History: Benjamin Bonneville, Simple Trapper or Government Agent?

Most of the trappers and mountain men who came west in the early 1800s came to trap fur-bearing animals, mainly beaver, to sell the hides and make a pile of money. Beaver fur was used in ‘beaver hats’ that were considered to be ‘in the vogue’ in Europe and later in American. At one time beaver felt hats were considered to be an essential aspect of a debonair man’s wardrobe. This fashion accessory did more to open the Western United States than any other factor.

The life of a trapper could be hard and filled with peril, but it also offered a free and exciting way of life, especially for young men looking for adventure. While they were following in the ‘fur rush’ they contributed greatly to opening up the lands west of the Missouri River. They mapped the country, built trading posts, negotiated with the Native Americans who hunted the lands, and found the easier routes that later became wagon trails and railroads.

One of these men who explored this country, including the area around Kaycee, Wyoming, was Captain Benjamin Bonneville. Was he just a fur trapper? Or did his explorations have more significance in the history of the West.

This is some of his story.

The Casper Daily Tribune, February 3, 1924 – E.H. Fourt of Lander Describes Scouting Expeditions in Hills – The Wind River range of the Rocky mountains has been considered one of the most scenic in the world ever since white first visited them; they were thought to be an impenetrable barrier and that the “Great American Desert” lying to the east made their approach until more difficult and undesirable. After Lewis and Clark had succeeded, under the guidance of a Shoshone Indian girl, in exploring the mountains somewhat and the country in the west.

Some of the great minds of our country began to think seriously. It was a hundred years ago December 2, 1923, since James Madison delivered his famous message which we now know as ‘“The Monroe Doctrine.”

This was part of speech delivered to Congress in 1823 by President James Monroe. The doctrine warned European nations that the United States would not tolerate further colonization by other countries.

If we were to prevent the extending of the colonization work of the European countries, it was necessary to know something about the Western Hemisphere ourselves. New France extended up the St. Lawrence and down the Mississippi to the gulf. Spain held Florida and West Florida, Great Britain claimed what is now Washington and Oregon and the rest of the Pacific slope was Mexico. If the United States was to maintain the “balance of power” in the western hemisphere It would simplify matters to have the country bounded by the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. Napoleon sold the Louisiana purchase because it weakened France by inviting an attack. Louisiana, Mexico and The British Dominions cornered at some unknown point in what is now Fremont county.

Explored by Bonneville. Captain Bonneville was sent out to explore with very limited and narrow instructions. He did explore. He overstayed his time. He got too much information, came back and reported. He was tried by court martial and dishonored but when the importance of the work which he had been doing came to the knowledge of President Andrew Jackson he was reinstated and promoted.

It is not improbable that the whole proceeding was only intended to keep things looking right to the diplomats. Bonneville climbed the peak now known as Chauvanet; and gave such a glowing account of the ascent and the widest range of vision that had yet been reported by any explorer and his report was confirmed by John C. Fremont who came through some twenty years later and who took careful astronomical observations. Fremont, too, violated his orders in some respects but was not severely censured and his actions seemed to be understood by the president and Senator.

Like Bonneville, Fremont spent some time in this range of mountains and considers the scenery the best in the United States and gave his name to one of the peaks.

Another article from the The Kaycee Independent, March 22, 1917, tells us more about the man. Captain B. L. E. Bonneville – The life of Captain Bonneville is particularly interesting to us because of his adventures and explorations in Wyoming. There was never a more noted explorer, and trapper than the gentle, well mannered Bonneville. He was born in France about the year 1708, His father wan a most worthy man, an excellent scholar, very well versed in Latin and Greek and fond of modern classics, Shakespeare was his favorite author. He possessed a happy disposition and a wonderful imagination.

His young son, Benjamin, inherited these very same traits. These, with his early training as a soldier, spurred him on to a life of action and adventure. The father emigrated to New York because of pamphlets, published at the Bonneville printing establishment, which were offensive to Napoleon.

Young Bonneville was educated at West Point, where he graduated with honors. In 1825 he was made a captain of the Seventh United States Infantry. He remained in the army until 1861, when he was retired. In 1865 he was brevetted brigadier-general for his long and faithful service. From 1831 to 1836 he spent his time at various posts in the Far West. It is with this period of his life that we are particularly interested.

He learned from the traders and trappers of their wild adventures in vast legions as yet unexplored. As he listened to their wonderful and exciting stories his imagination and love for adventure was aroused. He began to formulate plans, that would make all these things, which appealed to him so strongly, a reality. Captain Bonneville obtained a leave of absence and a sanction of his expedition from the major-general in chief. Being a soldier, his funds for such a project were very low, but full of bouy and hope, he laid his schemes before men of means and it a little while an association was formed, which provided the captain with the necessary capital for his expedition into the Far West, beyond the Rocky Mountains.

In May, 1832, Captain Bonneville left Fort Osage on the Missouri river with one hundred and ten experienced hunters and trappers and twenty wagons drawn by four mules, four horses or four oxen each. The wagons were loaded with ammunition, provisions and merchandise. He showed his splendid executive ability in organizing his expedition by selecting to assist him two officers, J. R. Walker (Joseph Walker, well known mountain man) of Tennessee, a frontiersman, and M. S. Cerre, an experienced Indian trader. From the middle of May to the end of the month the party pushed its way across trackless regions, and on the second of June arrived on the main stream of the Platte river, it was not till the twentieth of July that Bonneville saw the Rocky Mountains, the region of his hopes and plans— the wild Crow country, full of perils, but profitable for the trapper.

An information sign near Hudson, Wyoming

While he was in Crow Country he came up the Powder River, and with Antonio Montero, (some sources say Matoe) built a trading post to facilitate trade for bison robes with the Crow Indians who lived in the region.

This from The Kaycee Independent, February 22, 1917, from a longer article titled ‘Early History of the State.’ – Kit Carson was another pioneer trader. He trapped with Bridger, Wiggins, and other noted mountain men, Thomas Smith, Bill Williams, Joseph Meek. Tontenelle, William Sinclair, and others too many to name trapped in Wyoming during the thirties. The nearest fort or trading post to this particular part of Wyoming was the Portuguese Houses which stood very near the junction of the North and South Forks of Powder River, near where the military posts of Fort Reno later stood. All we know of them is from the following extract from the report of Captain W. F. Reynolds, who explored the country and visited the site of these houses on the twenty-sixth of September 1859.

“After a ride of about fifteen miles we came to the ruins of some old trading posts, known as the Portuguese House’s, from the fact that many years ago they were erected by a Portuguese trader named Antonia Matoe. They are now badly dilapidated, and only one side of the pickets remains standing. These, however, are of hewn logs. and from their character it is evident that the structures were originally very strongly built.” Bridger recounted a tradition that at one time this post was besieged by the Sioux for forty days, resisting successfully to the last strike, the strength and the ingenuity of their assaults, and the appearance of the ruins renders the story not only credible but probable.

Not many were the pleasures of the trappers who made this wild country their home. The rendezvous had broad meaning to the early trapper; not only was it a place to which they carried their furs and exchanged them for all sorts of commodities, such as clothing, saddles, tobacco and whiskey, but it was a place to meet traders who might wish to engage their service for the coming year. They also heard the news of what was going on in the eastern states, renewed old friendships and made new ones. It will be clearly established in the minds of those who read the early history of Wyoming that to the trappers belong the credit of having first made permanent homes in this country. Many of the men who came out with W. Ashley, Sublette, Bonneville and other renowned heroes, came here to make their homes. They paid dearly for their temerity as the estimate is that three fifths of this number met violent deaths from the Indians.

Many also succumbed to accidents, injuries, or encounters with dangerous wild animals. Below is a display depicting Hugh Glass, who was nearly killed by a grizzly bear.

Oil is a big part of Wyoming economy, and the first white man to discover oil in Wyoming was our intrepid explorer, Bonneville. Captain Bonneville discovered “Tar Springs” in Wind River Valley.

The Kemmerer Republican, December 8, 1916 – Oil Discovered Long Time Ago – The Indians had long used crude petroleum for medicinal and commercial purposes, but the earliest printed record we find of the knowledge of oil among white men is in Washington Irving’s ‘“Captain Bonneville.” Captain Bonneville visited the Wind River valley in 1833, and, having heard of petroleum springs from Indians and trappers, he hunted until he found the ‘tar spring,’ which marked the present location of the Dallas oil field.

This story from The Laramie Daily Boomerang, March 11, 1913 talked about the old trading post along the Powder River – There are many remains in the central northern part of this state to indicate that at some period there were other hands than those of the red man who erected buildings of defense. If this be true or not, we are not positive, or even certain, but when General Connor went north from Fort Laramie in 1865-6 to open up the Bozeman trail leading from Fort Laramie to Fort C. F. Smith, Montana, he found ruins of structures about fifty miles southeast of Fort Phil Kearney, near the junction of the South and North Powder rivers, near the site of Fort Reno. There were traces of what might easily have been a fort and the outlines of an arastre. Still further north was found an old mine, in which were rusted iron tools. More recent investigations have located the remains of the buildings on the site of Fort Reno as “The Portuguese Houses” erected by a fur trapper at one time where he withstood a forty days’ siege by the Sioux Indians. All of this is so uncertain, so remote that one hesitates to call it history, and for something better classes it as archaeology.

In 1832, Bonneville founded a winter camp and fur trading post not far from the present-day town of Pinedale, Wyoming.

Today, little is left of either Bonneville’s Fort, or of the Portuguese Houses near Kaycee. However, without the contribution of Captain Bonneville and other explorers like him, Wyoming and even the United States might not be what it is today.

Photos, except for the Wyoming Information Sign, are of displays at the Museum of the Mountain Man, Pinedale, Wyoming. With thanks.