The Way to the West, and the Lives of Three Early Americans: Boone—Crockett—Carson

by Emerson Hough

In far-off Chihuahua young Carson hired out as a teamster, serving in the employ of Robert McKnight. He went to the Copper Mines, on the Gila River, and thence back once more to Taos, which latter place was to serve as his headquarters all his life. All this time it was Carson’s ambition to be something better than a cook, or a teamster, or even an interpreter. The adventurer’s blood was in his veins. It was April of 1829 when he joined Young’s party of trappers, and soon thereafter he saw his first fight, in which the white men killed some fifteen Indians. It is not known whether or not Carson distinguished himself in this fight, but certainly he remained with the party, and it was no coward’s company.

This band now worked toward the West, trapped down the Salt River, and reached the head of the San Francisco River. They concluded to go over to the Sacramento River of California, then reported to abound in fur. On the seventh day’s journey to the west and southwest, they reached the Grand Cañon of the Colorado, now admitted to be one of the wonders of the world. These trappers always remembered the Grand Cañon of the Colorado; for it was near there that they bought a horse of some wandering Indians, and ate it. They were very hungry.

There were no trails across the interior desert in those days. Hence, although these were not the first adventurers to cross to California, they were in effect pioneers. In some way they succeeded in reaching San Gabriel Mission of California, and thence—by some very wonderful geography on the part of one or two biographers—they reached the Sacramento River. In the San Joaquin valley they met Peter Ogden’s party of Hudson Bay trappers. So we may see that the West was far from being an unexploited country when Kit Carson began his travels.

This early transcontinental party was successful in its trapping, and the leader, Ewing Young, visited San Rafael with the catch of furs and sold it out in entirety to the captain of a trading schooner. He then bought horses for the return East. The Indians of the Sierra foothills promptly stole certain numbers of these horses. Witness augury of the future of Kit Carson, when we read that he was detailed as the leader of a little party sent out in pursuit of the horse thieves. This was his first independent scouting trip. He and his party killed eight Indians and retook the horses. Already his hand was acquiring cunning in the stern trade of Western life.

September of 1829 found Kit Carson back again in New Mexico. It took the party nine days to ride from Los Angeles to the Colorado River. Thence they seem to have descended the Colorado to tidewater, to have crossed over to the Gila, and to have ascended the Gila to San Pedro. There was some more horse stealing, a little exchange on both sides between the whites and Indians in this line. The whites needed horses, for they had no other meat. Yet in some fashion they won up the Gila River to the copper mines of New Mexico; which, we may see, was ground already known to Carson. Here they cached their furs, since these would be contraband under the Spanish law, nearly all of these wanderings having taken place in the Spanish territory that was the western goal of the early commerce of the prairies.

In time the party turned up at Santa Fé, reaching that city in April, 1830, where the leader, Young, disposed of his furs, the net result for eighteen men during a term of one year being twenty-four thousand dollars. Kit Carson was now twenty-one years of age, and he was fully initiated in his calling. We can not appreciate these journeyings except by taking an accurate map of the great Western country, and following, finger by finger, along stream and across mountain, the course of the early voyagers.

This, however, is but the beginning. In the fall of 1830 the noted Western fur trader, Fitzpatrick, organized a strong party, and it was matter of course that Carson would find his way into it. This band visited the Platte River, whose long southern arm reaches so deep down into the heart of the Rockies. Thence, along good beaver waters, they moved over to the Green River, Pacific waters, also historic in the fur trade. We find them later in Jackson’s Hole, east of the range, even today the center of a great game country. Thence they moved west to the Salmon River, into a country still one of the wildest parts of America; and there, much as a matter of fact, they joined others of their party, who had started out slightly in advance of them, and “for whom they had been looking,” as one chronicler naïvely advises us. It was a search and a meeting in the heart of a wilderness many hundreds of miles in extent.

The winter of 1830-1831 was spent by Carson on the Salmon River. Now enter those stern warriors of the North, the Blackfeet. Kit saw four of his companions killed. He was inured to such scenes, and the incident gave him no pause. April of 1831 found him on the Bear River. Moving, always moving, we see him now on the Green River, again in the “New Park” of Colorado, on the plains of Laramie, again on the long South Fork of the Platte, and presently on the Arkansas. Beseech you, let your finger ever follow on the map; and accept warrant that if your following has been honest, your eyes shall stare in wonder at these journeyings. Let one seek to duplicate it himself, even in these civilized days when towns and ranches crowd the West; and then, having restored that West to the day of beaver and Blackfeet, ask himself how had it been with him had he been in Carson’s company!

This winter camp on the Arkansas River furnished a certain amount of interest. A party of fifty Crow Indians raided the camp and stole a number of horses. It was Carson once more, we may be sure, who was elected to lead the pursuit. Twelve Indians were killed by the young leader and his hardy riflemen. Carson was now accepted as one of the captains of the trails. He had fully learned his bold and difficult trade.

In the spring of 1832 Carson’s party moved to the Laramie River; moved again to the headwaters of the South Fork of the Platte, and caught beaver and fought Indians for a few months; from the Laramie to the Bayou Salade, or Ballo Salade, as it was sometimes spelled in those days. These operations were carried on in the heart of the most dangerous Indian country of the West. Heretofore it had been the custom of the trappers to go in parties of considerable size, so that they might successfully meet the Indians, who even thus made affairs dangerous enough. The quality of Carson’s spirit may therefore be seen when we discover him, with only two companions, breaking away for a solitary beaver hunt in the mountains in the heart of the range. Yet these three were fortunate, and returned to Taos in the fall of 1832 well laden with furs.