From Wonderland, 1903—Northern Pacific Railway.
Colter and Potts were sent trapping in the Blackfoot country. These people were in a revengeful mood because of the fatal encounter with Lewis on Maria's River, and Colter and Potts were on the alert to elude them, but they were discovered. As they pushed their canoe into the stream, an arrow struck Potts. He then fired and killed a man. Instantly he was riddled by arrows. Colter made no resistance. He was taken on shore and stripped. They thought of setting him up as a target, but the chief gave him a chance for his life, which indicates that they were not in so ferocious a temper as has been assumed, for had they been bent on blood atonement for the deaths on Maria's River they would have given Colter no chance at all. They were willing to make a game of it. The chance that was given was to lead the captive out on the prairie, about four hundred yards in advance of the band, and let him go to save himself if he could. They did not shoot at him. It was to be a pure test of speed. Colter ran fast, for he was a good runner and life was the prize. Only one pursuer gained. He drew nearer and nearer. Colter stopped, turned round, and threw up his hands. The blood, owing to his severe exertion, had flowed from his nostrils and covered his body, making a startling spectacle. The Blackfoot, surprised, tried to halt and throw his spear, but exhausted, he fell, breaking the spear as he went down. Colter thrust the sharp point into the man's heart, and rushed on for Jefferson River. This he reached while the Blackfeet stopped at their fallen comrade, and plunging in he swam to an island, dived under a large pile of driftwood, and raised his head above water amidst the sticks. The pursuers mounted the pile and ranged, the whole island all day long, but it did not occur to them to dive in the search. Night fell. All grew quiet. Colter swam gently down a long distance, and then started for Lisa's fort, where, after seven days' hard travel and exposure, he arrived.
Lisa went back to St. Louis the next year, 1808, but Colter remained till 1810. He passed through the geyser region of the Yellowstone, and is said to have been the first white man to go there. Inasmuch, however, as the Yellowstone was named before Lewis and Clark made their journey, and by Frenchmen, it seems probable that these same Frenchmen had visited the geyser region. They certainly were at the great canyon, for, as before noted, they would not otherwise have applied the name Yellowstone. Colter, therefore, more exactly may be said to have been the first American in the geyser basin. When he arrived at St. Louis again, he met there the English naturalist Bradbury, who printed the story of his race for life in the book he wrote, from which it has been transcribed many times. As it was a famous incident, I venture to give it again in a much condensed form.[75]
About this time Henry, one of Lisa's trappers, being obliged to abandon his post at the three forks, because of the hostility of the Blackfeet, passed over to the headwaters of the Snake and built a trading-post there, the very first establishment by an American on the Pacific slope, excepting Fort Clatsop, of Lewis and Clark, at the mouth of the Columbia. This fort of Henry's was built about three years later than the one Fraser founded for the North-west Company near latitude 54.
A Mansion of the Wilderness.
Photograph by F. S. Dellenbaugh.
The shrewd Lisa perceived that power was necessary in the fur business to secure the greatest profit, and as this required combination, he established, in the winter of 1808-09, the Missouri Fur Company, with William Morrison as one of the partners. At almost the same moment, a keen business man of New York, John Jacob Astor, obtained a charter from the State of New York for the American Fur Company. Encountering the rivalry of the Mackinaw Company, he arranged with some of the members of the North-west Company to buy it out, and they obtained possession in 1811. Meanwhile, the possibilities of the North-west and the region traversed by Lewis and Clark appealed to Astor's business sense, and in 1810 he organised another company to operate from the mouth of the Columbia, called the Pacific Fur Company. His plan was to establish a line of trading-posts along the Missouri and Columbia to the Pacific, where, at the mouth of the Columbia, a chief station was to be maintained, to receive furs and distribute supplies. An annual ship was to keep this post in touch with New York. The scheme was entirely feasible, but in the execution of it every circumstance appeared to conspire for defeat. Some enterprises float easily across every obstacle, while others seem to create barriers which grow to enormous proportions.
When Fraser established his post west of the Rocky Mountains in 1806, it was intended that he should move down and explore all the country to the southward. Later another party was dispatched under David Thompson especially to forestall Astor's people at the mouth of the Columbia. Astor, himself, endeavoured to conciliate the British companies by offering them a third interest in his Pacific Company, but they declined. He next engaged a number of North-west men for his enterprise, to gain the advantage of their experience, but in this he seems to have made a mistake. As Great Britain and the United States were on the verge of war, it would have been better if the concern had been made purely American. In prominent positions there were only two citizens of the Republic: Wilson Price Hunt, of New Jersey, chief agent; and Jonathan Thorn, a lieutenant of the United States Navy, on leave to command the first supply ship, the Tonquin, a vessel doomed to strange destruction. The new company organised on June 23, 1810, Astor holding one half of the hundred shares, while the other half was distributed among the several partners. Hunt was to go overland and remain at the chief station five years.[76]