The Santa Fe Trail - part 2

By Dan R. Conway

(Originally printed in the Hysham Echo on March 17, 1927)

Over this route which was, in the years that followed, to become a great highway of commerce, the first trail-blazer rode his perilous way with a train of pack mules in 1804. It was not until 1824 that the first wheeled vehicles creaked and groaned over these slow and weary miles to the remote markets of the southwest. During the long decades in which fur traders sought to extend the commerce of the United States westward, this old Santa Fe Trail was an almost continuous battlefield between the Indian and the traders and settlers.

The Santa Fe Trail

In the beginning of the trade with New Mexico, the route of the Santa Fe Trail across the great plains lay directly west from the Missouri river to the Rocky mountains, thence south to Santa Fe by the circuitous trail of Taos. When traffic assumed an importance demanding a less arduous course, the road was changed, running along the left bank of the Arkansas until that stream turned southwest, at which point it crossed the river and turned southwest to the Raton Pass. The atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railway line substantially follows the trail through the mountains, which here afford as wild and as picturesquely beautiful scenery as is afforded anywhere on the continent.

Crossing the plains of the interior of our great American continent form the Missouri river to the Rocky mountains, was a very different undertaking one hundred years ago, from what it is in these modern times. In those days the route was almost entirely unexplored. There existed no such thing as a chart to guide the traveler. When first the country traversed by the Santa Fe Trail was trekked by white men, the bold adventurers knew not where they might find springs of water, where there was forage for their animals or just where they should enter the desert’s desolation. Fording places upon rivers had to be sought out and dangerous rapid streams avoided.

A Treeless Wilderness

The country traversed was for the most part treeless, save for the groves of cottonwood and willow that bordered the rivers. Immense herds of buffalo, sometimes numbering ten to twenty thousand, grazed at will upon the rich and boundless pastures. Timid deer and great droves of wild horses here luxuriated in a congenial home. But very few white men then lived whose eyes had scanned the contour of the Rocky mountains. Along the entire route each Indian tribe had its own hunting grounds defined and marked out with considerable precision, beyond which the boldest men both red and white ventured to wander at the risk of life.

Perhaps the first expedition to cross the country over the entire route from Santa Fe to the Missouri river was the Spanish military force which was destroyed by the Missouri Indians in 1720. According to Chittenden, the next was that of the Mallet brothers, who in 1739 set out with six companions en route form the French settlements on the Mississippi river to the Spanish settlements of New Mexico. The first expedition from the Missouri river to Santa Fe was undertaken about 1763 by French traders, whose efforts culminated in their being imprisoned, their goods being stolen.

La Lande Was First

The overland trade between the United States and the northern provinces of New Mexico seems to have had no definite origin or well defined plan. It is recorded that the French creole, La Lande, who was employed by a Kaskaskia, Ill, merchant, was perhaps the second adventurer to enter the uncertain channels of commerce with Santa Fe. He began his adventurous journey across the vast wilderness alone in the spring of 1804, and it is believed that he reached his destination safely. La Lande was followed the next year by James Pursley, another trader. There is no record that either of these trailblazers ever returned to describe their adventures.

To Captain Zebulon Pike belongs the credit for establishing the impetus which the Santa Fe trade received in its beginnings. An expedition commanded by this military leader departed from the shores of the Missouri river in 1806, bound for the settlements of New Mexico. It was the report that he made of his travels and his enumeration of the commercial possibilities and opportunities in the southwest that aroused wide-spread interest, and encouraged numerous trade expeditions to that region.

Mexican Opposition

The Mexican authorities were bitterly antagonistic to this American commerce; and the restrictions imposed by the Mexican government proved a serious handicap to all of these enterprises which headed southwest. Not infrequently did adventurers who participated in this hazardous undertaking, have their entire stocks confiscated, and they, themselves, were often imprisoned for months as spies. It was because of this condition as well as the activities of the numerous tribes of hostile Indians along the route, that many of the expeditions prior to 1822 met with disaster and loss of life. And, it is true that within a dozen years after the first riders had ridden its perilous course, the Santa Fe Trail had become almost one continuous cemetery - a region of nameless and unmarked graves. As the Indians became better acquainted with the new established route traversed by these white traders and trappers, battles with these plains and mountain tribes grew in frequency, and to undertake the journey was to take one’s life and the lives of his party into his own hands.

During the years that have elapsed since the Santa Fe Trail was the sole avenue for commerce in the southwest, many of the old landmarks that designated the starting point from St. Louis followed the Mississippi to the mouth of the Missouri and then traced the course of the latter river. For some time, the old Boon’s Lick country (Now Howard county, Mo.), and old Franklin constituted the starting point of the trail. This town of old Franklin where the famous frontiersman, Sit Carson, was employed during his boyhood days, as an apprentice to a harness maker and saddler, now is the bottom of the Missouri river, the old townsite having been washed away.

Bent’s Fort

The first expeditions which made their way form Missouri to Santa Fe followed up the Arkansas river to a point near where the town of La Junta, Colorado, now stands. They then turned south and went first to Taos and then proceeded to historic old Santa Fe. This route continued to be used by many even after the shorter trail had been established across the desert. It was on this earlier route that was located Bent’s Fort. This trading post was located on the Arkansas river, about fifteen miles form where Pueblo is now situated. In its day it bore the record of being the most important outpost of civilization, ranking superior even to Forts Union, Pierre and Laramie. It was the great crossroads station of the southwestern country and the trading point for an immense area.

Bent’s Fort was established by William Bent and Ceran St. Brain, partners in a fur trading company which ranked next to the American Fur company in the amount of business it transacted during its most prosperous days. It is here worthy of mention that this William Bent was the great uncle of the late Charles M. Russell, Montana’s “Cowboy Artist.” The Bent family was one of the most distinguished to reside in St. Louis, and from as early as 1804 they were interested in fur trade in the far west. William Bent had three brothers who likewise were frontiersmen, two of them being in the employ of the American Fur company.

Bent’s fort was situated 530 miles from Independence, Mo., and stood on the left bank of the Arkansas river, about midway between the present cities of La Junta and Los Animas, Colorado. It was established in 1828 and its construction was completed in 1832.

Building the Fort

In 1824 William Bent had established a fort on the Arkansas in Colorado. He also was distinguished as having been the first white man to permanently settle in what is now Colorado. By his fair and open dealings ad his fearlessness, he won the confidence of the Indians and retained ti until his death. Among the rough fraternity of mountain trappers he was also very popular and had a reputation for courage.

Several historians have given descriptions of the old fort, but almost all of these differ. On certain points, however, these agree. It was set square with the compass on the north bank of the river. It was 100 feet square and 15 feet high. At the southwest and northeast corners of the walls were bastions or round towers, 30 fee high, each having loopholes for muskets and openings for cannon. Print this post