page_title: The Yellow Chief
section_title: Historical Background
hierarchical_section_title: The Yellow Chief / Historical Background
caption_attribution_description: English: Frontispiece of George A. Crofutt's "Great Trans-Continental P.R.R. Tourist's Guide" 1870 THE GREAT TRANS-CONTINENTAL TOURIST'S GUIDE CONTAINING A FULL AND AUTHENTIC DESCRIPTION OF OVER FIVE HUNDRED CITIES, TOWNS, VILLAGES, STATIONS, GOVERNMENT FORTS AND CAMPS, MOUNTAINS, LAKES, BITERS, SULPHUR, SODA AND HOT SPRINGS, SCENERY, WATERING PLACES, SUMMER RESORTS; Where to look for and hunt the Buffalo, Antelope, Deer, and other game; Trout Fishing, etc., etc. In fact, to tell you what is worth seeing—where to see it—where to go—how to go—and whom to stop with while passing over the UNION PACIFIC RAILROAD, CENTRAL PACIFIC RAILROAD OF CAL, Their Branches and Connections by Stage and Water, FROM THE ATLANTIC TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN. ILLUSTRATED. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by Geo. A. Crofutt, in the Clerk'sOffice of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. AMERICAN NEWS CO. WHOLESALE AGENTS. GEO. A. CROFUTT &amp; CO., PUBLISHERS No. 31 PARK ROW, NEW YORK
context_page_description: The Yellow Chief: A Romance of the Rocky Mountains is a novel by Thomas Mayne Reid written in 1869, converging frontier fiction with anti-slavery messages.
  The Yellow Chief tells the story of a southern mulatto slave who runs away to become a Cheyenne Indian chief in the Rocky Mountains, seeking revenge on his cruel plantation owners as they emigrate to the West.
  The novel was published in 1870 as a pulp western dime novel in London, and was afterwards published as Part II of Mayne Reid's The White Squaw. It is one of 75 adventure "romance" novels that Mayne Reid wrote in his lifetime, including The Rifle Rangers, The White Chief, The Scalp Hunters, and The Headless Horseman.
context_section_description: This novel was written in 1869, but begins in Mississippi in 1849 before the abolition of slavery. While describing the cruelties of the punishment of the pump, Mayne Reid recalls that this " is a tale of twenty years ago."
  In the years that The Yellow Chief takes place, America was undergoing the California Gold Rush, alluded in the Blackadder's emigration to California from Mississippi. The publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin around the mid 19th century beckoned a rise in anti-slavery novels such as this one.
  European immigration of workers was booming during this time in American history, as well as industrialization through the railroad system. The invasion of railroads into the western plains is mentioned at the very end of The Yellow Chief, as 'Lije Orton comes to visit Clara and Edward in Manhattan. By describing the rails as "penetrating" the prairies, readers can assume Mayne Reid's bitter reaction to industrialization, as his romantic view of America's uncharted territories reigns throughout the novel. 
  The events of The Yellow Chief precede the Civil War, but still allude to issues of anti-slavery and abolitionism, as events of tension such as Bleeding Kansas were going on at this time in American history.
  The real geographical places of the Bijou Creek at the South Platte River of The Yellow Chief are regions of the unorganized territories of the United States, east of the Rocky Mountains. This would later become Colorado. Although led by fictional characters in the novel, Fort Saint Vrain was a real notable fur trading post in this region. Native American tribes and mountain men engaged in trade at this structure, which would employ James Beckworth and Sacajewea's son Jean Baptiste Charbonneau in its existence.
caption: Frontispiece of George A. Crofutt's Great Trans-Continental P.R.R. Tourist's Guide 1870
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "6384", "Image ImageLength": "8544", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "2", "Image Make": "CanoScan", "Image Model": "LiDE 700F", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "600", "Image YResolution": "600", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS5 Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2013:06:02 10:45:06", "Image HostComputer": "Apple Mac OS X", "Image ExifOffset": "300", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "450", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "10066", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2956", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "4040"}