CHAPTER XV.

INCIDENTS ON THE RIVER (1845–50).

The annual voyages of 1845–46 were made on the steamer _General Brooks_. In the fall of the latter year Captain La Barge bought this boat for twelve thousand dollars, but sold her again at the close of the season. This was the first boat he had ever owned. He then went to Cincinnati, where he supervised the building of a new boat. She was named the _Martha_, and in her the voyage of 1847 was made. Captain Sire, who for several years had gone up as master, now decided to leave the river, and Captain La Barge accordingly made the trip alone in full charge of the Company’s business.

Besides the regular freight for the company trading posts, the boat carried up a large quantity of annuities for the several Indian tribes. A more extended reference to this annuity business and the abuses to which it led will be made further on. It is enough here to say that the agents were sent into the country without any protection; that the Company traders adroitly worked on their fears until they were fain to place themselves under the shelter of the trading posts; and that the Company was thus enabled to manage the government business to its own great profit. On this particular trip there was a new agent by the name of Matlock, and a good deal of time had to be spent at the various agencies to permit him to confer with the Indians.

At Crow Creek there was a band of Yankton Sioux near a trading establishment under charge of Colin Campbell. Here agent Matlock gave the Indians a feast and left part of their annuities, but not all, being induced by the Company’s agent to deposit the balance at Fort Pierre. The Indians were sharp enough to see that they had not received all they were entitled to and naturally could not understand why. Campbell assured them that they would receive the balance at Fort Pierre. “Why not here?” asked the Indians. “Why make this long journey for what we can just as well get right here?” Campbell turned them off by saying that the Indian agent could attend to the matter there better.

[Sidenote: SULLEN ACQUIESCENCE.]

[Sidenote: BADLY SCARED.]

The Indians sullenly acquiesced, evidently much dissatisfied. Campbell had cut ten or twelve cords of wood at this place for use of the boat, but it was not needed till the down trip. Captain La Barge feared, however, that, if it was left, the Indians, in their present temper, would burn it, and he therefore concluded to take it along. The Indians refused to let the wood be taken without pay, and seated themselves on the pile so that the men could not get at it. The captain was compelled to pay for the wood, although it had been cut by Company men. But the matter did not end here. Etienne Provost, who, as elsewhere stated, was employed on these trips to take charge of the rough and turbulent mountain men, was asked to attend to the loading of the wood, as it was feared there might be trouble. Provost came up on the boiler deck and sat down by La Barge, saying: “We are going to have some fun before that wood is on board.” He then shouted “Woodpile! Woodpile!” and enough men rushed out to the bank, to take the whole woodpile at once. Provost ordered them to pick up all they could carry and then to move on to the boat one after another, so as to have no crowding or confusion on the gang plank. Meanwhile a dozen or more Indians were standing by, looking on. When the men were loaded up and were jammed close together in single file on their way to the boat, the Indians jumped upon them and began to belabor them with the rawhide horsewhips which they always had fastened to their waists. The men were frightened almost out of their wits, and dropping their wood, scrambled on board the best way they could. Provost lay back and roared with laughter, saying, “I told you we should see some fun.”

[Sidenote: AFRAID OF PROVOST.]

He then went out himself onto the bank where the Indians were, and said, “Now, men, come out here and get this wood.” They came and loaded up. “Now go on board,” he said, and they went entirely unmolested. Provost went last, and before descending the bank, turned toward the Indians and asked them: “Why don’t you stop them? Are you afraid of _me_?” The truth is they were afraid of him. They knew him well and respected him, and understood that he would stand no foolishness.

[Sidenote: PROMPT MEASURES.]

La Barge thought nothing further of the affair, for the Indians soon disappeared, as he supposed, for good. The wind was too high to proceed, and the boat remained at the bank nearly all the afternoon waiting for it to subside. “Everything quieted down,” said the captain, in describing what followed, “and I was sitting in the cabin reading a paper, when all of a sudden there was a heavy volley of firearms and the sound of splintered wood and broken glass. This was instantly followed by an Indian yell and a rush for the boat, and in the uproar someone cried out that a man had been killed. The Indians got full possession of the forward part of the boat and flooded the boiler grates with water, putting out the fires. They had learned something of steam in the fifteen years that boats had been going up the river. My first act was to rush to my wife’s stateroom, where I found Mrs. La Barge unharmed. I told John B. Sarpy, who with his son was making the trip, to barricade her door with mattresses and to stay there until the trouble was over. I then hastened to the front of the cabin, but was met at the door by the Indians. Retreating, I met Colin Campbell, and asked him what the Indians wanted. Campbell replied that they wanted me to give up the boat; that if I would do so they would let the crew go, but if I resisted they would spare no one.

[Sidenote: EFFECT INSTANTANEOUS.]

“After the first rush the Indians seemed timorous and uncertain, evidently fearing some unpleasant surprise in the unknown labyrinths of the boat. This gave me time for effective measures. I had on board a light cannon of about 2½ inches caliber, mounted on four wheels. Unluckily it was at this time down in the engine room undergoing some repairs to the carriage. I had in my employ a man on whom I could absolutely rely--a brave and noble fellow, Nathan Grismore, the first engineer. Grismore had just finished the work on the cannon, and told me he thought he could get it up the back way, since the fore part of the boat was in possession of the Indians. He got some men and lines and soon hoisted the gun on deck and hauled it into the after part of the cabin. I always kept in the cabin some powder and shot for use in hunting. I got the powder, but the supply of shot was gone. Grismore promptly made up the loss with boiler rivets and the gun was heavily loaded and primed, ready for action. By this time the forward part of the cabin was crowded with Indians who were evidently afraid something was going to happen. I lost no time in verifying their fears. As soon as the gun was loaded I lighted a cigar, and holding the smoking stump in sight of the Indians, told Campbell to tell them to get off the boat or I would blow them all to the devil. At the same time I started for the gun with the lighted cigar in my hand. The effect was complete and instantaneous. The Indians turned and fled and fairly fell over each other in their panic to get off the boat. In less time than it takes to tell it, not an Indian was in sight. I had the cannon brought onto the roof, where it remained for an hour or more.

“As soon as the Indians were off the boat I began to look up the crew who had ingloriously fled at the first assault, leaving the boat practically defenseless. They had hidden, some here and some there, but most of them on the wheels (it was a sidewheel boat) where I found them packed thick as sardines all over the paddles. These were the brave mountaineers who were never slow in vaunting their courage and valorous performances! I was so disgusted that I was disposed to set the wheels in motion and give them all a ducking; but the fires had been put out by the Indians.

“The wind having subsided, we resumed our journey, and about a mile further on attempted to cross to the other shore. Failing in this we encamped for the night. On the following morning we buried the deckhand, Charles Smith, who had been killed when the attack began.”

Captain La Barge said that this was the only time that he was ever caught napping by the Indians, and it taught him a lesson that he did not forget.[26]

[Sidenote: FIRST WHITE WOMAN AT FORT UNION.]

As already mentioned, Captain La Barge’s wife was on board. It was always understood on the upper river that she was the first white woman to ascend the river from old Fort Lisa near the modern site of Omaha, Neb., to Fort Union, at the mouth of the Yellowstone. Her presence created great curiosity among the Indians. They would come on board and examine her with the liveliest interest, measuring her waist and the length of her hair, and wondering at the tastefulness and beauty of her dress. The leading squaws in great numbers visited her, and several adopted her as their sister. A good deal of time was lost in satisfying their importunities to see her. Years afterward they would inquire of La Barge after their white sister, and would send her presents. She never failed to send them something in return. As late as 1885, when La Barge was in the government service on the survey of the Missouri River in the vicinity of the ancient Aricara villages, an aged half-breed squaw, old Garreau’s daughter, told La Barge that she remembered seeing his wife on this early trip.

In the year 1848 Captain La Barge again went up the river with his boat _Martha_, on business for the Company. There were no noteworthy incidents on the trip except that the captain brought back quite a menagerie of the native animals from the upper country. There were buffalo, bear, beaver, antelope, elk, and deer. A large tank was made for the use of the beaver. All of the animals were for Kenneth McKenzie except the buffalo, which were for Pierre Chouteau, Jr.

[Sidenote: LEAVES COMPANY’S SERVICE.]

On this trip La Barge had some difficulty with the Company, which induced him to sell his boat to them at the close of the season. He immediately contracted for a new boat which, when completed, he named the _St. Ange_, in memory of St. Ange de Bellerive, the first military governor of upper Louisiana. It was a fine boat, and probably the only one ever built entirely complete upon the ways, and launched with steam up ready to start the moment she struck the water.[27]

[Sidenote: BLOODY ISLAND.]

As soon as the boat was done, La Barge, being no longer in the Company’s service, went to work for the Quartermaster Department of the Army, hauling supplies up the river. He had made two trips to Fort Leavenworth, and on his way back on the second trip encountered a severe storm, which delayed him several hours. This delay, vexatious enough at the time, was a blessing in disguise. Instead of getting into port at St. Louis before dark, it was nearly an hour after midnight before he reached there. As he was nearing the mouth of the Missouri a broad gleam of light overspread the sky in the direction of the city. Its extent and brilliancy clearly enough indicated a great conflagration. When La Barge reached port it was to find the river front wrapped in flames. He steamed the whole length of the levee, seeking a safe place to land, but finding none, turned back, crossed the river, and tied up for the night at Bloody Island, on the east shore.[28]

[Sidenote: THE GREAT FIRE OF ST. LOUIS.]

[Sidenote: A FLAMING FLEET.]

This conflagration, which is the historic “Great Fire” of St. Louis, commenced at about 10 P. M. on the night of May 17, 1849, and continued until 7 A. M. next day. Fire alarms had been heard several times early in the evening, but nothing had come of them, until about the hour above mentioned, when it was found that fire had broken out in earnest on the steamer _White Cloud_, which lay at the wharf between Wash and Cherry streets. The _Endors_ lay just above her and the _Edward Bates_ below. Both caught fire. At this time a well-intended, but ill-considered, effort to stop the progress of the fire was made by some parties, who cut the _Edward Bates’_ moorings and turned her into the stream. The boat was soon caught by the current and carried down the river; but a strong northeast wind bore it constantly in shore, and every time it touched it ignited another boat. An effort was now made to turn other boats loose before the _Bates_ could reach them, but a fatality seemed to attend every effort. The burning boat outsped them all, and by frequent contacts set fire to many more. These in turn ignited the rest, until in a short time the river presented the spectacle of a vast fleet of burning vessels drifting slowly along the shore. The fire next spread to the buildings, and before it could be arrested had destroyed the main business portion of the city. It was the most appalling calamity that had ever visited St. Louis, and followed as it was by the great cholera scourge of 1849, it was a terrible disaster. At the levee there were destroyed twenty-three steamboats, three barges, and one small boat. The total valuation of boats and cargo was estimated at about $440,000, and the insurance thereon was $225,000; but this was not all paid, for the fire broke up several of the insurance companies.[29]

Among the boats destroyed was the _Martha_, which La Barge had sold to the Company. She was loaded with a full cargo for the mountains. The day after the fire La Barge received a note from Captain Sire, requesting him to call at the Company’s office. He complied, and was met with an urgent appeal to go to the mountains with the Company’s annual outfit. He was at that time engaged for a government trip to Leavenworth, but offered to go as far as Fort Pierre upon his return, if it were possible to do so. Sire replied that that was all they could expect. The trip to Leavenworth was completed in June, and La Barge immediately started for Pierre. He made a quick and successful voyage, and returned early in August.

[Sidenote: CHOLERA EPIDEMIC.]

The year 1849 was one of the terrible cholera years in the West. Thousands died in St. Louis, and there were many deaths on every boat that went up the Missouri.

In the following year, 1850, Captain La Barge went to the mouth of the Yellowstone for the American Fur Company. It was the quickest trip on record, being made in the extraordinarily short time of twenty-eight days up and back, doing all the Company’s business at the various posts.