Jim Bridger, Our First Citizen

Jim Bridger, "Our First Citizen"

BY PRESTON NIBLEY

I

"His lifetime measures that period of our history during which the West was changed from a trackless wilderness to a settled and civilized country. He was among the first who went to the mountains, and he lived to see all that had made a life like his possible, swept away forever." — Hiram Chittenden.

Whenever I hear the name Jim Bridger mentioned, there are two events in that famous trapper's life that pass through my mind. I picture him first as a boy of twenty, clad in his fur cloth- ing, his trapper's garb, tramping through the snow alone in the dead of winter, through Bear River canyon, west of Cache Valley, down past the present sites of Deweyville and Corinne, following the winding river to where it empties into Great Salt Lake. I nicture him tasting the water of the lake, and his astonishment at finding it salt ; his pausing to reflect on the scene before him ; his returning to his companions encamped in Cache Valley and in- forming them he had discovered "an arm of the sea."

Then again I picture him later in life, when twenty-two more summers have passed over his head. He is a keen and hardy "mountain man" now : "In person tall and spare, straight and agile, eyes gray, hair brown and long, expression mild, and man- ners agreeable." Continuous travel, summer and winter, over the whole region of "the Great West," wild and thrilling experiences, have made him the foremost American hunter, trapper and guide of his day. "With a buffalo skin and a piece of charcoal he can map out any portion of this immense region and delineate moun- tains, streams, and circular valleys, called 'holes,' with wonderful accuracy."

It is June 28, 1847. The place is "the point where the Cali- fornia trail crosses the Little Sandy river," (in what is now south- western Wyoming) and the time is evening. Seated around a campfire are a group of earnest, weather-browned men, among whom, one, our immortal President Young, is questioning a lean, gaunt trapper, Jim Bridger. Listen ! The trapper is saying, "I consider it unwise to bring a large colony into the Great Basin until it is demonstrated that grain can be grown. And as for the Salt Lake Valley. I will give a thousand dollars for the first ear of corn that ripens there." President Young laconically replies, "Wait a little, and we will show you."

JIM BRIDGER, "OUR FIRST CITIZEN" 103

These are the two events of Jim Bridger's life that particu- larly interest me. First, that as a mere boy, here in the moun- tains in the Winter of 1824-25, he discovered, and was the first white man to report, so far as we know, the existence of our Great Salt Lake. And, second, that on that memorable western journey of our Pioneers, in the summer of 1847, Jim Bridger met them, camped with them, conversed with them, and heartily endeavored to discourage them in their settlement here. Bridger knew the country from more than twenty years experience, and he "knocked" it, but he "knocked" it to the wrong people.

To inquire further into the famous old trapper's life, is to read a most interesting history. For many, many years he was here in the "wilderness," before a settler ever came to till the soil, or build a home. Constantly surrounded by danger of wild animals and savage tribes, he trapped along the streams for beaver fur, day in and day out, over a vast region. He knew the head waters of the Missouri and Yellowstone ; he had sailed the Columbia to its mouth. The Sacramento River in California and the Rio Grande in Mexico, were familiar to him. It was a wild, fascinat- ing life he led ; tremendously interesting to us at this day when the "trackless wilderness" has become a settled country, dotted with prosperous towns and cities and covered with teeming fields.

The few facts I have been able to learn about Bridger's early years have been found after considerable research. He was a southerner by birth, born of a poor tavern-keeper in Richmond, Virginia, March, 1804. His father early caught the western fever and, in 1812, settled at St. Louis. Here the boy grew up, on the very edge of the wild west, where romantic stories of exciting ad- venture continually rang in his ears. At eighteen he was a black- smith's apprentice. In the same year a small advertisement in a St. Louis newspaper, put there by William Ashley, calling for "one hundred men to go to the mountains and trap beaver," caught his eye. Bridger answered "the call of the wild." He joined Ashley and disappeared into the desert, and but few times did he return to civilization again, except when, an old and feeble man, he re- turned to die.

Was it luck or insight attended this young scout in his achievements? It was on his first journey west that, riding his mule, and somewhat ahead of his fellows, Bridger is reported to have discovered the great south pass on the Wyoming plateau, which for years afforded to weary emigrants the road of easiest access across the Rockies. History is meagre as to his first trip, and but few events are fecorded. Here in the mountains, Ashley's men had a terrible time of it. They were attacked by Indians. They lost their supplies. The party broke up and scattered in all directions. As before related, Bridger and a few companions

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found themselves stranded, encamped in Cache Valley, waiting for the winter <>f 1824 25 b i pass.

Chittenden, the historian, tells the story of the discovery of Salt I .ake as foil >ws :

"\ party "I Ashley's nun wire encamped for the winter of 1824 ami 1825, in Cache Valley, and were trapping on Bear River and its tributaries. Here a controversy arose as to the course of Bear River, after it left the valley. A wager was laid and James Bridger was se- lected to follow the river and determine the bet. This he did, and soon arrived at its outlet in Great Salt Lake. Tasting the water, he dis- covered it to be salt, and on reporting to his companions, all assumed it was an arm of the Pacific Ocean."

I have read denials that Bridger was the first white man to look across the waters of our Inland Sea. Stansbury, in his re- port, (published in 1855) says "that the existence of a large lake of salt water somewhere amid the wilds, west of the Rocky moun- tains, seems to have been known vaguely as long as one hundred and fifty years since." One Samuel Ruddock claims to have passed through Salt Lake valley in 1821. "That no white man ever saw the Great Salt Lake," says Bancroft, "before Bridger, cannot be proven, but his being the only well authenticated account, history must rest there until it finds a better one."

For Jim Bridger's next adventure that we are able to learn in recorded history, we pass over a number of years. The story is told by nu other than the brilliant Washington Irving. It is 1832. Since we last heard of him, Captain Jim has become a hardy, fear- less trapper, a i°ader of his fellows, and, though still a boy, he is known as "the old man of the mountains." Irving relates that he and his fellow trappers, while traveling south, following the streams and trapping beaver near what is now the region of Yel- lowstone Park, one day saw a body of Blackfoot Indians in the open plain, though near enough some rocks which could be re- sorted to in case of neet..' The Indians made pacific overtures which were reciprocated by the whites. A few men advanced from each party. A circle was formed and the pipe of peace was smoked. While this ceremony was being enacted, a young Mex- ican named Loretto, a free trapper accompanying Bridger's band, who had previously ransomed from the Crows a beautiful Black- foot girl, and had made her his wife, was present looking on. The girl recognized her brother among the Indians. Instantly leaving her infant with Loretto, she rushed into her brother's arms, and was received with greatest warmth and affection. Bridger now rode forward to where the peace ceremonies were enacting. His rifle lay across his saddle. The Blackfoot chief came forward to meet him. Through some apparent distrust Bridger cocked his piece as if about to fire. The chief seized the barrel and pushed it

JIM BRIDGER, "OUR FIRST CITIZEN" 105

downward so that its contents were discharged into the ground. This precipitated a melee. Bridger received two arrow shots in his back, and the chief felled him to the earth with a blow from the gun which he had wrenched from Bridger's hand. The chief then leaped into Bridger's saddle and the whole party made for the cover of the rocks, where a desultory fire was kept up for some- time.

I would have you forget Loretto, the girl and the child, and remember the arrowheads Bridger received in his back. One of them remained there for nearly three years, or until the middle of August, 1835. At that time Dr. Marcus Whitman was at the trappers' rendezvous on Green river. Bridger was also there, and Dr. Whitman offered to perform a surgical operation. Chitten- den, who relates the story, says :

"The operation was a difficult one because the arrow was hooked at the point by striking a large bone, and a cartilaginous substance had grown around it. The doctor pursued his work with great self posses- sion and perseverance; and his patient manifested equal firmness. The Indians looked on meanwhile with countenances indicating wonder, and in their own peculiar manner expressed great astonishment when it was extracted. The arrowhead was of iron and was about three inches long."

Where was Jim Bridger for the following eight years ? Really, I have been at a loss to learn, except that he was a daring and fearless spirit, one of the leaders and "proprietors" of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. This company did a lot of business and shipped hundreds of bales of beaver fur from the mountains to St. Louis, where they were disposed of at enormous profits. But somehow the other man always got the profits and Bridger got the experience, though he was the greatest trapper of them all. At any rate, by 1843, Bridger was a poor man. The fur business was rapidly declining, and another means of maintenance had to be sought. He took advantage of it by establishing a small "Fort" on Black's Fork of the' Green River, not far from what is now Evanston, Wyoming. This event may not seem to have any special significance, and yet one historian says, "in the year 1843 James Bridger, whose name will always be prominent in western adventure, built a post on a tributary of Green River, a water of the Pacific ocean, for the convenience of emigrants. It was the first trading post ever built beyond the Mississippi for this pur- pose, and its establishment marks the beginning of the era of emigration into the Far West."

The year 1847 found Bridger doing business at a squalid fort on Black's Fork. He was wont to take the lean, worn horses of weary travelers, at a low price, feed them to fatness in his fertile

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pastures and sell them at a considerable profit to emigrants fol- lowing. Also he had had a sort of blacksmith's shop fixed up to repair wagons.

In June, 1847, history tells, Bridger set out horseback with two of his men on a business trip to Fort Laramie. They had not gone far when at evening time they decried in the distance a car- avan of wagons, — our "Mormon" Pioneers. As they drew near, President Young halted the trapper and invited him to camp with them over night. A careful account has been kept of what went mi ari nind the camp-fire that evening, and to us at this date is most interesting. I desire to reproduce a part of it as related in Whitney's History of Utah. It is from the pen of William Clay- tun :

There is no blacksmith shop at his fort. There was one but it was destroyed. From Bridger's fort to the Great Salt Lake, Hastings said, was about one hundred miles. Bridger himself had been through fifty times but could form no correct idea of the distance. There is no timber on the Utah Lake, but some on the streams emptying into it. In the valleys southeast of Utah Lake there is an abundance of blue grass and white clover. Some of his men have been around Salt Lake in canoes. But while they went out hunting, their horses were stolen by the Indians. They then spent three months going around the lake in canoes hunting beavers, the distance being five hundred and fifty miles. The Utah tribe of Indians live around the lake and are a bad people. If they catch a man alone they are sure to rob and abuse him, if they don't kill him, but parties of men are in no danger. The In- dians are mostly armed with guns.

There was a man who had opened a farm in Bear River Valley, where the soil is good and likely to produce grain, were it not for the excessive cold nights. lie never saw any grapes on the Utah Lake, but there are plenty of cherries and berries of several kinds. He thinks the region around the Utah Lake is the best country in the vicinity of the Salt Lake, and the country is still better the farther south one goes until the desert is reached, which is upwards of two hundred miles. There is plenty of timber on all the streams and mountains and an abundance of fish in the streams. He passed through the country a year ago last summer in the month of July, there is gen erally one or two showers of rain every day, sometimes very heavy thunder showers but not accompanied by strong winds. He said we would find plenty of water from here to Bridger's fort, except after crossing the Green River, when we have to travel about twenty miles without water. But there is plenty of grass. We need not fear the Utah Indians for we could drive the whole cf them in twenty-four hours. Mr. Bridger's theory was not to kill them, but make slaves of them. The Indians south of Utah Lake raise as good corn, wheat and pumpkins as wire ever raised in old Kentucky.

JIM BRIDGER, "OUR FIRST CITIZEN" 107

Then comes the oft repeated tale. The old trapper advised our Pioneers not to go to Salt Lake Valley. It was a barren, desert place and would not raise corn. Had they heeded him, might not the history of the West have been changed?

"Too Much to Do'

BY WM. HALLS

I want to express to you my appreciation of the Era. I am always glad to read it. I consider all the articles good, yet some interest me more than others. I was very much impressed by Dr. Gowan's address to the students of the University of Utah. I can see that as time rolls on, and conditions change, it will require intelligence and a strong will to see and choose the good and re- ject the evil.

Last summer I traveled about six hundred miles from Mancos in a northwesterly direction, visiting parts of Utah, Colo- rado and Idaho and talked with many men and women, and nearly every man and woman complained of "too much to do." With all our mechanical devices and labor-saving inventions we are over- worked. Since I have been unable to work hard and travel but very little I have had more time to read and study. I have tried to get a clearer conception of values, and I have concluded that there is something wrong with the person who has "too much to do." He who has no time to pray, nor to study the scripture, no time for spiritual development, — such a person is not in a normal condition. I believe in change, in progression, but with it, I want wisdom, intelligence to be able to separate the wheat from. the tares. There is no need to be in a hurry, advance steadily, be moderate in all things. Never look backward and sigh for the "good old times;" they will never return. We can't see the old times as they really were. "Distance lends enchantment to the scene." We don't want to travel over the rough roads our fathers traveled. Let us accept the light, the truth, the freedom trans- mitted to us, but seek inspiration to detect the darkness, the error, and the bondage. Let us "come out of Babylon." If we would profit bv the advantages that we eniov, and exercise a little com- mon-sense, what a good time we might have. I believe in some things as fundamental on which our happiness depends. Faith in God as our Father, in Jesus Christ as our Redeemer, in the efficacy of prayer, and in an ever-aeting Providence. The man having this in good working order, is rich ; all things essential are within his reach.

MANCOS, COLORADO