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Survey of Historic Sites and Buildings
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FORT HALL [Fur Trading Post]
Idaho
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Location: Bannock County, just off an unimproved
road, about 11 miles west of the town of Fort Hall. Make local
inquiry.
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The Fort Hall fur trading post, not to be confused
with the later Army fort of the same name at a different location, was
particularly noteworthy in the history of the fur trade,
transportation-communications, and overland emigration. Its significance
in these fields is discussed in detail in the appropriate volumes of
this series. The fur trading post, however, also had associations with
military-Indian affairs.
The post was founded by Nathaniel J. Wyeth, an
opportunistic New England businessman who dreamed of exploiting the
natural resources of the Oregon country. After an exploratory expedition
there in 1832-33, he returned the next year. Near the confluence of the
Snake and Portneuf Rivers in southeastern Idaho, he built Fort Hall, a
stockade of cottonwood logs with two blockhouses. But he found he could
not compete with the powerful Hudson's Bay Co., which the same year
built a rival post, Old Fort Boise (Snake Fort), Idaho, 260 miles to the
west at the confluence of the Boise and Snake Rivers.
Around 1837 the Hudson's Bay Co. purchased Fort Hall
from Wyeth, reconstructed it with adobe, and enlarged it considerably.
It became a center of the Rocky Mountain fur trade and was such a
lucrative enterprise that the Hudson's Bay Co. maintained it until
approximately 1856, or a decade after the United States acquired full
rights to the Oregon country from Great Britain. The post served an
acculturative role among the intermountain tribes similar to that of
Fort Union Trading Post, N. Dak., Fort Laramie, Wyo., and Bent's Old
Fort, Colo., among the Plains Indians.
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Interior view of Fort Hall
trading post, in 1849. (National Archives) |
Occupying a prime location only 50 miles northeast of
the point where the Oregon-California Trail forked to Oregon and
California, Fort Hall in 1842-43 became a major way station and supply
point for emigrants and travelers. Dr. Marcus Whitman, Rev. Henry H.
Spalding, and Father Pierre Jean De Smet stopped there at various times.
So did the explorer John C. Fremont in 1843, while probing the Far West.
He recommended establishment of a permanent military post at the spot to
supply emigrants and protect them from the Indians. The Army never acted
on his proposal, but troops later frequently camped at the fur post site
or its vicinity.
In 1849 the Loring Expedition of Mounted Riflemen
from Fort Leavenworth, Kans., establishing posts along the Oregon Trail,
founded Cantonment Loring, often incorrectly known as Fort Hall,
apparently 3 miles up the Snake River from the fur trading post. Loring
left two companies to erect a permanent post and proceeded to Fort
Vancouver, Wash. A shortage of forage and provisions, however, caused
the abandonment of the cantonment the next May.
A decline in trade and increasing Indian hostilities
led the Hudson's Bay Co. to discontinue operations at Fort Hall sometime
around 1856. For a few years itinerant traders sometimes lived in the
crumbling buildings. In 1859-60 and 1863 Regulars and Oregon Volunteers
camped there while patrolling the trail. A flood in the latter year
destroyed much of the fort. During the 1860's and 1870's overland stage
and mail lines used the site, a key road junction, as a base. So, too,
did freighters hauling supplies to mining camps in Oregon, Washington,
Idaho, and Montana.
In 1865-66, slightly to the north of the Fort Hall
site, Oregon Volunteers protecting the Oregon Trail maintained temporary
Camp Lander. For materials, they may have utilized log and adobe scraps
from the old fort. Federal troops returned to the area in 1870, but they
established a new post, also named Fort Hall, 25 miles to the
northeast.
The fur post site is on the Fort Hall Indian
Reservation. A small monument stands about 50 yards from the edge of
American Falls Reservoir. The only surface remains are low earth mounds
outlining the fort's walls. Except for the waters of the reservoir, the
natural scene is relatively unchanged. The sites of the nearby posts of
Cantonment Loring and Camp Lander, often confused with Fort Hall, have
not been ascertained.
NHL Designation: 01/20/61
http://www.cr.nps.gov/history/online_books/soldier-brave/siteb4.htm
Last Updated: 19-Aug-2005
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