Fort Union Trading Post Historic Structures Report (Part II) Historical Data Section

Between the time Capt. Meriwether Lewis had camped nearby in the spring of 1805 and the arrival of Kenneth McKenzie in the area, the junction of the Missouri and the Yellowstone had witnessed the fires of many whites. In the fall of 1822, Andrew Henry and William H. Ashley, considered to be the innovators of the annual rendezvous system in the Rockies, built a small post at the meeting point of the two streams. However, Henry found this location to be farther from the beaver country than he liked, and he soon moved his establishment up the Yellowstone. [1]

Three years later, 1825, Gen. Henry Atkinson led a considerable number of troops to the junction, which a diarist described as "the most beautiful spot we have seen on the river." The soldiers found the ruins of Henry's fort, and somewhere near it set up a temporary camp they called Barbour. A portion of the troops remained here while the rest escorted the Indian agent, Benjamin O'Fallon, up the Missouri to meet with the less than friendly Blackfeet. The entire command soon descended the river again for the benefits of civilization. [2]

About this same time, James Kipp, an associate of Kenneth McKenzie in the Columbia Fur Company, founded a post at the junction of the Missouri and White Earth rivers, among the Assiniboins. While this post was some distance below the mouth of the Yellowstone, it was closer than any other and provided Kipp, McKenzie, and the others a location from which to become better acquainted with the trade potential of the upper country. [3]

McKenzie, now in charge of the Upper Missouri Outfit, decided to build a post near the mouth of the Yellowstone. Here he could trade with the Assiniboins, who wandered the prairies toward the north; with the Crows, located up the Yellowstone; and perhaps with the Blackfeet, farther up the Missouri. From here also expeditions could be organized for the Rocky Mountains (he had wanted to get involved more directly with the mountain trade but Pierre Chouteau, Jr., had persuaded him that the upper Missouri would be more profitable). If the post was efficient enough, it could also attract the trade of the free, or unassociated, trappers throughout the country.

Only one or two historians have, over the years, offered documented evidence as to the date McKenzie started his new fort. One such was Hiram Chittenden who quoted from a letter, now lost, that McKenzie had established a fort near the mouth of the Yellowstone at least as early as December 1828, and that this post was called Fort Floyd. [4]

Chittenden also quoted, in French, from a letter written by Pierre Chouteau, Jr., to William Astor, John Jacob's son. The present whereabouts of this letter, dated April 19, 1830, is also unknown. The translation reads:

On my arrival here (St. Louis) on the 16th [April, 1830], I found a letter from Mr. McKenzie of 28 December, 1829, and ones dated 2 and 20 January [1830], 200 miles above the Yellow Stone. The mountain hunters were not as successful in the fall hunt as he had hoped, but he hopes for more success in the spring. It is his opinion that there will be many more robes this year than is the usual case; that is to say in the three upper posts, at the Mandans, at the mouth of the Yellow Stone, and Fort Union 200 miles above, and he says that the upper country is very rich in beaver and robes. [5]

This is the earliest known reference to a Fort Union, even though this Fort Union was or was to be 200 miles above the junction. The letter is not at all clear as to whether this Fort Union was built or still in the planning stage. As far as it may be otherwise determined, the Upper Missouri Outfit did not have any forts that far up the river at that time. The letter does imply, of course, that McKenzie was 200 miles up the Missouri beyond the junction for a good part of January 1830.

Considering both sources, one must assume there was a Fort Floyd. But it is not shown that this Fort Floyd was at the same location as Fort Union is known to have been, nor is it shown that the upriver Fort Union mentioned by Chouteau was ever built.

Two letters by William Laidlaw, another ex-Columbia man, now at Fort Tecumseh, tell us that McKenzie was on the upper Missouri in 1829. One of them, dated August 13, said that "McKenzie left here about 25 days ago for the Upper Country he was able to take with him a tolerable aportment of goods." Two months later, on October 26, Laidlaw wrote, "The last news from Mr McKensie (sic) he was at white earth river waiting for the summer boat, after her arrival he was to proceed up to the mouth of Yellow Stone river and winter there." [6]

Did McKenzie return to the Fort Floyd he mentioned the previous December? If so, did this fort evolve into Fort Union? The available evidence answers with a resounding silence. Prince Maximilian, a visitor to Fort Union in 1833, learned that "the erection of Fort Union was commenced in the autumn of 1829, by Mr. McKenzie." [7] Since the prince undoubtedly got this information directly from his good friend, McKenzie, it should not be ignored. Edwin T. Denig, who knew the fort well, made a similar statement in 1843, "The fort itself was begun in the fall of 1829, under the superintendence of Kenneth McKenzie." [8]

Despite Chittenden's belief that Fort Union grew out of Fort Floyd and thus its founding date was 1828, this report will assume that Fort Union was founded in the fall of 1829, when McKenzie went up to the junction of the two rivers from Fort Tecumseh. And it will assume that Fort Union did not evolve out of Fort Floyd, a post of some nature that is found in the documents by name but once.

The earliest mention of the name Union, as applied to the known historic site, was in a letter that Kenneth McKenzie sent to the "Gentleman in charge of Fort Tecumseh," which he dated Fort Union, May 5, 1830, less than three weeks after Chouteau applied the name to a site 200 miles upstream. [9] In this letter, McKenzie asked that various supplies be sent up. From the list, one may determine that both trade (beaver traps, shirts) and construction (pitsaw files) were actively under way. He also wanted sent up his "gray mare & her colt and John Dougherty's little mare." McKenzie was planning to stay.

He had reason to believe that the fort was well located. One would have looked up and down the Missouri vainly for a better location in this general area. Rather than locate the post right at the junction, where the land was level but low, McKenzie picked a high spot on the north bank of the Missouri about five miles by water above the junction. [10] There was a considerable growth of trees on points immediately above and below this site, trees which would supply both building timbers and firewood. The site was at least 20 feet above the river, high enough to be safe from the annual floods. The ground here was a level prairie that stretched away to the north for a mile or so, thus providing ample space for the Indian camps at trading time. Farther off to the northeast was a sizeable canyon that led down from the high prairies beyond the skyline; this canyon would provide an avenue of approach to the fort for the Assiniboins. And, perhaps most important, the river ran close to this bank, thus allowing boats to tie up near the fort and reducing the portage of cargo to but a few feet. [11]

This was the country of the big sky, the immense herds of buffalo, the high plains, and the Indians of the tipi. But it was not entirely a paradise. Nearly always, strong winds tore across the prairies, mosquitoes plagued man and beast in the spring, and the winters were long and bitterly cold. One employee wrote that the post was "exposed to every wind that blows from any point of the compass, is said to be the coldest place of all the posts be longing to this company--even as cold as those situated on Hudson Bay." [12] The fort would have to be firmly built.