Alfred J. Vaughan, agent of the Blackfeet Indians, in a report to the superintendent of Indian affairs, dated at the agency, tells the following concise story of the voyage: |
the two gallant crafts to land where no steamer was moored before."9 Periodical communications from the fleet published in The Century are full of interesting information. Following is a synopsis of one of these letters, dated "The Expedition,--near Sioux City, Ia., May 20, 1860," which was published in the issue of June 16: Left St. Louis May 31, have made nine hundred and fifty miles in seventeen days, average per day, fifty-six miles; on some days eighty miles; water the lowest "'in the memory of the oldest inhabitant.' If we had only this boat"--the Chippewa--"and the Key West, both sternwheelers, drawing thirty-two inches, loaded as they now are, we would have averaged seventy-five miles a day." The delays are all caused by waiting for the Spread Eagle, a side-wheeler, drawing four feet and intended to go only to Fort Union.10 9 Messages and Documents 1860-61, p. 306. 10 The statement by the correspondent of The Century, as early as May 20th, that the Spread Eagle was intended to go only to Fort Union seems questionable. An article in the Missouri Democrat, written by Mr. J. A. Hull and copied in the Peoples Press (Nebraska City) of July 19, 1860, says: "The mountain fleet arrived at mouth of Milk river Friday June 22d, fifty days out from St. Louis, and as the river had commenced falling it was thought advisable to send the 'flagship' back. Accordingly we transferred the balance of our freight to the Chippewa and Key West. Mr. P. W. [C. P.] Choteau then proposed that the Spread Eagle should make a pleasure trip above the point where the El Paso landed several years since [1853]. And with the officers of the army, and most of the officers of the boats, we run about fifteen miles above El Paso point--the Spread Eagle has now been higher up the Missouri river than any other side wheeled boat, and Captain La Barge has the honor of being her commander. On our arrival at the point two guns were fired, a basket of champagne was drank by the officers and guests, and one bottle buried on the point. I suppose any one who goes after it can have it. The Spread Eagle could have very easily got higher up--indeed it was thought at one time she would reach Fort Benton, the river rose so rapidly, but Captain Choteau did not wish to risk so much merely for glory." In the same communication it is said that on the return trip the Spread Eagle arrived at Sioux City July 5, met the Florence at Florence |
Have passed some very pretty towns, "especially Omaha City." The party consists of three hundred and forty recruits, "collected from all parts of the Union, and not very strictly selected either"; one hundred boatmen and fifty officers, "passengers, etc., gathered out of every nation under heaven." The writer correctly predicts the drying up of river traffic by railroads--now at St. Joseph, next at Sioux City, then when the Northern Pacific reaches Fort Union that will be the starting point for steamboats. Besides the soldiers there were about a dozen passengers on the three boats, including Colonel Vaughn, agent of the Blackfeet, Major Schoonover, agent for the tribes near Fort Union, several employees of the American Fur Company, and two New York artists--Hays and Terry--going to Fort Union, "to paint our great animals of the plains from life." The officers included Major Blake, Captains Lendrum and Jones, Lieutenants Cass, Livingston, Smith, Kautz, Carleton, Upham, Hardin and Stoughton, and Doctors Head and Cooper, all going to the Columbia river, and Captain Getty and a lieutenant for Fort Pierre. The "navy of the Missouri" was under "Commodore Choteau", with Captains Labarge, Humphreys and Wright. The next letter, appearing in the issue of July 5, and dated June 2, at Fort Pierre, notes progress since May 20 of six hundred miles, an average of only fifty miles a day. All agreed that starting so early was a mistake. If they had waited at St. Louis until about May 15, or until a rise of water began to show itself, two weeks time on the river would have been saved. There were only twenty-six inches of water on the bars at the Sioux City bend, so that on the 6th, passed the Emilie at Brownville on the 7th, and met the Omaha just below. The Omaha Nebraskian, of July 28, 1860, contains this notice: "The Chippewa from Fort Benton, touched at this point on her way down, on the 26th inst. We did not get her news." |
it was necessary to unload the Chippewa and lighten the Spread Eagle to get them over, causing a delay of three days in making thirty miles. Just above this point the fleet met a rise of eighteen inches, and the next day as much more, the increase alone being sufficient to float the two smaller boats. Consequently, for the following three days seventy-five miles a day was made, and Fort Randall was reached while the voyagers were "highly elated with the prospect of a quick voyage through." At the fort "the fulI band of the Fourth artillery greeted our arrival ... and cheered us as we again started towards the wilderness with the echoes of 'Home Sweet Home' and 'The Girl I Left Behind Me"'. About thirty miles farther on, a terrific storm of rain and hail forced the boats to lie by under shelter of bluffs for a day and a half; but while the resulting rise lasted ninety miles a day was made. "We travel, of course, only by day, though the high water and almost total absence of snags would make night travel easy if the channel were better known." Above Fort Randall it became difficult to obtain enough dry fuel for the boats. Betwen (sic) this post and Fort Pierre--two hundred and forty miles--"not a human being lives, except some white cedar log-cutters, and the reason of its desertion by Indians is evident in the almost total absence of game". Fort Pierre was nearly half way--1,450 miles--from St. Louis to Fort Benton. The next letter--published in The Century July 26, 1860--was dated, "Missouri River, Fifty miles From Fort Marion, Nebraska, June 19, 1860." 11 From Fort 11 this point was probably at Marion's Bend, about ten miles above the mouth of Poplar river, now in Valley county, Montana. The Spread Eagle, the slowest boat of the three, and the Chippewa made the voyage in 1859 to a point "a few miles below Fort Benton" in ten days less time. The Spread Eagle went as far as Fort Union and there transferred her cargo of about one hundred and sixty tons to the Chippewa which completed the voyage. (Messages and Documents, 1859-60, pt. 1, p. 483.) |
Pierre progress had been at the average rate of fifty-nine miles a day, "including long delays from being obliged to cut all our wood where it was often very scarce and from stopping to unload freight at the American Fur Company's Forts Clark and Berthold . . . The water has risen constantly and rapidly, so that it is higher now at Fort Union than ever before seen at the arrival of the arsenal of boats which have previously reached there only during its fall. And though the great river there divides, the Yellowstone, which had contributed half its volume, no longer helping us, yet the upper Missouri seems scarcely diminished in breadth or depth, the boats winding boldly along without fear of striking. The answer to the sounding-bell is almost invariably that forcible, if not exactly nautical phrase, 'no bottom'." A letter dated "Mouth of Milk River, Nebraska, June 22, 1860", was published in the same issue of the magazine as the preceding. The Spread Eagle was to start back down the river from this point the next day. The expedition had already advanced two hundred and fifty miles above Fort Union, a comparatively high up point; but in that region of magnificent distances the superlative objective was still five hundred and thirty-two miles beyond. The correspondent was encouraged by progress already made to believe that "boats can easily be built which will make the trip from St. Louis to Benton, thirty-five hundred and fifty miles, in thirty days." Wood was scarce for about one hundred and fifty miles above and below Fort Pierre but increased in amount northward. Above the great bend (now in South Dakota) there were "large groves of that excellent wood, the red cedar, much of it now dead, and ready for fuel if there were inhabitants to cut it". Lieutenant Warren was in error in saying in his topographical report to congress that this valuable tree disappeared at the forty-sixth parallel, for it reappears again at the forty |
seventh and becomes more abundant above the bend, growing thirty feet high and near a foot in diameter, accompanied by the low carpet-like juniper. "Milk river is named from its whiteness, caused by a great quantity of alkaline mud it always contains, and which gives to the Missouri below most of its turbidity, in color like weak coffee and milk . . . Above the Musselshell it will be found quite clear ... The artists left us last week having already painted some beautiful heads of animals." Our correspondent, whose name was concealed in the initial signature J. G. C., sketched views almost daily and also busily collected specimens of natural history. A letter published in the issue of August 2 informs us that the expedition arrived at Fort Benton July 2, sixty days from St. Louis; and that boats of proper draught would have made the trip in thirty days. Assistant Surgeon S. F. Head, U. S. A., and Doctor Cooper of New York, were attached to the expedition. The issue of August 9 contained a letter dated "Camp near Fort Benton, July 3, 1860." The fleet advanced from Milk river at the average rate of sixty miles a day. Large groves of Oregon fir, excellent pitch pine, and red cedar began to appear a few miles above Milk river. They only bordered the river where tracts bare of grass protected them from fire. It was necessary to cordelle the boats up much of the rapids below Fort Benton, three hundred men hauling by the ropes "to help the steam." Lieutenant Mullan would not be able to get through--over his new road from Walla Walla--before the end of a month. He could get oxen enough for only twenty-five, instead of the needed forty wagons for transportation for the expedition. On the first of August Lieutenant Mullan's expedition arrived at the fort, "the road of six hundred and thirty-three miles from Fort Walla Walla to Fort Benton being opened". On his arrival he turned over all his wagon |
transportation to Major Blake; but he retained a force of about twenty-five men with which he returned over the road in advance of Major Blake's command, starting August 5--"having seen that the party to descend the Missouri were properly provided for their trip . . ." He had previously reported that he had at Fort Benton "a ninety-foot keel boat, which I shall use in sending my party down the Missouri". 12 On November 1, 1860, in a communication to the assistant adjutant general, headquarters department of Oregon, Lieutenant Mullan sought to demonstrate that in future it would be more economical to use Fort Snelling as a rendezvous for troops destined for the easterly posts of the department of Oregon, the supplies, however, to be transported by steamboat to Fort Union and Fort Benton. In the course of his demonstration he states the experimental case of transportation of troops via the Missouri: "As you are aware, during the summer of 1859 and 1860 the Missouri river was proved to be navigable to within 100 miles of the Rocky mountains, and during the present season a military detachment of 300 recruits, under Major Blake, ascended in steamers as high as Fort Benton, where, taking land transportation, they moved safely and in good season to Fort Walla Walla. "This demonstrated that the Missouri river, together with the intervening land transit to the Columbia, could be used as a military line whenever the necessity for a movement existed, and provided the proper season for navigation be taken advantage of. But in future years, or until the condition of the interior shall guarantee an abundance of land transportation at the head of navigation on the Missouri, the element of uncertainty must ever enter into the movement of any body of troops to this coast via the Missouri and Columbia. During the last season it was practicable because we had land transportation at hand for the movement westward." 12 House Executive Documents 1860-61, v. 8, pp. 32, 53, 54. |
This objection is probably overrated to accommodate a prepossession. In a letter following Lieutenant Mullan's, Colonel Wright of the Ninth infantry concurs in his views, and he adds that the passage of a body of troops from Fort Snelling to Washington Territory would have an excellent effect upon the Indians on the route, checking a disposition to commit hostilities.13 "A report on Lieutenant Mullan's Wagon Road" by Major E. Steen to Quartermaster-General Joseph E. Johnston, dated at Fort Walla Walla January 5, 1861, states the case for the overland road in a manner which discloses a somewhat bitter feeling between partisans of the rival routes: "General: I take the liberty, and feel it my duty, to call your attention to the Fort Benton wagon road, as I believe, from experience in the service, and crossing the plains frequently for the last thirty years, that the cost of sending recruits or horses to this coast by that route will be ten times as much as by the route from Fort Leavenworth, via Forts Riley, Laramie, Hall, and Boisé, to this post; for by the boat to Benton each soldier will cost one hundred dollars, and each wagon the same; then to get mules or oxen for the wagons would be double the cost that it would be at Leavenworth. 13 Senate Documents 1860-61 (special session), v. 4, doc. 2, p. 3. John B. Floyd, Secretary of War, said in his report: "I took active measures to have a road constructed from Fort Walla-Walla on the Oregon river, across the mountain ranges to Fort Benton, on the head of the Missouri river ... After a prosperous march of less than sixty days from Fort Benton [600 miles] the command arrived in safety and good condition at Fort Walla-Walla ... Although the movement was an experiment alone, it has demonstrated the important fact that this line of intercommunication can be made available for moving large bodies of men from the Atlantic to the Pacific ... With comparatively a small sum of money spent upon the removal of obstructions from the Missouri river and some additional expenditure on the road, this line would constitute a most valuable improvement, second only, and hardly second for military purposes, to any of to projected lines of railroads to the Pacific." (Senate Documents, 2d Sess. 36th Cong., v. 2, p. 6.) |
Purchase your horses, wagons, and oxen or mules to transport your supplies at Leavenworth, and if the transportation is not needed here on its arrival, it can be sold at public auction for its full value in the States. By this means each soldier will hardly cost ten dollars, whereas by the Benton route each one would cost three hundred by the arrival here. "One more suggestion. Could not the one hundred thousand dollars already appropriated, and not yet expended, be transferred to the old road I speak of? It is much the shortest and best route--and emigrants come through every season, arriving here by the end of September, their animals in very good condition. "A post is to be established at Boisé in the spring, and there will always be troops at Fort Hall to protect emigration, and all that is needed are ferries at these posts, and very little work on the road. "There will then be grass, water, and all that is requisite for a military or emigrant road. "I do believe, if the one hundred thousand dollars is expended, and the Benton road finished, that not ten emigrants will travel it for twenty years to come. "But suppose you make the road from St. Paul to Benton, then you must establish a line of posts through the Sioux and Blackfoot country, requiring at least 1,500 soldiers, at a cost of half a million annually, and there would be a war, at a cost of three or four millions more. "In a conversation with Major Blake, of the army, who came by the Benton route with 300 recruits last summer, he spoke favorably of the route, and said he would apply to bring over horses from St. Paul, via Benton, to this department. Now, I am satisfied that the cost by that route will be ten times as much as by the route from Leavenworth, via Laramie, Hall, and Boisé; and, in addition, the major's route is much the longest; and in the months of May and June, from St. Paul west, say one thousand miles, you have much wet and marshy prairie, which I consider impassable. "Starting in July, then, you could not come through in the same season; and wintering in the mountains north |
east of us would cause much expense, the loss of many animals, and much suffering amongst the men." 14 Against Major Steen's unsupported statement that the cost per soldier from Fort Snelling to Washington Territory would be three hundred dollars, Lieutenant Mullan shows an estimate in detail that it would be only fifty-four dollars. The road was used but little for military transportation, though, contrary to Major Steen's prediction, it became an important highway for emigrants to Idaho, Washington and Montana.15 The construction of the Northern Pacific railroad in 1883 in the main superseded the Mullan road. The arrival of the Northern Pacific railroad at Bismarck in 1873 greatly reduced the traffic from Sioux City, and the last through trip of a commercial steamboat from St. Louis to Fort Benton was made in 1878. Steamboat traffic on the river was reduced and its main initial points changed by the successive arrivals of railroads at the Missouri river from the east,--the Chicago & Northwestern at Council Bluffs in 1867; the Sioux City & Pacific at Sioux City in 1868; the Northern Pacific at Bismarck in 1873; and the body blow was struck when the Great Northern reached Helena, Montana, in 1887. In his booklet, "Nebraska in 1857", James M. Woolworth said that Omaha "is at present the head of navigation of the Missouri river". A very promising commercial traffic by barges has recently been established between Kansas City and St. Louis. In explanation of the fact that the high up Missouri river points mentioned herein are placed in Nebraska, it should be said that until the territory of Dakota was estabished, March 2, 1861, Nebraska territory extended north to the Canadian boundary and west to the Rocky mountains. The Lieutenant Warren mentioned became famous afterward in our sectional war. He was chief 14 Ibid., p. 1. 15 Bancroft's Works, v. 31, pp. 384, 406. |
engineer of the army of the Potomac and ordered the occupation of Little Round Top on the Gettysburg battlefield, a point of great strategic importance. He participated in the famous battle of Ash Hollow, Nebraska, in 1855, and made important surveys in the territory in 1857-58. The Century magazine was published at New York and gave special attention to military affairs. Copies of it are in the public library of Chicago. Its issue of June 16, 1860, describes the Spread Eagle as a side-wheel vessel drawing four feet; therefore it could not keep up with the Chippewa and the Key West which had stern wheels and drew only thirty-two inches. According to Larpenteur,16 the Chippewa, the crack steamboat of the Missouri at that time, reached Fort Brulé, six miles above Marias river and sixteen miles below Benton, July 17, 1859.17 The boat was burned at 16 Forty Years a Furtrader, v. 2, pp. 326, 446, notes. 17 In his report to the commander of the Military Division of the Missouri, dated October 20, 1869, General Winfield S. Hancock, commander of the Department of Dakota, gives interesting information about the navigation of the upper Missouri as follows: "The navigation of the Missouri River above Sioux City, and, indeed, above St. Louis, may properly be divided into two parts: one to the mouth of the Yellowstone, (Fort Buford,) north of St. Louis two thousand two hundred and thirty-five miles; or of Sioux City, one thousand two hundred and twenty-five miles; the other, above Fort Buford to Fort Benton, the head of navigation, seven hundred and twenty-six miles. Boats drawing three feet of water may reach the mouth of the Yellowstone at almost any time during the season for boating on the Missouri. The Yellowstone is the first great tributary the Missouri receives. It gives the character to the Missouri River below the point of meeting, gives it depth, and changes the color of its waters. The Missouri is a clear stream above its junction with the Yellowstone; below that point it is yellow and muddy as it appears at the mouth of the Missouri. Boats drawing eighteen inches can only reach Fort Benton when the year is a favorable one, after the first high water of spring, derived from the melting snows in the mountains. At Fort Buford, no doubt, will be the point, hereafter, where the larger boats will transfer their loads to craft more suitable for the Upper Missouri. The obstacles met with in a low stage of water are bowlders in the bed of the river, deposited there by floating ice, and which may be felt grating against the bottom of boats at many points during low water. The most noted obstacles of this nature are those at Dauphin Rapids, one hundred and fifty miles below Fort Benton, by water, and thence in a lesser |
Disaster Bend, fifteen miles below the mouth of Poplar river, June 23, 1861. "She was a stern-wheeler, 160x32 feet, owned by the A. F. Co., W. H. Humphreys master." degree to Cow Island Rapids, thirty-five miles below. When I passed down the river, 9th of July, 1869, the year being an unfavorable one for water, there having been during the winter but little snow in the mountains, we found there were but seventeen inches of water on Dauphin Rapids, and scarcely more at Cow Island. The steamboat "Only Chance", on which we were, drawing that number of inches light and empty, the passengers and baggage having been removed, passed over it with difficulty, and I believe was the last boat to pass over either rapids." (Report of the Secretary of War, 2d sess. 41st cong., v. 1, p. 61.) |
 |
 |
 |
 |