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

by Hiram Martin Chittenden

The steamboat Shreveport, with the annual outfit of the new firm for the year 1863, did not get above Cow Island on account of the extremely low stage of the river. No other boat went as far as that within two hundred miles. Harkness and John La Barge put the cargo out upon the bank and hastened back to the assistance of the Robert Campbell. This event further illustrated the incapacity of Harkness. No arrangement was made for the transportation of the goods to Benton, although he knew that a considerable portion of the freight belonged to outside parties, and that the firm had contracted to take it through to that post. This precipitate action was due in part to danger from the Indians. In the year 1863 the tribes along the river were all in a state of unrest, and some of them actually on the warpath against the whites. Fort Union was practically in a state of siege all summer, and the danger to steamboats was a very formidable one. It was held by some parties that the sudden termination of the voyage was due to news received of the famous discovery of the Alder Gulch placers and the desire to go back and notify the firm; but of this there is not the slightest probability. Whatever the explanation, the act itself was disastrous upon the fortunes of the firm.

NICHOLAS WALL.

Among the number of outside parties who had freight on the Shreveport was the firm of John J. Roe and Nicholas Wall, both of St. Louis. Wall represented the firm in Montana and Roe remained in St. Louis. Some little account of Wall’s career and his previous relations with Captain La Barge will be of interest, to show how far a man may forfeit the sentiment of gratitude when his business interests are in any way involved. La Barge had previously been connected with Wall in a business way. In 1861 Wall joined the Confederate sympathizers, in St. Louis, and was captured by General Lyon in the affair of Camp Jackson, St. Louis, May 10, 1861. The prisoners taken there were all paroled, but were confined to the limits of the city. At Wall’s urgent appeal La Barge became bondsman for his good conduct and secured his freedom of action. He worked for La Barge during the rest of the season of 1861.

In the winter of 1862 Wall asked La Barge to assist him in getting to Montana. La Barge gave free transportation on the Emilie to Fort Benton for himself and his goods, and advanced him seven hundred dollars to get to the mines. Wall did a successful business in the Deer Lodge Valley in 1862, and in the fall of that year returned to St. Louis, where he entered into a partnership with John J. Roe. The outfit which this firm were to send to the mines was taken up on the Shreveport. It was through La Barge’s patronage that Nick Wall was extricated from a perilous situation and placed in a position to do a good business. His method of repaying his benefactor will presently appear.

LA BARGE, HARKNESS & CO. SUED.

When Wall heard that the Shreveport could not reach Benton and had discharged her cargo on the bank at Cow Island, he organized a wagon train and went down after his own freight and that of several others. In the spring of 1864 he returned to St. Louis, where he and Roe presented a claim to La Barge, Harkness & Co. for forty thousand dollars’ damages, on goods that were not worth at the outside ten thousand dollars in St. Louis. Captain La Barge agreed to pay the full price of the goods and charge no freight, but his offer was refused. He then told Roe and Wall that they could bring suit at once. Roe replied that he was too sharp to think of bringing suit in St. Louis; he would bring it in Montana, where he knew that the chances were much more in his favor. Robert Campbell and John S. McCune, two of St. Louis’ leading citizens, protested against this proceeding, and agreed to give bonds for the full payment of all damages. Roe refused all compromise and Wall returned to Montana and brought suit.

COLLAPSE OF AFFAIRS AT FORT LA BARGE.

In the meanwhile, affairs at Fort La Barge were showing the effect of absence from that post of any responsible member of the firm. Joseph Picotte, brother of Honoré Picotte, a distinguished trader of the American Fur Company, had been left in charge in 1862; but word having been received that he was not properly attending to his work, he was relieved by Robert H. Lemon, who had been highly recommended by Robert Campbell. Lemon proved to be of less account even than Picotte, and actually took the wholly unauthorized step of turning the firm’s property over for safe-keeping to the American Fur Company. The receipt for this transfer, signed by Andrew Dawson, agent American Fur Company, is still among the La Barge papers. The transaction took place August 31, 1863, and included not only the storage of all the firm’s property at Fort La Barge, but the payment of their employees’ wages, and the removal of the Shreveport freight from Cow Island to Fort Benton. The sum of one thousand dollars was to be paid for storage, and the goods were to be held as security for the payment of this sum and all other liabilities of the firm on account of wages, transportation, or other cause. Thus the entire business of the firm at Fort Benton was practically surrendered to their great rival, and the new “opposition” was crushed almost at its beginning.

OUTCOME OF THE SUIT.

As soon as Wall began legal proceedings the goods were seized and held, pending the outcome of the trial. This did not come off until 1865, when a verdict was rendered against La Barge, Harkness & Co. of twenty-four thousand dollars, which was paid in due course. All the firm’s property in Montana was absolutely lost, including a large quantity of furs ruined by the long detention. The total loss amounted to fully one hundred thousand dollars.