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THE FUR
TRADE EXPLORERS
In the early 19th century, trade in the Pacific
Northwest was controlled by two competing British interests:
The Hudson's Bay Company, founded in 1670, and the Northwest Company,
founded in 1787. Blocked by the Hudson's Bay Company to the north
and the United States to the south, the Northwest Company tried
to survive through expansion to the west, to find a northwest passage
or river route to a port on the Pacific.
| 1807 |
David Thompson, a British
explorer, ascended the Columbia River to its source at Lake
Windemere, and set up the first trading post west of the Rocky
Mountains.
Manuel Lisa, with 42 men including John Colter, John Potts and
George Drouillard of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, traveled
up the Missouri for the Americans as far as the Big Horn River
in Montana and set up forts as bases for their fur-trading operations.
A series of exploring expeditions were launched in all directions
from this base; contact was made with Indian tribes. John Colter
was probably the first white man to see Jackson's Hole, Yellowstone,
and the Grand Tetons. Most explorers in this period thought
that all western rivers had a common source. They also believed
that it was just a few days ride to the Spanish Empire from
the Yellowstone. |
| July 1811 |
The Wilson Price Hunt expedition
was the second great American overland crossing after Lewis
and Clark, and went from the Mandan Villages out along the Missouri
and over the Rocky Mountains. The group tried to go down the
Snake River, which proved impossible. Near starvation, they
discovered an important pass at the north end of the Wind River
Mountains [Union Pass]. They opened up the country to the U.S.
fur trade, and set up Fort Astoria on the Oregon Coast at the
mouth of the Columbia River. |
| June 1812 |
Robert Stuart and six men
from the Wilson Price Hunt expedition returned east overland
from Fort Astoria. They basically followed the route known later
as the Oregon Trail. They noted the existence of South Pass,
Wyoming in October 1812, and arrived in St. Louis on April 30,
1813. The knowledge of the existence of South Pass, the easiest
route through the Rocky Mountains, enabled the later migrations
to Oregon and California. |
| Nov. 1813 |
Fort Astoria was abandoned
when a British ship (and the ship's cannon) forced the Americans
to sell out to the Northwest Company. This put the Northwest
Company in virtual control of the entire Rocky Mountain west.
The British met with increasing Indian hostility, however, and
their fur trading enterprises languished.
Jacques Clamorgan, a French trader out of St. Louis, hoped to
open trade with the Spanish in Santa Fe, and traveled there.
He was rejected. |
| 1812 |
Fort Ross, California, was
established by the Russians, just 50 miles north of San Francisco. |
| 1818 |
A joint occupation agreement
of the Oregon Territory is signed by the U.S. and Great Britain. |
| 1819 |
The Stephen Long expedition
begins in St. Louis; it included the use of the first steamboats
on the Missouri. Accompanied by Titian Peale as assistant naturalist
and artist, Dr. Thomas Say as zoologist, and Samuel Seymour
as painter, they set out from Council Bluffs in early 1820.
Long encountered Long's Peak, went into Colorado as far as the
present site of Denver, and climbed Pike's Peak. This ill-managed
expedition did not discover much of note. Three of the men deserted
and took all the journals and notebooks of the expedition. The
men and the notes were never found. Long reaffirmed the "Great
American Desert" myth. |
| By 1822 |
American fur trappers were
at work throughout the Rockies. |
| 1821 |
Three separate expeditions
set out for Santa Fe from Missouri. William Becknell, from Franklin,
crossed Raton Pass and learned from Mexican soldiers that their
11 year war against Spanish rule had been won, and that independence
had been declared. Americans were now welcome in Santa Fe. On
his way home, Becknell located a new route via the Cimarron
River, later to become the Santa Fe Trail. The other two 1821
expeditions were Thomas James/Robert McKnight and Hugh Glenn/Jacob
Fowler. |
| 1824 |
The Santa Fe trade had become
so important to Missouri after just three years that Sen. Thomas
Hart Benton made a speech in the Senate, demanding that a national
road be built over the trail. In March 1825, President James
Monroe signed a bill authorizing $10,000 for surveying and marking
the road, and $20,000 to secure the rights of passage from the
Indians. The road was completed in 1827. |
| 1824 |
Dec. 25 - Sen. Thomas Hart
Benton visited Thomas Jefferson at Monticello. While a light
snow fell outside, the two men examined maps of the west and
discussed the politics and strategy of the westward movement.
Benton considered this an epic moment in his life - as though
Jefferson had "passed the baton" of advocating westward
expansion to Benton. Jefferson died on July 4, 1826, less than
two years later. |
 American
fur trappers and traders became intrepid explorers, the pathfinders
of the 1820s and 30s. Government-sponsored expeditions were non-existent,
and the trappers explored or re-explored territories claimed by
Spain and Britain, bringing information on them back to St. Louis
and thus to the American scientists and the public. Prior to 1840,
few maps had been made of the west. These were limited to:
|
1806
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Lewis and Clark |
| 1810 |
Zebulon
Pike |
| 1810 |
Humboldt, based on Spanish
exploration |
| 1821 |
Stephen H. Long |
| 1833 |
A.H. Brue |
| 1834 |
Aaron Arrowsmith |
| 1836 |
David H. Burr (based on
information supplied by Jedediah Smith) |
All other maps were copies of these. By 1832,
most of the basic work of rediscovery in the Southwest (except the
Grand Canyon) had been completed. But still there were poor maps
and few detailed, reliable accounts of the American West.
| 1824 |
Trapper Jim Bridger encountered
the Great Salt Lake. Ashley's fur trapping parties explored
Utah. |
| 1825 |
One exception to the American
monopoly of exploration was Peter Skene Ogden, leader of the
Snake River Brigade of the British Northwest Company. Ogden
explored the Pacific Northwest with independent American fur
traders, including Jedediah Smith. In 1828-29, Ogden encountered
the Humboldt River, and was one of the first whites to see the
Great Salt Lake. Ogden made six expeditions between 1824 and
1830. He completely explored the Snake River country, Oregon,
the Salt Lake and Bear River regions, and most of northern California.
Ogden submitted written reports on these expeditions to the
Hudson's Bay Company in London. |
| 1826 |
James Clyman, Louis Vasquez,
Henry Fraeb and Moses (Black) Harris floated around the Great
Salt Lake in a bullboat, trying to find an outlet for the mythical
Buenaventura River, which supposedly flowed to the Pacific.
Richard Campbell and a group of 35 men traveled to California.
James Ohio Pattie and Ewing Young led parties of trappers/explorers.
Jedediah Smith and a party of 16 explored southwest of the Great
Salt Lake, and traveled through the area of Zion National Park
to the Colorado River. They crossed the Mohave Desert to California,
reaching Mission San Gabriel (Los Angeles). In 1827, the party
set out from San Gabriel northward to the San Joaquin Valley.
They then crossed the Sierras and the Great Basin (the first
to do so) and reached the annual trapper's rendezvous near the
Great Salt Lake. |
| The 1827-28 |
trip was not so fortunate.
Attacked by Mohave Indians, incarcerated by Mexican authorities,
attacked by their own Indian guides, Smith barely made it into
Fort Vancouver, (Washington State) where he was well-received
by the British traders led by Dr. John McLoughlin. On October
29, 1830, Smith wrote a letter detailing this trip to the Secretary
of War. Smith chronicled his life in Oregon and the ease with
which loaded wagons and even milk cows could be taken over the
Rockies via South Pass. Smith, David Jackson, and William Sublette
signed the letter, which later became Senate Document 39 of
the 21st Congress. This and the Joshua Pilcher letter on the
suitability of Oregon for settlement were the genesis of "Oregon
fever" as farmers and settlers got the idea that they would
like to migrate to and settle in Oregon. Jed Smith was later
killed by Comanche warriors as he rode at the head of a caravan
bound for Santa Fe. When he died, most of his knowledge died
with him. Luckily, some of the information was incorporated
into maps made by others, but for the most part, it was lost. |
| 1829 |
Ewing Young and Kit Carson
to traveled to California. |
| 1831 |
Capt. Benjamin Bonneville:
On a "leave of absence" from the U.S. Army, Bonneville
had secret orders to explore the Rockies, and especially to
note the number of warriors in each Indian tribe and their methods
of waging war. Bonneville went at his own expense; the government
disavowed all knowledge of his mission. In 1831 he traveled
from St. Louis to Fort Osage, Missouri. In 1832 he crossed the
Continental Divide at South Pass, and set up a fort there as
a base of operations. In 1833, Bonneville sent Joseph Walker
and a party on an overland trip to California; they probably
traveled through Yosemite and followed the Merced River into
California. They returned by way of Walker's Pass in 1834, tracing
the future emigrant route to California. Walker's party reported
that California was a land of abundance, and sketched important
maps. Although Bonneville oversaw this and several other important
missions during his time in the mountains, he was not in favor
with the army. During the rest of his career he was shuttled
from one bad assignment to another, and never received credit
for the important work he did in secret, 1831-33. |
| 1832 |
American Nathaniel Wyeth
traveled overland to Oregon through South Pass. |
| 1834 |
Nathaniel Wyeth made a second
trip, this time with missionaries Jason and Daniel Lee. |
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