History of Early Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River, Volume 2 (of 2) / Life and Adventures of Joseph La Barge

by Hiram Martin Chittenden

FORT LA BARGE.

The operations at Fort Benton and beyond were placed in the hands of Mr. Harkness. The first step was to build a post at Fort Benton, where it was intended to locate the principal establishment of the firm. The site chosen was near the spot where the Grand Union Hotel later stood. The work was begun June 28, Mrs. La Barge driving the first stake. The inclosure was made three hundred feet long by two hundred feet wide, and the post was named Fort La Barge.

HARKNESS VISITS THE MINES.

Before the Shreveport set out to return to St. Louis, a considerable party made an excursion to the Great Falls of the Missouri. Among them were Father De Smet, Eugene Jaccard, member of the firm; Giles Filley of St. Louis, and his son, Frank; Mrs. John La Barge, Miss Harkness, W. G. Harkness, Tom La Barge, and Mrs. Culbertson, the Indian wife of the noted trader. Mrs. La Barge and Miss Harkness are supposed to be the first white women to have seen the Great Falls of the Missouri. Four days after their return the Shreveport left for St. Louis, taking with them all who had come up only for the trip.

LA BARGE CITY.

The Shreveport having gone, and affairs at Fort La Barge being well under way, Harkness set out July 9 with an ox train laden with assorted merchandise for the mines in the Deer Lodge Valley. When the boat left St. Louis it was expected to go to the Salmon River mines, but the recent discoveries in Montana gave a better prospect nearer home. In fact the demand for goods, even at Fort Benton, was brisk, and the firm had carried on a thriving trade ever since the arrival of the boats. Harkness followed the usual trail up the Missouri River and Little Prickly Pear Creek, through the broad valley on the border of which the city of Helena now stands, and thence to the valley of the Deer Lodge. Nothing of unusual note transpired on the trip. Harkness did not like the experience, except the trout fishing. His journal is full of complaints at the hardship he was compelled to undergo, and he plaintively asks if he “will ever live to reap the benefit.” He generally “nooned at 11 A. M.” in order to “catch trout for dinner.” He reached the Deer Lodge Valley July 23, near the point where the town of that name now stands.[54] Here he found a fellow passenger on the Emilie, Nicholas Wall of St. Louis, who had reached the mines some days before, and who was destined to figure prominently in the future affairs of La Barge, Harkness & Co.

After remaining in this section and prospecting around for eleven days, Harkness grew disgusted at the prospect, placed such of his goods as he did not sell in the hands of Nick Wall to be sold on commission, and set out for the Missouri “glad to be on the road home.” On the Sun River he met the Northern Overland Expedition from St. Paul. He visited the Great Falls on his way down, and arrived at Fort La Barge August 18. Harkness was now “tired and out of spirits,” and “adjusted his expense accounts and turned over everything to the store.” He had evidently had enough of this kind of life, and forthwith ordered “a boat built to go down the river.” The boat was launched August 26 and was christened the Maggie. Harkness lost no time in getting away, and left Fort La Barge at 4 A. M. on the 28th. No incidents occurred on this trip which are of much interest. The party reached Omaha September 30, where Harkness “sold the Maggie for five dollars,” and took passage on the Robert Campbell to St. Joseph. From that point he went by rail and the Mississippi River to St. Louis, where he arrived October 6.

INCOMPETENT HANDS.

The foregoing details, taken entirely from the diary of Harkness, show in what unfit hands the important business of the company in the upper country had been intrusted. From his arrival at Fort Benton until his departure was only two months and a half, including a trip of several hundred miles to the Montana mining regions. Only eleven days did he spend in establishing his trade in that section, the most important point of all, and then practically gave his goods away to Nick Wall, for the company never received a cent for anything left with that gentleman. Yet Harkness was the partner who was to remain in the upper country two years. “He was back in St. Louis almost as soon as I was,” said La Barge, with just indignation, in commenting on the affair.

FIRST SEASON’S OPERATIONS.