History of the Arkansas Valley, Colorado, Part 73

Author: O.L. Baskin & Co
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago : O.L. Baskin & Co.
Number of Pages: 1080

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On the 14th, he again started south in search of Red River. leaving two men in camp. This route, no doubt, lay up Grape Creek, as he, soon after starting, entered Wet Mount- ain Valley. Here he encountered snows to the depth of three to four feet. Many of his men had their limbs frozen, and were left at differ- ent points on the route. Finally, he crossed the Sangre de Christo Range into the San Luis Valley, and made a camp on the Rio Grande del Norte, and commenced building a fort, claiming the land in the name of the United States. This caused his being taken prisoner, the day after his arrival, by the Spanish soldiers, who kindly assisted him in gathering up the unfortunate stragglers. He was then taken to Santa Fe, and from there to Old Mexico. He was afterward released, and, on his return, was enabled, at last, and after so many trials and privations, to find the long-sought source of Red River.

Maurice, a French trader who came from Detroit, is said to have established the fort and trading-post on Adobe Creek, near the west line of the lamented Samuel L. Gould's

land, about the year 1830. The first agri- cultural settlement was by Mexicans, at near the mouth of Adobe Creek, soon after where they built thirteen low, flat, earth-roofed adobe houses on one side of a projected square or plaza, which was completed by an adobe wall. One of the buildings, with dirt floor and one small box window, was used for a church. Their marriage custom was their principal peculiarity, being performed in the evening, and followed by a night of dissipa- tion; they would repair with their friends to church in the morning, and, after saying mass, would form a procession, headed by the bride, in the whitest garments procurable, and, conducted by the groom, the procession marched around to music of violin and a sort of drum, the friends shooting off firearms and making grotesque gestures, until their future residence was reached, when each one took their departure from the newly married couple, after hearty pressure of body, by plac- ing hands to backs, and without further con- gratulations or salutations. They cultivated some land on Hardscrabble, but had a life of constant hazard from the Indians.

In 1838, on approach of the Sioux and Ara- pahoe Indians, they took refuge in Maurice's Fort. The Indians demanded of Maurice a Ute squaw who was living with him as con- dition of peace. He parleyed with them until a courier, sent to the Ute camp (then in Wet Mountain Valley) brought the braves, when, on the mesa south of the creek, one of the fiercest engagements of our early history was fought, resulting in victory to the side of Maurice and the Utes. The few particulars of this engage- ment obtainable were communicated by Mau- rice, in 1860, to J. A. Toof, Esq., who says the old Frenchman communicated all dates by moons. He told him that in 1844, four feet of snow fell all over his country, and lasted three moons, at the time of the great St. Louis inundation, and that it killed all the bison and many elk and deer. Mr. Toof thought it correct, as bison heads were seen all about the country. He was particularly impressed with the correctness of the state- ment on the following April 15, when he looked out on a clear sky at nightfall, and in the morning on an equally clear sky, but on

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HISTORY OF FREMONT COUNTY.

the ground covered with sixteen inches of snow. Civilization seems to have done away since, with these eccentricities of climate.

The first American settlement on Adobe Creek was in 1840, by an association of hunt- ers and trappers. The following-named per- sons are known to have been the leading spirits of the company: Gov. Bent, Mr. Lupton, Col. Ceren St. Vrain, Beaubien, and Lucien B. Maxwell. These men are all well known in the history of Colorado and New Mexico, Maxwell and Lupton at one time being companions of Fremont, in his first trip to California. Gov. Bent, first Gov- ernor of New Mexico after the conquest by the United States, afterward murdered at Taos in an insurrection led on by an advent- urous Mexican, who expected to become as successful as other bandit chieftains have in Old Mexico; but, as he was resisting the power of Uncle Sam, his "revolution " (for it is known by that name to this day in Taos Val- ley, the scene of the massacre) was of short duration. Lupton, the well-known "Fort Lupton," of Northern Colorado, being named in his honor. Col. St. Vrain, a French Count, not only legally a nobleman, but one of nature's noblemen-a beautiful river in Northern Colorado is named for him. Beau- bien, another noble Frenchman, one of the grantees of the "Beaubien and Miranda Grant" of lands, now known as the "Maxwell Grant," and Lucien B. Maxwell, former owner of the " Maxwell Land Grant," with others whose names cannot be obtained. Beaubien had immediate charge and management of the post, the object of which was to supply the wants of the trappers who were then op- erating in this section of the country.

The settlement remained on Adobe Creek, with few interruptions, until the year 1846, when it was broken up, and the inhabitants, except Maurice, went to other mountain lo- calities.

The Plains Indians did not appear again in force until August, 1852. The Mexicans, who, having come and gone several times, had crops in, at first determined to go out and fight, but the Indians, seeing their movements, and not desiring a square conflict, withdrew to ambush beyond the Mexicans' corn-field,

in which they left their ponies feeding. The Mexicans did not attempt driving them out, as they saw through the object of the movement, but made a show of preparing to do so until night, when they evacuated and made for Mexico by the way of San Carlos and Cuch- aras, leaving Maurice, with his family of In- dian and Mexican wives with his Ute allies, sole occupante of the country again. The settlers called his place Buzzard Roost.

Maurice seems to be the only French trader who remained any number of years in the county. He spoke Mexican mainly, but nearly all the Indian languages fluently. He had, at different times, a great many squaw wives. By a Flatfoot squaw he raised a son, who, at the time of Mr. Toof's arrival, was nine years old. He also had a son by a Mex- ican wife, who was about twelve years old. He was at one time quite wealthy in his trad- ing post store and in ponies. He was most attached to his Mexican wife, whose death, in 1858, bore heavily upon him, and he even lost his power to kill game. He would get terri- bly enraged at once if any one failed to com- prehend his conversation, and would show the adaptability of his mother tongue whenever he cursed, which he did at a fearful rate when piqued. The last seen of the old man was after all his worldly possessions had wasted away except his pony-his children having gone to Mexico-when, just at nightfall, he was mounted, dressed in his buckskin suit, with his gun slung across his back, going with the sun over the mountains toward Music Pass and Mexico. Owing to his friendship with the. Utes, he would never communicate any facts concerning their great fight and loss on the Ute Trail, from Crystal, or Brewster Spring, across to where the wagon road now leaves Grape Creek.

A few years since, Mr. George W. Griffin met a Spanish half-breed who was in the Ute Trail fight, and who said the Utes were off toward Mexico in 1847, some say in Huerfano, com- mitting depredations among the Mexican set- tlers, when they were pursued by troops under a regular Mexican army officer, whose name he could not remember; that the Utes did not make a stand until in the gulch, or canon, near this place, where they attempted to draw

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HISTORY OF FREMONT COUNTY.

the troops into ambush, which the troops dis- covered, and, gaining an advantageous posi- tion over the Utes, who fled in great conster- nation, leaving strung along the trail 125 of their number, the slaughter continuing on across Webster Park and into the cañon as far as Copper Gulch, where the last burial-mound yet remains. The rock-covered grave-mounds on this trail were strewn with evergreens by the Utes each season for years after the writer came to this country, at which times they are said to show much respect, as well as grief, over their fallen braves, and chanting mournful melodies, with all the guttural ca- dences peculiar to primitive song in every In- dian tribe. Another account of the Ute Trail battle is that, about the year 1845, the Utes surprised and massacred the settlers on Huer- fano, and who, following up the latter creek in their efforts to escape, gave that creek the name it now bears-Hardscrabble-and that St. Vrain gathered the settlers all along the eastern base of the mountains and gave them the terrible punishing shown by the burial- mounds that line this trail.

THE EXPEDITION WHICH LED TO THE DISCOVERY OF GOLD AND THE SETTLEMENT OF COLORADO .*

In examining the history of Colorado, I see that the historians have given to Green Rus- sell and a party of Georgians the credit of. starting the gold excitement in this country in 1858, which was the means of getting the country settled by white people. Believing the historians to be mistaken, I have conclud- ed to give my account of the expedition, of which I was a member. Green Russell and his party were not with the expedition until we had accomplished one-half the distance to the mountains.

In the spring of 1849, when the California gold excitement started, a party of Cherokees went there, traveling by the Arkansas River route, over the old road by the Squirrel Creek divide and the head of Cherry Creek. They were formerly from Georgia, where they had attained considerable experience in gold min- ing, and, going to California, took with them their mining tools, which they used in pan-

*By Philander Simmons, a member of the party who visited the park where Canon City is located, with Bent's Indian traders, in 1842, and published in the Fremont County Record.

ning out dirt along the different mountain streams, in many of which they found gold. Part of them were in favor of stopping and prospecting more thoroughly, but, the ma- jority prevailing, they continued their route to California, with the determination of thor- oughly prospecting this country on their re- turn trip. Disappointed in California, they did not succeed in getting up an expedition until the winter of 1858, when an expedition was organized to prospect the Pike's Peak country for gold, which at that time included the whole range from the Arkansas River to Long's Peak. Some of the Cherokees, who were then in Southwest Missouri, sent word to their friends in Georgia requesting them to go with them. It was in that way that Green Russell heard of it, and traced the mat- ter up until he found the organizers, to whom he wrote and proposed organizing a company in Georgia, who would overtake the main body of the expedition before they reached the mountains. Receiving their consent, he or- ganized the company and joined the main body of the expedition forty miles west of the Pawnee Forks.

The Cherokees had also another object in this expedition-that of finding a suitable lo- cation for their tribe, as there had been some talk of selling out the Cherokee country to the Government, and they wished a location where buffalo and other game was plenty.

Early in the spring of 1858, word was sent to some of their own people in Southwest Missouri to join the expedition. At that time, I was employed in the lead mines of Southwest Missouri, and, having had consid- erable experience in frontier life, both in the mountains and on the plains, I went to the Cherokee country and joined the expedition near Cody's ranch, on the Verdigris River, stopping over one night at Hon. George Hicks', who afterward became the leader of the expedition. He was a remarkable man, and exercised a powerful influence in the nation. A lawyer by profession, he had served on the bench as Judge. A war chief in his younger days, he saved the life of Gen. Andrew Jackson, who, with a small party of men, was surrounded by the Choctaws. Hicks, who was a personal friend of Jackson, raised

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HISTORY OF FREMONT COUNTY.

a relief party, and, routing the Choctaws, res- cued the party, who could have held out but a few days longer.

In the latter part of April, they began to assemble, intending to start about the 1st of May. The Osage Indians became scared at such a large gathering of the Cherokees, sup- posing they were on the war-path, and moved their villages and destroyed what, in their haste, they could not carry with them. Even though assured that the intentions of the Cher- okees were peaceful, they remained away until after their departure for the mountains, which happened about the 12th day of May, with a smaller company than they anticipated, there being but thirty Indians and twelve white persons. Among the Indians were the Hon. George Hicks and son, George, Jr .; John Beck and Zeke Beck, Jr. (who were the origi- nators of the expedition), and Pelican Tiger. The names of the few white people are Mr. Kirk, wife and family; Mr. Brown; George Mcdougal; Mr. Tubbs; Levi Braumbangh; Johns and Taylor, and a Mr. Kelly, who, with a Cherokee wife, her sister and myself, were all the whites in the expedition. There were in all about forty persons and seven or eight wagons, mostly drawn by oxen.

Hon. George Hicks was appointed Com- mander-in-Chief, and John Beck, Esq., second in command. Upon his election as Com- mander-in-Chief, Mr. Hicks addressed the company, telling of the dangers of the expe- dition from the wild Indians, and enjoined upon all a close observanceof the Sabbath, on which day no unnecessary work or traveling was to be done. But little of importance transpired during the early part of the way, with the exception of hunting deer and ante- lope, until they reached the buffalo country, when they engaged in the chase of the buffalo until they reached the trading-post at the Pawnee Fork of the Arkansas River, where a large camp of Arapahoe Indians were en- camped, with the chief of whom Mr. Hicks held a long conversation, in which he advised them to learn the manner of the white peo- ple and engage in farming, erect schools and churches, the same as the Cherokees had done. He explained to the chief that all the tribes were being surrounded by white

settlements, and that the best thing they could do was to make peace with each other and live peaceably and quietly, so that their treaties with the whites would be more respected. After a distribution of flour, sugar and coffee to the Indians, we traveled forty miles west of Pawnee Fork, and, according to our rules, rested over Sunday. On Monday, as we were preparing to start, a young Frenchman, a member of Green Russell's party, overtook us, and, hearing of the nearness of that party, we went into camp and waited for them.

On Wednesday, we resumed our march, without previous arrangements having been changed, Mr. Hicks still being Commander, the orders of whom Green Russell and party strictly observed. A few days' travel brought us to Bent's new fort, where we found but three men in charge. They were nearly out of provisions, with nothing to live on but corn. We offered them flour and groceries, but, hearing we had whisky, they took the whisky and refused the provisions. Forty miles west of this we came to the old fort, and what was once the center of a large fur trade we found deserted, and not an Indian in sight, or buffalo within a hundred miles. Leaving the old fort, we, in four days' travel, left the Arkansas River and traveled over the prairie to the Fontaine Qui Bouille, a distance of seventeen miles, and, four days afterward, reached the Squirrel Creek Pineries. There we found the remains of Capt. Marcy's camp, who, in the month of May, had been caught in a severe snow-storm while on his way to Utah to join Gen. Johnson in the Mormon war, during which several of his men were frozen and several hundred head of horses and mules were lost, until found and returned by young Autoba. A large number of dead sheep were lying in piles around the camp. In looking at the pinery, the Indians remarked what a pity it was that such a forest of pines should be so far away from any settlement, where they might be of some use, instead of furnishing shelter for Indians and wild beasts. They little thought then that that same tim- ber would furnish ties for railroads and lum- ber for cities and villages, in the early build- ing of which their expedition was instrument- al.

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HISTORY OF FREMONT COUNTY.

In two days' travel from the pineries, we arrived at Cherry Creek, where we expected to find gold in paying quantities. The min- ing tools and rockers were put to work, but, after three days' labor, all the gold that had been washed out was a small quantity of flat gold, washed there many ages since. Having no faith in the mines, I went on a hunt, and on my return found them discouraged, and in a few days we started for the Platte River, where we arrived in two days' travel. As we approached the river, we saw several antelope where East Denver is now built. Cherry Creek we crossed a little below where Blake street is now located, camping that night in a large grove of cottonwoods, that, three years afterward, began bearing fruit with boots on. That was in the early days of Denver. Hunt- ing being good, the Indians killed several deer where the town is now built, and some of the Indians remarked that "there " -- pointing to the present town site. " was a splendid loca- tion for a city, and that there would probably be a town built there in the course of a hundred years." A few months after these re- marks were made, the town was started.

Thirty miles north of the Platte, we came to a small stream, where Mr. Beck said we would realize our wishes, but we were again disappointed. Believing that gold could be found in the mountains, I finally, after much trouble, found a companion to go with me, the rest of the company agreeing to await our re- turn. After two days' travel, and swimming the Thompson's Fork, we got within two miles of the Cache la Poudre River, when we met a party of Mexicans on their way from Fort Laramie to New Mexico, who told us of the impossibility of fording the river, also telling us that 1,000 lodges of Cheyenne Indians were a little below the ford, and were very hostile, expecting some difficulty with the soldiers. My partner's courage failing him, and his re- fusing to lend me the pony to carry the bed- ding and tools, I was compelled to give up prospecting the south side of the river, and returned to the camp, made our report, and, though I repeatedly tried to get some one to go with me, such was the fear and discourage- ment that all of our party and some of Green Russell's returned to their homes. Green

Russell remained, and, through his instru- mentality, they prospected the balance of the season, and kept up the excitement by report- ing great discoveries and big strikes, which were in reality never made. Still, it was the means of starting the great immigration the next year. For this he deserves credit, but to the Cherokees, and the Cherokees only, be- longs the credit for originating the expedition which led to the early settlement of the Ter- ritory.

This is fully confirmed by Jesse Frazer, Esq., of Fremont County, who, up to 1857, ran a foundry and store at the lead mines in Southwestern Missouri, within four miles of the Cherokees, and knew the circumstances as related relative to the organization of the ex- pedition, and from Cherokee members of the expedition, after their return, who showed him some of the fine gold they gathered, and which they carried in goose-quills.

Mr. Simmons, who is a strictly conscien- tious old gentlemen is probably one of the oldest and most reliable mountaineers now living in Colorado; he was well acquainted with Pierre Choteau, who came with Laclede to St. Louis, February 15, 1763, and were the first fur traders west of the Mississippi, who operated so far west as this valley. He died, in St. Louis, in 1849, aged ninety-nine years. He was also acquainted with Mr. Laramie and Joseph Roubadeau, whose principal location was at Scott's Bluff, forty miles below Fort Laramie, who extended their operations to Upper Arkansas Valley, and the latter over the range long before Col. Ceren St. Vrain and Bent operated here. With old Bill Will- iams, also, who, he says, had been in the mountain country fifty years, and was the greatest and most noted mountain guide. He often heard Kit Carson brag over Bill Will- iams as being better posted than any other mountaineer, and, he says, Williams was old enough to be Kit Carson's father. The un- published incidents in the lives of these fear- less and noble old mountaineers, we trust, Mr. Simmons may yet give to the world before his span of life shall be run. When Henry Bur- nett, now living on Ute Creek, moved to Hard scrabble, in 1859, the old adobe buildings still remained, but were soon afterward appro-

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HISTORY OF FREMONT COUNTY.

priated by American settlers and moved to ranches, Vicroy putting one up on the Widow Bruce place, and Mr. Hammit taking one to the ranch below the mouth of Adobe Creek.

It is well known a deadly feud has existed for generations between the Indians of the mountains and those of the plains, in which the Utes, in many contests, from the nature of their country, and, perhaps, also from the bravery, inborn courage and spirit common to all mountaineers from earliest history, were usually the victors. They were also, latterly, better armed, discarding bows and arrows, spears, etc., long before the Indians of the plains. One of Fremont's parties, which win- tered in or near Canon City, upor breaking camp and traveling westward, came, in South Park, upon the hostilé forces, in battle, at a time when the Arapahoes and Cheyennes (who generally united in their war parties) were about, from numbers, to overpower the Utes. They immediately allied themselves to the Utes, aud routed the opposing forces with great slaughter, whereupon the Utes made a treaty, which they observed as well as Indians usually do, till within a few years past. -

During the latter part of November, 1860, a small band of Utes were camped on Oil Creek, a short distance below the present res- idence of Mr. M. J. Felch. The Cheyennes and their allies offered to any white man, who would join them, a good horse and equip- ments, and some of the hot bloods of Canon were about to enlist for the coming fight, but were prevented by the cool counsel and deter- mination, not to permit them, of men better acquainted with Indian character, and foresaw endless difficulties from such a course.

The fight, however, came off, resulting in the killing of three Utes. Twelve or fifteen years after, the petrified bone of a human arm was found on the battle-ground, which was believed to have belonged to one of the slain, and was sent, by Dr. J. F. Lewis, to the Museum of Asbury University, Indiana. Ute Pass, near Manitou, was so called because usually employed by the Utes in going to and from their forays on the plains, while the plains Indians used the others.

From 1847 until 1859, there was but little of interest to happen in the county. Owing

to the splendid climate, the hot springs, etc., the beautiful park upon which Canon City is located, was always a favorite trading-post for the hunters and trappers, and also winter quarters for both Indians and whites. As it now is, one can be enjoying the luxuries of a spring day in the month of January at Cañon City, and jump on the cars, and, in a few hours' ride, be in almost a frigid winter. A lady may find it necessary to use a parasol, when going out shopping, and look up to the locality of Signal Mountain to see a terrific snow storm.

About the middle of October, 1859, the first permanent white settlement was made in this county by a party of men (a part of whom had laid out Pueblo the year previous), consisting of the following-named persons: Josiah F. Smith and Stephen Smith, brothers, William H. Young, Robert Bearcaw, Charles D. Peck and William Kroenig. They followed up the river to where it debouches from the mount- ains, and laid out this town, naming it Canon City, because of its proximity to the Grand Cañon above. The point of rocks at the upper flume, on the big ditch, was the initial point, thence down the river to about the place, where W. A. Helm now lives; thence north and west a sufficient distance to embrace all the level ground above the Soda Springs. They built a log house near where the road crosses the ditch, above the Soda Spring, which was occupied the ensuing year by Rob- ert Middleton and family, Mrs. Middleton being the first white woman to come to Cañon. The following year, the house was occupied by Mr. A. Rudd as a blacksmith-shop. (That was the year Mr. Rudd took a seat on a cactus, and waited for twenty minutes to get a shot at a deer. He killed his deer, but had his pantaloons pinned fast to his body. It took Capt. B. F. Allen and M. V. B. Coffin, with a pair of tweezers, twelve hours to extract the thorns of the cactus. He has been quick to see the point to a joke ever since. But he captured the deer and waded the river to get it.) The building of this house was about the only improvement the company made on their site. They surveyed a road, however, to Tarryall, a distance of seventy-nine miles, and staked it with mile-posts, on which, at every

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History of the Arkansas Valley, Colorado, Part 73

Author: O.L. Baskin & Co Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Chicago : O.L. Baskin & Co. Number of Pages: 1080

Author: O.L. Baskin & Co
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago : O.L. Baskin & Co.
Number of Pages: 1080