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Title: History of Early Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River, Volume II (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 II (OF 2) ***
IV
AMERICAN EXPLORERS SERIES
=Early Steamboating on Missouri River=
_VOL. II._
[Illustration: KENNETT MCKENZIE]
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. II.
NEW YORK
FRANCIS P. HARPER
1903
COPYRIGHT, 1903,
BY
FRANCIS P. HARPER.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
CHAPTER XXI.
THE CIVIL WAR, 249
CHAPTER XXII.
GOLD IN MONTANA, 265
CHAPTER XXIII.
INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1862–67), 277
CHAPTER XXIV.
LA BARGE AGAIN IN OPPOSITION, 287
CHAPTER XXV.
VOYAGE OF 1863--THE TOBACCO GARDEN MASSACRE, 298
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE BLACKFOOT ANNUITIES, 315
CHAPTER XXVII.
COLLAPSE OF THE LA BARGE-HARKNESS OPPOSITION, 324
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CAPTAIN LA BARGE IN MONTANA, 331
CHAPTER XXIX.
CAPTAIN LA BARGE IN WASHINGTON, 340
CHAPTER XXX.
THE INDIAN OF THE MISSOURI VALLEY, 351
CHAPTER XXXI.
THE ARMY ON THE MISSOURI, 365
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE STEAMBOAT IN THE INDIAN WARS, 382
CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE PEACE COMMISSION OF 1856, 394
CHAPTER XXXIV.
THE MURDER OF CAPTAIN SPEAR, 408
CHAPTER XXXV.
THE BATTLE WITH THE RAILROADS, 417
CHAPTER XXXVI.
LAST VOYAGES TO BENTON, 425
CHAPTER XXXVII.
DECLINING YEARS, 438
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
DESTINY OF THE MISSOURI RIVER, 445
INDEX, 449
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
_VOL. II._
KENNETH MCKENZIE, _Frontispiece_
_Facing page_
LA BARGE ROCK, 299
A STEAMBOAT AT THE BANK, 331
REMOVING SNAGS FROM THE MISSOURI, 421
“IMPROVING” THE MISSOURI RIVER, 424
STEAMBOAT WRECK ON THE MISSOURI RIVER, 439
HISTORY OF
EARLY STEAMBOAT NAVIGATION
ON THE MISSOURI RIVER
CHAPTER XXI.
THE CIVIL WAR.
In a great many ways the War of the Rebellion affected the commerce
of the Missouri River. Missouri was a slave State, and most of her
citizens along the river were Southern sympathizers. It is stated that
all the Missouri River pilots except two were in sympathy with the
South, and that General Lyon had to go to the Illinois River for pilots
when he wanted to move his troops up the river in June, 1861.
The steamboat business on the river felt the weight of the war almost
immediately upon its breaking out. Most of the business was with the
loyal people and was, of course, considered by the Confederates as
a legitimate subject of confiscation. Guerrilla bands infested the
country along the river, fired into the boats, and did all they could
to break up the business. They succeeded in driving most of the
traffic off the lower river; but at the same time the demands of the
war stimulated the trade higher up. There was an increased movement of
government troops and stores, and in the later years of the war many
refugees from both armies passed up the river to the mountains. The
discovery of gold in Montana added greatly to the river commerce during
these years. The injurious effects of the war, therefore, were mainly
confined to the river below Kansas City.
[Sidenote: GUERRILLAS IN MISSOURI.]
The peril to navigation due to the operations of the guerrillas was
a formidable one. Wherever the channel ran close to the high wooded
banks or other sheltered localities, ambush and attack could always
be expected. The danger was mainly from the south bank. It became
necessary to tie up at night away from this bank, and Captain La Barge
followed the practice of anchoring in mid-stream. The pilot-houses
were regularly equipped with shields of boiler iron, semi-cylindrical
in form, inclosing the wheel, and capable of being moved so as to be
adjusted to the changing course of the vessel. These shields were of
great service on the upper river also, for the Indians at this time
were as dangerous in that section as were the guerrillas farther down.
Occasionally, when there was much government freight aboard, troops
were sent up on the boat until Kansas City was passed.
The passions aroused by this internecine strife deadened human
kindness, and made men as ferocious and brutal as wild beasts. This was
particularly true of the lawless bands of guerrillas whose desultory
operations have been in all wars the most cruel and most difficult to
suppress or control. Brigadier General Loan, of the Missouri State
Militia, in reporting the tragedy which we shall next relate, said:
“The guerrillas and Rebel sympathizers are waging a relentless, cruel,
and bloody war upon our unarmed and defenseless citizens, and are
determined to continue it until the last loyal citizen is murdered, or
driven from the State for fear of being murdered.” Such was the true
situation along the south bank of the Missouri River, and it was only
by the most vigilant precaution on the part of the steamboat men that
they did not suffer more than they did. We shall relate one instance in
which these precautions did not avail.
[Sidenote: AFFAIR OF THE “SAM GATY.”]
In the latter part of March, 1863, the steamboat _Sam Gaty_ was on her
way up the Missouri with a heavy load of freight and passengers, bound
for the far upper river. There were on board several persons of wealth
on their way to the newly discovered gold fields of Montana. There
were besides quite a number of paroled Union soldiers and some forty
contrabands, as the negroes freed by the war were called. While passing
under a high wooded bank near Sibley, Mo., the boat was attacked by a
band of guerrillas under the leadership of one Hicks, who had for some
time been the terror of the surrounding country. The boat was ordered
to come to the bank and promptly obeyed, whereupon the guerrillas
immediately boarded her. The attack was unexpected, and the passengers
were seated around the cabin engaged in games and conversation when
the appalling fact of their situation dawned upon them. A rush was
made to conceal valuable property, and the paroled soldiers made haste
to get into citizens’ clothes. The poor negroes could do nothing. The
guerrillas made quick and heartless work. They robbed the passengers of
all the valuables to be found on their persons, and one man narrowly
escaped summary death for attempting to slip his gold watch into his
boot. All the property on board that seemed to be of any use to the
government was thrown into the river. The safes were broken open and
robbed. Some of the paroled soldiers were taken off the boat and shot.
All of the contrabands were driven ashore, where they were shot down
in cold blood. Their shrieks and cries were plainly heard on the boat.
After this attack the boat was allowed to proceed.
[Sidenote: AN ATROCIOUS CRIME.]
Vengeance followed quickly in the wake of this atrocious crime. A
body of Kansas troops under a Major Ransom pursued and overtook the
guerrillas, attacked and destroyed their camp, took twenty-one horses,
killed seventeen men in combat and hanged two, and completely dispersed
the organization.[44]
[Sidenote: A UNION MAN]
Captain La Barge had his full share of troublesome experiences that
followed the outbreak of the war. As a slave-owner in a small way,
and as a man born and bred in the old ante-bellum atmosphere that
surrounded the institution of slavery, his natural sympathies were with
the South. But when it came to a decision he did not hesitate a moment.
As between union and disunion he was for union. It required a degree
of self-denial and patriotism which many Northerners have never fully
appreciated to stand by the country when one’s training and natural
sympathies would have led him to the other side. Captain La Barge
remained a Union man, took the oath of allegiance, and throughout the
war rendered constant service to the government. He soon came to see
the wisdom of his decision, and before the war was over his sympathies
had swung into full line with his action.
[Sidenote: THE GALLOWS CHEATED.]
In 1861 Captain La Barge was coming down the river on the _Emilie_ from
Omaha, and, as usual, stopped at St. Joseph for freight and passengers.
A good many people got on board, most of them Southern sympathizers
going south. When the boat rounded out into the stream the passengers
went up on deck and cheered for Jefferson Davis. The news of this
event was telegraphed to Colonel R. D. Anthony of Leavenworth[45].
This distinguished agitator and ardent Union man called a meeting of
the citizens, and it was decided to hang La Barge the moment the boat
arrived. The Captain had a stanch friend in Leavenworth of the name of
Alexander Majors, of the firm of Russell, Majors & Waddell, overland
freighters. He was waiting to take passage to his home in Lexington,
Mo. When the boat approached there was a great crowd on the levee.
The instant the prow touched the bank Majors leaped on board and told
the Captain not to make fast, as the crowd proposed to hang him. The
Captain asked the clerk what business they had for Leavenworth. He
replied that there were only a few bills to collect. “Let them go for
now,” said the Captain, and tapping the bell to depart, drew back
into the stream. When the crowd saw that they were outwitted, they
swung their rope into the air and yelled that they would get him at
Wyandotte. “All right,” replied the Captain, “I expect to stop there,”
but when he reached that place he kept right on.
[Sidenote: SERVING UNDER DURESS.]
[Sidenote: AN UNPLEASANT DILEMMA.]
On one of the down trips in the season of 1861 the _Emilie_ arrived at
Boonville just as the Confederates were evacuating that place upon the
approach of the Federals under General Lyon. La Barge knew nothing of
what was transpiring there, and his first intimation of any unusual
state of things was a volley of cannon shot whistling over the boat.
The Captain signaled that he would halt, and rounded to above the
town. The Confederate General Marmaduke came on board and with him
Captain Kelly and a company of troops. “I knew Marmaduke well,” said La
Barge, “and asked him as soon as he got on board what the matter was.
He replied, ‘I want you to turn around and take General Price up to
Lexington. He is sick and cannot stand the overland ride.’ I replied
that I could not think of such a thing; that I was in the service of
the government. He then took possession of the boat, placed me in
arrest, and forced me to take the boat back to Lexington. I protested
again, saying that the crew would look to me for pay for this extra
work, and the government would hold me responsible for failure to
fulfill my contract. Marmaduke replied, ‘I will pay you every cent you
have to disburse on account of this trip.’ After Price came on board
Marmaduke left, and we then steamed up to Lexington, where the boat
was turned over to me and I was told to shift for myself. I suppose
they thought I ought to consider myself fortunate to get off at all.
They never paid me anything, although they might easily have done so,
for the first thing done upon landing at Lexington, as I was told, was
to sack all the banks of that town. As to my getting away, that was far
from being a matter of much satisfaction. It was, of course, known in
the Federal lines that I had carried Price up the river. How should I
answer for myself upon my return? I went to Price, told him the dilemma
I was placed in, and asked him to help me. He gave me a very strong
letter, stating that I had acted under duress, and had been forced to
go back against my repeated protest.
[Sidenote: GENERAL LYON.]
[Sidenote: LA BARGE RELEASED.]
“It was with no slight misgivings that I turned the _Emilie_ downstream
and started in the direction of Boonville. I knew that there was
trouble in store for me. When I approached the Federal lines a volley
was fired at the boat, apparently with the definite purpose of hitting
her. I promptly rounded to and the firing ceased. A young Lieutenant by
the name of White came on board with a guard of a dozen men to arrest
me. I had known White in St. Louis as a commission clerk, a young man
of no account, but who, having now some authority, felt disposed, like
all inferior men, to exercise it with a severity in inverse proportion
to his ability. He doubtless thought it a great feather in his cap to
have as prisoner a man who would scarcely have deigned to notice him
in any other situation. He was insolent and arbitrary, and lunging his
sword toward me, would order me to walk faster. I was taken to General
Lyon’s quarters, and when in that officer’s presence, he said to me:
‘You are in a very bad scrape here, sir.’ I took Price’s letter from
my pocket and handed it to him, saying, ‘General, please read that; it
may help to straighten matters out.’ He read the letter, but pretended
not to think much of it. After hemming and hawing over the matter for a
while he said: ‘Do you know anyone here who can tell me who you are?’
He knew very well who I was, for he had been with Harney in the Sioux
War of 1854–55 and we had met then. I asked him to name the members of
his staff, and I could tell. He finally mentioned Frank Blair. I said
with some irony, ‘I know Frank Blair very well, and I think _he_ knows
me.’ We then walked up to Blair’s quarters. He shook hands cordially
and said, ‘I understand that you are in a bad fix here.’ ‘It looks like
it,’ I replied. ‘Rather be at home than here, I presume,’ he continued
jokingly. ‘Much rather,’ I replied. Lyon showed Blair Price’s letter.
They consulted together for a little while and Lyon then said to
me, ‘You can take possession of your steamboat and go home.’ I found
the boat in Lyon’s fleet where it had been taken, and all of her
provisions confiscated. I was not long in getting up steam, and left
the inhospitable region with the utmost expedition.
“I did not like Lyon. He was a Yankee, and his disposition seemed to be
to crush everyone who did not think as he did. His language and bearing
toward me were so insolent and exasperating that they left a lasting
rancor in my mind.[46]
“This affair cost me about five thousand dollars, although I was
partially reimbursed for the stores taken. I did not go up the river
again that season, being too much vexed and disgusted with my late
experience. I sent the boat up under charge of a man of the name of
Nick Wall, who ran her until my government contracts were completed.”
In the year 1862 Captain La Barge was again impressed temporarily
into the service of guerrillas. On October 16 of that year a body of
Confederates was at Portland, Mo., when the steamboat _Emilie_ came
along. The _Emilie_ stopped to put two men ashore, when a gang of
Rebels concealed behind a woodpile took possession of the boat and
compelled Captain La Barge to set them across the river. He was forced
to unload his deck freight and take on 175 horses and as many men.
Scarcely had they started across when a force of Union cavalry of the
Missouri State Militia arrived, but not in time to arrest the operation.
These were the only occasions on which Captain La Barge had trouble on
the river on account of the War. Like all other boatmen, he welcomed
the close of this conflict and the tranquillity which it brought to the
river business.
[Sidenote: UNITED STATES VOLUNTEERS.]
[Sidenote: A NOTABLE CHARACTER.]
There was an organization in the military establishment of the United
States, growing out of the progress of the war, of which very little
is known. It was called the United States Volunteers, and consisted
of six regiments and one independent company. It was composed chiefly
of deserters from the Confederate army and prisoners of war who had
taken the oath of allegiance to the United States. These troops served
continuously on the Western plains and in the Northwest, except the
1st and 4th regiments, which served mainly at Norfolk, Va. On the
Missouri River, and perhaps elsewhere, they were commonly spoken of as
“Galvanized Yankees.” In 1864, when Fort Rice was established near the
mouth of the Cannon Ball River, it was garrisoned by the 1st Regiment
of U. S. Volunteers under Colonel Charles A. R. Dimon. This officer was
one of the remarkable characters of Missouri River history, and made a
great impression along the valley, considering his brief service there.
He was the particular bugbear of the traders, and the character which
they have given him can be best expressed by spelling his name with an
“e” in the first syllable. It was said that he ordered his men shot
down on the least provocation, and that many of the regiment were slain
in this way. Numbers of his men are said to have deserted through fear
of his tyrannical and ungovernable temper. One of the traders has left
a record of his own special grievance.
[Sidenote: DRASTIC MEASURES.]
In the winter of 1864–65, as already stated, the American Fur Company
sold out to the Northwestern Fur Company, more commonly known as the
firm of Hawley & Hubbell. In the following spring these two gentlemen
went up the river with Mr. C. P. Chouteau on the American Fur Company
boat, the _Yellowstone_, to make the transfer of the posts and
property. There were many passengers of different political creeds on
board, including a number of ex-Confederates. At a point about one
hundred miles above Fort Sully news of Lincoln’s assassination was
received, and the passengers of all shades of opinion expressed their
horror of the event. When the boat arrived at Fort Rice, Colonel Dimon,
according to this authority, came down to the boat with a large guard
of soldiers and placed the whole party under arrest on the charge of
jubilating over the assassination of the President. The traders thought
the whole proceeding was a scheme of Colonel Dimon to advertise his
intense loyalty. He told Chouteau, whose Southern proclivities were
well understood along the river, that he would take him out on the
bank and shoot him like a dog. Chouteau was thoroughly frightened and
trembled like a leaf, for there was no knowing what the impetuous
officer might take a notion to do.
Hubbell and Hawley determined to go down to Sioux City and report to
General Sully the detention of their boat and the conduct of Colonel
Dimon toward themselves and others. Chouteau gave them a yawl and
wrote a letter to the General. Dimon ordered them not to go without
first reporting to him. Although his authority to give such an order
is doubtful, the men did not dare to disobey for fear of being shot.
When they appeared they were required to submit all their letters to
his inspection. The particular letter he was after was one he believed
Chouteau had written, but Hubbell and Hawley had slipped it into the
breech of a Henry rifle and left it in the boat. Finally they were
permitted to go. They made a rapid trip, partly by river and partly
by land, and immediately reported their grievances to General Sully.
The General promptly gave them a written order to Colonel Dimon to
release their boat. Armed with this they returned to Fort Rice by the
steamer _G. W. Graham_, and in an incredibly short time, considering
the distance and mode of travel, appeared before Colonel Dimon. General
Sully’s order eased matters up somewhat, but still the traders had a
good deal of trouble with the irate post commander.
[Sidenote: FACT AND FICTION.]
How much there was in the stories about Colonel Dimon is doubtful, but
probably about an equal mixture of fact and fiction. Certainly the
view of the traders concerning him was not shared by General Sully, if
we judge from the following extracts from his own correspondence with
General Pope. Writing from Sioux City under date of June 10, 1865, he
says:
[Sidenote: GENERAL SULLY’S VIEWS.]
“I admire his energy and pluck, the determination with which he
carries out orders; but he is too young--too rash--for his position,
and it would be well if he could be removed. He is making a good
deal of trouble for me, and eventually for you, in his over-zealous
desire to do his duty.... His regiment was raised and organized by
Ben. Butler, and he is too much like him in his actions for an Indian
country, but he is just the sort of a man I would like to have under
me in the field.” Upon his arrival at Fort Rice a month later he thus
commented upon Colonel Dimon:
“I am much pleased with the appearance of this post and the way
military duty is performed. Colonel Dimon is certainly an excellent
officer. A few more years of experience to curb his impetuosity would
make him one of the best officers in our volunteer service.”
Pope in the meanwhile authorized Sully to take such action in regard
to Colonel Dimon as he saw fit. A board of officers was convened to
investigate complaints against him, and on the strength of their report
he was relieved July 21, 1865. He resumed command of the post, however,
October 10, 1865, but was mustered out of the service on the 27th of
the following month. He was subsequently brevetted Brigadier General of
Volunteers for gallant and meritorious service during the war.
[Sidenote: A FAIR PROBABILITY.]
Colonel Dimon probably showed an excess of severity toward the traders
where the average officer showed far too little. That explains their
chief ground of dislike of him. Add to this the “impetuosity” of
temperament referred to by General Sully, and we have a pretty close
analysis of a situation which caused a great flurry on the Missouri
River in its day. As a matter of fact a great many of the men in
the 1st Volunteers died at Fort Rice, but from disease, and not
by execution under Dimon’s order. A number of men did desert, and
seventeen of them walked all the way to Fort Union. One of these men
made a pen drawing of that post which is probably the most accurate now
in existence.
CHAPTER XXII.
GOLD IN MONTANA.
[Sidenote: FIRST GOLD IN MONTANA.]
If the Civil War operated to drive commerce from the lower Missouri
River, other forces were at work at the head waters of that stream
to multiply it many fold. At the time when the attention of the
nation and of the world was centered on the tempest that had burst
over the eastern portion of the Republic, a few hardy miners were
prospecting the country around the upper tributaries of the Missouri
in their ever-restless search for gold. It is a singular fact that
the gold-bearing regions of western Montana, the very first in the
mountain country to be extensively frequented by white men, should
have been the last to give up the secret of their hidden wealth. For
nearly twenty years emigration had been pouring into the West. The
Mormons had settled a few hundred miles to the south. Settlement had
gained a permanent foothold on the Pacific Coast from Mexico to the
British line. The Pike’s Peak gold discoveries were rapidly filling
up Colorado. The reflex wave of emigration was rolling back from the
Pacific Coast across the Sierras and the Cascades into Nevada, eastern
Oregon, and Idaho. But as yet there were no settlers to speak of in the
mountains of Montana, and that country was still practically unknown to
the general public. It is a remarkable fact that a section of country
in that neighborhood, which is now considered the most wonderful in the
world, was the very last of all the national domain to be discovered
and explored.
[Sidenote: FIRST SALE OF GOLD DUST.]
The wave of gold discovery in the Northwest moved from the west toward
the east. In 1860–61 it made known the rich deposits in Idaho on the
Salmon and Clearwater rivers. Next came the findings just west of the
Continental Divide, and then the rich discoveries on the head waters of
the Missouri. The existence of placer deposits within the limits of the
present State of Montana had been asserted as early as 1852. A Canadian
half-breed of the name of Beneetse is said to have found pay dirt in
that year on a small tributary of Deer Lodge River, one of the sources
of the Columbia. The stream has since been known as Gold Creek, and the
place of discovery is about fifty miles northwest of the modern city of
Butte. Four years later, 1856, the discovery was confirmed by a party
who were traveling from Great Salt Lake to the Bitter Root Valley. In
the same year a man turned up at Fort Benton with what he asserted
was golddust. He came from the mountains in the Southwest, most likely
from the Deer Lodge Valley. None of the people at the post were gold
experts, and they hesitated about receiving the dust; but Culbertson
finally took it on his own responsibility, giving for it a thousand
dollars’ worth of merchandise. Next year he sent it down the river, and
it was found to be pure gold, worth fifteen hundred dollars. This was
the first exchange of golddust in Montana.
The next step in the progress of discovery must be credited to James
and Granville Stuart, two of Montana’s most distinguished pioneers.
They had been spending the winter of 1857–58, with a number of other
people, in the valley of the Bighole River, a tributary of the
Missouri, and in the spring of 1858 went over to the Deer Lodge Valley
to investigate the reported findings on Gold Creek. They remained there
for a time and found paying prospects, but were so harassed by the
Blackfeet Indians that they were compelled to leave. They moved to a
safer locality, but here James Stuart met with an accident which came
near proving fatal, and the two brothers left the country and went to
Fort Bridger. Although they had made no great discovery, their report
was considered as confirming those already made of the existence of
gold in the Deer Lodge Valley.
Before these prospects were any further developed attention was wholly
diverted to the important discoveries in Idaho already referred to. A
great stampede to the Salmon and Clearwater rivers began. Emigrants
poured in both by way of Salt Lake and the Missouri River, and an even
larger inflow came from the Pacific Coast. But before the rush from the
East had gathered full force discoveries in Montana arrested its course
and held it permanently in a new and greater Eldorado.
[Sidenote: BEGINNING OF MINING IN MONTANA.]
In the winter of 1861–62 a considerable floating population, among them
the Stuart brothers, remained in the Deer Lodge Valley. The Stuarts
commenced sluicing in a systematic way on Gold Creek, and their work
was the beginning of the gold-mining industry in Montana. Although
nothing particularly remarkable was found, it was enough to attract
attention, and reports soon got abroad that the findings were very
rich. The greater part of the emigration from the East in the year 1862
was bound for the Idaho mines, but did not get beyond the Deer Lodge
Valley, or other points in western Montana. Among these parties was one
from Colorado, including J. M. Bozeman, for whom the town of Bozeman,
in the beautiful Gallatin Valley, is named. The newcomers made a rich
discovery on a branch of Gold Creek, which was named, from the place
whence the party came, Pike’s Peak Gulch.
[Sidenote: BANNOCK CITY.]
Another party from Colorado, bound for the Idaho mines, were deflected
north by the difficulty of getting through the Lemhi Mountains and
by favorable reports from the Deer Lodge Valley. Two of their number
discovered gold on Grasshopper Creek, in the southwestern corner of
the present State of Montana. They carried the news to the main party,
who had gone on to the Deer Lodge, and all returned to investigate
the discovery. The report of the two men was found to be true, and
prospecting in that part of the country was carried on extensively.
This work resulted in the finding of a very rich deposit by a party
under one White, for whom the spot was named White’s Bar. Here the
town of Bannock sprang up, and before the end of the year boasted a
population of five hundred souls. Other rich discoveries were made in
that vicinity, while far to the north the deposits on the Big Prickly
Pear Creek were found. It was now apparent that the whole country on
the head waters of the Missouri abounded in gold, and the work of
prospecting assumed enormous proportions.
[Sidenote: NORTHERN OVERLAND EXPEDITION.]
Two other important expeditions came from the East this season, bound
for the Idaho mines, but were stopped in their course, like that
from Colorado, by the new discoveries in Montana. One of these was
the firm of La Barge, Harkness & Co. of St. Louis, and the other was
a body of emigrants who accompanied what was known in its day as
the Northern Overland Expedition from St. Paul. This expedition was
of a semi-official character, under a Federal appropriation of five
thousand dollars, and its ostensible object was to open a wagon road
from St. Paul to Fort Benton. It was under the command of Captain James
L. Fisk, who, a private soldier in the 3d Minnesota Volunteers, was
appointed Captain and Quartermaster and placed in charge. About 125
emigrants accompanied the expedition. The journey was made in safety,
and was full of interesting happenings. It contributed one of the most
important additions ever made to population of the rising State.[47]
The spring of 1863 was marked by one of the most noted gold discoveries
ever made. During the previous winter a considerable party, under the
leadership of James Stuart, was organized at Bannock City, to explore
and prospect the country on the sources of the Yellowstone. A portion
of this party, including William Fairweather and Henry Edgar, went by
the way of Deer Lodge Valley to secure horses, having fixed on the
mouth of the Beaverhead River as the place of joining the main party.
Through some unavoidable delay the smaller party did not arrive on
time and Stuart went on without them. The Fairweather party discovered
Stuart’s trail and made forced marches to overtake him. The route
lay up the Gallatin Valley and across the divide to the Yellowstone,
and thence down the valley of that stream. Soon after reaching the
Yellowstone the smaller party were plundered by a band of Crows of
everything except their guns and mining tools. The Indians had the
generosity to give them in exchange for their mounts old broken-down
horses of their own.
[Sidenote: ALDER GULCH.]
The party gave up their pursuit of Stuart and started back for Bannock
City. On the 26th of May they stopped for noon on Alder Creek, a
little branch of one of the main tributaries of Jefferson Fork of the
Missouri. Here, as a result of a chance examination of a bar by two
men, Fairweather and Edgar, the famous Alder Gulch discovery was made,
and the richest placer deposit in the history of gold mining came to
the knowledge of the world. The news of this wonderful discovery drew
to the spot a large part of the population of the Territory, and the
town of Virginia City sprang up as if in a night. For several years it
was the principal town in the Territory and became its first capital.
In less than two years it had grown to a city of ten thousand souls.
[Sidenote: LAST CHANCE GULCH.]
The next important discovery was made in the fall of 1864, in what
was named at the time Last Chance Gulch. The deposits were very rich,
and the history of Alder Gulch was re-enacted here. The town which
arose on the spot was named Helena, and soon outgrew its sister to the
south. It became, and for many years remained, the principal town of
the Territory. In 1874 it was made the Territorial capital, and after
Montana was admitted to the Union, it was made the permanent capital of
the State.
Other discoveries followed those here mentioned, many of them rich and
of permanent value, but none equaling those of Alder and Last Chance
gulches. The Territory at once took rank with California and Colorado
as a gold-producing territory, and has held its high place ever since.
The mighty metamorphosis which, in the space of five years, came over
the country at the headwaters of the Missouri, produced an equally
marvelous change in the commercial business of that stream. The river
gave a sure highway for travel to within one hundred to two hundred
miles of the mines. There was no other route that could compete with
it, for this could carry freight from St. Louis to Fort Benton, in
cargoes of one to five hundred tons, without breaking bulk. The
emigrants themselves went in large numbers by overland routes, but a
great number also by the boats; while nearly all merchandise, including
every necessary of life, and all mining machinery and heavy freight,
came by the river.
[Sidenote: HIGH WATER MARK.]
[Sidenote: AN EXTRAORDINARY SCENE.]
The steamboat trade jumped suddenly to enormous proportions. Prior
to 1864 there had been only six steamboat arrivals at the levee of
Fort Benton. In 1866 and 1867 there were seventy arrivals. The trade
touched high-water mark in 1867, and at this time presented one of
the most extraordinary developments known to the history of commerce.
There were times when thirty or forty steamboats were on the river
between Fort Benton and the mouth of the Yellowstone,[48] where all
the way the river flowed amid scenes of wildness that were in the
strictest sense primeval. To one who could have been set down in the
unbroken wilderness along the banks of the river, where nothing dwelt
except wild animals and wilder men, where the fierce Indian made life
a constant peril, where no civilized habitation greeted the eye, it
would have seemed marvelous and wholly inexplicable to find this river
filled with noble craft, as beautiful as any that ever rode the ocean,
stored with all the necessaries of civilization, and crowded with
passengers as cultured, refined, and well dressed as the cabin list of
an ocean steamer. What could it all mean? Whence came this handful of
civilization and what brought it here? Certainly a most extraordinary
scene, flashed for a moment before the world and then withdrawn forever.
[Sidenote: PERILOUS VOYAGE.]
It was not the steamboat alone, however, that made up the romantic
history of Missouri navigation in these exciting times. There were
every year many men from the mines who wanted to return to the States
because they were weary of the country or wished to carry down the
crude wealth which they had secured. The steamboats came up only in the
spring, and if passengers were not ready to go down it was necessary
to seek other conveyance. The usual resource in such cases was the
mackinaw boat. It was a perfectly comfortable and very cheap mode of
traveling, with only one drawback--danger from the Indians, who, at
this time, were intensely hostile all along the river. It was regarded
as a sort of forlorn hope to go down in an open boat, and yet many
tried it every year. Generally they got through all right, with their
precious freight, but there were some terrible tragedies as the penalty
of such reckless daring.
Some statistics have survived showing the magnitude of the steamboat
business on the Missouri River during these years. In the year 1865,
1000 passengers, 6000 tons of merchandise, and 20 quartz mills went to
Fort Benton. In the year 1867 forty steamboats had passed Sioux City
before June 1 on their way up the river. They carried over 12,000 tons
of freight, most of it for Fort Benton. There was not much downstream
traffic, although all the boats carried golddust. In 1866 one boat,
the _Luella_, had on board $1,250,000 worth of dust.
[Sidenote: FABULOUS PROFITS.]
The profits of a successful voyage were enormous. The reported profits
for some of the trips of 1866 were as follows: The _St. John_, $17,000;
the _Tacony_, $16,000; the _W. J. Lewis_, $40,000; the _Peter Balen_,
$65,000. In 1867 Captain La Barge cleared over $40,000 on the trip of
the _Octavia_.
Freight rates from St. Louis to Fort Benton in 1866 were 12 cents per
pound. Insurance rates were 6 1-2 per cent. in the case of sidewheel
boats and 8 per cent with sternwheel boats. The fare for cabin
passengers was $300. It was not everyone, however, who had a share
in the high prices of those times. The master of the boat received
$200 per month; the clerk $150; the mate and engineer each $125. The
pilot was the only member of the crew who could command what salary he
pleased. So indispensable were his services that as high as $1200 per
month was paid for the best talent.
CHAPTER XXIII.
INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1862–67).
In the summer of 1863 a party of twenty-one men and three women went
down the Missouri in a mackinaw boat from Fort Benton. They reached the
vicinity of the mouth of Apple Creek, near where Bismarck, N. D., now
stands, just as the Sioux Indians, whom General Sibley was driving out
of Minnesota and across the country to the Missouri, arrived on the
banks of that stream. They had just been defeated in three engagements
with General Sibley and were in a very angry temper. They attacked the
boat and fought the little party an entire day, and finally killed
them all and sunk the boat. It was reported that the whites killed
ninety-one Indians in the fight, and that the captain of the boat,
whose name is supposed to have been Baker, “made such a brave defense
that the Indians were struck with admiration for him and wanted to save
him.” The boat had a large amount of golddust on board, and some of
it was recovered by the Mandan and Aricara Indians. An air of mystery
has always hung over this affair, and the details will probably never
be known. For some unexplained reason, certain individuals who were
believed to have had some knowledge of it refused to disclose anything.
[Sidenote: THE STOLEN MACKINAW.]
In 1864, while Captain La Barge was at Fort Benton, a number of miners
applied to him to purchase a mackinaw boat. He refused to sell because
he felt sure that it meant death to them to try to run the gantlet
of the Indians in that way. They replied that they were afraid to go
overland on account of road agents. The Captain told them they had less
to fear from road agents than from Indians. The road agents might take
their gold, but the Indians would spare neither treasure nor life.
They were unconvinced, however, and as the Captain would not sell the
boat, they stole it and set out. While passing a high cut bank, about
thirty miles below Fort Berthold, where the channel ran close to the
shore, they were attacked by a war party of Sioux and all killed.
Pierre Garreau, the well-known interpreter, went down from Berthold and
recovered a part of the golddust. La Barge saw some of it among the
Indians the following year.
In 1865 the steamer _St. Johns_, on her way down the river, was
attacked by the Indians and the mate instantly killed. The boat was
under full headway and out of reach before it was possible to return
fire.
[Sidenote: SOWING THE WIND.]
In the same year the _General Grant_ lost three men. They had been sent
ashore at a wooding place to make fast a line, when they were pounced
upon by the Indians and killed.
On April 23, 1865, a band of Blood Indians near Fort Benton stole
about forty horses belonging to a party of beaver-trappers, of whom
Charley Carson, a nephew of “Kit” Carson, was one. On the night of May
22 these men, having gotten on a drunken spree, attacked a small party
of Blood Indians who happened to be near Fort Benton, but were not
known to be the thieves, killed three, and threw their bodies into the
Missouri. The survivors fled toward the south and met a large band of
warriors near Sun River, on their way north. Exasperated at the outrage
upon their brethren, they were ready for any measure of revenge, and
accident soon threw the desired opportunity in their way.
[Sidenote: REAPING THE WHIRLWIND.]
At the mouth of the Marias River lay the steamboat _Cutter_. A town
site had been laid off at this point and named Ophir, and some timber
had been cut in the valley of the Marias for use in the erection of
buildings. The principal proprietor of the nascent village was a
passenger on the _Cutter_, and the business of that boat seems to have
been connected with the building of the town. On the afternoon of May
25, about half-past two o’clock, eight men left the boat with a wagon
and three yoke of oxen to bring down some of the timber, and an hour
later two men went on horseback to join them, for it was felt that
there might be trouble from the Indians, and that the party should be
as strong as possible. These men were all well armed. Their route lay
up the valley of the Marias along its right bank, which they ascended
about three miles. At this point the valley, which was quite broad
below, narrowed to a width of four hundred yards. There was a growth
of timber quite dense close to the river, but open farther back. Just
above this point the bluffs crowded close upon the river, seamed with
ravines and gullies, like all the river bluffs along the Missouri. The
roadway at the foot of these bluffs was very narrow.
Beyond this defile the valley opened out again, and there was another
belt of timber. In the upper opening the Indians seem to have been
in camp and to have been discovered by the wood-choppers just as the
latter were passing the defile. It was probably the same band which we
have noted as being near Sun River two days before. The wagons were
instantly turned about, although in a most disadvantageous situation.
The Indians saw the whites at about the same time. They were lying in
wait for another party with a mule train, and were intending, after
attacking it, to try to take the steamboat. As soon as they saw the
wood-choppers they at once attacked them and killed every man and
captured all the property. The bodies of the slain were found scattered
along the river, fifty to one hundred yards apart, except one, that of
N. W. Burroughs, which was found half a mile further downstream, where
he was overtaken on his flight to the boat. Of the Indians the head
chief and one other were killed and a third dangerously wounded. The
Indians, to the number of about two hundred, immediately moved toward
the British line.
[Sidenote: ENTIRE PARTY SLAIN.]
The attack occurred about four o’clock and the firing was distinctly
heard on the boat. A party prepared to go out and investigate when a
hunter came riding in from the bluffs, saying that the whites were
being assailed by a large party of Indians. Three scouts set out
immediately, and after proceeding about two miles and a half found the
body of Mr. Burroughs. It being certain that all the rest had been
killed, and not knowing where the Indians were, it was not thought best
to go farther at the time. Next morning a party went out with wagons
and brought in the bodies, all of which were found. They were buried
in one grave, side by side, with a head board giving the names and
date.[49]
[Sidenote: YANKEE JACK AGAIN.]
Captain La Barge arrived at the mouth of the Marias on the _Effie
Deans_ soon after this affair and saw the fresh graves. He remembered
the circumstance particularly, because, among the guard, which had been
stationed there after the massacre, was the identical “Yankee Jack” who
had whipped the two Irishmen on the _Robert Campbell_ in 1863.
About September, 1865, eight men left Fort Benton in a skiff for the
States. They were attacked by some forty Indians near the mouth of Milk
River and five of their number were killed. The fight lasted over five
hours. One of the men who was killed, T. A. Kent by name, is said to
have actually killed thirteen Indians before he himself fell.
In the year 1866 there were several noted open-boat voyages down the
river. One of these was made by a party of ten miners, who purchased
a mackinaw at Fort Benton in which to transport themselves and their
golddust. When in camp on an island about sixty miles above Fort
Randall, one of the men, of the name of Thompson, got up in the night,
took an ax, killed one companion and wounded another. He was apparently
bent on the destruction of the entire party. The rest of the men,
suddenly awakened by the cries of their comrades, and believing that
they were attacked by Indians, rushed to the boat with the wounded man
and made off, leaving the murderer and his victim alone on the island.
Whether robbery was the motive of the deed, or whether it was caused by
insanity, was never known.
More fortunate was another mackinaw party that went down the same
season. It consisted of seventeen men, and made the trip from Fort
Benton to Sioux City in twenty-two days. They brought down over two
hundred thousand dollars in golddust.
The third party of this season consisted of one man in a yawl and about
twenty others in a mackinaw. They made the entire trip without loss,
although they were attacked, some 225 miles below Benton, by about five
hundred Blackfeet. The river was in flood stage, and thanks to its
great width and swift current the boats were able to keep out of range
of the Indians and to pass quickly beyond their reach.
[Sidenote: HUBBELL’S MACKINAW.]
The most important mackinaw trip ever made down the river was in 1866
under the leadership of J. B. Hubbell of the firm of Hawley & Hubbell.
Hubbell had advertised that his steamboat would leave Fort Benton on
her second trip about September 15, promising, if she did not get to
Fort Benton, to take the passengers down in a mackinaw until they met
her. As late as October 20 she had not appeared, and accordingly about
thirty passengers started down in a mackinaw. The boat was a very
elaborate one, built for this particular trip. It was eighty feet long,
twelve feet beam, housed in on both sides by bulletproof walls for a
distance of fifty feet, with sleeping bunks along the sides, and open
spaces at bow and stern for managing the boat. Two masts rigged with
square sails were provided.
[Sidenote: A SUCCESSFUL VOYAGE.]
The boat was run until after dark every night and was started before
daylight in the morning. Wherever possible she was tied to a snag out
in the stream for the night so as to make it impossible for the Indians
to attack by surprise. When the party arrived at Fort Union they
learned that the steamer had been up, but had gone back. After some
deliberation it was decided to undertake the rest of the journey and
trust to luck not to be caught by the ice. Everyone took a hand at the
oars and rapid progress was made. Game was plentiful and the boat was
full of golddust, and in spite of the fear of ice and Indians the party
were in the best of spirits. They arrived at Sioux City November 22,
with the river running full of ice. Two days later and they would have
been frozen in. Mr. Hubbell received $175 per passenger.[50]
[Sidenote: THE LOST NEGRO BOYS.]
[Sidenote: INCREDIBLE ENDURANCE.]
A singular incident happened in the summer of 1867, growing out of
the wreck of one of the river boats. In July of that year the steamer
_Trover_ was wrecked at a point 240 miles below Fort Benton. The
_Ida Stockdale_ happened along about the time, took her freight and
passengers to Benton, and on the way back took off her machinery
and carried it to St. Louis. When she left the wreck there were two
colored boys asleep in the hold, and the boat went off without knowing
they were there. On waking up and finding themselves alone, without a
thing to eat or any means of defense, and surrounded by a wilderness
wholly unknown to them, they were completely paralyzed with fright;
but recovering their presence of mind they saw that they must find
some relief immediately or they would die of starvation. They left the
wreck and started down the river. In crossing a small tributary of
the Missouri one of the boys was drowned. The other kept on night and
day, most of the time back from the river, to avoid the bends and the
swamps and underbrush. He had nothing to eat except a little bark and
some flower blossoms and did not stop a moment for sleep. His keeping
back from the river caused him to miss the boats and trading posts.
Finally, almost famished and exhausted, he beat his way through a
dense willow growth to the bank of the river in the hope that some boat
would come along before he should die. Shortly afterward a steamer hove
in sight--the _Sunset_--on her way up the river. She was a veritable
sun_rise_ to the poor boy, who began waving an old white hat, almost
the only article of clothing he had left. The people on the boat saw
the signal and sent the yawl out and brought the boy in. His face
was almost raw from mosquito bites, and he was so weak that he could
scarcely stand. He was found at a point twenty-five miles below Fort
Rice, or 642 miles, by river channel, below where the _Trover_ was
wrecked. He traveled this distance in nine days. With all the cut-offs
duly allowed for, he must have averaged seventy miles a day during
this time, and all the while without food. Were it not that the facts
seem well established, such an example of physical endurance would be
incredible.[51] The name of this little hero was Frederick Good and his
home was in St. Louis.
CHAPTER XXIV.
LA BARGE AGAIN IN OPPOSITION.
With a view to entering, upon a large scale, into the newly developing
business at the head waters of the Missouri, the firm of La Barge,
Harkness & Co. was formed in St. Louis in the winter of 1861–62. The
members were Joseph La Barge, Eugene Jaccard, James Harkness, John
B. La Barge, and Charles E. Galpin. Each partner put in ten thousand
dollars. Two steamboats were purchased--Captain La Barge’s boat, the
_Emilie_, and a light-draft boat, the _Shreveport_. In the division of
duties and responsibilities among the partners Jaccard was to attend to
the affairs of the firm in St. Louis, the La Barges were to manage the
steamboat business, Galpin was to look after the trade along the river,
and Harkness was to go to the mines with an outfit of merchandise, and
was to remain there and develop a business with those rapidly growing
communities.
[Sidenote: VOYAGE OF 1862.]
When it was known that Captain La Barge was to make a spring trip to
Benton, he was overwhelmed with applications, not merely from those who
wanted to go to the mines, but from business men and capitalists who
wished to join the enterprise. He could easily have organized a capital
of a million dollars, but he adhered to his first plan and pushed his
preparations with vigor. The _Shreveport_ was first gotten ready to
sail and left port April 30, 1862. Captain John La Barge was master.
The _Emilie_ followed on the 14th of May.
As a performance in steamboating the voyage of the _Emilie_ was a great
success. She was loaded to the guards with some 350 tons of freight and
160 passengers. Captain La Barge himself had never been more than a
hundred miles above Fort Union; yet he made the whole trip, 2300 miles,
in a little less than thirty-two days, and would have finished it
sooner but for the fact that he had to help the _Shreveport_ the last
hundred miles of the distance. The boats arrived at Fort Benton at noon
June 17, and at 6 A. M., June 19, the _Emilie_ started down the river,
reaching St. Louis on the 3d of July. Her speed up averaged 71 miles
per day; down, 152 miles.
[Sidenote: A DESPERATE GAME.]
An exciting incident of the trip was the passing of the American Fur
Company’s boat, the _Spread Eagle_. The new opposition of La Barge,
Harkness & Co. was a formidable one, and the Company bestirred itself
with unusual vigor to be first on the ground with its annual outfit.
The _Spread Eagle_ left St. Louis with three days the start, but was
overtaken by the _Emilie_ near Fort Berthold. For the next two days
the boats were near each other most of the time. The day after leaving
Berthold the _Emilie_ passed her rival for good. When the officers of
the _Spread Eagle_ saw that they were beaten they played a desperate
game, which showed to what lengths the Company’s servants would go when
it was a matter of rivalry in trade.
[Sidenote: THE “SPREAD EAGLE” RACE.]
At the point where the race took place there was a towhead (a newly
formed island) which at the stage of the river then prevailing was
covered with water. The main channel, and at ordinary stages the only
channel, passed on the right-hand side going up, and this channel the
_Spread Eagle_ took. But the water was now high enough to give a good
channel on the other side of the towhead. As the distance by this
channel was somewhat shorter, and as the _Emilie_ was the faster boat
anyway, it was a good chance to get well ahead and out of the way. La
Barge promptly seized the opportunity. The pilot of the _Spread Eagle_
with quick eye realized that he had been out-maneuvered, and seeing no
other way to prevent the _Emilie’s_ passage, determined upon wrecking
her. He accordingly left the main channel and made for the chute that
the _Emilie_ was entering. He steamed alongside of her for a moment,
but found that he was losing ground.[52] The boats were scarcely fifty
feet apart, when the pilot of the _Spread Eagle_, seeing that he could
not make it, deliberately put his rudder to port, and plunged the bow
of the boat into the _Emilie_ immediately opposite her boilers. Several
of the guards were broken and the danger of wreck was imminent. La
Barge was in the pilot-house at the time and was not looking for such a
move, for he did not believe that even the American Fur Company would
play so desperate a game when human life was at stake. He instantly
called out to Bailey, the pilot of the _Spread Eagle_, to stop his
engines and drop his boat back or he would put a bullet through him.
The passengers likewise became thoroughly aroused, and some of them got
their arms and threatened to use them if the _Spread Eagle_ did not
withdraw. These threats were effective; the _Spread Eagle_ fell to the
rear and was seen no more on the voyage. She was four days behind at
Benton, and a week on the whole trip. She lost four men on one of the
rapids by the grossest carelessness. A crew had gone to the head of the
rapids to plant a deadman,[53] and having finished this work dropped
down to the boat in their yawl. Instead of passing alongside of the
steamer they made directly for the bow, and on reaching the boat the
swift current instantly rolled the yawl under and the crew were drowned.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE’S GENEROSITY.]
When the _Spread Eagle_ returned to St. Louis charges were preferred
against Bailey for having attempted to wreck the _Emilie_. He was
brought to trial before the steamboat inspector and his license was
canceled. It was a hard blow to him, for steamboating was his trade,
and he had a large family to support. About a month afterward he went
to La Barge saying that he had been trying to get the inspector to
reinstate him, but that he would not do it except upon La Barge’s
recommendation. Bailey admitted his guilt, but said that he had acted
at the instigation of the Company’s agents, and he begged La Barge to
reinstate him for the sake of his wife and children. The Captain was
never good at resisting appeals of this sort, and he accordingly went
to the inspector and got Bailey reinstated.
[Sidenote: CHOUTEAU IN DOUBT.]
When the _Emilie_ was reported as back from her trip, the old gentleman
Chouteau sent his carriage to bring La Barge to the office.
“At what point did you turn back?” he asked when La Barge arrived, for
the phenomenally quick trip indicated that the _Emilie_ did not reach
Fort Benton.
“Fort Benton, sir,” replied La Barge.
“Tut, tut! I know you could not have done that. Tell me candidly where
you left your trip.”
“Fort Benton, sir.”
“We’ll see about it. I don’t believe it, don’t believe it.”
“Sorry you doubt my word, but it is nevertheless true.”
“Where did you leave the _Spread Eagle_?”
“’Way below Benton; found her cordelling.”
“Well, if you got to Fort Benton you made a good trip; but I don’t
believe it.”
As soon as Captain La Barge reached St. Louis he loaded his boat with
merchandise for the new posts along the river, intending to go back
until he should meet the _Shreveport_, a much lighter-draft vessel, and
transfer the cargo to her for the rest of the trip. The _Shreveport_
left Fort Benton July 6, and met the _Emilie_ at Sioux City. The
transfer of cargo and passengers was made, and the _Emilie_ returned to
St. Louis. The _Shreveport_ went as high as the mouth of Milk River,
the farthest of the new posts except that near Fort Benton. After the
_Emilie’s_ return from her second voyage she went to work for the
government, carrying stores from St. Louis to Memphis, and remained in
this service all winter.
The river portion of the season’s operations of the new firm had been a
complete success. Three large cargoes had been sent up the river, two
to Fort Benton and one to the lower posts. Of these posts there were
four--La Framboise, near old Fort Pierre; another near Fort Berthold;
Fort Stuart, near the mouth of Poplar River, and Fort Galpin, near the
mouth of Milk River. It remains to notice what was done at Fort Benton
and in the projected expedition to the mines.
[Sidenote: FORT LA BARGE.]
The operations at Fort Benton and beyond were placed in the hands of
Mr. Harkness. The first step was to build a post at Fort Benton, where
it was intended to locate the principal establishment of the firm. The
site chosen was near the spot where the Grand Union Hotel later stood.
The work was begun June 28, Mrs. La Barge driving the first stake. The
inclosure was made three hundred feet long by two hundred feet wide,
and the post was named Fort La Barge.
[Sidenote: HARKNESS VISITS THE MINES.]
Before the _Shreveport_ set out to return to St. Louis, a considerable
party made an excursion to the Great Falls of the Missouri. Among them
were Father De Smet, Eugene Jaccard, member of the firm; Giles Filley
of St. Louis, and his son, Frank; Mrs. John La Barge, Miss Harkness,
W. G. Harkness, Tom La Barge, and Mrs. Culbertson, the Indian wife of
the noted trader. Mrs. La Barge and Miss Harkness are supposed to be
the first white women to have seen the Great Falls of the Missouri.
Four days after their return the _Shreveport_ left for St. Louis,
taking with them all who had come up only for the trip.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE CITY.]
The _Shreveport_ having gone, and affairs at Fort La Barge being
well under way, Harkness set out July 9 with an ox train laden with
assorted merchandise for the mines in the Deer Lodge Valley. When the
boat left St. Louis it was expected to go to the Salmon River mines,
but the recent discoveries in Montana gave a better prospect nearer
home. In fact the demand for goods, even at Fort Benton, was brisk,
and the firm had carried on a thriving trade ever since the arrival of
the boats. Harkness followed the usual trail up the Missouri River and
Little Prickly Pear Creek, through the broad valley on the border of
which the city of Helena now stands, and thence to the valley of the
Deer Lodge. Nothing of unusual note transpired on the trip. Harkness
did not like the experience, except the trout fishing. His journal is
full of complaints at the hardship he was compelled to undergo, and
he plaintively asks if he “will ever live to reap the benefit.” He
generally “nooned at 11 A. M.” in order to “catch trout for dinner.”
He reached the Deer Lodge Valley July 23, near the point where the
town of that name now stands.[54] Here he found a fellow passenger on
the _Emilie_, Nicholas Wall of St. Louis, who had reached the mines
some days before, and who was destined to figure prominently in the
future affairs of La Barge, Harkness & Co.
After remaining in this section and prospecting around for eleven days,
Harkness grew disgusted at the prospect, placed such of his goods as
he did not sell in the hands of Nick Wall to be sold on commission,
and set out for the Missouri “glad to be on the road home.” On the
Sun River he met the Northern Overland Expedition from St. Paul. He
visited the Great Falls on his way down, and arrived at Fort La Barge
August 18. Harkness was now “tired and out of spirits,” and “adjusted
his expense accounts and turned over everything to the store.” He had
evidently had enough of this kind of life, and forthwith ordered “a
boat built to go down the river.” The boat was launched August 26 and
was christened the _Maggie_. Harkness lost no time in getting away,
and left Fort La Barge at 4 A. M. on the 28th. No incidents occurred
on this trip which are of much interest. The party reached Omaha
September 30, where Harkness “sold the _Maggie_ for five dollars,” and
took passage on the _Robert Campbell_ to St. Joseph. From that point he
went by rail and the Mississippi River to St. Louis, where he arrived
October 6.
[Sidenote: INCOMPETENT HANDS.]
The foregoing details, taken entirely from the diary of Harkness, show
in what unfit hands the important business of the company in the upper
country had been intrusted. From his arrival at Fort Benton until his
departure was only two months and a half, including a trip of several
hundred miles to the Montana mining regions. Only eleven days did he
spend in establishing his trade in that section, the most important
point of all, and then practically gave his goods away to Nick Wall,
for the company never received a cent for anything left with that
gentleman. Yet Harkness was the partner who was to remain in the upper
country two years. “He was back in St. Louis almost as soon as I was,”
said La Barge, with just indignation, in commenting on the affair.
[Sidenote: FIRST SEASON’S OPERATIONS.]
Such were the first season’s operations of the firm of La Barge,
Harkness & Co. In most respects the firm had made a brilliant
beginning. The prospects in the river portion of the business were all
that could be asked. Only Harkness’ weak management of his part of the
enterprise can be criticised. He was not the man for the place, and
lacked the courage and hardihood for that kind of work, and he threw
away an opportunity from which a more enterprising man would have made
a fortune.
CHAPTER XXV.
VOYAGE OF 1863--THE TOBACCO GARDEN MASSACRE.
[Sidenote: DISASTROUS DELAY.]
Deferring for the present our narrative of the fortunes of La Barge,
Harkness & Co., we shall recount one of those mournful tragedies and
one of those instances of official corruption which marked the later
history of the Indian tribes along the Missouri River. When Captain
La Barge, in the spring of 1863, undertook to leave the government
service on the Mississippi, to get ready for his trip to Fort Benton,
he was told by the Quartermaster in St. Louis that he could not have
the boat, for the government had further use for it. Not having time to
go to Washington to see about it, he sold the boat for twenty thousand
dollars to the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad, and left to that
company the task of securing its release. He then chartered the _Robert
Campbell_, and, with the _Shreveport_, prepared for a voyage to Fort
Benton. It proved to be a notable trip. The cargo and passenger lists
of the _Shreveport_ were made up almost exclusively for the mines and
for the posts of La Barge, Harkness & Co. The _Campbell_ was loaded
with annuities for the Sioux, Crows, Blackfeet, and Assiniboines,
together with some other freight, making a cargo of nearly five hundred
tons. The _Shreveport_ got away from port in the latter part of April,
but the _Campbell_ was subjected to annoying and even disastrous delay
by the failure of the annuities to arrive on time. Captain La Barge,
who had the contract to transport the annuities, had been ordered to
have his boat in readiness on the 1st of April. The goods did not
arrive, and he was held in St. Louis for forty-two days before he could
start on the long journey. It was considered of the highest importance
to start as soon as the ice disappeared in order that the trip, both
coming and going, could be made during high water. As the year 1863
happened to be a low-water year, the delay which Captain La Barge
suffered made it impossible to complete the voyage. Even on the 12th of
May, the day of starting, only a portion of the goods had arrived, and
the rest were taken on at St. Joseph, whither they were sent by rail.
[Illustration: LA BARGE ROCK]
The boat proceeded on her way, determined to accomplish the trip if it
were possible to do so. The water was unusually low for that time of
year, and it took nearly a month to get to Sioux City, which ought to
have been reached easily in a third of the time. Owing to the great
danger from guerrillas below Kansas City, a force of thirty soldiers
accompanied the boat as far as St. Joseph, Mo. This precaution was
very timely. Every boat that was met in the lower river reported
attacks with occasional loss of life. Owing to the presence of soldiers
on the _Robert Campbell_, and Captain La Barge’s precaution to anchor
midstream at night instead of lying at the bank, he got through all
right. At Miami and at Cogswell’s Landing parties tried to board the
boat, but without success.
[Sidenote: INDIANS HOSTILE.]
Among the passengers on the _Campbell_ were two Indian agents, Henry
W. Reed and Samuel M. Latta, the former for the Blackfeet tribes and
the latter for the Sioux, Crows, Mandans, and other tribes in that
region. Henry A. Boller, whose work, “Among the Indians,” achieved some
notoriety in its time, was likewise on board, as were also Alexander
Culbertson and his Blackfoot wife. In all there were some thirty
passengers, and this number was considerably increased at the various
landings as far up as Sioux City. The value of the annuity goods on
board was upwards of seventy thousand dollars.
[Sidenote: CHEATING THE INDIANS.]
The Indians all along the Missouri above the Niobrara were at this time
intensely hostile, but knowing that their annuity goods were about
to arrive, they held aloof from any desperate measures until these
were received. It would have been a wise thing to have sent a company
of troops all the way on this important trip, but not a soldier was
to be had. The boat reached Fort Pierre June 20, and here several of
the Sioux bands were assembled to receive their annuities. It appears
that the Two Kettles band were in a great state of exasperation over
the recent killing of eight of their number by the soldiers near Fort
Randall. After a considerable amount of parleying the distribution
of the annuities commenced, but for some reason, which Captain La
Barge never heard explained, only a portion (about two-thirds, as he
estimated it) of the goods to which the Indians were entitled were put
off. The Indians could not be deceived in the matter and were very
angry. They went to the Captain and appealed to him to see justice
done them. They had the fullest confidence in him, for they had known
him for years, and he had always treated them honestly. He was now
helpless, however, and could only tell them that he was under the
orders of the agent and had no control whatever over the goods. They
then assured him that they should follow the boat and cause it all the
trouble they could, but they would not harm him if they could avoid it.
[Sidenote: REVENGEFUL SPIRIT OF THE INDIANS.]
They were as good as their word. All the way from Pierre to Union, six
hundred miles, these Indians followed the boat. It is a remarkable
fact, when we stop to think of it--this pursuit of a steamboat on
its laborious voyage through the Western prairies, seeking at every
turn to destroy it and kill its passengers and crew. There was some
deep and far-reaching cause that could create and support so bitter
and vindictive a spirit as this. The warning of the Indians to Captain
La Barge was taken by him at its full value. The boat was thoroughly
barricaded with the cargo by piling it so as to protect the vulnerable
points, and all the firearms on board were made ready for use. These
precautions proved to be of the highest importance. At every woodpile
Indians appeared and attacked the crew. At every favorable point shots
were fired into the boat. On one occasion a bullet passed through the
pilot-house, barely missing the pilot, Atkins, who was at the wheel. We
shall relate some incidents that occurred on the way to Union, one more
comical than serious, but one tragic and deplorable as any in frontier
history.
[Sidenote: THE UPRIGHT HAT.]
The _Shreveport_ had gone up the river in advance of the _Robert
Campbell_, but being unable, on account of low water, to get beyond
Snake Point, or Cow Island, 130 miles below Fort Benton, had discharged
her cargo on the bank and had returned down the river. She met the
_Robert Campbell_ at Apple Creek, thirteen miles below Bismarck, and
was there stopped by Captain La Barge. A part of the cargo of the
larger boat was transferred to the _Shreveport_, and the two then
proceeded up the river, the _Shreveport_ being sometimes ahead and
sometimes in rear. The hunter on the _Shreveport_ was Louis Dauphin,
already referred to as one of the bravest men and most noted characters
of the upper country. He now acted as hunter for both boats. It was
his custom to go along ahead of the boat, beating up the country and
securing whatever game was worth stopping the boat for. Whatever he
killed, as an elk or deer, he would hang on a pole or tree near the
bank where it could be seen from the boat, and would then continue his
hunt. One day about noon Captain La Barge’s eye, which was constantly
studying the river ahead, fell upon a curious object floating
downstream. It looked like a hat, but, strange to say, was standing
upright on the water, with no tendency to sink at all. It caused the
Captain no little perplexity. In the windy country of the Missouri it
was no uncommon thing for hats to be blown into the river, but he had
never before seen one ride like that. He followed it with his glass
until it was near the boat, when up it rose, securely perched on the
head of a swimmer who proved to be no other than the hunter Dauphin.
“I had to take to the water this time,” he said as he climbed on
board. “They were too many for me. You are going to have trouble at
the Tobacco Garden. The Indians are gathered there to the number of
at least fifteen hundred and intend to capture the boat.” The general
amusement which Dauphin’s subaqueous adventure had caused on the boat
was quickly dispelled by the sad fulfillment of the predictions which
he brought back.
[Sidenote: A DISASTROUS SURPRISE.]
Just above the mouth of Rising Water Creek the boats stopped to wood,
and were hailed by some Grosventres (of the Missouri, Minnetarees)
who offered some meat if a boat were sent out for it. These Indians,
a friendly tribe, had been out hunting for two weeks and were just
returning well laden with meat. The women had made some bullboats and
were about to ferry it over the river. The men had meanwhile turned
most of their horses out to graze, keeping only one each fastened by
lariats. Some meat was exchanged for coffee and other articles and the
_Robert Campbell_ resumed her voyage. Just as she was starting one of
the squaws uttered a piercing scream, and the people on the boat saw a
Sioux Indian riding at full speed for the Grosventre herd, brandishing
a red cloth, and followed by a large body of his tribe. The Grosventre
squaws took to their boats and the men to the tied horses. The
_Campbell_ drew in to the bank and took men and horses on board and set
them across the river. The poor Grosventres lost nearly their entire
herd and all the fruits of their hunt.
[Sidenote: THE TOBACCO GARDEN.]
The name “Tobacco Garden” on the Missouri River designated the bottoms
at the outlet of Tobacco Creek, on the left or north bank of the river,
eighty-eight miles below the mouth of the Yellowstone. The origin of
the name is uncertain, but the place has long been well known to river
men. Near this point, but on the opposite shore, was a bottom, covered
with large trees, but open and free of underbrush. The south bank of
the river was a “caving bank,” or one that was being undermined by the
river. At this time there was a very narrow beach at the water’s edge,
above which the bank rose perpendicularly to a height of six or eight
feet. The channel was close to the shore and a boat in passing had to
come within thirty or forty yards of the bank. Even if anchored to the
sandbar immediately opposite, it could not get more than sixty yards
away. It was an ideal place to “hold up” a boat, and the Indians were
shrewd enough to understand this perfectly.
[Sidenote: LATTA NOT AFRAID.]
It was toward noon of the 7th of July that the two boats hove in sight
of the Tobacco Garden, and there, true to Dauphin’s prediction, they
beheld on the south shore a large body of Indians assembled with the
evident purpose of stopping them. There was no use in trying to run a
gantlet like that, and accordingly the boats made fast to the opposite
sandbar, the _Shreveport_ about one hundred yards below the _Robert
Campbell_. A parley ensued with the Indians, who were so near that
it was perfectly practicable to talk back and forth. La Barge asked
them what they wanted. They said they wanted the balance of their
annuities; they wanted no trouble, but simply their just dues. The
agent refused them the goods, but “requested the Captain to send his
yawl and bring aboard some of the chiefs and head men that we could
have a talk and ... make them a present of sugar, coffee, tobacco,
etc., and by this means quiet them.” The Indians likewise wanted the
yawl to be sent out, but wanted the agent to go with it. They would
then send their principal chiefs back with him to the boat, where
everything could be talked over. They were very shrewd, and the agent
almost fell into the trap.[55] The Captain told him that he could not
possibly think of ordering the yawl out, considering the disposition
of the Indians and their evident purpose of mischief. Latta replied:
“Why, I’ll go; I’m not afraid.” “All right,” answered the Captain, “if
you can get volunteers; I will not order a crew out.” They then went
to the mate, Miller by name, and a crew was made up to take Latta to
the shore. When the yawl was ready the Captain sent word to the agent,
who had disappeared upstairs. The latter sent back a reply that he was
suddenly taken ill and could not possibly go, but to send the men and
bring the chiefs on board.[56]
[Sidenote: A BRAVE CREW.]
The crew of the _Robert Campbell_ were not lacking in physical courage,
and the necessary force to man the yawl was easily made up. It was a
little after noon when the yawl left the boat. There is no truth in the
statements of Boller and Larpenteur that the men were forced to go and
clung to the side of the steamer until the mate threatened to cut off
their fingers if they did not let go. It was easy enough for them to
get out of going if they chose to. The crew of the yawl consisted of
seven men. The steersman, a gallant fellow of the name of Andy Stinger,
sat in the stern. Two men of the names of O’Mally and Chris Sharky
sat in the bow. There were four oarsmen, one of them a young man of
the name of Martin, and the other, one of the Irishmen who had been
whipped by “Yankee Jack,” as related elsewhere. The yawl put off, and
as the distance was very short, it quickly reached the opposite shore.
It struck the beach head on and then swung around under the force of
the current, so that it lay alongside of the bank.[57]
[Sidenote: ANDY STINGER’S PRESENCE OF MIND.]
A chief and three Indians were under the cut bank on the beach when the
yawl arrived. One of the Indians stood exactly opposite Stinger, with a
gun in his hand covered with a leather case. The other two Indians were
armed with spears. The chief was a fierce-looking man, and it seemed
as if his eye would pierce one through and through. Stinger motioned
him to get into the yawl. The men meanwhile were sitting quietly with
their oars across their laps. The chief gave some quick directions and
in an instant the two Indians with spears jumped into the boat and the
one with the gun stripped the leather case off. Stinger knew what this
meant, and with great presence of mind instantly threw himself into the
water on the river side of the boat, where it was fortunately four or
five feet deep. Slipping up along the boat he seized it by the gunwale
amidships and dragged it from the bank. The movement, however, quick as
it was, was not quick enough. The two young bucks who had leaped into
the boat thrust their spears into the bodies of two of the oarsmen,
killing them instantly. A third was killed by the Indian with the gun,
who had missed his chance at Stinger, and a fourth was severely wounded
by an arrow from the bank. The two men in the bow instantly threw
themselves into the bottom of the yawl.
[Sidenote: BOATS RETURN FIRE.]
The Indians had no time to carry the attack further. The crews of both
the steamboats were watching with breathless anxiety the progress
of events. When they saw Stinger jump into the water they thought
him killed. Someone exclaimed, “There goes Andy,” and instantly
both boats responded with their entire armament. This included two
howitzers on the hurricane deck of the _Robert Campbell_ and one on the
_Shreveport_, together with weapons of various sorts belonging to the
passengers and crew. One rattle-brained Irishman was so upset that he
brandished his revolver in the air, firing off into space without the
slightest regard as to the whereabouts of the enemy. The fire, on the
whole, was very effective. Numbers of the Indians were seen to fall,
and Captain La Barge afterward learned through Pierre Garreau, the
interpreter at Fort Berthold, that there were eighteen men and twenty
horses killed and many wounded. The Indians soon withdrew, and in about
an hour some were seen trying to get water for their wounded near a
pile of driftwood half a mile below. It was an intensely sultry day.
The howitzers were turned on them and they disappeared.
[Sidenote: ANDY ANGRY.]
Returning to the yawl, we find that Andy Stinger, protected behind the
gunwale, was steadily pulling the boat into the stream and swimming
toward the sandbar as the current drifted him down. When about halfway
across he called to the men to get up, while he himself climbed into
the yawl, which was then rowed to the bank. The people on the two
boats were so absorbed with the battle that no one thought of going to
the assistance of the yawl crew. The wounded man and the two who were
unharmed got out and walked up the beach. Stinger was thus left alone
to drag the yawl and its mournful cargo up alongside the boat. This
apparent neglect fired him to a desperate pitch, and he let go some
powerful language to the mate and others of the crew. Captain La Barge
presently came aft and looked into the yawl. He said not a word, but
turned away shaking his head in a manner that showed plainly enough
what was passing in his mind.
[Sidenote: HERO OF THE TOBACCO GARDEN.]
Such was the celebrated “affair at the Tobacco Garden.” After the
return to St. Louis Captain La Barge was talking to a friend about
it when Andy Stinger happened to pass by. He said, loud enough for
Andy to hear: “There goes the hero of the Tobacco Garden.” The brave
steersman treasured up these words as his proudest title during the
rest of his life. Long years passed away before Captain La Barge heard
from him again. He did not even know whether his old boatman was still
alive when, in the fall of 1896, thirty-three years after the massacre,
he received a most cordial and affectionate letter from him,[58] and
two years later had the pleasure of meeting him again.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE’S CRITICISM.]
Commenting upon the affair at the Tobacco Garden, Captain La Barge said:
“This event was one which could not have happened under ordinary
circumstances. Master of both boat and cargo, I should never have
permitted the yawl to go ashore. I was under orders of the agent in
everything except the mere handling of the boat, and was bound to give
him such opportunities to meet the Indians as he desired. I had gone to
the extreme of my freedom of action when I refused to order a crew to
go ashore for him, but could not well decline to let men volunteer. It
was a lamentable affair, and one of the many crimes which must ever lie
at the door of the Department of Indian Affairs in Washington. Here was
an agent who gave every evidence of being corrupt and in collusion with
the Fur Company, for he retained about a third of the annuities due the
Indians and stored them in the Company’s warehouse, from which they
never reached the Indians except in exchange for robes, as in the case
of private merchandise. Moreover, the agent was utterly ignorant of
Indian character, full of the self-assurance which goes with ignorance,
and not knowing himself what to do became the passive tool of the
crafty and trained agents of the company.”[59]
[Sidenote: CHARLES LARPENTEUR.]
About 3 P. M. the boats resumed their voyage, as the Indians had
entirely disappeared. On the following morning the burial of the
victims took place at a point about forty-seven miles above the Tobacco
Garden. They were buried on an eminence on the south side of the river
nearly opposite the mouth of Little Muddy Creek, and a cedar cross was
planted at the head of their grave. The boat then pursued her way up
the river and arrived at the mouth of the Yellowstone on the 8th of
July. Here the Indians were seen again, and a few shots were fired by
them at the boats, but no injury was done.
[Sidenote: HEAVY RESPONSIBILITY.]
The herculean labors of Captain La Barge on this memorable voyage won
the plaudits of all who observed them. He seemed to be everywhere
present, and the only man on whom reliance could be placed. “We got
to the mouth of the Yellowstone,” says agent Reed, “after the most
untiring efforts, especially on the part of Captain La Barge, who
seemed to know the only channel to be found in the Missouri.” The
Captain was constantly exposed to danger, and personally conducted all
soundings of the river, going far from the boat with a few men in the
yawl. The responsibility resting upon him was very great. The lives
of the passengers, the safety of his valuable cargo, the danger from
the Indians if their expected goods should be lost, and his own large
pecuniary stake in the voyage, all rested upon his own shoulders.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE BLACKFOOT ANNUITIES.
[Sidenote: A BAD PREDICAMENT.]
[Sidenote: OFFICIAL REPORTS.]
At the mouth of the Yellowstone the voyage of the _Robert Campbell_
came abruptly to an end. There was only a depth of two feet over the
Yellowstone bar, and it was a physical impossibility to proceed. The
annuities had now been delivered to the lower tribes so far as Captain
La Barge was concerned, but there still remained undelivered those
going to the Crows, Assiniboines, and Blackfeet. The annuities for
the first of these tribes were to be delivered wherever these Indians
could be found, but those of the Blackfeet were to be delivered at Fort
Benton. Fortunately, the Assiniboines came in while the boats were at
the Yellowstone, and their annuities were delivered. Dr. Reed, the
agent for the Blackfeet, then advised La Barge to abandon the idea of
going further, and to store the goods at Fort Union until the following
spring. This the Captain was very loath to do. He knew only too well
the complications that might arise, particularly as such a course
compelled him to place himself in any degree within the power of the
American Fur Company. It seemed, however, the only thing to do. The
_Robert Campbell_ simply could not get any further. The _Shreveport_
had not been able to get above Snake Point, and since that time the
water had fallen materially. It was now the 8th of July, and no further
rise could be expected; in fact no boats reached Benton that year. The
only alternative to storing the goods was to haul them by wagon to
their destination, and for this purpose the transportation could not
be had. The Captain very reluctantly concluded to follow the agent’s
advice, particularly as the bulk of annuities were for the Indians
belonging to his own agency. An arrangement was made with William
Hodgkiss,[60] agent of the American Fur Company, and five days were
consumed in transferring the cargo to the warehouse. Full receipts
were given by Agent Hodgkiss, and these were witnessed by Captain W.
B. Greer, U. S. Army. In addition to the receipts the Captain secured
from Agent Reed a written statement of the circumstances in order that
his action might have the fullest explanation possible. In those days,
when the government felt that it was being robbed right and left by
dishonest contractors, and every claim was looked upon with suspicion,
the adjustment of any matter of that sort was extremely difficult, and
the innocent were made to suffer with the guilty.[61]
[Sidenote: THE “SHREVEPORT” IMPRESSED.]
[Sidenote: AT WORK FOR THE GOVERNMENT.]
As soon as the business at Fort Union was cleared up the two boats
turned their prows down the river and made the best of their way
toward the lower country. When they arrived at Crow Creek, eighty-two
miles below Pierre, they met General Sully, who was engaged in his
expedition against the hostile Sioux. The General invited La Barge
to his tent and told him he should have to impress one of the boats
into his service for a time. As the _Shreveport_ was much the lighter
boat it was considered best to take her. Captain La Barge’s brother,
however, absolutely refused to remain, and accordingly Captain La Barge
had to. It was also necessary to use military authority to secure a
crew. The _Robert Campbell_ then went on her way to St. Louis, and
Captain La Barge commenced hauling supplies for General Sully. He went
up as far as the mouth of the Little Cheyenne, and there awaited the
result of General Sully’s expedition, which was a victorious battle
with the Indians. He then dropped down below old Fort Pierre, when
he was ordered to proceed to Fort Leavenworth and report to General
Easton. By that officer he was directed to take a cargo to Sioux City.
Though late in the season, the trip was successfully accomplished.
Captain La Barge then returned to St. Louis, where he arrived late in
November, and reported to the commanding officer at that point. He had
now been continuously at work for over six months, during one of the
most trying seasons ever experienced upon the river. His nightly sleep
scarcely averaged five hours, and he was constantly under the weight of
a terrible responsibility. Nothing but an iron constitution could have
withstood the incessant strain.
As soon as Captain La Barge could straighten matters up at home he set
out for Washington to see the Indian Commissioner in regard to his past
season’s contract. He received full payment for everything delivered,
but nothing for the annuities still undelivered and nothing for his
great loss caused by the delay of the Indian Department in delivering
the goods to him on time. He was, however, given a new contract to
transport the goods to their destination the following year.
In order to pursue this particular subject to its final outcome we
shall step ahead of our narrative to the year 1864. Captain La Barge
went up the river that year with the steamer _Effie Deans_, leaving
space on the boat for the undelivered annuities. Arrived at Fort Union
he first fell in with Captain Greer, who had witnessed the receipt of
Agent Hodgkiss for the goods the previous summer. Captain La Barge
told him that he had come to take the annuities to their destination.
“I don’t believe that you will find much,” said Captain Greer. “The
Company has traded it nearly all for robes.”
[Sidenote: MANIFEST FRAUD.]
[Sidenote: THE GOODS UNDELIVERED.]
Agent Hodgkiss had died during the winter, and Captain La Barge
presented the receipts to the new agent, Rolette. The latter refused
to deliver the goods except upon payment of the extortionate storage
charge of two thousand dollars. He expected that this charge would
cause Captain La Barge to refuse to take the goods. The sum, however,
was tendered, whereupon the agent refused to deliver them except upon
the prior surrender of Agent Hodgkiss’ receipts. Suspecting that
a large part of the goods were missing, the Captain declined this
condition, but offered to give a receipt for all goods he should take
from the warehouse. Driven from every position, the agent openly
avowed that he could not deliver all the goods, for he did not have
them all. He stated that, under instructions from Commissioner Dole,
transmitted through the Company, he had delivered a large portion of
the goods to the Grosventres and many packages to other Indians. The
delivery of the balance could, therefore, not be made except upon
surrender of the receipts of the previous year. Captain La Barge
asked to see the receipts of the Indians to whom the goods had been
delivered. The agent had none, although it was an invariable rule to
secure such receipts for all annuities delivered. The alleged order
from Commissioner Dole was then called for, but that could not be
produced, the agent stating that it came by messenger, who delivered it
verbally.
“You acknowledge, then, that a large portion of these goods you have
not got,” asked Captain La Barge.
“Yes,” replied the agent; “they have been delivered during the winter
and have reached their proper destination.”
[Sidenote: GOODS TRADED WITH THE INDIANS.]
All these proceedings were witnessed by the officer, Captain Greer,
whom Captain La Barge had taken the precaution to have present. From
what Captain Greer had told him, and from the trader’s inability to
account satisfactorily for the disposition of the goods, Captain La
Barge became thoroughly convinced that they had been used in trade,
and he very wisely declined to surrender his receipts. As the trader
would not give up the rest of the goods except upon a surrender of the
receipts for all, the Captain went on his way without them.
[Sidenote: UNPAID DEBT.]
In the meanwhile Dr. Reed, who had been relieved as Agent of
the Blackfoot tribes, went up on the American Fur Company boat
_Yellowstone_ to turn over his charge to the new agent, Mr. Gad E.
Upson. Mr. Chouteau had received the contract for taking up the
annuities for the year 1864. He took them only to Cow Island, where,
for some reason, possibly low water, they were put on the shore and
the boat turned back. Mr. Upson, who had gone down from Benton to
Union early in the spring, went back on the _Yellowstone_ with Mr.
Reed. The boat, after unloading, turned back, and a day later met the
_Effie Deans_. La Barge reported to Dr. Reed the facts as to the goods
at Fort Union. Mr. Chouteau, who was on the _Yellowstone_, was called
in and professed to disapprove of Rolette’s course, but did nothing
to rectify it. So far as Captain La Barge knew at the time or ever
learned afterward, this large quantity of Indian goods was traded out
to the Indians by the so-called American Fur Company and constituted an
unqualified theft from the government. The final outcome of the affair,
so far as Captain La Barge was concerned, was a loss of nearly twenty
thousand dollars.[62] He died a poor man, with the government in his
debt by a sum that would have given ample comfort to his declining
years.
CHAPTER XXVII.
COLLAPSE OF THE LA BARGE-HARKNESS OPPOSITION.
The steamboat _Shreveport_, with the annual outfit of the new firm
for the year 1863, did not get above Cow Island on account of the
extremely low stage of the river. No other boat went as far as that
within two hundred miles. Harkness and John La Barge put the cargo
out upon the bank and hastened back to the assistance of the _Robert
Campbell_. This event further illustrated the incapacity of Harkness.
No arrangement was made for the transportation of the goods to Benton,
although he knew that a considerable portion of the freight belonged to
outside parties, and that the firm had contracted to take it through
to that post. This precipitate action was due in part to danger from
the Indians. In the year 1863 the tribes along the river were all in
a state of unrest, and some of them actually on the warpath against
the whites. Fort Union was practically in a state of siege all summer,
and the danger to steamboats was a very formidable one. It was held
by some parties that the sudden termination of the voyage was due to
news received of the famous discovery of the Alder Gulch placers and
the desire to go back and notify the firm; but of this there is not the
slightest probability. Whatever the explanation, the act itself was
disastrous upon the fortunes of the firm.
[Sidenote: NICHOLAS WALL.]
Among the number of outside parties who had freight on the _Shreveport_
was the firm of John J. Roe and Nicholas Wall, both of St. Louis.
Wall represented the firm in Montana and Roe remained in St. Louis.
Some little account of Wall’s career and his previous relations with
Captain La Barge will be of interest, to show how far a man may forfeit
the sentiment of gratitude when his business interests are in any
way involved. La Barge had previously been connected with Wall in a
business way. In 1861 Wall joined the Confederate sympathizers, in St.
Louis, and was captured by General Lyon in the affair of Camp Jackson,
St. Louis, May 10, 1861. The prisoners taken there were all paroled,
but were confined to the limits of the city. At Wall’s urgent appeal La
Barge became bondsman for his good conduct and secured his freedom of
action. He worked for La Barge during the rest of the season of 1861.
In the winter of 1862 Wall asked La Barge to assist him in getting to
Montana. La Barge gave free transportation on the _Emilie_ to Fort
Benton for himself and his goods, and advanced him seven hundred
dollars to get to the mines. Wall did a successful business in the
Deer Lodge Valley in 1862, and in the fall of that year returned to
St. Louis, where he entered into a partnership with John J. Roe. The
outfit which this firm were to send to the mines was taken up on the
_Shreveport_. It was through La Barge’s patronage that Nick Wall was
extricated from a perilous situation and placed in a position to do a
good business. His method of repaying his benefactor will presently
appear.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE, HARKNESS & CO. SUED.]
When Wall heard that the _Shreveport_ could not reach Benton and
had discharged her cargo on the bank at Cow Island, he organized a
wagon train and went down after his own freight and that of several
others. In the spring of 1864 he returned to St. Louis, where he and
Roe presented a claim to La Barge, Harkness & Co. for forty thousand
dollars’ damages, on goods that were not worth at the outside ten
thousand dollars in St. Louis. Captain La Barge agreed to pay the full
price of the goods and charge no freight, but his offer was refused.
He then told Roe and Wall that they could bring suit at once. Roe
replied that he was too sharp to think of bringing suit in St. Louis;
he would bring it in Montana, where he knew that the chances were much
more in his favor. Robert Campbell and John S. McCune, two of St.
Louis’ leading citizens, protested against this proceeding, and agreed
to give bonds for the full payment of all damages. Roe refused all
compromise and Wall returned to Montana and brought suit.
[Sidenote: COLLAPSE OF AFFAIRS AT FORT LA BARGE.]
In the meanwhile, affairs at Fort La Barge were showing the effect
of absence from that post of any responsible member of the firm.
Joseph Picotte, brother of Honoré Picotte, a distinguished trader of
the American Fur Company, had been left in charge in 1862; but word
having been received that he was not properly attending to his work,
he was relieved by Robert H. Lemon, who had been highly recommended by
Robert Campbell. Lemon proved to be of less account even than Picotte,
and actually took the wholly unauthorized step of turning the firm’s
property over for safe-keeping to the American Fur Company. The receipt
for this transfer, signed by Andrew Dawson, agent American Fur Company,
is still among the La Barge papers. The transaction took place August
31, 1863, and included not only the storage of all the firm’s property
at Fort La Barge, but the payment of their employees’ wages, and the
removal of the _Shreveport_ freight from Cow Island to Fort Benton.
The sum of one thousand dollars was to be paid for storage, and the
goods were to be held as security for the payment of this sum and all
other liabilities of the firm on account of wages, transportation, or
other cause. Thus the entire business of the firm at Fort Benton was
practically surrendered to their great rival, and the new “opposition”
was crushed almost at its beginning.
[Sidenote: OUTCOME OF THE SUIT.]
As soon as Wall began legal proceedings the goods were seized and
held, pending the outcome of the trial. This did not come off until
1865, when a verdict was rendered against La Barge, Harkness & Co.
of twenty-four thousand dollars, which was paid in due course. All
the firm’s property in Montana was absolutely lost, including a large
quantity of furs ruined by the long detention. The total loss amounted
to fully one hundred thousand dollars.
The lawsuit itself was an important one at the time. It involved the
rights and obligations of carriers on the Missouri River. It was the
first important legal case in the history of the Territory. It brought
into distinguished notice one of the picturesque and leading characters
in the pioneer history of Montana, Colonel Wilbur F. Sanders, who
became one of Montana’s first representatives in the Senate of the
United States. On the part of the defense the case was badly managed.
None of the principals was present at the trial, which was held at a
point nearly three thousand miles from their home. With a skillful
defense it would probably not have resulted so disastrously as it did.
[Sidenote: CAUSES OF FAILURE.]
The immediate result of the trial was the dissolution of the firm of
La Barge, Harkness & Co. It went out of business upon an honorable
footing. Every liability was paid in full, but so much of it fell upon
Captain La Barge that it seriously impaired his fortune. He cherished,
not without reason, a very bitter feeling toward some of the parties
who were instrumental in the downfall of his business, and particularly
toward the American Fur Company. There is no doubt that that concern
furthered the result in every possible way. It was a principle of
their business to crush all opposition, and they made no exception in
this case. But it is evident that the real cause lay in the reckless
management of affairs at Fort Benton and at the mines, and for this
Harkness was alone responsible.
[Sidenote: THE DIAMOND R COMPANY.]
The collapse of the La Barge, Harkness & Co. business marked the
inception of a system of land transportation in Montana which grew
to enormous proportions. It was known as the Diamond R Company.
Among the ill-gotten gains of John J. Roe, in his successful effort to
break up a rival company, were a large number of oxen which La Barge,
Harkness & Co. had brought up the river to transport freight between
Fort Benton and the mines. Roe organized a transportation company,
using these oxen as a nucleus for commencing the business. By various
changes of ownership it passed into the hands of Montana men. It soon
became a great company, with a complete organization of agents, issuing
its bills of lading to all points, both in and out of the Territory. At
one time it employed no less than twelve hundred oxen and four hundred
mules, besides a large number of horses, and the sustenance of these
animals was a source of no slight income to the small farmers of that
section. It went out of business in 1883.
[Illustration: A STEAMBOAT AT THE BANK]
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CAPTAIN LA BARGE IN MONTANA.
Captain La Barge sold the _Emilie_ late in the winter of 1862–63. In
the following winter he made an unexpected sale of the _Shreveport_.
Henry Ames & Co., pork packers, sent their clerk one day to see if the
Captain would sell the boat. He replied that he did not care to, but
would if the price were satisfactory. Being invited to come to the
office of the firm, he was told that the boat suited them and was asked
to name a price.
“Twenty-five thousand dollars,” he said.
“Give the Captain a check for twenty-five thousand dollars,” said Ames,
turning to his clerk.
“Don’t you want a bill of sale and the customary evidence that she is
clear of debt?” asked the Captain, in some surprise.
“No,” was the reply; “you say she is so, and I will take your word.”
La Barge went down to the levee, transferred the boat, and then went to
the bank and cashed the check. He recalled this last circumstance by
the fact that the teller handed him the amount in twenty-five notes,
each of one thousand dollars.
[Sidenote: PURCHASE OF THE “EFFIE DEANS.”]
This sale took place in the winter, and it behooved the Captain to
cast about at once for a boat for the next annual voyage. A new boat
was being built on the Ohio River by the Keokuk Packet Company, John
S. McCune, President. Not proving satisfactory for their purposes,
she was brought to St. Louis and offered for sale. La Barge found her
well fitted for his work, and negotiated a purchase at forty thousand
dollars. McCune retained a one-fourth interest. She was called the
_Effie Deans_.
The boat was loaded with the usual assortment of freight, and left
St. Louis March 22, 1864, with forty-nine passengers and a cargo of
160 tons. She succeeded in getting only to the Marias River, where
the cargo was discharged. The boat was sent back in charge of John La
Barge, and the Captain himself remained in the upper country. He hired
wagons and took his property up the river, selling part of it in Benton
and the rest in Virginia City. He remained in the mining regions upward
of two months, although he finished his business in much less time. On
account of the danger from outlaws, or road agents, it was necessary to
await an exceptionally good opportunity for getting away. The Captain
had decided to return _via_ Salt Lake City, because to go by way of
the Missouri in an open boat would have meant little less than suicide.
The feeling of the Indians was so bitter at this time that no one could
pass their country in safety unless well protected.
The Captain had almost a hundred thousand dollars in golddust to take
with him, and he knew that this was not a secret with himself. He
caused it to be given out that he expected to depart on a certain day,
but actually stole away several days before, and was safely in Salt
Lake City before the announced date of his departure. The coach he was
to have taken was held up by the road agents and a passenger of the
name of Hughes was killed.
[Sidenote: COSTLY TRANSPORTATION.]
In Salt Lake City Captain La Barge remained for some time arranging
for the rest of his journey home. He could not hire a coach from Ben
Holiday, proprietor of the overland line, for less than eighteen
hundred dollars. The Wells-Fargo Express Company wanted twenty-five
hundred dollars to send the dust by way of San Francisco, and would
assume no responsibility. These conditions were not satisfactory, and
the Captain purchased a team and wagon, with which he and three or four
others undertook the journey alone. Their golddust was carried in bags
of thick buckskin.
[Sidenote: TEMPTING INDUCEMENTS.]
While in Salt Lake City the Captain renewed his acquaintance with
Brigham Young and other Mormons whom he had known on the Missouri. An
old friend of his of the name of Hooper, who had turned Mormon, and
later became a delegate from the Territory to Congress, called as soon
as he heard that La Barge was in town. He also found there another
friend, Hopkins by name, whom he had known from boyhood. Hopkins tried
his best to induce La Barge to join the Mormons. He assured the Captain
that if he would sell out in St. Louis and come to Utah it would be
his fortune. As proof of this, he referred to himself and others, who,
he said, had gone into Mormonism, not for any love of the doctrine,
but as a simple business proposition. Hooper and Hopkins had both been
unsuccessful in St. Louis. La Barge had taken them up on his boat to
Fort Kearney, about 1852, and had always esteemed them good men. He
asked the wife of one of them one day why her husband had never married
again, since the doctrine of the Church and the sentiment of the
community sanctioned it. “He doesn’t dare to; he knows _I_ would leave
him if he did,” she replied.
[Sidenote: DIGNITARIES OF THE MORMON CHURCH.]
The Captain called on Young several times. That dignitary received
him very hospitably, took him to the Tabernacle and other places of
interest, and presented him to several of his families. They went to
the theater together, where they sat in a box with Young’s favorite
wife, the other wives being ranged in seats below. Young never said
anything intended to convert La Barge to his religion. Other members
of the Church did, and particularly Orson Hyde, who was a man of
education and a very persuasive talker. La Barge heard a sermon by
Heber Kimball--a rough old fellow who took off his coat, rolled up his
sleeves, and waded in. His language was coarse and vulgar, and would
not bear repetition in refined ears.
The route of the Captain’s party, on leaving Salt Lake City, was
through Weber Cañon to Fort Bridger. They stopped there a short time
with Captain Carter, who, for many years, did business at that frontier
post. From there they made their way east, and left the mountain
country _via_ the valley of the Cache à la Poudre River. In the valley
of the South Platte they met an old man of the name of Geary, who told
them that a band of hostile Indians was scouring the country between
them and Denver, and that they had better conceal themselves for a few
days on an island in the Platte River. They acted upon this advice,
and when they judged the danger to be past they resumed their journey.
They had gone but a little way when they came to a spot where a party
of emigrants had been massacred only a day or two before. Their timely
measure of precaution was therefore well taken.
[Sidenote: A LONG VOYAGE.]
The rest of the journey was made without noteworthy incident. The
party reached the Missouri at Nebraska City just in time to catch the
last boat to St. Louis. They arrived home about December 1. Captain
La Barge found that the _Effie Deans_ had returned and had been
chartered by McCune’s company to go to Montgomery, Ala. She made this
trip in safety, returning to St. Louis before ice closed in. Probably
no other boat ever made so long a trip on inland waters in a single
season, including also a sea voyage, as did the _Effie Deans_ in 1864.
The distance on the Missouri up and back was 4570 miles; that on the
Mississippi to the Gulf and back was 2522 miles; that from Mobile to
Montgomery and back was 676 miles; and that across the Gulf from the
mouth of the Mississippi to Mobile and back not less than 600 miles.
The whole distance traveled was about 8400 miles.
[Sidenote: ANOTHER DILEMMA.]
In April, 1865, Captain La Barge started up the river again on the
_Effie Deans_. At Nebraska City came the news of Lee’s surrender,
and at Decatur that of the assassination of Lincoln. There was great
commotion among the passengers at the news of this terrible deed.
There were many ex-Confederates on board, some of whom expressed their
satisfaction at the event, and there might very easily have been
trouble between them and the Union passengers; but Captain La Barge
skillfully avoided all difficulty.
The voyage, though a tedious one, was completed without serious delay
or accident. Captain La Barge sent the boat back in charge of the
pilot, Captain Ray, and himself started with another outfit of goods
for the mines. This time he went to Helena, which had sprung into
existence since his last trip to Montana. He bought a small house in
which to store his goods and he and his son acted as salesmen.
[Sidenote: A TIMELY RESCUE.]
In the meanwhile Captain La Barge’s brother had again involved St.
Louis parties in serious difficulty on account of the non-delivery of
freight. John S. McCune had shipped to Fort Benton a fine cargo of
goods on the _Kate Kearney_, Captain John La Barge, master. The very
hostile attitude of the Indians caused the Captain to abandon the trip
a little above Fort Union. When the news reached the mines suits were
brought against McCune aggregating some three hundred thousand dollars.
As soon as word reached St. Louis, McCune saw the gravity of the
situation, and instantly dispatched a message to La Barge in Montana
_via_ the overland route. It fortunately reached the Captain before he
had finished his business in Helena, and he set out forthwith for Fort
Benton, leaving his son in charge of the store. He felt certain that
Captain Ray, the pilot of the _Effie Deans_, would not abandon the
cargo, and he was not mistaken. When Ray met the _Kate Kearney_, on his
return trip, he transferred the cargo to the _Effie Deans_, and brought
it back to Fort Galpin, a little above the mouth of Milk River, but
could get no further on account of low water. He then sent an express
to Fort Benton for teams. Captain La Barge was there at the time, and
at once procured thirty ox teams of five yoke each, with the necessary
wagons, and started for Fort Galpin. There he took all the freight and
delivered it safely at its destination. It was a prodigious task, but
its timely completion saved McCune from a disastrous loss. The suits
were all withdrawn, and the cost of transportation by wagon was the sum
of the extra expense.
La Barge left the Territory late in the season with fifty thousand
dollars in golddust. He went by way of Salt Lake City, where he and
two others chartered a coach to take them through to Nebraska City.
When within about fifty miles of Denver the stage driver refused to go
farther on account of the Indians, and the party were compelled to hire
a wagon and go the rest of the way alone. At Nebraska City they found
the steamboat _Denver_, on which they went to St. Joseph, and thence by
the railroad to St. Louis.
[Sidenote: AN UNEXPECTED DELIVERANCE.]
Captain La Barge had not been heard from in two months. He at once went
to McCune’s office to relieve the fears under which that gentleman had
so long been laboring. McCune came up to him, looked the travel-worn
Captain in the face, and said: “I don’t dare to ask you any questions.
I am afraid to know the worst.”
“Don’t be alarmed,” said La Barge; “I think I have straightened
everything out all right.”
“Are there no suits pending?” asked McCune.
“No; they are all settled, and here are the receipts.”
“How much has the misadventure cost me?”
“Not to exceed ten thousand dollars all told.”
McCune was overjoyed at the news, for he feared that he was ruined. As
it was, in spite of the extra expense, he would reap a handsome profit.
He threw his arms around La Barge and embraced him for joy at the
unexpected deliverance, and could never thereafter do enough for him.
CHAPTER XXIX.
CAPTAIN LA BARGE IN WASHINGTON.
In connection with his work for the government it became necessary for
Captain La Barge to make several visits to Washington. Considering the
interesting period through which the national Capital was then passing,
it was to be expected that these visits should present some features of
note. The Captain went to Washington in all three times, once in each
of the winters of 1862–65.
[Sidenote: INTERVIEW WITH LINCOLN.]
On the occasion of his first visit he was a member of a party who
called upon the President to present him with a fine robe of fur. Three
years before this Captain La Barge had promised Lincoln to procure for
him a good buffalo robe; but the rapid march of events and the great
matters that weighed upon the public mind had so far kept him from
fulfilling his promise. On the present occasion it was proposed to give
the President an elegant robe composed of ten beaver skins, the whole
richly lined and embroidered.
The members of the party were Dr. Walter A. Burleigh of Yankton,
Dak.; Captain La Barge, Charles E. Galpin,[63] and several others. Dr.
Burleigh acted as spokesman. The delegation were shown to a room apart
from the general reception room, and Lincoln, after a little while,
came in, saying that he had sent them in there so that he might have
some uninterrupted talk with them about the West. He remembered at once
the old steamboat Captain with whom he had ridden on the Missouri,
and he greeted La Barge with great cordiality. After some general
conversation Dr. Burleigh arose, took the robe, asked the President
to stand up, and then threw it over his shoulders. Lincoln folded it
around him like a blanket and danced about for an instant in Indian
fashion. He seemed greatly delighted with the gift. He then asked the
party many questions about the West, for the Indian troubles were at
that time causing the administration a great deal of annoyance.
[Sidenote: LINCOLN AND THE INDIAN.]
In the winter of 1863–64 La Barge saw the President again. The only
subject of importance which was touched upon on that occasion was the
Indian, in whose welfare he always displayed the deepest interest. As
it was a subject which had often aroused the Captain’s indignation and
pity, he made the most of his opportunity to acquaint the President
with the facts. He told him of the gross frauds practiced on the
Indians, and how their annuities, under present conditions, had to
pass through the hands of some of the worst rascals on the face of the
earth, who deliberately cheated the Indians right and left. Lincoln
replied that he knew it; that, under the stress of war, he was not
able to send just the men he would like to into that country as Indian
agents, and that too many of them were importunate place-seekers of
worthless character whom members of Congress were anxious to get rid
of somewhere. “But wait,” said he, “until I get this Rebellion off my
hands, and I will take up this question and see that justice is done
the Indian.”
The Captain made his third visit to Washington in the winter of
1864–65. His particular business was to secure payment on his
government contracts, which had been approved by the Department of
War and the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but disallowed by the Treasury.
He went to Secretary Chase, but was told by that gentleman that all
Missourians were _prima facie_ Rebels, and that that was why his
account was being held up. La Barge did not relish this very much, as
he had been doing business for the government all through the war, and
had even gone so far as to take the oath of allegiance. He went to
Lincoln and laid the matter before him. The President smiled at Chase’s
remark, gave La Barge a card with his autograph on it to hand to Chase,
and said he presumed that would fix matters all right. La Barge went
back, and the account was paid without further delay. La Barge, with
his usual distrust of the American Fur Company, suspected that some of
its members had been giving him a bad character in Washington in order
further to cripple his opposition.
[Sidenote: THE BLACKFOOT’S ANNUITIES.]
[Sidenote: FINAL EVIDENCE.]
On the occasion of his interview with the President he brought up the
matter of the Blackfoot annuities, explicitly charging that these
goods had been wrongfully disposed of and had not reached their
proper destination. Lincoln sent for the proper officer of the Indian
Department to hear La Barge’s accusation. This officer stated that he
had receipts signed by the Indian chiefs saying that they had received
their annuities. The signatures of the Indians were witnessed by agents
of the American Fur Company. La Barge declared that the receipts were
false; that he had himself carried these goods and knew that the
Indians had not received them, but that they had been appropriated by
the American Fur Company and sold. “Well,” said the official, “there
are the receipts; we cannot go back of them; they have been considered
final evidence in such cases since the foundation of the government.”
And there the matter rested.
While in Washington on this visit La Barge was summoned before the
Senate Committee on Pacific railroads and questioned by B. Gratz Brown
upon his knowledge of the Western country and his opinion upon the
availability of certain routes for a transcontinental line.
[Sidenote: LOOK AT YOUR MAP.]
Before he left Washington the Captain was the central figure in an
amusing little incident that occurred at Ford’s Theater. _Harper’s
Weekly_ had published a story of La Barge’s steamboating experiences
which ran something like this: On one of his trips up the river in the
earlier part of his career there were several Englishmen aboard. They
had a map and applied themselves industriously for the first day or
two in trying to identify the various places upon it with those along
their route. They were in the pilot-house a good deal, and one of them
questioned La Barge rather officiously about the geography of the
country.
“What place is this that we are approaching, Mr. Pilot?” he asked.
“St. Charles, sir,” La Barge replied.
“You are mistaken, sir; according to the map it is ----”
La Barge made no reply. He stopped as usual at St. Charles and then
went on his way. Presently they came to another village.
“What place, Captain?” inquired the Englishman.
“Washington, Mo., sir.”
“Wrong again. The map gives this place as ----.”
This experience was gone through several times, the Captain’s temper
becoming more ruffled with each repetition, though no one would
have suspected it from his unruffled exterior. Presently a flock
of wild geese passed over the river and drew the attention of the
passengers and crew. The Englishmen were standing on the hurricane roof
immediately in front of the pilot-house.
“What kind of birds are those, Captain?” asked one of them in eager
haste.
The Captain, whose language still smacked somewhat of the French idiom,
replied:
“Look at your map; he tell you.”
The printed programme of the evening at the theater happened to have
this story under the heading of “Old Joe La Barge.” The Captain and
some friends occupied a box, and as there were several persons in the
audience who knew him, the fact that the hero of the story was in the
box soon spread itself about. At one of the pauses in the performance
someone called out for La Barge to stand up, and cries of “La Barge”
soon came from all parts of the house. The modest steamboat pilot was
panic-stricken at the occurrence and clung desperately to his seat,
whereupon the audience called for him the more; but nothing would
induce him to stir.
[Sidenote: AN EXTENSIVE ACQUAINTANCE.]
We may here properly refer to Captain La Barge’s extensive acquaintance
with public men of the West. His prominence in the carrying trade of
Western rivers, when travel was largely done by boat, brought him into
contact with distinguished characters from all parts of the country.
There were few public men in the West whom he did not know, and his
personal estimate of their character as they appeared to him is not
without interest and value. We have already noted his acquaintance with
Audubon, General Warren, Dr. Hayden, Brigham Young, and others.
The Captain knew General Lee when the latter was stationed in St. Louis
as an officer of engineers in charge of river and harbor works on the
Mississippi and the Missouri rivers.
He knew both of the Johnstons,--Albert Sidney and Joseph E.,--and
at the time of the Mormon War transported much of the supplies and
munitions of war used by Albert Sidney Johnston on his arduous and
perilous campaign.
[Sidenote: GENERAL GRANT.]
He saw Grant for the first time during the Mexican War, and frequently
in later years when he lived near St. Louis. In Grant’s visits to town
La Barge became well acquainted with him. He saw him in the early part
of the war, while Fremont was in command at St. Louis. He was trying to
get an interview with the General, but that officer was harder to reach
than a king or the Pope. He would keep people waiting for hours, and
then as like as not refuse them an audience. In the winter of 1864–65
La Barge saw Grant in Washington. The head of the armies of the Union
spoke to the steamboat pilot in as equal and friendly a way as when
he was unloading wood in St. Louis. He asked the Captain if there was
anything that he could do for him, and expressed his desire to serve
him if he could.
[Sidenote: GENERAL FREMONT.]
La Barge saw a great deal at one time and another of General Fremont.
He first met him when he went up the river as the assistant to the
distinguished geographer and scientist, Jean I. Nicollet. Nicollet’s
party traveled on the boat which La Barge was piloting. At Leavenworth
there was an extremely rapid current, and La Barge expressed a
curiosity to know what its velocity was. Nicollet at once sent Fremont
to measure it. It was found to be eleven miles per hour in the swiftest
place. La Barge’s opinion of Fremont was that which seems to have
universally prevailed in St. Louis--that he was a greatly overrated
man, and that his success was due more to his fortunate marriage than
to his own merit. We must dissent, in a measure, from this view. In his
proper niche, Fremont was a great man. He found that niche in the work
of exploring the unknown West. In the faculty of making the unknown
known, of doing work in such a way as to make its results popular with
the public, in spreading a knowledge of the Great West throughout his
country and throughout the world, he stood without a peer among the
explorers of that region. In the broader field of national politics or
great military responsibility, he was wading beyond his depth.
[Sidenote: THOMAS H. BENTON.]
Thomas H. Benton, Fremont’s father-in-law, and Missouri’s greatest
statesman, was an intimate acquaintance of Captain La Barge, the
two men having known each other from La Barge’s childhood until
Benton’s death. Captain La Barge had a great admiration for the bluff
old Senator, although he did not like the way in which he used his
powerful influence in shielding the American Fur Company on so many
occasions from the just consequences of their illegal acts. Benton
was a frequent passenger on the Missouri River boats, and La Barge saw
a great deal of him there. He recalled particularly a trip which the
Senator made as far up as Kansas City, where he went to meet Fremont,
who was returning from the West. It was a very interesting voyage.
The people all along the river wanted to see him, and calls for “Old
Bullion” compelled him to appear at every landing place. He made
numerous addresses, and the boat was frequently delayed to permit this
interchange of greetings between the people and their distinguished
servant. Benton was in the pilot-house a great deal,--as every traveler
in those days liked to be,--and La Barge never forgot his expression
of deep faith in the future of the West, so unlike that of most of
his Congressional associates from east of the Mississippi. He said
once to Captain La Barge: “You will live to see railroads across to
the Pacific, and up the Missouri beyond the Great Falls.” La Barge,
a much younger man, replied that he scarcely expected to see that
in his lifetime. “But I have,” said the Captain, in telling of this
conversation, “and I have seen far more than even Senator Benton dared
to hope for.” In the same line of thought the Senator once said, as he
pointed to the west, which was overspread with the marvelous glow of
evening: “That is the East”--for he felt that we should yet go in that
direction to reach the treasures of the Orient.
[Sidenote: NOTED MEN OF THE WEST.]
The interesting notes of Captain La Barge’s observations of public
men with whom he was thrown in contact would fill a volume. His
acquaintance with the army was very extensive, owing to the Indian wars
along the Missouri, and he personally knew nearly all the principal
officers from General Sherman down. The same was true of the Indian
agents, Territorial officers, and leading business men of the West.
In a time when so much public travel went by steamboat he enjoyed
exceptional opportunities of seeing and knowing the men who made the
history of the Western country.
CHAPTER XXX.
THE INDIANS OF THE MISSOURI VALLEY.
The course of this narrative has shown that a large portion of the
business of the Missouri River steamboats pertained to the Indians who
dwelt on the banks of that stream. The great valley had been their home
for unknown generations. The tribes were distributed along its course
or those of its tributaries, from its mouth to their sources. First
came the Missouris, whose name the river still bears--a tribe long
since extinct as a separate organization. The Osages and the Kansas
likewise bequeathed their names to the rivers in whose valleys they
dwelt. The Omahas have lived, since the white man knew them, a short
distance above the city which perpetuates their name, while a hundred
miles to the westward in the valley of the Loup Fork of the Platte
dwelt the four tribes of the Pawnees. From the point where Sioux City
now stands, northward nearly to the British line, the great nation of
the Sioux held a wide tract of country on both sides of the river.
Within their territory dwelt the treacherous Aricaras, near the mouth
of the Grand River, and the stalwart Cheyennes at the eastern base of
the Black Hills. The unhappy tribe of the Mandans lived near the river
some distance north of the modern town of Bismarck, and near them were
the Minnetarees, or Grosventres of the Missouri. Along the northern
shore of the river from the Mandans to Milk River, and northward far
into British territory, roamed the numerous bands of the Assiniboines,
one of the most populous of the plains tribes. From Milk River to the
sources of the Missouri was the land of the hostile Blackfeet, where
dwelt the Piegan, Blood, and Blackfoot bands and the Grosventres of
the Prairies. Finally, in the valley of the Yellowstone and its great
tributary the Bighorn, was Absaroka, the home of the proud tribe of the
Crows.
[Sidenote: GRAVITATE TOWARD THE RIVER.]
All of these tribes gravitated toward the great watercourses, as man,
in every stage of his history has done. It was not in this case the
use of the stream as a transportation route that made it attractive.
The Missouri Valley tribes, unlike those of the Great Lakes, or the
Coast, or the northern rivers, were not good navigators. The stream
was a treacherous one, and its shores did not yield a timber suitable
to the crude workmanship of the Indian. Skin boats were used to a
limited extent, but as a rule the horse and not the boat was the means
of travel and transportation. The great importance of the river
arose from other considerations. In a region where streams are scarce
and where most of them dry up in the summer, this river furnished a
never-failing supply of as healthy a drinking water as flows on the
surface of the globe. Then its valley was the only timbered region of
consequence for hundreds of miles on either side. Groves of cottonwood,
walnut, cedar, and willow lined its banks, and the Indian here found
all the wood that his simple order of life required. The abundant
groves along the bottoms gave splendid shelter from the heat of summer
and the cold of winter.
[Sidenote: STRANGE VISITORS.]
The entire watershed of the river was thus originally occupied by
Indians. Considering its extensive area, their numbers were very
few--scarcely one to ten square miles. But as they mostly dwelt near
the rivers, the country seemed to the early navigators more densely
populated than it really was. Into this primeval domain there came,
more than two centuries ago, strange visitors who never went away. They
were welcomed at first; but every foot of ground they gained was held,
farther and farther up the river to its source among the mountains,
thence to the River of the West, and down its rugged valleys to the
western sea. It was a sad day to the tribes of the Missouri Valley, as
to every other, when the white man came, but a far sadder day when
the emigrant and settler came. Between these two epochs there was
a long interval in which the paleface and his red brother lived in
comparative harmony together. It was the era of the trader. Under the
fur-trade régime the Indian might have continued his native mode of
life indefinitely. The trader never sought to change it. He introduced
but few innovations; had no desire to introduce any; and looked with as
jealous an eye as the Indian himself upon the approach of civilization.
This relation of the two races was ideal, and during its continuance
the Indian is seen at his best.
[Sidenote: THE COMING OF THE EMIGRANT.]
All this was changed when the emigrant came. The traders were few in
number and made no permanent settlements. The emigrants came by the
thousand and spread themselves all over the country. They made roads,
discovered rich mines, laid out cities, and declared their purpose
to send the “fire-horse” across the plains, as they had sent the
“fire canoe” up the great river. Before this ever-increasing host the
game wasted away. It was estimated that in the single year 1853 four
hundred thousand buffalo were slain. As the buffalo was the very life
of the plains tribes, its extermination meant inevitable starvation or
hopeless dependence upon the government.
[Sidenote: AN UNSOLVABLE PROBLEM.]
All this the Indian foresaw with unerring vision, and it affected
him just as it would any other independent people. A state of unrest
ensued. Depredations and outrages occurred--for the Indian understood
no other way of expressing his displeasure,--and the government was
forced to interfere. The era of the fur trade came to an end, and that
of the treaty, the agent, and the annuity, began--an era whose history
will bring the blush of shame to its readers to the latest generations.
And yet it would be wholly unjust to charge the flagrant wrongs which
followed to this or that particular cause. History will exonerate
the government from any but the purest motives in its dealings with
the Indians. It may have been unwise in some of its measures; it was
certainly weak in carrying its purposes into effect; but it always
sought, with the light it possessed, the highest good of the Indian.
The problem, unfortunately, was beyond human wisdom to solve. The
ablest minds of this country and century have grappled with it in
vain. It was the problem of how to commit a great wrong without doing
any wrong--how to deprive the Indian of his birthright in such a way
that he should feel that no injustice had been done him. It was the
decree of destiny that the European should displace the native American
upon his own soil. No earthly power could prevent it. _This_ was the
wrong; all else was purely incidental; and whatever consideration or
generosity might attend the details of the change, nothing could alter
the stern and fundamental fact.[64]
[Sidenote: THE TREATY SYSTEM.]
[Sidenote: POLICY OF INSINCERITY.]
With this impossible problem our law-givers wrestled for a century
in vain. They sought to deal with the Indian on a basis of political
equality, where such equality did not and could not exist. The treaty
system was the outgrowth of this attempt. Perhaps it was impossible to
deal with the Indians except by treaty, but it is difficult at this day
to see the wisdom of that method. It only deferred the inevitable. It
made promises which, in the nature of things, could not be kept.[65]
Made to be broken, they served no other purpose than to lull the
natives into temporary quiet while the paleface was fastening his
grip ever more tightly upon their country. It was throughout a policy
of insincerity; the fostering of a spirit of independent sovereignty
when in fact the tribes were only vassals. Like all insincerity, it
bred endless wrong. The loss of his lands would not have been so bad to
him if he had understood it from the start; but as it was, he had not
only to bear this loss, but the ever-increasing evidence of the white
man’s bad faith; and he thus came to hate the whites and distrust their
government.[66]
This, if we were to venture a criticism, has been the government’s
one great mistake in dealing with the Indians. A firm attitude of
authority toward the tribes, with an unqualified claim to sovereignty
of the soil, and an assertion of the right to reduce it and them to a
condition of ultimate civilization, would have eliminated the element
of bad faith which has always characterized the treaty system. But
instead of this the government continued to foster to the last the
notion of tribal sovereignty over the lands of the West. Under the
farce of obtaining these lands by treaty it saved itself from the
charge of wresting them by force from the Indian. It was a distinction
without a difference, and in its effort to save its honor in one
direction, it hopelessly sacrificed it in another.
[Sidenote: TREATY OF FORT LARAMIE.]
[Sidenote: A SUCCESSFUL COUNCIL.]
The first general treaty with the tribes of the upper Missouri was
held at Fort Laramie in September, 1851. It included nearly every
tribe in the valley from the Omahas up, except the Blackfeet. The
Indians came from far and near and pitched their separate camps on
the council ground. Tribes that had never met before here made each
other’s acquaintance. Others, who had met only on the battlefield,
encamped side by side in peace. The government was represented by
men of experience and dignity. In particular, Superintendent D. D.
Mitchell and Father P. J. De Smet were men in whom the Indians felt
the most implicit trust. The council was convened for the purpose of
coming to some understanding among the tribes themselves and between
them and the whites as to their immediate future relations. It was
hoped to put an end to inter-tribal wars and to outrages upon the
emigrants, and to secure the right of way for roads and railroads
across the Indian lands. The several tribes showed the greatest
interest in the work of the council. The deliberations were conducted
with solemnity and evident sincerity on both sides. The presents from
the government were munificent and well chosen, and were received with
deep satisfaction. When the work of the council was completed, the
tribes bade each other farewell, and departed for their several homes
with every appearance of mutual trust and friendship. To all outward
appearances the council had been a complete success. Treaties were
made with all the tribes present. The gifts received were to be in
full compensation for all previous losses caused by the white man, and
the Indians were to receive goods annually to the aggregate amount of
fifty thousand dollars. The treaties, as amended in Washington, were to
remain in force for fifteen years. Four years later a similar treaty
was made near Fort Benton with the several bands of the Blackfeet by a
commission consisting of Governor I. I. Stevens and Alfred Cummings,
Superintendent of Indian Affairs.
[Sidenote: A MIXING OF GOODS.]
It was thus that the annuity system came into extensive vogue among the
tribes of the upper Missouri. It probably gave rise to more abuses than
any other one thing in the conduct of Indian affairs. The temptations
for fraud were as great as the opportunities for its commission were
numerous and excellent, and it required more than average public
virtue to resist them. The Indian could not go to the market and
help select his goods; he had no hand in awarding the contracts for
their transportation to his country; nor any means of seeing that he
received what he was entitled to. His only function was to accept
what the agent saw fit to give him. During the Civil War, when the
currency depreciated to such an enormous extent, the annuities shrank
in quantity as prices went up, and the Indian was a heavy loser from
causes that he could not comprehend. The annuities were always sent
up the river in the boats of the traders, generally in those of the
American Fur Company. The agents were given no escort and no separate
residence or warehouse, and were compelled to throw themselves upon
the hospitality of the traders. In this way the annuity goods became
mixed with those of the traders, and the Indian paid in furs for what
he was entitled to as a free gift. This abuse was a grave one and very
difficult to correct, for all that the Department required in evidence
of the delivery was the signature of the chiefs, witnessed in the usual
manner. It is easy to see how wide open the door was in this business
for the commission of almost unlimited fraud.[67]
[Sidenote: ANNUITY SYSTEM.]
It is doubtful if, during the period from 1850 to 1870, the Indian
tribes along the Missouri River received more than half the bounty
which was promised them by the government.
[Sidenote: A CORRUPT ATMOSPHERE.]
In the early days of the Republic the conduct of Indian affairs was in
the hands of the military authorities, and it has always been a mooted
question whether it ought not to have remained there. The verdict of
history will undoubtedly be that it should. The spoils system came
into absolute control of the agencies, and fitness and experience
received scant consideration. There was more or less friction between
the agents and the military, for the latter always had to be called
in when the former could no longer control their flocks. But the
greatest defect of the system was the total absence of anything like
a fixed and recognized procedure. The annual reports of the agents
show how utterly lacking in all the elements of practical business was
their haphazard management. Every new agent felt called upon, as a
necessary preliminary to his own work, to criticise the conduct of his
predecessor. He put forth new schemes and tried new experiments, until
finally he himself made way for a successor who in turn deplored the
failures of those who had gone before him.
Probably the majority of the agents were men of average integrity, but
there were many who sought the business solely for “what there was in
it.” The whole atmosphere of the Indian trade was so against an honest
conduct of the business that an agent who should undertake to enforce
strict integrity in his official work was regarded as a fit subject
for an asylum of the feeble-minded. At one time the experiment was
tried of appointing only clergymen to the agencies. But the scheme was
a visionary one. What these agents made up in honesty they lacked in
experience, and were pliant tools in the hands of the shrewd trader.
Their saintly character, moreover, was not always a sure panoply
against the attacks of worldly temptation. To more than one of them,
in the words of Captain La Barge, “a dollar looked bigger than a
cart wheel,” and they, like the rest, learned how to connive at the
crookedness of the traders. But whatever their virtues or intentions,
they were powerless to accomplish any good work. The fault was in
the system, which was inherently vicious, and mere honesty in the
individual could not eliminate its defects.
[Sidenote: THE SYSTEM AT FAULT.]
The actual results of the treaty-annuity-agency system in the conduct
of Indian affairs are now matters of history. No treaty that it
was possible to devise could stand. The encroachment of settlement
continually increased. It led to resistance on the part of the
Indians, and resistance to chastisement and to new treaties, and these
invariably to loss of territory and abridgment of rights. At last it
led to war, and the final transition of nearly all the tribes to their
present situation was accompanied by scenes of blood.
It is not possible to follow here the intricate pathway of the treaty
system through the quarter century after 1850, for it is a long story.
There were treaty after treaty, commission after commission, and a
constant exercise of its best offices on the part of the government
to reach some satisfactory result; but in vain. The life of a people,
like that of an individual, cannot be extinguished without a struggle.
Whether in this case the inevitable struggle was intensified by the
procrastinating policy of the government may be an open question.
It probably was, for it was preceded by years of bad faith, broken
pledges, and cruel wrongs, until the hearts of this unhappy people were
embittered, and they drew the sword in a spirit of hatred and revenge.
[Sidenote: THE INDIAN AND THE STEAMBOAT.]
Throughout the painful annals of the river tribes during the past
century there was no more attractive feature of their relations with
the whites than the means of transportation by which the paleface came
to their country. The keelboat and the steamboat are a part of their
life history. The steamboat in particular came to be what the buffalo
had been--their principal resource for the necessities of life. It was
a difficult rôle that it had to fill. To the Indian it was friend and
foe, truth and falsehood, honor and shame, alike. It brought the early
traders with their welcome merchandise, and alas! with their liquor and
the smallpox. It brought the Commissioners to make treaties, and the
annuities which those treaties guaranteed. It brought the Indian agent
and the evils that followed in his train, and finally it brought the
sword. When the Indian at last gave up the fight he and the steamboat
abandoned the river together, and both are now strangers where once
they made the entire valley teem with life.
CHAPTER XXXI.
THE ARMY ON THE MISSOURI.
The rôle which the army was called upon to fill in the history of our
Indian affairs was a most unpleasant one. It began while the proud
spirit of the tribes was as yet unbroken, but had been aroused by
ever-increasing aggression to the point of active resistance. It then
became necessary to subdue them by force to absolute subordination to
the government, and to remove them from their larger hunting grounds
to small reservations. This thankless task devolved upon the army. It
was not merely a thankless task, but a most arduous and formidable one.
Compared with service in the Indian campaigns, that in the South during
the Civil War was a holiday pastime. What tragedy in all our national
wars can compare with the battle of the Little Big Horn? What record
of retreat and pursuit is there like that of the Nez Percé campaign of
1877? Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow had no terrors for the individual
soldier like those of the winter campaign of Crook in the Powder River
country in March, 1876, when it was so cold that the men were not
permitted to go to sleep at night for fear they would never wake up.
[Sidenote: THE WEIGHT OF A DREAD POWER.]
In the course of twenty years after 1855 military posts sprang up
all over the West. There was scarcely an Indian trail in that entire
region that did not witness the passage of government troops. From one
haunt to another his relentless pursuers tracked the desperate Indian.
Ambushes and massacres were met with crushing defeats in battle, but
the general drift of the conflict was uniformly one way. The Indian was
learning the weight of that dread power which had so far tolerated his
independence, but was now to extinguish it forever. The struggle lasted
in its main features about sixteen years, or from 1862 to 1877; but its
extreme limits were the Grattan Massacre of August 19, 1854, and the
battle of Wounded Knee, December 29, 1890.
For some years the Indians who were parties to the treaty of Laramie
observed its conditions fairly well; but in 1854 an unfortunate affair
occurred which temporarily interrupted the general peace. Some fifteen
hundred Indians of three different Sioux bands were encamped in the
Platte Valley, about six miles below Fort Laramie, in August of that
year. One of the Indians drove off and killed a stray cow belonging to
an emigrant train. The owner complained of the theft to the officer in
command at Laramie, and Lieutenant Grattan, with about twenty men, was
sent to bring in the thief. He probably did not show very much tact
in performing his delicate task, and made the mistake of attempting
to take the culprit by force in the presence of nearly ten times his
number of Indians. The result was the massacre of his entire party. The
Indians then went to the American Fur Company warehouse, where their
annuity goods were in waiting, broke open the building, and carried off
the annuities.
[Sidenote: BATTLE OF ASH HOLLOW.]
Thereupon the government ordered General Harney to take the field with
a military force, establish convenient bases of supplies, protect the
frontier and the emigrant routes, and to deal a heavy blow upon the
offending Indians. On September 3, 1855, General Harney attacked a
large force of Indians who had taken part in the Grattan massacre,
completely routed them, killed and captured upward of two hundred, and
destroyed nearly all their property. This affair took place across the
Platte River from Ash Hollow, a noted situation on the emigrant trail,
from which the battle has taken its name.
General Harney next moved his force to the Missouri River, where
the old trading post of Fort Pierre had been lately acquired by the
government, and there held councils with various tribes, which again
resulted in general pacification. In the following year the important
military post of Fort Randall was built, and Fort Pierre was abandoned
because of its undesirable situation. General Harney discharged his
task in a manner highly creditable to himself and satisfactory both to
the Indians and the government; and seven years were to elapse before
any further difficulty of a serious character should occur.
[Sidenote: SITUATION GROWING WORSE.]
[Sidenote: INTRIGUES OF THE HALF-BREEDS.]
But while the severe lesson of Ash Hollow, the frank counsel of General
Harney, and the presence of a military force at Fort Randall, kept
the tribes in comparative peace, the wrongs from which they suffered
continually increased, and their temper grew constantly worse. The
discovery of gold in Montana brought a multitude of emigrants to and
through this country, with the consequent destruction of game and
threats of roads and railroads and loss of lands. Events were fast
developing into a crisis, when the outbreak of the Civil War in the
United States gave the tribes their desired opportunity. The frontier
garrisons were depleted in order that the regular troops might be sent
south. New levies made up of the able-bodied citizens went away to
the war. The Indian was quick to see how this movement weakened the
frontier settlements. He was made to believe, by gross exaggeration,
that the situation of the Great Father in Washington was a desperate
one, that his capital was about to be taken and his power destroyed.
It has been asserted that the Confederates had emissaries among
the Indians, but there is no proof of any direct intrigue of this
character. Indirectly, however, they exercised a powerful influence
upon them. The people of the British possessions, like those of
the mother country, sympathized ardently with the South, and this
sympathy found effective expression in the intercourse of the British
half-breeds north of the boundary with the Indians south. These
half-breeds knew the border tribes perfectly, and had greater influence
with them than the whites, who were strangers to their customs and
the authors of their many wrongs. Selfish motives of trade combined
with national prejudice to stir up strife against the Americans and
to provide means for making that strife effective. The half-breeds
circulated freely south of the border, and the tracks of their carts
could be seen everywhere from the Red River of the North to the
Missouri River. They brought powder and balls, guns, rum, and regular
merchandise of trade, and their influence at this particular time
was decisive. Their territory, moreover, offered a sure asylum from
punishment for any outrages which the Indians might commit.[68]
[Sidenote: THE MINNESOTA MASSACRE.]
Trouble first broke out in 1862 among the Minnesota Indians, where the
evil conditions from which the tribes had been suffering had reached an
acute stage. Under the leadership of a noted Sioux chief, Little Crow,
the Indians in the valley of the Minnesota River above Mankato attacked
the settlement of New Ulm and others in that vicinity, on the 18th
of August, murdering and taking captive the inhabitants, destroying
property, and spreading consternation in every direction. In the course
of three days nearly a thousand persons were killed and two million
dollars’ worth of property destroyed.
The State and national governments sent instant relief; the outrages
were checked; the Indians were driven up the Minnesota Valley and
beaten in several battles; the captive whites were mostly released,
and a large number of hostiles engaged in the massacre were taken
prisoners. This work was done under the immediate leadership of General
H. H. Sibley, first Governor of Minnesota. The captured Indians were
tried by court martial, and a great number were condemned to death, but
this penalty was commuted by President Lincoln except in the cases of
thirty-eight, who were hanged at Mankato, December 26, 1862.
[Sidenote: AN INDIAN WAR.]
In the meanwhile the Indians under Little Crow, though checked and
driven back, were not conquered or discouraged. Their emissaries were
active among the tribes of the Missouri, who were aroused almost to
the point of war. The execution of the Indians at Mankato exasperated
Little Crow to a desperate pitch, and he vowed extermination of the
whites. It was clear that an Indian war was at hand, and the government
at once prepared for it. Its conduct was placed in the hands of General
John Pope, who had been relieved from his command of the Army of the
Potomac after the second Bull Run, and was now in command of the
Department of the Northwest, with headquarters at Milwaukee. General
Pope organized two expeditions, one under General Sibley, to move west
from Mankato against the Indians and drive them toward the Missouri,
and the other under General Sully, to move from Sioux City up the
Missouri and cut off their retreat. The plan was well conceived, but
the extreme low water in the Missouri in 1863 prevented General Sully
from receiving his supplies in time to carry out his part of the
programme.
[Sidenote: EXPEDITION OF GENERAL SIBLEY.]
Sibley’s expedition left Camp Pope in the Minnesota Valley June 16,
1863, and two days later that of General Sully left Sioux City.
Sibley’s route lay up the Minnesota to its source, thence by way of
Lake Traverse to the Cheyenne River of North Dakota, and up that stream
toward Devil’s Lake, where the Indians were supposed to be. Learning
that they had left that region and had gone toward the Missouri,
General Sibley changed his march to the southwest, and pursued the
retreating enemy with great vigor. He came upon them and fought three
battles within a week--Big Mound, July 24; Dead Buffalo Lake, July 26;
and Stony Lake, July 28. The Indians were defeated in all three fights,
and then crossed the Missouri River just below where Bismarck, N. D.,
now stands. General Sibley reached that stream on July 29, and here his
expedition ended. Two days later his command set out on its homeward
march.[69]
At this time General Sully was at Fort Pierre. The transportation of
his supplies had delayed him, and it was not until the 14th of August
that he started from that point on his march north. He went up the
east bank of the Missouri, with a great deal of vexatious delay, and
finally reached the scene of Sibley’s third fight just a month after it
had taken place. The Indians, meanwhile, far from being conquered or
dispirited, had recrossed the river and were on their way back to the
grazing grounds on the Coteau of the Missouri. Some of them harassed
the homeward-bound column of General Sibley. Sully pursued them to the
northeast and overtook and fought them at Whitestone Hill, some thirty
miles south and slightly west of Jamestown, N. D. The Indians were
badly defeated, many of them were killed, and a large amount of their
property was destroyed. Sully then returned to the Missouri and built a
new post, Fort Sully, on the left bank of the river, opposite the head
of Farm Island, midway between Fort Pierre and Fort George. With this
work the campaign of 1863 came to an end.
[Sidenote: CAMPAIGN INDECISIVE.]
The movements of troops in this campaign and the force of Indians
engaged were the largest yet known in the history of the United
States. The number of warriors was estimated at over six thousand,
while the troops under Sibley and Sully numbered about four thousand.
The campaign, however, was not conclusive. Although the Indians had
been defeated with severe loss in every engagement, they were still
unsubdued, and retained their defiant attitude during the following
winter. Accordingly another campaign was planned for the summer of
1864. General Sully was placed in charge with a cavalry force of about
2500 men.
[Sidenote: SULLY’S CAMPAIGN OF 1864.]
General Sully’s first move was to build a post near the mouth of
the Cannon Ball River--Fort Rice, forty miles below where Bismarck
now stands, and on the other side of the river. The Indians being
reported as near the source of Heart River, General Sully concluded
to continue his march in search of them, whether found or not, until
he should reach the Yellowstone River. He took with him only the
necessary rations for the march and sent his steamboats with supplies
and materials for a new post around to meet him at the Brasseau Houses
on the Yellowstone, fifty miles above the mouth of that stream.
Accompanying Sully’s march to the Yellowstone was an emigrant train of
about 125 people bound for the mines of Montana.
Sully’s route lay up the Cannon Ball River nearly to its source, and
thence across to the head waters of Heart River. Here the General
packed his train and left it with the emigrants under a strong guard,
and himself and command, in light marching order, struck out for Knife
River, where the Indians were reported encamped. He found them as
expected. They were defiant and eager for battle, and an engagement
immediately followed. The Indians were badly defeated, a large number
being killed, and all of their property destroyed. This was the battle
of Tahkahokuty, or Killdeer Mountain, and was fought July 28, 1864.
[Sidenote: THE ARMY REACHES THE YELLOWSTONE.]
Sully then returned to his camp on Heart River, and, under the guidance
of a single Indian, who, of all those with him, professed to know a
passable route, started on the perilous undertaking of carrying a wagon
train through the Bad Lands to the Yellowstone River. The route was
west to the Little Missouri, where it turned sharply to the northwest
and struck the Yellowstone about fifteen miles below the Brasseau
Houses. This point was reached on the 12th of August, and fortunately
the supply steamers were close at hand to relieve the necessities of
the troops. This was the first expedition across the Bad Lands of North
Dakota, and was accomplished at the cost of great labor and suffering.
The command crossed the Yellowstone and then marched to the Missouri
River opposite Fort Union. This stream was forded with much peril, and
the troops then returned to Fort Rice along the north shore. Garrisons
were left at Forts Union and Berthold, but the contemplated post on the
Yellowstone could not be built, owing to the wrecking of one of the
steamers with most of the material on board.
Thus the military forces of the United States were advanced in
permanent occupation to the mouth of the Yellowstone River. Only twice
before had the uniform of the American soldier been so far up the
Missouri--in 1805–06, when the Lewis and Clark expedition passed this
point, and in 1825, when General Atkinson took his command to a point
about a hundred miles farther up. Neither of these earlier visits
contemplated permanent occupation.
[Sidenote: SIGNS OF WEAKENING.]
By this time the Indians began to realize the magnitude of the power
they were contending with, and to show signs of weakening. No extensive
campaign was found necessary along the river for a number of years,
although many of the Indians continued hostile and committed numerous
depredations. The termination of the Civil War, with complete victory
for the government, and the release of so many soldiers from Southern
fields who could now be sent to the frontier, all tended to make the
Indians proceed in their schemes of war with greater caution and
hesitation. Could the evils of our Indian system have been corrected
the tribes might readily have been brought to terms of “lasting peace,”
which was so confidently predicted at the time by Indian agents and
even by some military officers.
In this matter of the military conquest of the Missouri Valley, as in
that treated in the last chapter, it is not possible, with our present
space, to follow in detail the course of events during the next twelve
years. The army made some new advances every year, not only in the
Missouri Valley, but throughout the entire West. Campaigns, battles,
and some appalling massacres occurred, and the soldiers became as
familiar with the country and as expert in savage methods of warfare as
the Indian himself. Finally, in 1875–77, came the last act in the great
tragedy, by which the power of the Sioux nation was broken and their
career as an independent people brought to an end.
[Sidenote: NON-TREATY SIOUX.]
Great efforts had been made for several years to reduce the Sioux
tribes, by peaceable methods, to life on the reservations. Several
government commissions were sent to them, and one in particular, of
which General Sherman was a member, went into the whole matter with
the greatest possible care. Most of the Sioux were finally located on
the reservations and appeared to be peaceably disposed. But there were
some exceptions, estimated to number not more than six or eight hundred
warriors, who had persistently refused from the first to recognize in
any way the treaties or other arrangements with the government. The
agents had failed to get them to quiet down on the reservations, and
they continued to roam over the country as of old, subsisting upon the
fruits of the chase. They were uncompromisingly hostile to the whites
and their Indian allies, and committed outrages without number upon
both. Finally the Indian Department served notice upon them that unless
they settled down on the reservations before January 31, 1876, they
would be turned over to the military authorities and be dealt with by
force. The Indians paid no attention to this ultimatum, and their case
was accordingly placed in the hands of the army.
[Sidenote: CAMPAIGN OF 1876.]
An effort was made to reach these Indians by a winter campaign, but
after one attempt, which ended in a battle of no decisive results, the
scheme was abandoned, because the excessive cold made it impossible
to conduct operations in that shelterless country. General Sheridan,
who was charged with the conduct of this important business, thereupon
planned a campaign which was to be carried out as soon as the season
would permit. He determined upon a concentric movement by which bodies
of troops from widely separated localities should move upon a given
section where it was believed that the hostile band would be found.
General Crook was to start from Fort Fetterman, on the Platte, and
move north; General Terry from Fort Abraham Lincoln, on the Missouri,
and move west; and General Gibbon from Fort Ellis, in western Montana,
and move east. The point of rendezvous was to be in the Yellowstone
Valley near the mouth of the Powder River, or wherever in that vicinity
further development might indicate. General Crook left Fort Fetterman
May 29 with about 1000 men; General Terry left Fort Lincoln May 17 with
about 1000 men, sending his supplies around into the Yellowstone by
steamboat. General Gibbon, with 450 men, left Fort Ellis on the 1st of
April, crossed over to the Yellowstone, and marched down the left bank
of that stream.
[Sidenote: ERRONEOUS ESTIMATES.]
Up to this time all obtainable evidence indicated that the hostile
Indians did not number more than 800 warriors. As a matter of fact,
discontented Indians from nearly all the surrounding Sioux and Cheyenne
agencies had for some time past been leaving the reservations and going
to the hostiles, until the latter had gathered a force of not less than
2500 men. It was against this force, more than three times as large as
was supposed, that the joint movement of Generals Terry, Crook, and
Gibbon was directed.
General Crook was the first to encounter the Indians. He met and fought
them on the head of the Rosebud River June 17, and although the Indians
withdrew, the battle was indecisive, and the great number of the
Indians, as disclosed by the fight, induced General Crook not to take
the risk of going further. He withdrew to the valley of Goose Creek and
sent for re-enforcements.
Generals Terry and Gibbon met about fifteen miles below the mouth of
the Tongue River on the 9th of June, and their combined forces formed
a junction at the mouth of the Rosebud on the 21st of that month. Here
the plan of operations against the Indians was agreed upon. Nothing
was known of Crook’s whereabouts, nor of his recent fight, but it was
pretty well established, from various scouting parties, that the Indian
village was in the valley of the Little Big Horn, from seventy-five to
ninety miles distant. It was decided that General Custer, with the 7th
Cavalry, should proceed up the Rosebud until he should strike a large
Indian trail which had been discovered a few days before, and should
then follow it to the Little Big Horn, feeling well to the south to
prevent the escape of the Indians. General Gibbon, whose column General
Terry accompanied, was to ascend the Yellowstone to the mouth of the
Big Horn, and that stream to the mouth of the Little Big Horn, where
it was expected to arrive not later than the 26th, and where it should
come into touch with Custer.
[Sidenote: THE CUSTER MASSACRE.]
In carrying out his part of the programme, General Custer moved more
rapidly than his instructions contemplated, so rapidly, in fact, that
he would have arrived at the appointed rendezvous, had his march not
been interrupted, an entire day in advance of that fixed for the
arrival of General Gibbon. The result was that his command came upon
the Indian village on the morning of the 25th while advancing in
three separate columns not within supporting distance of each other.
Custer’s column was surrounded and annihilated to a man. The other two
detachments, under Major Reno and Captain Benteen, effected a junction
and intrenched themselves on the river bluff of the Little Big Horn,
where they withstood for nearly thirty hours the terrific siege by the
Indians, who were confident and exultant from their late victory over
Custer. The total loss to Custer’s command was about 270 men. General
Gibbon’s column reached the scene of the battle on the 27th, the
Indians withdrawing upon their approach.
[Sidenote: MILITARY PROBLEM SOLVED.]
This was the crowning tragedy of the long Sioux wars, which had been
waged at intervals for upward of twenty years. Although a great
disaster to the whites, it marked the downfall of the Indian power.
The various bands into which the hostile force scattered after the
Custer massacre were relentlessly pursued until all were driven into
the reservations or beyond the British line. Once on the reservations
they were disarmed and dismounted, so as to cripple them from further
resistance. Another year was consumed in this work, and the military
posts were further extended into the Indian country; but by the end of
1877 the military problem in our Indian affairs was practically solved.
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE STEAMBOAT IN THE INDIAN WARS.
[Sidenote: MILITARY USE OF KEELBOATS.]
Throughout the Indian wars of the Missouri Valley the steamboat played
a part of the very highest importance. It was almost the exclusive
means of transporting men and supplies along the river, except when in
active campaign work in the interior. Its use in the military service
dates from the very beginning of steamboat navigation on the river, as
well as from the first important step toward the military occupation
of the valley. When the first steamboat entered the Missouri, in 1819,
arrangements were being perfected to transport by steam to the mouth
of the Yellowstone a large body of troops designed to establish a post
there. Five boats were brought into requisition for this purpose, and a
sixth, the _Western Engineer_, was built by the government to transport
a party of scientists who were to accompany the expedition. Owing
to the entire absence of experience in navigating the Missouri with
steamboats, this attempt proved a failure. None of the boats except
the _Western Engineer_ got as far as to the old Council Bluffs, and
the troops, after marching a part of the distance, went into winter
quarters at that point.
Four years later the first Indian campaign west of the Mississippi
River took place, when Colonel Leavenworth, with a considerable body
of troops, went up the river from Fort Atkinson (old Council Bluffs)
to chastise the Aricaras, who had attacked a fur-trading party under
General Ashley and killed a number of men. Keelboats were used on this
expedition.
Two years later, 1825, General Atkinson took a large body of troops
from Fort Atkinson to a point about one hundred miles above the mouth
of the Yellowstone and return. His purpose was to make treaties with
the Indian tribes along the valley and acquaint them with the power
of the United States. Keelboats were used, and a novel feature was
introduced in propelling them--a wheel, or wheels, which were operated
by hand power, the soldiers being used for this purpose.
No further use of steamboats in the military service except at Forts
Leavenworth, Kearney, and Croghan, and in connection with the Mexican
War, occurred until Harney’s campaign of 1855. All the troops that went
up the river at that time were transported in steamboats. The transfer
of ownership of Fort Pierre from the American Fur Company to the army,
and the movement of material connected therewith, were also done by
steam. The establishment of Fort Randall and the subsequent maintenance
of that post were mainly accomplished by the aid of the steamboat.
[Sidenote: A LONG WAY AROUND.]
The outbreak of the Sioux War in 1863 and the campaigns of 1863–64
called the steamboat again into extensive use. A remarkable instance
of this use was the transportation of the Winnebago Indians from their
home near Mankato, Minn., to their new home on the Missouri River. The
feeling against the Indians after the Minnesota massacre was so bitter
that it was taken advantage of to move them all from the State. It
does not appear that the Winnebagos were active participants in the
outbreak, but the hand of vengeance fell upon them as upon the others.
They were moved westward several hundred miles, and in exchange for the
fertile lands of the Minnesota Valley were given a home on the sterile
wastes of the Missouri. In making this transfer the Indians were not
taken directly across the country, which was perfectly practicable for
wagons all the way, but were transported by _steamboat_. They were put
on board the _Favorite_ and other boats at Mankato on the Minnesota
River, taken down that stream to the Mississippi at Fort Snelling, down
the Mississippi to the Missouri, and up the Missouri to the mouth of
Crow Creek, twenty miles above the present site of Chamberlain, S. D.
The distance around was 1900 miles, against about 300 miles across.
The Indians arrived at Crow Creek on May 30, 1863. A reservation was
laid off, the necessary agency buildings were erected in a stockaded
inclosure, and the place was named Fort Thompson, in honor of Clark
W. Thompson, the Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Northern
Superintendency. Mr. Thompson personally supervised the work of
locating the Indians on this new reservation.
[Sidenote: STEAMBOATS IN SULLY’S CAMPAIGNS.]
In the campaign of General Sully in 1863 he relied entirely upon
steamboats for transporting his supplies from Sioux City to the field
of operations, and one boat accompanied him from Fort Pierre well on
his way to the scene of actual hostilities. It was on this campaign
that General Sully impressed Captain La Barge’s boat, the _Shreveport_,
into his service for a time.
The campaign of 1864 from Fort Rice to the Yellowstone River was
conducted in connection with steamboats. Three boats were sent around
into the Yellowstone to meet the troops at the Brasseau Houses. They
were loaded with rations, forage, and material for a new post which
it was proposed to build on the Yellowstone River near the mouth of
Powder River. These boats were the _Chippewa Falls_, the _Alone_, and
the _Island City_. The last-mentioned boat had all the forage for the
animals on board and was unfortunately wrecked just below the mouth of
the Yellowstone River. This occurrence caused General Sully to abandon
for the time his contemplated establishment on the Yellowstone.
During the next twelve years steamboats were constantly in the service
of the government in transporting troops and supplies along the river.
It is impossible to estimate the great value in the military operations
of the valley of this important line of communication. Forts and
cantonments were strung all along the river from Fort Randall to Fort
Benton, and all of them, as well as the troops in the field, depended
for their support upon the river boats. The conquest of the Missouri
Valley would have been a very different matter had the government been
deprived of this important aid in its operations.
[Sidenote: STEAMBOATS IN CAMPAIGN OF 1876.]
In the Sioux campaign of 1876 steamboats bore a prominent part, one
of the very highest importance, and one which had its full share
of the thrilling incidents of that tragic conflict. A considerable
fleet of boats was sent up the river from Fort Abraham Lincoln to
co-operate with the troops under Terry, who marched across the country
to the Yellowstone. They not only carried supplies, but assisted in
patrolling the river to prevent the Indians from crossing, and moved
the troops from point to point as their services were needed. One boat
in particular, the _Far West_, Captain Grant Marsh, master, performed
a service which will go down in the history of the campaign as one of
its most thrilling episodes.
[Sidenote: THE “FAR WEST.”]
The _Far West_ was for a few days used by General Terry as his
headquarters boat while his command was moving up the Yellowstone to
the mouth of the Big Horn. The boat, after ferrying General Gibbon’s
command to the north bank of the Yellowstone, was directed to proceed
up the Big Horn, and, if possible, to reach the mouth of the Little Big
Horn. General Gibbon, being ill at the time, remained on the boat with
a company of infantry a part of the way, when he joined Terry’s column
and resumed command of his own troops. The _Far West_ ascended the Big
Horn fifteen miles above the mouth of the Little Big Horn and then
dropped down to that tributary. It remained there until the 30th, by
which time all the wounded from Reno’s fight had been placed on board,
and it then moved down to the Yellowstone, where it arrived on the
same day. Three days later it started down the river for Fort Abraham
Lincoln with all the wounded, and a volume of dispatches, official and
private, relating to the terrible tragedy of which the world had but
just been informed. The very nature of its mission made the voyage of
the _Far West_ one of romantic interest. Its cargo of wounded men, its
greater burden of news to anxious friends and an impatient public, all
mark it as one of the historic incidents of our Indian wars. The _Far
West_ arrived at Fort Lincoln July 5, about midnight.[70]
[Sidenote: AN HISTORIC VOYAGE.]
The _Far West_ returned from Fort Abraham Lincoln immediately after
she had discharged her cargo, and remained with other boats on the
Yellowstone until the subsiding waters made it impossible to navigate
that stream. Among these boats was another, well known to the army for
many years, and the only one of the old fleet that still survives.
This was the _Josephine_, which is now in the service of the government
as a snagboat in the work of keeping the upper river free from
obstructions.
[Sidenote: A STRANGE LAND; AN UNKNOWN RIVER.]
[Sidenote: DOWN THE SWIFT YELLOWSTONE.]
[Sidenote: LA BARGE IN CUSTER CAMPAIGN.]
Captain La Barge also saw service in the Custer campaign. The need
of a light-draft boat for use in the latter part of the season led
the authorities to engage his boat, the _John M. Chambers_, to carry
supplies to Fort Buford. The boat left St. Louis August 5 and reached
Buford September 11. The commissary stores were at once unloaded, with
the assistance of soldiers detailed for the purpose. General Terry and
staff, with a company of troops and a piece of artillery, were then
taken on board, and the boat started for Wolf Point in the hope of
heading off the Indians, who were reported to be in that vicinity. The
boat started early on the morning of the 12th. She proceeded about
thirty miles that day, having made a stop at Fort Union to put off
General Hazen and take on a supply of meat for the troops. Owing to the
low water she made only about twenty miles on the 13th. On the 14th the
party stopped to examine a broken-down ambulance on the shore. It was
found to have belonged to Reno’s troops, who were in pursuit of the
Indians. A little farther they came upon a party of seven men on their
way down the river from Montana, and through them news of Reno and the
Indians was received. These men had been terribly frightened the night
before. The boat had laid up near their camp and had thrown a shell
into a grove of cottonwoods to search for Indians. It struck near their
bivouac and almost paralyzed them with fright. They came on board next
day and went down by the boat on its return home.
On the 15th the boat reached Reno’s camp. The Indians had already
crossed, and Captain La Barge immediately commenced ferrying Reno’s
command over. This work was accomplished before night, and the boat
left for Buford the following morning, with General Terry and staff and
270 men. Buford was reached on the 17th, and the boat was discharged.
She at once started on her return to St. Louis, where she arrived
October 8.
[Sidenote: THE NEZ PERCÉ CAMPAIGN.]
Strange as it may seem, considering the nature of a campaign like that
of 1877 against the Nez Percé Indians, the Missouri River steamboat
played an important, and perhaps a decisive, part in its operations.
Chief Joseph, in his long march from Idaho, had crossed the Yellowstone
National Park, and finding himself pursued and harried in every
direction, struck north for the British line. The pursuing troops, whom
he had so far eluded, he felt confident would not overtake him; but he
did not count on a danger which arose in a quite unexpected quarter.
General Miles, with about 350 men, was encamped on the Yellowstone at
the mouth of the Tongue River, where the news reached him that Indians
had crossed the Yellowstone farther up and were making for the British
line. He at once put his command in motion to intercept them. His first
objective was the Missouri River at the mouth of the Musselshell. As
soon as he came in sight of the river, scouts were sent on ahead to
stop any steamer that might happen along. By the greatest good fortune
the scouts reached the bank just as the last boat of the season was
passing down. Fifteen minutes later and she would have been gone.
[Sidenote: TIMELY AID.]
The troops were brought down to the river and ten days’ rations were
put on the boat and taken to the mouth of the Musselshell. The
officers of the boat stated that the Indians had not yet crossed the
Missouri, and General Miles accordingly decided to march up the valley
of the Musselshell to intercept them. The boat was discharged and
dropped downstream, stopping about a mile below to take on some wood.
While there, two men came down the river in a mackinaw and reported
that the Indians _had_ crossed the river, some eighty miles above,
and were making for the British line. General Miles instantly ordered
some cannon shots fired in the direction of the steamboat. A Captain
Baldwin, who had been sent down on account of sickness, was on board.
He at once understood that the boat was wanted, and caused her to
be brought back. The command was ferried over, and on the following
morning, September 27, set out to the northwest after the Indians.
They were overtaken on Snake Creek, where Chief Joseph was defeated
in battle, and the greater part of his people captured. This point
was within fifty miles of the boundary, and about one hundred of the
Indians actually got across the line. But for the timely aid of the
steamboat it is probable that the whole band would have escaped.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE PEACE COMMISSION OF 1866.
[Sidenote: LOSS OF THE “EFFIE DEANS.”]
We left Captain La Barge in 1865 just as he had returned from Montana
on his second journey by way of Great Salt Lake. His boat, the _Effie
Deans_, had reached St. Louis some time before he did. The boat was
still owned in partnership with John S. McCune and Eugene Jaccard. La
Barge tried to get full possession of her, offering, however, either
to buy or sell. Not being able to negotiate a purchase, he demanded a
dissolution of the partnership, and bought the boat in. He then put six
thousand dollars’ worth of repairs on her, and in the spring advertised
for a trip to Benton. He secured a full cargo, and had every prospect
of a profitable trip, when one of those sudden accidents overtook him
which were so common in the hazardous business he was carrying on. He
had hesitated a good deal about insuring the boat, and finally, upon
McCune’s advice, concluded not to do so. He felt safe if he could get
out of port, the greatest danger being from fire there. The insurance
rates were so high that it was a great object to avoid them, if
possible. It was on Friday that he had his talk with McCune and decided
not to insure. He was to start next morning. He mentioned to his wife
what he had done, and she, with a woman’s intuition, remonstrated
strongly, saying she knew he would repent it. About one o’clock next
morning the doorbell rang. La Barge raised the window and asked who
it was. “Watchman of the _Effie Deans_,” was the reply. “What is the
matter?” asked the Captain. “The _Effie Deans_ is burned up.”
“The loss to me,” said Captain La Barge, “was difficult to reconcile,
from the fact of my having rejected insurance the day before, as well
as an offer of forty thousand dollars for the boat the same day. The
fire had been communicated to the boat from one of the neighboring
vessels, the _Nevada_, and was in no sense the fault of my crew. Next
morning Robert Campbell came down to the levee and said he understood
I had no insurance on the boat. I replied that such was the case. He
said that he had always put me down as a prudent man, but that such a
course showed great recklessness. I replied that I thought not; that
the loss was the fault of my neighbors, and not my own. ‘Well, if that
is any consolation, I have nothing more to say,’ he replied, and walked
away. His apparent indifference surprised me. I had done business with
him for many years, and had paid him as high as sixty thousand dollars
commissions. Now, in my misfortune, he did not as much as offer the
least assistance.
[Sidenote: BUILDING OF THE “OCTAVIA.”]
“Very different was the conduct of John S. McCune. He also came down
soon after Campbell left. He looked at the wreck, said it was most
unfortunate, talked very little, but told me to be early at his office
Monday morning. I called according to appointment. McCune said, ‘You
have got to have a new boat. Let us go down to the Marine Railway
Ways in Carondelet and see what we can do.’ We went down, saw the
superintendent, told him what we wanted, and asked him if he could
undertake the construction of a boat. He replied that he could, and
McCune told him to go ahead on my plans, and he would back me with
his credit. I drew the entire plans and specifications for the boat,
machinery and all, and she was built that summer accordingly. Before
I got back in the fall McCune had named her for me, but I renamed
her _Octavia_, for my second daughter. She cost fifty-seven thousand
dollars, and was a splendid boat. I paid for her partly in cash and
gave my notes for the balance.”
[Sidenote: NORTHWESTERN TREATY COMMISSION.]
In the meantime a commission had been appointed to go up the river and
make treaties with certain tribes of Indians in regard to the right of
way for railroads across their lands. It was officially known as the
Northwestern Treaty Commission, but was popularly referred to as the
Peace Commission of 1866. It was composed of Newton Edmunds, Governor
of Dakota Territory; General S. R. Curtis, a well-known officer of
the Iowa Volunteers; Orrin Guernsey, and the Rev. Henry W. Reed, who
so long figured as an Indian agent on the upper river. The Commission
were well provided with presents and proposed to travel in becoming
state. Captain La Barge had secured for the summer, while the _Octavia_
was building, another boat, a fine new one, the _Ben Johnson_. The
Commission contracted with the Captain to carry them up the river and
back at three hundred dollars per day. One of the Commissioners wanted
the Captain to hire his son as clerk, or in some other capacity, at
five dollars per day. The Captain had made up his crew and did not care
to go to this extra and unnecessary expense. But as the Commissioner
rather insisted, the charter price was raised to $305 per day, and the
young man enjoyed a fat sinecure during the trip--an instance of the
kind of corruption which was almost universal in the period following
the war.
[Sidenote: PEACE COMMISSION A FAILURE.]
To Captain La Barge the voyage seemed more like a pleasure excursion
than a business enterprise. The boat moved by very leisurely stages,
always tying up early in the evening and starting late in the morning.
Whist and other games were the order of the day. Long stops were
made at all interesting points, and the party enjoyed exceptional
opportunities of seeing Indian life in all its wildness. As a means
of accomplishing any good, the Commission was looked upon from the
first by the people of the Missouri Valley as little more than a
farce. No end of ridicule was poured upon it, and it was held up
to the general contempt by those who had any definite acquaintance
with the situation. The Indians were generally loath to negotiate,
fearing that the Commission “would want them to sign some paper that
would take from them their lands and houses and oblige them to seek
new ones farther west.” It cannot be said that any good came from
this Commission--certainly nothing to justify its great expense.
It did without doubt create new complications, lead to increased
dissatisfaction on the part of the Indians, and, on the whole,
aggravate an already serious situation.[71]
Some of the incidents on this trip had a flavor of danger about them,
and we shall narrate one as given us by Captain La Barge. It related
to an interview of the Commissioners with the Yanktonais, who were well
known as the most relentlessly hostile of any of the Sioux tribes.
“Some twenty miles below the mouth of White Earth River,” said Captain
La Barge, “I saw two Indian hunters on the hills. I hailed them,
landed the steamer, asked them on board, and after feasting them
(an indispensable preliminary to the transaction of any business),
inquired if they were Yanktonais, and if so where were the rest of the
tribe. They replied in the affirmative, and said that their camp was
about ten miles off, on the White Earth River. The Chairman of the
Commission asked them to go to camp and tell the chiefs to move their
whole village down to the mouth of the White Earth and there await the
arrival of the boat for the purpose of holding a council. He inquired
the size of the village, and found it to be six hundred tepees, which
meant about three thousand Indians.
[Sidenote: A VIGOROUS REMONSTRANCE.]
“I remonstrated at this proposition, strongly urging that only the
chiefs be invited. Should so powerful a band of these hostile Indians
get any advantage of us they would certainly use it. We had no power of
resisting them, having only thirty people in all, and they were poorly
armed. The Indians would, I feared, make a rush and attempt to capture
the steamer as soon as we landed. Our interpreter, Zephyr Rencontre,
seconded me in this opinion. I had been in the power of these Indians
once before, and, thanks to Rencontre, I was wearing my hair on this
occasion.
[Sidenote: AFRAID OF INDIANS.]
“The Chairman of the Commission said he perceived that I was afraid of
the Indians, but not to be alarmed; he would answer for all harm. The
Indians would never dare molest a government officer. To me, who had
spent all my life among the Indians, this gratuitous insinuation from
a mere novice in Indian experience cut me to the quick, and I replied:
‘Very well, I will land as you say, but before we get through we shall
see who is afraid of Indians.’
“This was another instance of the mistakes made by our government in
the selection, to treat with the Indians, of men without knowledge of
the native character. It was a universal rule that such men would treat
with contempt the cautious bearing of those who knew the Indians; and
this ignorant bravado has many times led to disastrous consequences.
It is very unpleasant to act with such men, who ridicule one’s honest
knowledge of peril, and are powerless to help when they get you into
danger. It was also a common observation with me that the volunteer
officers of the war were always more haughty and overbearing than those
bred to the profession. They loved to assume, assert, and display
authority, where the trained soldier would see no occasion to do so.
“I said to Curtis on this occasion, ‘This course is contrary to
my judgment, General; and in order not to be responsible for the
consequences I desire a positive order from you before I adopt it.’ He
gave me the order. The Indians arrived just as we were tying up the
boat. The women immediately commenced setting up the lodges and the men
began to rush on board. They were all armed. Curtis had said, when I
foretold this: ‘We will keep them off, only letting on those we want.’
I replied, ‘You will see, General. It will be impossible to keep them
off.’
[Sidenote: MATTERS BECOME SERIOUS.]
“As already stated, the Indians at once rushed on board, and
unfortunately did not congregate in one place, but scattered themselves
in every direction. Matters at once became serious. I was thoroughly
alarmed for the safety of the boat and her passengers, but remained
perfectly cool and indifferent in outward appearance, and did not
permit myself to resent the actions of the Indians. An act of that sort
might have precipitated difficulty. We were over a powder mine, and a
spark was liable to fall at any moment. The Indians became insolent,
would elbow us around, sneer at us, display their muscular arms, and
try in every way to provoke us to action. One Indian, an ugly fellow
and noted villain, Crazy Wolf, followed me everywhere I went, armed
with gun, pistol, and bow and arrows. He tried in every way to get me
to notice him. At this time I consulted with Zephyr on the situation,
saying that I feared trouble was brewing. He replied that he thought
so too, and that I had better prepare for prompt measures. I had steam
kept up. Pilot and engineer remained at their posts, and the mate was
kept forward. He had been instructed to cut the line whenever he should
hear a single tap of the bell.
[Sidenote: FUTILE ATTEMPT AT NEGOTIATIONS.]
“Meanwhile the Commissioners had been attempting negotiations, but to
little purpose. In front, on the boiler deck, there were a table and
seats for the principal Indians. Curtis tried to call them to order,
but without success. He then summoned Rencontre and tried to talk to
them. He told them he was about to roll some bales of goods on shore
and requested that they would withdraw and distribute them. They
answered to roll them on shore; the women would take care of them; for
their part they would remain on the boat.
“Nothing whatever could be done. Matters became dubious. One by one the
Commissioners slipped away and locked themselves in their staterooms.
General Curtis was finally left alone, and after a while he also
withdrew, and told me to get out of the scrape as best I could. He
fully realized the gravity of the blunder he had made, and his own
inability to cope with the situation.
[Sidenote: A SUDDEN PANIC.]
[Sidenote: ENOUGH OF A GOOD THING.]
“The Indians as yet had made no attempt on the staterooms, but they
were incensed at the withdrawal of the Commissioners and might do so
at any moment. Rencontre said to me, ‘The Indians don’t like this,
and will give us trouble. We had better do something right away.’ ‘Is
it time to cut loose?’ I asked. ‘I think so,’ he replied. I gave the
signal, the line was cut, the wheels began to turn backward and the
boat slid quickly from the bank. The sudden move astounded the Indians.
Those on shore seized the line and began pulling before they discovered
that it was cut. I knew they would not dare to fire, for fear of
shooting their own people. Those on the boat were panic-stricken and
began to leap overboard. I caused the nose of the boat to be held close
to shore so that they could get to land without drowning, and in a few
minutes the boat was clear of them. Then, reversing the engines, we
steered for the opposite shore and made the boat fast. The danger being
over, I went to Curtis’ room and told him it was safe for him to come
out. When he appeared I said: ‘Who is afraid of Indians now, General
Curtis?’ His only reply was: ‘Who would have thought that the rascals
would dare molest a government officer?’ They cared a good deal about a
government officer, indeed, and the remark showed how little he knew of
the Indian character. I asked the General if he wanted to make another
trial, but he replied that he had had enough.
“No further attempt was made to treat with these Indians, and we went
on up the river. As on a previous occasion, the Indians followed us.
Durfee & Peck at this time had a post on the site where Fort Buford
later stood. The Indians made a signal from the opposite side of the
river that they had robes to sell, and the agent at the post wanted to
borrow our yawl to go across and get them. I consented, but advised
against it. They crossed and actually bought several hundred robes, but
just as the boat was about to put back, the Indians jumped upon the
crew, killed one, severely wounded another, and would have killed all,
had I not promptly crossed over with the steamboat to their assistance.
Mr. Durfee afterward thanked me very heartily for this action.”
The Commissioners then went on to old Fort Union, where they remained
for a time treating with the Assiniboines, Crows, and Grosventres.
The Crows and the Grosventres came down by the steamboat _Miner_,
under promise that they should be taken back to their camp on the
Musselshell by boat. The river being too low to take so large a boat as
the _Ben Johnson_ farther up in safety, the Commission impressed into
their service, for the purpose of taking these Indians back, a small
boat, the _Amanda_, which was in the employ of the War Department.
She was then on her way up the river to meet Colonel Reeve, who was
expected back from the Judith, where he had just established a post.
The Crows and Grosventres, with their presents and with copies of the
new treaties, got on board and started up the river. The agent for
the Blackfeet, George B. Wright, was also on board on his way to Fort
Benton.
[Sidenote: CROWS HAVE TO WALK.]
At the mouth of the Milk River the _Amanda_ met Colonel Reeve, who
promptly took the boat into his own charge, put the Indians ashore
with their presents and other property, and left them to walk home.
The anger of the Crows was fired to a desperate pitch by this action.
They refused to take the presents, tore up some of the treaties, and
sent others back to the Commissioners, and declared that they would
henceforth fire upon every boat going up the river. Agent Wright
thought the situation too critical for him to attempt to go on overland
to Benton, so he returned with the boat and went to his station by way
of Omaha, Salt Lake, and Helena. The Commissioners criticised him
severely for this action, and he, on the other hand, charged them with
positive misrepresentation in regard to their work. They had already
prepared a report setting forth in glowing terms their success in
treating with the various tribes. Agent Wright had likewise written a
report of his experiences at the mouth of Milk River and the action of
the Crows in repudiating the treaties. As the two reports conflicted in
important matters the Commission requested, and finally prevailed upon,
Agent Wright to modify his report, so as to be in harmony with their
own.
[Sidenote: MERCENARY PATRIOTISM.]
After the business was completed at Fort Union the _Ben Johnson_
turned her prow downstream and proceeded homeward by leisurely stages,
stopping at the various camps, agencies, and military posts. The
property remaining on the boat was put off partly at Yankton, partly
at Sioux City, and partly at Omaha. At Sioux City it was put off at
night. Captain La Barge knew nothing of it. Hearing the noise of
unloading he arose and went to see what was going on, and found the
crew unloading freight. He asked by whose orders they were doing this,
and they replied, those of the Commission. He said no more. It was
clearly the intention to conceal this move from him, and again he saw
how mercenary was the patriotism of many of our government officials.
The boat pursued her way safely to St. Louis, where she arrived late in
August.
[Sidenote: THE “OCTAVIA” FINISHED.]
Captain La Barge turned over the steamer to her owners and took
possession of his new boat, the _Octavia_, brought her to the wharf,
finished her construction, and left on her first trip October 1. He ran
in the lower river the rest of the season, and then on the Mississippi
until ice closed in. He laid up the boat for the winter at Kimmswick,
twenty miles below St. Louis.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
THE MURDER OF CAPTAIN SPEAR.
The voyage of the _Octavia_ in the summer of 1867 was one of the most
successful and important in all Captain La Barge’s career on the river.
It was unhappily marred by a most revolting crime, committed on board,
but in other respects passed off without any untoward incident. Its
narrative will be presented in the Captain’s own words.
“Early in the spring of 1867 I started in the Weston and St. Joseph
trade, and about April 1 advertised for a trip to Benton. Business on
the river seemed rather dull at this time, and people ridiculed me
for attempting a trip. But within two weeks my boat was filled; in
fact it was the largest trip I ever had up the river. I remember that
one morning, about two days prior to our departure. Captain Walker S.
Carter, a merchant of St. Louis, who was on the levee, said to me,
‘Have you got a trip?’ I replied, ‘More than I can carry.’ ‘It is
astonishing,’ said he. ‘Anybody else than you could not have got half
a trip.’ ‘That shows the value of a reputation,’ I replied.
“This trip of the _Octavia_ was a very profitable one. The cargo was
composed entirely of private freight, Mr. W. M. McPherson having been
the successful bidder for government contracts. I had freight for
nearly every firm in Helena, besides a good list of passengers, among
whom was Green Clay Smith, newly appointed Governor of Montana, and
also the Surveyor General for the same Territory, Thomas E. Tutt, now
of the Third National of St. Louis, and Robert Donnell, now a New York
banker.
[Sidenote: GENERAL SHERMAN.]
[Sidenote: THE MCPHERSON CONTRACT.]
[Sidenote: THE SHERMAN CONTRACT.]
“An interesting incident took place just before the departure of the
boat in which no less a personage than General Sherman was concerned.
Colonel Thomas, Sherman’s Quartermaster, had contracted with W. M.
McPherson, as I have said, for all the season’s business up the
Missouri River. The _Octavia_ was to leave port on Tuesday, and on the
Saturday previous General Smith came on board and said to me, ‘Did I
not understand you to say that you had no government freight or troops
to transport this year?’ I answered in the affirmative--that McPherson
had the contract, and I would not carry for him. ‘Well,’ returned
General Smith, ‘I am just from General Sherman, where I went to apply
for an escort. I was told by the General that I would not need one,
for he was going to send a hundred men by the _Octavia_ to Camp Cook,
near the mouth of the Judith River, under Lieutenant Horrigan.’ To
confirm his statement he showed me a dispatch that he had just sent to
Omaha to have the men all ready, so as not to detain the boat beyond
a few minutes. This was a good deal of a surprise to me, as I had had
no intimation of such action, and had my boat about full. I told Smith
I would go and see Sherman about it, and did so at once. I found the
General in his office, and before I could tell him my business he said,
‘I know what you want,’ and he took down his dispatch book to show me
that he had taken all precautions not to cause me any delay. ‘But that
is not the question, General,’ I said; ‘I cannot take the troops.’
‘Ah! that alters the case. Haven’t you room?’ I replied that I could
probably make room, but understood that this shipment was under the
McPherson contract. The General said it was. ‘Well then,’ I said, ‘I
will not carry them, for I will not work for McPherson.’ The General
asked my reasons. ‘Because McPherson will not pay enough for the
work,’ I said. ‘He gets a good price from the government, but the poor
steamboat man who does the work gets nothing for it. For example, he
gets fifty dollars per man to haul the troops to Camp Cook. He will pay
me fifteen and pocket thirty-five, and do no work nor take any risk.
I will not work for him on such terms.’ ‘I think you are perfectly
right,’ said the General. ‘In your place I would do the same thing.
But you will carry the troops up for General Sherman?’ I replied that
I would if he would contract with me individually and directly and
pay me the McPherson rates. ‘That’s fair,’ said he, and he called in
Thomas and told him to draw up a contract. ‘Well,’ said Thomas, ‘this
work is for McPherson to do under our contract with him. If you pay La
Barge you will also have to pay McPherson.’ Thomas wanted to argue the
matter, but Sherman shut him off by saying, ‘It’s no use, Thomas; you
just draw up that contract as I tell you to.’ And he did.
[Sidenote: CAPTAIN SPEAR SHOT.]
“The _Octavia_ left St. Louis Tuesday, May 7, 1867, on the most
important trip I ever made up the river. There were no incidents of
note until the boat reached Omaha, where the troops were taken on
board. We also received at this point a passenger in the person of
a Captain W. D. Spear, 79th Royal Rifles, an officer of the British
Army, on furlough from India. He was on his way to Salt Lake _via_
the Missouri River, and was going thence to California. He seemed to
be a man of means. This embarkation of the troops and of this officer
was the prelude to one of the most distressing tragedies that ever
occurred on the Missouri River. The troops were mostly Irish Fenians,
and the Lieutenant in charge was an Irishman, all intensely hostile
to the English. This fact may in part explain what subsequently
transpired. Spear himself felt doubts for his safety, and one day
remarked to me that he would be lucky if he got out of this scrape
without accident. I did not know what he meant, for he was a very
fearless man, going on shore frequently in spite of danger from the
Indians. Just after midnight of the 7th of June, or more precisely
about 12.30 A. M. June 8, as Captain Spear and Joseph C. La Barge,
my son, were going up the steps to the hurricane deck, Captain Spear
being a little ahead, a sentinel, William Barry, stationed near
there, fired at Captain Spear, the bullet passing through his head at
the base of the brain and killing him instantly. The following day
an inquest was held by a committee of the passengers consisting of
Thomas E. Tutt, Green Clay Smith, Sam McLean, Richard Leach, T. H.
Eastman, Geo. W. McLean, and W. J. McCormick, Secretary. Several of the
passengers and crew were sworn and their testimony taken. No motive
could be discovered for the deed. The sentinel’s orders required him
to challenge only parties approaching the boat from the shore, and it
was expressly agreed with me, by Lieutenant Horrigan, as a condition
of permitting sentinels to be posted on the hurricane deck, that they
should not interfere in any way with the passengers. The finding of
the committee was that “the shooting was not in accordance with any
instructions given to said sentinel, and that he deserves the most
rigid punishment known to the law.” There was indeed a strong sentiment
among the passengers in favor of lynching him, but the military could
easily have prevented it, and everyone believed that he would meet with
due punishment in regular order. The sentinel was of course at once
relieved from duty and placed under arrest.
[Sidenote: NEW METHOD OF EMBALMING.]
“Our trip up the river was a dangerous one, owing to the intense
hostility of the Indians, but by taking great precautions no accidents
happened. I put off the remains of Captain Spear at Fort Buford to
await my return. I asked the commanding officer if he could suggest any
way of embalming the body. He advised the construction of a large box
and the filling of it with green cottonwood sawdust. The experiment
seemed to work well, although I had never heard of such a thing before.
The post commander refused to receive the prisoner, who was taken on
to Camp Cook. The commanding officer there refused to try him on the
ground that the crime had been committed in Dakota. He held him for us
to take back to Yankton.
“The troops were left at Camp Cook and the boat went on to Benton.
I found many passengers for the down trip and great quantities of
golddust. I filled the office safe and every other available receptacle
with it. There were no incidents of especial importance on the return
trip. The soldier, Barry, was taken down to Yankton and there turned
over to the United States marshal, who held him until orders came from
Washington for his release, when he was sent back to his company.
[Sidenote: TRIAL OF SPEARS MURDERER.]
“I took Captain Spear’s remains back to St. Louis, where I found
telegrams directing the shipment of them to Europe. A Lieutenant Terry
of Spear’s company came to St. Louis to get full particulars of the
affair. I was then living with my family on the _Octavia_, and invited
him to stay there with me. He did so, and I gave him as full an account
as possible of Captain Spear’s death. When the news reached England
that the assassin had been released without trial, the government
promptly took up the matter and I understood that a demand was made
upon our government through Minister Thornton for a civil trial of the
soldier. This demand was complied with, and the man was tried before
Judge Kidder at Vermillion, Dak. Myself and several others went up
as witnesses. The evidence seemed to me overwhelmingly against the
accused, there being nothing in his favor except his own statement
that he acted in the line of his duty. The jury returned a verdict of
not guilty, upon instructions from the judge that the man had simply
obeyed his orders. They were given a verdict to sign written out by the
judge, and thus the culprit escaped.
[Sidenote: TRAVESTY UPON JUSTICE.]
“To us who knew the facts, this travesty upon justice seemed the
crowning outrage of the whole deplorable affair. Here was as
deliberate, cold-blooded, and unprovoked a murder as the annals of
crime afford, actuated unquestionably by the national hate of the
murderer for the country of the victim. The crime was considered by the
passengers as meriting the severest penalty of the law. The pretense
that the sentinel acted under orders had not the remotest foundation,
or if it had, it only made the officer _particeps criminis_. The final
outcome was the grossest miscarriage of justice which even frontier
annals afford, and it was unquestionably a justifiable ground for
reprisal on the part of the British government. Let those who lament
British obduracy in the case of Mrs. Maybrick ponder upon this far more
lamentable case of the unavenged death of Captain Spear.
[Sidenote: PHENOMENAL SUCCESS.]
“Upon my return to St. Louis I called upon McCune, who advised me to
attend promptly to my obligations for the construction of the boat,
which had now about matured. He offered to help me get them renewed.
I told him it was unnecessary, as I should take them all up and clear
the debt off. He was greatly surprised and delighted at the success
of my trip, which was indeed almost phenomenal. I made a clear profit
of forty-five thousand dollars between May 7, the date of leaving
St. Louis, and the date of my return. Yet it was a hard trip. The
responsibility was very great. I was heavily in debt for my boat. I
had on board three hundred passengers and three hundred tons of cargo.
The difficulties of Missouri River navigation, the dangers from the
Indians, and the many other contingencies of such a trip made it
wearing in the extreme. Many boats that had set out weeks before us
were passed on the way.[72] On the trip I was awake the greater part
of the time night and day. I kept up all right and stood the strain so
long as the excitement was on, but the moment we landed at Benton and I
knew the danger was over, I went to sleep and instructed my wife not to
awaken me even for meals. I slept almost continuously for twenty-four
hours.”
CHAPTER XXXV.
THE BATTLE WITH THE RAILROADS.
The great enemy of the Missouri River steamboat was the railroad. The
impression now exists that the river has ceased to be a navigable
stream. It has ceased to be a navigated stream, but it is as navigable
as it ever was. Let it be known that all railroads in its valley will
cease running for a period of five years and there will be a thousand
boats on the river in less than six months. It is not a change in the
stream, but in methods of transportation, that has ruined the commerce
of the river.
[Sidenote: ADVANCE OF THE RAILROADS.]
The struggle between the steamboat and the railroad lasted just about
twenty-eight years, or from 1859--when the Hannibal and St. Joseph
railroad reached St. Joseph, Mo.--to 1887, when the Great Northern
reached Helena, Mont. The influence of the railroads had been felt
to some extent before this on the lower river. The Missouri Pacific
railroad, which parallels the river from St. Louis to Kansas City, was
opened to Jefferson City, March 13, 1856, but did not reach Kansas City
until ten years later. This road did not have much effect upon the
steamboat business of the river. Most of the boats ran far beyond the
points reached by the road, and would have kept on the river whether
the railroad were there or not. Being there, they secured a large part
of the freight, even along the line of the railroad.
When the Hannibal and St. Joseph railroad reached the Missouri River at
St. Joseph in 1859, that town became an important terminus for river
commerce connected with the railroad. A line of packets including
three boats ran south to Kansas City and north to Sioux City, with
an occasional trip to Fort Randall. The first service of Captain La
Barge’s boat, the _Emilie_, was in this trade, in which he remained for
two years.
The next point on the river reached by the railroads was at Council
Bluffs and Omaha. On the 15th of March, 1867, the Chicago and
Northwestern railroad reached the former place and on March 15, 1872,
the Union Pacific bridge was opened across the river. Omaha largely
supplanted St. Joseph in the upper river trade, and still further
restricted the business from St. Louis.
The Sioux City and Pacific railroad entered Sioux City in 1868 from
Missouri Valley, thus connecting with Omaha and Chicago. In 1870 the
Illinois Central reached the same place directly across the State.
Sioux City became, and for a long time remained, a more important
river port than either St. Joseph or Omaha. All during the period of
the Indian wars, in the decade from 1870 to 1880 it was the great
shipping point for the army in all its work on the upper river. Even
the trade to Fort Benton was in great part transferred to this point,
and the St. Louis trade with that port suffered another severe falling
off.
[Sidenote: FINISHING BLOWS.]
And now its bold antagonist attacked the steamboat business on every
side. The Union Pacific railroad was opened to Ogden in 1869, and a
freight line was at once established through to Helena, thus diverting
south a large part of the business which had before gone to the river.
In 1872 the Northern Pacific reached Bismarck, and cut off nearly
all the upper river trade from Sioux City. In 1880 the Utah Northern
entered Montana from Ogden and captured a large share of the trade of
that Territory. In 1883 the Northern Pacific reached the valley of the
Upper Missouri, and virtually controlled all the business that had
hitherto gone to the Missouri River except the small proportion which
originated at Fort Benton and below to Bismarck. The final blow was
delivered to the river trade in 1887, when the Great Northern reached
Helena.
[Sidenote: DOOM OF OLD FORT BENTON.]
This was practically the end of the steamboat business on the Missouri
River, and the doom of old Fort Benton. A new town arose at the
Great Falls, under the fostering care of the railroad, absorbed most
of the former trade of Fort Benton, and grew into one of the largest
towns of the State. Fort Benton dropped rapidly into a condition of
decadence from which it has never recovered. In the meanwhile all the
regular steamboat owners withdrew from the river except the Benton
Transportation Company, which has maintained to the present day a very
small fleet of boats at Bismarck, N. D. It was a sad day for the marine
insurance companies when the fate of the river commerce was settled by
the railroads. Accidents occurred with astonishing certainty whenever
it was found that boats were no longer needed; and it was left to the
underwriters to close up the final account of this record of disaster.
[Illustration: REMOVING SNAGS FROM THE MISSOURI]
The last commercial boat that ever arrived at Fort Benton left that
port in 1890. The victory of the railroads was complete, and every year
since they have extended their lines still further into the valley
and along the shores of the river, gradually cutting off the small
local trade to points not yet reached by rail. The boat was never able
to compete with the locomotive. The river did not run in the right
direction. Mile for mile the transportation of freight upon it cost
more than by rail. As to passenger traffic--what could forty miles a
day do against four hundred! Nothing but the absolute exclusion of
railroads could save the steamboat, and the development of the country
made this as undesirable as it was impossible.
[Sidenote: IMPROVEMENT OF THE MISSOURI RIVER.]
In this long and hopeless struggle the steamboats found a strenuous
ally in the government of the United States, which cheerfully undertook
to alter the course of events and maintain a freight traffic along the
river. The history of government improvement work upon the Missouri
River is an instructive one. For many years it consisted solely in the
removal of snags and obstructions, and to this extent was a great and
unquestionable benefit. Of the hundreds of steamboats lost on the river
about seventy per cent. were lost from striking snags, and the removal
of these obstructions was therefore an obvious step of good policy.
Appropriations began to be made for the Missouri River jointly with
the Mississippi and the Ohio as early as 1832, but the first actual
work seems to have been done in 1838. In that year two snagboats, the
_Heliopolis_ and the _Archimedes_, ran up the river 325 miles and 385
miles respectively, removing altogether 2245 snags and cutting 1710
overhanging trees from the banks, at a total cost of twenty thousand
dollars. In this same year the river was examined as far up as Westport
(Kansas City), with a view of taking up the question of its general
improvement. The officer of Engineers who made this examination was
Captain Robert E. Lee.
From this time on to 1879 appropriations continued to be made
jointly for the Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, and Arkansas rivers,
with occasional lapses of one or more years. The work done under
these appropriations was exclusively the removal of snags, and was
undoubtedly of great value. It was done when the traffic on the river
was at its height, and it was therefore applied when and where needed.
There can be little doubt that the property saved by this work many
times repaid its cost.
[Sidenote: A DOUBTFUL POLICY.]
[Sidenote: DEAD BEYOND HOPE.]
In 1879 the government began a general improvement of the river by
contracting its channel, so as to produce a greater depth at low water
and make navigation possible at all stages. It was a doubtful policy at
best, in view of the rapid and inevitable decline of traffic, but this
consideration seems only to have increased the determination to keep
boats on the river whether the interests of the public required them
there or not. The policy was kept up in ever-increasing measure, and in
1884 Congress created a Commission of five members to take the matter
in charge and conduct the work in a systematic way. A more fatuitous
course has rarely been adopted by any government than this attempt to
reverse the decrees of destiny and accomplish the impossible. Even at
that time the fate of Missouri River navigation was to most men as
clear as the flash of light in the night. It was dead beyond the hope
of resurrection, at least within another century. The desultory traffic
which existed here and there would not amount, in the total value of
the freight carried, to the appropriations made for facilitating its
transportation.
Nevertheless, in face of this inevitable march of events, the problem
was taken up in earnest. Millions of dollars were appropriated, a
vast accumulation of plant was made, and an astonishing amount of
actual work accomplished. The result? So far as its influence upon the
commerce of the valley is concerned the same as if this money had been
used to build a railroad in Greenland. Not a boat more has followed
the river than if the work had not been done. From that point of
view it has all been wasted effort. From another viewpoint, however,
it has been of great benefit. It has protected many miles of river
front, saved from destruction thousands of acres of valuable bottom
lands, and millions of property on city fronts and along the lines of
railroads. It has developed some of the most effective methods known to
engineering for the control of alluvial rivers, and has made a solid
contribution to the advancement of science. From a purely engineering
point of view and its great value in the protection of property, the
work may be considered a success; from its influence upon the commerce
of the country, something very different.
[Sidenote: MISSOURI RIVER COMMISSION.]
For seventeen years the Missouri River Commission dragged out an
unnecessary existence, and was finally abolished by Act of Congress,
June 13, 1902. But the lesson, if a costly one, has been well learned.
So far as government work on the Missouri River is concerned, it will,
in the near future at least, be confined to two purposes. On the lower
stretches of the river it will be devoted to the protection of property
along the banks; in the upper course to the building of reservoirs and
canals, for the utilization of its waters in irrigation.[73]
Thus the battle between the railroads on the one hand and the
steamboats, with their government ally, on the other, has resulted
in overwhelming victory for the former. It is a victory not to be
regretted. It is in line with progress. The country has passed beyond
any use that can come from transportation methods like those of the
Missouri River steamboat. It served its purpose and served it well. It
filled a great place in the early development of the Western country.
But its day has passed, and henceforth it will be of interest only to
lovers of history.
[Illustration: “IMPROVING” THE MISSOURI RIVER]
CHAPTER XXXVI.
LAST VOYAGES TO BENTON.
As soon as the ice broke up in the spring of 1868 Captain La Barge
commenced work on the river, and after two trips to St. Joseph
advertised for a trip to Benton. He received a good cargo and had
a fairly profitable voyage, but in no sense so satisfactory as the
year before. After his return in the fall to St. Louis he received
a proposition for the charter of the boat in the government river
work. Terms were arranged with General McComb of Cincinnati, through
Captain Charles R. Suter, who was later for many years in charge of the
government work on the Missouri River. Captain La Barge remained on the
boat, working for the government, during the rest of the season, when
he sold the boat to the Engineer Department for $40,000.
[Sidenote: THE MISSOURI HIS HOME.]
“And here,” said the Captain, “I have to record another of the great
mistakes of my life. I was now well ‘fixed,’ as the world goes. I had
the $40,000 which I had received for my boat. I had about $50,000 in
the bank. My home, forty acres in Cabanné place, was easily worth
$40,000 even at that time; and I was entirely out of debt. I had
thought much of retiring from the river and ought to have done so. It
was only too evident that the steamboat business on the Missouri had
seen its day. It had passed its meridian in the middle of the sixties,
and henceforth it was sure to decline. The reluctance of an active
man, still in the prime of life (I was fifty-three), to lay aside the
pursuits of a thrifty career, may have blinded my eyes to the certain
and early fate of the business I had been engaged in, and have led me
to hope that it would continue to be what it had been in the past. I
had no desire to go on any other river. The Missouri was my home. I had
grown up on it from childhood. I liked it, and knew I could not feel at
home on any other.
“And so I unwisely concluded to continue at my old business, and went
into it on a larger scale than ever before. I built the _Emilie La
Barge_, a larger and finer boat even than the _Octavia_, costing me
$60,000. The hull was built on the Ohio and brought to St. Louis for
completion. This was in the winter of 1868–69.”
Government business up the river was still very good, but competition
for it was getting closer, as other lines of steamboat trade declined,
and Captain La Barge failed to secure a contract. He went to work,
however, for the successful bidder and did a paying business during
the summer. He returned to St. Louis in September and made two trips
to New Orleans, when the boat was laid up until the spring of 1870. He
then entered into a contract with the government to transport Colonel
Gilbert and 480 men with over 400 tons of freight to Fort Buford. It
was a low-water season and the trip was slow and tedious; but the boat
got through all right. After his return Captain La Barge ran in the
lower river the balance of the season. But the profits were small, for
the railroads had thoroughly gotten the upper hand. There was no longer
any money in the lower river trade.
[Sidenote: AN OPEN BAR.]
“I recall a little incident that amused me somewhat while on this
summer’s trip,” said the Captain. “Colonel Gilbert was a strict
disciplinarian, yet withal much liked by his men. When he came on board
he told me that I need not close the bar on the boat unless I chose
to do so. If any of his men wanted a drink and had money to pay for
it, let them have it. ‘That’s something very unusual,’ said I, for
generally when troops were in transport I had to close the bar. ‘All
right, I’ll take my chances,’ he replied. ‘If any of them get drunk,
they will not get drunk again.’ I noted throughout the trip that there
was not a single drunken soldier, although the bar was open all the
time.
[Sidenote: COLONEL AND LIEUTENANT.]
“It was customary whenever we stopped to have a guard posted near the
gangway, and this was done on our arrival at Fort Randall. A guard
from the post was also ordered down, presumably to prevent the post
soldiers from getting on the boat. The young lieutenant in charge made
his way on board past Colonel Gilbert’s guard, on telling who he was.
He inquired of me for Colonel Gilbert, and I took him up and introduced
him. After a few minutes’ conversation he noticed the open bar on the
boat and some soldiers there, drinking. He said to Colonel Gilbert that
he would like to have the bar closed, as such were his orders. ‘Why
don’t you have it closed, then?’ said Colonel Gilbert bluntly. ‘Well,
I don’t like to order it when you are aboard with troops.’ ‘It suits
me to have it open,’ returned the Colonel. The lieutenant explained
that they were afraid that some of the post soldiers would get aboard
and get drunk. ‘You have a guard out there, haven’t you?’ asked the
Colonel. ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Well, if they get past your guard they won’t
mine,’ and he turned and walked off, leaving the lieutenant quite
crestfallen at the encounter.
“It was while we were here at Randall that I was subpœnaed by a United
States marshal to appear at the trial of the murderer of Captain Spear.
I had the greatest difficulty in getting permission to continue my
trip, although the trial was not to come off for several months. I had
to give $20,000 bonds for my appearance.
[Sidenote: DISASTROUS CONTRACT.]
“After my return to St. Louis that fall I made several Mississippi
River trips and laid the boat up late in the season. In the summer of
1871 I ran in what is called the Omaha line all the season. In the fall
I sold the boat for $30,000. She had paid me just about what she cost.
I remained at home all the winter of 1871–72, when I again got tired
of doing nothing; and being bred to the steamboat business, and not
daring to turn my hand to anything else, commenced building another
boat. She was completed by the middle of the summer, and named _De
Smet_, in honor of the distinguished Jesuit missionary. I at once took
a contract to transport freight from St. Louis to Shreveport, La., for
the construction of the Southern Pacific railroad. This enterprise
was disastrous in the extreme. I found the Red River without water
enough at the mouth for me to enter, all of it going down the Bayou
Atchafalaya. I did not get away from there until January, having had to
import one hundred mules at my own expense to get the freight through.
The enterprise was so disastrous that I was released from the contract.
I secured fifteen hundred bales of cotton for my return trip to St.
Louis, but the winter was severe and I was stopped by ice at Helena,
Ark., and had to send the freight on by rail. Take it all in all, the
season’s venture was a most ruinous one.”
[Sidenote: AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE.]
While engaged in this work Captain La Barge found it necessary to run
down to New Orleans with his boat. He went to transact some business
with Jesse K. Bell, a man closely connected with Mississippi River
business and a capitalist well known throughout the valley. While in
his office someone came in and asked to see Dave McCann. “What McCann
is that?” asked La Barge. “Dave McCann.” “Dave McCann?” “Yes. Do you
know him?” “I used to know a Dave McCann over forty years ago.” “Well,
I guess it’s the same man. Let’s see if he knows you,” and Bell sent
his servant to call McCann in. When La Barge was on the _Warrior_
during the Blackhawk war in 1832 McCann was second engineer on the
boat. The two young men became intimately acquainted and very fond of
each other. They were together for a time during the cholera scourge
and promised to take care of each other if either were taken sick.
Finally their ways parted and neither had seen or heard of the other
since. McCann quickly appeared in Mr. Bell’s office and glanced at
where La Barge was sitting. “Well, if here isn’t Joe La Barge!” he
exclaimed, grasping his old associate by the hand. “And if this isn’t
Dave McCann!” was the Captain’s warm rejoinder. McCann was at the time
president of the Cotton Compress Company and of the New Orleans Foundry
Company.
Captain La Barge did not reach St. Louis until February, 1873. He
remained there for a while and made a second, and this time profitable,
trip to Shreveport. He then advertised for Benton, secured a good
cargo, and made a successful trip.
[Sidenote: INCIDENT AT FORT RICE.]
[Sidenote: CUSTER AND STANLEY.]
“An incident occurred on this voyage at Fort Rice,” said the Captain,
“which illustrates some traits of General Custer’s military character.
Custer was daily expected to arrive opposite Fort Rice, and General
Stanley, who was commanding there, wanted me to delay a day or two
and ferry him over. I made an arrangement with him to do this, and
when Custer arrived I crossed the river with an order from Stanley
to bring him over. I cleared the deck of the _De Smet_ entirely, and
rigged stages so that the horses and wagons could be driven directly on
board. As the command approached, I saw an officer come riding down,
clad in buckskin trousers from the seams of which a large fringe was
fluttering, red-topped boots, broad sombrero, large gauntlets, flowing
hair, and mounted on a spirited animal. I had never seen Custer, but
of course had heard a great deal of him, and there was no mistaking
this picture. I went out on the bank to meet him. He stopped his horse,
but did not get off. I said, ‘General Custer, I suppose?’ He nodded
assent. I showed him my order for the transportation of the command and
told him that if he would have the wagons brought down I would see to
their proper disposition on the boat. ‘Stand aside, sir,’ he replied;
‘my wagon-master will take charge of the boat and see to ferrying the
command over.’ ‘Not if I know myself,’ I replied, and started for the
boat. Custer sent for a guard to arrest me, but I took time by the
forelock, drew in the stage, and steamed across the river and reported
to General Stanley. Stanley immediately sent me back with an officer
and guard, who arrested Custer and brought him to his headquarters.
“Custer seemed to me to be generally unpopular, that is, I rarely heard
him well spoken of. Stanley, on the other hand, always appeared to be a
gentleman of rare qualities, one who never forgot to treat a civilian
as a man--something that many officers were little disposed to do.”
[Sidenote: LA BARGE IN ARREST.]
While at Benton awaiting passengers for a return trip Captain La Barge
had some new experiences of the character of men who were delegated
by the government to do its business with the Indians. He was one day
arrested by Mr. C. D. Hard, deputy U. S. marshal, sub-Indian agent,
and special Indian detective at this point, on charge of selling
and trading whisky on Indian reservations. The second day afterward
Captain La Barge was brought up for examination, but not being allowed
to introduce any evidence in his own behalf, made no effort to clear
himself. The agent then seized his boat in the following words: “I
seize the boat as sub-Indian agent, and turn her over to myself as
deputy marshal for safe keeping.” Being requested to produce papers
for such a proceeding, he replied that verbal seizure was sufficient
for him, and others would have to accommodate themselves accordingly.
He immediately placed a fellow criminal over the boat and applied
to Captain Kirtland, the military officer in charge, for a squad of
soldiers to aid him in his rascality. This request was peremptorily
refused. Hard became very insolent and abusive after the seizure, and
it was soon evident that the object of himself and his confederates was
to levy blackmail upon the Captain. Being determined to defeat this
outrageous scheme, he left for Helena to consult legal authorities.
When Captain La Barge reached Helena he had no difficulty in securing
a telegraphic order from Chief Justice Wade, of the Territory,
directing the release of the boat, and he returned to Benton and
resumed possession of her, much to the chagrin of the authors of this
high-handed proceeding. This virtuous public officer had endeavored to
work a similar game on another boat the same season, but was defeated
by some of the passengers.
The boat had been detained by this incident upward of two weeks, and
it was not until the middle of July that she set out on her return
trip. Among the passengers was the family of Colonel Wilbur F. Sanders,
already known in these pages as counsel for the plaintiffs in the case
against La Barge, Harkness & Co. The Captain and he were always on good
terms, however, and their former relations had nothing to do with their
subsequent friendship.
[Sidenote: A SERVICE REWARDED.]
On the way up the river this season two Catholic Sisters came on
board on a begging visit in the interest of the Chicopee Mission in
Minnesota. The Captain gave them passage to Benton and back. They
visited Helena and Virginia City, and were very successful. They came
back from Helena with the Sanders family and returned to Sioux City.
About a month later Captain La Barge received by express a beautiful
specimen of needlework handsomely framed, representing St. Joseph. It
is still in the possession of the La Barge family.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE SELLS HIS BOAT.]
After Captain La Barge’s return to St. Louis he entered the Alton
trade, and made daily trips in opposition to the Eagle Packet Company.
He entered the same trade again in 1874 under an arrangement with John
S. McCune, who had long controlled the trade on this part of the river.
But in March of this year, while Mr. McCune was in Jefferson City to
settle some details in regard to the sale of lands constituting the
present Forest Park of the City of St. Louis, he was taken sick with
pneumonia and died one day after his return to St. Louis. This broke up
all the Captain’s plans, and as he was not able, unaided, to compete
with the Eagle Packet Company, he sold his boat to them.
Captain La Barge spent the remainder of the season in St. Louis, and in
the fall commenced building a new boat, which he christened the _John
M. Chambers_, in honor of the infant son of B. M. Chambers, President
of the Butchers’ and Drovers’ Bank. The boat was ready for use in the
spring of 1877. Captain La Barge made a trip as far as to Fort Rice,
loaded mainly with quartermaster stores. He then entered the Yankton
trade, that being at the time an important terminus for the declining
river business. Certain defects in the boat’s machinery, which could
not be remedied at Yankton, compelled an early return to St. Louis
and the loss of some important work. Captain La Barge remained in St.
Louis until the following spring. He then returned to Yankton under
a government contract to transport goods from that point. He finished
this work early, but had scarcely returned to St. Louis when he was
called upon to go up the river again, as we have elsewhere related, for
service in the Custer campaign.
[Sidenote: LAST COMMERCIAL VOYAGE.]
In 1877 La Barge took the _Chambers_ as far up the Missouri as to the
mouth of the Yellowstone, and up the latter stream to the mouth of
Tongue River. In the following year he made a trip to Benton, arriving
there on the 4th day of June. This is believed to have been the last
commercial trip from St. Louis to Fort Benton. Upon his return to St.
Louis he sold his boat and retired permanently from the business of
boat owner and builder. He served as pilot on the lower river during
the summer of 1879, and then finally withdrew from connection with
commercial boating on the Missouri.
[Sidenote: LA BARGE RETIRES FROM THE RIVER.]
From 1880 to 1885 Captain La Barge was in the service of the government
as pilot of the steamer _Missouri_, which was then engaged in making
a survey of the river valley. This duty was little enough like the
active business of his better days. It was filled with reminiscences of
his past career which could not but bring regretful reflections. His
intimate knowledge of the river was of great help in recovering the
proper geographical nomenclature of the valley, and might have been
of far greater value had the surveyor under whose charge he worked
possessed an ordinary appreciation of the mine of knowledge which lay
at his disposal. In 1885 the boat was taken from St. Louis to Fort
Benton, this being the very last through trip ever made. The year 1885
closed Captain La Barge’s career on the Missouri River, and he took his
hand from the wheel after a record of service unequaled by any other
pilot in its history. Three years more than half a century had elapsed
since he made his first voyage up the river.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
DECLINING YEARS.
It is a sad reflection that, after a life of hard and useful work and
the prominent part he took in up-building the great West, Captain La
Barge should have closed his career in comparative want. But such were
the vicissitudes of the business to which his life had been devoted.
That business had passed away, and like a sinking ship it dragged down
all who clung to it. Captain La Barge struggled bravely against these
adverse conditions, but it was impossible to withstand the downward
tendency.
[Illustration: STEAMBOAT WRECK ON THE MISSOURI RIVER]
From 1890 to 1894 Captain La Barge held a position under the city
government of St. Louis. His very last remunerative work of any kind
was for the United States Government, under the direction of the author
of this work, whom he helped compile a list of the steamboat wrecks
which have occurred on the Missouri River. This work was done in the
year 1897, and was published as a part of the report of the Missouri
River Commission for that year. Although the number of these wrecks
lacks but five of three hundred, the Captain’s memory embraced them
nearly all, and most of them with great accuracy of detail.
[Sidenote: GREATEST WRECK OF ALL.]
Truly a mournful task was this to the veteran pilot. What reminiscences
of a strange and wonderful past did it bring to mind! He lived over
again his river life of fifty years, saw the old keelboat, the
mackinaw, and the canoe, dodged again the bullets of the treacherous
savages, killed the wild buffalo, sparred his boat over sandbars or
warped it up the rapids, beheld again the wild rush to the gold fields,
heard the tramp of the army going to battle on the plains, and mused
upon a thousand other features of a life that existed no more. And as
he recalled one by one these wrecks of a once flourishing business,
he could not but reflect that the greatest wreck of all was the
business itself. It was gone--buried so deep in the sands of commercial
competition that not even the pennant staff or smokestack caused a
ripple on the surface--passengers, cargo, and all that clung to her a
total loss.
Captain La Barge survived most of his associates in the river business,
and in his later years was frequently consulted by those who had
occasion to recover facts concerning the early history of the river.
He lived only about two years after the completion of his work for the
government. He had grown visibly feebler during this time, and it was
apparent to those who knew him that the end of his life was near. It
came at last, however, quite unexpectedly. He was taken suddenly ill on
the 2d of April, 1899, and at 3 P. M. of the following day breathed his
last.
[Sidenote: JESUITS HONOR LA BARGE.]
The funeral of Captain La Barge was from the St. Xavier Cathedral in
St. Louis, and was largely attended. The Jesuits were under a deep debt
of gratitude to the Captain, who, throughout his career, had extended
to their missionaries the freedom of his boats. Through mistaken
information they had often credited this generosity to the American Fur
Company, for which Captain La Barge worked so much. Upon discovering
their error they made due acknowledgment of it, and upon this occasion
made a particular point to correct it and to acknowledge their lasting
debt to the great pilot. It was probably in line with this purpose that
the Church paid to the deceased its very highest honors. On Thursday
morning, April 6, solemn high mass was celebrated at the Cathedral for
the repose of the soul. Archbishop Kain, assisted by eight priests,
officiated at the mass. Six grandsons of the deceased acted as pall
bearers. Father Walter H. Hill, a lifelong friend of Captain La Barge,
preached the funeral sermon. In the course of his remarks he said:
“Captain La Barge led an honorable life. In the eyes of the Church to
which he belonged he led a good life. There was no stigma upon his
name. No vice marred his character to bring the blush of shame to his
children. His life was an example of which they might well be proud.”
[Sidenote: A WONDERFUL METAMORPHOSIS.]
The speaker drew an interesting picture of the changes that had taken
place in the city of St. Louis and in the great West within the span
of this man’s life. In his infancy he had actually been in peril from
the Indians in what are now the outskirts of the city. Then luxury and
plenty, as we now know them, had no existence. The mother cared for
her children and did the work of the house. The candle and not the
incandescent furnished light at night. Water was pumped from the well
and people did not ride to and from their business in swift electric
cars. In the words of a local paper, commenting upon the Captain’s
career, “He passed through all the gradations and progressive steps
of the century until in its very last year the sun of his life set
forever, and his expiring gaze beheld a little village grown to a great
metropolis, enmeshed in a perfect tangle of railways, factories, and
furnaces, teeming with busy activity, converting the crude material
into every possible contrivance imaginable for the use of man; palatial
mansions where, in his youth, was a wilderness; in short, every
improvement that the brain of man had wrought.”
Father Hill illustrated this marvelous growth by a reference to the
growth of his own Church in St. Louis: “As I stand here to-day,” he
said, “to pay the last sad tribute of respect to the memory of the
friend of my early youth, I cannot help thinking of the marvelous
changes that have been wrought in the last eighty-four years. On the
evening of October 22, 1815, a mother entered a little frame church
on the banks of the Mississippi, bearing an infant in her arms. The
parent had come to have the child baptized. Tallow candles lighted her
way through the aisle to the rude altar where the ceremony was to be
performed. To-day the remains of that babe, grown to manhood’s estate
and full of years, lie before me. The spirit now dwells in his Father’s
house. At the christening were only the most primitive conveniences;
at the burial services his remains rest in a magnificent granite
structure; hundreds of electric lights glare upon the dead; hundreds of
heads are bowed in silent prayer. Which of us can ponder for an instant
upon the span of this life and not be bewildered at the contemplation?”
[Sidenote: A FIT RESTING PLACE.]
Captain La Barge was buried in the beautiful Calvary Cemetery, which
lies adjacent to the even more beautiful Bellefontaine Cemetery in
the northern part of the City of St. Louis. His grave is within a
short distance of where he spent his earliest infancy, and is in all
respects a peculiarly appropriate resting place after a life like
his. To the eastward, in full view where not cut off by the foliage,
flows the mighty Mississippi. To the northward the impetuous Missouri
brings down its flood from the dim and shadowy distance. How often had
this individual guided his intrepid bark up the channels of these two
streams, headed for remote and almost unknown ports, and anon, gliding
swiftly on his homeward journey, sped eastward into the Mississippi and
south to the port to which he always returned. Standing by his grave
and overlooking the valleys of these streams, their history through the
past two centuries thrills the mind like a romance of the past.
[Sidenote: PERSONAL APPEARANCE.]
In personal appearance Captain La Barge was one of the most
distinguished-looking men of the West in his time. He stood five feet
ten, was well proportioned, weighed about 180 pounds, was erect,
muscular, and alert, with a sharp, quick eye and a quiet energy in
all his movements. He always wore a beard after reaching manhood’s
estate, and in later years bore a striking resemblance to General
Grant. Colonel Thomas of the army, long stationed in St. Louis, always
addressed him by the name, Grant; and only a few years before his death
a gentleman met him on the street and said, “Well, if I did not know
Grant is dead, I should say there he comes.”
[Sidenote: SUNSHINE AND TEMPEST.]
Captain La Barge’s manner in social intercourse was mild and agreeable,
and his accent pleasant to a degree. It was a satisfaction to hear him
talk. Although almost invariably soft and unobtrusive, his voice would
occasionally swell, under the influence of emotion, until it possessed
all the power of command. It is said that this characteristic marked
his entire career. His men were not deceived by it. They never dared to
take undue advantage of the sunshine of his manner, lest they call down
upon them the thunder of the tempest.
Captain La Barge was a lifelong, consistent Catholic in religion, and
in politics a lifelong, consistent Democrat.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
DESTINY OF THE MISSOURI RIVER.
What of the future? Is the useful purpose of the Missouri River in
the up-building of the West already fulfilled? Is its great history a
closed book? Such, it must be admitted, is the general view. In popular
estimation that river to-day is little more than a vast sewer, whose
seething, eddying waters bear down the sands and clay and débris from
the far upper country, scattering them along its course, swelling
the floods of the Mississippi, and pushing ever seaward the delta of
that mighty stream. To the railroads it is a million-dollar obstacle
wherever they want to cross it. As a competitive route of commerce it
has sunk beneath their notice. To the husbandman along its borders it
is a perpetual nightmare, for he knows not what morning he may awake
to find his worldly possessions ruthlessly swept away. From all points
of view it now seems like one of those things in the economy of nature
which could be dispensed with and the world be none the worse for its
absence.
[Sidenote: PAST AND PRESENT.]
Nevertheless the river is still there--a fact, a thing to be reckoned
with in some way or other. It will not let its presence be forgotten.
In its old-time fashion it carves up the lands, but with vastly greater
destructiveness now that they have become so valuable. Its terrible
ice gorges pile up as of yore, but are now more dreaded than they used
to be on account of the property along the banks. In other respects as
well it is the same peculiar stream that it has ever been. The weird
sandstorms drive over its illimitable bars, the willows bend to the
blast, and the swift-rolling waters are lashed into foam by the prairie
gale. In periods of calm its silvery sheen stretches away under the
morning and evening sun as when the pilot followed its interminable
windings through the prairies; and its resistless tide rushes on, as in
the blithe steamboat days, when it carried upon its bosom the commerce
of the valley.
But here the likeness between the past and present ends. No aboriginal
savage now roams upon its borders. The buffalo does not come to its
shore to quench his thirst, or to swim its current, or to cross upon
its ice. The lonely dwellers of the valley have long since ceased
to watch the eastern horizon where the river runs into the sky, for
the curling smoke no longer tells them of the approach of those
white-winged messengers of civilization, the Missouri River steamboats.
They are gone, its greatness and glory, never, in their ancient form,
to return.
[Sidenote: THE GERM OF EMPIRE.]
But the river itself is still there, and those who dwell on its shores
refuse to believe that its power for good has passed away. For years
they have wistfully looked upon its waters, flowing by in absolute
waste, and then upon the rich lands on either side, parching in a
rainless climate. A vague hope of what the river _may_ be already
possesses their minds. Does it not hold the secret germ of a mighty
future empire? Twenty-five millions of people these wasted waters could
sustain, if only they could be scattered upon the neighboring lands.
With great canals to divert them from the river, with great reservoirs
to keep them from going to waste, there would follow the necessary
millions of money and men to turn them to proper account.
This is the dream. Can it be realized, or must it always remain nothing
more than a dream? It is an engineering problem purely. The grand
desideratum would be that everywhere, whether upon the main stream or
its tributaries, the water could be saved and used in irrigation. But
the obstacles in the way of so complete a result seem at present almost
insurmountable. The higher tributaries can doubtless all be utilized,
but the main streams, in their lower courses, have so little fall that
it will be very difficult to build canals of sufficient length to get
the water upon the higher ground. Whether the water will ever have a
value that will justify pumping it to the necessary elevation it would
be unwise at present to hazard a conjecture. But even if not more than
half can be utilized, it will still be enough to maintain a population
equal to that at present existing in the entire arid region of the West.
[Sidenote: A MIGHTY FUTURE.]
Here, then, is the answer to our question--What of the future? Turn
this river out upon the lands. Unlock its imprisoned power. Where the
rains do not fall let it supply the need. Then the new and greater
history of the Missouri River will begin. Utility will take the place
of romance. The buffalo, the Indian, the steamboat, the gold-seeker,
the soldier, will be seen in its valley no more, but in their stead
the culture and comfort, and the thousand blessings that come with
civilization. Such, let us hope, in drawing the curtain over a mighty
past, will be the consummation of a still more mighty future.[74]
FOOTNOTES
[44] The fact of this attack on the _Sam Gaty_ has been questioned by
some; but there would seem to be no doubt of its truth in all essential
details.
[45] Brother of Susan B. Anthony, and at the present date editor of the
Leavenworth _Times_.
[46] This was the opinion naturally held by Southern sympathizers in
Missouri. The unbending will of this stern and ardent patriot would
overbear and crush without compunction anyone who had even a taint of
disloyalty about him. Though La Barge had taken a stand which was quite
as honorable, and more self-sacrificing than that of Lyon, still the
latter could not forget that the Captain’s environment and training had
made him more sympathetic with the Southern cause than a Northerner
could possibly be. Lyon’s temperament, moreover, aggravated the
severity of his patriotism. He was not popular with his associates in
the old army on account of his overbearing disposition.
[47] Fisk repeated the expedition several times. It virtually amounted
to emigration at government expense. The military authorities did not
think much of either Fisk or his scheme, and officially denounced
both. Thus General Sully, September 9, 1864: “Why will the government
continue to act so foolishly, sending out emigrant trains at great
expense? Do they know that most of the men that go are persons running
away from the draft?”
[48] In 1866 the _Deer Lodge_, which left Benton about May 20, met the
following boats on her way down: _St. John_ and _Cora_ at Fort Benton;
_Waverly_ at Eagle Creek; _Mollie Dozier_ and _W. J. Lewis_ at Fort
Galpin; _Marcella_ at Fort Charles; _Big Horn_, above Big Muddy; _Only
Chance_ 30 miles below Union; _Favorite_ and _Ontario_ 70 miles below;
_Tacony_ and _Iron City_ 130 miles below; _Amelia Poe_ and _Walter
B. Dance_ near White Earth River; _Jennie Brown_, _Peter Balen_, and
_Gold Finch_ in Big Bend; _Miner_ below Fort Clark; _Luella_ above
Fort Rice; _Helena_ at Fort Rice; _Tom Stevens_ 40 miles below Fort
Rice; _Huntsville_ at Grand River; _Lillie Martin_ at Island below
Grand River; _Sunset_ 20 miles below Swan Lake Bend; _Agnes_ at Devil’s
Island; _Ned Tracy_ and _Mary McDonald_ above Big Cheyenne; _Marion_ 30
miles above Fort Sully; _Jennie Lewis_ above Pierre; _Gallatin_ below
Fort Sully; _Rubicon_ at Cadet Island; _Lexington_ above Great Bend;
_Montana_ below Crow Creek; and _Ben Johnson_ at Bon Homme Island.
[49] The names were N. W. Burroughs, George Friend, Franklin Friend,
Abraham Low, James H. Lyons, Harry Martin, Frank Angevine, George
Allen, James Andrews, and James Perie (colored).
[50] This account is taken from the published narrative of Mr. Hubbell
in the St. Paul _Pioneer Press_ of December 11, 1898. Mr. Hubbell has
published several most interesting and valuable accounts in the St.
Paul papers of his early experiences as a Missouri River trader.
[51] “The _Ida Stockdale_ reached Fort Benton June 29, 1867. She could
not have returned to Trover Point before the 1st or 2d of July. The
_Sunset_ picked up the boy July 11. The time that he was alleged
to have been lost could therefore not have been far wrong, and the
distance he traveled is known with accuracy.”
[52] “The _Spread Eagle_ is just along side of us and we are having
a race, probably the first ever run on the upper Missouri. She
passed us and then we passed her, when she ran into us, breaking our
guard and doing some other damage. There was a good deal of angry
talk.”--_Harkness’ Journal_. (This journal of the voyage of 1862 and of
Harkness’ trip to the mines and his return to St. Louis is published in
the Proceedings of the Montana Historical Society, vol. ii.)
[53] See page 122.
[54] What is now the town of Deer Lodge, Mont., was first named La
Barge City, and was so known for about two years. The name was given
by two friends of Captain La Barge, John S. Pemberton of St. Louis and
Leon Quesnelle, a descendant of the Quesnelle who seems to have been
the first permanent settler at Bellevue, Neb. Quesnelle had been in the
Deer Lodge Valley for some time, and had a ranch near where the town
was afterward built. Two years later the town site was organized by
James Stuart and others, surveyed and laid out by W. W. De Lacy, and
rechristened Deer Lodge. The original town site plot of La Barge City
is in possession of the Montana Historical Society.
[55] Letter from S. N. Latta, agent, to W. P. Dole, Commissioner Indian
Affairs, dated Yankton, Dak., August 27, 1863. See report Com. Ind.
Affs., 1863, p. 170.
[56] The two Indian agents profess in their reports not to have
anticipated any trouble. Latta would hardly have ordered the yawl out
if he had suspected what actually occurred. Reed, the Blackfoot agent,
says that they “continued to hollow to us for some time, and showed
great signs of friendship, and wanted us to come ashore.” The sum of
it all is that the two men who were officially in charge of the trip
entirely failed to understand the gravity of the situation, which was
thoroughly appreciated by those, like Culbertson and La Barge, who had
had long experience with the Indians. The sending of the yawl and the
consequences which followed must ever remain charged to the account of
Samuel N. Latta, Indian Agent.
[57] The account of what happened from the time the yawl left the
_Robert Campbell_ until it returned was given to the author in an
interview with Andy Stinger, the steersman and rescuer of the party.
[58]
“KNOB VIEW, CRAWFORD, CO., MO.
Sept. 2, 1896.
“MY DEAR OLD CAPTAIN
“JOSEPH LA BARGE,
“_My Dear Friend_: I should like to hear from you whether you are still
in the land of the living. Thank God for his mercies. Dear Captain I
should be happy to be with you a few hours and have a good talk over
the hardships of our past life steamboating, especially on the _Robert
Campbell_ in 1863 going to the mountains. It would give me great
pleasure to see you and all your family once more. It is a great many
years since I have heard anything from you. Please let me hear from you
soon. My love and friendship to you and all your family. I remain your
true friend untill death. From the Hero of the Tobacco Garden on _Bob
Campbell_ in 1863.
“WM. ANDY STINGER.
“P. S. Address
“Wm. A. Stinger,
“Knob View, Crawford Co. Mo.
“Farewell Dear Captain. May God bless you all with health and strength.”
[59] There are numerous authorities upon the affair of the Tobacco
Garden. The reports of both the agents Latta and Reed describe it.
Henry A. Boller, in his “Among the Indians,” describes it at length,
as does Larpenteur in his “Forty Years a Fur Trader.” The testimony of
Captain La Barge and Andy Stinger, who in each other’s presence related
the matter to the author, is here produced for the first time.
In his edition of “Larpenteur’s Journal,” referred to above, p. 352,
Dr. Elliott Coues makes the following statement: “I have offered in
writing to Captain Joseph La Barge to print in this connection any
statement concerning the affair that he might wish to make and would be
willing to sign; but up to date of going to press have not heard from
him.”
The inference from this is that Captain La Barge could not controvert
Larpenteur’s statements, or he would have done so when the opportunity
was given. This offer was sent to Captain La Barge through the author
of the present work. The old gentleman retained in his old age the same
spirit of haughty disdain for willful attempts to injure the reputation
of others that characterized his whole life, and he indignantly refused
to notice the matter. “Time will set this right,” he said. The truth is
that Charles Larpenteur, although very long in the Indian country, was
never a man of high standing there, and proved a failure in whatever he
undertook. Like all such men, he nursed the delusion that the world was
in league against him, and he took advantage of the opportunity offered
by the preparation of his memoirs to even matters up. Nearly everyone
with whom he deals comes in for a round measure of abuse, until one
is led to believe that Larpenteur was a saint, solitary and forlorn,
wandering disconsolate among the children of Beelzebub. Larpenteur
was probably an honest man in his business relations, but never an
able man, and his attempts to account for the consequences of his own
deficiencies by attributing them to the rascality of others, does not
add to the value of his memoirs as historical material. Bad as the
early population of that country was, it was not entirely composed of
scoundrels.
[60] This was the same man who served as clerk to Captain Bonneville in
the latter’s celebrated expeditions. He died March 15, 1864.
[61] Following are the official reports of Agents Latta and Reed upon
this event:
Report of Judge Latta, p. 164, Report Com. Ind. Aff., 1863. “The Crow
goods, as I have informed you [Commissioner Dole], were stored at Fort
Union by the steamer _Shreveport_. When the _Robert Campbell_ reached
the mouth of the Yellowstone, she could get no further, there being
only two feet of water in the channel above, it requiring five trips
of the steamer _Shreveport_ to convey the _Campbell’s_ freight to Fort
Union some six miles above. We found it utterly impossible to proceed
any further. The _Shreveport_, though a light-draught boat, could not
have passed up empty.”
Report of Dr. Reed, p. 172, Report Com. Ind. Aff., 1863. “We got to
the mouth of the Yellowstone River after the most untiring efforts,
especially on the part of Captain La Barge, who seemed to know the only
channel in the Missouri, about the 7th of July. After passing the mouth
of the Yellowstone, it was found that the Missouri River was extremely
low; indeed lower than ever known at this season of the year. It was
found that even the _Shreveport_, a light-draught and small boat, could
scarcely get up to Fort Union with any load at all, and as the river
has been constantly falling, it was ascertained that there was no hope
at all of getting to Milk River, the next fort above. Chouteau, with
a light-draught boat and not a large load, had just left his goods on
the bank, not being able to get up to Milk River fort. Under these
circumstances, especially as there were no teams at Fort Union and
the Indians (Sioux) were all through the country, so that no company
could go either with a mackinaw boat or by land, with any safety,
except under escort, it was thought not only advisable but the only
course, to stow away the goods, and leave them until next spring at
Fort Union. The man in charge of the fort said there was an abundance
of room, and there would be no danger unless the Indians should attack
the fort; then the goods would have to share the lot of all the other
goods and the people of the fort. The goods are all safely stored and
every prospect of everything being right. Of course Captain La Barge is
responsible, as the Blackfeet goods are not to their destination nor
the bills of lading receipted; though I must say I never saw men more
anxious to get up, nor do more night and day, to get along; and could
the goods have been at St. Louis by the 10th or 12th of April, they no
doubt would have all been distributed by this time.”
[62]
Blackfoot annuities, 142,862 lbs., freight St. Louis
to Fort Benton, at 11 cents per pound, $15,714.82
Crow annuities, 12,572 lbs., freight St. Louis to
the mouth of Milk River, at 8 cents, 1,005.76
Demurrage, 33 days at $300 per day, 9,900.00
----------
$26,620.58
Only payment ever received on this claim, 7,206.55
----------
Balance unpaid, $19,414.03
[63] Galpin’s mission to Washington was to secure reimbursement of a
ransom which he had paid for the liberation of a white female prisoner,
who had been captured the year before at the time of the Minnesota
massacres. Galpin had been sent by La Barge from Fort La Framboise to
rescue the prisoner, and had been compelled to pay fifteen hundred
dollars. Captain La Barge took her down in his boat to Sioux City,
whence she was sent home. He had Galpin go with him to Washington to
assist in presenting the matter to the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The
ransom money was reimbursed in full.
[64] “What consideration will induce you to give up war and remain
at peace?” is the hypothetical question of a certain Indian agent
to a tribe of the Sioux in 1867. And the hypothetical answer, based
upon his many talks with them, was this: “Stop the white man from
traveling across our lands; give us the country which is ours by right
of conquest and inheritance, to live in and enjoy unmolested by his
encroachments, and we will be at peace with all the world.”
[65] Gruff old General Harney had his own views upon this treaty
business. When Commissioner Cummings came down the river from the
council with the Blackfeet, and, having lost his mules at Fort Pierre,
besought the General to give him some others to complete his journey
with, the General replied: “Yes, Colonel, I have plenty of mules, but
you can’t have one; and I only regret that when the Indians got your
mules they didn’t get your scalp also. Here all summer I and my men
have suffered and boiled to chastise these wretches, while you have
been patching up another of your sham treaties to be broken to-morrow
and give us more work.”
“It is beyond question that such a system of treaty-making is, of all
others, the most unpolitic, whether negotiated with savage or civilized
peoples, and ... aside from its effect in encouraging and stimulating
breaches of treaties of peace, is always attended with fraud upon the
government and upon the Indian.”--_General John Pope, Report of August
3, 1864._
[66] “Send me one man who will tell the truth and I will talk with
him,” was the laconic reply of a celebrated chief who had been asked to
meet a government commission in council.
[67] “Traders in former years have run the only boats to that region,
and had connected with their stores the only safe places for deposit;
hence a convenient mixture of government and traders’ goods has so
amalgamated matters as to have converted government annuities into
mercantile supplies.
“Our further progress up to the more remote tribes has disclosed to
us more mortifying evidence of negligence by former agents, and most
probably stupendous frauds and outrages.... Immediate arrangements
should be made to place the present agents independent of traders and
also to enable them to build safe storehouses, where the goods can be
properly protected and preserved....
“Deliveries of goods should be witnessed by some Federal officer
who should certify _that he saw the delivery_.”--_Report of the
Northwestern Treaty Commission to the Sioux of the Upper Missouri,
1866._
“The government appropriations are supposed to be liberal; but it so
happens that by the time they reach their destination, they have, and
not mysteriously either, dwindled down into a paltry present.”--_Henry
A. Boller, in “Among the Indians.”_
“This system of issuing annuity goods is one grand humbug.”--_Report of
Gen. Alfred Sully, August 18, 1864._
Evidence like the foregoing could be presented by the volume.
[68] “I saw, while at Sioux City, Captain La Barge, who had just
returned with his boat from the upper Missouri. Captain La Barge
has been in the American Fur Company employment for twenty-five
years, and says that never before this trip have the Indians been
unusually hostile. He says that now the whole Sioux nation is bound
for a war of extermination against the frontier, ... and that the
British government, through the Hudson Bay Company, are in his opinion
instigating all the Indians to attack the whites. He says British rum
from Red River comes over to the Missouri, and British traders are
among them [the Indians] continually. I have great confidence in his
judgment and opinion.”--_H. C. Nutt, Lieutenant Colonel Iowa State
Militia, to Hon. S. J. Kirkwood, Iowa City, dated Council Bluffs,
September 15, 1862._
[69] See page 277 for an account of the massacre of a party of miners
from Montana by these Indians.
[70] It has been asserted that the _Far West_ bore the first news of
the Custer massacre to the world; but this is not so. General Terry’s
dispatch to General Sheridan, written in camp on the Little Big Horn
June 27, was sent by courier to Fort Ellis, 240 miles distant, and
there put on the wire.
The following graphic account of the voyage of the _Far West_ is
well worth preserving in spite of its many errors of fact. As a word
picture of what was really a notable performance, it is a fine example
of journalistic writing. It is from the pen of M. E. Terry, and was
published in the _Pioneer Press_ of St. Paul in May, 1878:
“The steamer _Far West_ was moored at the mouth of the Little Big
Horn. The wounded were carried on board the steamer and Dr. Porter
was detailed to go down with them. Terry’s adjutant general, Colonel
Ed Smith, was sent along with the official dispatches and a hundred
other messages. He had a traveling-bag full of telegrams for the
Bismarck office. Captain Grant Marsh, of Yankton, was in command of
the _Far West_. He put everything in the completest order and took on
a large amount of fuel. He received orders to reach Bismarck as soon
as possible. He understood his instructions literally, and never did a
river man obey them more conscientiously. On the evening of the 3d of
July the steamer weighed anchor. In a few minutes the _Far West_, so
fittingly named, was under full head of steam. It was a strange land
and an unknown river. What a cargo on that steamer! What a story to
carry to the government, to Fort Lincoln, to the widows!
“It was running from a field of havoc to a station of mourners. The
steamer _Far West_ never received the credit due her. Neither has the
gallant Marsh; nor the pilots, David Campbell and John Johnson. Marsh,
too, acted as pilot. It required all their endurance and skill. They
proved the men for the emergency. The engineer, whose name is not known
to me, did his duty. Every one of the crew is entitled to the same
acknowledgment. They felt no sacrifice was too great upon that journey,
and in behalf of the wounded heroes. The Big Horn is full of islands,
and a successful passage, even on the bosom of a ‘June rise,’ is not
an easy feat. The _Far West_ would take a shoot on this or that side
of an island, as the quick judgment of the pilot would dictate. It is
no river, in the Eastern sense of that word. It is only a creek. A
steamboat moving as fast as a railway train in a narrow, winding stream
is not a pleasure. It was no pleasant sensation to be dashing straight
at a headland, and the pilot the only power to save. Occasionally the
bank would be touched and the men would topple over like ten-pins. It
was a reminder of what the result would be if a snag was struck. Down
the Big Horn the heroine went, missing islands, snags, and shore. It
was a thrilling voyage. The rate of speed was unrivaled in the annals
of boating. Into the Yellowstone the stanch craft shot, and down that
sealed river to pilots she made over twenty miles an hour. The bold
Captain was taking chances, but he scarcely thought of them. He was
under flying orders. Lives were at stake. His engineer was instructed
to keep up steam at the highest pitch. Once the gauge marked a pressure
that turned his cool head and made every nerve in his powerful frame
quiver. The crisis passed and the _Far West_ escaped a fate more
terrible than Custer’s. Once a stop was made, and a shallow grave
explained the reason. He still rests in that lone spot. Down the swift
Yellowstone, like shooting the Lachine Rapids, every mile a repetition
of the former. From the Yellowstone she sped into the broad Missouri,
and then there was clear sailing. There was a deeper channel and more
confidence. A few minutes were lost at Buford. Everybody at the fort
was beside himself. The boat was crowded with inquirers, and their
inquiries were not half answered when the steamer was away. At Berthold
a wounded scout was put off, and at Fort Stevenson a brief stop to tell
in a word what had happened. There was no difference in the speed from
Stevenson to Bismarck. The same desperate rate was kept up to the end.
They were approaching home with something of that feeling which always
moves the human heart. At eleven o’clock on the night of the 5th of
July they reached Bismarck and Fort A. Lincoln. One thousand miles in
fifty-four hours was the proud record.”
[71] Charles Larpenteur, who was interpreter for the Commission in
their negotiations with the Assiniboines at Fort Union, says in his
journal, “The great Peace Commission was a complete failure.” Such was
the general sentiment along the valley.
[72] The _Montana Post_ is authority for the statement that this voyage
of the _Octavia_ was the quickest ever made from St. Louis to Fort
Benton.
[73] See footnote at end of chapter xxxviii.
[74] On the 13th of June, 1902, Congress passed an Act abolishing the
Missouri River Commission, and virtually abandoning the river as a
commercial highway.
On the 17th of the same month it passed an act inaugurating a
government policy of reclamation of the arid lands. This policy will
eventually result in an extensive use of the waters of the Missouri in
irrigation.
INDEX.
A
Abraham Lincoln, Fort, 386, 387
Arrival of _Far West_ at, 390
Agency system, 362
Agents, Indian, situation of, 360
Alder Gulch, discovery of, 271
_Amanda_, the, impressed by Peace Com. of 1866, 405
American Fur Company, questionable methods of, 25, 43, 59, 64, 135,
159, 183, 215, 290, 320, 329, 343, 344, 360
sells its business on the river, 239, 260
sends steamboat to Fort Benton, 218
Annuities, delivery of, in 1863, 301
Annuity system, abuses of, 177, 359, 360
Anthony, Col. R. D., 254
Appropriations for improving the Mo. r., 421–3
Aricara Indians, Ashley’s fight with, 5
Army, the, in Indian affairs, 365 et seq.
Arrival of steamboat at trading post, 132
Ash Hollow, battle of, 367
Ashley, Gen. W. H., 5, 8
transports furs by bullboat, 101
_Assiniboine_, the, ascends Mo. r. to Poplar r., 139, 218
Assiniboine Indians, 352
break peace with Blackfeet, 228
Astor, John Jacob, 134, 138
Astorian expedition, 107
Atkinson, Gen. Henry, takes expedition to Yellowstone in 1825, 376, 383
Aubrey, Felix X., ride of, 114
Audubon the naturalist and the black squirrel, 150
on board the _Omega_, 141 et seq.
unpopularity of, 150
B
Bad Axe, battle of, 24
Bad lands, first military expedition through, 375
Bailey, pilot of the _Spread Eagle_, 1863, 290, 291
Bannock City, 269
Barry, William, kills Captain Spear, 412
released from arrest, 414
tried and acquitted, 415
Bell of the _Saluda_, 125
Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis, 442
Beneetse, discoverer of gold in Montana, 266
_Ben Johnson_, the, transports Peace Com. of 1863, 397
Benteen, Captain, in Custer campaign, 381
Benton, Fort, christening of, 235
growth of, 237
head of navigation, 220, 222
historical sketch of, 222 et seq.
ruined by the railroads, 419
Benton, Thos. H., bequeaths name to Fort Benton, 235
defends Am. F. Co., 27, 159, 235, 348
faith of, in the West, 348
Benton Transportation Company, 420
Bercier accompanies La Barge on war party, 46
death of, 46
Berger, Jacob, attacks Malcolm Clark, 232
goes on mission to the Blackfeet, 223
Bible lost on the _Naomi_, 79
Big Mound, battle of, 372
_Bishop_, the, lost in whirlpool, 122
Bismarck, first railroad at, 419
Black Dave, adventure of, 149
Blackfeet Indians, annuities for, 315 et seq.
enemies of Crows, 223, 228
sketch of, 226, 352
trade relations with, 223
treaty with Assiniboines, 225
treaty with whites, 237, 359
Black Squirrel, Audubon and the, 150
Blair, Frank, and La Barge, 257
Bloody Island, 185
Boats, kinds of, on the Mo. r., 91 et seq.
Boller, Henry A., cited, 300, 307, 313, 361
Bonneville, Captain, ships furs by bullboat, 101
Boone, Daniel, burial of, 57
Boonville, battle of, 255
Bozeman, J. M., 268
Bradley, James H., historical researches of, 238
Brasseaux Houses, 374, 375, 385
Bridger, Fort, La Barge at, 335
Brulé, Fort, origin of name, 232
Bruyère tries to break up La Barge’s expedition, 61
Buffalo, adventure with, 163
Bullboat, description of, 96
Indian type of, 101
noted voyages of, 100
Burgwin, Captain, inspects the _Omega_, 144
Burials along the Missouri r., 36
Burleigh, Dr. W. A., 341
C
Cabanné, John P., affair of, with Leclerc, 24–7
California, conquest of, 172
discovery of gold in, 173
Calvary cemetery, St. Louis, 442
Campbell, Robert, criticises La Barge, 395
Canoe, description of, 91
Cargo of steamboats, 126
Cass, Fort, 228
Catholic sisters on La Barge’s boat, 434
Catlin, George, on board the _Yellowstone_, 137
Championship among steamboat employees, 128
Channel of the Missouri, changes in, 76
Chantier, description of, 96
Chappelle, Phil. A., assistance acknowledged, vi
Chardon, F. A., and Blackfoot massacre, 231
relieves Alexander Culbertson, 231
Chardon, Fort, 232, 237
Chase, Salmon P., La Barge’s experience with, 343
Chatillon, Henry, hunter for steamboats, 126
Cheyenne Indians, 352
Chicago and N. W. R. R. reaches Council Bluffs, 418
_Chippewa_, the, reaches head of navigation, 218, 219
Cholera on the _St. Ange_, 189
on the _Yellowstone_, 31
Chouteau Bluffs, origin of name, 137
Chouteau, C. P., 201, 219
encounter with Col. Dimon, 261
Chouteau, Edward Liguest, La Barge’s companion, 19, 345
Chouteau, Pierre, Jr., colloquy with La Barge, 292
offers stand of colors to La Barge, 240
quoted, 35, 134
Civil War, the, effect of, on Indians, 368
relation of, to Mo. r. commerce, 249 et seq.
termination of, 368
Clark, Fort, 139
Clark, Malcolm, attacks Alexander Harvey, 233
kills Owen McKenzie, 233
Clergymen as Indian agents, 143, 362
Cook, Camp, 410, 413
Cordelle, the, description of, 103
Cottonwood bark as forage, 49
Coues, Dr. Elliott, quoted, 313
Council Bluffs, first railroad at, 418
Crazy Wolf, Yanktonais Indian, 402
Crook, General, in campaign of 1876, 378, 379
Crooks, Ramsay, quoted, 138
Crow Indians, 352
enemies of Blackfeet, 223, 228
experience with Peace Com. of 1866, 404
Crow Indian prisoner killed by Pawnee, 31
Culbertson, Alexander, career at Fort Benton, 227 et seq.
Cummings, Alfred, makes treaty with Blackfeet, 236, 359
Curtis, General, mem. Peace Com. 1866, 397 et seq.
Custer, General, campaign of 1876, 380
command of, annihilated, 380
tries to arrest La Barge, 431
Custer massacre, first news of, 388
D
Dauphin, Louis, hunter for steamboats, 126
subaqueous adventure of, 303
Dawson, Andrew, receives property of La Barge, Harkness & Co., 327
Dead Buffalo Lake, battle of, 372
Deadman, meaning of term in steamboating, 122
_Deer Lodge_, the, boats met by, in 1866, 273
Deer Lodge Valley, discovery of gold in, 266, 267
De Lacey, W. W., 237, 295
Departure from port, 127
De Smet, Father P. J., at Fort Laramie, arrived in 1851, 358
goes from Fort Union to Fort Laramie, 193
on the _St. Ange_ in 1851, 189
stories of, 194
Diamond R Company, 329
Dimon, Col. Charles A. R., 260 et seq.
Dodge, Grenville M., assistance acknowledged, vi
relations with Lincoln, 243, 244
Dog, a, causes steamboat wreck, 116
chloroformed by Gen. Harney, 202
Durack, John, lassoes a buffalo, 163
E
Edgar, Henry, discoverer of Alder Gulch, 271
Edmunds, Newton, mem. Peace Com. of 1866, 397
_Edna_, the, explosion of, 124
_Effie Deans_, the, burned, 394
length of voyage in one season, 336
purchase of, 332
voyage of, in 1864, 319
_El Paso_, the, reaches Milk r., 218
Embalming, new method, 413
_Emilie_, the, 240, 241
voyage of, in 1862, 288
Evans, Dr., on the _St. Ange_ in 1851, 190
Exploration of the West, 174
Express, the, description of, 41
F
Fairweather, William, discoverer of Alder Gulch, 271
_Far West_, the, part played by, in campaign of 1876, 387, 388
Fire canoe of the Indians, 111
Fisk James L., leader of Northern Overland Expedition, 270
Flood of 1844, 154
Floods of Missouri and Mississippi, 83, 155
Fremont, General John, as an explorer, 348
inaccessibility of, 347
La Barge’s acquaintance with, 347
Freight rates on the Missouri, 276
Fuel for steamboats, 117
Fur trade, relation of, to the Indians, 353
use of steamboats in, 3
G
Galpin, Charles E., 341
Galpin, Fort, 293
Galvanized Yankees, 260
Gardner, Johnson, transports furs by bullboat, 101
Garreau, Pierre, 197
Gibbon, General, in Custer campaign, 378
Gilbert, Colonel, incident concerning, 427
Gold, discovery of, in California, 173
discovery of, in Montana, 237, 265 et seq., 368
Gold dust, first sale of, in Montana, 267
great quantity shipped by the _Octavia_, 413
transportation of, 275, 333
Good, Frederick, lost from the _Trover_, 286
Government work on the Missouri r., 421 et seq.
Grant, General, La Barge’s acquaintance with, 347
La Barge’s resemblance to, 443
Grattan massacre, 366, 367
Great Falls of the Missouri, 75
first white woman to see, 294
Great Falls City, Mont., 420
Great fire of St. Louis, 185
Great Northern R. R. reaches Helena, 417, 418
Greer, Capt. W. B., witnesses transactions at Fort Union, 316, 320, 321
Grismore, Nathan, La Barge’s mate, 181
Guerette, Louis, killed on the _Saluda_, 24, 124
Guerette, Pelagie wife of Capt. La Barge, 71
Guerrillas in Missouri, 250
H
Half breeds, British, among the Indians, 369
Hannibal and St. Joseph R. R. reaches the Mo. r., 241, 417, 418
Hard, C. D., arrests La Barge, 432
Harkness, James, connection of, with firm of La Barge, Harkness & Co.,
286, 293, 324, 329
journal of, 290
Harney, General, campaign of 1855, 367, 383
chloroforms a dog, 202
experience with Captain La Barge’s father, 6
friend of the Indians, 201
quoted, 356
Harvey, Alexander, attacked by Malcolm Clark, 234
desperate character of, 229 et seq.
Harvey, Primeau & Co., 234
Hat, Louis Dauphin’s, 303
Hawley, Hubbell & Co., buy out Am. F. Co., 239, 260
Hayden, Dr. F. N., on La Barge’s boat, 209
Helena, Mont., rise of, 272
Hill, Father W. H., preaches La Barge’s funeral sermon, 440
Hodgkiss, Wm., agent at Fort Union, 316, 320
Hoecken, Father, death of, 191
Hooper, Mormon acquaintance of La Barge’s, 334
Hopkins, Mormon acquaintance of La Barge’s, 334
Horrigan, Lieutenant, with troops on _Octavia_, 410
Hortiz, Eulalie, mother of Capt. La Barge, 11
Hortiz, Joseph Alvarez, 11
Hubbell, J. B. assistance acknowledged, vi
cited, 284
mackinaw voyage of, in 1866, 283
Hunters for steamboats, 125
Hyde, Orson, Mormon preacher, 375
I
Ice break up of 1856, 204
Ice gorges, 81
Illinois Central R. R. reaches Sioux City, 418
Improvement work on the Mo. r., 241 et seq.
_Independence_, the, first steamboat on the Missouri, 90, 219
Indian, the, and the fur trade, 353
and the steamboat, 364
Indian agents, character of, 362
Indian question, 355
Indians attack the _Martha_, 179
attack the _Omega_, 148
danger to boats from, 123
Indians of the Missouri Valley, 351
Insurance rates, 276
Irrigation, Congressional Act of, 448
relation of, to Mo. r., 447
Irving, Washington, quoted, 109
_Island City_, the, wreck of, 385
J
Jesuits honor La Barge’s memory, 440
Johnston, General A. S., 346
Joseph, Nez Percé chief, 392
captured, 393
K
Kansas City, first railroad at 417
Kansas Indians, 351
Keelboat, advent of, on the Missouri, 90
description of, 102
Kernel of corn, the, 152
Kidder, Judge, tries murderer of Capt. Spear, 414
Killdeer Mountain, battle of, 374
Kimball, Heber, Mormon preacher, 335
Kipp, James, accompanies La Barge, 70
builds Fort Piegan, 225
L
La Barge, A. G., assistance acknowledged, vi
La Barge Avenue, St. Louis, 198
La Barge, Charles S., killed in steamboat explosion, 13, 124
La Barge city, 295
La Barge, Fort, established, 293
turned over to Am. F. Co., 327
La Barge, Harkness & Co., 270, 287
collapse of firm, 329
operations of, in 1862, 293
sued, 326
La Barge, John B., brother of Capt. La Barge, 13
member of firm L. H. & Co., 287
takes first steamboat to head of navigation, 219
LA BARGE, JOSEPH, Mo. r. pilot accompanies Pawnee war party, 45
acquaintance with the Mormons, 56
acquaintance with prominent men, 346, 350
adventure with Sioux war party, 38
among the Pawnees, 27 et seq.
ancestry of, 2 et seq.
an authority on Mo. r. history, 439
as an expert witness, 165
at Ford’s theater, 344
before Senate Committee, 344
birth of, 12, 13
captured by Pawnees, 160
carries express to Pierre, 44
changes during his lifetime, 441
childhood of, 13
claim against government, 323
contemplates retirement, 198, 426
death of, iv, 440
dictates memoirs, iii
education of, 17
enters service Am. F. Co., 23, 56, 67, 200
enters service H. & St. Joe R. R., 241, 418
experience with Englishmen, 344
experience with rattlesnakes, 46
falls into an air hole, 50
funeral of, 440
grave of, 442
helps prepare list of steamboat wrecks, 438
in Cabanné-Leclerc affair, 24 et seq.
in Custer campaign, 389
in meteoric shower, 40
in Montana, 331 et seq.
in “opposition,” 59 et seq., 287
in Salt Lake City, 333
in Washington, 340 et seq.
intimate knowledge of the river, 116
leaves service Am. F. Co., 56, 184, 199, 210, 214, 215
marriage of, 71
meets Dave McCann, 430
on the _Yellowstone_ in cholera scourge, 32
opposes Am. F. Co., 59, et seq., 287
personal characteristics, 443
politics of, 444
purchases the _Sonora_, 190
religion of, 444
remains with the Union, 253
rescues boat from ice gorge, 207
retires from the river, 447
serves apprenticeship in steamboating, 55
serves as interpreter, 22
skill as a swimmer, 53
works for city of St. Louis, 438
La Barge, Joseph Marie, at Council Bluffs, 42
sketch of, 3
stories concerning, 6 et seq.
Laberge, Dr. Philemon, 12
La Fayette, visits of, to St. Louis, 15
La Framboise, Fort, 293
Langford, N. P., assistance acknowledged, vi
Laramie Fort, treaty of, 358
Larpenteur, Charles, cited, 307
estimate of, 313
quoted, 398
Last Chance Gulch, 272
Latta, S. M., Indian agent, 300
at the Tobacco Garden, 306
cited, 207
quoted, 317
Leavenworth, Colonel, in Aricara campaign, 383
Leclerc, Narcisse, affair of, with Cabanné, 24 et seq.
disloyal to La Barge, 60, 65
Lee, General R. E., acquaintance of La Barge with, 346
examines Mo. r., 422
surrender of, 336
Lemon, R. H., transfers Fort La Barge, 327
Lewis and Clark, expedition of, 375
Lewis, Fort, 233 et seq.
Lincoln, Abraham, assistance of, 261, 336
at Council Bluffs, 241
commutes sentence of Indians, 371
election of, 247
interest in Indian question, 342
on La Barge’s boat, 246
on Missouri r., 241 et seq.
presented with fur robe, 340
Little Crow, Sioux Chief, incites massacre, 370
Liquor, importation of, prohibited, 25, 141
Lisa, Manuel, voyage of, in 1811, 106, 107
Loan, Brig. Gen., quoted, 251
Log book kept by Captain Sire, 139
quoted, 146, 159
Lyon, General, goes to Illinois r. for pilots, 249
La Barge’s experience with, 257, 258
M
Mackinaw boat, description of, 94 et seq.
party are massacred, 277, 278
voyages of, 275, 284
Majors, Alexander, saves La Barge, 254
Mandan Indians, 252
Marine Insurance Companies, frauds upon, 420
Marmaduke, General, impresses the _Emilie_, 255
Marquette and Joliet discover Mo. r., 87
Marsh, Captain Grant, important services of, 387
master of the _Far West_, 388
Massacre, Custer, 380
Massacre on the Marias r., 279
Matlock, Indian Agent, 178
Maximilian, Prince of Wied, at Fort McKenzie, 228
voyage of, in 1833, 139
Maybrick, Mrs., case of, compared with that of Capt. Spear, 415
Meteoric shower, 40
Mexico, war with, 171
Miles, General, in Nez Percé campaign, 392
Miller, mate on the _Robert Campbell_, 396
Miller, Dr. Geo. L., quoted, 203
Miller, Joseph, Indian agent at Bellevue, 156
_Miner_, the, caught in a whirlpool, 122
Minnesota massacre, 370
Minnetarees, or Gros ventres of the Missouri, 352
Missouri Indians, 351
Missouri Pacific R. R. reaches Kansas City, 416
MISSOURI RIVER, THE
burials along shore, 36
commercial importance of, iv, 73
destiny of, 445
discovery of, 87
early exploration of, 89
first navigation of, 87
first steamboat to enter, 90
head of navigation on, 220
highest point reached by steam, 220
improvement of, by the government, 422 et seq.
Indian tribes along, 351
kinds of boats used on, 91 et seq.
modern view concerning, 445
navigation of, 115
origin of name, 88
physical characteristics of, 74 et seq.
relation of, to gold regions of Montana, 273
scenery of, 83
sediment carried, 78
source of, 74
Missouri River Commission, abolition of, 424, 448
creation of, 422
Mitchell, D. D., attends Council at Fort Laramie, 358
builds Fort McKenzie, 226
Montana, first railroads in, 419
gold fields of, 265
Montana Historical Society, 239
Mormons, the, in Missouri, 65
La Barge’s acquaintance with, 175, 333
migration of, to Great Salt Lake, 171
relation of, to commerce of Mo. r., 171
sketch of, 167
McCann, Dave, meets La Barge, 430
McCune, John S., relations with La Barge, 337, 396, 435
McKenzie, Fort, 137
burned, 232
founding of, 227
sketch of, 228
McKenzie, Kenneth, 134
opens trade with the Blackfeet, 223
McKenzie, Owen, killed by Malcolm Clark, 233
McPherson, W. W., government contractor, 409
N
_Naomi_, the, discovery of a Bible belonging to, 79
Negro boys lost, 285
New Mexico, conquest of, 172
Nez Percé campaign, steamboat in, 392
Nicollet, J. J., 347
_Nimrod_, the, injured by hailstorm, 164
inspection of, at Bellevue, 156
voyage of, in 1844, 154
Northern Overland Expedition, 270
Northern Pacific R. R. reaches Bismarck, 419
reaches Montana, 419
Northwestern Fur Company, 239, 260
Northwestern Treaty Commission--See “Peace Commission of 1866”
Nutt, H. C., quoted, 369
O
_Octavia_, the, built, 396
great profit on voyage of, 416
voyage of, 1867, 408
Omaha, first railroad at, 418
Omaha Indians, 351
_Omega_, the, voyage of 1843, 141 et seq.
Ophir City, 279
“Opposition,” meaning of term, 59
Orleans, Fort, 88
Osage Indians, 351
Otrante, Comte de, 155
P
Passenger fares on Mo. r., 276
lists on Mo. r. steamboats, 120
Pawnee Indians, 27, 351
capture La Barge, 160
La Barge’s residence among, 27
Peace Commission of 1866, 396 et seq.
quoted, 360
Peindry, Comte de, 155
Piegan, Fort, founding of, 225
Pierre, Fort, 137
transfer of, to United States, 201, 367, 383
Pike’s Peak Gulch, 269
Pilcher, Joshua, in charge of Cabanné’s post, 37
interest in young La Barge, 39, 44, 48
Pilot, Missouri r., experiences of, 131
important duty of, 115
wages of, 276
Pilot shields, 250
Poles, use of, on keelboats, 104
Pope, General, plans Indian campaign, 371
quoted, 357
Price, General Sterling, 255
Profits in steamboat business, 276
Prou, Mr., botanist to Audubon, 152
Provost, Etienne, praises La Barge, 39
outwits a botanist, 152
settles championship, 128
wooding the Martha, 179
R
Racing steamboats on the Mo. r., 123
Railroads, the enemy of the steamboat, 417
relation of, to Mo. r., 445
Randall, Fort, 367, 383
Rattlesnakes, 46
Ray, Captain, faithful conduct of, 337
Reed, H. W., Indian Agent, 300
advises La Barge to store annuities, 316
cited, 207
mem. Peace Com. 1866, 397
quoted, 314
Reeve, Colonel, makes Crows walk, 405
Rencontre, Zephyr, aids La Barge, 67
interprets for Peace Com. of 1866, 400, 402
Reno, Major, in Custer campaign, 381, 391
Rice, Fort, 260, 374
_Robert Campbell_, the, voyage of, in 1863, 298 et seq.
Roe, John J., organizes Diamond R. Co., 328
relations with La Barge, 325
Rolette, agt. Am. F. Co. at Fort Union, 320
S
Sail, use of, on keelboats, 106
Sailors, lost from the _Nimrod_, 160
_Saint Ange_, launching of, 184
voyage of, in 1851, 189
Saint Joseph, first railroad at, 417
Saint Louis, great fire of, 185
Salaries on steamboats, 271
_Saluda_, the, explosion of, 124
_Sam Gaty_, the, attack on, 251
Sanders, W. F., assistance acknowledged, vi
counsel against La Barge, Harkness & Co., 328
Sarpy, Peter A., arrests Leclerc, 26
in charge of Cabanné’s post, 49
Scenery of the Missouri r., 83
Sediment carried by the Mo. r., 78
Sheridan, General, plans campaign of 1876, 378
Sherman, General, Commissioner to treat with Indians, 377
gives La Barge a contract, 410
_Shreveport_, the, impressed by General Sully, 385
voyage of, in 1863, 302
Sibley, General, in charge of operations against Sioux Indians
in 1863, 370
Sioux City, first railroad at, 418
important river port, 419
Sioux City and Pacific R. R. reaches Sioux City, 418
Sioux Indians, 351
capture Grosventre herd, 304
non-treaty, 377
power of, broken, 377
Sire, Joseph A., 140
master of the _Omega_, 141
master of the _Nimrod_, 154
outwits inspectors, 144, 157
Sire log book, the, 139
Slope of Missouri river, 83
Smallpox among the Blackfeet, 229
Smith, Green Clay, Governor of Montana Territory, 409
Smith, Joseph, death of, 57, 169
Snags in Missouri river, 80, 119, 421
Snagboats, early, 422
Sounding the channel, 120
Sparring over sand bars, 121
Spear, Capt. W. D., killed by a sentinel, 412
takes passage on the _Octavia_, 411
_Spread Eagle_, the, rams the _Emilie_, 289
Stanley, General, arrests Custer, 431
Statistics of steamboat traffic, 217, 275
Steamboat, the, and the Indians, 364
architectural beauty of, 111
description of, 109 et seq.
in the Indian wars, 382
in the Nez Percé campaign, 392
last at Fort Benton, 420
navigation of the Mo. r., importance of, iv
trade on Mo. r., rapid growth of, 174, 216, 274
wrecks, causes of, 421
voyages up the Mo. r., 127
Stevens, I. I., makes treaty with Blackfeet, 236, 359
Stinger, Andy, hero of the Tobacco Garden, 307, 311
Stony Lake, battle of, 372
Storm injures the _Nimrod_, 164
Storms on the Missouri, 84
Stuart, Fort, 293
Stuart, James, English traveler, 4
Stuart, James, Montana pioneer, 267, 268, 271
Sublette & Campbell, 36
Suit against La Barge, Harkness & Co., 328
Sully, Fort, 373
Sully, General, campaign of 1863, 371, 372
campaign of 1864, 374
impresses the _Shreveport_, 318
opinion of Col. Dimon, 262
quoted, 270, 361
uses steamboats in his campaigns, 385
Survey of the Missouri r., 436
Suter, Capt, C. R., purchases the _Octavia_, 425
T
Tecumseh, Fort, 137
Terry, General Alfred, in campaign of 1876, 378
on La Barge’s boat, 390
Terry, Lieutenant, English officer, investigates death of Capt.
Spear, 414
Terry, M. M., writes account of voyage of _Far West_, 388
Thomas, Col., Quartermaster in St. Louis, 410
Thompson, C. W., Indian agent, 385
Thompson, Fort, 385
Tobacco Garden, affair at, 305 et seq.
Transportation by water and rail, 420
Treaty of Fort Laramie, 358, 366
with Blackfeet, 237, 259
Treaty system, abuses of, 356
_Trover_, the, wreck of, 285
U
Union, Fort, 139
Union Pacific Bridge at Omaha opened, 418
Union Pacific R. R., Lincoln’s interest in, 244
reaches Ogden, 419
Upson, Gad E., Indian agent, 322
Utah Northern R. R. enters Montana, 419
V
Vallandingham, C. L., 244
Virginia City, Mont., 272
Volunteers, U. S., 259
Voyage, last, to Fort Benton, 436, 437
Voyageurs, 108
W
Wall, Nicholas, relations with Capt. La Barge, 258, 295, 325, 326
War with Mexico, 171
Warping over rapids, 121
Warren, General, on the upper Missouri, 208
Weather, influence of, on navigation of the river, 86
_Western Engineer_, the, 91, 382
Whirlpools on the Missouri, 122
Whitestone Hill, battle of, 373
Winnebago Indians, transported by steamboat, 384
Wooding steamboat, 118
Wooding at Crow creek in 1847, 179
Wounded Knee, battle of, 366
Wrecks of steamboats on Mo. r., causes of, 421
list of, 438
Wright, Geo. B., agent for the Blackfeet, 405
Wyeth, Nathaniel J., transports furs by bullboat, 101
Y
Yankee Jack, adventure of, 129
mentioned, 282
Yanktonais, the, experience of, with Peace Com. of 1866, 399
Yawl, importance of, to steamboat, 54, 91
_Yellowstone_, the, first steamboat on the upper river, 22, 136
cholera on, 32
description of, 112
public interested in voyage of, 138
Yellowstone expedition of 1819, 382
Yellowstone National Park, 75, 266
Yellowstone river, 75
falls of, 75
La Barge ascends, 436
Young, Brigham, 169, 175
entertains La Barge, 334
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 II of a two-volume set. The Index covers both
Volumes. Volume I, which also is available at no cost at Project
Gutenberg, ends on page 248 and this volume begins on page 249.
The index was not checked for proper alphabetization or
correct page references.
Footnotes have been renumbered to continue the sequence begun in Volume I.
Page 254: Missing footnote anchor added by Transcriber. Based on the
context of the text, this likely is in the right place.
Page 276: “6 1-2” was printed that way.
Page 306: Missing footnote anchor added by Transcriber. This may not be
in the right place. The document cited in the footnote is easily found
by an online search.
Footnote 58, originally on page 311: “untill” was printed that way.
Page 461: Page numbers for the entry, “Yawl, importance of, to
steamboat” were omitted in the original book and added by the
Transcriber, based on an examination of the main text.
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