Rogers Archaeology Lab : February 2015

By Lotte Govaerts

This blog post is part of a series of posts about my research on the historic artifacts collected by River Basin Surveys (RBS) archaeologists in the mid-20^th century and curated here at the National Museum of Natural History. In previous posts we established that RBS historic sites fall into three primary categories: fur trade, military, and Indian Agencies. In my last post, I discussed the historical background of the region’s fur trade. Here, I will focus on how the US military presence in the area influenced the region’s shift towards US settlement.

Ink on paper drawing of US cavalry charging

Figure 1: Ink on paper drawing of US soldiers charging by unknown Cheyenne artist, ca. 1894. "Cheyenne Pictures. Soldiers Charging on Sioux and Cheyennes.” Image Source: National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center. Via Smithsonian Collections Search Center

In the middle of the nineteenth century the northwestern expansion of the US military presence reached the Upper Missouri Basin. The US government had made plans to establish military outposts in the region after the war of 1812 to counter British interests and establish dominance, but implementation was limited due to funding shortfalls. Only two posts were eventually built in 1819. One was Fort Atkinson, the first US military post west of the Missouri, in what is now Nebraska. The other was Fort Snelling (originally Fort Saint Anthony), at the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers in what is now the state of Minnesota. There was ongoing discussion on moving the military frontier line westward over the years, especially after a conflict between fur traders and the Sahnish (Arikara) in the 1820s eventuated in military actions. Ultimately the expansion was deemed unnecessary until the late 1840s when forts were built to protect US settlers moving to the west.

Regional demographics were changing rapidly in the mid-19^th century. Smallpox and other epidemics decimated the Plains Village tribes in the area. The Sioux, particularly among the seven Lakota bands, were not as affected by these diseases as the more sedentary tribes. It is thought that their nomadic way of life offered the Sioux some protection against infectious disease. It is also possible that US vaccination programs had some success. As a consequence, the Lakota Sioux became one of the dominant Native groups in the area.

In the meantime, growing US populations to the east resulted in settlements creeping up the Missouri River and tributary valleys. In addition, there was a large increase in overland travel by US settlers and miners seeking the rich lands of the northwest or western sites where gold was being discovered. New military forts were built to accompany this westward expansion. The first were Forts Kearny (1848) and Laramie (purchased from fur traders in 1849) along the Platte River and the famous Oregon trail. Many others soon followed. In many cases the military followed in the footprints of the earlier fur traders, as they purchased earlier fur trade establishments to use as military posts.

Drawing: covered wagons being ferried across the river

Figure 2. An 1859 drawing by Daniel A. Jenks, showing two covered wagons being ferried across the North Platte in central Wyoming. Image Source: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, item 2004661637

Increasing intrusions of US settlers onto Native lands, and the related decline of buffalo herds contributed to rising tensions and conflict between Native tribes and the US. The US sought to establish boundaries and safe westward passage via the signing of treaties with Native peoples. One glaring issue relating to these treaties was that the Native people in attendance did not necessarily speak for all the peoples the US was attempting to negotiate with, nor did they necessarily understand what they were agreeing to. Although the US representatives did speak for the US government, individual settlers or miners did not always heed the treaties, and the US government frequently ended up disregarding them as well. In the Northern Plains specifically, the first Treaty of Fort Laramie in 1851 was supposed to assure safe passage for US settlers on the Oregon Trail, and allow the construction of roads and forts along the trail, in exchange for annuities. In reality, conflict continued and small issues easily escalated into major incidents. For example, in 1854 when a dispute over a cow lead to an armed confrontation that resulted in the deaths of Brule Lakota chief Conquering Bear as well as Lieutenant Grattan and his entire command. Events like these, where the US military suffered a serious loss, would trigger punitive campaigns aimed at Native villages.

In 1862, when the military was occupied with the Civil War, a large scale conflict arose between the Dakota Sioux and non-native settlers in Minnesota. This conflict is often referred to as the “Sioux uprising”. The conflict spread west when some of the Dakota involved in this conflict, pursued by the US military, fled into what is now the Dakotas. Generals Sully and Sibley followed these bands of Dakota, bringing with them a military presence and a string of military forts.

To the west, the Bozeman trail to the Montana gold fields angered the Lakota Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho peoples as it cut through their hunting grounds. Here too, in 1866, an officer by the name of Fetterman was killed with his entire command (totaling over 80 people) when he underestimated a situation and strayed too far from his fort in pursuit of a group that had attacked a wood train. Incidents like these impassioned the US public and made the US government reflect upon the cost of western expansion. At the same time, the public back east became increasingly horrified by stories about the destruction of entire Native villages, particularly after such incidents as the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864. At Sand Creek, Colonel Chivington (who infamously advocated the killing of Native children by saying “Nits make lice”) and a force of some 700 men attacked a peaceful village of Cheyenne and Arapaho. The village had been flying a US flag, and did not harbor the warriors that had been attacking settlers in the area. Chivington and his men indiscriminately killed villagers, including children and elderly people. Indian policy became a topic of national debate. It was in this climate that a Peace Commission was created in 1867. Its purpose was to find a peaceful solution to the conflicts. The solution the Peace Commission came up with primarily involved Native assimilation into mainstream US culture.

Late 19th century photograph of General Sherman and other government representatives in council with several Native leaders

Figure 3: Photograph taken during negotiations preceding the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie. "Photograph of General William T. Sherman and Commissioners in Council with Indian Chiefs at Fort Laramie, Wyoming, ca. 1868”. Image Source: National Archives, identifier 531079.

As it continued to experience resistance from the Northern Cheyenne and bands of Arapaho and Lakota under the leadership of a man named Red Cloud, the US Government eventually closed the Bozeman trail and abandoned the forts along it. In the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 the Great Sioux Reservation was created. The Powder River Country was declared “Unceded Indian Territory”. Not long thereafter, however, gold was discovered in the Black Hills of the Great Sioux Reservation, and profit-hungry miners and settlers descended upon these Sioux lands. This naturally led to more conflict and eventually the US government seized the land, in violation of their earlier treaty. Various battles were fought between the US army and the Lakota Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho. The most famous of these battles is probably the Native victory at Little Bighorn in 1876. Unfortunately for the victors, their success in battle essentially sealed their fate. The peoples involved were relentlessly pursued by the US military. They fled north but straggled back south due to starvation. Soon thereafter, the last of the Native peoples in the area were confined to ever-shrinking reservations.

Figure 4. An 1882(?) portrait of Hunkpapa Lakota chief Sitting Bull, who played an important role in the so-called “Great Sioux War” of 1876, and the battle of Little Bighorn. Image source: Denver Public Library, Western History/Genealogy Department

This concludes the discussion of the historical context of 19^th century US military activity in the Upper Missouri River Basin. In my next post, I will examine the establishment of Indian Agencies in the Northern Plains, and the Upper Missouri Basin more specifically. Stay tuned!

This post is part of a series about my research on the historic artifact collections obtained during the River Basin Surveys (RBS) in the mid-twentieth century, and curated by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. In the first two installments of this series I introduced the field of historical archaeology and the River Basin Surveys. In this third post, I explore the historical background of the Upper Missouri basin, the area my research focuses on.

At the turn of the nineteenth century, the Northern Plains of North America were home to various Native peoples (Figure 1). The Upper Missouri River Basin, in what is now the states of North and South Dakota, was home to three of the Plains Village tribes: The Siouan-speaking Mandan and Hidatsa (also referred to as Minnetaree, or Gros Ventres [of the River]) in what is now North Dakota, and the Caddoan-speaking Arikara (as they are called in the literature, also “ricarees”, or “rees”. They call themselves Sahnish) in what is now South Dakota. To the east roamed the nomadic Western Dakota Sioux (the Yankton and Yanktonai, sometimes erroneously referred to as “Nakota”), and further east still the Eastern Dakota or Santee Sioux. To the West was the territory of the seven bands of Lakota or Teton Sioux. To the North lived the Assiniboine. To the south lived the Ponca. The area also included the very edges of the territories of other peoples, such as the Pawnee, Omaha, Cheyenne, Crow, Arapaho, Plains Ojibwa, and Gros Ventres [of the Prairies] (De Mallie & Sturtevant 2001).

Turn of the 19th century Upper Missouri Basin tribal territories

Figure 1. Turn of the 19th century tribal territories in the Upper Missouri Basin and surrounding area, overlaid on map of modern state boundaries. Image adapted from DeMallie & Sturtevant 2001, part I, fig1, p.3

By the turn of the twentieth century, however, the region’s demographic picture had completely changed. The Native peoples had lost all but very small fractions of their lands to US settlement, transportation infrastructure, and mining operations. In this blog post I will examine some of the mechanisms and circumstances involved in this shift toward US settlement. Historic sites that reflect this transition are related to the fur trade, the military frontier, the settlement of US towns, and US government installations enacting the assimilation of Native peoples including: Indian Agencies, Indian Schools, missions, and reservations. As was discussed in the previous blog post, circumstances of the RBS led investigators to focus primarily on fur trade establishments, military posts, and Indian agencies. However, additional sites related to early US settlement of the area were also included in the survey. In this blog post I will focus on the history of the fur trade in the 19th century Upper Missouri Basin, while the next two posts will deal with the US military presence in the area, and with the establishment of Indian agencies.

Fur Trade

The area of interest to my research, the Upper Missouri River Basin, was part of a vast expanse of land claimed by France in 1699. The land changed to Spanish ownership in 1762, before returning to France under Napoleon in 1800. Because of pressing circumstances (a slave revolt in French-controlled Haiti, and war plans for Europe that required money), Napoleon decided to sell this area - the Louisiana Territory – to the US in 1803.

Immediately after acquiring the Louisiana Territory, the US government sought to establish a presence in the region, seek a river route to the Pacific, and map the area. And thus the famous Lewis and Clark expedition was launched in May 1804, lasting until September 1806.

Figure 2. Detail of “A map of Lewis and Clark's track across the western portion of North America, from the Mississippi to the Pacific Ocean : by order of the executive of the United States in 1804, 5 & 6” copied by Samuel Lewis from the original drawing of Wm. Clark. 1814. Source: Library of Congress

Lewis and Clark’s journals from their journey up the Missouri River indicate that relatively few fur traders were operating along the Upper Missouri at that time, mainly French Canadians from the north. Native American people had been trading furs with Europeans since before Europeans permanently settled in North America. Beaver pelts, in particular, were in demand for the manufacture of men’s hats. Their popularity had driven the beaver to near extinction across Europe and Russia. Furs were often traded for European goods such as metal implements, fabrics, blankets, and glass beads.

Fur trade companies were large and profitable enterprises in turn of the 19th century North America. The British Hudson’s Bay Company and North West Company dominated the North American fur trade in the second half of the eighteenth century, but after the US’ independence, American fur traders began to seriously compete. John Jacob Astor’s “American Fur Company” soon became the dominant fur trade outfit within the US, as well as one of the US’ largest and wealthiest companies overall. Manuel Lisa was the first US fur trader to specifically focus on the Upper Missouri River area, with his St. Louis-based “Missouri Fur Company” which operated in the area between 1807 and 1824. Other companies followed, building many trade posts/forts along the river. These fur traders operated from their forts, trading with Native people who did the trapping. Fur traders would also directly employ a small number of trappers or hunters.

Figure 3. A mid-nineteenth century beaver fur top hat. Image source: “Westward by Sea: A Maritime Perspective on American Expansion, 1820-1890.” Image source: Mystic Seaport Museum, Connecticut, 1967.371.c.

Tracing the history of the various fur trade companies is complicated because extreme competition resulted in companies being created and dissolved at a rapid pace. Alliances constantly shifted among the fur traders. With expanding traffic, many trade posts were built along the Upper Missouri River, often with competing posts directly next to each other. Determining what fur trade companies were operating in a given area is complicated by the fact that historical documents often refer to competitor posts as “The Opposition” rather than using proper names.

One of the larger traders in the region was the Columbia Fur Company. It was created after a merger of the Hudson’s Bay and Northwest companies left many experienced fur traders without jobs. This newly formed company operated between the upper Mississippi and Missouri in the 1820s, until it merged with the dominant American Fur Company and became that company’s “Upper Missouri Outfit”.

The trade in beaver furs declined in the 1830s due to a combination of factors. Beaver was becoming scarce, and European fashions were changing to favor silk hats over the older style beaver fur hats. The American Fur Company was dissolved at this point, but the Upper Missouri Outfit continued doing business. Tracing the company’s activities in the historical record after this point is difficult because many documents continued to refer to the company as the “American Fur Company”. The fur trade at this point was mainly in buffalo hides, commonly called “buffalo robes” (Mattison 1961; Sunder 1965; Barbour 2001).

Photo of brass number tags in artifact storage box

Figure 4. Sheet-brass tags die-stamped with numbers. These were excavated from Fort Berthold II (32ML2). They were probably fastened to bales of buffalo robes or other trade items. Photo credit: Lotte Govaerts.

Growth of the fur trade and development of river transportation were closely entwined. The enlarging trade required ever expanding transportation, and increasing transportation allowed larger volumes of products to be transported. The vast distances and the harsh winters of the Northern Plains made overland travel difficult, so the Missouri River was a natural choice for transportation. However, river transportation had its own difficulties. The river would freeze between mid-November and mid-April every year. When not frozen, it was difficult to navigate because of its muddiness, shallowness, currents, and ever-changing channels. Many a ship was snagged on downed trees while navigating the Missouri River.

During the early decades of the nineteenth century, fur traders largely relied on non-motorized methods of river transportation, such as keelboats, mackinaw boats, and canoes. Using these methods, travel upstream was naturally more difficult than downstream, especially with heavy loads of cargo. Steamboating on the Missouri river developed only slightly later than it did on the Mississippi, but it took some time to perfect. The conditions of the Upper Missouri required specialized ships with a very shallow draft, and rear-wheel rather than side-wheel propulsion. From the 1830s to 1859 these so-called “mountain boats” allowed trade access up to Fort Union on the Upper Missouri River at the mouth of the Yellowstone River. Fort Union and Fort Pierre to the south (in present day central South Dakota) were the main outposts of the American Fur Company/Upper Missouri Outfit. Starting in 1859, steamships were able to make it up to the Missouri River’s head of navigation near Fort Benton, just 37 miles downstream from Great Falls where the river exits the Rocky Mountains. The expanding influence of steamships is evident in fur trader journals. In the 1830s traders describe how the arrival of one steamboat a year was highly anticipated in the spring, while journals written in the late 50s and 60s describe several steamboats in port all at the same time. Many steamboats navigated the Upper Missouri over the years, and many were lost along with some or most of their valuable cargo, as the Upper Missouri remained treacherous, even for specially adapted boats (Lass 1962; Kane 2004; Corbin 2006; Corbin & Rogers 2008).

Late 19th century photo of the steamboat Far West docked along the Missouri river.

Figure 5. The steamboat Far West, docked somewhere along the Missouri River. Picture taken between 1874 and 1890. Image source:Denver Public Library, Western History/Genealogy Dept.

Eventually railroads penetrated the northern reaches of the Upper Missouri basin and river transportation became obsolete. The coming of the railroad was also a major factor in the demographic transformation of the area (Winther 1964). However, no railroad-related sites were included with the historic sites investigated during the RBS.

The fur trade declined in the middle of the 19^th century, as buffalo herds were shrinking in size. This decrease in buffalo was partly due to the enormous numbers of skins being harvested, but other factors were also involved. For example, both railroad companies and US military personnel purposefully culled buffalo herds in order to obtain land and assimilate Native people who depended on the buffalo hunt. With the fall of the buffalo came an end to the preeminence of the region’s fur trade.

Figure 6. "The buffalo from North America". S. Augustus Mitchell A. System of Modern Geography, Comprising a Description of the Present State of The World, and Its Grand Divisions (Philadelphia: E. H. Butler and Co., 1867) 83. Courtesy the private collection of Roy Winkelman. Retrieved via Florida Center for Instructional Technology

This concludes the discussion of the historical background of the fur trade in 19^th century Upper Missouri River Basin. In my next post I will explore the arrival and expansion of the US military presence in the region. Stay tuned!

References/Further Reading:

Native American Peoples of the Northern Plains:

DeMallie, Raymond and William Sturtevant (eds)

2001 Handbook of North American Indians, Volume 13: Plains Pt. 1 and Pt. 2. Smithsonian Institution.

Fur Trade - general:

Barbour, Barton H.

2001 Fort Union and the Upper Missouri Fur Trade, Norman, University of Oklahoma Press.

Casler, Michael M.

1999 Steamboats of the Fort Union fur trade : an illustrated listing of steamboats on the Upper Missouri River, 1831-1867, Fort Union Association.

Chittenden, Hiram M.

1902 The American Fur Trade of the Far West, New York.

Gale, Ryan R.

2009 The Great Northwest Fur Trade: A Material Culture, 1763 – 1850.

Mattison, Ray H.

1961 The Upper Missouri Fur Trade: its Methods of Operation, Nebraska history, v. 42, no. 1, pp. 1-28.

Sunder, John E.

1965 The Fur Trade on the Upper Missouri, 1840 – 1865, Norman, University of Oklahoma Press.

Fur Trader and Visitor Journals (edited volumes):

Abel, Annie Heloise (ed)

1939 Tabeau’s Narrative of Loisel’s Expedition to the Upper Missouri, Norman.

Casler, Michael M. (ed)

2007 The Original Journal of Charles Larpenteur, My travels to The Rocky Mountains Between 1833 and 1872, Chadron, Nebraska.

Kelly, Carla (ed)

2005 On the Upper Missouri, The Journal of Rudolph Friederich Kurz, 1851-1852, Norman.

Wood, W. Raymon (ed)

2008 Twilight of the Upper Missouri River Fur Trade, The Journals of Henry A. Boller, Bismarck.

Wood, W. Raymond and Thomas D. Thiessen

1985 Early Fur trade on the Northern Plains, Canadian Traders Among the Mandan and Hidatsa Indians, 1738 – 1818, The Narratives of John Macdonnell, David Thompson, Francois-Antoine Larocque, and Charles McKenzie, Norman.

Steamboats/transportation

Casler, Michael M.

1999 Steamboats of the Fort Union fur trade: an illustrated listing of steamboats on the Upper Missouri River, 1831-1867, Fort Union Association.

Chappell, Phil E.

1906 River Navigation: A History of the Missouri River, Transactions of the Kansas State Historical Society 1905 – 1906: 226-31.

Chittenden, Hiram M.

1903 History of Early Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River: Life and Adventures of Joseph LaBarge, Cleveland, Arthur H. Clark Company.

Corbin, Annalies

2000 The Material Culture of Steamboat Passengers: Archaeological Evidence from the Missouri River, New York, Kluwer/Plenum.

2006 The Life and Times of the Steamboat Red Cloud or How Merchants, Mounties, and the Missouri Transformed the West. College Station Texas A & M Press.

Corbin Annalies and Bradley A. Rogers

2008 The Steamboat Montana and the Opening of the West, History, Excavation, and Architecture, University Press of Florida.

Kane, Adam

2004 The Western River Steamboat, College Station Texas A&M Press.

Lass, William E. A.

1962 A History of Steamboating on the Upper Missouri River, Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press.

Petsche, Jerome E

1974 The Steamboat Bertrand: History, Excavation, and Architecture, Washington DC National Park Service.

Winther, Oscar O.

1964 The Transportation Frontier: Trans-Mississippi West, 1856-1890, New York.

Rogers Archaeology Lab

February 2015

02/26/2015

The Upper Missouri River Basin in the Nineteenth Century: Military Frontier

Further Reading:

02/19/2015

The Upper Missouri River Basin in the Nineteenth Century: Fur Trade

Native American Peoples of the Northern Plains:

Fur Trade - general:

Fur Trader and Visitor Journals (edited volumes):

Steamboats/transportation

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