowstone_ set
out again, and this time reached Fort Union. The voyage was highly
successful, and the return trip was made at the rate of a hundred
miles a day. Pierre Chouteau, Jr., was again a passenger. Since the
previous year Fort Tecumseh had been rebuilt in a situation less
exposed to the ravages of the river, and was ready for occupancy when
the _Yellowstone_ arrived on her upward trip. It was at that time
christened _Fort Pierre_, in honor of the distinguished visitor and
member of the company. George Catlin, the painter of Indian scenes and
portraits, was also a passenger, and his writings and sketches have
added to the celebrity of the voyage.
[Sidenote: SUCCESSFUL EXPERIMENT.]
The success of the second experiment in navigating the Missouri gave
great satisfaction to the company and to the public in general, for it
had never been considered possible to take steamboats so far. It added
seventeen hundred miles to the internal navigable waters of the United
States, with every prospect that this would be extended to the very
foothills of the Rocky Mountains. The voyage created great interest
both in this country and in Europe, and John Jacob Astor, who was in
France at the time, wrote home that nearly all the public journals of
the Continent had made mention of it. Ramsay Crooks, general agent of
the company in New York, thus expressed his pleasure to the house in
St. Louis at the great success which they had achieved:
[Sidenote: CONGRATULATIONS.]
“I congratulate you most cordially on your perseverance and
ultimate success in reaching the Yellowstone by _steam_, and
the future historian of the Missouri will preserve for you the
honorable and enviable distinction of having accomplished an
object of immense importance, by exhibiting the practicability
of conquering the obstructions of the Missouri, considered till
almost the present day insurmountable to steamboats, even
among those best acquainted with their capabilities. You have
brought the Falls of the Missouri as near, comparatively, as
was the River Platte in my younger days.”
The experiment thus inaugurated grew into a regular business. The
American Fur Company sent up one or more boats every spring, as long
as it continued in the business. In the spring of 1833 it sent up two
boats, the _Yellowstone_ and the _Assiniboine_. It was this year that
Maximilian, Prince of Wied, went up and spent several months at Forts
McKenzie, Clark, and Union.[20] The _Assiniboine_ went above Fort Union
for some distance, thus making another advance toward the head of
navigation. It was caught in this advanced situation by low water, and
was compelled to remain there all winter.
[Sidenote: AN EARLY LOGBOOK.]
A most interesting and valuable relic of these early steamboat days has
survived in the form of a journal, or logbook, covering the voyages
from 1841 to 1847 inclusive. It is all in French except that for the
year 1847. It is very complete, and exhibits in the clearest detail the
manner of life which existed on the Missouri River steamboat in those
early days. Captain La Barge was pilot on some of these voyages, and
we shall now note a few of the interesting incidents with which he was
connected, for they furnish a living picture of a condition of things
which has long since ceased to exist.
CHAPTER XII.
VOYAGE OF 1843.
The voyage of 1843 is known in more complete detail than any other in
the history of the river. There are two complete journals of it--the
Sire logbook, just referred to, and the published journal of the great
naturalist, Audubon, who was one of the passengers. Captain La Barge
himself gave the present author his full recollections of the trip.
There were in all about one hundred passengers, besides some Indians
returning to their country from a visit to St. Louis. The passenger
list included the usual picturesque variety, but its most conspicuous
and noteworthy feature was, of course, the presence of Audubon and his
party of scientists. Captain Joseph Sire was master of the boat and
Captain La Barge pilot.
The _Omega_ left St. Louis April 25, 1843. Along the lower course
of the river the voyage was more than ordinarily difficult. The
waters were high and the bottoms were badly overflowed, making shore
excursions very unpleasant. The current was strong and the winds so
severe and constant that the boat had to lie at the bank for several
hours nearly every day. These delays were improved by the boat crew in
procuring wood, and by the scientists in studying the country.
[Sidenote: AN INDISPENSABLE ARTICLE.]
No incident worthy of particular mention occurred until the boat
reached Bellevue, a few miles below the modern site of Omaha, Neb. The
importation of liquor into the Indian country was prohibited under the
severest penalties, and inspectors were stationed at Leavenworth and
Bellevue to examine all cargoes bound up the river. Now it so happened
that liquor was the one article above all others that the traders
considered indispensable to their business, and they never failed to
smuggle it through in some way or other. In the earlier years there was
only one place at which the cargoes going up the river were inspected,
and that was Fort Leavenworth. Later, when an Indian agency was
established at Bellevue, that place also became a point of detention.
At this particular time it was the _bête noire_ of the American Fur
Company traders. The military authorities at Fort Leavenworth, from
long experience in the country and intimate knowledge of conditions
prevailing there, exercised their office as inspectors with reasonable
judgment and discretion. They understood very well that the small
competing traders would smuggle liquor past them in spite of all they
could do, and that to deprive the only responsible company on the
river of its means of maintaining itself was simply to debauch the
trade with the Indians to a reckless and demoralizing rivalry among a
horde of irresponsible traders. They were therefore very lenient in
their inspections, and the company rarely had any difficulty in getting
past them.
[Sidenote: A ZEALOUS CLERGYMAN.]
Not so, however, with some of the newly appointed Indian agents. It
was about this time that the Indian Department tried the experiment
of assigning clergymen to the agencies--an example of good intentions
but bad judgment. These new agents showed more zeal than discretion
in their work, and although they put the traders to a great deal of
trouble, it is doubtful if they lessened by a single drop the amount of
liquor carried into the country.
On the occasion of the voyage of 1843 the agent at Bellevue happened
to be absent from his station when the boat arrived. Elated at this
unexpected good fortune, Captain Sire lost no time in putting off the
freight destined for this point and in getting on his way. He pursued
his voyage until nine o’clock that evening, and doubtless felicitated
himself that he was out of danger. But it appears that the agent had
delegated the function of inspector during his absence to the commander
of the United States troops in the vicinity. The boat left her mooring
at daylight next morning, but had scarcely gotten under way when a
couple of rifle shots were fired across her bow. She brought to at once
and made for the shore. There Captain Sire found a lieutenant in charge
of a few dragoons, who had come from his camp four miles distant. The
young officer came on board and presented to Captain Sire a polite note
from Captain Burgwin, commander of the camp, stating that his orders
required him to inspect the boat before letting her proceed.
[Sidenote: A DASH OF COLD WATER.]
This was like a dash of cold water to the buoyant spirits of Captain
Sire, and none the less so to Audubon, to whom, as well as to the
company, the loss of the liquid portion of the cargo would have been
irreparable. The naturalist had a permit from the government to carry
with him a quantity of liquor for the use of himself and party, and
upon showing his credentials to the young officer he was, to use his
own words, “immediately settled comfortably.” But in the moment of his
good fortune he did not forget his companions who were not yet “settled
comfortably.” He understood that time was required to prepare for the
approaching function, and he could at least help to secure this time
by delaying inspection as long as possible. He accordingly expressed
a desire to visit the camp, and the lieutenant detailed a dragoon to
accompany him. The great naturalist rode four miles to call upon an
obscure army officer whom he knew he could see in a short time by
waiting at the boat. The officer was overwhelmed at the honor of the
visit, and when Audubon offered to present his credentials he politely
and gallantly replied that his name was too well known throughout the
United States to require any letters. Audubon says of the occasion:
“I was on excellent and friendly terms in less time than it has taken
me to write this account of our meeting.” Between his entertaining
conversation and the shooting of some birds he contrived to detain the
Captain for a good two hours before they returned to the boat.
[Sidenote: THE TRAMWAY IN THE HOLD.]
The time had not been wasted by Captain Sire and his loyal crew. The
shallow hold of the steamboat of those days was divided lengthwise into
two compartments by a partition or bulkhead running the full length of
the boat. A narrow-gauge tramway extended down each side of the hold
its entire length, the two sides connecting with each other by a curve
which passed under the hatchway in the forecastle. Small cars received
the cargo let down through the hatchway, and carried it to its place
in the hold or brought it out again when the boat was being unloaded.
A car could pass from the stern of the boat on one side of the hold
around the curve in the bow and to the stern of the boat on the other
side. There being no windows in the hold, everything was buried in
blackness a few feet from the hatchway. Workmen were lighted to their
labors by means of candles.
During the absence of Audubon the crew had loaded all the liquor upon
the cars, and had run them down on one side of the hold far enough
from the hatchway to be entirely concealed in the darkness. They were
carefully instructed in the part they had to play in the approaching
comedy, and very likely were put through a preliminary rehearsal or two.
[Sidenote: THE VIRTUOUS SIRE.]
When Captain Burgwin arrived in Audubon’s company, he was received
most hospitably and treated to a luncheon, in which was included, as a
matter of course, a generous portion from the private store embraced
in Audubon’s “credentials.” By this time the young Captain was in
most excellent temper and was quite disposed to forego the inspection
altogether. But the virtuous Sire would not have it so. “I insisted, as
it were,” says the worthy navigator in his log of May 10, “that he make
the strictest possible search, but upon the condition that he would do
the same with other traders.”[21]
[Sidenote: A FAIR PROPOSITION.]
A proposition so eminently fair was at once agreed to by the inspector,
whose mellow faculties were now in a most accommodating condition.
The shrewd steamboat master, who never forgot to be sober when his
company’s interests were at stake, escorted the officer down the
hatchway, and together they groped their way along the hold by the
light of a not too brilliant candle. It may be imagined with what zeal
the scrupulous Captain thrust the ineffectual flame into every nook and
corner, and even insisted that the inspector move a box or bale now and
then to assure himself that everything was all right.
Arrived at the foot of the hold, they passed through an opening and
started back on the other side. The officer was doubtless too much
absorbed with the effects of his recent collation to notice the glimmer
of light under the hatchway at the other end of the boat, where a
miniature train with its suspicious cargo was creeping stealthily
around the curve and disappearing toward the side which they had just
left. The party finished their inspection, and everything was found
quite as it should be. With many protestations of good will the clever
hosts and their delighted guest parted company, and the good Captain
Sire went on his way rejoicing. But woe to the luckless craft of some
rival trader which should happen along with no Audubon in the cabin and
no tramway in the hold.[22]
The ordeal of inspection being over, the boat proceeded on her way with
no further drawbacks than those arising from the various hindrances
to navigation. One of the disagreeable features of the trip above the
mouth of the Big Sioux River was the vast number of dead buffalo that
were encountered. They had been drowned on the upper river at the time
of the spring break-up in attempting to cross the ice after it became
too weak. Their bodies had then floated downstream and had lodged
all along the river on sandbars, islands, or the low shores. Some
time having elapsed since they were drowned, their flesh was now in a
condition that rendered the air almost insupportable.
[Sidenote: AN INDIAN ATTACK.]
An incident which caused considerable excitement, but luckily no
misfortune, occurred at Handy’s Point (where Fort Randall later stood)
on the 22d of May. A band of eight or ten Santee Indians, apparently
angered because the boat would not stop for them, opened fire upon it
from the bank. The bullets tore through the cabins and pilot-house,
but by the greatest good luck no one was hurt. A Scotchman who was
asleep in his bunk was awakened and terribly frightened by one of the
bullets which entered his berth, passing through his pantaloons, and
flattening itself against a trunk. Audubon saved two of the spent
bullets as relics. He was himself standing near one of the chimneys and
saw a bullet splash in the water just in front of the boat. Considering
the large number of people on board, the escape of everyone was almost
miraculous.
[Sidenote: CAREFUL OF HIS EYESIGHT.]
Captain La Barge was at the wheel at the time. In the pilot-house with
him was a French negro from Louisiana named Jacques Desiré, always
known as Black Dave. He was an excellent pilot and was on board with
a crew to return with the steamboat _Trapper_, which had been left up
the river the previous autumn on account of low water. When the bullet
crashed through the pilot-house Black Dave walked quietly out and took
shelter behind one of the smokestacks, where he remained until the boat
was well away from the scene of the attack. Captain La Barge asked him
why he did not remain in the pilot-house, so as to be ready to take the
wheel in case he himself were disabled. Dave replied that it was not
the fear of bullets that drove him away, but that his eyesight was all
he had to make his living by, and he was afraid of its getting injured
by the flying glass.
[Sidenote: AN UNPOPULAR PASSENGER.]
As may readily be understood, a feature of first importance on this
trip was the presence of so distinguished a passenger as the naturalist
Audubon. The impression which the celebrated scientist made upon the
crew and those who were entertaining him was quite unfavorable. He was
very reserved, and when he did hold intercourse with members of the
crew it was generally in an overbearing manner which alienated their
good will. It thus resulted that his hunters rendered him inefficient
service, and his journal is full of complaints at their failure to keep
their promises. Certain personal habits aggravated this defect, and
altogether he was not a popular traveler with the crew.
Captain La Barge mentions several instances of his ill treatment, one
of which concerned himself, and is here given in his own words, as he
once prepared them for publication in the _Missouri Republican_:
[Sidenote: THE BLACK SQUIRREL.]
“On one occasion he [Audubon] asked me if I had ever seen any
black squirrels during my voyages on the upper Missouri River.
My answer was that I had often killed them. ‘Do you know what
a black squirrel is?’ he asked. I replied that I knew what I
called a black squirrel, and would try to get him one at the
first opportunity. A few days later we were windbound. Seeing
that we would be compelled to remain tied to the bank most of
the day I took my gun and started around to look for a black
squirrel. I was fortunate. I ran across a very fine one and
shot him. He proved to be a fine large buck. I brought him
aboard. The first person I met was Mr. Bell, taxidermist of the
Audubon party, who remarked, after examining the squirrel, that
it was certainly a very fine specimen. He called Mr. Audubon’s
attention to it, who examined the animal carefully, and then
said to me: ‘_That_ is what you call a black squirrel, is it?
I expected as much. It is very strange that people born and
raised in a country do not know the names of the animals and
birds which it produces.’ After the squirrel had been thus
criticised for some time, I remarked that I would take it down
to the cook and have it baked for dinner. ‘No, no!’ said Mr.
Audubon, ‘Mr. Bell will take care of it’; and then walked off.
“Some few days after this one of his assistants called to me to
show me a painting that Mr. Audubon had finished that morning.
This was after dinner, as Mr. Audubon had always to retire
to his stateroom after that meal and have his long afternoon
nap. The assistant took advantage of this opportunity to show
me some of the drawings which Mr. Audubon was opposed to our
seeing. On entering the room I saw the drawing of the squirrel
just finished, and certainly I never saw anything representing
life so strikingly. The assistant then told me that Mr.
Audubon had remarked that it was the best specimen of a black
squirrel that he had ever painted.”
[Sidenote: THE OVER-WISE BOTANIST.]
[Sidenote: A KERNEL OF CORN.]
The crew soon lost a good deal of the deference and respect which were
justly due to individuals of such scientific attainments as were those
of the Audubon party; and it is to be feared that they played pranks
on them now and then which they would have avoided with people of more
congenial manner. Etienne Provost was serving as guide to the party.
No one in that day knew the Western country better than he, and he was
quite astonished when Mr. Prou, Audubon’s botanist, said to him one day
that he could tell the name of any plant in that country from the leaf
and stalk, even if he had never seen it growing. “You may think so,”
said Provost, “but I will undertake to prove that you are mistaken; for
I know a plant that grows in this country whose name you will not be
able to tell, even with the aid of your books.” Soon afterward the boat
landed to take on wood near the mouth of the Cheyenne River. A band of
Indians had spent the previous winter near by and had dropped some of
their corn on the ground. This was now well sprouted and the tender
blades were just shooting up. Provost carefully cut the ground around a
spear of the corn so as not to disturb the roots or the kernel, which
was still attached thereto. He deftly concealed everything except one
leaf and then showed it to Mr. Prou. The eager scientist was looking
for some test of a formidable character, and anything like corn did
not even occur to him. It is doubtful if he realized at the time that
corn was grown in that country. He racked his brain for a plant that he
could identify with the specimen. He grew nervous under the scrutiny
of the on-lookers that had gathered around him. Taking his book,
he searched back and forth, but to no purpose. It was indeed a new
species, and he finally acknowledged himself beaten. Provost then, with
provoking gravity, pulled away the dirt around the roots and finally
disclosed to the astonished scientist--a kernel of _corn_.
Above Omaha the boat made its way with more than usual speed and good
luck to its destination. It reached Fort Pierre May 31 and Fort Union
at sundown June 12. It left Fort Union June 14, reached Pierre June 21,
and St. Louis June 29. The time consumed was forty-nine days from St.
Louis to Fort Union and seventeen days returning. Mr. Audubon and party
remained at Fort Union until autumn, returning in a mackinaw boat.
CHAPTER XIII.
VOYAGE OF 1844.
[Sidenote: A POPULAR FALLACY.]
In the winter of 1843–44 the American Fur Company built a new boat,
the _Nimrod_, designed to correct certain defects in the _Omega_, and
in this boat the voyage of 1844 was made. As in the previous year,
Captains Sire and La Barge were master and pilot. It was in the spring
and summer of this year that occurred the great flood of 1844. This
appears to have been the greatest flood in the lower Missouri and
central Mississippi ever known before or since. The entire bottoms
in the vicinity of St. Louis were covered with water to a width of
several miles. The flood had the curious effect of completely filling
up the old bed of the river, so that, when it subsided, the river had
to cut out a new channel, and it was many years before the channel was
restored to its condition before the flood. The high water lasted far
into the summer. When Captain La Barge returned from his trip to Fort
Union he ran his boat up Washington Avenue to Commercial Alley, where
he made her fast through a window in J. E. Walsh’s warehouse at the
corner of those streets. This great flood was mostly from the lower
country, and scarcely at all from the mountains. When the _Nimrod_
reached the Omaha villages, a short distance below the modern site of
Sioux City, Ia., she found the water so low that she was compelled to
wait several days for a rise. This fact is a noteworthy one, as another
refutation of the popular idea that floods in the Mississippi have
their origin in the melting snows of the Rocky Mountains. As a matter
of fact they always come from the heavy rains of the lower country.
The _Nimrod_ passenger list, like that of the _Omega_ the year before,
included some notable names. Among these were the Comte d’Otrante, son
of the famous Fouché of France, and another Frenchman, the Comte de
Peindry. D’Otrante was much liked by the crew. He was an accomplished
gentleman, very wealthy, and had with him a retinue of servants who had
been reared with him upon the ancestral domain in France. He was making
the present journey solely for the purpose of pleasure. De Peindry was
a different sort of man. He and d’Otrante met by accident on this trip
and had little to do with each other. It was noted that de Peindry
treated his compatriot with great deference and respect as being his
superior. He was silent and impenetrable, and spent much of his time
hunting. When leaving the boat on these hunts he would give directions
not to wait for him if he did not return. He was repeatedly cautioned
that the boat could not wait for him, but his invariable reply was:
“Do not wait; I will turn up; if I do not, it is no matter.” He caused
a great deal of uneasiness on several occasions by not getting back
in time, and Captain Sire in his journal comments severely upon his
conduct. He was said to be a noted duelist, who, for some unknown
cause, had been compelled to leave Paris. He was very much of an enigma
to the passengers of the _Nimrod_. In 1845 he went to California,
whence the report came a few years later that he had been assassinated.
[Sidenote: MORE SHARP PRACTICE.]
In passing the Indian agency at Bellevue this year it was necessary to
indulge in some more sharp practice to get the annual cargo of alcohol
past that point. The new Indian agent at Bellevue was an ex-Methodist
minister of the name of Joseph Miller--as zealous in his new role of
liquor inspector as he had ever been in the regular practice of his
profession. It was his boast that no liquor could pass his agency.
He rummaged every boat from stem to stern, broke open the packages,
overturned the piles of merchandise, and with a long, slender, pointed
rod pierced the bales of blankets and clothing, lest kegs of alcohol
might be rolled up within. The persistent clergyman put the experienced
agents of the company to their wit’s ends, and it was with great
difficulty that they succeeded in eluding his scrutiny.
[Sidenote: NECESSITY THE MOTHER OF INVENTION.]
The urgency of the problem, however, produced its own solution. Captain
Sire had the alcohol all packed in barrels of flour. But he knew that
even this device would not alone be enough, for the energetic agent
would very likely have the barrels burst open. The Captain therefore
had them all marked as if consigned to Peter A. Sarpy, the Company’s
agent at Bellevue, and they were labeled in large letters “P. A. S.”
The moment the nose of the boat touched the landing at Bellevue, the
Captain, as was his custom, ordered the freight for that point placed
on shore, and the barrels were promptly bowled out upon the bank and
carried into the warehouse. The agent, never suspecting this freight,
went on board, and after a most rigid search, found nothing wrong. The
boat was permitted to proceed, but, contrary to its usual haste in
getting away as soon as the loading and unloading were complete, it
remained the rest of the day, and gave out that it would not sail until
the following morning. The extraordinarily good character of the boat
on this occasion, and the unusually long delay in departing, roused the
suspicions of the agent, who stationed a man to watch the boat and to
whistle if he saw anything wrong.
Everything remained quiet until some time after midnight, except that
a full head of steam was kept up in the boilers. Presently there was
great activity on the boat, although with an ominous silence about it
all. The pilot, Captain La Barge, was quietly engineering the reloading
of the barrels. He had spread tarpaulins on the deck and gang plank
to deaden the noise, and the full crew of the boat were hurrying the
barrels back in a most lively fashion. “What does this mean?” one of
the deckhands asked of another. “We unloaded these barrels yesterday.”
“Why, don’t you see?” was the brilliant reply of another, “they’re
marked ‘P. A. S.’; they’ve got to pass.”
[Sidenote: THE PARTED LINE.]
The work was quickly over and every barrel was on board, when the
agent’s sleepy guard awoke to the fact that something was going on. He
uttered his signal, and the agent made haste to turn out and see what
was the matter. La Barge and Captain Sire, who knew full well what the
whistle meant, did not linger to make explanations. Captain La Barge
seized an ax and cut the line. “Get aboard, men!” he shouted; “the line
has parted!” The boat instantly dropped back into the current and then
stood out into the river under her own steam. She was already out of
reach of the bank when the reverend inspector appeared and wanted to
know why they were off so early. It was about 3 A. M. “Oh, the line
parted,” replied Captain La Barge, “and it was so near time to start
that it was not worth while to tie up again.”[23]
[Sidenote: TOO MUCH FOR CREDULITY.]
This was a little too much for the agent, who could not understand
how it happened that the boat was so thoroughly prepared for such an
accident, with steam up, pilot at the wheel, crew at their places, and
all at so early an hour. Next day he found that the barrels consigned
to Sarpy were gone, and saw how completely he had been duped. Mortified
and indignant, he reported the company to the authorities, and a long
train of difficulties ensued, with ineffectual threats of canceling
the company’s license.[24] Meanwhile the alcohol found its intended
destination in the stomachs of the Indians, and the company reaped the
enormous profit which traffic in that article always yielded.
[Sidenote: CAPTURED BY THE PAWNEES.]
As already noted, when the _Nimrod_ arrived at the site of the Omaha
villages, the river was so low that she could not proceed for several
days. A crew was kept constantly busy with the yawl, sounding the
channel to detect any favorable changes in its shifting bed. On one
of these sounding excursions, when about five miles from the boat,
and under a high cut bank, La Barge was surprised and captured by a
Pawnee war party on their way to steal horses from the Yanktonais. When
the Captain heard them speak Pawnee he felt safe, and at once opened
conversation with them in their own tongue. Although he knew none of
the Indians personally, he succeeded in inducing them to come to the
boat and partake of a feast. Thus the Captain’s knowledge of the Pawnee
language, acquired in the villages of that tribe ten years before,
stood him in excellent stead. These Indians might not have killed him,
belonging as they did to a friendly tribe; but war parties, even of
friendly Indians, were lawless and desperate, and they would no doubt
have handled the little boat crew pretty roughly.
[Sidenote: THE LOST SAILORS.]
[Sidenote: A TIMELY RESCUE.]
Among the crew of the _Nimrod_ there were two ocean sailors, good men,
but with no river experience, who had engaged for the trip to see the
interior of the country. They were employed principally in handling the
rigging. One Sunday morning, May 19, while the boat was still at the
Omaha villages, they set off together with a single gun to try their
luck hunting. They failed to return that day and likewise the next,
when general uneasiness began to be felt about them. Parties were sent
after them in all directions, guns were fired, and everything done to
find them, but to no purpose; and the boat proceeded on her way without
them. The general opinion was that they had been killed by some vagrant
war party of Indians. Some two weeks later, as the boat was setting
out one morning, a trader by the name of Kensler was seen coming down
the river with a small boatload of furs. La Barge ran his boat to
shore and hailed the trader, who promptly hove to and came on board.
La Barge explained the circumstance of these two men having been lost,
gave Kensler some provisions for them, and asked him to stop at the
woodpile,[25] where the boat had laid up so long, and see if he could
find any traces of the men. He did so, and actually found them there.
They had converted the woodpile into a rude fortress, with one opening
on the river just large enough to enable them to get out for water.
They were almost starved to death, being reduced to mere skeletons,
scarcely able to crawl back and forth to the river. Kensler took them
to P. A. Sarpy’s trading post at Bellevue, where the _Nimrod_ found
them on her way back and took them to St. Louis. They gave La Barge the
following story: On the first day of their hunt they became confused
and lost, and after much wandering came to the bank of the river. But
they were utterly unable to conjecture whether they were above or
below the steamboat, and in this dilemma resolved to build a raft and
float down the river. If above the boat they would, of course, come to
where it was; if below, they would land after having proven the fact,
and return on foot. As a matter of fact they were below the boat, and
after drifting some thirty miles concluded to start back. They were
considering the question of landing when their raft ran upon a snag,
broke to pieces, precipitated them into the water, and lost them their
gun. They swam ashore and walked up the river bank until they reached
the place where the boat had been. They resolved to stay there and wait
for someone to come along. They disposed the woodpile so as to make
a rough fort, and gathered into their fortress all remnants of camp
refuse left by the _Nimrod_ which could sustain life. Here they waited
for several weeks, and had about given themselves up as lost when they
were rescued in the manner already related.
[Sidenote: NOT “UP TO” BUFFALO.]
The fare provided by the company for its steamboat crew was exceedingly
plain and scanty. The men got very tired of it, and as they were much
delayed by low water in getting into the buffalo country, La Barge told
them that the first buffalo they came in sight of they should have,
even if he had to lie to half a day to get it. La Barge had as first
mate an excellent man, John Durack, who had served in the English navy,
and had made his way to New Orleans and thence to St. Louis. He had
been on the river before, but had never been engaged in a buffalo hunt,
and the Captain thought this a good opportunity to initiate him. When
the boat reached the vicinity of Handy’s post four buffalo bulls were
seen swimming the river. “Man the yawl, John,” said La Barge. “I will
go with you and we will have a buffalo before we get back.” The Captain
gave orders to the men on the boat to shoot the buffaloes, and he would
then lasso one of the wounded ones and drag it to the boat. He put
Durack in the bow with a line while he took the rudder. The men on the
steamboat fired and wounded two of the buffaloes. To get to the wounded
ones the boat had to pass close to the two uninjured ones. The Captain
supposed that Durack fully understood the programme, but the mate was
not “up to buffalo,” and to La Barge’s consternation slipped the noose
over the head of one of the uninjured animals. Too late Captain La
Barge shouted to him not to do this--that he did not want to anchor
to a live buffalo. “Oh,” replied Durack, “he’s as good as any.” The
buffalo kept straight on his course. The men backed their oars, but to
no purpose; they could not stop him. Finally his feet touched bottom
and up the bank he went with the boat and its helpless crew after him.
They might indeed have taken a boat ride over the bare prairie had not
the stem of the yawl given way, being wrenched entirely out of the boat
and carried off by the terrified animal. There stood the sorry crew,
shipwrecked on a sandbar across the river from the steamboat--and with
no buffalo. A whole day was consumed in getting back to the boat and in
repairing the broken yawl. Meanwhile the crew kept on eating salt pork
and navy bread.
[Sidenote: A TERRIBLE STORM.]
On the 23d of June, when the _Nimrod_ was a little below the site of
the Aricara villages, near the mouth of Grand River, there arose one of
those frightful tempests of wind, hail, and rain which were so frequent
on the central prairies. For a little while the safety of the boat was
despaired of. All the glass on the windward side was broken and the
interior of the boat deluged with rain and hail. The hail accumulated
in the cabin to the depth of a foot, and some of the hailstones were as
large as turkey eggs. Captain La Barge made clay impressions of some
of them and sent them to the St. Louis _Republican_ as curiosities
deserving public notice. Besides the damage to the cabins the wind
carried away the pilot-house, which had to be replaced with a skin roof.
On another of Captain La Barge’s voyages he encountered a storm which
carried away the smokestacks. He extemporized some skin chimneys,
which enabled him to complete the trip. The Captain was once summoned
as an expert witness in a trial which grew out of a similar accident
to another steamboat, whose owners had been sued for damages for not
delivering freight. The defense was that a storm had so wrecked the
boat that she could not proceed. The particular damage alleged was the
blowing down of the smokestacks. La Barge explained how he had managed
in a similar case, and the court instructed the jury against the
defendant.
[Sidenote: EXPERT WITNESS.]
[Sidenote: ACCIDENT TO BE AVOIDED.]
In another case La Barge’s evidence, as an expert steamboat man, was
decisive. It was a case of collision in which the pilot of the boat
that was lost had not followed strictly the recognized signals and
rules in passing the other boat. The owners had sued for damages. The
defense was that the defendant’s pilot had followed the strict rules
of steamboating, and the other pilot had not. The main question was
whether the defendant’s pilot, when he saw the danger, should not
have given way if possible, even if the other pilot was violating the
rules, whether through willfulness or ignorance. La Barge was asked
what course he would have pursued in the premises. He replied that,
under any circumstances, it was a pilot’s duty to avoid accident, if
possible. The court agreed with this view.
The rest of the voyage of the _Nimrod_ passed off without noteworthy
incident. The boat reached Fort Union on June 22, started back June 24,
and reached St. Louis July 9, after an absence of seventy-one days.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHANGED CONDITIONS.
Down to the date to which our narrative has now arrived, the steamboat
business of the Missouri was mainly that of the fur trade. A small
traffic was carried on with the settlements along the lower river
and with the government establishment at Fort Leavenworth. In 1829 a
regular packet was put on between St. Louis and Leavenworth, and this
was kept up at intervals during the next fifteen years. But still the
main business was the trade with the Indians or with Santa Fe and the
parties of white hunters who roved all over the Western country. Its
single noteworthy feature, as late as 1845, was the annual voyage of
the Fur Company’s boat to the mouth of the Yellowstone.
[Sidenote: FROM PILLAR TO POST.]
At about the date last mentioned a profound change came over the
business--a change inseparably connected with the foundation of
civilization in the Far West. The emigration of the Mormons to Great
Salt Lake was one feature of this new development. That singular sect,
whose origin and doctrines have excited the contempt of the civilized
world, as its marvelous growth and material achievement have commanded
its admiration, was at this time about fifteen years old. Its founder
was Joseph Smith, its birthplace Fayette, in New York State, and
the year of its birth 1830. For causes which are differently stated
by the friends and enemies of the church, Smith and his followers
found it expedient to emigrate from New York. They went to Kirtland,
O., where they laid the foundations of their New Jerusalem, and
where they flourished with varying fortune for several years. In the
meantime another location was also chosen, possibly as a refuge in
case of expulsion from Kirtland--a situation on the very frontier
of civilization, twelve miles west of Independence, Mo. Here the
corner-stone of Zion was laid, under the sanction of divine revelation,
and here the church began to erect its earthly temple. Hither in a
few years came the faithful from Kirtland, having been expelled by
the community, to whom their doctrine and practices had rendered them
obnoxious.
[Sidenote: JOSEPH SMITH.]
In western Missouri their experience was even more discouraging than in
Ohio. The neighboring communities would have none of them. The State
authorities were appealed to by both sides, and finally entered the
contest; the militia was ordered out, and things assumed the aspect
of civil war. Blood was shed, and the Mormons were finally compelled
to flee from the country, leaving Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon
prisoners in the hands of their enemies. These worthies, however, soon
escaped and joined the refugees near Commerce, Hancock Co., Ill.
Their first reception in Illinois was one of welcome, for the people
of that State believed that they had been persecuted with uncalled-for
severity by the citizens and State of Missouri. Under the impulse of
this friendly feeling Smith secured a charter from the State, and
forthwith began building the city of Nauvoo, on a site which has been
universally admired for its great natural beauty. The powers conferred
by this charter were very broad, and Smith became virtually emperor
of an _imperium in imperio_. He was mayor of the city, _Lieutenant
General_ of the newly created Nauvoo legion, and President of the
church. He acquired wide notoriety throughout the country, and became a
political factor of no little importance in the State of Illinois. The
colony flourished under the impulse of missionary effort, which sent
proselytes hither from America and Europe alike. On the 6th of April,
1841, the corner-stone of still another temple was laid.
But the same causes which proved disastrous to the settlements in
Ohio and Missouri soon began to operate in Illinois. The people were
outraged at the immoral doctrines of the new sect, and alarmed at the
arrogant defiance of civil authority by its spiritual and temporal
head. Finally an act of violence under Smith’s authority led to his
arrest and that of his brother Hyrum, and their confinement in the
Carthage jail, under guarantee of safety by the Governor of the State.
But a mob was organized which overbore the civil authority, broke into
the jail, and slew the brothers in cold blood.
For the future development of the sect, this was the most fortunate
event in its history. It set the seal of martyrdom upon the founder of
the church; it healed internal dissensions; it intensified the high
purpose to succeed; and finally it opened up the career of the one man
who above all others was qualified to carry the movement to success.
This was that astute and gifted leader of men, prophet Brigham Young.
[Sidenote: NO ABIDING PLACE.]
[Sidenote: A FINAL HOME.]
It was now apparent that there was no abiding place for the church upon
the soil of the United States, and it was necessary to look beyond.
From the narratives of those who had visited the regions west of the
Rocky Mountains, Young determined to lead his people to the valley of
the Great Salt Lake, at this time a possession of the Mexican Republic.
In that remote and benighted wilderness his people could at least have
freedom from persecution, for the civil authority of Mexico could
scarcely reach so far. The movement was decided upon. Smith had been
killed in June, 1844, and the general exodus began in the spring of
1846. In July, 1847, Young laid the foundation of the final home of his
people on the shores of the Great Salt Lake.
In the course of this movement large bodies of Mormons remained
encamped for long periods on both shores of the Missouri near Council
Bluffs and Omaha. This situation became the great rendezvous for the
expeditions before starting across the plains, and it was here that the
Mormons came into relation with the steamboat traffic of the Missouri.
Large quantities of freight and great numbers of passengers were
brought up and disembarked here. The _Saluda_, whose tragic fate we
have elsewhere described, was loaded with Mormons. In 1851 the steamer
_St. Ange_ carried up two hundred of these people, and the _Sacramento_
four hundred. Many other boats, for fully a decade after 1846, brought
up passengers and freight destined to the distant colony in the heart
of the Rocky Mountains.
[Sidenote: WAR WITH MEXICO.]
Another of the great movements of the time, which gave a marked
impetus to Missouri River navigation, was the War with Mexico. This
great event--great not so much in its battles as in its far-reaching
results--had been gathering force for years. The influx of American
settlers into the province of Texas caused the Mexican Government
to adopt repressive measures toward them. This led to successful
revolution on the part of Texas, and her independence was finally won
by force of arms in 1836. For the next ten years Texas was practically
an independent republic seeking annexation to the United States. The
question of annexation was the determining issue in the national
election of 1844, and the pro-annexationists prevailed. Texas was
annexed in the spring of 1845, and in the following December was
admitted as a State, against the protest of the Mexican Government.
The administration ordered American troops to occupy certain disputed
territory claimed by both Mexico and Texas. Collision with the Mexican
troops followed: blood was shed, and the United States declared war.
Among the minor operations of the war from a military point of view,
but of transcendent importance in their results, were the conquests
of New Mexico and California under Harney, Doniphan, and Fremont. All
the country so won became a part of the United States. It lay in the
pathway of emigration to the West, and must sooner or later have given
rise to grave complications. The inevitable issue was precipitated
sooner than was expected, but the result must ultimately have been the
same. The importance of this acquisition in the history of the nation
cannot be overestimated.
The invasion of New Mexico naturally followed the line of the Santa
Fe trail. The expeditions were organized on the frontier, mostly at
Fort Leavenworth, but also at other points, such as Fort Kearney and
St. Joseph. The transportation of troops and supplies to Westport,
Leavenworth, and Kearney gave a great deal of work to the Missouri
River boats, which thus became an important factor in one of our
national wars.
[Sidenote: DISCOVERY OF GOLD.]
Scarcely had the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo, which closed the war,
been signed, when an event took place in the newly acquired territory
which completely revolutionized the situation of things in the West.
This was the discovery of gold in California in 1848. Emigration had
been moving to the coast, principally into Oregon, for the previous
six years. The first large movement took place in 1843. In 1845 and
1846 several parties crossed the Sierras into California, and there was
a strong nucleus of American settlers there when the conquest came.
The discovery of gold swelled this incipient stream into a mighty
river. From every part of the world, by land and by sea, the rush to
California began. The overland movement was one of the greatest and
most wonderful migrations of a people which history records. It ran in
full strength for several years, beginning in 1849, and by 1854 a vast
but unknown number had crossed the plains.
There were various starting points from the Missouri River in this
migration, although the different routes united before Fort Laramie was
reached. Westport, Leavenworth, Fort Kearney, and Omaha became initial
rendezvous, and a great deal of traffic for the emigrants was done by
the river boats from St. Louis to these points.
Following the three great movements just described came the period of
government exploration of the entire Western country, and the search
for practical railroad routes across the mountains. Large exploring
parties were sent into the field, and bodies of troops were dispatched
to the Pacific Coast and to distant points in the interior.
[Sidenote: LARGE RIVER BUSINESS.]
The aggregate amount of business brought to the lower Missouri
from these various causes was large. Viewed from the standpoint of
transportation, the Western country in that day can be likened in shape
to a fan. The handle was that portion which extended from St. Louis to
the mouth of the Kansas River. Thence the various routes to all parts
of the country diverged along the arms of the fan, which were outspread
from Santa Fe on the south to Fort Union on the north. Most of the
business below the point of divergence was done by steamboat. Vessels
in large numbers plied the river over this first four hundred miles,
and the amount of freight and passenger traffic carried by them was
very great. Boats departed daily from St. Louis, carrying an almost
inconceivable variety of articles for use of the emigrants, and nearly
as large a variety of emigrants themselves. To one who witnessed this
business in the noontide of its activity, it would have seemed scarcely
possible that another generation should witness its total extinction.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE AND THE MORMONS.]
Of the river business which grew out of the several movements just
described, Captain La Barge had his full share. He knew the Mormons
well. He had already seen much of them during their sojourn in western
Missouri, and came into business relations with them on a considerable
scale during their emigration of 1846 and subsequent years. He always
liked them, and had several warm friends among them. He was introduced
to Brigham Young by Peter A. Sarpy at Bellevue, where the American Fur
Company post for that section was situated. The Mormons were encamped
in this vicinity so long that they brought to Sarpy’s post a large
amount of business. La Barge himself became well acquainted with Young
and with others of the principal men. Young impressed him from the
first as a man of great ability. Apparently deficient in education
and refinement, he was fair and honest in his dealings, and seemed
extremely liberal in conversation upon religious subjects. He impressed
La Barge as anything but a religious fanatic or even enthusiast;
but he knew how to make use of the fanaticism of others and direct
it to great ends. He was kind and considerate, but a firm and strict
disciplinarian. In the Mormon movement he had found his niche. He saw
in it his opportunity to achieve power and fame, to amass a fortune,
and to become a great leader.
The freight business which came to the steamboats as a result of the
gold rush was not of a desirable character. Many of the emigrants were
so poor that it was difficult to collect from them, and once out of
reach there was scarcely a chance of ever hearing from them again. This
condition improved in later years, and the emigrant trade on the whole
was one of great magnitude and importance.
[Sidenote: THE GOLD CRAZE.]
Referring to the gold craze, Captain La Barge said:
“I was never seized with the craze. My wife wanted me to go, but I was
too busy and was already making money. Had I been idle, or unsuccessful
in business, I should undoubtedly have gone. I saw enough of the
movement to show me how many chances of failure there were to one of
success; and as I saw the thousands of disheartened adventurers who
turned back without ever reaching the desired region, I never repented
not going.”
CHAPTER XV.
INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1845–50).
The annual voyages of 1845–46 were made on the steamer _General
Brooks_. In the fall of the latter year Captain La Barge bought this
boat for twelve thousand dollars, but sold her again at the close of
the season. This was the first boat he had ever owned. He then went to
Cincinnati, where he supervised the building of a new boat. She was
named the _Martha_, and in her the voyage of 1847 was made. Captain
Sire, who for several years had gone up as master, now decided to leave
the river, and Captain La Barge accordingly made the trip alone in full
charge of the Company’s business.
Besides the regular freight for the company trading posts, the boat
carried up a large quantity of annuities for the several Indian tribes.
A more extended reference to this annuity business and the abuses to
which it led will be made further on. It is enough here to say that
the agents were sent into the country without any protection; that the
Company traders adroitly worked on their fears until they were fain
to place themselves under the shelter of the trading posts; and that
the Company was thus enabled to manage the government business to its
own great profit. On this particular trip there was a new agent by the
name of Matlock, and a good deal of time had to be spent at the various
agencies to permit him to confer with the Indians.
At Crow Creek there was a band of Yankton Sioux near a trading
establishment under charge of Colin Campbell. Here agent Matlock
gave the Indians a feast and left part of their annuities, but not
all, being induced by the Company’s agent to deposit the balance at
Fort Pierre. The Indians were sharp enough to see that they had not
received all they were entitled to and naturally could not understand
why. Campbell assured them that they would receive the balance at Fort
Pierre. “Why not here?” asked the Indians. “Why make this long journey
for what we can just as well get right here?” Campbell turned them off
by saying that the Indian agent could attend to the matter there better.
[Sidenote: SULLEN ACQUIESCENCE.]
[Sidenote: BADLY SCARED.]
The Indians sullenly acquiesced, evidently much dissatisfied. Campbell
had cut ten or twelve cords of wood at this place for use of the boat,
but it was not needed till the down trip. Captain La Barge feared,
however, that, if it was left, the Indians, in their present temper,
would burn it, and he therefore concluded to take it along. The Indians
refused to let the wood be taken without pay, and seated themselves on
the pile so that the men could not get at it. The captain was compelled
to pay for the wood, although it had been cut by Company men. But the
matter did not end here. Etienne Provost, who, as elsewhere stated,
was employed on these trips to take charge of the rough and turbulent
mountain men, was asked to attend to the loading of the wood, as it
was feared there might be trouble. Provost came up on the boiler deck
and sat down by La Barge, saying: “We are going to have some fun
before that wood is on board.” He then shouted “Woodpile! Woodpile!”
and enough men rushed out to the bank, to take the whole woodpile at
once. Provost ordered them to pick up all they could carry and then to
move on to the boat one after another, so as to have no crowding or
confusion on the gang plank. Meanwhile a dozen or more Indians were
standing by, looking on. When the men were loaded up and were jammed
close together in single file on their way to the boat, the Indians
jumped upon them and began to belabor them with the rawhide horsewhips
which they always had fastened to their waists. The men were frightened
almost out of their wits, and dropping their wood, scrambled on board
the best way they could. Provost lay back and roared with laughter,
saying, “I told you we should see some fun.”
[Sidenote: AFRAID OF PROVOST.]
He then went out himself onto the bank where the Indians were, and
said, “Now, men, come out here and get this wood.” They came and loaded
up. “Now go on board,” he said, and they went entirely unmolested.
Provost went last, and before descending the bank, turned toward the
Indians and asked them: “Why don’t you stop them? Are you afraid of
_me_?” The truth is they were afraid of him. They knew him well and
respected him, and understood that he would stand no foolishness.
[Sidenote: PROMPT MEASURES.]
La Barge thought nothing further of the affair, for the Indians soon
disappeared, as he supposed, for good. The wind was too high to
proceed, and the boat remained at the bank nearly all the afternoon
waiting for it to subside. “Everything quieted down,” said the captain,
in describing what followed, “and I was sitting in the cabin reading
a paper, when all of a sudden there was a heavy volley of firearms
and the sound of splintered wood and broken glass. This was instantly
followed by an Indian yell and a rush for the boat, and in the uproar
someone cried out that a man had been killed. The Indians got full
possession of the forward part of the boat and flooded the boiler
grates with water, putting out the fires. They had learned something of
steam in the fifteen years that boats had been going up the river. My
first act was to rush to my wife’s stateroom, where I found Mrs. La
Barge unharmed. I told John B. Sarpy, who with his son was making the
trip, to barricade her door with mattresses and to stay there until the
trouble was over. I then hastened to the front of the cabin, but was
met at the door by the Indians. Retreating, I met Colin Campbell, and
asked him what the Indians wanted. Campbell replied that they wanted me
to give up the boat; that if I would do so they would let the crew go,
but if I resisted they would spare no one.
[Sidenote: EFFECT INSTANTANEOUS.]
“After the first rush the Indians seemed timorous and uncertain,
evidently fearing some unpleasant surprise in the unknown labyrinths
of the boat. This gave me time for effective measures. I had on board
a light cannon of about 2½ inches caliber, mounted on four wheels.
Unluckily it was at this time down in the engine room undergoing some
repairs to the carriage. I had in my employ a man on whom I could
absolutely rely--a brave and noble fellow, Nathan Grismore, the first
engineer. Grismore had just finished the work on the cannon, and told
me he thought he could get it up the back way, since the fore part of
the boat was in possession of the Indians. He got some men and lines
and soon hoisted the gun on deck and hauled it into the after part of
the cabin. I always kept in the cabin some powder and shot for use in
hunting. I got the powder, but the supply of shot was gone. Grismore
promptly made up the loss with boiler rivets and the gun was heavily
loaded and primed, ready for action. By this time the forward part of
the cabin was crowded with Indians who were evidently afraid something
was going to happen. I lost no time in verifying their fears. As soon
as the gun was loaded I lighted a cigar, and holding the smoking stump
in sight of the Indians, told Campbell to tell them to get off the boat
or I would blow them all to the devil. At the same time I started for
the gun with the lighted cigar in my hand. The effect was complete and
instantaneous. The Indians turned and fled and fairly fell over each
other in their panic to get off the boat. In less time than it takes to
tell it, not an Indian was in sight. I had the cannon brought onto the
roof, where it remained for an hour or more.
“As soon as the Indians were off the boat I began to look up the crew
who had ingloriously fled at the first assault, leaving the boat
practically defenseless. They had hidden, some here and some there, but
most of them on the wheels (it was a sidewheel boat) where I found them
packed thick as sardines all over the paddles. These were the brave
mountaineers who were never slow in vaunting their courage and valorous
performances! I was so disgusted that I was disposed to set the wheels
in motion and give them all a ducking; but the fires had been put out
by the Indians.
“The wind having subsided, we resumed our journey, and about a mile
further on attempted to cross to the other shore. Failing in this
we encamped for the night. On the following morning we buried the
deckhand, Charles Smith, who had been killed when the attack began.”
Captain La Barge said that this was the only time that he was ever
caught napping by the Indians, and it taught him a lesson that he did
not forget.[26]
[Sidenote: FIRST WHITE WOMAN AT FORT UNION.]
As already mentioned, Captain La Barge’s wife was on board. It was
always understood on the upper river that she was the first white woman
to ascend the river from old Fort Lisa near the modern site of Omaha,
Neb., to Fort Union, at the mouth of the Yellowstone. Her presence
created great curiosity among the Indians. They would come on board
and examine her with the liveliest interest, measuring her waist and
the length of her hair, and wondering at the tastefulness and beauty
of her dress. The leading squaws in great numbers visited her, and
several adopted her as their sister. A good deal of time was lost
in satisfying their importunities to see her. Years afterward they
would inquire of La Barge after their white sister, and would send her
presents. She never failed to send them something in return. As late
as 1885, when La Barge was in the government service on the survey of
the Missouri River in the vicinity of the ancient Aricara villages, an
aged half-breed squaw, old Garreau’s daughter, told La Barge that she
remembered seeing his wife on this early trip.
In the year 1848 Captain La Barge again went up the river with his
boat _Martha_, on business for the Company. There were no noteworthy
incidents on the trip except that the captain brought back quite a
menagerie of the native animals from the upper country. There were
buffalo, bear, beaver, antelope, elk, and deer. A large tank was made
for the use of the beaver. All of the animals were for Kenneth McKenzie
except the buffalo, which were for Pierre Chouteau, Jr.
[Sidenote: LEAVES COMPANY’S SERVICE.]
On this trip La Barge had some difficulty with the Company, which
induced him to sell his boat to them at the close of the season. He
immediately contracted for a new boat which, when completed, he named
the _St. Ange_, in memory of St. Ange de Bellerive, the first military
governor of upper Louisiana. It was a fine boat, and probably the only
one ever built entirely complete upon the ways, and launched with
steam up ready to start the moment she struck the water.[27]
[Sidenote: BLOODY ISLAND.]
As soon as the boat was done, La Barge, being no longer in the
Company’s service, went to work for the Quartermaster Department of
the Army, hauling supplies up the river. He had made two trips to Fort
Leavenworth, and on his way back on the second trip encountered a
severe storm, which delayed him several hours. This delay, vexatious
enough at the time, was a blessing in disguise. Instead of getting
into port at St. Louis before dark, it was nearly an hour after
midnight before he reached there. As he was nearing the mouth of the
Missouri a broad gleam of light overspread the sky in the direction of
the city. Its extent and brilliancy clearly enough indicated a great
conflagration. When La Barge reached port it was to find the river
front wrapped in flames. He steamed the whole length of the levee,
seeking a safe place to land, but finding none, turned back, crossed
the river, and tied up for the night at Bloody Island, on the east
shore.[28]
[Sidenote: THE GREAT FIRE OF ST. LOUIS.]
[Sidenote: A FLAMING FLEET.]
This conflagration, which is the historic “Great Fire” of St. Louis,
commenced at about 10 P. M. on the night of May 17, 1849, and continued
until 7 A. M. next day. Fire alarms had been heard several times early
in the evening, but nothing had come of them, until about the hour
above mentioned, when it was found that fire had broken out in earnest
on the steamer _White Cloud_, which lay at the wharf between Wash
and Cherry streets. The _Endors_ lay just above her and the _Edward
Bates_ below. Both caught fire. At this time a well-intended, but
ill-considered, effort to stop the progress of the fire was made by
some parties, who cut the _Edward Bates’_ moorings and turned her into
the stream. The boat was soon caught by the current and carried down
the river; but a strong northeast wind bore it constantly in shore,
and every time it touched it ignited another boat. An effort was now
made to turn other boats loose before the _Bates_ could reach them,
but a fatality seemed to attend every effort. The burning boat outsped
them all, and by frequent contacts set fire to many more. These in
turn ignited the rest, until in a short time the river presented the
spectacle of a vast fleet of burning vessels drifting slowly along
the shore. The fire next spread to the buildings, and before it could
be arrested had destroyed the main business portion of the city. It
was the most appalling calamity that had ever visited St. Louis, and
followed as it was by the great cholera scourge of 1849, it was a
terrible disaster. At the levee there were destroyed twenty-three
steamboats, three barges, and one small boat. The total valuation of
boats and cargo was estimated at about $440,000, and the insurance
thereon was $225,000; but this was not all paid, for the fire broke up
several of the insurance companies.[29]
Among the boats destroyed was the _Martha_, which La Barge had sold
to the Company. She was loaded with a full cargo for the mountains.
The day after the fire La Barge received a note from Captain Sire,
requesting him to call at the Company’s office. He complied, and was
met with an urgent appeal to go to the mountains with the Company’s
annual outfit. He was at that time engaged for a government trip to
Leavenworth, but offered to go as far as Fort Pierre upon his return,
if it were possible to do so. Sire replied that that was all they could
expect. The trip to Leavenworth was completed in June, and La Barge
immediately started for Pierre. He made a quick and successful voyage,
and returned early in August.
[Sidenote: CHOLERA EPIDEMIC.]
The year 1849 was one of the terrible cholera years in the West.
Thousands died in St. Louis, and there were many deaths on every boat
that went up the Missouri.
In the following year, 1850, Captain La Barge went to the mouth of the
Yellowstone for the American Fur Company. It was the quickest trip on
record, being made in the extraordinarily short time of twenty-eight
days up and back, doing all the Company’s business at the various
posts.
CHAPTER XVI.
INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1851–53).
The _St. Ange_ left St. Louis on her voyage to Fort Union for the
American Fur Company, June 7, 1851. She had on board about one hundred
passengers, mostly employees of the Company. The cabin list included
two distinguished Jesuit missionaries, Father Christian Hoecken and
Father De Smet, bound for the Rocky Mountains.
[Sidenote: CHOLERA BREAKS OUT.]
The spring had been particularly backward and wet, and the Missouri
was in one of its most dangerous floods. The whole bottom country
was overflowed, and the river looked like a floating mass of débris
of every description. Navigation, though relieved of the danger from
snags, was much impeded by these floating obstructions, and the
gathering of fuel was unusually difficult. The overflowed condition
of the country made it malarial and unhealthy--as bad as possible for
a year when the cholera was abroad in the land. Sickness in one form
or another soon appeared among the passengers. In a little while the
vessel, according to Father De Smet, resembled a floating hospital,
and a feeling of gloom fell over the passengers. Father De Smet himself
was seized with a bilious fever which completely prostrated him, and
for a time his recovery was doubtful. When about five hundred miles up
the river the cholera broke out. A clerk of the American Fur Company
was the first victim, and from that time on for the next few days there
were several deaths every day. The situation was a terrible one, and
oppressed passengers and crew alike with the most dismal forebodings.
There was a physician on board of the name of Dr. Evans, a
distinguished scientist who was making the voyage in the interests of
the Smithsonian Institution. He did everything in his power to allay
the plague. Father De Smet was too ill to do anything, but Father
Hoecken worked incessantly, caring for the sick and watching over their
spiritual needs. This heroic priest won the hearts of the passengers
by his untiring labors in their behalf; but he so completely exhausted
himself that he had no reserve strength to combat the disease if it
should attack himself. He seemed everywhere at once, like a ministering
angel, and Father De Smet earnestly besought him to spare himself
somewhat or he would not hold out. Father De Smet’s condition was so
serious that he had asked Father Hoecken to receive his confession;
but the latter did not think his brother in immediate danger, and
hastened to the bedsides of those who were in a more precarious
condition. In the midst of his unselfish labors the zealous missionary
was himself stricken. Father De Smet thus records the sad story of his
death:
[Sidenote: DEATH OF FATHER HOECKEN.]
“Between one and two o’clock at night, when all on board was
calm and silent, and the sick in their wakefulness heard naught
but the sighs and moans of their fellow-sufferers, the voice
of Father Hoecken was suddenly heard. He was calling me to his
assistance. Awaking from a deep sleep, I recognized his voice,
and dragged myself to his pillow. Ah, me! I found him ill and
even in extremity. He asked me to hear his confession: I at
once acquiesced in his desire. Dr. Evans, a physician of great
experience and remarkable charity, endeavored to relieve him,
and watched by him, but his care and remedies proved fruitless.
I administered extreme unction; he responded to all the prayers
with a recollection and piety which increased the esteem that
all on board had conceived for him. I could see him sinking.
As I was myself in so alarming a state, and fearing that I
might be taken away at any moment, and thus share his last
abode in this land of pilgrimage and exile, I besought him to
hear my confession, if he were yet capable of listening to
me. I knelt, bathed in tears, by the dying couch of my brother
in Christ--of my faithful friend--of my sole companion in the
lonely desert. To him in his agony, I, sick and almost dying,
made my confession! Strength forsook him; soon, also, he lost
the power of speech, although he remained sensible to what was
passing around him. Resigning myself to God’s holy will, I
recited the prayers of the agonizing with the formula of the
plenary indulgence, which Christ grants at the hour of death.
Father Hoecken, ripe for heaven, surrendered his pure soul into
the hands of his Divine Redeemer on the 19th of June, 1851,
twelve days after our departure from St. Louis.
[Sidenote: BURIAL OF FATHER HOECKEN.]
“The passengers were deeply moved at the sight of the lifeless
body of him who had so lately been ‘all to all,’ according to
the language of the apostle. Their kind father quitted them
at the moment in which his services seemed to be the most
necessary. I shall remember with deep gratitude the solicitude
evinced by the passengers to the reverend father in his dying
moments. My resolution not to leave the body of the pious
missionary in the desert was unanimously approved. A decent
coffin, very thick, and tarred within, was prepared to receive
his mortal remains: a temporary grave was dug in a beautiful
forest, in the vicinity of the mouth of the Little Sioux, and
the burial was performed with all the ceremonies of the Church,
in the evening of the 19th of June, all on board assisting.”
On the return trip from Fort Union, Captain La Barge, despite the
protests of the passengers, took Father Hoecken’s remains on board and
delivered them to the Jesuits at St. Louis, and they were buried in the
Novitiate of the Society of Jesus at Florissant, whither Father De Smet
was to follow twenty-two years later.
[Sidenote: ABATEMENT OF THE PLAGUE.]
After the burial of Father Hoecken near the mouth of the Little Sioux
River, Captain La Barge put everyone ashore, made the passengers roam
around the neighborhood, unloaded and aired all the baggage, and
completely renovated the boat. These measures, with the increasing
healthfulness of the country as the boat entered the more arid
sections, brought complete relief from the plague. Only one more death
occurred, and in a short time everything assumed a normal aspect. The
boat reached Fort Union on the 14th of July, and here Father De Smet
left it to make a journey overland, southward to Fort John, on the
Laramie River, where a great council of plains Indians was to assemble.
Captain La Barge went on a hundred miles further, to the mouth of
Poplar River, it being, as he then understood, the highest point
reached by any steamboat; but it was not much, if any, farther than the
_Assiniboine_ went in 1834.
[Sidenote: CHARACTER OF FATHER DE SMET.]
This may be a proper place to record some incidents in the career of
Father De Smet which fell under Captain La Barge’s observation. De
Smet, as is well known, traveled a great deal in nearly all parts
of the far northwest. Sometimes he went around by sea, and then
came overland to the headwaters of the Missouri; sometimes he went
by the Oregon trail; and at others by the Missouri River. La Barge,
who saw much of him, found him always a pure and excellent man, very
companionable, full of anecdotes, and fearless and brave in all
situations. He was liked by everyone who knew him. The Mormons were
well acquainted with him and thought much of him. The Indians had the
very highest regard for his character, and he seemed always to be safe
in their hands. The Government of the United States likewise held him
in high esteem, and on several occasions called on him for responsible
and delicate work among the Indians.
Father De Smet entertained the most affectionate regard for Captain La
Barge. He presented him with autograph copies of all his works, and
always referred to him in terms of deepest affection. The incidents
which follow were witnessed by La Barge himself.
[Sidenote: DE SMET AND THE BLACKFEET.]
On one occasion near Poplar River a band of Blackfeet came down to the
bank near where the boat was. In addition to the well-known traditional
hostility of these Indians to the whites, there were other reasons for
believing that they were at this time in an ugly temper and meditated
trouble. Father De Smet, grasping the situation, said, “It looks as
if those Indians mean mischief. I will go out and meet them.” La
Barge remonstrated, saying that De Smet was not acquainted with these
particular Indians, and that they might kill him, when, if they knew
who he was, they might spare him. But De Smet knew that his reputation
had traveled where he himself had not been, and he believed that they
would recognize and protect the Black Robe, as they called him. He
accordingly donned his cassock, and with the crucifix before him, went
ashore and walked boldly to where the Indians were. As he had expected,
they received him well, made him sit down on a buffalo robe, and then
lifted him up and carried him on the boat. La Barge gave them a feast
and presented the chief with a suit of clothes, which greatly pleased
his vanity. After a time the Indians withdrew without attempting any
harm.
[Sidenote: MAKING IT RAIN.]
Although the spring of 1851 had been very backward and wet in the lower
country, it was not so higher up, and when the _St. Ange_ arrived at
the Aricara villages the corn crop of those Indians was found to be
actually suffering from drouth. The Aricara chief, White Shield, came
on board and said to La Barge, who understood his language well:[30]
“I am glad to see you, and I hear the Black Robe is on board.”
La Barge replied that that was so. The chief then continued:
“I want to ask him a favor. It is very late in the season and no rain.
Corn ought to be up now. We want the Black Robe to send us rain.”
La Barge took the Indian back to De Smet’s room and said to the priest,
“Father, here is the White Shield, who wants you to make it rain, for
the corn is not up yet.”
De Smet, who knew the White Shield well, laughed heartily, and said he
would do all he could. He then asked La Barge if the boat was going to
remain there all day, and being informed that it was, he said to the
White Shield: “Go to your village and put your lodge in order, and call
in some of the chiefs. I will come and offer prayer to the Almighty
and ask him to be merciful and grant your requests; and I am satisfied
that, if you deserve it, the Great Spirit will look down and favor you.”
[Sidenote: A COPIOUS SHOWER.]
Captain La Barge and several of the passengers went along with the
father, and the interpreter translated the prayer to the Indians.
They left the Indians satisfied, and at noon had them on the boat for
a feast, after which they returned to their village. As good fortune
would have it, along about three or four o’clock in the afternoon,
there came up a heavy thunder shower which fairly deluged the place.
Father De Smet laughed and said:
“They will think I did it. They will give me all the credit for it.”
Some time after the shower Pierre Garreau, a French Canadian, who had
spent all his life among the Indians, and had become almost an Indian
himself, came to the boat and said to La Barge:
“I want you to help me. I want to find out how Father De Smet did that.”
“Did what?” asked La Barge.
“Made it rain. I will pay a good price if he will tell me. I will give
him ten horses.”
La Barge took him back to De Smet, where he presented his request
himself. De Smet told him to be a good Christian, and pray when he
wanted it to rain, and if he deserved it, it would come. Garreau went
away disappointed, for he fully believed that the father had some
secret art by which he produced so signal a result. After he had gone,
De Smet laughed and said: “Did I not tell you they would say I did it?”
[Sidenote: ATTEMPTED RETIREMENT.]
After La Barge returned from this trip he laid the boat up for repairs,
and soon after sold her. He had now about made up his mind to quit the
river and retire from active business. He had already accumulated a
snug fortune for those days, and concluded to enjoy it. He made the
best financial move of his life in the purchase of a large tract of
land in what is now Cabanné Place in St. Louis. Had he held on to this
purchase, the mere growth of the city would have made him immensely
wealthy.[31] But retirement from business is one of the hardest things
for a man to do, even in old age. For a man in the prime of life, as
La Barge was at this time, being only thirty-six, it was not to be
expected; and fate soon threw in his way a temptation that brought him
back to the river.
[Sidenote: PURCHASES THE “SONORA.”]
In the spring of 1852 he met in town one day Captain Edward Salt-Marsh,
who had just arrived from Ohio with a handsome new boat. She was called
the _Sonora_, as almost everything in those days was given a California
name. “Nothing would do but that I should go and inspect his boat,”
said La Barge. “I found her an excellent craft, and soon learned that
Salt-Marsh was disposed to sell her. A desire to purchase at once took
possession of me and led to a lengthy negotiation, which ended in my
buying the boat for thirty thousand dollars. Next day I went into town
and raised the entire amount.”
The Captain this year made a contract with the Company to take their
annual outfit up the river. He went to Union and back, but there were
no especial incidents on the trip. After the return of the _Sonora_ he
ran in the New Orleans trade for the rest of the season. This was a
yellow-fever year in that section, and so many boats had left the river
that Captain La Barge found plenty of business.
There were some untoward incidents on the Fort Union trip this season
which decided La Barge not to go up for the Company the following year.
He sold the _Sonora_ in the fall of 1852, purchased a small boat, the
_Highland Mary_, with which he ran in the lower river the entire season
of 1853. He sold his boat in the fall of that year.
CHAPTER XVII.
ICE BREAK-UP OF 1856.
During the season of 1854 Captain La Barge was in the employ of the
government most of the time. In the previous winter Colonel Crossman,
of the army, Quartermaster at St. Louis, contracted with a company of
boat-builders on the Osage River for a steamboat for government use.
When the hull was nearly completed Captain La Barge went up and brought
the boat down by the use of sweeps. He supervised her completion and
remained on her as pilot during the entire season. This boat was called
the _Mink_, from the color selected in painting her.
The American Fur Company chartered a boat to take up the outfit of
1854, but the crew mutinied, and the voyage proved a failure. Mr.
Chouteau then asked La Barge to recommend him a boat for the next
year’s trade and join with him in purchasing her. It so happened that
two St. Louisans, Sam Gaty and a man named Baldwin, had recently won a
prize of forty thousand dollars in the Havana lottery, and were using
it in building a boat. They sold the boat in her unfinished state, the
Company purchasing a half interest and La Barge and John J. Roe each
one-fourth. La Barge supervised her completion and named her the _St.
Mary_, after a new town which P. A. Sarpy had just laid out a few miles
below the modern Council Bluffs, Ia., and which has been long since
entirely washed into the river.
[Sidenote: TRANSFER OF FORT PIERRE.]
Captain La Barge made the annual voyage of 1855 in this new boat. Mr.
Charles P. Chouteau, son of Pierre Chouteau, Jr., accompanied the trip.
The only incident of particular moment on this voyage was the transfer
of Fort Pierre to the United States Government in accordance with the
terms of a sale which had been consummated the previous spring. This
important event, which will again be referred to more at length, marked
the beginning of the conquest of the upper Missouri country by the army
of the United States. The _St. Mary_ was used in making the transfer of
the post to the War Department and in moving the Fur Company’s property
to a new situation some distance above the old site, near the mouth of
Chantier Creek.
General Harney was in command of the troops sent to the upper Missouri
in 1855, and La Barge saw him at Fort Pierre. The Captain always liked
him, and considered him one of the best friends of the Indians that the
army ever produced--a terrible fighter when fight was unavoidable, but
always desirous of accomplishing his purposes by peaceful means. The
Captain recalled an incident of Harney’s intercourse with the Sioux
which created a great deal of mirth on the frontier at the time.
[Sidenote: THE POWER OF THE WHITE MAN.]
[Sidenote: MEDICINE TOO STRONG.]
While holding a council at Pierre with about three thousand Sioux, the
General told them of the great power of the American people and the
uselessness of their trying to resist them. He was anxious to exhibit
some proof that would appeal to the native imagination. Finally a
thought struck him. Chloroform was just coming into use in surgery,
and the hospital equipment with the expedition had some of it along.
“I will show you the great power of the white man,” said the General
with impressive gravity. “I will show you how he can even kill and
bring to life again.” He called the surgeon, explained what he wanted,
and then, through the interpreter, commanded that a dog be killed and
afterward restored to life. He cautioned the surgeon to be extremely
careful not to overdo the matter. The surgeon proceeded to chloroform
the dog, while the Indians looked on in mute astonishment, if not with
superstitious awe. After the dog was insensible the General called
the chiefs and told them to satisfy themselves that he was actually
dead. The surgeon was then ordered to resurrect the dog. He applied
the usual restoratives, but the dog slept on. He nipped his tail with
a pair of pincers, but still no sign of life. The surgeon finally
gave it up, and the white man’s marvelous power did not materialize.
The Indians looked on, and putting their hands to their mouths said:
“Medicine too strong, too strong.”[32]
[Sidenote: ICE BREAK-UP OF 1856.]
After the return of the _St. Mary_ to St. Louis, Captain La Barge, as
was his wont, ran in the lower river trade the rest of the season. In
the following winter, February 27, occurred the famous ice “break-up”
of 1856 on the Mississippi River at St. Louis. The winter had been very
cold and the ice was three or four feet thick and the water low. The
break-up was not caused in the usual way by the thawing of the ice, but
by a rise in the river from above, which caused the ice to move before
it had become much disintegrated. It was an appalling and terrible
example of the power of a great river when restrained in its course.
The following account is from the pen of an eyewitness:
[Sidenote: TERRIBLE DISPLAY OF POWER.]
“The ice at first moved very slowly and without any perceptible
shock. The boats lying above Chestnut Street were merely shoved
ashore. Messrs. Eads & Nelson’s Submarine No. 4, which had
just finished work at the wreck of the _Parthenia_, was almost
immediately capsized and became herself a hopeless wreck.
Here the destruction commenced. The _Federal Arch_ parted her
fastenings and became at once a total wreck. Lying below were
the steamers _Australia_, _Adriatic_, _Brunette_, _Paul Jones_,
_Falls City_, _Altona_, _A. B. Chambers_, and _Challenge_, all
of which were torn away from the shore as easily as if they
were mere skiffs, and floated down with the immense fields of
ice. The shock and the crashing of these boats can better
be imagined than described. All their ample fastenings were
as nothing against the enormous flood of ice, and they were
carried down apparently fastened and wedged together. The first
obstacles with which they came in contact were a large fleet of
wood-boats, flats, and canal-boats. These small fry were either
broken to pieces or were forced out on the levee in a very
damaged condition. There must have been at least fifty of these
smaller water craft which were destroyed, pierced by the ice or
crushed by the pressure of each against the other.
[Sidenote: A DESOLATE SCENE.]
“In the meantime some of the boats lying above Chestnut Street
fared badly. The _F. X. Aubrey_ was forced into the bank and
was considerably damaged, the noble _Nebraska_, which was
thought to be in a most perilous position, escaped with the
loss of her larboard wheel and some other small injuries. A
number of the upper-river boats, lying above Chestnut Street,
were more or less damaged. Both the Alton wharf-boats were sunk
and broken in pieces. The old _Shenandoah_ and the _Sam Cloon_
were forced away from the shore and floated down together,
lodging against the steamer _Clara_, where they were soon torn
to pieces and sunk by a collision with one of the ferryboats
floating down. The Keokuk wharf-boat maintained its position
against the flood and saved three boats below, viz., the
_Polar Star_, _Pringle_, and _Forest Rose_, none of which was
injured.
“After running about an hour the character of the ice changed,
and it came down in a frothy, crumbled condition, with an
occasional heavy piece. At the end of two hours it ran very
slowly, and finally stopped about 5 1-2 o’clock P. M. Just
before the ice stopped and commenced to gorge, huge piles,
twenty and thirty feet in height, were forced up by the current
on every hand, both on the shore and at the lower dike, where
so many boats had come to a halt. In fact these boats seemed to
be literally buried in ice.
* * * * *
“The levee on the morning after the day of the disaster
presented a dreary and desolate spectacle, looking more like a
scene in the polar regions than in the fertile and beautiful
Mississippi Valley. The Mississippi, awakened from her long
sleep, was pitching along at a wild and rapid rate of speed,
as if to make up for lost time. The ice coat of mail was torn
into shreds, which lay strewn along the levee, and was in some
places heaped up to a height of twenty feet above the level of
the water. Where the boats had lain in dense crowds only a few
hours before, nothing was to be seen save this high bulwark of
ice, which seemed as if it had been left there purposely to
complete the picture of bleak desolation. The whole business
portion of the levee was clear of boats, except the two wrecked
Alton wharf-boats, which were almost shattered to pieces, and
cast like toys upon the shore in the midst of the ridge of ice.
There was not a single boat at the levee which entirely escaped
injury by the memorable breaking up of the ice on February 27,
1856.”
[Sidenote: LA BARGE RESCUES HIS BOAT.]
Captain La Barge retained a vivid recollection of this great
catastrophe, for he was the only steamboat man who succeeded in
extricating his boat from the wreck. The sight was something terrible
to him, and a marvelous exhibition of power. The ice piled up in
enormous masses as easily as a child would heap up sand, and then
it collapsed and gave way. There were three of these pilings-up, or
gorges. The noise of the crushing ice was terrific. Some of the boats
were smashed to splinters; some were sunk, and others were pushed far
up onto the bank.
The _St. Mary_ was lying at the wharf when the movement began. La Barge
at once got up steam and prepared to do what he could to save her.
Sarpy came down to see him, and said to him, “Do just what you think
best with the boat. If anyone can save her you can. Draw on me for
anything you want.” It was a very risky thing to trust one’s life in
a chaos of wreckage like that. Hooper, the mate, came and said that he
should go too if the Captain was going to risk the river. He thought
he could get five or six men to venture. The final give-way came about
dark, and La Barge backed the boat away from the shore, let her drift
in the ice, and thus escaped the crush which came along the shore. He
drifted some twenty miles downstream before he could extricate himself
from the ice.
[Sidenote: GOUVENEUR K. WARREN.]
La Barge went to Fort Union for the Company again in 1856. On this trip
Lieutenant Gouveneur K. Warren, afterward general and corps commander
in the Civil War, took passage on the boat nearly all the way from St.
Louis. He had with him a corps of scientific assistants, among them
the eminent geologist Dr. F. V. Hayden, who was then just beginning
his explorations of the West. Lieutenant Warren sketched the course of
the river from the pilot-house as the boat proceeded, taking compass
bearings and estimating the distances. He speaks in his report of the
uniform courtesy extended him by Captain La Barge in facilitating
his operations. The Captain remembered him well, as he was in the
pilot-house nearly all the time. He was very active, and kept his men
vigorously employed gathering information. At night he went on shore
and took observations. La Barge became very much interested in his
work, and assisted him in every possible way, often stopping the boat
to allow him to do some particular work. He seemed so interested and
pleased with everything, and so intelligent and well posted, that
he quite won the Captain’s admiration. He was, as Captain La Barge
remembered him, a handsome man, with a fine head and clear eye, at that
time rather slender, but well built and erect. He was always pleasant,
and was liked by his men, but was nevertheless a strict disciplinarian.
We can easily discover in the Captain’s recollections the youthful
portrait of the future hero of Little Round Top at Gettysburg, and the
accomplished leader of the Fifth Corps.
[Sidenote: DR. F. V. HAYDEN.]
[Sidenote: DANGEROUS BUSINESS.]
The Captain also distinctly remembered Dr. Hayden, and related a
certain incident which came very near proving disastrous to that
enthusiastic explorer. Hayden was a man of rather small stature,
talkative and companionable, well informed, and very energetic and
eager in his work. On one occasion his devotion to his scientific
pursuits came very near getting him into danger. The incident in
question occurred at the site of old Fort Clark, which stood upon a
high cut bank. “We laid up here for an entire day,” said the Captain in
narrating this event. “The bank was full of fossils, some of them very
rare. I had told Hayden of this on a former trip, and he was anxious
to investigate the place. He went down under the bank, pick in hand and
his rifle over his shoulder. An Aricara village was on the top, and
while he was absorbed in his investigations some young bucks took it
into their heads to have a little fun at his expense. They commenced
pelting him with small pebbles, corncobs, etc., from the top of the
bank, at the same time keeping themselves concealed from his view. For
some time Hayden could not see where the missiles came from, but at
length caught sight of the Indians, and instantly leveled his rifle at
them. I had been a quiet spectator from the boiler deck of the boat,
and quick as thought called to him to desist or he was a dead man. He
lowered his gun and came on board and hunted no more fossils under that
bank. If he had fired he would certainly have been killed, and as it
was, the Indians were greatly incensed that he should have leveled his
gun at them.”
[Sidenote: A DISAGREEABLE INCIDENT.]
Upon this trip a disagreeable incident happened which led Captain La
Barge to leave the Company’s service for good. He had as clerk of
the boat a son of one of the partners. The young man’s wife was also
on board, going up for the pleasure of the voyage. La Barge had been
particularly requested by the clerk’s father to use his best offices
for her protection, comfort, and pleasure in the wild and lawless
country to which she was going, and he promised to do so. Everything
passed off pleasantly until Fort Clark was reached, when one of the
partners of the Upper Missouri Outfit, the bourgeois of the post at
Fort Clark, came on board to accompany the boat to Fort Union. He was
naturally a rough, arrogant, blustering character, disposed to override
everyone, and on two previous occasions La Barge had been compelled to
deal pretty severely with him. He was, nevertheless, a man of great
energy, well versed in the business of the fur trade, and a good man
for the Company. He was therefore tolerated where a less capable man
with his faults would have been gotten rid of.
[Sidenote: INSULTING INSINUATIONS.]
“When he came on board,” said Captain La Barge, “he went to the office
and told the clerk to assign him a stateroom so that he could have
his baggage sent to it. The clerk promised to attend to it and the
bourgeois withdrew. The clerk and myself then looked over the register
to see what we could do for him. There was only one room that could be
made available except by causing passengers who had secured and paid
for their rooms to vacate them. This room was occupied by two clerks,
who were compelled to give it up and sleep on cots outside. It was a
forward stateroom, and hence not so desirable as those further aft, but
still a good room, and the only one that was available. I directed
the clerk to have the bourgeois’ baggage put in, and to show him the
room when he should request it. About 9 P. M., when the boat was tied
up for the night, and I was in the office writing up the journal, the
bourgeois came in and asked the clerk for his room. The clerk took him
out and showed him his room and told him that two of the clerks had
given it up for him. The bourgeois turned up his nose and exclaimed,
‘What! that room for ----, a member of the firm? Can’t I have a room in
the after cabin, where the bourgeois are usually assigned?’ He was told
that it was impossible without ousting others who could not reasonably
be disturbed. He did not ask me, for he knew I would not grant it.
Then drawing himself up in a pompous fashion, he said to the clerk,
calling him by name: ‘I will occupy your room to-night and you may
occupy this,’ and added other suggestions not calculated to mollify the
feelings of the young husband.
[Sidenote: SEVERE DISCIPLINE.]
“The clerk came into the room deathly pale, but made no response to the
bourgeois’ insulting insinuations. I overheard the whole conversation,
and determined to remain up and see the affair out. After a while
the bourgeois came to the door of the office and said to the clerk:
‘Good-night, Mr. ----.’ ‘Good night, Mr. ----,’ replied the clerk,
and the bourgeois withdrew and started for the ladies’ cabin. I
immediately stepped out and followed him. He walked directly back to
the clerk’s stateroom and was about to take hold of the door knob, when
I seized him by the collar, jerked him around, gave him a smart kick
in the direction of the forward cabin, followed it up by two or three
others, and in short order landed him in front of the boat yelling
‘Murder!’ and calling for help. Culbertson and others came out, but
I told them not to interfere, as I was simply protecting a lady from
insult. The bourgeois would not be quiet, and I ordered my mate Hooper
to put him on the bank. This was promptly done, the boat was held off
shore by a spar, the gang plank drawn in, and the bourgeois could not
get back on board. The weather was so warm that he would not suffer
from the cold, and the pestering mosquitoes, which swarmed in the
willows, kept him active all night.
“When I returned to St. Louis I made no report of this affair, leaving
it to the clerk, whose wife’s honor had been protected, to lay the
matter before his father. Instead of reporting the facts he represented
that I had treated the bourgeois with uncalled-for severity, and that
such things ought not to be allowed to go on. He said nothing of the
real cause of the trouble, although his wife, a refined, cultured, and
beautiful woman, drove to my house as soon as she returned, and told my
wife how thankful she was for what I had done.
“A few days after my return from Union I was summoned to the office,
and was there informed that the men in the upper country thought me
altogether too hard on them, and that, to avoid future difficulty, it
was best to terminate our relations. I replied that I felt so fully
justified in my action that I should retire from their service with the
utmost willingness if such was their view of the affair. This was in
the fall of 1856, and was the last time that I worked for the Company.
[Sidenote: THE TRUTH DISCLOSED.]
“Three years later I was again called to the office and thus addressed
by the father of my ungrateful clerk:
“‘I have called you in to scold you for your conduct.’
“‘Why so, Mr. ----?’
“‘You remember the cause of the trouble in 1856 that led to our
separation?’
“‘Very distinctly.’
“‘Why did you not defend yourself? Why did you not make me a full
report?’
“‘I thought, sir, it was your son’s place to lay the matter before
you, as the whole trouble had been on his and his wife’s account.
I had promised you that I would protect her, and all I did was in
fulfillment of that promise. I am glad that you now know the truth of
the matter.’
“‘Perhaps you are right; it was my son’s place to tell me; but he was
influenced by others and never mentioned it.’
“The old gentleman was very indignant over the affair, and ever after
treated me with the greatest consideration.”
[Sidenote: LEAVES AMERICAN FUR CO.’S SERVICE.]
As has been stated already, this was the last service of Captain La
Barge for the American Fur Company. Many years of the most active part
of his life had been spent in their interest. They never had a pilot on
whom they could more confidently rely, and his careful management of
their expeditions was worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to them.
But their hard and exacting ways, often sullied with open injustice,
gave rise to misunderstandings, which on several occasions virtually
compelled him to quit their service and finally led to permanent
separation.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE HEAD OF NAVIGATION REACHED.
The decade from 1850 to 1860 saw a very rapid growth in the steamboat
business of the Missouri River. The stream of emigration across the
plains continued practically unchecked. Settlement was rapidly filling
up the lower valley of the river, and by 1856 had reached as far as
Sioux City, and all the modern towns below that point had commenced
their existence. Government exploration was being pushed with vigor
in all directions into the country beyond. The Indians were becoming
restive under the pressure of settlement; their annuities were
increasing, and the presence of troops in all parts of their country
was becoming more imperative. The long Indian wars of the Missouri
Valley were beginning.
[Sidenote: STEAMBOAT STATISTICS.]
All these developments had their effect upon the steamboat traffic of
the Missouri River, for that stream was the one great transportation
route into the heart of the West. Some idea of the magnitude of the
business may be gleaned from the records of the times as published
in the newspapers along the river. In the year 1858 there were 59
steamboats on the lower river and 306 steamboat arrivals at the port
of Leavenworth, Kan. The freight charges paid at that point during the
season amounted to $166,941.35. In 1859 the steamboat advertisements
in the St. Louis papers showed that more vessels left that port for
the Missouri River than for both the upper and lower Mississippi. In
1857 there were 28 steamboat arrivals at the new village of Sioux City
before July 1. There were 23 regular boats on that part of the river,
and their freight tonnage for the season was valued at $1,250,000.
The period from 1855 to 1860 was the golden era of steamboating on
the Missouri River. It was the period just before the advent of the
railroads. No other period before or after approached it in the
splendor of the boats. All the boats were sidewheelers, had full-length
cabins, and were fitted up more for passengers than for freight. It
was an era of fast boats and of racing. It was the heyday of that most
important personage, the Missouri River pilot.[33]
[Sidenote: PROGRESS UP THE RIVER.]
While this rapid development of traffic on the lower river was
going on, the American Fur Company was laying its plans to carry
steamboat navigation to Fort Benton. We have elsewhere told how the
_Assiniboine_ in 1834 reached a point near the mouth of Poplar River,
a hundred miles above the Yellowstone, and being caught by low water,
was compelled to stay there all winter. For the next nineteen years
this remained the farthest point reached by steamboats. In 1853 the _El
Paso_ went about 125 miles further, to a point five miles above the
mouth of Milk River. El Paso point, as this place came to be called,
marked the limit of steamboat progress up the river for the next six
years.
In 1859 the final step, or very nearly so, was taken in reaching the
real head of navigation. The record of this event is quite as definite
as are those of the entrance of steamboats into the mouth of the
Missouri in 1819 and the voyage of the _Yellowstone_ to Fort Union
in 1832. In the spring of 1859 the American Fur Company sent up two
boats with its annual outfit, its own boat, the _Spread Eagle_, and a
chartered boat, the _Chippewa_. The _Chippewa_ was a light boat, and
her owner, Captain Crabtree, contracted to take her to Fort Benton,
or as far as it was possible to go. At Fort Union he defaulted in his
contract and sold the boat to the Company for just about the charter
price for the voyage. Such freight as the _Spread Eagle_ carried for
Fort Benton was then transferred to the _Chippewa_, making a total
cargo of 160 tons. Captain John La Barge,[34] brother of Joseph La
Barge, and pilot of the _Spread Eagle_, was assigned to charge of the
_Chippewa_ on her adventurous undertaking. Mr. Charles P. Chouteau went
along as the Company’s representative.
The boat made her way successfully, and without any notable incident,
to within fifteen miles of Fort Benton, and discharged her freight at
Brulé bottom, where Fort McKenzie stood in former years. Her arrival at
this point was on July 17, 1859, forty years and two months after the
_Independence_ entered the mouth of the river.[35]
This noteworthy event must be classed as one of the celebrated feats
in steamboat navigation. The _Chippewa_ had reached a point further
from the sea by a continuous water course than any other boat had ever
been. She was now 3560 miles from, and 2565 feet above, the ocean, and
the whole distance had been made by steam on a river unimproved by
artificial works.
[Sidenote: HEAD OF NAVIGATION REACHED.]
In 1860 the _Chippewa_ and the _Key West_ completed the short remaining
distance to Fort Benton, and made fast to the bank in front of the old
post July 2 of that year. On June 16, 1866, the steamer _Peter Balen_
ascended the river to the mouth of Belt Creek, six miles from the Great
Falls, and thirty-one miles above Fort Benton. This is believed to be
the farthest point reached by steam on the Missouri River.[36] The feat
was accomplished during the June flood and would have been impossible
at ordinary stages. Fort Benton has always been considered the head of
navigation on the Missouri River.
[Sidenote: LOSS OF THE “CHIPPEWA.”]
[Sidenote: ALCOHOL AND CANDLES.]
In 1861 the heroic _Chippewa_ made her last trip up the river. Again
bound for Fort Benton, she reached the end of her voyage and of her
career at a point a little below the mouth of Poplar River, Mont.,
since known, from this connection, as Disaster Bend. She was loaded
with American Fur Company goods and Blackfeet annuities, and had a
goodly quantity of alcohol on board. One Sunday evening in the month of
May, while supper was being served, the boat was discovered to be on
fire. She was immediately run ashore, the passengers were put off, and
she was set adrift to avoid the danger from an expected explosion of
gunpowder that was in the hold. The boat floated across the river and
about a mile downstream, when she blew up, just as the upper works were
fairly consumed to the water’s edge. The explosion was terrific, and
packages of merchandise were found at a great distance from the place.
No lives were lost, and the personal effects of the passengers were
saved. The fire was caused by some deckhands, who went into the hold
with a lighted candle to steal some liquor.
CHAPTER XIX.
FORT BENTON.
Few, if any, towns in the Far West country possess so unique and varied
a history as Fort Benton. With the exception of some of the old Spanish
villages in the southwest it is the oldest settlement in the mountain
country, for the traders made their first establishment there in 1831.
The true historic career of Fort Benton did not embrace more than half
a century, yet in that brief space it saw more of romance, tragedy,
and vigorous life than many a city of a hundred times its size and ten
times its age.
[Sidenote: OPENING TRADE WITH THE BLACKFEET.]
The commercial importance of Fort Benton arose, of course, from its
situation at the head of navigation on the Missouri River; but this was
not the cause of its first location there. The surrounding country was
the home of the Blackfeet Indians--great fur producers, but in early
times inveterate enemies of the whites. From the time when the traders
began to penetrate those distant regions it was their ambition to open
up trade relations with this fierce and refractory tribe. Attempts were
made in the years 1807–10 and again in 1822–23, but wholly without
success. The Indians always evinced a deadly hostility, attacked the
trappers, killed a great many, drove them out of the country, and gave
them no opportunity to explain their pacific purposes.
In 1831 Kenneth McKenzie, ablest of the American Fur Company traders
on the upper Missouri, resolved to make another attempt. He had
already securely established himself at Fort Union, near the mouth of
the Yellowstone. Fortune threw into his hands at this time the very
instrument required for his purposes--an old trapper who had long
served under the Hudson Bay Company in the Blackfoot country north of
the boundary. His name was Jacob Berger. He understood perfectly the
language of these Indians and knew many of them personally. McKenzie
prevailed upon him to go to their country with overtures of peace and
the promise of a trading post. The real origin of the enmity of the
Blackfeet had been the apparent favoritism of the whites, in years
gone by, toward their hereditary enemies, the Crows; and McKenzie felt
confident that, if he could once get their ear and explain the true
purpose of the traders toward them, he would secure their friendship
and custom.
Berger set out with a small party in the fall of 1830, carrying
unfurled an American flag, and traveled upward of four weeks before he
saw an Indian. Finally he came upon a large village in the valley of
the Marias River. The sight so terrified the little band that they were
for instant flight before they should be discovered. Berger, however,
persisted in his mission, and the party moved forward, scarcely
expecting to be alive another hour. They were quickly discovered,
whereupon a number of mounted warriors started at full gallop to meet
them. The whites halted and Berger advanced with his flag. The Indians
paused and Berger made signs of peace, and called out his own name.
As he was well known to the tribe, they recognized him at once. There
was a rush to shake hands and Berger and his party were taken to the
village, where, to their infinite relief, they were received with every
demonstration of good will.
[Sidenote: A FAIR PROPOSITION.]
Berger remained at the village for some time, and made the Indians
fully acquainted with the purpose of his mission. He finally induced
about forty of the leading men to return with him to Fort Union, where
they could confer with McKenzie direct. The journey was long, and
the fickle nature of the Indians showed signs of weakening before it
was nearly completed. They began to fear treachery, and it took all
of Berger’s ingenuity to keep them from turning back. Finally, as a
last resort, when almost at their journey’s end, he pledged them his
scalp and his horses if they did not reach the fort in one day more.
They agreed to this eminently fair proposition, and before the day
had passed they saw, from the top of a hill, in the plain below them,
the imposing palisades and bastions of Fort Union. This was about the
beginning of the year 1831.
[Sidenote: SUCCESSFUL NEGOTIATIONS.]
McKenzie did all in his power to impress the delegation favorably. He
made them liberal presents, and sent a trader with an outfit of goods
to remain in their village during the winter. Finally he promised them
a permanent trading post the following year. Before the year had passed
he induced the Blackfeet and Assiniboines to make a treaty with each
other, and he thus established peace all along the northern border.
In the fall of 1831 he sent a complete outfit under James Kipp to the
Blackfoot country for the purpose of establishing the promised post.
After a long and tedious voyage Kipp reached the mouth of the Marias
River and selected the point of land between the two streams for the
proposed establishment. It was begun about the middle of October.
The Indians appeared soon after his arrival, but Kipp requested them
to withdraw for seventy-five days, until he could finish the work.
They went away and returned punctually on the day fixed. To their
astonishment they found the fort entirely finished and everything ready
for the trade. This post was very properly named, from the sub-tribe
of the Blackfeet in whose country it was located, Fort Piegan.[37]
[Sidenote: THE BLACKFEET NATION.]
Thus was the white man’s first foothold established in the land of the
Blackfeet, near where the great post of Fort Benton stood in later
years. Kipp drove a thriving trade during the winter, and in the spring
went down to Union with the returns and with all his men, for they
refused to remain if he went. It is said that the Indians burned the
post after Kipp withdrew. Whether from this cause or from some other,
it was not rebuilt upon the original site. D. D. Mitchell, one of the
Company’s most capable servants, was sent up in 1832 to reopen trade
with the Blackfeet. On his way up he lost his boat in a storm, with all
the property, worth some thirty thousand dollars, and two men, one of
them a Piegan Indian. The Indians who were with him suspected foul play
and Mitchell had all he could do to maintain himself while sending back
to Union for another outfit. He succeeded, however, and in due time
reached the mouth of the Marias.
[Sidenote: FOUNDING OF FORT MCKENZIE.]
Not liking the situation selected by Kipp, he went up the river some
seven miles farther, and chose a spot on the left bank in a fine bottom
with abundant growths of timber near by. The erection of the new post
was one of the dramatic incidents of the early fur trade. There were
several thousand Indians present, suspicious of the whites and ready
for trouble upon any pretext. The men worked like beavers in getting up
the pickets, and during this time slept on the keelboat. It required
the utmost tact and firmness on the part of Mitchell to prevent an
outbreak, and several times it seemed as if all were lost. The work was
finally completed, and once within the fort the little party felt safe.
The new post was named Fort McKenzie, a merited tribute to the man
who had accomplished a feat which the traders had hitherto considered
impossible.
In the summer of 1833 Alexander Culbertson, next to McKenzie the
greatest of the American Fur Company traders, went up with Mitchell
from Fort Union, and began his long and eventful career on the upper
river. Prince Maximilian was a guest of the party, and remained at Fort
McKenzie nearly all summer. While there he was treated to a genuine
Indian battle. The Assiniboines, becoming weary of peace, broke the
treaty of two years before, and fell upon a band of Piegans who were
encamped around the fort. They killed several Indians in the first
onset, but were quickly repulsed by aid of the inmates of the post, and
were finally driven back beyond the Marias. Mitchell and Culbertson
took part in the fight, and the venerable Prince became its historian.
[Illustration: ALEXANDER CULBERTSON]
[Sidenote: BLACKFEET AND CROWS.]
The history of Fort McKenzie had more of excitement and incident about
it than any of the other early trading posts. The Blackfeet and the
Crows were deadly enemies of each other, and many were the bloody
encounters between them. The Crows often came to seek their enemy in
his own country, and the Blackfeet went to the Crow country on the
Yellowstone, where the inmates of Fort Cass witnessed the counterpart
of scenes which fell under the eyes of the traders at Fort McKenzie.
It is said, but upon uncertain authority, that the Crows once actually
laid siege to Fort McKenzie, but as they were a friendly tribe to the
whites, this may be taken with some allowance. It is certain, however,
that for many years the warfare between these two tribes raged with
great fury, though not with much loss to the traders, for the booty
captured from one party found its way directly to the trading post in
the country of the other.
[Sidenote: SMALLPOX AMONG THE BLACKFEET.]
The thrilling incidents with which the annals of Fort McKenzie abounded
in these early years would fill a volume; but we can note only the
more important. The year 1837 was the year of the terrible smallpox
scourge among the tribes of the Missouri Valley. Great care was taken
at Fort Union to dispatch the annual outfit for Fort McKenzie without
carrying the smallpox along with it. The expedition was in charge of
Alexander Harvey, one of the most noted and desperate characters which
the fur trade produced. Harvey took every possible precaution, but in
spite of his efforts the disease broke out in his party. He therefore
thought it prudent to stop before he reached Fort McKenzie and send
word to Culbertson, who had been in charge of the fort since 1834, when
Mitchell left. Culbertson wisely decided to leave the cargo at the
mouth of the Judith until the disease had run its course. There were
large numbers of Indians encamped near the fort awaiting the arrival
of the boat, and when they learned of the proposed delay they became
suspicious and insisted that the boat should be brought up. Culbertson
expostulated with them, but all in vain, and to avoid the capture and
destruction of the boat and its crew, he yielded to their demands.
[Sidenote: TERRIBLE MORTALITY.]
The result was exactly what had been foreseen. The disease was
communicated to the inmates of the post and to the Indians as well.
The latter completed their trade and left the fort before the pest
actually broke out among them, and the garrison remained for some time
in ignorance of what their fate had been. For upwards of two months
not an Indian was seen, and Culbertson, fearing the dreadful truth,
resolved to go in search of them. With a single companion he set out
for the Three Forks of the Missouri, where the Piegans usually spent
their autumns hunting beaver. They finally came upon a village of about
sixty lodges, only to find it absolutely deserted, with dead bodies
strewn in every direction, and carrion birds of prey the only sign of
life anywhere around. The smallpox had done its work well, and the
few survivors of the village had fled in scattered groups among the
surrounding mountains. The mortality among the Bloods and Blackfeet had
been as great as among the Piegans, and Culbertson estimated the total
loss among the three bands at six thousand souls. The Grosventres, for
some cause, escaped with small loss.
The annals of Fort McKenzie during the next six years find their chief
sensational interest in the exploits of Alexander Harvey. Many were the
desperate deeds committed by him, and it required all the steadying
authority of Culbertson to offset his sinister influence among the
Indians. Harvey was, however, an excellent trader, and rendered the
company good service. He was left in charge of the post during the
occasional temporary absences of Culbertson at Fort Union, and in spite
of his many outrages upon the Indians, and even upon the whites, was
considered too valuable a man to lose.
[Sidenote: CULBERTSON TRANSFERRED.]
Under Culbertson’s prudent management Fort McKenzie had become, next to
Union, the most paying establishment on the river. The Company were so
pleased with his record that they decided to send him to Fort John, on
the Laramie River, to build up the trade of that post, which was doing
a losing business on account of bad management. Culbertson protested
that it would be a mistake to take him away from McKenzie, but the
Company overruled him, and Francis A. Chardon, one of their most
experienced clerks, was sent to relieve him.
[Sidenote: REVOLTING CRIME.]
Chardon was the same manner of man as was Alexander Harvey, and it
goes without saying that such a pair traveled rapidly the highway
to commercial ruin. Chardon, being new to his duties and new to the
post, relied a great deal upon Harvey, who became the real head of the
establishment. The natural consequences of this arrangement quickly
followed. Some little offenses committed by the Indians, which a
prudent trader would have passed by without trouble, were made the
excuse for one of the most atrocious crimes ever committed by either
white man or Indian upon the other. The plan was to fall upon the
unsuspecting Indians the next time they should come in to trade, and
to kill all they could and confiscate their property. It only partly
succeeded, owing to the failure of the actors to co-operate exactly;
but it went far enough to arouse the hatred of the Indians to the
highest pitch. They began a war of vengeance, and soon rendered the
situation at Fort McKenzie untenable. Chardon accordingly moved down
to the Judith River, and erected a new post on the left bank of the
Missouri, opposite the mouth of the smaller stream. He named the post
Fort Chardon. Fort McKenzie was burned, some say by Chardon himself
and some by the Indians. The fort lost its old name and became known
as Fort Brulé, or burned fort, a name which still survives in Brulé
bottom, where Fort McKenzie stood. The massacre took place early in the
winter of 1842–43.[38]
[Sidenote: RETURN OF CULBERTSON.]
As a result of their reckless management, Chardon and Harvey had by
this time ruined the trade with the Blackfeet tribes. In this emergency
the Company turned to Culbertson, acknowledged their error in removing
him from Fort McKenzie, and besought him to return and restore things
to their old-time condition. Culbertson went back in the summer of
1844, abandoned and burned Fort Chardon, and established a new post
twelve miles above the modern Fort Benton. The fort was built on the
right bank of the Missouri, and was named Fort Lewis, in honor of the
great explorer, Captain Meriwether Lewis.
On his way up from Fort Union this season Culbertson was accompanied
by Jacob Berger, James Lee, and Malcolm Clark. Clark had served at
Fort McKenzie five years before. He was a noted frontier character of
good family connections, an unsuccessful student at the West Point
Military Academy, a man of fine physical presence, and possessed of
a bold and desperate character, which brought to his name the stigma
of more than one crime.[39] Clark and his companions seem to have
plotted the murder or severe punishment of Alexander Harvey; for when
Harvey came down from Fort Chardon to meet the boat, he was attacked by
Clark and Lee and barely escaped with his life. He fled to the post,
barricaded himself, induced the inmates to stand by him, and would not
admit even Culbertson without a guarantee of personal safety. He then
closed up his affairs at the post, left the Company’s service, went
down the river, and soon after became senior member in the opposition
firm of Harvey, Primeau & Co. He returned to the upper river, built a
small post near the mouth of Shonkin Creek, and did a fair business for
several years, when he sold out to his old employers.
[Sidenote: BLACKFEET TRADE RESTORED.]
With Chardon and Harvey away, Culbertson soon won back the trade of
the Blackfeet. The site of Fort Lewis, however, proved unsatisfactory.
The valley of the Teton River, a tributary of the Marias, which flowed
parallel with the Missouri for many miles, was a favorite camping
ground of the Indians. Fort Lewis was a long way off, and across the
Missouri from this valley. Accordingly, in the spring of 1846 the
post was dismantled, moved down the river, and set up in the fine open
bottom where the village of Fort Benton now stands.
[Sidenote: FORT BENTON FOUNDED.]
The post was thus finally settled in its future permanent location,
although the name, Fort Lewis, was still retained for several years.
Business flourished under Culbertson’s management, and he at one
time had three outlying posts in the country round about. In 1850 he
determined to rebuild the post of adobe, after the manner of Fort John,
on the Laramie. The soil was well adapted to the purpose, and although
the work was begun late in the season, it was completed, thanks to
an open fall, before winter set in. On Christmas night, 1850, it was
dedicated with a grand ball, and was rechristened Fort Benton, in honor
of Senator Thomas H. Benton, who had so often rescued the Company from
the peril of its own malefactions. The name Fort Benton, as applied
to the post of the Blackfeet, and to the head of navigation on the
Missouri River, thus dates from the year 1850, nineteen years after the
first trading post was established in that vicinity.
[Sidenote: THE STEVENS EXPLORATION.]
No events of other than a routine nature transpired at Fort Benton
until the year 1853, when the extensive exploring expedition of
Governor I. I. Stevens took the field to find a northern railroad
route to the Pacific Ocean. These explorations brought a great deal
of business to Fort Benton, and added a new feature to the life of
that hitherto almost unknown post. Growing out of this work came the
effort to negotiate treaties with the Blackfeet similar to those which
had been formed at Fort Laramie three years before with most of the
plains tribes. Congress made a large appropriation to cover the expense
of the negotiations, and Governor Stevens and Alfred Cummings were
appointed treaty commissioners. The necessary gifts for the Indians
were purchased, the American Fur Company was awarded the contract for
their transportation, and in due time Commissioner Cummings and party
left St. Louis on the Company’s steamboat _St. Mary_.
There were on board, besides Commissioner Cummings, Major Culbertson,
Indian agents Vaughn and Hatch, and a friend of Captain La Barge, an
army officer, who later became paymaster in the army. At Fort Union
the goods were transshipped in keelboats for Fort Benton, while
the passengers took wagons for the same destination. Arrived at
Milk River crossing, the party met Governor Stevens just returning
from the Pacific Coast, and here the details of organization of the
Commission were decided upon. There was much dispute over the question
of precedence, and although Governor Stevens finally yielded to his
colleague, the relations of the two men were so embittered that their
subsequent work lacked harmony and effectiveness.
[Sidenote: CHANGE OF CONDITIONS.]
From Milk River the party went on to Fort Benton, but the boats were
not able to get up that far except with very great delay, and it
was decided to hold the expected council at the mouth of the Judith
River. The goods were stopped at that point and hither repaired the
Commissioners and the various Blackfeet bands to the number of about
two thousand. The work was completed and in about ten days the Indians
departed with their lavish presents. The era of the fur trader had
ended and that of the Indian agent had come. In this case, as in all
that had preceded it, the change, so far as the Indians were concerned,
was a change for the worse.
[Sidenote: GREATNESS OF FORT BENTON.]
These events bring our sketch of the history of Fort Benton down to
the point already reached in our regular narrative. The arrival of the
first steamboat in 1859 was an epoch in her history. Followed, as it
was, almost immediately by the discovery of gold in Montana, and the
consequent rush of emigration, it changed the whole order of things
at the post. Stores and other buildings began to appear, and in 1865
a town site was laid off.[40] The young city grew with astonishing
rapidity and became a place of very great importance. Strange
indeed must it have seemed to the Indians and to the old trappers to
behold upon this spot, where for so many years there had been only
a single palisade--sole habitation of white men within five hundred
miles--buildings of metropolitan style and quality, trains of wagons
coming and going, and lines of noble steamboats lying at the bank along
the entire front of the town.[41] It was a wonderful metamorphosis,
scarcely paralleled in any other city of the country. Mushroom towns
have sprung up all over the West, but no permanent city from causes
like those which built up Fort Benton. Her rise and greatness were due
solely to her position as a strategic point in the commerce of the far
Northwest, not from any great mineral discovery in her neighborhood.
Her supremacy she maintained until other commercial routes had rendered
useless the great natural highway which found its terminus at her
door.[42]
[Illustration: FORT BENTON LEVEE]
[Sidenote: AMERICAN FUR CO. LEAVES THE RIVER.]
The American Fur Company, founders of Fort Benton, continued to do
business on the upper river until 1864, when they sold out to the firm
of Hawley, Hubbell & Co., under the style of the Northwestern Fur
Company. The negotiations were concluded in the winter of 1864–65, and
the actual transfer accomplished in the following season. In 1869 the
Northwestern Fur Company sold out all its interests below Fort Union to
Durfee & Peck, and in 1870 abandoned all the trade above Fort Union.
CHAPTER XX.
LINCOLN ON THE MISSOURI.
Having permanently left the service of the American Fur Company,
Captain La Barge spent the three years, 1857–59, mainly on the lower
river, not generally going above Council Bluffs. In the summer of
1859 he built a fine new boat, one of the best that ever went up the
river. Pierre Chouteau, Jr., having heard of his undertaking, sent to
him and offered any assistance that might be needed. The Company still
cherished a high appreciation of Captain La Barge’s services and would
gladly have taken him back into their employ. The captain thanked Mr.
Chouteau, but never took advantage of his offer. When he had finished
his boat he named her the _Emilie_, for one of his daughters. Soon
after this he received a polite note from Mr. Chouteau, telling him
to order a complete stand of colors for the boat and he would pay the
bill. The captain was much embarrassed, for he knew that Mr. Chouteau
had made the offer under the impression that the boat had been named
in honor of his wife. When La Barge declined his generous offer and
explained why, Mr. Chouteau said: “That’s all right. I am glad you have
told me so frankly. You did well to name the boat for your daughter.”
[Sidenote: THE “EMILIE.”]
The _Emilie_ was one of the famous boats of the Missouri River. She was
225 feet long, 32 feet beam, with a hold 6 feet deep, and could easily
carry 500 tons. She was a sidewheel boat, built on the most approved
lines, and an exceedingly beautiful craft. Captain La Barge was
designer, builder, owner, and master, and set out on his first voyage
with her October 1, 1859, his forty-fourth birthday.
Before the boat was completed he entered into a contract with the
Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad, which had just reached the Missouri
River at St. Joseph, to run from that point up and down the river in
connection with the road. The _Emilie_ was accordingly taken at once up
the river, and remained all the fall in that section, going up as far
as Fort Randall once or twice.
[Sidenote: LINCOLN AT COUNCIL BLUFFS.]
[Sidenote: LINCOLN’S SPEECH.]
It was during the boating season of 1859 that Captain La Barge first
saw Abraham Lincoln. Among the more obscure incidents in that great
man’s career were his visits to the Missouri River in the summer
and fall of this year. In August he visited Council Bluffs, and in
December several towns in Kansas. The purpose of his first visit was
not political, although during his stay at the Bluffs he was induced
to make a political speech.[43] He had evidently come out to take a
look at the great West, and possibly also to make some investments in
real estate. At any rate, in November following he purchased from N.
B. Judd lot 3, block 1, of Riddle’s Subdivision of Council Bluffs. In
1867 this property was conveyed back to Mr. Judd by the Lincoln heirs.
It is a very singular fact that the adjoining lot 4 of this subdivision
was owned by Clement L. Vallandigham, Mr. Lincoln’s greatest political
enemy.
[Sidenote: UNION PACIFIC.]
General Grenville M. Dodge, who later became a distinguished officer in
the Civil War, was at this time engaged in surveys for the proposed
Union Pacific railroad. He had just come in from the plains, and
Lincoln, hearing of the fact, sought him out and had a long talk with
him in regard to his surveys. His great interest in the matter and
his skill in drawing out information soon gave him all that the young
surveyor knew. The latter thought no more of this at the time than that
possibly he had been giving away secrets that belonged to his employers
only. In 1863, while in command of the district of Corinth, Miss., he
received a dispatch from General Grant directing him to proceed to
Washington and report to the President. He was a good deal perturbed
over the matter, for he feared it might be something pertaining to his
military work that had not given satisfaction. When he appeared before
Mr. Lincoln he found that the President wanted to consult with him
in regard to the eastern terminus of the proposed Pacific railroad,
which would soon have to be determined. Mr. Lincoln had remembered the
conversation in Council Bluffs, and now sought assistance from the same
source from which he drew so freely on the former occasion. The result
was that Council Bluffs instead of Omaha was fixed as the terminus, and
that is why the Union Pacific railroad begins just across the river in
Iowa, and not, as would have seemed natural, on the west shore of the
river.
[Sidenote: LINCOLN IN KANSAS.]
Late in the fall of 1859 Mr. Lincoln visited Kansas. He arrived at St.
Joseph December 1, _via_ the new Hannibal and St. Joseph railroad. He
was met at the station by D. D. Wilder and M. W. Delahay, who escorted
him at once to the ferry. Mr. Wilder was a member of the reception
committee, and had spent several days in the office of Lincoln &
Herndon the previous summer. While waiting for the boat they sat down
on the bank, and Lincoln talked freely of the recent exciting political
events in Illinois. The party then crossed to Kansas, the first stop
being at Elwood, where Lincoln spoke on the night of December 1. The
next day he went to Troy, Kan., where he gave an address, and in the
evening he made a speech at Doniphan. The following day he went to
Atchison and spoke in the Methodist church. Lincoln’s speeches on these
occasions were essentially the same as that delivered at a later date
at Cooper Union, New York. Lincoln seems to have gone to Leavenworth on
the 4th of December. He remained there two or three days, delivering
two speeches at Stockton’s Hall and holding a public reception. His
long stay at this place was probably due to his having to wait for the
steamboat to take him back to St. Joseph. He left Leavenworth on the
7th of December, accompanied by Mr. Parrott, the Kansas delegate to
Congress.
[Sidenote: LINCOLN ON LA BARGE’S BOAT.]
It was on the occasion of one of these visits to the Missouri River
that Captain La Barge met Mr. Lincoln. It is understood that Mr.
Lincoln made his journey to Council Bluffs by boat, either from St.
Louis or St. Joseph, and returned home across the State; and that on
his Kansas visit he went back by boat from Leavenworth to St. Joseph in
December. On one of these trips he traveled on Captain La Barge’s boat.
The Captain retained with great distinctness his impressions of the
appearance and personal peculiarities of the distinguished passenger.
The tall and relatively slender build of Mr. Lincoln, his high hat,
sallow complexion, and not very elegant costume, gave him a somewhat
comical appearance at first sight. He seemed to La Barge rather quick
in his movements, and apparently a good walker. The captain noticed
that he was scarcely ever alone, there being always someone listening
to him. Although he made no speeches on his way up, he had an audience
all the time, and his agreeable address, and interesting way of putting
things, made him a constant center of attraction.
[Sidenote: LINCOLN’S ELECTION.]
La Barge remembered that he frequently came into the pilot-house, and
asked many questions, particularly about the fur trade and the Indians.
He expressed his desire to make a visit to the upper country. Before
he left the boat he asked La Barge if he would not procure for him a
fine buffalo robe and send it to him, giving him to understand that he
should of course expect to pay him well for all expense he might be
put to. La Barge promised to do so. Lincoln was not at this time much
talked of for the Presidency, and in Missouri was unpopular on account
of his attitude toward slavery.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: THE NEGROES FREED.]
Captain La Barge did not take his boat down the river in the fall of
1859, because the ice cut him off. She was laid up a little below
Atchison. He himself went to St. Louis, and in February returned with
his family. In the spring of 1860, when the ice was about to break up,
the citizens of Atchison offered to furnish fuel for the boat if La
Barge would attempt to cut through the ice to St. Joseph. He undertook
it, running his boat up on the ice until her weight broke it in, and
in that way succeeded in getting through. The captain remained in the
service of the railroad all summer, running to Kansas City and Omaha
and intermediate points. In the fall he started for St. Louis, but was
caught by the ice at Liberty, Mo., and compelled to lay up his boat
there. It was at this point that he first heard of Lincoln’s election.
When John Baxter, keeper of Liberty Landing, came on board with the
news, La Barge said to him: “Up go all your niggers.” “Oh, you don’t
think that’ll make any difference, do you?” “Up go all your niggers,”
replied La Barge; “they will all be set free.” “And they were all set
free,” remarked the captain in narrating this dialogue, “and mine with
the rest, for I had some.”
FOOTNOTES
[1] There is in the possession of the La Barge family in St. Louis a
large pocketbook, still in a state of excellent preservation, which was
brought from Canada by Captain La Barge’s father. In this book is a
slip of paper, worn and mutilated with age, which contains the record
of the elder La Barge’s birth.
[2] “I can safely recommend him to any traveler, as the best person
in his line I have ever met--intelligent, sober, obliging, and never
afraid to encounter any difficulty that may occur.”--_Three Years in
North America_, by James Stuart, who traveled in the United States,
1828–30, and employed La Barge to convey him on his journeys in the
vicinity of St. Louis and as far east as Vincennes, Ind. He was very
anxious to adopt the young child, Joseph La Barge, and take him to
England and educate him, but the parents would not consent.
[3] For a history of this exciting affair see “The American Fur Trade
of the Far West,” p. 267.
[4] The expeditions of General W. H. Ashley to the Rocky Mountains in
quest of beaver fur were very celebrated in those days. They occurred
in the years 1822–26.
[5] The data for the sketch here given of the ancestry of the La Barge
family are mainly derived from letters by Dr. Philemon Laberge, Sheriff
of the district of Beauharnois, Quebec, to Captain La Barge. Dr.
Laberge had chanced to come across a copy of the St. Louis _Republic_
of January 9, 1898, in which there were a biographical sketch and
photograph of Captain La Barge. Knowing that there was but one family
of the name in America, he set about to trace the relationship, and
presently sent to Captain La Barge a complete genealogical table of the
family from Robert Laberge down.
The data relating to the maternal line are gleaned from Scharff’s
“History of St. Louis.”
[6] The following tradition concerning the Lafayette visit is taken
from the obituary sketch of Captain La Barge in one of the St. Louis
papers:
“When General Lafayette visited the city in 1825 the populace turned
out to greet him. He was a French nobleman and an American patriot--two
distinctions that entitled him to the greatest courtesy. The children
of the town had gathered to welcome his coming. When he was driven
away hundreds paid homage by following the route of his carriage. To
follow was not enough for Joe La Barge. He broke from the crowd and
ran to the carriage in which Lafayette rode. Jumping upon the rear
axle, he remained there a considerable time. The crowd was horrified,
but Lafayette was too great a man to be thus wounded. Gently stroking
the lad on the head, he asked his name. The boy responded: ‘La Barge.’
‘Ah,’ said the General, ‘then we are both Frenchmen, and the only
difference is in the ending of our names.’”
[7] The term _engagé_ was applied to the common hands who did the
ordinary work of the fur trade. The term _bourgeois_ was used to
designate the person in charge of a trading post.
[8] “Captain Pratt of the _Assiniboine_ reports that he met the
_Yellowstone_ at the mouth of the Kansas River, having lost her
best pilot from the cholera, and four or five men in the space of
twenty-four hours. I fear that, in this situation, she will not be able
to continue her voyage.”--_Pierre Chouteau, Jr., to John Jacob Astor,
July 12, 1833._
[9] See account of American and Rocky Mountain Fur Companies, in
“American Fur Trade of the Far West.”
[10] This man had a long and honorable career in the West. As late as
1859–60 he was in the service of the government as interpreter on the
expedition of Captain W. F. Reynolds, Corps of Engineers, U. S. A.
[11] A curious illustration of the great changes which have taken place
along the Missouri Valley occurred a few years ago. In 1896 a farmer
was digging a well near the mouth of Grand River, Mo., several miles
from the present channel of the Missouri. A Bible was found in the
excavation, and on its cover was the name _Naomi_. The book was sent
to Captain La Barge to see if he could suggest any explanation of its
presence where it was found. The Captain recalled perfectly the fact
that the steamer _Naomi_ was wrecked at that precise spot fifty-six
years before. In those days the missionaries always left Bibles on
board the various boats, attached by chains to the tables or other
parts of the cabin, and lettered with the names of the boats to which
they belonged.
[12] The first _Yellowstone_, built in the winter of 1830–31, is a good
example of the original river boat. It was 130 feet long, 19 feet beam,
6 feet hold: beautiful model; side wheels; single engine; flywheel;
cabin aft of shaft; ladies’ cabin in stern hold; boiler decks open;
no hurricane roof; pilot-house elevated; two smokestacks; one rudder;
6-foot wheel bucket; 18-foot wheel; stages aft; draft, light, 4½ feet;
loaded to 75 tons, 5½ feet.
In the river boats the main or forecastle deck was the first above
the water, and the one covering the hold; the boiler deck was the
second one, just over the boilers, covered by the hurricane roof; the
hurricane deck was the third deck. Upon this were situated the texas
and the pilot-house.
[13] A noted steamboat that ran on the lower river during a portion
of the fifties was the _Felix X. Aubrey_. Between the smokestacks was
the figure of a man riding at full speed on horseback. The reference
was to a horseback ride, very celebrated in its day, from Santa Fe
to Westport, where Kansas City now stands. In the year 1853 Felix X.
Aubrey made this ride in five days and thirteen hours. The distance was
775 miles.
[14] “Of all the variable things in creation the most uncertain are the
action of a jury, the state of woman’s mind, and the condition of the
Missouri River.”--_Sioux City Register_, March 28, 1868.
[15] As an example of primitive lighthouse or fog-signal work, the
story is told of a steamboat captain who always made a certain crossing
on the lower river, if at night, by the aid of the bark of a dog
belonging to a farmhouse directly in line with the course of the boat.
The dog came out on the bank whenever boats were approaching, and
saluted them vigorously until they had passed. The captain ran by this
bark with the most implicit confidence. But unhappily the dog _did_
change his position--once--and the captain ran by its bark no more, for
the next morning his own bark was a hopeless wreck upon a neighboring
sandbar.
[16] About 1856 this matter was made the subject of military
investigation under General Harney.
[17] The practicability of commercial steamboating on the Missouri
River had begun to be recognized about 1829. In the summer of that year
the _W. D. Duncan_ commenced a regular packet trade to Fort Leavenworth.
[18] Kenneth McKenzie, the ablest trader the American Fur Company
produced, was at this time in charge of Fort Union, at the mouth of
the Yellowstone, and of all the company’s operations in the tributary
country along the upper rivers.
[19] This affords a glimpse at the crafty and oppressive methods of
the company, which bore with intolerable hardship upon its employees.
To pay wages in merchandise at an advance of three or four hundred
per cent. upon their cost was a great saving to the company, but an
unqualified fraud upon its servants.
[20] Fort McKenzie was six miles above the mouth of the Marias River;
Fort Union was three miles above the mouth of the Yellowstone: and Fort
Clark was about fifty-six miles above the modern Bismarck, N. D.
[21] Log of steamboat _Omega_, May 10, 1843: “Nous venons très bien
jusqu’aux cotes à Hart où, à sept heures, nous sommes sommés par un
officier de dragoons de mettre à terre. Je reçois une note polie du
Capitaine Burgwin m’informant que son devoir l’oblige de faire visiter
le bâteau. Aussitôt nous nous mettons à l’ouvrage, et pendant ce temps
M. Audubon va faire une visite au Capitaine. Ils reviennent ensemble
deux heures après. Je force en quelque sorte l’officier à faire un
recherche aussi stricte que possible, mais à la condition qu’il en sera
de même avec les autres traiteurs.”
[22] The above description of this inspection is from “The American Fur
Trade of the Far West,” by the present author.
[23] Captain Sire, in the logbook of the _Nimrod_, Friday, May 10,
1844, says: “Il s’est passé encore longtemps avant que Messieurs les
agents faisaient leur visite. Tout se trouvait satisfaisante. J’ai
décidé de ne partir que demain matin, et pour cause.--May 11. Nous nous
mettons en route avant le jour.”
[24] It appears that the company’s bond was to have been put in suit;
but the United States Attorney would not bring the case to trial unless
he could get La Barge as a witness. When La Barge got back to St. Louis
Sarpy came on board and told him to make himself scarce immediately.
The Captain hastened to St. Charles and took service on the _Iatan_,
where he remained until the storm had blown over. The case was finally
compromised through the influence of Thomas H. Benton.
[25] While detained at the Omaha villages the crew had cut and piled
about fifty cords of wood.
[26] The original journal is silent about this affair, but the facts
were suppressed, says Captain La Barge, by clerk Finch, of the American
Fur Company, in order not to expose the questionable conduct of
Campbell and Matlock in regard to the annuities. La Barge himself wrote
the following marginal note opposite the entry for June 9: “The Indians
fired on the boat while we were lying there and killed Charles Smith,
deckhand.”
[27] _The Republican_, March 19, 1849, in an editorial notice of the
event, thus referred to Captain La Barge: “There is no Captain on the
Western waters more highly esteemed than Captain La Barge. He is a St.
Louisan born, and has been familiar with the river from early life.”
[28] This island took its name from the fact that it was a famous
dueling ground. Its history in this connection dates from the past
century, but its fame rests upon a few celebrated contests, among which
the following may be noted: Thomas H. Benton and Charles Lucas fought
here twice, on August 12 and September 27, 1817. In the last encounter
Benton killed his antagonist. Joshua Barton, brother of the first U.
S. Senator from Missouri, and Thomas C. Rector fought here June 30,
1823, and Barton was killed. The most celebrated duel of all took place
August 27, 1831, between Major Thomas Biddle, Paymaster U. S. A., and
Congressman Spencer Pettis of St. Louis. Both principals were killed.
Another duel occurred in which one of the principals, B. Gratz Brown,
editor of the _Democrat_, received a wound in the knee. When dueling
fell into disuse the island became a noted resort for prize-fighters.
Overlooking the island stood a large cottonwood tree, near which these
duels were fought. It was certainly more than two hundred years old,
and it fell from old age, July 18, 1897.
[29] The City of St. Louis passed an ordinance at this time that
vessels should be moored with iron cables, and it placed permanent
rings in the levee for that purpose, so that boats could not be cut
loose in case of fire.
[30] The Aricara language is related to that of the Pawnees, which La
Barge, as we have seen, had learned in his first years in the Indian
country.
[31] La Barge Avenue, St. Louis, extending from Union Avenue west to
the city limits, was in part given by Captain La Barge and recorded in
his name. A later generation, with an amazing indifference to the work
of one of the most noted characters in the history of the city, has
changed the name to “Maple Avenue.”
[32] One of the medical officers accompanying the troops, and possibly
the surgeon in this case, was Dr. George L. Miller of Omaha, Neb.,
who had early established himself in the West to seek his fortune
there, and afterward became one of Nebraska’s most eminent citizens
and well known throughout the country. He had gone up with the troops
for temporary service because they had no regular surgeon. Dr. Miller
returned to Omaha on the _St. Mary_, and many years later prepared
an account of his personal experiences on the trip. His reference to
Captain La Barge is interesting in this connection. He described him as
“a short, stout, alert, and energetic man, with the eye of an eagle,
which had been trained by twenty years’ service as a student of the
mysterious and muddy waters of the Missouri.” A few years before these
reminiscences were written by Dr. Miller, Captain La Barge’s brother
John died, and Dr. Miller had mistakenly understood it to be his old
river friend of 1855. The event called forth this further reference to
the Captain: “The death of Joe La Barge, the brown-faced and black-eyed
pilot, two or three years ago, caused a pang of regret in the hearts of
tens of thousands who dwell along the valley of the great river, and
who knew and admired him both in character and calling.”
[33] For a vivid picture of those early steamboat days, see
_Everybody’s Magazine_, October, 1892.
[34] “Captain John La Barge, one of the oldest and best steam boat men
on the river, takes command of the _Chippewa_, and if the trip to Fort
Benton can be made, he will make it!”--_Sioux City Eagle_, July 23,
1859.
[35] For a complete record of this event, see letter from Alfred
Vaughn, Indian Agent for the Blackfeet--Report Commissioner of Indian
Affairs for 1859.
[36] The _Tom Stevens_ is said to have gone to the mouth of Portage
creek, within five miles of the Great Falls the same year, and one
authority states that the _Gallatin_, either in 1866 or 1867, went
nearer to the Falls than any other boat before or since. The exact
point is not stated.
[37] The Blackfeet nation, as understood by the early traders and
trappers, comprised four bands--the Piegans, the Bloods, the Blackfeet,
and the Grosventres of the Prairies. Only the first three were really
Blackfeet. The tribal affinity of the Grosventres was with the
Arapahoes. In some way these two tribes had become widely separated,
the Arapahoes going far to the south, and the Grosventres to the
country of the Blackfeet. So far did the Grosventres adopt the language
and customs of the Blackfeet that they were ordinarily considered in
early times as a part of that tribe and were commonly referred to as
Blackfeet. They were relentlessly hostile to the whites during the
first twenty-five years after Lewis and Clark passed through their
country. Next to them in point of hostility came the Blood Indians. The
Piegans were the most favorably disposed of any of the Blackfeet tribes
and were also the best beaver hunters, and it was with this band that
trade relations were first opened.
[38] There has been a good deal of confusion about this date, and it
cannot yet be considered as definitely settled. The weight of authority
is as given above. Chardon had other difficulties with the Indians
which may have been confused with this affair. Thus the journal of one
of the inmates of the Blackfoot post (whether Fort McKenzie or Fort
Chardon is uncertain) says: “February 19, 1844. Fight with the north
Blackfeet, in which we killed six and wounded several others; took
two children prisoners. The fruits of our victory were four scalps,
twenty-two horses, 350 robes, and guns, bows, and arrows, etc.” This
answers very closely to the description of the “Blackfoot Massacre” at
Fort McKenzie. If it is the same, the founding of Fort Chardon was in
1844 instead of 1843.
[39] In 1864 Malcolm Clark shot and instantly killed Owen McKenzie,
son of Kenneth McKenzie. The affair took place on the _Nellie Rogers_,
American Fur Company boat, near the mouth of Milk River. McKenzie and
Clark had some standing cause of dispute between them, and Clark shot
his opponent while the latter was in a state of intoxication. The
family of Clark have tried to screen his name from any blame in this
affair, and have claimed that the deed was done in self-defense. On the
river it was everywhere considered at the time a cold-blooded murder.
[40] By W. W. DeLacy, a civil engineer of high reputation, and closely
identified with the early history of Montana.
[41] June 11, 1866, there were seven steamboats at one time at the
levee of Fort Benton.
[42] In this sketch of Fort Benton I have drawn somewhat, for the
period after 1843, from the notes of Lieutenant James H. Bradley, as
published in vol. iii. Proceedings Mont. Hist. Soc. The notes were
taken by dictation from Alexander Culbertson. Unfortunately, as in
most cases of personal narrative, this one abounds in errors, and is
controlled throughout by the desire of the narrator to magnify his own
importance in the events he describes. The notes possess, however,
great intrinsic value, and are an important contribution to the history
of the West. Their preservation is due to the zealous forethought of
an army officer who recognized the importance of collecting original
data on the history of the West before its principal actors should have
passed away. He did not live to prepare these notes for publication
himself. They found their way to the Montana Historical Society, which,
with the intelligent zeal that has always characterized that body, has
given them to the public in a well-gotten-up volume of the society’s
proceedings.
Lieutenant James H. Bradley was born in Sandusky, O., May 25, 1844;
enlisted as a private in the 14th Ohio Volunteers, April, 1861;
re-enlisted in the 45th Ohio Volunteers, June, 1862; mustered out as
Sergeant, July, 1865; appointed Second Lieutenant 18th U. S. Infantry,
February 23, 1866; promoted to First Lieutenant, July 9, 1866,
transferred to 7th Infantry, November 28, 1871; killed in the Battle of
the Big Hole by the Nez Percé Indians, August 9, 1877.
[43] “Hon. Abe Lincoln, and the Secretary of State for Illinois, Hon.
O. M. Hatch, arrived in our city last evening, and are stopping at the
Pacific House. The distinguished ‘sucker’ has yielded to the earnest
importunities of our citizens,--without distinction of party,--and
will speak upon the political issues of the day, at Concert Hall, this
evening. The celebrity of the speaker will most certainly insure him a
full house. Go and hear ‘Old Abe.’”--_From the Council Bluffs “Weekly
Nonpareil,” Saturday Morning, August 13, 1859._
The reports upon this speech in the Republican and Democratic papers of
the town were as follows:
From the _Nonpareil_, August 20, 1859:
“ABE LINCOLN.
“This distinguished gentleman addressed a very large audience
of ladies and gentlemen at Concert Hall in this city, Saturday
evening. The clear and lucid manner in which he set forth
the true principles of the Republican party--the dexterity
with which he applied the political scalpel to the Democratic
carcass--beggars all description at our hands. Suffice it, that
the speaker fully and fairly sustained the great reputation he
acquired in the memorable Illinois campaign as a man of great
intellectual power--a close and sound reasoner.”
From the _Weekly Bugle_, August 17, 1859:
“ABE LINCOLN ON THE SLOPE.
“The people of this city were edified last Saturday evening
by a speech from Honorable Abe Lincoln. He apologized very
handsomely for appearing before an Iowa audience during a
campaign in which he was not interested. He then, with many
excuses and a lengthy explanation, as if conscious of the
nauseous nature of the black Republican nostrum, announced his
intention to speak about the ‘eternal negro,’ to use his own
language, and entered into a lengthy and ingenious analysis
of the nigger question, impressing upon his hearers that it
was the only question to be agitated until finally settled. He
carefully avoided going directly to the extreme ground occupied
by him in his canvass against Douglas, yet the doctrines
which he preached, carried out to their legitimate results,
amount to precisely the same thing. He was decidedly opposed
to any fusion or coalition of the Republican party with the
opposition of the South, and clearly proved the correctness
of his ground, in point of policy. They must retain their
sectional organization and sectional character, and continue
to wage their sectional warfare by slavery agitation; but if
the opposition South would accede to their view and adopt
their doctrines, he was willing to run for President in 1860,
a Southern man with Northern principles, or in other words,
with abolition proclivities. His speech was of the character
of an exhortation to the Republican party, but was in reality
as good a speech as could have been made for the interest of
the Democracy. He was listened to with much attention, for his
Waterloo defeat by Douglas has magnified him into quite a lion
here.”
Transcriber’s Notes
Old English lettering on the pages preceding the Table of Contents
is represented here within =equals signs=.
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.
Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs
and outside quotations. In versions of this eBook that support
hyperlinks, the page references in the List of Illustrations lead to
the corresponding illustrations.
Running page headers are shown here as Sidenotes, usually positioned
just above the paragraph they summarize. When such Sidenotes summarize
footnotes, they are positioned above the paragraphs that referenced
those footnotes.
This is Volume I of a two-volume set. The Index for both volumes is
at the end of Volume II, and that volume also is available at
LibraryBlog.
Page 196: “drouth” (drought) was printed that way, and in use in the
1800s.
Page 206: “5 1-2 o’clock” was printed that way.
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