Chapter One
Westward Expansion, 1803-1848

1803 Louisiana Purchase

The Fur Trade Opens Trails into the Louisiana Purchase

The Fur Trade Moves Westward to the Rockies

Another St Louis-based competitor, General William Ashley, entered the fur business in 1822, intending to capture a significant portion of the Missouri River business from Manuel Lisa’s successor, the Missouri Fur Company. Ashley’s plans were thwarted by a June 1823 battle with the Mandan Indians at the Arikara Villages (on the Missouri River in today’s northern South Dakota), which stopped his progress up the river. Not to be deterred, Ashley sent an overland trapping expedition west into the Rockies under the command of Jedediah Smith and William Sublette, thus forming the foundation for what would become the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. This party crossed at South Pass and trapped for beaver in the Green River region until 1825. This was the first time that an organized party of American trappers had gone into the wilderness to hunt directly, and raised the logistical problems of re-supply and getting the furs back to market. Ashley solved these problems by sending a supply train to the first fur trade rendezvous at Henry Fork in June 1825. There, he sold supplies at attractive margins to the trappers and purchased their furs from them at low prices. Ashley transported the furs back to St Louis where he could sell them at a significant profit, and the trappers stayed in the mountains for another year of trapping. This business model proved so profitable that annual fur trade rendezvous meetings continued until 1840.

Table 1-2 below details the earliest fur trade rendezvous trips.

Table 1-2 shows that, initially, the Ashley supply caravans left St Louis in the fall of each year and wintered in the mountains. They then trapped until the following summer rendezvous and returned with the furs in the fall. Starting in 1826, the fur trade caravans left in the spring of each year and returned in the fall of that same year. They used the Platte River road from a jumping off point along the lower Missouri River (typically Independence, Missouri) to the Rocky Mountains. This route followed the banks of the Platte River and the North Fork of the Platte River to South Pass and then into the trapping areas, and became the foundation for both the later Oregon and California emigration trails. Figure 1-3 shows this trail, along with the locations of the 1825-1840 Fur Trade rendezvous meetings.

Ashley’s financial success was noted by other fur trade companies, who hurried to adopt the new business model of sending trappers into the wilderness, and using the annual rendezvous to re-supply and gather furs. By 1834, five competing fur trade companies were vying for business at the rendezvous: the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, the American Fur Company, the Hudson’s Bay Company, Nathaniel Wyeth’s Columbia River Fishing & Trading Company, and the Bonneville Fur Company.

Typically, only one to three caravans were sent each year (by competing fur trade companies), all departing from St Louis in the March to May period. This was because the caravans travelled in large groups for safety from Indian attacks, and set out only after there was enough prairie grass to feed their horses. The two to three month trip from St Louis also meant that most of the rendezvous meetings were held in June-August.

Early settlers and missionaries, particularly those going overland to Oregon, accompanied fur trade caravans to the annual rendezvous, and then continued with a returning Hudson’s Bay Company fur trade caravan to Oregon from the rendezvous.

The fur trade experienced intense competition in 1834-36, followed in 1836-37 by a consolidation that left two major contestants: Astor’s American Fur Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company. However, a precipitous decline in demand for beaver pelts meant the effective end of the business by 1840. No further rendezvous were held after the June 1840 meeting at the Green River.

Further Westward Expansion, 1845 to 1848

Spain lost its Mexican colonies to independence in 1821, so the United States found itself with a new neighbor. In the 1820s, Mexico encouraged American immigration to Texas in an effort to populate its northern region. The Americans quickly became the majority, and seceded from Mexico in 1836. The new Republic of Texas favored annexation to the United States, but faced initial opposition from the U.S. Congress.

In 1844, James Polk was elected President with a popular mandate to acquire both Texas and Oregon. Polk was also highly intrigued by Mexico’s Alta California province, and was concerned that the Pacific coast might fall under the dominion of Great Britain. After failed negotiations to purchase Texas, New Mexico and California from Mexico in November 1845, Polk set a plan into action to forcefully acquire those territories.Texas was admitted as a state on December 29, 1845, and this precipitated conflict with Mexico, which still claimed Texas as part of its sovereign territory. The United States sent troops to the Rio Grande River to protect its new state, and fighting soon broke out. Consequently, war was declared with Mexico on May 13, 1846. Polk had anticipated this in 1845 by sending naval forces to the coast of California and a small force under Colonel John Frémont overland to California.

The war was disastrous for Mexico. General Stephen Kearny’s Army of the West captured Santa Fe, New Mexico on August 18, 1846 before proceeding to California, and the Mexican forces in California surrendered to Frémont on January 13, 1847. The final blow was the loss of Mexico City to General Winfield Scott on May 1, 1847. With few options left, Mexico signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on February 2, 1848, which ended hostilities but ceded Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada and Alta California to the United States.

As shown in Figure 1-1, the United States and Great Britain also had a number of territorial disputes, some of which were resolved by the Treaty of 1818. That agreement established the joint occupation and settlement of the Oregon Territory, and traded British territory around the Red River Settlement for American claims above the 49th parallel in Canada’s Alberta province.

The two countries then engaged in a race to control Oregon, with the United States sending numerous missionaries and settlers to the region in 1834-43, and Great Britain’s Hudson’s Bay Company establishing commercial dominance in the area. This rivalry culminated in the June 15, 1846 agreement to divide the disputed territory along the 49th parallel, with the United States gaining full control of the southern portion encompassing today’s states of Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

In the span of just 45 years, the United States had more than tripled its territory. The major issue remaining was how to settle and incorporate the new territory. Postal communication would play a crucial enabling role in that consolidation.

Settling the Western Territories

After the fur trade blazed the trails across the western wilderness from 1825 to 1833, four major waves of emigration from the United States populated the West from 1843 to 1860. Sporadic missionaries and settlers went west in the intervening decade of 1833 to 1843, but specific events spurred the greater movement westward in 1843 and afterwards.The first major emigration was to Oregon, spurred by reports from returning missionaries and advocates for settlement such as Jason Lee, Hall Kelley and Marcus Whitman. In addition, Oregon passed the Organic Laws in July 1843, which allowed each settler a claim of up to 160 acres. Consequently, a growing number of emigrants in 1843 increased markedly in 1844 and beyond.

While large numbers of emigrants went to Oregon in 1843-45, a small number split off for California. In 1846, this number increased dramatically (and actually exceeded the number going to Oregon that year), but included the ill-fated Donner Party, whose fate was well publicized back east. Consequently, the number of emigrants to California decreased markedly in 1847-48. However, news of the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill in January 1848 reached New York in August 1848, and precipitated a massive emigration to California in 1849 and beyond.

Persecution of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (popularly known as the Mormon Church) drove its members from their homes in the East to Nauvoo, Illinois in 1838. Continued troubles and the after-effects of the murder of Joseph Smith in June 1844 led to the expulsion of the Mormons from Illinois in February 1846. Their new leader, Brigham Young, then led them to safety in Winter Quarters on the west bank of the Missouri River in today’s Nebraska. Young decided that they should settle on land not wanted by anyone else, and identified the Great Salt Lake valley (owned by Mexico at that time) as the best location for permanent settlement. Accordingly, the first Mormon emigrant train left Winter Quarters on April 5, 1847 and followed the north bank of the Platte River to South Pass. It then proceeded via Fort Bridger to Salt Lake, where its advance elements arrived on July 21, 1847.

Table 1-3 shows the numbers of emigrants to California, Oregon and Utah from 1840 to 1860, as estimated by Unruh in The Plains Across. During the same period of time, the U.S. population grew from 17 million in 1840 to 31 million in 1860.

Early Letter Communications with the West

Figure 1-4. Letter dated July 14, 1832 from Pierre’s Hole rendezvous, and carried to St Louis by fur trader William Sublette.

The writer was Nathaniel Wyeth, a Boston ice merchant who was trying to get into the fur trade and salmon fishing businesses. His party, which was traveling to Oregon, had been escorted to the rendezvous by William Sublette, who led the only fur trade supply caravan that year. They left Independence, Missouri on May 13, 1832 and arrived at the Pierre’s Hole rendezvous (in today’s eastern Idaho) on July 8. Wyeth stayed until July 24, and then left for Oregon.

Before leaving, he wrote this short July 14 note to his brother, complaining about desertions among his men, but expressing optimism that he could make money in the fur trade, “after learning the business.” He endorsed it “fav(or) of Mr. Wm L. Sublette” and entrusted it to Sublette for the return journey to St Louis. Following a skirmish with Black Feet Indians, known as the Battle of Pierre’s Hole, Sublette left the rendezvous with this letter on July 30 and arrived back in St Louis on October 3. He mailed it unpaid on October 5 in St Louis. It was rated 25 cents due for the greater than 400 miles from St. Louis to Baltimore. This is the earliest known trans-Rocky Mountains letter.

Figure 1-6. Letter datelined June 21, 1834 from the Ham’s Fork rendezvous, and carried to St Louis by fur trader Michael Cerré.

Evolution of Postal Communications

The growing numbers of settlers in the West demanded adequate letter communications with the United States. Initially, this need was met by private expresses and forwarders that charged a premium fee for the letters that they carried.