History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 17

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198

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KITTSON AND ROLETTE

Norman W. Kittson was a Canadian, born about 1814; he went to Pembina in 1843 to engage in the fur trade, where, during the same year, he founded the Red River Transportation Company in connection with Joseph Rolette. He was the first postmaster at Pembina, appointed in 1849, by President Fillmore; and was elected to the Minnesota Territorial Legislature in 1855. He continued in the fur trade at Pembina and Turtle Mountain for many years. He is credited with buikling the first steamboat for traffic on the Red River. Kittson was favor- ably regarded by the half-breed population of that country and his influence usually carried whatever enterprise he engaged in. Prior to building his boat, he in company with Mr. Rolette, established a line of Red River carts connect- ing Pembina with St. Paul, in competition with the Hudson's Bay Company, and in 1847 attacked the English fort at Pembina, burned the buildings, and drove off the trader. Rolette had ambition for political distinction and was elected a member of the Territorial Legislature of Minnesota from the Pembina district, in 1853 and in 1855, and was a member of the last Territorial Assembly in 1857, prior to the admission of Minnesota into the Union. In 1851 the United States made Pembina the seat of a custom house with a revenue agent. Charles Cavileer, an Ohioan, was the first customs officer, and also deputy postmaster, and was a partner with Forbes & Kittson in their Indian trade. Cavileer's wife was a Scotch lady, born near Fort Garry, and educated in the mission schools. Cavileer

HISTORY OF DAKOTA TERRITORY

received his appointment from President Fillmore, the last of the Whig presi- dents, and about this time would seem an appropriate one to begin the history of the Red River country in connection with the history of Dakota.

When President Pierce came in in 1853 he appointed Norman Kittson as customs officer, and he in turn was succeeded by Joseph Beaupre of St. Cloud, Minnesota, and Beaupre by Hon. James MeFetridge, who, in 1861, was elected a member of the Council of the Dakota Legislature by the Red River vote.

Pembina's first United States mail was received by dog train from St. Paul, once a month. In 1856 William H. Moorhead became a resident. He engaged in freighting with Red River carts from St. Paul. From this time the growth of the l'embina settlement amounted to very little until the treaty with the Chippewa Indians, in 1864, opened the valley to settlement. It may be remarked that it was during these years, 1856-57, that the settlements in the Big Sioux Valley, at Sioux Falls and Medary, and in the Missouri Valley at Yankton and opposite Fort Randall, had their beginning.

The famons Red River cart was made without any iron save a strap iron band about the hub, and cost in Red River currency, two pounds sterling. The carts were made up in trains of twenty-five to forty or more, each drawn by an ox and containing when on the march from eight hundred to one thousand pounds of freight. They were used largely in transporting merchandise from St. Paul, Minnesota, to the settlements on the Red River of the North, and to the trading posts of the lludson's Bay Company, the Northwest Company, and many indi- vidual traders. They were operated by transportation companies. One half- breed would drive three or four carts, and the distance covered in a day was about twenty-five miles. The carts were good for three or four round trips from Garry or Pembina to St. Paul, a distance of three or four thousand miles. They were also in common use among the half-breeds for transporting their portable prop- erty, and Armstrong speaks of employing one while prosecuting his surveys, to carry himself and his instruments.

THE RED RIVER TREATY

The Chippewa Indians on the Red River had made no relinquishment of their title to the lands of that region until 1864. The Chippewas owned the land on both sides of the Red River and extending nearly across the northern part of Minnesota and also west as far as Devil's Lake, and the Cheyenne River, Dakota. Commissioners had effected a treaty with the Chippewas as early as 1851, when the treaties were made with the Sioux for their lands in Minnesota, but the treaty had never been ratified. In October, 1863, a treaty was concluded at the old crossing of Red Lake River, by Alexander Ramsey and Ashley C. Morrill, and the chiefs and head men of the Red Lake and Pembina bands of Chippewa In- (lians for the cession of a large tract of country, of which the boundaries are as follows: Commencing at the intersection of the national boundary with the Lake of the Woods ; thence in a southwest direction to the head of Thief River ; thence following that stream to its mouth ; thence sontheasterly in a direct line toward the head of Wild Rice River, and thence following the boundary of the Pillager cession of 1855 to the month of said river; thence up the channel of the Red River of the North to the mouth of the Cheyenne ; thence up said river to Stump Lake near the eastern extremity of Devil's Lake, thence north to the interna- tional boundary ; and thence east on said boundary to the place of beginning.

It embraced nearly all of the Red River Valley in Minnesota and Dakota, and was estimated to contain eleven million acres. This treaty was ratified by the Senate March 1, 1864, but certain amendments had been made by that body which required the assent of the Indians. This being obtained the treaty was confirmed by proclamation of President Lincoln, May, 1864. Thereafter the white settlements on Red River were entitled to the privileges and protection of the laws of Dakota.

HISTORY OF DAKOTA TERRITORY

FORT ABERCROMBIE

Fort Abercrombie, on the Red River of the North, was built in 1857, about the same time that Fort Randall was erected on the Missouri. It completed the chain of military posts partially encircling the frontier from Fort Leavenworth, Kan- sas, by Fort Riley, Fort Laramie, Fort Randall, Fort Abercrombie, Fort Ridgely, Minnesota, down to Fort Snelling at the mouth of the Minnesota River. It was located on the west bank of the Red River, just north of the 46th parallel of north latitude, and about twenty-five miles north of the headwaters of the Red, which is formed by two streams named Otter Tail and the Bois de Sioux. The post was built under the direction of Lieut .- Col. John J. Abercrombie, for whom it appears to have been named. Logs were the material used in its construction. It was a two company post. The fort was the practical head of navigation on the Red River during favorable seasons. Gen. Alfred Sully, who later won distinc- tion in Dakota in the campaigns against the Sioux in 1863 and 1864, was stationed at Abercrombie shortly after the completion of the post, and marched across the plains with his company in 1858, to old Fort Pierre; returning to Fort Ridgely the year following.

At the time of the Little Crow outbreak in the Yellow Medicine country, Min- nesota, in August, 1862, Fort Abercrombie was garrisoned by a portion of the Fifth Minnesota Volunteer Infantry, the regular troops having all been sent south for service with the forces who were then contending for the preservation of the Union against the armies of the Southern Confederacy. Fort Abercrombie lay almost directly in the path of the thousands of fleeing savages who were being pursued from the headwaters of the Minnesota River country by Sibley's troops. The pioneer settlers from a large section in the western part of Minnesota sought refuge at the fort at this time, though hundreds were killed before reaching it. The settlement of Breckinridge, some twenty miles south of the fort, on the Minnesota side, was deserted save by a few who sought to barricade one of the best buildings and defend themselves. They were, nevertheless, assailed by an overwhelming force of the hostiles, all killed, their bodies mutilated, and the town partially destroyed. The fort was besieged by the same merciless foe, and from about the 20th of August until the same date in September, the soldiers and set- tlers gathered there had almost daily conflicts with the savages who attempted to capture the fort and slaughter its inmates. About the 20th of the latter month substantial reinforcements arrived from Fort Snelling under Captain Emiel Buerger. The hostile Indians then abandoned the siege and pursued their way to the Cheyenne Valley and on to Devil's Lake, where they spent the winter. A portion of these Indian refugees found their way to the Chippewa lands on the Lower Red River, and were pursued and many captured by General Sibley. In this terrible crisis which for a time depopulated the frontiers of Minnesota and Dakota, Fort Abercrombie gave a good account of itself, and proved its inestima- ble value in succoring hundreds of helpless settlers and many women and children included, from massacre. Abercrombie was abandoned as a military post in 1877. and the improvements disposed of to homesteaders of the surrounding country.

STEAMBOATING ON THE RED RIVER

The era during which steamboating flourished on the Red River of the North began two or three years earlier than the beginning of the same industry on the Upper Missouri River and flourished in the American waters of that stream con- temporaneously with the period of activity on the Missouri. the industry rapidly declining in the early years of the decade beginning in 1880. The inception of the industry on Red River, south of Pembina, was in the year 1859 or 1860, when the steamboat Anson Northrup, built at or near Fort Abercrombie, expressly for the shallow waters of the Upper Red River, and owned and operated by Anson Northrup, its builder, made a trip from Abercrombie to Fort Garry and return.

HISTORY OF DAKOTA TERRITORY

The voyage down occupied twenty days. The boat carried freight and passen- gers, and at that time, owing to gold discoveries in British Columbia, there was quite an encouraging amount of travel out of the frontier settlement of St. Paul for the Red River country, many going out with the Red River cart-trains which made regular trips from St. Paul to Pembina. The Northrup was sold the following year to J. C. & H. C. Burbank, prominent in that day as the proprietors of Minnesota stage lines. The name of the Northrup was changed to that of the Pioneer, and after some needed remodeling, it was put into service and proved a profitable venture. In 1861 the second steamboat was built at Georgetown, and named the International; Capt. Norman W. Kittson was her commander, and may have been the owner. Kittson was a capable man, and well acquainted with the river, and the inhabitants of the country, chiefly Chippewa Indians and half- breeds. Kittson, however, spoke their language fluently, which accomplishment coupled with his fine address and genial manners, made him a popular character in such an important position. Citizens from the southern portion of the territory had occasion to visit the Red Valley during the early '6os, and on official political missions, and spoke of their acquaintance with the commodore as one of the pleasing memories of their journey. The Indian troubles, however, seriously in- terfered with business. The Indians along the river complained that the whistles of the boats frightened their game away; and at the same period the troubles that culminated in the Little Crow war of 1862 were beginning to have a detri- mental effect on the freighting and passenger business through this exposed region. Navigation of the river by steamboats was nearly abandoned for a brief time ; but in 1864 the Indian troubles quieted down and the International made one trip that year to Fort Garry, and thereafter and until 1870, there appears to have been no further effort to increase the commerce of the stream, though the boats then in commission were kept employed. In 1871, the steamboat Selkirk was built for Hill & Griggs, with Alex Griggs as master. The Mr. Hill of the firm is presumed to be Mr. James J. Hill, who has since achieved renown as the railway king of the entire country. He was then getting acquainted with the transportation business. The Selkirk was a success, and soon added the former Pioneer and International to its line, so that the firm controlled a small fleet and did a thriving business. In the meantime the steamboat Manitoba had been built in 1874 at Winnipeg, the name of the town that had sprung into existence near the site of Fort Garry, and the capital of the Province of Manitoba. Another vessel named the Minnesota was put in commission in 1875. In 1876 Commodore Kitt- son bought both the Manitoba and Minnesota, and a new company was then organized called the Red River Transportation Company, and their steamboats were called the Kittson Line, and included the International, Captain Painter ; the Selkirk, Capt. John Griggs: the Manitoba, Capt. Alex Griggs; the Minnesota, Captain Timeus : the Dakota, Captain Seigers ; and the Alphia, Captain Russell. If the old Pioneer boat built by Mr. Northrup was in this fleet, it was steaming around under a new title. In 1872 the Northern Pacific Railroad had reached Moorhead, Minnesota, on the Red River, and that point became the head of navi- gation and the transfer point from the railroad to the steamboats for passengers and freight destined for the Red River settlements as far down as Winnipeg.

By 1876 the transportation business had increased enormously, with the com- pletion of the shortening of the route by river and cutting off the portion of the stream which had presented the greatest obstacles to navigation. But the increase of tonnage and passengers had kept up with the increased facilities for carrying it, and the Kittson Line was abundantly patronized and proved a very lucrative enter- prise for the owners as well as an important factor in the growth and settlement of the country.

These steamboats, as a rule, towed from two to a dozen barges all laden with merchandise, and in later years the volume of goods to be carried north increased to that extent that the boats continued running until the ice closed the stream, and when this occurred there would be waiting for shipment a thousand or fifteen

Fort Abercrombie.D.T. Mau 1# 1863 In Command of Lieut. Cot. E. Peteler, U.S.S.S

NEAR SOURCES OF THE RED RIVER OF THE NORTH Drawn by a soldier stationed at the Fort in 1962-3

HISTORY OF DAKOTA TERRITORY

hundred tons destined for the lower river as far north as Fort Garry. The trans- portation of these belated supplies to their destination was performed during the winter by teams. The tonnage of the Red River during these active years was given in round numbers at 60,000 tons per annum. But its days were numbered. The St. Paul & Pacific continued the construction of its line from Crookston north, and reached the international boundary at St. Vincent, on the Minnesota side of the Red, in 1878, where it joined with the Canadian Pacific which had been built up to the boundary from Winnipeg, and thereafter the railways monopolized the carrying trade of the Red River.

In this connection it will not be out of place to note the first adventure in transporting supplies by way of the Minnesota and Red rivers, to the Pembina settlement.

An incident connected with its earliest navigation in 1820 is made the subject of a brief sketch by General Sibley, which he furnished the Historical Society of Minnesota. The sketch tells of a trip from Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, to Pembina, with Mackinaw boats:

In 1820, on the 15th day of April, three Mackinaw boats, manned with six hands each, laden with 200 bushels of wheat, 100 bushels of oats, and thirty bushels of peas, under the charge of Messrs. Graham and Laidlaw, left Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, on the Mississippi River, for Selkirk's colony on the Red River of the North. They were detained by ice at Lake Pepin, and the crews planted the Maypole thereon. On the 3d of May the ice was sufficiently broken up to allow the passage of the boats through the lake. The voyage was continued up the Minnesota River to Big Stone Lake, from which a portage was made into Lake Traverse, about one and a half miles distant, the boats being drawn across on wooden rollers. Traversing the latter body of water and descending the Sioux Wood River to the Red River, the party arrived at Pembina in safety, with their charge, on the 3d day of June. Pembina was at that time a small hamlet, the rival companies of the Northwest and Hudson's Bay having each a trading post at the confluence of the Pembina River with the Red River, but on opposite sides of the former. The crop at Selkirk's colony having entirely failed the previous year, the grain was much needed for seed the ensuing season, and, of course, commanded a high price. The trip performed in these boats is worthy of mention, as it is the only instance of heavy articles being transported the entire distance from Prairie du Chien to the Red River settlements, with the exception of the portage between Big Stone and Traverse lakes, by water. The party returned across the plains, on foot, as far as Big Stone Lake, from which point they descended to Prairie du Chien in canoes.

PUBLIC LAND SURVEYS

The first public land surveys in the Red River of the North country were made by M. K. Armstrong, in 1867, who was selected by Surveyor General Tripp to perform the important work. It became necessary, before the work of town- shipping and subdividing was done, to extend the eleventh, and establish the twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth standard parallels north, and extend the seventh guide meridian from the seventh standard parallel to the international boundary through the country ceded by the Red Lake and Pembina bands of Chippewa Indians in 1864, in order to reach the locality of Pembina, which was presumed to be about two miles south of the international boundary, as astro- nomically established in 1823, by Major Long, United States topographical engi- neer. Armstrong was further instructed to run and define the international boundary for a distance of forty miles west along the 49th parallel from the post on the west bank of Red River placed by Major Long. It was the most important work that had ever devolved on the Dakota office, and the execution of the work involved all the hazards incident to an unexplored wilderness in- habited by a race of savage people.

Mr. Armstrong selected his assistants and procured his outfit at Yankton. In his company were Samuel Morrow, Thomas A. MeLeese, Louis Frick and William Brewster. The party started on its journey overland June 15th, taking a direc- tion north by east, passing near Sioux Falls, thence up the Big Sioux, and across to the headwaters of the Red River, thence to Fort Abercrombie, where the first halt was made, and where it remained a few days resting and making final prep-

HISTORY OF DAKOTA TERRITORY

arations for its important duties. Leaving Abercrombie, they could not expect to meet with a white man or a semblance of civilization until they entered the Pembina settlement. Settlements at that time had extended but a very few miles north or east of the Missouri River in Dakota. While encountering many diffi- culties, suffering some privations and experiencing many exciting adventures, nearly devoured at times by myriads of mosquitoes and buffalo gnats, the pur- pose of their long journey was successfully accomplished, and they returned to their homes in November following, with their scalps on, which it may be added, was about all they did have on. They had traveled 600 miles across the trackless prairies of Dakota, traversing the territory from its extreme southern boundary to its northernmost limit, walking the entire distance, and were probably the only human beings of any race who have made the journey through the Dakotas afoot. The party met with no disturbance from the Indians, enjoyed a number of thrill- ing occasions chasing the American bison, upon whose meat, in the form of pemmican, when obtainable in the chase, they mainly subsisted. The members of the party had made good use of their opportunity to observe the natural features of the country, and were able to give the settlers on the Missouri border the assurance that Dakota was a vast domain of fertility, that would some day pro- duce sufficient food products to supply the inhabitants of the United States with their bread and meat.

Regarding the character of the country, Armstrong says :

This portion of Dakota is in reality a timbered region. 1 ran a line seventeen miles long through a heavy forest of oak, ash, birch and whitewood. These woods abound with bear, moose and wolves in the way of game, and as for fruit, strawberries, cherries and cranberries grow in profusion. The birds of the forest are here, the blue-jay, the pigeon, and the mocking bird being seen daily in the woods.

Concerning the people of the Pembina region, Mr. Armstrong wrote:

There were a great many, and they lived on pounded buffalo meat, or "pemmican," and called themselves "plain hunters." They make their annual summer visits to the plains with horses, oxen, carts, and families to procure meat and robes, and return late in the fall to live in their thatched-roof log houses on Pembina River, of which the woods are filled for sixteen miles below St. Joe. This pemmican trade is like our fisheries, and is carried on almost as extensively, 300 carts sometimes going out in one train. The pemmican is made by drying and stripping the buffalo meat, then threshing the same with a flail, like wheat, till broken into fine shreds; the tallow of the buffalo is then heated to a liquid and poured onto the meat, and the whole mixed with a wooden shovel, like mortar for plastering, and the entire compound, with berries and other fruits, is then shoveled into a sack of raw buffalo hide, which, when cooled, becomes as hard as wood and has to be cut or shaved off with an axe for cooking. This is the food our party has been living on for the last six weeks, and I must say that when dished up "in style" with onions, potatoes and flour, salt and pepper, it is very nutritious, and a palatable food. This, with black tea, maple sugar, and rather hard-shelled bread, completes a northern meal.

As for the means of transportation, large wooden wheel carts, tireless and with unbanded hubs. harnessed with rawhide to an ox or horse, constitutes a team, so much so that the roads are all three tracked cart trails, making them very tiresome for two horses. During my survey I have had some Cree and French half-breeds with me and two of these ox-carts, and it would make a white man look will to see these two-wheeled things go through the words, smashing through brush, tumbling over logs, and fallen trees, and plunging down steep river banks, sometimes both ox and half-breed under the cart, and the next moment coming up all right on the other side. As for myself. I stopped riding in these northern sulkies after my first effort in crossing a creek. when I was thrown, compass and all, high and dry into a neighboring trec.

I believe these people are among the happiest in the world. If they only have enough to cat. storm, sunshine and hardships are all the same to them, and after their day's labor is done and supper over, they build a blazing camp-fire and with the, iron kettle for a drum, they perform their Indian dance and song for hours, and when they retire for the night they kneel by their beds and go through with the Catholic prayer. The Catholic religion prevails almost exclusively among the people here. They have a church at St. Joe, and there is a large attendance every Sabbath.

.4.4

FORT GARRY

Red River cart in foreground. As Fort Douglas this assemblage of the Hudson Bay trading post was first erected near Pembina, North Dakota

HISTORY OF DAKOTA TERRITORY

THE INTERNATIONAL BOUNDARY LINE

In prosecuting this work, Mr. Armstrong found by actual measurement that the 49th parallel crossed the Red River about one and one-half miles north of the boundary established by Major Long, leaving the Hudson's Bay post within the United States. The improvements were not again disturbed at this time. The situation was explained to the United States authorities and the British am- bassador at Washington, whereupon it was tacitly agreed to permit the com- pany to continue business, foresecing that the day was rapidly approaching when the company would abandon the post in any event. This post was the one taken by Riel's rebels a year or two later, and resulted in a case in court at Pembina and the liberation of Riel's followers. Armstrong's report led to a further and more accurate astronomical survey by the War Department in 1870, when Captain Heap, A. A. A., after the most careful observations with the best equipment ob- tainable, planted the boundary monument one mile and 683 feet north of the old oak post which Major Long had set to define the line, and about 400 feet south of Armstrong's line. Armstrong's measurements were unquestionably correct. but a parallel of latitude is not located by the surveyor's chain. The proximity of the measured line with that fixed by the astronomer entirely satisfied both gov- ernments that the correct boundary had been found and marked, near enough to the imaginary circle for all practical purposes. The boundary was, several years later, marked by iron posts between the Lake of the Woods and the Rocky Mountains.

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History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 17

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920 Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1198

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198