Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1894-01-19
CHAPTER Al.
EARLY EVENTS.

S the new city on the Missouri
~ was stirring into life, the Red
~ river settlements on the eastern
boundary Of the territory were
gaining added strength.
Fort AbercrOmbie, which at this early
period wa a post of great Importance, as
being the terminus of the military mail
routes-from Fort Stevenson via Fort Tot
ten and Fort Wadsworth via Fort Ransom, :
and the point from whence mail from these
posts was forwarded to department head
quarters at st. Paul, was situated on the
west bank Of the Red River of the North,
twelve miles north of the confluence of its
two branches-the Bots de Sioux and the
otter Tail. Latitude 46m. 27s. north, lonRi
tud 96m. 28w. west. This post was estab-
lished by act Of congress, approved March
8, 1857, the general orders issued in June,
1857. from the headquarters of the army,
directing that it be named Fort Abercrom-
bic, and that it be established on the most
eligible site neal the head of navigation OF
the Red River of the North, in the vicinity
of a place known as Graham's Point, MINI.
In obedience to orders Lieut.. Col. J. ).
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT with troops and en-
camped in a protected bend of the river on
Aug. %. 1868. The heat was intense and
the mosquitoes and buffalo flies intOlerable,
but the troops worked vigorously to build
the log quarters in which they spent the
winter. In July, 1859 the post was aban-
doned, but was again occupiedin July, 1851.
In 1862, the post was besleged by some
800 Indians of the Sisseton and Yankton
bands of Sioux. They drove away the
cattle and horses belonging to the post,
and those of the citizens near by. The In
dians made two assaults on the fort, one
on September Sd, and the other on Septem-
Der g. 1852, but were repulsed. The fort,
having no stockade, was in imminent
danger, but fortunately many Of the citi-
9 zens were able and willing to assist in its
Il defense: and a train laden with goods for
the Red Lake Indians, having just arrived,
having among other supplies, sixty double
barreled shotguns, the teamsters and other
s citizens were armed with them, and formed
a militia company, which rendered effect
i've service, In February, 1858, a stockade
and block houses were erected. and the
fort made defensible against any number
of Indians.
The valley of the Red River of the North
at old Fort Abercrombie is about LOO feet
above the level of the sea, and formsia per-
fectly flat prairie, broken only by the
streams that drain it. 1t commences about
fifty miles south of the old post, at the
divide which separates the waters of Lake
Traverse, one source of the Red River,
from the waters of Big Stone Lake, the
source of the Minnesota or st. Peters
rivers, and extends eastward into Mime
sofa, to a high range of hills sixty miles
distant, called Leaf Mountains, westward
in North Dakota to the Coteau:des Prairies
] fifty miles distant, and northward to the
debOuche OF the river in Lake Winnipeg,
only contracted at its western side by
Pembina mountain, which is probably the
northern abutment of the Coteau DIES
Prairies, once the western shore of the
great water that filled the broad Red River
valley. AS the Red River flows northward
and into a colder climate, the snow and
ice, which form in the water !, melt on its
sources before its outlet is free from ice, and
this cause overfowso of its bank which often
occur. The tortuous course of the river,
also causes in the spring, when the ice
breaks up, frequent gauges Of ice, and then
the country behind the gorge becomes
flooded. From this cause and also from
floods in the Wild Rice and Cheyenne
rivers the mail and supply trains for the
distant posts Of Fort Stevenson and Buford
were frequently delayed, and the stage OF
water inEthe Red River Of North and its
branches became the gorge by which the
jewellers in those lonely stations on the
Missouri river could judge Of the probable
regularity Of their mail service.
Officers who were stationed at Fort
AbercromDie during the late COS state that
the country then vas infested with locusts,
that came in countless swarms and de-
stroyed every green thing, and4sthat sixty
miles west Of them their ravagesscaused
destitutlon and famine. They also stated
that the climate was very cold during four
or i've months of the year, frequently be-
ing 40 degrees below zero, and in the sum
mer rising often to 100 degrees in the shade.
Between these two extremes the mean an
nual temperature was 80 degrees: From
Fort Abercrombie the mail was sent
weekly by Quartermaster team to ". Cloud,
Mimi, and from thence was forwarded to
st. Paul. III
Fort Ransom was one Of the forts. esstab-
lished in the department of Dakota for the
protection OF. the settlers, who still held in
vivid remembrance the hloOdv Si0ux, nm.