Kansas Before 1854, A Revised Annals, 11

Autumn 1963

Compiled by LOUISE BARRY

PART ELEVEN, 1840-1841

1840

DIED: Wau-sa-on-o-quet (or "Wossaonukwut"), principal chief of the Ottawas, on January 10, at the Ottawa settlement in present Franklin county. Ref: Jotham Meeker's "Diary," in KHi ms. division, January 10, 1840. As a treaty signer, in 1833, the chief's name was listed as "Wau-sa-on-o-quet." See C. J. Kappler's Indian Affairs, Laws and Treaties (Washington, 1904), v. 2, p. 393.

DIED: the Rev. Moses Merrill, missionary to the Otoes and Missourias, on February 6, at the Otoe Baptist Mission (in "Nebraska") which he had founded in October, 1833. See KHQ, v. 28, pp. 340, 341. Ref: The Baptist Missionary Magazine, Boston, v. 20 (June, 1840), p. 129; Nebraska State Historical Society Transactions, Lincoln, v. 4, pp. 157-159.

MARRIED: John Baptiste Chaurette and Elise Braconier, on February 21, at the American Fur Company trading house of Michel Giraud on the Marais des Cygnes (at present Trading Post, Linn co.), by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen, S. J.

This ceremony renewed an earlier marriage. A son, Jean Baptiste Chaurette, born to this couple on July 5, 1839, was baptized on February 21, 1840, by Father Aelen. Michel Giraud was sponsor at the ceremony. Ref: "Pottawatomie Marriage Register," and "Pottawatomie Baptismal Register," at St. Mary's College, St. Marys.

DIED: Au-to-kee (or, "Ottowukkee"), principal Ottawa chief (since January see above), on March 18, at the Ottawa settlement in present Franklin county. He had come to "Kansas" in August, 1839 -seep. 179.

"Ottowukkee" (according to Jotham Meeker) was much opposed to Christian teachings among his people. Just prior to his death he had been working actively toward the expulsion of the Baptist missionaries (the Meekers) and some of the leading Christian Ottawas. Ref: Jotham Meeker's "Diary," January 10, 1840; The Baptist Missionary Magazine, v. 20 (June, 1840), p. 128, and v. 21 (June, 1841), p. 173. As a treaty signer, in 1833, the chief's name was "Au-to-kee" (then second chief of the Ottawas). See Kappler, op. cit., v. 2, p. 393.

March 25. Capt. Nathan Boone, with Companies B and I, First U. S. dragoons, left Fort Leavenworth (crossing the Missouri at the LOUISE BARRY is a member of the staff of the Kansas State Historical Society.

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post) and began a march up the river's left bank to settle difficulties between northwest Missouri settlers, and the Otoe and Iowa Indians.

The Otoes had raided stock in Buchanan county; while the lowas (a band living on the "Council Bluffs" Pottawatomies' reserve in southwest Iowa) had destroyed cattle of Nishnabotna valley settlers. By report, several detachments of volunteers joined Captain Boone's troops. The troubles were quickly settled, and on April 10 the dragoons were back at Fort Leavenworth. Ref: Missouri Argus (daily), St. Louis, April 4, 11, 1840; Louis Pelzer's Marches of the Dragoons . . . (Iowa City, 1917), p. 86; O. E. Young's The West of Philip St. George Cooke . . . (Glendale, Calif., 1955), p. 98.

Spring. Among the steamboats in the Missouri river trade were the: Naomi, Malta, Shawnee, Bedford, Rienzi, Euphrasie (new; W. B. Miller, master), Thames ("splendid, fast-running"; Thomas Dennis, master), Rhine, Albany, Platte, and General Leavenworth.

On April 25 the Naomi sank in about six feet of water at the mouth of Grand river. The Osceola (an Osage river boat) took her passengers down to St. Louis. Ref: Missouri Argus (daily), March and April, 1840, issues; Missouri Daily Republican, St. Louis, April 30, 1840 (in Nebraska State Historical Society Publications, Lincoln, v. 20, p. 108). Though "Euphraise" in some advertisements, this boat generally was listed as the "Euphrasie." During 1840, 28 steamboats made 147 trips on the Missouri (many in the lower river only), according to a tabulation published in Niles' National Register, Baltimore, v. 72 (July 31, 1847), p. 351. In 1838, 17 steamboats had made 96 trips; and in 1839, 35 steamboats had made 141 trips. Ibid.

April 1. About this date the steamboat Antelope (American Fur Company) left St. Louis for the annual trip to the upper Missouri trading posts. Presumably she passed along the "Kansas" shore in the latter half of the month. Ref: Missouri Argus (daily), April 1, 1840. Charles Larpenteur, in his Forty fears a Fur Trader . . . (New York, 1898), v. 1, p. 161, implies that the Trapper went up to Fort Union in 1840, but he may have meant 1841 for the Trapper's first trip.

BORN: on April 7, at loway and Sac Mission" (present Doniphan county), Margaret Elcy Hamilton, daughter of the Rev. William and Julia Ann N. (McGiffin) Hamilton. Ref: Presbyterian Historical Society, American Indian Missions correspondence, Box 100 (microfilm, KHi), William Hamilton's letter of September 29, 1851.

April 17. The first issue, dated April 3, of the Independence (Mo.) Chronicle (a weekly Democratic paper, published by William C. Reed), received this comment from the editor of the St. Louis Missouri Argus:

"The establishment of such a journal within twelve miles of the western limits of the Union, and almost within sight of the wigwam of the aboriginal savage, is a rich illustration of the rapid uniformity with which intellectual culture spreads among the American people. . . ." Ref: Missouri Argus (daily), April 17, 1840; the Library of Congress, Washington, D. C., has a copy of the April 3, 1840, issue of the Chronicle, according to the Union List of Newspapers.

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April 19. Agent Joseph V. Hamilton (of the Council Bluffs Agency) and Missionary (to the Pawnees) John Dunbar, set out from Bellevue [Neb.] to visit the six Pawnee villages (along the Platte and the Loup Fork). They completed the tour, and returned on May 2.

While on this trip Hamilton obtained custody of seven Mexican youths (aged 12 to 16) held by the Pawnees, who had captured them on the southwest frontier. (In late September, 1840, they were still in his care, but were to be sent home at the first opportunity.)

Also, he had a census taken the first "accurate" count of the Pawnees. (John Dunbar was of the opinion that the figures were "nearly correct/') The Pawnee Loups (836 males and 1,070 females) totaled 1,906; the Republican band (775 males and 1,048 females) totaled 1,823; the Grand Pawnees (746 males and 1,035 females) totaled 1,781; and the Tappage band (380 males and 452 females) totaled 832. The grand total was 6,342.

Hamilton reported that a count of the Otoes & Missourias had been made "recently/' and their number was found to total 943 souls. Ref: Superintendency of Indian Affairs (SIA), St. Louis, "Records," v. 8, typed copy, p. 58, or, Comm'r of Indian affairs Report, 1840 (for Hamilton's September 30, 1840, letter); Kansas Historical Collections (KHC), v. 14, pp. 641, 642; Nile*' National Register, v. 58 (June 20, 1840), p. 241, stated of the Mexican youths, "Two of them were . . . drowned." The Grand Pawnee census totals 1,781, not 1,683 as appears in Hamilton's report. Thus, the grand total, revised, would be 6,342, not 6,244 as he gave it.

April 22. Ewing, Clymer & Co. received an Indian department contract to erect a "church and parsonage house*' at Sugar Creek (Catholic) Mission for the Pottawatomies (in present Linn county). The buildings were to be completed in four months at a cost of $1,640.

Arrival of more Pottawatomies (over 500?) early in October, required an enlargement of the new facility; and on October 23 Joseph Clymer, Jr., got the contract for "making certain additions to a church lately built," to cost $360.

On December 25 the new log church was blessed by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen, S. J., then in charge of Sugar Creek Mission. Ref: 26th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 72 (Serial 383), p. 2; 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 34 (Serial 402), p. 39; T. H. KinseUa's The History of Our Cradle Land . . . (1921), p. 227; G. J. Garraghan's The Jesuits of the Middle United States (New York, 1938), v. 2, pp. 199, 200; SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, p. 124, v. 8, typed copy, pp. 29, 30. The 1840 federal census of Jackson couny, Mo., lists heads of households "G. N[?]. Ewing" and "J. Climer" [Clymer].

Crossing "Kansas" in April, the year's first east-bound company on the Santa Fe trail, arrived at Independence, Mo., early in May. William S. Messervy was one of the principal merchants in this train of about 40 wagons (some of them from Chihuahua). The traders brought "a quantity of gold and silver." See, also, June 30 annals entry.

Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, May 11, 1840 (as reprinted in Nebraska State Historical Society Publications, v. 20, p. 108); The Weekly Picayune, New Orleans, May 25, 1840 (or, see J. E. Sunder, editor, Matt Field on the Santa Fe Trail [Norman, c1960], p. xxiv); Niles' National Register, v. 58 (May 23, 1840), p. 192.

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April 30. Andrew Drips headed the American Fur Company's caravan which set out for the Rocky mountains. Cotraveler Father Pierre- Jean De Smet wrote: "I started from Westport on the 30th of April in company with the Annual Expedition. . . ." Joel P.

Walker later recollected there were 40 men, 30 carts (two-wheeled; each drawn by two mules tandem), and some 60 pack mules, in the traders' outfit. Seven of the carts, and 16 mules (also eight horses), belonged to Henry Fraeb and Jim Bridger (new partners). Some of the 40 men were in their employ.

Father De Smet (en route to explore the prospects for establishing an Indian mission in the northwest) had reached Westport on April 11, and by the 20th had purchased four horses and three mules for the journey. (Walker recollected that De Smet joined them "at Kaw river with six or eight men and pack mules.")

With Joel P. Walker (brother of mountain man Joseph R. Walker) were his wife, Mary (Young) Walker, their four children (John, Joseph, Newton, Isabella), also, Mrs. Walker's sister, Martha Young. They had two wagons. (The Walkers, residents for some years of the Independence, Mo., area, planned to settle in California. One historian has referred to them as the "first family of avowed emigrants that came to Oregon or the Pacific coast.")

Also accompanying the fur traders were six Oregon-bound missionaries: the Rev. Harvey Clark (a Congregationalist) with his wife; and laymen Philo B. Little John and Alvin T. Smith, with their wives. The missionaries' outfit included two wagons.

Of the journey across "Kansas" (over the route of 1839 the "Oregon trail" see p. 169), Father De Smet wrote: "Until the 17th of May we traveled westward over immense plains, destitute of trees or shrubs, except along the streams, and broken by deep ravines, where our voyageurs lowered and raised the carts by means of ropes. . . . often the thermometer would be as low as 27 in the morning, though it might rise to 90 by noon. The strong winds that prevail unceasingly in these vast plains make the heat supportable. . . ."

On May 18 the caravan crossed the 30-mile plain from the Little Blue to the Platte river; and on June 30 reached the mouth of Horse creek, in the Green river valley, where the 16th (and last) annual trappers' rendezvous was to be held.

Subsequently the three missionary couples, and the Walkers, made their way to Oregon (but in 1841 the Walkers went overland to California). Father De Smet, after traveling as far as Pierre's Hole (where he met the Flathead Indians), came down the Missouri (by horseback, and canoe), to Council Bluffs [Iowa]; left there December 14; reached Westport on the 22d; and arrived at St. Louis on the last day of 1840. Ref: H. M. Chittenden and A. T. Richardson's Life, Letters and Travels of Father Pierre-Jean De Smet, S. (New York, 1905), v. 1, pp. 198-258, 270; Joel P. Walker's narrative, A Pioneer of Pioneers . . . (Los Angeles, Glen Dawson, 1953); H. H. Bancroft's History of Oregon, v. 1, 1838-1848 (San Francisco, 1886), pp. 239-241; The Pacific Northwest Quarterly, Seattle, v. 35 (January, 1944), pp. 29-43 (especially p. 34, for De Smet's letter dated Westport, April 20, 1840); Robert Newell's Memoranda . . ., edited

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by Dorothy O. Johansen (Portland, Ore., 1959), p. 39; "Chouteau Account Books" (in Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis), items of March 13-16, 1840 (courtesy of Dale L. Morgan, of the Bancroft Library); Glimpses of the Past, St. Louis, v. 8 (January- June, 1941), p. 42; History of Sonoma County . . . (San Francisco, 1880), pp. 482-484.

Within this year (in the spring?), it is said, Joseph Papin and his half-Kansa wife, "Josette” (Gonville) Papin (see p. 76 for their 1837 marriage) took up residence on Kansa half-breed reserve No. 3 (across the Kansas river from present south Topeka), which had been alloted under the 1825 treaty to "Josette" Gonville.

(For location on the north side of the Kansas, in present Soldier township, Shawnee co. see outline map in KHQ, v. 28, p. 59.)

In December, 1841, Isaac McCoy (employed by the government in an abortive effort to extinguish all 23 Kansa half-breed reserves) indicated that 22 of the 640-acre tracts should be purchased at $800 ($1.25 an acre) each; but that Josette Papin had made improvements on her section worth $250, and ought to receive $1,050. Ref: W. W. Cone's Historical Sketch of Shawnee County . . . (Topeka, 1877), p. 7; Isaac McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27 (for McCoy's December 22, 1841, report to the secretary of war); A. T. Andreas and W. G. Cutler, History of the State of Kansas (Chicago, 1883), pp. 531, 532. The fact that Father Point's 1840 list of Kaw's mouth residents (see November 1 entry) does not include the Papin name, tends to corroborate the Papins' presence in "Kansas" prior to November, 1840.

April. The Rev. Isaac McCoy's History of Baptist Indian Missions a 611-page volume, written from the viewpoint of his more than 20 years of missionary operations, and based upon a journal he had kept during that span of time was in process of publication at Washington and in New York.

McCoy's preface was dated "Shawanoe Baptist Mission, Indian Territory, December, 1839," and his history was inclusive to that date. A receipt of April 18, 1840 (in the McCoy Collection), shows payment by Isaac McCoy of $500 to printer Peter Force, of Washington, for his work on the History. Ref: Isaac McCoy's History of Baptist Indian Missions . . . (Washington and New York, 1840); McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27, KHi ms. division (for receipt).

May(?) The spring caravan to Santa Fe a small one was made up principally of Mexican proprietors. Don Jose Chavez y Castillo and his party had merchandise valued at $75,000 (goods purchased in the East during the preceding winter) which was freighted in 11 wagons. One of the U. S. citizens had three wagons.

The caravan reached Santa Fe in July. Don Jose Chavez y Castillo paid $1,200 in duties to Mexican customs officials, but the U. S. citizen with only three wagons was compelled to pay $1,286. Dr. John H. Lyman perhaps traveled to New Mexico with this company. Darby H. Cantrell was in charge of wagons and some 30 mules belonging to Manuel Alvarez on this trip.

war

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Ref: The Weekly Picayune, June 12, 1840 (or, see Sunder, op. tit., p. xxiv); H. H. Dunham's "Sidelights on Santa Fe Traders 1839-1846," in 1950 Brand Book (Denver, C1951), p. 286; H. R. Wagner and C. L. Camp, The Plains and the Rockies . . ., 3d edition (Columbus, Ohio, 1953), p. 128; Office of Indian Affairs (OIA), National Archives Microcopy 234, Roll 301.

May 22. Edward Papin, son of Pierre Melicour Papin (the American Fur Company's trader with the Osages) and his part- Osage wife Sophie Mongrain, was baptized near the Marais des Cygnes (in present Linn? county) by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen.

Edward Papin was born, it appears, July 12, 1838. Sponsor at the baptism was Michel Giraud, of the American Fur Company's Marais des Cygnes post. Ref: "Pottawatomie Baptismal Register," p. 34, at St. Mary's College, St. Marys.

On May 25 tourist Victor Tixier (young French medical student), three companions (James De Berty Trudeau, Alexandre Guerin, Foureau), and two half-breed Osage guides entered present Bourbon county. Moving southwest, this mounted party camped for the night near the "Panie-Tanga" (Big Pawnee), now Pawnee creek (a tributary of the Marmaton's South Fork); and on May 27, following several hours of travel ( and after fording the "Nion-Chou" [Neosho]), reached the Osage town of Manrinhabotso ("The Village Which Scrapes the Sky" see KHQ, v. 28, p. 508), and the home of Trader Pierre M. Papin, their host (in present Neosho county).

[Tixier and his friends, while passengers on a New Orleans-to-St. Louis steamboat, early in May, had met Paul Ligueste Chouteau who influenced them to make the journey to the Osages' country. Before May 19 they had reached Independence, Mo. (and made a trip to Westport, and the Shawnee reserve, in search of horses); then moved southward on May 20; and reached George Douglass* Vernon county, Mo., farm (northeast of present Deerfield, Mo.) on the 22d. There they remained two days before starting west into "Kansas."

Tixier's account of his journey to, and subsequent experiences among, the Osages, together with much valuable commentary on the Indians (their situation, civilization, culture, etc.) was originally published in France in 1844, under the title Voyage aux Prairies Osages, Louisiana et Missouri, 1839-40.]

Besides Manrinhabotso (where Baptiste Mongrain was "chief), there were, by Tixier's description, three other Great Osage towns within a few miles: Naniompa ("The Village of the Pipe") where old White Hair (about 80; uncle of the Osages' great chief) and young [George] White Hair (cousin of the Osages' great chief) lived; Maisons Cailles, the town of Chief White Hair, the reigning chief of all the Osage Indians, who was called Majakita (or, The Lips); Coeurs Tranquilles (village of the "Quiet Hearts") a town of young warriors known as the "Bande-des-Chiens" (Band of Dogs) whose chief was Man-chap-che-mani. Also, there was an "independent republic" village not far away, where Ouachinka-lagri (Bel Oiseau; or, Handsome Bird) was chief.

On June 4 the Osages set out for the summer hunt, heading west (northwest at first) to the Verdigris. At the camp that first night out, there were

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some 200 lodges, 1,500 men, the same number of dogs, and 3,000 horses (by Tixier's estimate). Pierre M. Papin, his Indian family, and entourage, plus his four guests, constituted one lodge of some 15 persons.

Several days' travel beyond their fording of the Arkansas, the Osages reached the buffalo country. Near the camp they set up were some 200 lodges of Kansa. Tixier remarked how different "the Kansa lodges were from ours." "Each frame," he wrote, "was covered with skins decorated with red, yellow, blue, and black designs which, through their primitive simplicity, recall the ancient Egyptian paintings." And he noted that the Kansa girls were "much prettier" than the Osage.

The Kansa head chief "White Feather" [White Plume II], invited "Majakita, Baptiste, and some of the principal [Osage] chiefs, and us, the white warriors" to a banquet, wrote Tixier. He described "White Feather" as "a short, wiry man with an aquiline nose and piercing eyes." [White Plume II, leading chief since Autumn (?) 1838, apparently died prior to February, 1841. Tixier's comment, plus Artist Alfred Jacob Miller's portrait see note in KHQ, v. 29, pp. 64, 65, and Isaac McCoy's mention of him (in ibid., p. 159), give the only information known about White Plume II, who was so briefly leader of the Kansa.]

After hunting and traveling together for six days, the two nations separated. The Osages moved on west till near the end of June when they reached the "warpaths." Then they changed course to the southeast so as to approach the Great Saline. Around July 20 they made a one-day, 25-mile-each-way round trip to the Saline for a supply of salt. [See account of G. C. Sibley's trip in 1811, with the Osages, to the "Grand Saline," in KHQ, v. 27, p. 370.]

Then the Indians headed for the Arkansas river; and continued eastward to their Neosho river villages. Tixier noted that the Osages had "secured rather large provisions," and that the place where they had found the "largest number of bison" was on the "River Bahabeh" [or, "Pa-ha-bee"? probably the present Bluff creek (tributary of the Chikaskia), which crosses present Harper and Summer counties in Kansas, and Kay county, Okla.]. The night before they reached home the Osages camped on the "river 'A-la-bete' " [Labette creek].

On August 8 Victor Tixier and his three companions left Pierre M. Papin's house to retrace their pathway of May to George Douglass* farm in Missouri. Tixier reached St. Louis late in August (he had gone down the Osage to its mouth in a canoe, then boarded the steamboat Thames}-, proceeded to New York; and sailed for France on September 25, reaching home a month later. Ref: Tixier's Travels on the Osage Prairies, edited by John F. McDermott (Norman, Okla., 1940); R. A. Galloway's report of September 1, 1843, in SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 8, typed copy, pp. 228-239, helps to clarify the identity of the head chief White Hair (or, Pahuscah).

May-June. "Messrs. Bent & St. Vrain" arrived in St. Louis at the beginning of July on the steamboat Euphrasie with 15,000 buffalo robes and a considerable amount of furs. These traders had left Fort William ("Bent's Fort") in May to bring their laden wagons across "Kansas" on the Santa Fe trail. They reached Independence, Mo., in June. Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, June 12, July 3, 1840 (as reprinted in Nebraska State Historical Society Publications, v. 20, pp. 108, 109).

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BORN: on June 7, at Shawnee Friends Mission (present Johnson county), Nathan Pearson, son of mission superintendent Moses Pearson and his wife Sarah. (See June, 1837, annals entry.) Ref: The History of Miami County, Ohio (1880), p. 849; W. W. Hinshaw's Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy, Ann Arbor, Mich., v. 5, p. 819.

June 10. At Joseph Robidoux's "Blacksnake Hills" trading post (present St. Joseph, Mo.) a post office was established. Julius C. Robidoux (a son of Joseph) was the first postmaster. (His successor was appointed August 7, 1841.) Ref: The History of Buchanan County, Missouri (1881), p. 413; and see KHC, v. 10, p. 319.

June 13. New superintendents Henry and Ann (Maden) Harvey, with six of their children (aged 3 to 18 ) , from Clinton county, Ohio, arrived at Shawnee Friends Mission (present Johnson county). David Jones, a teacher they had hired, had preceded them and was at the mission when they arrived.

[The Harveys replaced Moses and Sarah Pearson (see June, 1837, annals, p. 69); they stayed two years; and were succeeded in 1842 by Thomas and Esther (Cattell) French.]

By July 1, the mission school (with 27 pupils) had been resumed. (It had been discontinued in March with the departure of teacher Elias Newby.) At the beginning of September there were 36 children (22 males, 14 females) attending. All except two were Shawnees. Ref: W. W. Hinshaw's Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy, v. 5, pp. 544d, 572; KHC, v. 8, p. 252, v. 13, p. 348; Some Account of the Conduct of the Religious Society of Friends Towards the Indian Tribes . . . (London, 1844), p. 241; Henry Harvey's History of the Shawnee Indians, From . . . 1681 to 1854 . . .

(Cincinnati, 1855), p. 250. The Harveys' children (and their ages) as of spring, 1840, were: George M. (21), who, it appears did not come to "Kansas," Caleb E. (18), Mary (16), Deborah (14), Samuel (9), Henry C. (6), and Ann B. (3). "Maden" seems to be correct as Mrs. Harvey's maiden name, but the common spelling is "Madden."

June. Dr. Joseph R. De Prefontaine, of Westport, Mo., was employed to give smallpox vaccinations to "such Indians as may stand in need of the Operation" in R. W. Cummins' Fort Leavenworth Agency and A. L. Davis* Osage [Marais des Cygnes] River Sub- agency. (See September, 1839, annals for his work in 1839.)

The Indian department had authorized only $200 for this purpose. On July 20 the physician visited the Ottawas, who gathered at the Baptist mission for their vaccinations. Ref: SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, p. 90 (Joshua Pilcher's May 28, 1840, letter); Jotham Meeker's "Dairy"; 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 164 (Serial 403), p. 20.

June 30(?) "Hicks and Marney," of Boone county, Mo., arrived at Independence, Mo., from Santa Fe. Between 20 and 30 wagons (as reported ) were in the train which they headed.

At St. Louis (in mid- July) it was stated: "This company and the one which

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arrived in May have brought about $200,000 in specie and bullion." (One wagon, from Chihuahua, of the above train, was said to have brought into St. Louis $50,000 in bullion and $30,000 in specie.) Ref: Missouri Daily Argus, July 9, 23, 1840; James J. Webb in Adventures in the Santa Fe Trade . . . (1931), p. 133, refers to traders "Hicks and Marney."

As July opened it was harvest time at Shawnee Methodist Mission and Indian manual labor school (present Johnson county). The farmer in charge, "Mr. Kline," had 90 acres of wheat to cut; and also had the care of 100 acres of timothy and 125 of oats. "Our wheat and oats are first rate," wrote Missionary Thomas Johnson, "and if we can save them will very much lessen the current expenses of the institution.”

In mid-September a report of the institution gave these crop statistics: "about 2,000 bushels of wheat, 4,000 bushels of oats, 3,500 bushels of corn, 500 bushels of potatoes. . . ." Ref: Christian Advocate and Journal, New York, v. 15 (November 25, 1840), p. 58; Comm'r of Indian affairs Report for 1840 (Agent R. W. Cummins' report). The identity of "Mr. Kline" has not been determined. Perhaps he was Charles Kline who had journeyed to the Rocky mountains with the 1839 American Fur Company expedition, and returned in the autumn, by way of Bent's Fort, and the Santa Fe trail, with Dr. F. A. Wislizenus and Paul Richardson.

July 3. At Delaware Methodist Mission (present Wyandotte county) a newly erected hewed-log meeting house (22'x27') 3 which the Indians themselves had constructed, was dedicated. The Rev. Thomas Johnson (of Shawnee Mission) made the principal address; and the Delawares* second chief (Ketchum, apparently), who was a Christian, also made a speech. Ref: Christian Advocate and Journal, v. 15 (November 25, 1840), p. 58.

July 7. The Jesuits opened a school for Indian boys at Pottawatomie Catholic Mission, on Sugar creek (present Linn county). (See, also, March 10, 1839, entry.) The school was maintained at Sugar creek till 1848; then was transferred to the Pottawatomies* new Kansa river reserve. Ref: G. J. Garraghan's The Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 2, pp. 202, 208, 209, 213.

July. Inspecting at Fort Leavenworth, Col. George Croghan wrote: "The Captain [Thomas Swords, acting quartermaster] has in cultivation a field of about 800 acres in corn, oats, and timothy, which promises fairly. [See June, 1838, annals entry.] When the harvest is gathered in, an estimate of costs may be made out from which a correct decision can be drawn as to the propriety of continuing this system of cultivation." [In 1842 Colonel Croghan, again at Fort Leavenworth, wrote: "The Farm is still kept up, but as yet without profit, nor need profit ever be expected so long as it is cultivated by soldiers and under the direction of a military officer,

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ignorant (as most officers are) of even the first principles of farming. There are a few hired citizens at work on the farm. . . ."] See, also, October 11, 1842, entry. Ref: F. P. Prucha, ed., Army Life on the Western Frontier (c1958), pp. 86, 88. The colonel's 1842 report was dated August 16.

MARRIED. John Tecumseh ("Tauy") Jones (well-educated; half Chippewa and half English, but counted as a Pottawatomie), and Rachel Littleman (a Stockbridge Indian), on July 20, at Ottawa Baptist Mission (present Franklin county), by Jotham Meeker, in the presence of 30 Indians. (See Jones' portrait facing p. 328.)

(In his diary entry of July 21, Meeker recorded: "Br. & Sis. Jones leave for Putawatomie" meaning the settlement at Pottawatomie creek, 12 miles distant.) Ref: Jotham Meeker's "Diary," July 20, 21, 1840; Lewis Henry Morgan's The Indian Journals 1859-62 (Ann Arbor, c!959), pp. 38, 39 (contains some autobiographical information on Jones, and a portrait).

MARRIED: Jean Baptiste St. Michel (half? Osage), and Elizabeth Quenneville (half Osage), daughter of Francois Quenneville (Canville), on August 10, "a la riviere des Osages, American Fur Compy's trading post" (i.e., on the Marais des Cygnes, at present Trading Post, Linn co.), by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen, S. J. Witnesses to the ceremony were: Michel Giraud, Marguerite Renaud, Charles Cardinal, Wossosta, Louis Peltier, Thomas Mongeon, Martin Belhumeur, Francois St. Michel, Joseph Marie, Auguste Kans, Antoine Payne, Solomon Bienville, Francois Queneville, A. Janis(?). These persons were dwellers near, or employees of, the American Fur Company's Marais des Cygnes post.

Among the Osage half-breeds mentioned in the treaty of June 2, 1825, who were to be assigned 640-acre reserves on the north side of the Marais des Cygnes, above Harmony Mission (Mo.) were Baptiste St. Mitchelle, Jr. (also Julia and Francis St. Mitchelle), and Marguerite Reneau (Renaud). Ref: "Pottawatomie Marriage Register," at St. Mary's College, St. Marys; also, in Osage Catholic Mission "Records," v. 1 (microfilm, KHi); W. A. Mitchell's Linn County, Kansas . . . (c1928), pp. 197, 198, mentions "Jean Baptiste" (whose marriage is noted above), and "Michael Giareau" of the Trading Post; Stella M. Drumm, ed., John C. Luttig's Journal . . . (1920), p. 60, has data on Francois Quenneville and his descendants.

August. Bound for Santa Fe, a small caravan carrying goods owned by U. S. citizens apparently crossed "Kansas" during this month. It reached Santa Fe in October. The proprietors had to pay duties higher than those charged their compatriots in July. (See May annals entry.)

According to Josiah Gregg's statistics, 1840 was a poor year in the Santa Fe trade. Not since 1824 had such a small valuation of goods been taken from Missouri to New Mexico. He estimated the merchandise transported to Santa Fe in 1840 at $50,000 (perhaps excluding the Mexican nationals' goods?), with five proprietors, employing some 60 men, and about 30 wagons, in the trade. Ref: 1950 Brand Book (Denver, c1951), p. 268; Josiah Gregg's Commerce of the Prairies (New York, 1844), v. 2, p. 160.

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August(?) The trading expedition of "Metcalf and Richard" may have crossed "Kansas" during this month. A St. Louis newspaper of July 9 had stated these traders would "depart for the Rocky Mountains in ten or fifteen days." Ref: Missouri Argus (daily), July 9, 1840. In a journal entry of July 16, 1843, Theodore Talbot (of Fremont's second expedition) referred to "Metcalf, a trader," as bringing "news from the North Fork of the Platte" to "St. Vrain's Fort" (on the South Platte). In a diary entry on July 5, 1843, Matthew C. Field (with Sir William Drummond's Stewart pleasure party) wrote of encamping "opposite Richard's fort" ["Fort Platte" purchased by Sihille & Adams in 1842 from Lancaster P. Lupton]. It appears that John Reshaw [or, "Richard"] was, for a time, a copartner with Sibille & Adams. Sources for the preceding: The Journals of Theodore Talbot . . ., edited by C. H. Carey (Portland, 1931), p. 23; Matthew C. Field's Prairie and Mountain Sketches . . ., edited by Kate L. Gregg and John F. McDermott (Norman, c1957), p. 74; Dale L. Morgan's letters of June 15 and 28, 1963, to L. Barry.

August-September. Among the Kansa Indians, and at the Kansa Methodist Mission (present Shawnee county), sickness ("fever, and other diseases") was prevalent.

Residing at, and near, the mission were 14 white persons the Rev. William Johnson, his wife, and two children; assistant [Martin?] Greene, his wife; a "young lady" (not identified); also, Kansa farmer David Benzley, his wife, and five children. At one time, Johnson and the "young lady" were administering to 10 sick people. The Kansa farmer's wife [Margaret (Ligget)?] Benzley died; several weeks later, the Johnsons lost their young daughter Mary Frances.

Wrote Missionary Johnson: "While we were sick at the mission, the Indians were suffering equally as much. In some families as many as five died. [Young Kansa head chief White Plume II may have been one of the victims.] But few families escaped disease; and the number of deaths was great in proportion to the number sick. . . . The Indians were gloomy, and not inclined to do anything but prepare for their fall hunt; believing that they would be better off if scattered in the woods, where fresh meat could be obtained. . . . The last two summers have been sickly here [see Autumn, 1839, annals, p. 182], though we have always considered the country very healthy." Ref: KHC, v. 16, p. 231 (for William Johnson's December 30, 1840, letter). In the Jackson county, Mo., marriage records, the marriage of David Benzley and Margaret Ligget is entered as occurring on September 10, 1830. It has been assumed she was the Mrs. Benzley who died in "Kansas" in 1840. For the Greenes, see July 14, 1839, annals entry. In June, 1840, Victor Tixier met the then Kansa head chief White Plume II; but eight months later, in February, 1841, it was "Kihigawatinga" (Fool Chief) who received $1,000, by tribal order, at the payment of the Kansa annuities evidently as head chief of the nation.

September (P) At St. Louis, on August 25, Sup't Joshua Pilcher wrote to Agent R. W. Cummins (in "Kansas"): "A party of men left this city a day or two since for the west, whose object I have casually understood to be an excursion of pleasure towards the Arkansas. . . . the party consists principally of British Officers from Canada. These gentlemen are unknown to me. . . ." Pilcher's letter to Cummins was to ensure that the tourists were apprised

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of the need to obtain a passport (which Cummins could issue) before going into the Indian country, since the intercourse act set a heavy penalty for non-compliance. Ref: SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, pp. 110, 111.

BORN: on September 5, at the new Shawnee Methodist Mission (present Johnson county), Thomas Johnson Greene and Mary Elizabeth Greene, son and daughter of the Rev. Jesse and Mary (Todd) Greene. They were, so far as known, the first white twins born in "Kansas." Ref: KHi's 15th Biennial Report, p. 36; Kansas City (Mo.) Star, January 23, 1925 (for T. J. Greene's recollections of early days at Shawnee Mission).

DIED: Jacques Ash-kum (chief of the Wabash Pottawatomies) , on September 10(?), at the Sugar creek settlement (present Linn county). He was upwards of 70 years old. Burial was on September 11. (See his portrait facing p. 328.) Ref: "Pottawatomie Burial Register," at St. Mary's College, St. Marys.

DIED: Cynthia (Burr) Mercer, wife of Reuben Mercer (of Jackson county, Mo.), on September 11, at Pottawatomie creek (present Franklin county), where the couple was living while Mr. Mercer worked on "Mr. Simerwell's houses" the new buildings at Pottawatomie Baptist Mission (see p. 76).

The Mercers had been married at Otoe Baptist Mission, near the Council Bluffs (Neb.) on August 18, 1836, by the Rev. Moses Merrill. Theirs was one of the early marriages of white persons in "Nebraska." Ref: Jotham Meeker's "Diary," September 12, 1840; Jackson county, Mo., marriage records (for affidavit by Merrill, made at Independence, Mo., February 23, 1837, of the Mercer-Burr marriage); Delilah (McCoy) Lykins' letter of March 31, 1840 (in Isaac McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27), for item on Mercer's work in "Kansas."

September 22. Col. Stephen W. Kearny and 165 First U. S. dragoons left Fort Leavenworth, crossed the Missouri, and marched up the left bank towards the Pottawatomie settlements near present Council Bluffs, Iowa. Capt. Philip St. George Cooke made this trip, and by report, Captains Nathan Boone and James Allen, with their companies, were on the expedition.

By the 29th they were encamped on Mosquito creek (about a mile and a half "from that part of the Missouri river opposite to Belleview" [Bellevue, "Neb."], where they remained till October 7. During that time the Pottawatomies received their annuities under dragoon supervision; and Colonel Kearny held councils with the Indians. A problem relating to a band of some 150 lowas residing on the Pottawatomies' reserve was resolved when the latter requested that the lowas not be forced to remove. Pottawatomie chiefs Joseph Lafromboise, Wam-goe-see, Sau-ke-nosh [Sagaunash? Billy Caldwell?], and Half Day were among those who took part in the proceedings.

336 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

On October 14 Colonel Kearny and his command were back at Fort Leavenworth. Ref: Office of Indian Affairs (OIA), Letters received from SIA, St. Louis (National Archives Microcopy No. 234, Roll 752), Col. S. W. Kearny's report, October 16, 1840; Missouri Argus (daily), September 28, 1840; Comm'r of Indian affairs Report for 1840.

October 6. Emigrant Pottawatomies (from northern Indiana and southern Michigan) , reported to number 524 persons on arrival, reached the reservation in "Kansas" south of the Marais des Cygnes river. Their conductor was Samuel P. Brady.

[The subsistence and transportation west of this party was by war department contract of June 13 (made by Bvt. Brig. Gen. Hugh Brady) with Alexis Coquillard, of South Bend, Ind., who agreed to remove the Indians for the sum of $55 each.]

It appears that the Rev. Stanislaus A. Bernier (Catholic) accompanied (but did not remain with) this party; and that most (or all?) of the immigrants settled with the Sugar creek Pottawatomies (in present Linn county). See, also, November 25 entry. Ref: 26th Cong., 2d Sess., Sen. Doc. No. 161 (Serial 378), p. 37; 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 143 (Serial 403), pp. 26-29, 151; SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, pp. 126-128; G. J. Garraghan's The Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 2, p. 190; Niles' National Register, v. 59 (September 12, 26, 1840), pp. 17, 50.

BORN: on October 8, at Shawnee Baptist Mission (present Johnson county), Mary Frances Barker, daughter (and first child) of the Rev. Francis and Elizabeth F. (Churchill) Barker. (See October 23, 1839, annals entry.) Ref: Elizabeth F. Barker's Barker Genealogy (New York, 1927), p. 199; "Barker Collection," in KHi ms. division. In KHi's 15th Biennial Report, p. 36, the name is incorrectly given as "Frances Elizabeth Mary Barker." Mary Frances Barker married William L. Miles in 1873; died in 1917.

MARRIED: Thomas Mongeon (half Osage) and Helene De'haitre (the widow Bastien), on October 26, at the American Fur Company's Marais des Cygnes post (present Linn county), by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen, S. J. (See, also, August 10 entry. )

Witnesses were: John Basile, Michel Giraud, Andrew Drips, Louis Peltier, J. Arquoite, John Michel [St. Mitchelle?], N(?) Woester(P), J. Petre, J. Michel [St. Mitchelle?], Solomon Bienville, J. Queneville, B. L'Habitant, A. Payne. Ref: "Pottawatomie Marriage Register," at St. Mary's College, St. Marys; also in Osage Catholic Mission "Records," v. 1 (microfilm, KHi); and see G. J. Garraghan's The Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 2, p. 230. The "Pottawatomie Baptismal Register," p. 66, has record of the baptism, on August 7, 1841, of this couple's son Joseph. The mother's name is given as "d' Etre." "Mongeon" is, presumably, a form of the name "Mongrain."

October 31 and November 2. At Sugar creek (present Linn county), Comm'r Alexis Coquillard held councils with the Pottawatomies (all except Chief To-pin-a-bee and part of his band attended) on the subject of reuniting the nation by removing the

Council Bluffs (Iowa) Pottawatomies to the reserve in "Kansas." [Bvt. Brig. Gen. Hugh Brady had appointed Coquillard, of South Bend, Ind.,

KANSAS BEFORE 1854: A REVISED ANNALS 337

and the Rev. Isaac McCoy, of Westport, Mo., commissioners to treat with the Indians on this matter. Coquillard arrived at Westport on October 26; consulted with McCoy (who drew up a treaty form); then proceeded southward to the Marais des Cygnes. George Crawford (secretary) accompanied him.]

"Sag-au-naw"[?] was principal spokesman for the "Kansas" Pottawatomies at both councils. Other chiefs who indicated approval of the plan included Che-bas, We-we-saw, Che-chaw-cose, Be-se-ah, Pa-ma-di-si, Louison, and loway. Witnesses to the unilateral agreement were Crawford, and Pottawatomies Abram Burnett (interpreter), Andrew Jackson, Richard Furman, Joseph N. Bourassa, and Lewis Compant. See, also, November 9 entry. Ref: 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 143 (Serial 403), pp. 23, 24, 139-144; Isaac McCoy's letter of January 1, 1841, in McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27.

November 1. The Rev. Nicholas Point, S. J., arrived at Westport Landing to take charge of the St. Francis Regis (originally "Chouteau's Church" see KHQ, v. 28, pp. 507, 508) parish, in present Kansas City, Mo. He remained till May 10, 1841.

"The district [at the Kaw's mouth] in which I took up my abode," wrote Father Point, "was peopled by an assemblage of 23 Indian families each family group comprising a Frenchman with his Indian wife and half-breed children." He sketched a map of his parish, listing the residents' names (including several non-French persons). Some of these people (listed below) had been connected with "Kansas" history in the early 1800s; and others (or their relatives) became "Kansas" residents in the 1840's, or later:

(1) Mission-church, (2) [Moyse] Bellemaire and Clement [Lessert], (3) Gerber, (4) [Joseph] Carboneau, (5) [Antoine] De Laurier, (6) Tremble, (7) [Joseph] Vertefeuille, (8) [Pierre] Laliberte, (9) [Joseph] Rivard, (10) Petit Louis [Louis Prieu, step-son of Grand Louis Bertholet], (11) [Andrew B.] Campville [Canville], (12) Cadoret, (13) Widow Rivard, (14) Widow Chouteau [Berenice (Menard) Chouteau, widow of Francis G.], (15) Grand Louis [Bertholet], (16) [Gabriel] Philibert, (17) Peria, (18) Benjamin [Lagautherie], (19) [John?] Gray, (20) Prud'homme, (21) Edouard, (22) Bowird [William Bowers], (23) Ben., (24) [Andrew] Drips, (25) [Thomas A.] Smart, (26) Meguille. Ref: G. J. Garraghan's Catholic Beginnings in Kansas City, Missouri (Chicago, 1920), pp. 101, 102; also his The Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 1, p. 261; Kansas City (Mo.) Times, November 4, 1948 (also, in KHi library, in Kansas City, Mo., history "Clippings," v. 5, pp. 74, 75). Possibly "Gerber" was Joseph Jarboe. "Widow Rivard" was, it appears, Frances (Roy) Rivard, widow of Joseph Rivard. 'Teria" was, perhaps, 'Terrier."

The Prud'homme household doubtlessly included Mrs. Gabriel Prudhomme. "Edouard," according to Mrs. Blanche O. Garrison, of Bartlesville, Okla., was Edouard La Chasse. "Meguille" is generally supposed to be a spelling of Magill, or McGill.

November 9. The Rev. William Hamilton (of "loway and Sac Mission/' present Doniphan county) wrote that the resident missionaries were Samuel M. Irvin, Henry Bradley, William Hamilton, and their wives.

The summer school had averaged about 30 students, who were taught in English. The lowas were decreasing rapidly; the five houses for the chiefs (per September, 1836, treaty) had been erected; their mill (for lack of a substantial dam) was doing little business; many lowas had sold their farming

338 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

tools to whisky traders; and had also killed their stock. They had dismissed their government farmers and smiths about a year earlier. Some of the lowas were on the Pottawatomies' reserve (in Iowa). The Sacs had torn down most of their mill ( no water had ever run in the mill race ) ; and had also destroyed part of their houses. They were averse to missionary operations.

In 1841 (?) Isaac McCoy was told by the Rev. S. M. Irvin that the lowas numbered about 600 (450 on the reserve; 150 among the Pottawatomies ) ; that the principal chiefs were White Cloud and No Heart; and that this tribe had employed Francis Irvin (father of Samuel M.) as their farmer. The "Sauks" (Sacs & Foxes of Missouri) were supposed to number about 600. Their principal chiefs were Nesoquot and Shakopee. Ref: Isaac McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27 (for Hamilton's letter dated "Liberty Nov. 9th 1840"; and McCoy's notes from Irvin, a few pages following the letter).

November 9. Comm'rs Alexis Coquillard and Isaac McCoy, their secretary George Crawford, Dr. Johnston Lykins, with part Pottawatomies Luther Rice and Joseph Bertrand, Jr. (interpreters), also J. B. Bertrand (in charge of the pack horse), set out from Westport, Mo., for Council Bluffs (Iowa).

They reached the Pottawatomie reserve on the 16th; found the Indians had left in October for the hunting grounds; sent out runners to bring them in for a council. Finally, on January 2, 1841, the commissioners met with some of the Pottawatomie chiefs (one being "Wau-pen-say" Wau-bon-seh? ) and discussed the subject of removal from the Council Bluffs reserve to the Pottawatomie reserve in "Kansas" (south of the Marais des Cygnes). "Shaw-be-my" was spokesman for the Council Bluffs Indians at this meeting (which accomplished nothing). Ref: 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 143 (Serial 403), pp. 144-146; McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27, for Isaac McCoy's letter of November 22, 1840.

November 16. Missionary (and printer) John G. Pratt and his wife, Olivia (Evans) Pratt, returned to Shawnee Baptist Mission, after a year in the East where Mrs. Pratt had been restored to good health. A teacher, Abigail Ann Webster, accompanied them to "Kansas," and on December 1, under the superintendence of the Rev. Francis Barker, assumed charge of the mission school of 10 pupils. Ref: The Baptist Missionary Magazine, v. 20 (June, 1840), p. 127, v. 21 (March, 1841), p. 80. The Pratts had come to "Kansas," originally, in May, 1837. See Kansas Historical Quarterly, v. 29, p. 66.

November 25. About 439 Pottawatomies (from southern Michigan and northern Indiana), conducted by Robert A. Forsyth, reached the reservation in "Kansas" south of the Marais des Cygnes river. Apparently most (or all) these Indians settled with their kinsmen on Pottawatomie creek (in present Miami and Franklin counties). See, also, October 6 entry.

Bvt. Brig. Gen. Hugh Brady, with 200 soldiers, and 100 mounted volunteers had rounded up these very reluctant emigrants in the late summer and early autumn; then herded them cross-country to Peru, III, where they were placed

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aboard a steamboat. (For the capture of a chief [?] named Muc-mote [Muck-e-moote], one citizen received payment of $100.) The "bold and determined conduct" of Robert A. Forsyth in handling the Pottawatomies made it unnecessary to send a military escort on the steamboat. Before November 11 the emigrants had reached St. Louis and were encamped about 20 miles from the city, awaiting transportation to "Kansas." The Rev. Isaac S. Ketchum (an assistant Indian agent) accompanied this party; and a "Mr. Kercheval" was assistant conductor.

The subsistence and transportation West of these Pottawatomies was by war department contract (made by General Brady on August 4) with James J. and Peter Godfrey (who were to receive $60 per Indian). The emigrants' destitute condition, the late traveling season, and early severe weather required the government to furnish them with over $6,000 worth of clothing. After their arrival in "Kansas," Subagent Anthony L. Davis made further contracts for their subsistence.

Chiefs, or head men, Os-met, Was-saw-we, Ken-kosh, Kapes-co-wet, To-pen-ebi, 2d, and others (some 30 in all), of the above party, wrote a letter dated "Pottawatomie Creek, Feb. 3, 1841," to the secretary of war, stating that "Muck-e-moote" and three others of the tribe who had started to Washington in January (?), with the Rev. Isaac S. Ketchum, "are not considered by us as chiefs. . . ." Ref: 26th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 72 (Serial 383), p. 3 (for Godfrey contract); 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 143 (Serial 403), pp. 28-32, 34, 50, 51, 138; 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 164 (Serial 403), p. 70; Niles* National Register, v. 59 (November 7, 1840), p. 148; SIA, v. 7, typed copy, pp. 141, 142, v. 8, typed copy, p. 63; Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collections, Lansing, v. 21 (1892), pp. 305-311; S. W. Durant's History of Ingham and Eaton Counties, Michigan . . . (Philadelphia, 1880), p. 350.

December. As Agent R. W. Cummins reported it: "The Kanzas Indians while in the buffaloe grounds this winter, sent out a war party of Sixty five men, they came across a party of (Seventeen lodges) Pawnees, the men were absent in search of buffaloe, the Kanzas rushed into the lodges, killed they say, Sixty or upwards women and children and took eleven prisoners, five women and six children. . . ."

According to another account (via Fort Leavenworth), the Kansa "laid in ambush near the ill-fated encampment until they saw the Pawnee warriors, numbering but 17, depart for their hunting ground. The Kanzas warriors, 65 in all, then commenced a murderous fire upon the defenceless women and children [and three men, one blind], which they continued until they supposed all within the encampment had been killed. On entering the scene of carnage they tomahawked and scalped more than 70 of their victims they found 12 (six women and as many children) unhurt, whom they decided to retain as prisoners. . . ." (One of these women fought her captors and was killed.) These Indians were stated to be "Pawnee Republics."

Kansa missionary William Johnson wrote that there were 19 Pawnee lodges (a camp of around 150? Indians); that the Kansa "killed and scalped about 93, and took 11 prisoners, 10 horses, and all the articles they could pack, out of their houses [lodges], burned the balance, and then fled. . . . they shot some dead, and others they thrust through with the spear. . . ."

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Ref: SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 8, typed copy, pp. 69, 70 (for Cummins' March 1, 1841, letter); Arkansas State Gazette, Little Rock, April 7, 1841 (reprinting of a St. Louis Gazette article), or, see KHQ, v. 11, p. 399; KHC, v. 16, pp. 232, 233; Niles' National Register, v. 60 (April 3, 1841), p. 68. Father DeSmet, in 1841, referred to the "ninety" Pawnee scalps taken by the Kansa. See Chittenden and Richardson, op. cit., v. 1, p. 285.

Employed in "Kansas" by the Indian Department during all, or part of the year 1840 were the following persons:

FORT LEAVENWORTH AGENCY Agent Richard W. Cummins; Interpreters Henry Tiblow and Clement Lessert; Blacksmiths William F. Newton (for Delawares), Robert Dunlap (for Shawnees), Greenup Dodson (for Shawnees), W. J. Baugh (for Kansa); Assistant blacksmiths W. H. Newton (for Delawares), Benjamin Rodgers, Wilson Rodgers, James M. Simpson, and Jackson Pitman (all for the Shawnees); Charles Fish (for Kansa); Farmers James Hays (for Kansa), and David Benzley (for Kansa).

GREAT NEMAHA SUB AGENCY (re-established) Subagent Congreve Jackson (beginning November 15); Interpreter Jeffrey Dorion; Assistant blacksmith: John B. Rubeti (for lowas).

OSAGE [MARAIS DES CYGNES] RIVER SUBAGENCY Subagent Anthony L. Davis; Interpreter Luther Rice; Blacksmiths Robert Simerwell (appointed June) and Robert Wilson (both for Pottawatomies ) ; Assistant blacksmiths John Leib (appointed June 1) and D. Moreland (both for Pottawatomies).

OSAGE SUBAGENCY Subagent Congreve Jackson (transferred to Great Nemaha Subagency late in 1840), succeeded by Robert A. Galloway (beginning near end of 1840?); Interpreter Charles Mongrain; Blacksmiths John Lemons, and John C. Brashears (appointed March 4); Assistant blacksmiths Peter Kannab, and E. W. Black (appointed March 4). Ref: 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 41 (Serial 402); 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 164 (Serial 403), pp. 63, 73, 75, 89, 90, 96, 97; SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, pp. 55, 57, 72, 142, 143, 145, 146, 387, and v. 8, typed copy, p. 257.

1841

MARRIED: Moyse Bellemare (a French-Canadian, from Yama-chiche, Quebec) and Adele Lessert (half -Kansa daughter of Clement Lessert, a French-Canadian), on January 7, at present Kansas City, Mo., by the Rev. Nicholas Point, S. J.

In the Kansa treaty of June 3, 1825, "Adel" (then a child) and her brother "Clement" (who died young) were the first-named of the 23 half-breeds who were each to receive a 640-acre reserve on the Kansas river. Some time in the 1840's Moyse and Adele (Lessert) Bellemare moved from the Kaw's mouth [Kansas City, Mo.] to present Shawnee county, to make their home on reserve No. 2 (see Shawnee county map in KHQ, v. 28, p. 59). "Moses Bellemore," but not his family, was recorded in the Kansas territorial census of 1855. The state census of 1865 listed the "Bellmore" family as follows: Moses (52), Adell (42), Joseph (17; born in Missouri!?]), Julia (12), and Leonard (4), both born in Kansas. Ref: "Westport Register," at St. Mary's College, St. Marys; G. J. Garraghan's The

Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 1, p. 263; Isaac McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27 (McCoy's December 22, 1841, report); KHC, v. 8, pp. 482, 483; 37th Cong., 2d Sess., Sen.Ex. Doc. No. 58 (Serial 1122), pp. 2, 11; Kansas territorial census, 1855, 12th district, p.

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5; Kansas state census, 1865, Soldier township, Shawnee co.; Kansas City chapter, D. A. R., Vital Historical Records of Jackson County, Missouri . . . (c!934), pp. 92, 95, 266 (for items on children born to the Bellemares). Mrs. Theodore Bellmard, in a letter of

April 17, 1962, to L. Barry, wrote that Joseph Napoleon Bellmard's application for a Civil War pension states he was bom at "Topeka," August 1, 1847. (He was the "Joseph" aged 17 in 1865, noted above.) The Bellemares were not listed in the 1860 or 1870 federal censuses.

January. The Kansa Indians returned from the buffalo country to their villages, bringing the prisoners taken in the December massacre of the Pawnee Republic camp.

Wrote Missionary William Johnson, at the end of January: "Since the Indians came in, the war song and scalp dance constitute their daily employment. All other matters . . . are laid aside. The effect of this massacre upon the tribe at large, in paralyzing all our operations, is now felt to an alarming extent. There are but few men ... of the Kanzas now disposed to think of anything but a defense against the attacks of the Pawnees, now exasperated at the slaughter of their women and children.

"The upper village of Kanzas have fled from their town, and expect to wander to and fro for the balance of the year. They talk of planting a little corn at their town, but even that is uncertain. The village near the mission are so elated with their past act of bravery, that they have done little else than dance since they came in. The few families who were building houses near the mission are now the subjects of laughter and sport by the new-made braves. The number who are now disposed to build houses and provide for their families is small, not more than 15 families in all. . . . The prospect of reforming these people is truly gloomy at present. . . ." Ref: KHC, v. 16, pp. 233, 234 (Johnson's letter of January 30, 1841, reprinted from the Christian Advocate and Journal, v. 15, p. 122).

February. Agent R. W. Cummins, accompanied by a First U. S. dragoon escort (Capt. Eustace Trenor, Asst. Surg. Alfred W. Kennedy, and Company F), arrived at the principal Kansa village on the 22nd. (The troops had left Fort Leavenworth on February 17.) Cummins' two-fold purpose: (1) to make the annual annuity payment ($2,500 to the tribe; also, $1,000 to chief "Kihigawatinga" [Fool Chief] by order of the Kansa), and (2) to recover the 11 women and children of the Pawnee Republic band held captive by the Kansa since December, 1840.

The agent later reported: ". . . they gave up the prisoners the same evening [February 22] without hesitation, they were much alarmed at the approach of the troops. ... As the prisoners were naked I was compelled to purchase them some clothing and blankets.”

The dragoons, with the 11 Pawnees, returned to Fort Leavenworth on March 1. On the 5th Lt. Charles F. Ruff, with a few troops, set out from the post "to convey the Pawnee prisoners to Bellevue [Neb.]," where they would "meet their missionaries and some members of their own tribe." Ref: Arkansas State Gazette, April 7, 1841 (or, see KHQ, v. 11, p. 399); SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 8, typed copy, pp. 69, 70, and v. 7, typed copy, pp. 175-177; 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 164 (Serial 403), p. 90 (for item on "Kihigawatinga," also

342 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

for items that Frederick Chouteau was paid $45 for "blankets furnished Pawnee prisoners," and William Johnson received $29.20 "for transportation of Kanzas annuity &c and shirts for Pawnee prisoners."

BORN: on March 9, at Fort Leavenworth, Louisa Kearny, daughter of Col. Stephen W. and Mary (Radford) Kearny. (The colonel also noted in his diary: "Snowed all day to a depth of ten inches.") Ref: D. L. Clarke's Stephen Watts Kearny . . . (Norman, c1961), p. 81.

March. While the Osages received their annual annuity, Sub-agent Robert A. Galloway had a census taken. There were, he reported, 1,484 men, 1,436 women, and 1,375 children a total of 4,295 souls. (In 1840 it had been estimated the Osages had 1,024 "warriors." The report of the Comm'r of Indian affairs, in late 1841, gave the Osage population as 5,120. Also, see March, 1836, annals, p. 44. ) Ref: Galloway's report, and the commissioner's, are in Report of the Comm'r of Indian affairs, 1841; 26th Cong., 1st Sess., Sen. Doc. No. 379 (Serial 359), for the 1840 "warriors" figure.

April. At Shawnee Baptist Mission (present Johnson county), a new printing office was under construction. (The former office was to be used "as a place of religious worship and school-house.”)

Missionary-printer John G. Pratt (despite ill health; the move to the new office; and other interruptions) proceeded to print the following works on the "Meeker press" between April, 1841, and April, 1842: 750 copies of Matthew (a 68-page book) in Shawnee; 500 copies of Matthew (a 125-page book) in Ottawa; 750 copies of Matthew (48 pages; reprinted) in Shawnee; 500 copies of a 24-page, reprinted First Book in Delaware; occasional issues (totaling 12 pages and 800 copies ) of the Shawanoe Sun ( newspaper ) ; and a "small hymn book, in Shawanoe," was reported as "in press, and nearly completed." Ref: The Baptist Missionary Magazine, v. 21 (June, 1841), p. 173, v. 22 (June, 1842). p. 161.

April. The Trapper was the American Fur Company's steamboat sent to the upper Missouri trading posts in 1841. Upbound, she presumably passed along the "Kansas" shore in April, reaching Fort Union (at the mouth of the Yellowstone) after an 80-day journey from St. Louis.

At St. Louis, on July 14, a "fleet" of 10 "barges" from the headwaters of the Missouri and Yellowstone, reached port "all richly laden, upwards of 20,000 Buffalo robes, and an indefinite amount of beaver skins, buffalo tongues and other luxuries. . . ." The Trapper's arrival was expected hourly, with other peltries. Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, July 15, 1841 (as reprinted in Nebraska State Historical Society Publications, v. 20, p. 114); Weekly Picayune, August 2, 1841; H. M. Chittenden's The American Fur Trade of the Far West (New York, 1935), v. 2, p. 956. Charles Larpenteur (see his Forty fears a Fur Trader . . ., v. 1, p. 161) may have been aboard the up-bound Trapper in 1841 (not 1840 as his narrative suggests). He stated: "On the 31st of March I was on the steamer Trapper, and after a long, tedious trip we reached Union on the 27th of June."

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April. Among the steamboats in the Missouri river trade were the: General Leavenworth, Shaumee (B. P. Clifford, master), Colonel Woods (L. C. Dickerson, master), Thames (Thomas Dennis, master), and the new Oceana (W. B. Miller, master). Others which were on the Missouri during the spring and summer season included: Bowling Green, Malta, latan, the new Emilie (J. W. Keiser, master), and the new Mary Tompkins (B. J. Byer, master). Ref: Dotty Missouri Republican, April-July, 1841, issues; SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, pp. 177, 183, 195, v. 8, typed copy, pp. 93, 94. According to statistics published in Niles' National Register, v. 72 (July 31, 1847), p. 351, there were 32 steamboats on the Missouri in 1841.

MARRIED: Anthony A. Ward (wheelwright at the Methodists' Indian manual labor school, present Johnson county) and Mary Jane Foster (of Jackson county, Mo.) on April 7, at Independence^), Mo., by the Rev. James Porter.

From 1841 till after 1851, the Wards lived at Shawnee Mission. During that time they had six children born (two of whom died young). John Allen Ward, their first child, apparently was born early in 1842.

In 1854 (after a brief stay at Uniontown), the Wards bought Kansas riverfront property just west of the original Topeka town site. Five acres of that farm, and the "Ward-Meade house" on the tract, now belong to the city of Topeka, to be used as a park. Ref: Jackson county, Missouri, marriage records; Cone, op. eft., p. 5; Bulletin of the Shaumee County Historical Society, Topeka, v. 3 (March, 1949), pp. 9-13; Allen T. Ward letters (in KHi ms. division); Kansas territorial census, 1860, v. 9, p. 36 (Shawnee county); Kansas state census, 1865, Topeka township, Shawnee co. (which lists the Ward family: Anthony A. (53), Mary J. (48), and their "Kansas-born" children, J. A. (23), Mary E. (20), Emily J. (17), Alice (13), Anthony (11), and William (9).

MARRIED: John W. Polke (son of trader Robert Polke, resident on Pottawatomie creek, "Kansas") and Sarah Ann Chick (daughter of William M. Chick, Westport, Mo., erchant), on April 11, presumably at Westport, by the Rev. Thomas Johnson (of Shawnee Mission, "Kansas"). Ref: Jackson county, Missouri, marriage records.

May. Under construction at Shawnee Methodist Mission and Indian manual labor school (present Johnson county) was a large two-story brick building, 110 feet by 34 feet, to contain 14 rooms "for the accommodation of Teachers & children & for school and lodging rooms." (In this building, in 1855, the first Kansas territorial legislature met, and passed the "bogus" laws. ) Ref: SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 8, typed copy, pp. 73, 74; Martha B. Caldwell, compiler, Annals of Shawnee Methodist Mission . . . (Topeka, 1939), pp. 40, 41.

May. A Shawnee Methodist meeting house (within present Shawnee, Johnson co. ) was being built. It had been promoted by the Rev. Learner B. Stateler of Shawnee Mission. The Indians were

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doing much of the work (including the log-hewing), and also had raised nearly $100 to help pay for the building (a 25' x 50' structure, with one large door and nine windows ) . The church was ready for use by early summer.

The location (by a description of 1857): within the N. 1.4 of the S. E. K of Sec. 11, T. 12 S., R. 24 E. It was in a grove about four miles west of the Indian manual labor school. Ref: Christian Advocate and Journal, New York, v. 15 (May 5, 1841), p. 150; E. J.

Stanley's Life of the Rev. L. B. Stateler (1907), pp. 104, 105 (Stateler had been transferred from Delaware Mission to Shawnee in the fall of 1840); "Shawnee Census, 1857" (ms. in KHi archives division), which describes the site (the five acres "including the meeting house and grave yard" ) of Shawnee Methodist Church.

May 7. The Rev. Ambler Edson and his wife arrived at Bellevue [Neb.] as Baptist missionaries to the Otoe and Missouri Indians. Since the death of Missionary Moses Merrill in February, 1840, the condition of the Otoes (as reported) had "greatly deteriorated," and their number had been "diminished by intemperance and civil feuds." The Missourias had crossed to the south side of the Platte and refused to return; and others of the Indians were "roaming at large, having no fixed abode."

During the summer Missionary Edson "collected a school . . . of 20 pupils." Later, illness forced him to close it. The Edsons journeyed to St. Louis in March, 1842, but returned in April, in improved health. The Otoe Baptist Mission school (with 13 pupils) was reopened. However, the Indians became "increasingly intemperate and quarrelsome," and in August, 1842, it became expedient to abandon the mission. Ref: The Baptist Missionary Magazine, v. 21 (June, 1841), p. 172, v. 22 (June, 1842), p. 160, v. 23 (June, 1843), p. 138. See KHQ, v. 28, pp. 340, 341, for the founding of Otoe Baptist Mission in 1833.

May 8. "Messrs. [Solomon] Houck, [William S.?] McKnight, Mazerva [William S. Messervy] and [ ?] Martin" were the principal merchants in the spring caravan which departed from Independence, Mo., for Santa Fe. On the 9th "the few last wagons . . . left." "Many other individuals" besides traders were co-travelers. Some were "going ... for pleasure, some for health, and others for the curiosities and botanical plants." The naturalist William Gambel (who went on from Santa Fe to California with the Rowland-Workman party) was one of the latter group.

When this company organized, at Cow creek (some 235 miles out), late in May, the personnel totaled 87 males and one female (a "nice little Dutch woman," accompanying her husband); the vehicles 'large and small, of various and quaint construction," numbered 33 (one, an "artillery wagon" with a cannon); and there were about 200 mules, also some oxen.

Twelve days after leaving Independence the caravan reached Council Grove; and stopped three days to overhaul and reload wagons, while waiting for lag

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gards to arrive. About May 28, at Cow creek, Samuel Houck was elected captain, the company was enrolled, and guard duty assigned.

Just before the train reached this crossing, eight late-starting travelers (who left Independence about May 19), with their "three little wagons . . . and three riding mules," caught up with the caravan. Among the eight were Isaac L. Given, John McClure, Wade Hampton, and Albert G. Toomes. These four, after reaching Santa Fe, went on to California with the Rowland- Workman party.

On June 1 the caravan was at Ash creek; on June 5, at a point apparently below any of the usual crossings, the rising Arkansas river was forded; then the 60-mile "Jomada" was traversed; and by the 12th the line of march was up the Cimarron. The wagon train reached Santa Fe early in July completing the trip in less than two months. Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, May 19, November 23, 1841. The latter issue contains the unsigned letter from Santa Fe, of July 29, 1841, originally published in the Evansville (Ind.) Journal, which was widely reprinted, appearing in Niles' National Register, v. 61 (December 4, 1841), p. 209, the New York (weekly) Tribune, November 13, 1841 (see KHQ, v. 8, pp. 104-106), and various other publications in 1841 and 1842. Santa Fe and the Far West . . . (Los Angeles, 1949), is a reprint of this same letter, with a note by Dale L. Morgan, outlining his reasons for concluding that John McClure probably wrote it. Other references: "Isaac Given Biography" (ms. in Bancroft Library); Richard L. Wilson's Short Ravelings From a Long Yarn . . . (Santa Ana, Calif., 1936); Susan D. McKelvey's Botanical Exploration of the Trans-Mississippi West 1790-1850 (1950), pp. 731-735, 744-746 (for Gambel); 1950 Brand Book . . . (Denver, 1951), p. 269.

On May 10 and 11 four Methodist ministers (Thomas Johnson, E. R. Ames, W. W. Redman, James M. Jameson) journeyed 80 miles on horseback from Shawnee Mission (present Johnson county) to Kansa Methodist Mission (present Shawnee county).

They traveled about half way on the 10th; camped some three miles west of the Wakarusa crossing for the night; reached Mission creek on the evening of the 11th. The delegation found Missionary William Johnson and his family "in good health." Also on hand to greet them were the "venerable" American Chief, his son ("a vile wretch"), and a few other Kansa.

On May 12, at a vacant house half a mile distant, these Kansa Indians and some 25 others (men and women) gathered for a council with the Methodists. On this day, too, Chief E-ya-no-sa (meaning "Big both ways" an apt description), who was living eight miles up the Kansas, came to invite the white men to his village.

Early on the 13th the ministers set out for E-ya-no-sa's town which was in a "most delightful" location, "in the fork, between the Kansas and the Wa-nun-ja-hu, a large creek which empties itself into the Kansas" [present Mill creek, Wabaunsee county]. Crossing the Wa-nun-ja-hu, to reach the village, they found that it consisted of about 25 lodges "constructed of the bark of trees, so as to form a pleasant summer house, but require to be differently fixed for the winter." After a council with the chief, the Methodists returned to the Kansa mission. They were back at Shawnee before May 20. Ref: KHC, v. 16, pp. 263-265, contains the Rev. James M. Jameson's letter of May 20, written at Shawnee Mission, describing the May 10-13 experiences of his party.

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May 12. From the Sapling Grove rendezvous (15? miles west of Independence, and eight from Westport, Mo.) on the Shawnee reserve (present Johnson county), the men, and families, of the first emigrant wagon train to set out for the Pacific (the "Bidwell-Bartleson" party) began the journey across "Kansas" on the "Oregon trail."

The emigrants (and a few men traveling for pleasure, health, or other reasons) numbered, at the outset, around 60 persons, including five women and perhaps 10(?) children. They had eight mule-and-horse-drawn wagons; five larger wagons drawn by 17 yoke of oxen; and riding animals; but took no milk cows.

In advance was the Jesuit missionary party (11 men) of Father Pierre-Jean De Smet (bound for the Flathead Indians' country), whose guide, Thomas Fitzpatrick, was to pilot the combined company to the West. The missionaries had four carts and a small wagon all two-wheeled, (drawn by two mules each, hitched in tandem); and riding horses. With De Smet (who had set out from Westport on May 10, after arriving there 10 days earlier on the Oceana) were Father Nicholas Point (a Westport resident during the winter of 1840-1841), Father Gregory Mengarini, three lay brothers, an English tourist "Romaine,"

James Baker (a trapper), and John Gray (an Iroquois; and Kaw's mouth resident), hired as hunter. Two others of this party (who had taken a baggage-loaded pirogue upriver) were waiting at the Kansas crossing (at, or near, present Topeka), when De Smet and his companions arrived about May 16(?). On hand to help the horses swim the river were two Kansa Indians. "Baggage, wagons and men" crossed in the pirogue (a "hollowed tree trunk," which, at a distance, reminded Father De Smet of a Venetian gondola). Camp was made "on the banks of the Soldier's river ... six miles from the [Kansa] village." "We had scarcely pitched our tents when the great chief [Fool Chief] presented himself with six of his bravest warriors, to bid us welcome," wrote De Smet. The chief supplied the missionaries with two armed guards for "the three days and three nights" spent at Soldier creek camp.

The emigrants arrived at, and crossed the Kansas, on May 17, and proceeded to the Soldier creek camp (two miles west of the river) where they spent two nights. Nancy (Mrs. Benjamin) Kelsey later recollected: ". . . the Indians towed us across the . . . river in rawhide boats made of buffalo skins. Our oxen crossed the river with the empty wagons."

On the 18th the company organized. "Talbot H. Green" whose real name was Paul Geddes presided; and young John Bidwell recently a schoolteacher in Platte county, Mo. served as secretary. John Bardeson ( aged 54, of Jackson county, Mo. ) was elected captain.

When the caravan set out on the 19th, there were (according to Father De Smet) 70 souls, "fifty of whom were capable of managing the rifle." He, Father Point, and young Romaine, left the procession to spend an hour at Fool Chief's 20-lodge village (to the left of their line of march). [Point sketched the town see KHQ, v. 28, facing p. 49 and De Smet, in a letter, described the Kansa village, and its occupants, at some length.]

Overtaking the caravan on May 23 were three men, Joseph B. Chiles, of Jackson county, Mo. (with a wagon), Charles M. Weber, and James John who had left Westport on May 16. Also joining north of Kansas river were Robert

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Rickman, of Jackson county, Mo., James Shotwell, and Henry Peyton. [Others in the company who had left Jackson county, Mo., homes were Charles Hopper, William P. Overton, Grove Cook (a brother-in-law of the fur-trading Sublettes), and some (if not all) of the Kelsey family.] On May 27 the Rev. Joseph Williams caught up with the wagon train (see May 21 entry). He was the last accession to the "very mixed crowd" now 79(?) in all.

As far as the Platte (reached June 1) the journey was fairly routine. Between Grand Island and Green river (reached on July 23) a number of events occurred including two weddings, one death (James Shotwell's) by accident, some "desertions," a few accessions, and Nicholas Dawson's encounter with Indians. On August 3, at Soda Springs [Ida.], the travelers came to a parting of ways. The missionaries, with guide Thomas Fitzpatrick, and 24(?) Oregon-bound emigrants (including all but one family), turned north towards Fort Hall (the Rev. Joseph Williams accompanied this group); while 32(?) men, one woman and her infant daughter, took a route towards California.

Among those who reached California (after a difficult journey; and after abandoning their wagons en route) were: John Bartleson, John Bidwell, Charles Hopper, Robert Rickman, Grove Cook, Joseph B. Chiles, Charles M. Weber, Josiah Belden, James P. Springer, "Talbot Green," Andrew Kelsey, Benjamin Kelsey, his wife and child; and George Henshaw. (The names of the rest are on record, but not listed here. ) Some returned to Missouri in the fall of 1842, as will be noted in these annals. Ref: John Bidwell, A Journey to California . . . (San Francisco, 1937); Doyce B. Nunis, Jr., editor, Josiah Belden 1841 California Overland Pioneer: His Memoir and Early Letters (Georgetown, Calif., 1962); Chittenden and Richardson, op. cit., v. 1, pp. 275- 286; C. L. Camp, editor, Narrative of Nicholas "Cheyenne" Dawson . . . (San Francisco, 1933); Joseph Williams, Narrative of a Tour . . . (New York, 1921); John Bidwell’s Echoes of the Past (Chicago, 1928); H. H. Bancroft's History of California (San Francisco, 1886), v. 4, pp. 265-280; Nicholas Point's "Recollections . . .," in Woodstock Letters, Woodstock, Md., v. 12 (1883), pp. 3-22, 133-153; Gregory Mengarini's "The Rocky Mountains . . .," in ibid, v. 17 (1888), pp. 298-309; Daily Missouri Republican, May 19, 1841; Transactions of the 19th Annual Reunion of the Oregon Pioneer Association for 1891, p. 139; Oregon Historical Quarterly, Salem, v. 31 (September, 1930), pp. 253, 254; from the Bancroft Library, Berkeley, Calif, (courtesy of Dale L. Morgan), typed copies of manuscripts by James John, Nicholas Dawson, J. B. Chiles, Charles Hopper, Mrs. Benjamin Kelsey, and A. S. Taylor; also, courtesy of Dale L. Morgan, a typed copy of a James John journal in the Rosenbach Foundation library, Philadelphia; W. J. Ghent, The Early Far West . . . (New York, 1931), pp. 314-319; George R. Stewart's The California Trail . . . (New York, c1962), pp. 7-29; H. E. Tobie's "From the Missouri to the Columbia, 1841," in Oregon Historical Quarterly, v. 38 (June, 1937), pp. 135-159; John C. McCoy's "Tales of an Old Timer" (from Kansas City [Mo.] Journal, January 30, 1879), in "Kansas Reminiscences" clippings, KHi library.

May 14. "Mr. Hinkley" began work on the Ottawas' mill (in present Franklin county, not far from Ottawa Baptist Mission ) . On the 19th Jotham Meeker sent the "Ottawa Mill up to its place after its having set in ... [the mission] door yard near 3 years." It was declared operational on May 25.

(The building for the mill had been put up in 1840; and additional work had been done on it by the Ottawas in April, 1841.)

Meeker wrote on June 14 "it [the mill] still does not do well"; but on the 16th he recorded: "It grinds pretty well." Ref: Jotham Meeker's "Diary," January 10, 11, 13, March 2, 3, 1840, May 14, 19, 25, June 14, 16, 1841.

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May. A caravan from Santa Fe, in which the principal proprietors were "Messrs. [James M.] Giddings, from Fayette, McGuffin [James W. McGoffin], Garvis [Chavez] and some other Spanish gentlemen," reached Independence, Mo. This company had 22 wagons, a large number of mules (around 100 extra ones), and brought, by report, $180,000 to $200,000 in specie.

(About May 14 and 15, in present Douglas and Osage counties, travelers in the Santa Fe-bound spring caravan had met some of the above train. Richard L. Wilson recorded (on the 14th?): "we met about 20 Spanish Mexicans of the Chihuahua return Company . . . headed by Chavez . . ." and next day, west of 110-mile creek, "four Mexican wagons hove in sight." With this rear detachment was "Black Wolf," a Delaware chief. ) Ref: Dotty Missouri Republican, May 19, 1841; Wilson, op. cit., pp. 19-22. Chavez was probably either Don Antonio Jos6 Chavez, or Don Jos6 Chavez y Castillo.

About May 20 a small mounted party Missionary William Johnson, Fool Chief (head of the Kansa nation), another chief, and nine Kansa boys (aged from nine to 13) arrived at the Indian manual labor school (present Johnson county), where the youths were to be enrolled.

Meeting, on this occasion, the man who had recently (late 1840?) become leader of the Kansa, the Rev. James M. Jameson wrote: "Ki-ha-ga-wa-ti-in-ga . . . signifies the chief who accomplishes what he undertakes at all hazards. He is known by the phrase Tool-chief;' but our word reckless would better express the meaning of the original. He is a man of middle stature, of strong native mind, and of fine address, and speaks with ease and force." Ref: KHC, v. 16, p. 265 (from Western Christian Advocate, Cincinnati, v. 8, January 28, 1842, p. 161). "Ki-he-ga" (or "Ki-ha-ga") signifies "chief." Fool Chief's name appears in varying forms, for example "Ca-he-ga-wa-tan-nin-ga," "Ky-he-ga-wa-ti-nin-ka." The above Fool Chief was at least the second Kansas leader to bear the name. The "Ky-he-ga-wa-ti-nin-ka" who signed the June 3, 1825, Kansa treaty was probably the father of this young Fool Chief.

May 21. En route to Oregon, 64-year-old Methodist preacher Joseph Williams arrived at Shawnee Methodist Mission, after a journey on horseback from his Indiana home.

With Missionary William Johnson, and two Kansa chiefs (see preceding entry), he rode westward on May 22 as far as Wakarusa river. The next day's 45-mile journey brought them to Kansa Methodist Mission (present Shawnee county). On the 24th, supplied with provisions by the Johnsons, and accompanied by "Mr. Brensill" (the Kansa Indians' farmer David Benzley?), Williams crossed the Kansas (the water was over their horses' backs); and, after a few miles, was left to hasten on, alone, in pursuit of the Oregon-and-

California-bound companies. He carried no gun or weapon. By good fortune he avoided hostile Pawnees in the area, and, after two nights and most of three days on the prairies, caught up with the caravan on May 26. (See May 12 entry.) Ref: Williams, op. cit., pp. 25-33; John Bidwell, A Journey to California, p. 3.

May 25. At Ottawa Baptist Mission (present Franklin county),

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John Clayter and his work crew (under a contract let by Jotham Meeker) began to erect new mission buildings which cost $832.

On September 22 the family moved into the not-yet-completed structures. "The houses are well built with substantial stone chimneys," wrote Meeker. "There are four rooms one for a dwelling room, a meeting room, a kitchen, and an Indian house." Ref : Jotham Meeker's "Diary"; and his letter of February 7, 1842.

May. East-bound from Fort William ("Bent's Fort"), a Bent, St. Vrain & Co. train (18 fur-laden wagons), transporting the previous winter's "fine trade" crossed the Santa Fe trail en route to Missouri. Charles Bent headed this expedition which had left the upper Arkansas on April 30.

Around May 27, in present McPherson county, the spring caravan bound for Santa Fe met Bent's party. As Richard L. Wilson described the encounter: "... a troop of Mountain Trappers hove in sight, and came up like a herd of buffalo, with their pack-mules laden with furs and robes, and 17 wagons in train. Fine specimens of bronzed humanity were they all. . . ."

A St. Louis newspaper reported Charles Bent's arrival in that city on June 10. He brought a "large lot of Buffalo robes and furs." Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, June 12, 1841; New Mexico Historical Review, Santa Fe, v. 30 (April, 1955), p. 159 (has Bent's April 30, 1841, letter, with the statement "Our Wagons 18 in number left this morning. ... I think I shall be in St Louis . . . by the 10th June . . ."); Wilson, op. cit., pp. 27, 28; "Isaac Given Biography" (ms. in Bancroft Library).

June 1. A trading license issued to Pierre Chouteau [Jr.] and Company (by Sup't Joshua Pilcher, at St. Louis) specified trade with the Pottawatomies, Peorias, Weas, and "Maumis" at these places:

(1) on the Marais des Cygnes near the mouth of Sugar creek [{. e. y present Trading Post, Linn co.] Michel Giraud's headquarters.

(2) at Sugar creek [the Pottawatomie settlements, also in present Linn county, but 15 miles west of Giraud's place].

(3) at Pottawatomie creek near the Issue House [the Pottawatomie settlements in present Franklin and Miami counties, about 15 miles north of the Sugar creek settlements].

(4) also, the 15 employees in the Marais des Cygnes outfit of the American Fur Company could trade "at the respective villages of the above tribes." Ref: OIA, Letters Received from SIA, St. Louis (National Archives Microcopy 234, Roll 753), December 31, 1841, list of licenses issued in 1841. The license of June 27, 1842, was nearly identical; but only 11 men were employed.

Around the first of June, at the lower Cimarron Spring (in present Grant county), some 500 Arapahoes met a party of Pawnees, and in the ensuing battle the Pawnees lost over 70 men (72 or 76, by varying reports), and their horses. The Arapahoes had six warriors killed.

The Santa Fe-bound spring caravan met the still-elated Arapahoes at the

350 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

lower spring in June, 10 days after the battle, and (as reported by John McClure?) "gratified them with encamping on the battle ground, where the unburied bodies were yet almost unbroken." Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, November 23, 1841 (for McClure's? letter see May 8, 1841, annals entry); Rufus B. Sage's Scenes in the Rocky Mountains as reprinted in Rufus B. Sage . . ., edited by L. R. and Ann W. Hafen (Glendale, Calif., 1956), v. 1, p. 137; Wilson, op. cit., pp. 71-74.

June. The "six waggons with 18 men, with Furs and Robes on their way from Ft. Larimie, to St. Louis," which the west-bound emigrant-and-missionary caravan met on May 31 while on the head of the Little Blue, crossed "Kansas" during this month. John Bidwell further described the party: "The waggons were drawn by oxen and mules . . . the rusty mountaineers looked as though they never had seen razor, water, soap, or brush. . . ." Ref: John Bidwell’s A Journey to California . . ., p. 4.

BORN: on June 8, near Sugar creek (present Linn county), Genevieve Caroline Wilson, daughter of government blacksmith for the Pottawatomies Robert Wilson and his wife Genevieve C. Wilson. She was baptized on June 9 by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen, S. J. Ref: "Pottawatomie Baptismal Register," at St. Mary's College, St. Marys.

July 15 (or 17?). Four nuns from the Society of the Sacred Heart (Mothers Philippine Duchesne, Lucille Mathevon, A. O'Connor, and lay sister Louise Amyot) opened a school for Indian girls at Sugar Creek (Pottawatomie) Mission, in present Linn county. (See March 10, 1839, entry.)

(From Mother Mathevon's journal it is known that they left St. Louis June 29, by steamboat, escorted by the Rev. P. J. Verhaegen [superior of the Missouri Jesuits]; arrived at Westport Landing about July 6[?]; proceeded, by wagon, southward on the Fort Leavenworth-Fort Gibson military road; spent the night of July 7 at the house of American Fur Company trader Michel Giraud [at present Trading Post]; and, on July 8, traveled the last miles of the journey with an escort of some 150 mounted Pottawatomies, arrayed in colorful finery [including feathered head-dresses], led by Fathers Aelen and Eysvogels of Sugar Creek Mission. )

The building of a school (in July), and a two-story, six-room log house (in August) was supervised by the nuns' Negro servant. The location was "close to the mission-church on a bluff or eminence that commanded a view of the surrounding country." Here the well-attended girls' school was maintained till 1848, when it was transferred to the Pottawatomies' new Kansas river reserve. The aged Mother Duchesne left in July, 1842. In her place came Mothers Thiefry and Xavier, who remained till 1845. Ref: G. J. Garraghan's The Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 2, pp. 204-213; Kinsella, op. cit., pp. 18-22, 227.

BORN: on July 17, at Shawnee Baptist Mission (present Johnson county), Lucius Bolles Pratt, son (and second child) of Missionaries John G. and Olivia ( Evans ) Pratt.

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(On March 2, 1860, at Delaware Baptist Mission, 19-year-old Lucius B. Pratt married Nannie May Journeycake [daughter of Charles Journeycake, Delaware Indian]. Young Pratt died five years later on September 7, 1865.) Ref: Pratt Collection (in KHi ms. division); Jack W. Manning's "John Gill Pratt . . ." (dissertation, May, 1951).

July. Santa Fe trader [James M.] Giddings and party left Independence, Mo., for New Mexico on the 23d. James W. Magoffin's company (bound for Chihuahua) was to join him. On July 27 a number of wagons belonging to "Mr. Ward," of Rocheport, Mo., passed through Independence "on their way to Santa Fe and Chihuahua." Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, August 6, 1841; Weekly Picayune, September 6, 1841.

August. Hiram Rich (a Liberty, Mo., trader, aged 42) was appointed sutler at Fort Leavenworth. ( On October 19 he was also appointed postmaster.) He succeeded Albert G. Wilson (see December 5, 1839, annals) in both positions. For the next 20 years (till his sudden death in April, 1862), Rich remained as the post's sutler and postmaster.

As early as 1829 Hiram Rich was established as a merchant at Liberty. By 1837 his trading ventures extended to the South Platte. The license granted on November 2, 1837, to Hiram Rich (for 11 employees) specified trade "At a point on the South Fork of the Platte about 30 miles below the mountains" with the Arapahoes, Cheyennes, and Sioux. (That he ever journeyed to that region himself has not been ascertained.)

On July 16, 1838, he received a one-year contract to supply rations for immigrant Pottawatomies (and other Indians) in the Osage [Marais des Cygnes] River Subagency. A year later (August 14, 1839) Sup't Joshua Pilcher, of St. Louis, wrote: "This [1838] contract with Mr. Rich was tie offspring of necessity; but fortunately for the government, that necessity will soon cease to exist. Those Liberty birds have feathered their nest, but I shall take measures to check their career." On November 10, 1840, Rich was given a one-year license to trade (23 men in all) with the bands of Sioux on the upper

Missouri. Ref: KHC, v. 7, p. 441; SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, p. 37 (for Pilcher), v. 10 (bottom of page headed "St Louis Dec 2nd 1834" has an early reference to Hiram Rich); OIA, Letters received from SIA, St. Louis (National Archives Microcopy No. 234, Roll 751 and Roll 753); 25th Cong., 3d Sess., H. Doc. No. 94 (Serial 346), p. 4 (for 1838 contract); Leavenworth Daily Times, April 30, 1862 (for obituary). Hiram Rich is buried in the Fort Leavenworth national cemetery. The inscription states he was born at Charlotte, Vt., September 21, 1799, and died April 28, 1862, aged 62 years, seven months, and seven days. In KHC, v. 13, p. 335, the Hiram Stone diary entry of April 24, 1862, recording Rich's funeral as occurring on that date is evidently a misprint for April 29.

August. The Osages, returning to their towns (in "Kansas") from the summer hunt "on the southwestern part of the Grand Prairie," brought two white persons they had purchased from the Comanches. One was a young Spanish woman; the other a nine- or ten-year-old Texas girl.

352 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

The Osages reported the Comanches had many white prisoners; and were only "waiting for the leaves to fall . . ." before making a general attack on the whole Texas frontier. Ref: Osage Subagent Robert A. Galloway's August 23, 1841, letter to the editors of the Houston (Tex.) Telegraph, as reprinted in Niles' National Register, v. 61 (October 2, 1841), p. 66; also reprinted in Weekly Picayune, September 20, 1841.

August. Around the middle of the month the Delawares' blacksmith shop (just north of the Delaware, or Grinter, crossing of the Kansas river, on the Fort Leavenworth-Fort Gibson military road) burned, and nearly all the tools were destroyed.

(In 1842, by Indian department authorization, the shop was rebuilt at a cost of $140, and the sum of $75 was provided for replacement tools.) Ref: SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, p. 223, v. 8, typed copy, pp. 77, 78, 92, 93; KHQ, v. 28, p. 338 (for location of the shop).

BORN: on August 16, at Shawnee Methodist Mission (present Johnson county), Andrew Monroe Johnson, son of the Rev. Thomas and Sarah T. (Davis) Johnson. Ref: KHC, v. 12, p. iii.

August 29. Jesuit fathers Felix L. Verreydt and Christian Hoecken, with lay brothers Andrew Mazzella and George Miles arrived at Pottawatomie mission on Sugar creek (present Linn county) . (See portrait of Father Verreydt facing p. 328.)

(They came from Council Bluffs [Iowa], where a Pottawatomie Catholic mission had been abandoned. Verreydt succeeded the Rev. Herman G. Aelen as superior, and remained at the head of Sugar Creek mission till it was transferred to the Kansas river in 1848. )

Another recent arrival was Father Anthony Eysvogels, who had come in May or June. Ref: G. J. Garraghan's The Jesuits of the Middle United States, v. 1, p. 446, v. 2, pp. 195, 196.

Early in September a wagon train from Santa Fe reached Independence, Mo. As reported, there were only one or two "old traders," the majority being the freighters who had gone out in the spring. Some Mexican citizens with this company "brought along with them 70, or 80,000 dollars, and a quantity of valuable furs." An unidentified Independence writer called it the "most expeditious . . . [trip] ever performed." Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, September 28, 1841, or, Niles' National Register, v. 61 (October 16, 1841), pp. 100, 101; Sage, op. cit., v. 1, pp. 132-135.

September 4. Lancaster P. Lupton's caravan, bound for new Fort Platte [Wyo.], set out from a camp on the Shawnee reserve, in present Johnson county, to follow the "Oregon trail" across "Kansas," up to the Little Blue and Platte rivers.

Around 18(?) men (mountaineers, apprentices, and greenhorns) were in the

KANSAS BEFORE 1854: A REVISED ANNALS 353

company at the outset. (A small advance party was picked up at the Wakarusa, and two voyageurs joined beyond the Kansas crossing, making the total personnel about 24.) Of the six (or more) wagons, at least four were large Connestogas; and there was a dearborn, also, in the outfit. The freight included illegal cargo 24 barrels (perhaps more) of alcohol for the Indian trade.

[One of Lupton's employees was Rufus B. Sage (aged 24), west-bound, for the first time, to gather material for a book. His Scenes in the Rocky Mountains, subsequently published (in 1846), described what Sage learned and experienced during his travels in 1841, 1842, and 1843.]

Lupton's caravan reached, crossed, and camped by the Wakarusa on September 6. On the 7th, after some 12 miles of travel, the over-night stop was "at a place known as the Springs" (possibly at Big Springs, Douglas co., of today). Camp on the 8th was "at a small creek within six miles of the crossing of the Kansas river" ( the Shunganunga, or a branch ) . Most of September 9 was spent fording the Kansas (at, or near, present Topeka). "This proved rather difficult," according to Sage, "as the water was deep and the bottom sandy," and the river was "not far from six hundred yards wide, with steep banks of clay and sand." The caravan then proceeded some six miles before making camp.

Sage noted that the Kansa Indians' "main village" (Fool Chiefs) was "on the left bank ... a few miles above the crossing." He mentioned the "Protestant mission" (the Methodists' establishment on the opposite side of the river). Without specifying a location, he wrote that there were "two or three families of half-breeds in the neighborhood, who "occupy neat houses, and have splendid farms and improvements." (The "splendid farms" doubtless were those which had been plowed and prepared by the government farmers.)

When Lupton and his company reached the "North Fork of Blue" (Big Blue) in mid-month they were detained till September 24 by high water. Their sojourn, in present Marshall county, was not unpleasant. Sage wrote: "During our stay no less than four bee-trees were levelled, and every [container] in the whole camp was filled to overflowing, and every stomach to repletion, with honey of almost crystalline transparency. The great abundance of deer, turkey, and other game in the vicinity, also contributed their share of amusement, and enlivened the interval of detention."

On September 27 the caravan reached the Little Blue; crossed to the Platte about October 10; and arrived at Fort Platte [Wyo.] on November 2. This new trading post was on the left bank of the North Platte, not far from the mouth of Laramie river, and a mile or so from the American Fur Company's opposition post Fort John (Fort Laramie ) .

(Sage, and some other trappers, made an unsuccessful attempt to descend the Platte with a boatload of furs in the spring of 1842; finally arrived at Council Bluffs [Neb.] afoot; then descended the Missouri in canoes, reaching St. Louis about July 20, 1842. See, also, August 10, 1842, entry.) Ref: Sage, op. cit., v. 1, pp. 84-87, 125-221.

September 5. A "party of Americans [from Santa Fe] with six or eight waggons and a large number of horses and mules" was met by L. P. Lupton's mountain-bound caravan west of Elm Grove, in present Johnson county.

354 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

These travelers from Santa Fe (possibly stragglers from the fall caravan see p. 352), had with them a nearly full-grown elk, two blacktailed deer, an antelope, and a white-tailed fawn. Ref: Sage, op. cit., v. 1, pp. 132-135.

September. At least six men (John Gray, the Iroquois; Henry Peyton; [J. M.?] Jones; the Englishman Romaine; Amos E. Frye; and [Edward?] Rogers) who had accompanied the Oregon-and-California-bound wagon train of emigrants and missionaries to the Rocky mountains in the spring and summer, retraced the Oregon trail across "Kansas," and reached Missouri in mid-September.

On September 21, an Independence, Mo., writer reported: "Nine or ten of the California company returned a few days since having left the remainder on some of the tributaries of Green River . . . [on July 23]. . . . The returning party were attacked six or eight times [!], but not seriously injured. They seem satisfied completely with their Quixotic adventure." Ref: John Bidwell, Echoes of the Past . . ., p. 11; also, his A Journey to California, p. 11; James John's "Diary" (in Bancroft Library); Daily Missouri Republican, September 28, 1841; or, Niles' National Register, v. 61 (October 16, 1841), p. 101.

September (?) Partners John Sibille and David Adams, taking their first trading outfit (with perhaps 10 men in all) out to Laramie's Fork, crossed "Kansas" (via the "Oregon trail" route) during this month. By mid-November this company had reached its destination.

(On July 31 Sibille & Adams had been issued their first license, at St. Louis, to trade on Laramie's fork, the Cheyenne, and Wind rivers. James Adams, brother of David, was one of the "sureties" for the partners; Bernard Pratte [the younger?] was another.) Ref: OIA, Letters Received from SIA, St. Louis (National Archives Microcopy No. 234, Roll 753), for D. D. Mitchell's December 31, 1841, list of licenses issued during the year; Dale L. Morgan's letters of March 26, and June 15, 1963, to L. Barry, noting David Adams' fragmentary 1841 diary, at Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis; and see Bulletin of the Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, v. 13 (October, 1956), p. 101; Glimpses of the Past, v. 8, p. 42.

September 17; October 5. In New Mexico the advance, and main, parties of the Texan Santa Fe expedition (which had left Austin in June), surrendered to Gov. Manuel Armijo's army, after being defeated by the arid plains, where they had been lost for days and suffered privations. (The captives were cruelly treated; marched, on foot, to Mexico City and imprisoned; most were released in April, 1842.)

President Mirabeau B. Lamar had anticipated that this combined diplomatic-military-commercial venture (of 303? men, with 24? ox-drawn merchandise-and-supply-carrying wagons) would establish Texas jurisdiction over part of New Mexico, or at least gain for his republic some of the Santa Fe trade which Missouri enjoyed.

The expedition, though a failure, focused United States and Mexican

KANSAS BEFORE 1854: A REVISED ANNALS 355

attention anew on Texas. In New Mexico there were some demonstrations against, and an increased suspicion of, U. S. citizens. Ref: G. W. Kendall's Narrative of the Texan Santa Fe Expedition (New York, 1844); W. C. Binkley's The Expansionist Movement in Texas, 1836-1850 (Berkeley, 1925), pp. 68-95; Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Austin, v. 27 (1923), pp. 85-107; Thomas Falconer's Letters and Notes on the Texan Santa Fe Expedition . . . (New York, 1930).

September 20. David D. Mitchell was appointed to head the superintendency of Indian affairs, St. Louis. (He replaced Joshua Pilcher appointed March 4, 1839 whose removal in 1841 was a matter of politics.) Ref: 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 41 (Serial 402). SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, p. 192 (for Pilcher's departure on June 11, 1841), p. 199 (for D. D. Mitchell's October 6, 1841, letter one of his first in office); Daily Missouri Republican, April 12, June 7, 1841 (for comment on Pilcher and his politics).

September-October. A small party of mountain men (unidentified, except that they had connections with Fort Davy Crockett [in northwestern "Colorado"] and the activities of trader Philip F. Thompson) brought "a large drove of horses, and several domesticated buffalo" down from the mountains, crossing "Kansas" apparently by way of the "Oregon trail."

L. P. Lupton's party met this outfit in the latter part of September, west of the Big Blue (near the north "Kansas" line). Rufus B. Sage (west-bound with Lupton) stated: "Their horses had been mostly obtained from Upper California, the year previous, by a band of [22] mountaineers, under the lead of one Thompson. This band . . . had made a descent upon the Mexican ranchoes and captured between two and three thousand head of horses and mules," but then lost at least half of them before reaching their rendezvous. Ref: Sage, op. cit., v. 1, p. 137; L. R. and Ann W. Hafen's Old Spanish Trail (Glendale, 1954), pp. 236-241; Colorado Magazine, Denver, v. 29 (January, 1952), p. 17, for location of Fort Davy Crockett.

Early in October (before the 9th) a large caravan, in which were some 30 wagons (carrying 72 tons of merchandise) , and around 350 mules, set out from Independence, Mo., for Santa Fe. "Seignoirs Armeho [Armijo], Charvois [Chavez] and Monsieur D. Gordis [De Gordin?]" headed this expedition. (See May annals entry, p. 348). Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, October 20, 24, 1841.

October 11. A "few gentlemen" arrived at Independence, Mo., from Santa Fe, by way of Bent's Fort. They had come down from the upper Arkansas in company with "an express" sent to meet the west-bound wagon train of Charles Bent. From the meeting point (some 150 miles west of Independence) the east-bound travelers had proceeded without escort.

(The "express" probably carried news relating to the Texan Santa Fe ex-

356 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

pedition. The Weekly Picayune, New Orleans, of August 30, 1841, had reported: "The brothers Bent have just left Missouri [i. e., St. Louis?] for their fort upon the Arkansas intending to go into Santa Fe with a hundred men, in anticipation of the Texan expedition and afford any and every facility in their power in forwarding whatever object shall be set forth in [Texas president Mirabeau] Lamar's proclamation." The Picayune's source of information was not indicated.) Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, October 15, 1841; Weekly Picayune, as noted above.

October. The Rev. Jerome C. Berryman succeeded the Rev. Thomas Johnson as head of the Methodists' Indian manual labor school (present Johnson county). (See his portrait facing p. 329.) Johnson (who retired because of ill health) had been for 11 years in the Indian country. (See KHQ, v. 28, p. 178, for his founding, in 1830, of Shawnee Mission, the first Methodist mission in "Kansas.") Berryman (eight years among the Indians) had established Kickapoo Mission in 1833. See KHQ, v. 28, p. 344. ( In 1847 Thomas Johnson returned to head the school.) Ref: Stanley, op. cit., p. 106. Caldwell, op. cit., p. 61.

DIED: Robert S. Bent (youngest of the four Bent brothers associated with the history of Bent's Fort [Colo.]), on October 19, at St. Louis, Mo., aged 25 years.

(The notice published in the Missouri Republican, St. Louis, October 21, 1841 "Died on the 19th instant; in this city, Robert S. Bent, son of the late Judge [Silas] Bent." disproves the current, and several-times-published "tale" that Robert was killed by Comanches on the Santa Fe trail.) Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, October 21, 1841. George B. Grinnell, quoting an October 15, 1913, letter by Robert's nephew, George Bent (the half-Cheyenne son of William Bent and Owl Woman), in KHC, v. 15, p. 51, was probably the first to publish the "tale." Other writers, since, have accepted as factual George Bent's statement: "Robert Bent, my father's brother, was killed by Comanches near Pawnee Fork. . . ." According to Allen H. Bent's The Bent Family in America (Boston, 1900), Robert S. Bent was born February 23, 1816.

October. A hunting party (16 Delawares and one Pottawatomie) was surrounded and massacred by a large force of Sioux, on a fork of "Mink Creek" [in Iowa?]. The Pottawatomie, badly wounded, escaped; 14 Delawares were slain and scalped (and two taken prisoners?); while 28 dead Sioux were found on the battleground (as reported to Subagent W. P. Richardson of the Great Nemaha Subagency on January 17, 1842, by a five-man Delaware search party). Ref: SIA, St. Louis, "Records," v. 7, typed copy, pp. 249, 250, 266, v. 8, typed copy, pp. 84, 85, 338, 481, 482.

MARRIED: (1) Francis St. Michel and Mary Jane Prior (Pry or), (2) Charles Cardinal and Angelique Wot-sing-a, (3) Louis Peltier and Angelique Osinga, all on November 17, near Marmiton (now Marmaton) river, by the Rev. Herman G. Aelen, S. J.

Witnesses to the first of these Osage (or half-blood) marriages were Pierre

KANSAS BEFORE 1854: A REVISED ANNALS 357

Melicour Papin and Louis Peltier; to the second marriage, Papin, and Francis St. Michel; and to the third, Charles Cardinal and Joseph Swiss ( or, La Suisse "Lasweese" see KHQ, v. 28, p. 348, for his marriage). Ref: "Pottawatomie Marriage Register," St. Mary's College, St. Marys. Joseph Swiss (or, Suisse) was probably the "Swiss" who came down from the Rocky mountains in the autumn of 1839 with Dr. Frederick A. Wislizenus, Paul Richardson, and two others see p. 181. (For other data on Joseph Suisse see Victor Tixier's Travels on the Osage Prairies, p. 153, in editor John F. McDermott's footnote.) A daughter, Pelagic, of "Francois Michel" (St. Michel) and "Marie Jeanne Prior," born October 13, 1844 (?), was baptized June 20, 1845, by Father F. L. Verreydt, S. J. "Westport Register," also at St. Mary's College. See, also, August 10, 1840, annals entry.

December 13. Manuel Alvarez (acting U. S. consul at Santa Fe), who, with 16 Americans, and 67 horses and mules, had set out from New Mexico late in October, arrived at Independence, Mo., with seven men and 27 animals. Cold weather and a blizzard (with deep and drifting snow) had caused these travelers much suffering during their 50-day journey.

On the Arkansas five of the party had turned southward to head for Texas. On the plains one man froze to death. At Cottonwood Crossing (present Marion county) three men ("one badly frozen, one sick . . ." and a third to assist them) had been left to whom Alvarez dispatched aid on the 14th (?) One of the three died; and the other two reached Independence on the 24th.

The unseasonable trip had been undertaken because of the precarious situation for Americans in New Mexico ( a result of the capture of the Texan Santa Fe expedition see p. 354). Alvarez, for one, had difficulty getting a passport to leave. (Earlier, his home at Santa Fe had been attacked, and he had suffered a severe facial wound.) Ref: Daily Missouri Republican, December 24, 1841; NUes' National Register, v. 61 (January 8, 1842), p. 304; 1950 Brand Book (v. 6), Denver, pp. 273, 274.

December. Antoine Robidoux, it is said, lost two men and some 400 mules and horses all frozen to death in a blizzard (the same endured by the Alvarez party?) while at, or in the vicinity of, Cottonwood Crossing, on the Santa Fe trail.

Joseph Robidoux, Jr., headed the relief party which arrived from Blacksnake Hills (St. Joseph), Mo., to assist his brother's company. Ref: William S. Wallace's Antoine Robidoux 1794-1860 . . . (Los Angeles, 1953), pp. 30, 31, 56 (which uses as a source James L. Collins* letter of December, 1852, recounting the above episode, published in El Palacio, Santa Fe, v. 19 [1925], pp. 206-211; also, the St. Joseph [Mo.] Gazette of August 29, 1860). Collins referred to the Alvarez party as being ahead of Robidoux on the trail.

December 14. The license issued to Joseph Robidoux, Sr. (by Sup't D. D. Mitchell, at St. Louis ) specified trade with the lowas and the Sacs & Foxes of the Missouri, at Robidoux's "establishment on the Great Nemaha Sub Agency" (in present Doniphan county), and at such other points as the subagent might designate. Ten men were employed in this activity.

(In the 1842 license July 15, 1842 Robidoux's trading locations in "Kan-

358 KANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

sas" were "at a point opposite Blacksnake Hills, south of the Missouri river," and at the loway and Sac villages; and his trade was with the Kickapoos also. Nine men were employed.). Ref: OIA, Letters Received from SIA, St. Louis (National Archives Microcopy 234, Roll 753), D. D. Mitchell's lists of licenses issued: (1) during 1841, dated December 31, 1841; and (2) for January 1-September 30, 1842. See KHQ, v. 18, pp. 159-163, for an article on Robidoux creek in present Marshall county, and an 1841 item on Joseph Robidoux's brother Michel in "Kansas."

December 22. "Waubaunse," an "old and very influential" Pottawatomie chief, accompanied by his son, and four others (three of whom were Pottawatomie chiefs residing on the Kickapoo reserve above Fort Leavenworth) arrived at Westport, Mo., to discuss with Isaac McCoy the desire many of their people had to exchange the reserve in southwestern Iowa for lands in "Kansas."

Chief Wabaunsee (who, in 1845, was described as having "the snows of eighty winters on his head" ) had come from his home in present Mills county, Iowa, where he had lived since 1836. Once he had been the principal war chief of the Prairie Pottawatomies (when their home was on the Kankakee river in Illinois).

Though Wabaunsee died before the Pottawatomies left Iowa to settle on a Kansas river reserve in the late 1840's, a town, a township, and a county in present Kansas bear his name. (His death occurred in Ohio, apparently in December, 1845, when a stage upset in which he and other Pottawatomie chiefs were riding while homeward-bound from Washington.) Ref: Isaac McCoy "Manuscripts," v. 27, for McCoy's December 22, 1841, letter; History of Mills County, Iowa . . . (Des Moines, 1881), p. 379; Annals of Iowa, Des Moines, 3d series, v. 35 (Fall, 1959), pp. 81-100; The Palimpsest, Iowa City, v. 29 (December, 1948), pp. 353-361; T. L. McKenney and James Hall's The Indian Tribes of North America . . . (Edinburgh, 1934), v. 2, p. 194; R. S. Elliott's Notes Taken in Sixty Years (St. Louis, 1883), p. 212 (for item on Wabaunsee's death).

Employed in "Kansas" by the Indian Department during all, or part of the year 1841 were the following persons:

FORT LEAVENWORTH AGENCY Agent Richard W. Cummins; Interpreters Clement Lessert and Henry Tiblow; Blacksmiths James M. Simpson (for Shawnees), Greenup Dodson (for Shawnees; till November), William Donalson (for Shawnees; beginning November 1); William F. Newton (for Delawares), W. J. Baugh (for Kansa; till August 4), Charles Fish (for Kansa; promoted from assistant smith); Assistant blacksmiths Wilson Rodgers (for Shawnees), Jackson Pitman (for Shawnees), W. H. Newton (for Delawares), Charles Fish (for Kansa; promoted to smith), Mab Frankier (for Kansa); Farmer David Benzley (for Kansa).

GREAT NEMAHAW SUBAGENCY Subagent Congreve Jackson (till August 3), succeeded by William P. Richardson on August 4 (but appointed on June 25); Interpreters Peter Cadue (for Sacs & Foxes), John Rubeti (for Sacs & Foxes; appointed August 5), Jeffrey Dorney (for lowas), Elisha P. Swift (for lowas, from November 4); Blacksmith James Gilmore (for Sacs & Foxes; appointed August 7); Assistant blacksmith William Davies [or, Daviess?] (for Sacs & Foxes; appointed August 7); Farmer P. Richardson (for Sacs & Foxes;

KANSAS BEFORE 1854: A REVISED ANNALS 359

appointed October 1); Assistant farmer Pleasant Johnson (for Sacs & Foxes); Teacher William Hamilton (for Sacs & Foxes, appointed September 23).

OSAGE [MARAIS DES CYGNES] RIVER SUBAGENCY Subagent Anthony L. Davis; Interpreter Luther Rice; Blacksmiths Robert Simerwell and Robert Wilson (both for Pottawatomies ) ; Assistant blacksmiths D. Moreland, Thomas Evans, William A. Simerwell (all for Pottawatomies); "Issuing agent" for the Pottawatomies Andrew H. Stinson (from April 1 to November 24).

OSAGE SUBAGENCY Subagent Robert A. Galloway; Interpreter Charles Mongrain; Blacksmiths John Mathews (appointed January 1), John C. Brashears (till March 4), Silas Moser (appointed March 5; died on, or before, September 4), Edwin B. Lowther (from September 5); Assistant blacksmiths E. W. Black (till March 4), William (half-breed Osage; appointed January 1), and Jacob (an Osage; appointed March 5). Ref: 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 41 (Serial 402); 27th Cong., 2d Sess., H. Doc. No. 164 (Serial 403); 27th Cong., 3d Sess., H. Doc. No. 76 (Serial 403); 27th Cong., 3d Sess., H. Doc. No. 162 (Serial 422); SIA, St. Louis "Records," v. 8, typed copy, pp. 240, 257-259.

(Part Twelve Will Appear in the Winter, 1968, Issue.)

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