Mexico weekly ledger., 1877-02-08
An Old Trapper's "reminiscences.

the following communication to the
New York Graphic:
Having just returned with the Com
mission to negotiate with the Sioux, of
which | was a member, I was informed
in a late issue of your paper you pub
lished a sketch of Gen. B. L. E. Bonnie.
vile, in which some errors have crept
which l would like to correct without
detracting from the well established
fame of the General. The public gen.
orally seem to think that Bonneville
and Fremont and Marcy were the first
explorers of the sections of which they
give such graphic descriptions, but in
this they are in error, as most of the
country was hunted, trapped, and pros
pected years before they set about their
scientific explorations. Capt. Bonnie
vile received a furlough in 1882, and
explored the West for four. years.
In 1925 I accompanied Gen. w. IL.
Ashley, of St. Louis, with a party of
100 trappers, to the Rocky Mountains.
Ashley took ont a party of fifty men in
1928, at which time / was among the
Osages in charge of the trading outfits
of Messrs. Paul Balls IL Co., of st.
Louis. He lett his party near the Great
Salt Lake, under Jackson and Sublett,
and took out Our party to reinforce
them. We found OIL arriving IN Bear
River that the Indians had attacked and
dispersed the first party, and the sur
vivors were scattered through the noun
tains. The trappers of our party, and
others who were in the country, trapped
all along the mountains from the Brit
ish possessions into Mexico. Our prin-
cipal competitors in those days were
the free trappers of the British North
western Fur Company, who ranged all
owe west of the mountains, and had
taken out 3,000,0 900 beavers before Ash
ley's first party went to work. When
Ashley returned to st. Louis in 1925 he
left the party of about 95 men camped
ON Bear River (now in Utah), in charge
of Col. Robert Campbell, now one of the
wealthiest men of St. Louis.
In 1925 the most Western military
post was Fort Usage, in Jackson Coun-
ty, Mo-, and the wilderness stretched
from there westward. The Indians in
those days were armed with stone
hatchets and lances, and their arrows
fint-tipped. 1t was only amusement to
fight them, and a few trappers went
f~earlessly anywhere. L well remember
one incident of that my first trip. AS
we were travelling along the Platte Riv-
er uplands one day, we discovered IN
the distance a large number of Indians,
and those of US who had not made the
trip to the mountains before were ex-
cited in anticipation of a brush, when
heIndians suddenly disappeared. The
plain stretched in full view before us,
| anI mr. oN1,l1 baua Snan thnnl rH off IN
any direction. You can imagine u
Old trappers, who tried to make Us be-
lieve we had seen a mirage, common on
those plains. But a short time
brought US to the under
ground village of the Pawnees,
where they lived in s~ubterraneous
rooms, like the prairie dogs. These
rooms were about eight feet in dame
ter, and lined with grass and buffalo
hides, each being the abode of a family.
We had no especial incidents beyond
those of hunting and trapping on the
expedition. We ran into a party of
Rickarees who were going to fight the
Pawnees, and q few of our fellows put
the party to flight. Along the noun
tains 10 or 20 Indians would occasion
ally pitch at one of our men when they
got him in a close place. but if he could
get a fair show he could keep them Oft
until assistance reached him. They pre-
ferred fighting their Indian enemies to
bothering us.
In 1925 we travelled 1900 miles, to
our beaver grounds, and our carts were
taken through the South Pass nine
years before Bonneville is said to have
taken the first wagon train through
there. None of the regular trapping
outfits had wagons in those days, but a
light cart called q chdratte was used by
the voyagers.
The Santa Fe traders who went after
silver took a route of LOO miles
through the wilderness tenyears before
Marcy graduated from West Point, in
1882. Along between 1925 and 1885
the fur-trade fever was at its height.
The American Fur Company of st.
Louis and the other companies had
over 1000 men in their employ. They
built forts at the mouth of the Yellow
stone, at the Mandan Village (above
the present site of Bismarck, DID,
and at the mouth of the Teton, since
called Bad River. Fort Leavenworth
was also built by the United States.
1.-THE British company had fully 1000
men trapping and trading west OF the
mountains, and the Mexicans had quite
as many trappers and traders
from the mountains to the Pacific, and
There were more than as many more
free-traders and trappers scattered all
over the West and Northwest.
Many of these men found gold in the
{ Black Hills and other places, but the
trapping and trading paid far better
then than gold hunting, and was more
certain, and when the rush was made
for California all the old trappers point
ed to the Black Hills as a fine field for
mining enterprise. These trappers
rarely aver became miners; they pre-
|, ferred their solitary rambles to the
hustle of a mining camp; but they pen
etrated everywhere and guided the ex-
plorers to the wonderful scenes in whose
Jo.or;o+;op +hoy howe oa1npd Such fame