Old Fort Hall—1836–1920 · Improvement Era

Old Fort Hall— 1836-1920 By Hyrum Kay

In the pioneer days of the Oregon Trail, and for 40 odd years, the vicinity of the present city of Pocatello, Idaho, was known by the martial name of Fort Hall; and, like an oasis in a desert, it was in very deed a comforting thought to west-bound wayfarers, and a haven of rest. And thereby hangs a tale dear to the Idahoans and pioneers in general, and to the Pocatellan in particular. Apparently fate had decreed this work in the "gem of the mountains" to be a centrifugal point of trade, commerce, rest and recuperation. The causes were largely geogra- phical, physical and nat- ural. Water courses and trails led to a large valley with its west end greatly depressed at the junction of the Portneuf and the mighty Snake river, the River Nile of Idaho; grass was plentiful for game and stock, winter feeding was a feature of the place, the warm chinook winds — known also as the "Janu- — ary thaw" were a factor in shortening the winter by several visits during the season. The place was a south- ern trapping tributary to Henry Hall, after whom Old Fort Hall the Hudson Bay Fur Trad- was named. ing company and was Spanish-Mexican territory up to 1846. Lewis and Clark, commissioned explorers for the government, passed through here in 1805, and put Idaho on the map forever after. The free life of the hunter and trapper, and the unknown dangers of an unexplored country filled with hostile red men, formed a magnet that drew westward adventurous men from the Atlantic seaboard, and other sections of the Union. The policy generally pursued by the explorer or trapper was to engage a native guide or a white mountaineer trapper. In the case of the Lewis and Clark expedition an In-

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dian woman, Sacajawea, "the bird woman," was the guide, she was the wife of a French-Canadian named Tourraint Chaboneau. Nathaniel J. Wyeth of Cambridge, Massachusetts, known also as Captain Wyeth, was the first white man to deal in real estate in Pocatello or all Idaho, for that matter. It was not merely a dwelling home, it was a blockhouse to boot. Wyeth was a well-to-do business man of Cambridge, the son of Jacob Wyeth and Elizabeth Jarvis, a descendant of George Wyeth, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and was also, on his mother's side, a relative of John Hancock, another signer of the Declaration. He was born in Cambridge in 1802. At 30 years of age Nathaniel was successfully managing an ice business in his native city. The spirit of adventure, with the hope of gain through the fur and salmon trade, was the magnet that drew this young business man west. Wyeth's first overland expedition from Boston passed through Idaho in the summer of 1832, and he reached Fort Vancouver in the autumn of that year. There, near the mouth of the Columbia, Wyeth waited for his supply ship, the Sultana. It never arrived, as it had suffered a shipwreck while on the way around Cape Horn. In February, 1833, he was compelled to return home, after having made the first continuous journey on record from Boston to the Columbia. He returned to Idaho the following summer with a stock of goods to fill an order which had been placed the previous year by Smith, Jackson, and William Sublette, of the Rocky Mountain Fur company. Just Capt. B. L. E. Bonneville as Wyeth arrived, however, control was passing to the new partners, Fitzpatrick, Bridger, and Milton Sublette. So Wyeth found himself in the western mountains with a large outfit of merchandise on his hands. In order to protect and keep his goods until he could make other arrangements to dispose of them he built a stockade in the summer of 1834 on the left bank of the Snake, nine miles above, or north of the Portneuf, 16 miles northwest of Pocatello. He named the place Fort Hall in honor of Henry Hall, senior member who financed the expedition. The stockade was made of cottonwood logs, 80 feet square, and 15 feet high, the entrance facing the Portneuf river on the south, with eight-foot square

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bastions at corners, with port-holes for guns. A vegetable garden was subsequently added. Work began on the stockade July 9, and was practically completed August 4. A patriotic program and flag raising took place on August 6. Wyeth had with him 50 men, including Reverend Jason Lee, and three other Methodist ministers. Indians and trappers visited the camp while it was being built, and on Sunday, July 26, religious services were held, the first on record in the Rocky Mountains. Reverend Mr. Lee spoke from the text: "Whether, therefore, ye eat, or drink, do all to the glory of God." It is estimated that the attendance was about 150. Sports were indulged in during the afternoon. One man was injured in the horse races and died. He was given a Christian burial. Captain Wyeth found himself playing a losing game in competing in trapping against the well organized Hudson Bay Company, and they bought him out. The new firm remodeled and enlarged the fort in 1838, building it, with adobes or sundried clay bricks, two stories high. A rifle pit was added, and a slough served as a moat of defense. The fort was always kept whitewashed and was consequently a noted landmark. In time the government purchased the fort and its holdings from the Hudson Bay Company and the place became a farfamed trading station. It was demolished in 1860. Another site for a trading station was selected by local people some few miles further south and as building material, except clay, was scarce, what was left of the old fort was transferred to the new location, which in time also was abandoned as the iron horse opened new highways in the desert and affected the old trail locations. The last named station became known to the present generation as "The Adobes," at "the bottoms," now sought as a good fishing ground. When in course of time an Indian reserve was established here, it was called the Fort Hall Indian reservation, and a bench land site was chosen at the present Ross Fork railroad station, 14 miles north of Pocatello. As time passed on, the location of the old fort was totally lost, and special research was required to find it. Some two decades ago, Ezra J. Meeker, now living in Payallup, Washington, now a very old man, over 90 years, made it his life's work to interest the nation in marking the old Oregon Trail, and he succeeded in so doing, recrossing the old trail several times by ox team. In his first visit to Pocatello he failed to locate the old site of Fort Hall, but in his third effort, in 1916, aided by Joe Rainey, a local Indian government interpreter at Fort Hall, the site was definitely located. A basalt stone obelisk was ordered to mark the place and an obelisk ordered to memorialize

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the Oregon Trail, the latter being placed in the Pocatello high school garden. Superintendent Walter R. Siders of the public schools for the past 20 years, taking great- interest in this historic movement, assisted Mr. Meeker in his labor and research, and eventually local interest was aroused to the extent that the local Weyeth Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Dr. Minnie T. Howard, chairman, decided to hold a rousing anniversary dedication service at the place of the old fort, and to make the day an annual affair. It is intended to honor the men, the American men, who were the first white men in Idaho to remember their God in Christian service, to build a permanent abode to honor the growing young republic and the first Americans to celebrate the Declaration of Independence, by a program and the hoisting of the American ensign. July 27, 1920, was set apart as the day of pilgrimage to the Idaho shrine on the banks of the great Snake river. One o'clock was set for the meeting time at the Y. M. C. A. Appeal was made for a large public attendance, and for auto owners to provide cars. The response was generous, and the affair was at-

Exterior of Old Fort Hall.

tended by representative citizens of the community, including Fort Hall and Blackfoot. A patriotic and reverential spirit prevailed. The boy scout division of the Y. M. C. A., in khaki uniform, with flag and bugle, led the van like true scouts. About 30 automobiles conveyed about 150 people. Reverend James David Gillilan, Methodist minister of Blackfoot, formerly of Pocatello, and author of Trail Tales was the principal orator of the day. He reviewed the major facts of the story of old Fort Hall, and the aim and purpose of Reverend Jason Lee and his missionary companions in preaching to the Indians. He also read extracts from the history of Idaho, and from Trail

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Tales, showing why the mission to the Indians was attempted in those early days. Reverend C. H. Cleaves, of the Pocatello Congregational church, was the first speaker and dedicated with an inscribed marker a cairn of stones in commemoration of the first Christian sermon preached in the intermountain region, the sermon preached by Reverend Jason Lee on July 27, 1834. Addresses also were made by Superintendent Walter R. Siders, and I. H. Ireland, an aged Pocatello pioneer. One feature" of special interest was in the closing address of Reverend Gillilan when he read an excerpt from his book, Trail Tales. The excerpt told of a party of five Nez Perce Indians, who had gone from Idaho, to St. Louis, Missouri, a trip of 1,100 miles, in the year of 1832 in quest of "the white man's Book of Heaven." Says the excerpt:

Having heard the early explorers speak of God, the Bible, and religion, and knowing that on Sundays the flag was raised and work suspended, the Indians wanted to know more about these things, and two chiefs, Hee-oh'-ko-te-kin (Rabbit-skin Leggins) and H'co-a-h'co-a-cotes-min (No-horn-on-his-head) set out to find the white missionaries who could inform their troubled minds. They did not reach Saint Louis until 1832, whete they found General Clark, whom they had known. The messengers were of the Nez Perce tribe. General Clark took them to the cathedral and showed them the pictures of the saints and entertained them in the most approved Christian style; but they were heart-hungry and went home dissatisfied. One of them made the following speech to the kindly soldier, General Clark: "I came to you over a trail of many moons from the setting sun. You were the friend of my fathers, who have all gone the long way. I came with one eye partly open, for more light for my people who sit in darkness. I go back with both eyes closed. How can I go back with both eyes closed? I made my way to you with strong arms, through many enemies and strange lands, that I might carry much back to them. I go back with both arms broken and empty. The two fathers who came with — us the braves of many winters and wars we laid asleep by your great wigwam. [Four of their number died; only one reached home.] They were tired in many moons, and their moccasins were worn out. My people sent me to get white man's Book of Heaven. You took me where you allow your women to dance, as we do not ours, and the Book was not there; you showed me the images of the good spirits and the pictures of the good land beyond, but the Book was not among them to tell us the way. I am going back the long, sad trail to my people of the dark land. You make my feet heavy with the burden of many gifts, and my moccasins will grow old in carrying them, but the Book is not among them. When I tell my poor, blind people, after one more snow, in the big council, that I did not bring the Book, no word will be spoken by our old men or our young braves. One by one they will rise up and go out in silence. "My people will die in darkness, and they will go on the long path to other hunting grounds. No white man's Book will make the way plain. Ihave no more words." It was the rumor of this address that started Jason Lee and Marcus Whitman westward over the old trail.

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Itmiay not be out of place here to consider the probable effect that the first Indian missionby the elders of the then newly organized Latter-day Saint Church, sent out under the direction of the Prophet Joseph Smith, may have had upon the minds of the Indians who were then impelled to seek for this book. Let us consider the really swift communication of new? messages from Fayette, Seneca county, New York, in the east, to the Rocky Mountains in the west.

Interior of Fort Hall

The Latter-day Saints Church was organized April 6, 1830 And I find by consulting the History of the Church that Oliver Cowdery, Peter Whitmer, Jr., Parley P. Pratt, and Ziba Peterson, were commissioned and authorized to preach to the Indians, in October, 1830. (Doc. and Cov. 32:1-3.) Elder Pratt, of the above mentioned four missionaries, had the experience of being a preacher of the Baptist faith before joining the Church. He says:

After traveling some days the Lamanite mission called on some Indian encampments near tho city of Buffalo, where they spent part of a day instructing them in the knowledge of their forefathers. These Indians were of the Catteraugus tribe, and kindly received the brethren, who left (with certain of their numbers who could read English), two copies of the Book of Mormon, and then continued their journey westward.",4utobiography of Parley P. Pratt, pp. 49, 61. They bade adieu to their brethren and friends, and commenced their journey, preaching by the way, and leaving a sealing testimony behind them, lifting up their voice like a trump in the villages through which they passed. They continued their journey until they came to Kirtland, Ohio, where they tarried some time, there being a number in that place and vicinity who believed their testimony, and came forward and obeyed the Gospel."— History of the Church, vol. 1. p. 120.

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Possibly these Nez Perce Indians were seeking for that "white man's book of heaven" that we call the Book of Mormon. We are only three generations removed from this Nez Perce incident; it would be a grandfather's story to know first hand

Photo by W. R. Siders SPRINGHOLE, WHERE CHIEF POCATELLO WAS BURIED Judge W T. Oliver, who was the only white man witness, says that Poca- .

tello died on thebottoms, near American Falls, that the Indians buried him in the Springhole, because it was winter time, and too difficult to dig a grave. A three-days' pow-wow was held. They put stones in his blanket and rolled him in it; killed his horses and threw them in; threw his saddles, rifles, revolvers, and all belongings into the Springhole, which is located at the south edge of the bottoms, about one-half way between American Falls and Pocatello.

whether or not they had heard of the white man's book of heaven in the west, in the early thirties. It would be interesting to know if additional testimony could be obtained, even at this late date, from any of the Idaho Indians now living. Pocatello, Idaho

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Old Fort Hall, 1836–1920