page_title: Pacific Fur Company
section_title: The Rocky Mountains
hierarchical_section_title: Pacific Fur Company / Overland Expedition / The Rocky Mountains
caption_attribution_description: English: Six Blackfeet Chiefs painted by Paul Kane along the North Saskatchewan River in Saskatchewan Canada. "Amongst others, I sketched group No. 17, consisting of Big Snake, the centre figure; Mis-ke-me-kin, “The Iron Collar,” a Blood Indian chief, with his face painted red; to the extreme left of the picture, is a chief called “Little Horn,” with a buffalo robe draped round him, and between him and Big Snake is Wah-nis-stow, “The White Buffalo,” principal chief of the Sur-cee tribe. In the background stand two chiefs of inferior quality, one of them has his face painted half black, being in half-mourning for some friend." (Paul Kane, "Wanderings of an Artist," 1859:424–425)
context_page_description: The Pacific Fur Company was an American fur trade venture wholly owned and funded by John Jacob Astor that functioned from 1810 to 1813. It was based in the Pacific Northwest, an area contested over the decades between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Spanish Empire, the United States of America and the Russian Empire.
  Management, clerks and fur trappers were sent both by land and by sea to the Pacific Coast in the Autumn of 1810. The base of operations was constructed at the mouth of the Columbia River in 1811, Fort Astoria. The destruction of the company vessel the Tonquin later that year off the shore of Vancouver Island took with it the majority of the annual trading goods. Commercial competition with the British-Canadian North West Company began soon after the foundation of Fort Astoria. The Canadian competitors maintained several stations in the interior, primarily Spokane House, Kootanae House and Saleesh House. Fort Okanogan was also opened in 1811, the first of several PFC posts created to counter these locations.
context_section_description: While at the Arikara village, Hunt met and employed several American trappers that had previously worked for the MFC in modern Idaho. The men advised strongly against going into the Piikáni homelands of modern Montana. The Piikáni and other Niitsitapi nations at the time were typically unreceptive to trespass from European descendants and made a showing of military force against the Lewis and Clark Expedition. This changed Hunt's plans, who according determined it best to avoid the Niitsitapi peoples.
  
  The expedition left their Arikara hosts in late July for the nearby Grand River. After following the Little Missouri River, the party to rest for several days while transactions were made with a band of Cheyenne. In total 36 horses were purchased from the Cheyenne. The expedition broke camp on 6 August and Hunt ordered six men to hunt Bison. Hunt's party continued southwest through the modern state of Wyoming and the hunting party rejoined on the 18th of August, having killed 8 Bison. While at the base of Cloud Peak on 30 August, a scouting party of Apsáalooke visited the camp. The following day a delegation of Apsáalooke on horseback invited them to visit their nearby village. Hunt recalled the importance of mercantile deals with the Apsáalooke stating that:
  "We spent the first day of September buying some robes and belts and trading our tired, maimed horses for fresh ones... thereby augmenting the number of our horses to about 121, most of which were well-trained and able to cross the mountains."
   Continuing westward towards the Continental Divide of the Americas, the PFC party followed the course of the Wind River, crossed the Divide and followed the Gros Ventre River.
caption: The military prowess of the various Niitsitapi peoples deterred the Overland party from continuing to follow the Lewis & Clark Expedition's path up the Missouri River.
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