: Scotts Bluff National Monument Nebraska by Mattes Merrill J - Overland journeys to the Pacific; Scotts Bluff National Monument (Neb.); Scotts Bluff County (Neb.) History

@FreeBooks

Posted in: #FreeBooks #FreeBooksIndia #FreeBooksApp #gg

Vote Up Vote Down   0 Reactions

Login to give Reaction!

This publication is one of a series of handbooks describing the historical and archeological areas in the National Park System administered by the National Park Service of the United States Department of the Interior. It is printed by the Government Printing Office and may be purchased from the Superintendent of Documents, Washington 25, D. C. Price 30 cents.

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE HISTORICAL HANDBOOK SERIES NO. 28 Washington, D. C., 1958

Following LaSalle's traverse of the Mississippi and the establishment of French settlements along that river, several French explorers--notably Bourgmont and Charlevois--penetrated the fringe of the Great Plains, bringing back reports of strange shaggy beasts in numbers so vast that they blackened the landscape. The Platte River was named by Frenchmen who explored its lower reaches; for this is the French word for "flat," a literal translation of the Oto word, "Nebrathka." The Upper Platte was not explored by Frenchmen until 1739 when the Mallet brothers lead a small party from the mouth of the Niobrara across Nebraska, up the South Platte, and thence to Santa Fe. The high tide of French exploration of the Plains was marked in 1743 by the long journey, on foot, of the Verendrye brothers from the Missouri River westward. How far west they traveled has been a widely debated subject, but most scholars believe that they reached the vicinity of the Black Hills of South Dakota.

The famous Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804-6, dispatched by President Jefferson to explore the newly acquired Louisiana Territory, followed the natural passageway of the upper Missouri and Columbia Rivers to become the first Americans to cross the continent. While they triumphantly returned to St. Louis, Lt. Zebulon Pike visited a Pawnee village on the Upper Republican River, then proceeded southwestward up the Arkansas. In the wake of these official explorers came the fur trappers and traders, a strange breed of men who traced out and rough-mapped the tributary streams of the western plains and mountains in their search for beaver hides. The early history of Scotts Bluff is closely linked with the history of the western American fur trade.

Fur traders were the first white men known to have seen Scotts Bluff. They were the returning Astorians--a group of seven men under Robert Stuart, traveling from their trading post at the mouth of the Columbia River to St. Louis. On Christmas day, 1812, Stuart recorded in his journal:

Constantly imperiled by exposure, starvation, and Indians, they crossed the Continental Divide near South Pass and descended the Sweetwater and North Platte Rivers. After they had passed Scotts Bluff, the hostility of the wintry Plains impelled them to retrace their steps to a point near present Torrington, Wyo., where they camped for the winter and built canoes. Early in the spring of 1813 they resumed their journey. They were unable to navigate the shallow, braided, upper reaches of the Platte River, and it was not until they reached Grand Island, that they successfully launched their canoes.

Stuart's journal was not published until many years later, and the tremendous import of his geographical discovery--a central route across the continent--was lost amid preoccupation with the War of 1812 and the seizure of Astoria by the British forces. For the next decade the fur traders, operating out of St. Louis, concentrated on sending expeditions up the Missouri River, persisting in their notion that this was the only logical route westward. Manual Lisa, William Ashley, Andrew Henry, and Joshua Pilcher were among the leaders of numerous invasions of the Upper Missouri country. Beaver pelts were plentiful, but the Blackfoot, Ree, Gros Ventre, and other Indian tribes were unfriendly. A series of disastrous encounters with these Indians reached a crisis in 1823, when a large fur brigade under William Ashley was treacherously attacked above Grand River by the Rees, the same who had blocked the path of the Astorians 11 years before. An appeal for military aid resulted in an expedition from Fort Atkinson under Col. Henry Leavenworth. The Indian villages were besieged but the results were indecisive. Thereupon Ashley and his men abandoned their efforts on the Upper Missouri, and struck out overland to the mountains. This decision led to the discovery of the rich beaver valleys of the central Rockies, and the rediscovery of South Pass and the Great Platte route. It ushered in the historic Rocky Mountain fur trade, and opened a new chapter in the history of Scotts Bluff.

Among the enterprising young men employed by Ashley, who received their baptism of fire at the Ree villages, were several destined to achieve great fame in the annals of the West. Conspicuous among them were Jim Bridger and Etienne Provost, who soon discovered the Great Salt Lake; Jedediah Smith, who led a band of trappers across the Black Hills and the Bighorn Mountains to explore the headwaters of the Green and Snake Rivers, and to become the first American to challenge the supremacy of British fur traders in the Oregon country; William Sublette, who became the founder of Fort William on the Laramie River; Thomas Fitzpatrick, noted "mountain man," emigrant guide, and Indian agent; and Hiram Scott, one of Ashley's clerks who would soon die tragically near the bluff which now bears his name.

If any white men traveled by Scotts Bluff in the decade following the downstream passage of the returning Astorians, they left no distinct record. It is surmised that Canadian half-breeds roamed and trapped in this region during this period since several geographic names of French origin seem to have survived from the earliest days of the fur trade. Laramie or "La Ramee" River and Goshen or "Goche's" Hole, both in nearby Wyoming, tell of early trappers about whom there survive only the haziest traditions. We can only say that the second group of white men in the North Platte Valley who can be positively identified were four of Ashley's trappers who, in the spring of 1824, attempted to bring their beaver pelts down the Platte River. With this event, Scotts Bluff once more emerges on the pages of history.

Following a successful harvest of beaver, Jedediah Smith delegated Thomas Fitzpatrick, James Clyman, and two others to transport the pelts to Fort Atkinson. This led directly to the rediscovery of the strategic Platte route and the beginning of a half century during which Scotts Bluff became one of the great landmarks of that historic route. Fitzpatrick failed in his effort to transport the furs down the Sweetwater by bullboat and, lacking horses, was compelled to cache them near Independence Rock. He and his companions were subsequently scattered by marauding Indians, but they all arrived safely at Fort Atkinson. Fitzpatrick promptly took horses back to Independence Rock to retrieve his furs, and so passed Scotts Bluff three times in 1824.

Ashley was impressed by Fitzpatrick's report on the success of his employees in locating rich beaver territory. Late in the autumn of 1824, he hurried westward up the Platte River, sending his brigades out to trap while he personally led an exploration of the lower canyons of the Green River. In 1825, reunited with his men at Henry's Fork of the Green, he led them to the head of Wind River where they constructed boats and floated their cargo to St. Louis via the Bighorn, Yellowstone, and Missouri Rivers.

Ashley is credited with conceiving a new scheme of handling the mountain fur trade which became known as the rendezvous system. Instead of building expensive fixed trading posts in the wilderness, dependent upon the Indian trade, the idea was to send white trappers to camp out all winter, trapping while the beaver were in prime fur, then all to foregather at some prearranged mountain valley where they would meet traders bringing pack trains of equipment and trade goods from St. Louis. Casks of whisky, standard trade items, insured that the annual mountain carnival or rendezvous would see not only a rapid exchange of trade goods for beaver pelts, but also carousing and roistering on a scale suitable to compensate the trappers for their long lonely winter vigils. For 15 years Scotts Bluff would witness traders' caravans, going mountainward in early summer, and returning in the autumn laden with their harvest of furs.

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

(0)

Login to post a comment!