goldfields

Saturday, 22nd. Started at six o’clock this morning, traveled about 18 miles, high rolling prairie, encamped on a small stream, shaded by a few willows.

That was an average day. 18 miles was a decent distance. Just moving along over the prairie with nothing much to report.

Wagon Train Across the Prairie by Olaf C. Seltzer

Friday, 21st. Our oxen left us last night, and it was 9 o’clock before we were all ready to start, passed a considerable stream called Vermillion, a branch of the Kanzas. On its banks were finer timber than we had heretofore seen, hickory, walnut, &c. &c. The country was prairie, hilly and strong; we passed in the forenoon a Kanzas village, entirely deserted on account of the Pawnees, [we] encamped by a scattering grove, having come about 15 miles.

On the 19th the emigrants had met some well-armed Kansas (Kaw or Kanza) Indians. who were expecting an attack by the Pawnees, in retaliation for an attack by the Kansas on a Pawnee village a short time before. The Kaw and the Pawnee were traditional enemies whose hostility had been intensified by pressure from the westward movement of American settlers.

Kanza chief

The fear of meeting hostile Indians was one of the chief concerns of the members of the Bidwell-Bartleson party. Under the guidance of Thomas Fitzpatrick, who was well-acquainted with the Plains Indian tribes, they were able to avoid coming between rival native bands.

Pawnee Indian by George Catlin

Pictures were taken from the Legends of Kansas website.

Thursday, 20. The day was tolerably pleasant. Our road was interrupted by small streams which crossed our course in every 2 or 3 miles during the day. The land was prairie, except the narrow groves which accompanied every stream — timber principally, burr-oak, black walnut, elm and white hickory. Traveled this day about sixteen miles and encamped in a beautiful grove of timber, through which meandered a small stream.

Point, Nicolas, 1799-1868, “Passage d’un ravin bourbeuse ,” Jesuit Archives Digital Collections and Resources, accessed May 16, 2020, https://jesuitarchives.omeka.net/items/show/132.

Father Nicholas Point made several pencil sketches along the way. This one, “Passage of a Muddy Ravine,” shows how the wagon train negotiated those narrow groves and stream beds. The Nicholas Point Missionary Drawings Collection can be accessed at the Jesuit Archives.

Wednesday, 19th. This morning the wagons started off in single file; first the 4 carts and 1 small wagon of the missionaries, next 8 wagons drawn by mules and horses, and lastly, 5 wagons drawn by 17 yoke of oxen. . . . Our course was west, leaving the Kanzas no great distance to our left, we traveled in the valley of the river which was prairie excepting near the margin of the stream. The day was very warm and we stopped about noon, having traveled about 12 miles.

This afternoon we had a heavy shower of rain and hail. Several Kanzas Indians came to our camp; they were well armed with bows and arrows, and some had guns. They were daily expecting an attack by the Pawnees, whom they but a short time ago had made inroads on, and had massacred at one of their villages a large number of old men, women, and children, whole the warriors were hunting buffalo.

It’s May 18th, so time to start following John Bidwell’s journal of the adventures of the Bidwell-Bartleson Party:

May, Tuesday 18th 1841. Having waited at this place (2 miles W. of Kanzas river) 2 days, and all the Company being arrived, except those heretofore mentioned, the Company was convened for the purpose of electing a Captain and adopting rules of government of the Company; when T. H. Green was chosen President – and J. Bidwell, Secretary.

After the rules were read and adopted, J. Bartleson was elected Captain; it will be understood that Fitzpatrick was Capt. of the Missionary Company and pilot of the whole. Orders were given for the company to start in the morning, and the meeting was broken up.

John Bidwell, the young schoolteacher, was chosen to be secretary, and he took that responsibility seriously. That’s the reason we have such a good account of this trailblazing group of pioneers.

Talbot H. Green, the man elected as president of the company, had made a good impression on the other men. Nicholas “Cheyenne” Dawson recalled him as “a young man of evident culture and very pleasing address.” When the company gathered to organize and elect officers, Green was elected president. This was not a position with much responsibility. The Company had a captain, John Bartleson, and a trail guide, Thomas Fitzpatrick, who was the true leader, at least until the California-bound company parted from the larger group. But Green’s election was testimony to his instant likability.

Tombstone of John Bartleson, from findagrave.com

John Bartleson was born in October 1786, making him 54 years old when they set out from Missouri. He was part of the “Chiles Mess,” made up of Joseph B. Chiles, Michael Nye, and some German immigrants. When they joined the company he insisted on being made captain, probably feeling that as an older and more experienced man, he was more qualified to lead the group. Bidwell wrote of him:

He was not the best man for the position, but we were given to understand that if he was not elected captain, he would not go; and he had seven or eight men with him, and we did not want the party diminished.

He proved to be a poor leader, as we will see, and returned to Missouri the year after they arrived in California, dying there in 1848.

In five days after my arrival we were ready to start, but no one knew where to go, not even the captain. Finally a man came up, one of the last to arrive, and announced that a company of Catholic missionaries were on their way from St. Louis to the Flathead nation of Indians with an old Rocky Mountaineer for a guide, and that if we would wait another day they would be up with us. At first we were independent, and thought we could not afford to wait for a slow missionary party. But when we found that no one knew which way to go, we sobered down and waited for them to come up. (Echoes of the Past, p. 133)

And a good thing they did.

The wagon train was very lucky to be able to join up with the missionary party. Without the guidance of the trail guide — Thomas Fitzpatrick — hired by the missionaries, they probably would have gotten hopelessly and fatally lost.

Thomas Fitzpatrick, born in County Cavan, Ireland, had been a mountain man, fur trapper, and trail guide in the Rocky Mountains for twenty years. He spoke several Indian languages and knew the geography (like the location of South Pass).

The missionaries were led by Father Pierre Jean De Smet, a Belgian Jesuit who spent many years working among the American Indians. In 1841 he was on his way, with two other priests and three lay brothers, to minister to the Flathead Indians. He established St. Mary’s Mission on the Bitterroot River near Missoula, Montana. Bidwell described him as follows:

He was genial, of fine presence, and one of the saintliest men I have ever known, and I cannot wonder that the Indians were made to believe him divinely protected. He was a man of great kindness and great affability under all circumstances; nothing seemed to disturb his temper. (Echoes of the Past, p. 114)

More information on Father De Smet can be found in this article from Historic St. Mary’s Mission and Museum.