page_title: Fort Bridger
section_title: Utah War
hierarchical_section_title: Fort Bridger / Utah War
caption_attribution_description: English: A view of Fort Bridger in Utah Territory (present-day Wyoming). The photograph was taken in 1858 during Captain James H. Simpson's "Utah Expedition." It shows the fort after it was taken over by the United States Army having been burned and abandoned by the area's Mormon settlers.
context_page_description: Fort Bridger was originally a 19th-century fur trading outpost established in 1842, on Blacks Fork of the Green River, in what is now Uinta County, Wyoming, United States. It became a vital resupply point for wagon trains on the Oregon Trail, California Trail, and Mormon Trail. The Army established a military post here in 1858 during the Utah War, until it was finally closed in 1890. A small town, Fort Bridger, Wyoming, remains near the fort and takes its name from it.
context_section_description: Relations deteriorated between Mormon leaders in Utah Territory and federal authorities in Washington, D.C. Following the election of President James Buchanan, the  United States Army was ordered to Utah to install a new governor, replacing Brigham Young, as well as to establish a military presence. As the army advanced, the Mormons in the Green River valley withdrew, burning Fort Supply and Supply City. On the night of October 7, 1857, "Wild Bill" Hickman set fire to Fort Bridger to keep it from falling into the hands of the approaching United States Army during the Utah War.
  The army wintered near Fort Bridger. In June 1858, as the majority of Johnston's Army set off for Salt Lake City, two companies of troops remained behind and established Fort Bridger as an official Army post. The other troops continued on and eventually established Camp Floyd south of Salt Lake City.
  In 1858, William A. Carter was appointed as post sutler at Fort Bridger. Perhaps more than any other individual, the history of the post revolves around this civilian merchant who remained at the center of the post's activities for its entire history.
  At the end of the hostilities, the United States Congress rejected Brigham Young's claim to the fort and did not recognize Jim Bridger's continuing claims to the fort.
caption: Fort Bridger, 1858. By Samuel C. Mills, photographer with the Simpson Expedition.
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