Andrew Henry and Two Fort Henrys
During the late 1700s and early 1800s it took a different breed of men (skilled or unskilled) to leave the conveniences and security of a relatively safe eastern settlement of fellow inhabitants and go charging off across the North American Continent into the untamed wilderness of the western regions. That is precisely what happened to those free spirited men known as fur trappers who were in search of opportunity and wealth that laid unexploited in the rivers and streams of the Rocky Mountains and surrounding vicinity. The wealth existed in the form of the fur skins of the beaver, otter, lynx, bobcat, cougar, bear, and wolf. All of these type mammals grew, matured, and propagated in the hidden regions of the remote and treacherous mountains of Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Utah, Northern California and Nevada.
These wild-in-heart men and some like-kind women trekked up into the remote mountains and plied their trade while battling the elements, predators, and wild savages of the region. It was indeed these fur trappers who played the first role in settling and taming the wild mountain areas of the far west of America. Had it not been for them and their personal strength and stamina, the white man would not have survived and grew into a civilized society of people who opened up a new way of life for all of those folks who came behind them.
Pull in here a little closer to the fire, top off your coffee cup, and allow me to spin you a yarn about one brave man who was one of the first to take on the wild west,…his name was Andrew Henry.
Andrew Henry was born in Pennsylvania around 1775. Having been born to a life of affluence and social prominence, he prospered and thrived. He had developed into a tall man with a swarthy dark complexion and a taste for the finer things in life. Andrew wore the latest fashions, dined in the finest homes and wooed the ladies by playing quixotic melodies on his violin. He kept himself active in several different organizations, often holding high positions within their structure; and being civic-minded, served as election judge and juryman. Then, at the age of thirty-three, he apparently tired of the “easy” life.
In 1809, Andrew Henry joined Manuel Lisa, Jean Pierre Chouteau and seven others in organizing the Missouri Fur Company. Andrew Henry was not content to work and operate from behind the scenes from an office in St. Louis. Consequently, he donned buckskins and headed for the Rocky Mountains. While living and trapping in the Rockies he contended with the hardships of the trade; grizzly bear attacks; fighting Blackfoot Indian warriors; hunger; cold; thirst; and physical exhaustion.
Many different tribal members ended up working for the Missouri Fur Company. The Company had relied on the Indians to do the actual trapping and hunting that produced the furs. The furs thus collected were then taken to various trading posts where, with increasing frequency, the Indians trappers were given hard liquor as an actual medium of exchange for their harvested animal fur pelts, also known as “plews.” The whole pattern was so firmly established that it was very difficult to conduct business without a substantial supply of alcohol. In July of 1822, a law was enacted prohibiting the sale or trade of alcohol to any Indians.
Andrew Henry then joined with William H. Ashley, to form a new business, The Rocky Mountain Fur Company, based in St. Louis. Advertisements were posted in St. Louis newspapers seeking “One hundred enterprising young men…to ascend the River Missouri to its source, there to be employed for one, two, or three years.” Among those hired were Jedediah Smith, William Sublette, Milton Sublette, Jim Beckworth, Thomas Fitzpatrick, and David Edward Jackson.
Andrew Henry retired from the fur trade two years later in 1824, at age of fifty, and he died in 1832. He could have lived and died a very wealthy man. But he did not. He had chosen adventure instead. He once told a friend that he had suffered a great deal and had met with many misfortunes. But he left a legacy which must certainly have eased some of his losses–the establishment of Fort Henry, in present-day Idaho, the first American fur post erected on the Pacific side of the Rockies.
During the spring of 1810, Andrew Henry and his men built a fort on the Three Forks of the Missouri River in present-day Montana. However, a little over a month later the fort came under Indian attack. Eight trappers lost their lives fighting the territorial Blackfoot Indians. Many other fur trappers were seriously wounded.
Knowing that such attacks would definitely continue, Henry abandoned the fort. He and his company ascended the Madison River, crossed the Continental Divide and came upon a spring fed lake (later named Henry’s Lake in and around West Yellowstone National Park in present-day Idaho). The group continued on until they found a well-watered district with numerous tributaries. Here Andrew Henry erected another fort (in the vicinity of the present day city of St. Anthony in southeastern Idaho). Three log cabins were built to serve as temporary winter quarters for him and his men.
The area had at first seemed ideal for such a post. There was an abundance of game, wood, and grass. Streams crisscrossed the whole area and beaver ponds were everywhere.
The Shoshoni Indians called the area “Egin,” meaning “cold.” Its elevation was 4,600 feet and was an area prone to heavy snowfall. Below-zero temperatures often persisted for weeks during the winter months. Had Andrew Henry known this, the fort would most likely have been moved seventy miles farther south to the bottomlands of the Portneuf River near what is known today as the city of Pocatello, Idaho.
The winter of 1810 was bitterly harsh. The wild game animals all migrated out of the area. The fur trappers had great difficulty obtaining enough food to sustain themselves. They subsisted by eating the flesh of their own horses. Though the men suffered greatly from the cold, no deaths were recorded.
The spring hunt of 1811 brought in forty packs of beaver pelts from the area. However, at the conclusion of the spring trapping season, Henry again abandoned yet another second Fort Henry.
If you stop for a moment and consider that these men had no insulated underwear, polar fleece, heated gloves and boots, and no canvas tents and camp stoves on which to cook, and no dehydrated ready to eat meals to prepare and consume, you can easily see and understand just how strong and hardy they actually were as they withstood the rigors of the wilds of the far west.
The hardy people who today populate the western, and in particular the northwestern states of America all came from the loins of even the more hardy stock of their fur trapper forefathers. Like father,…like son.
Peace and Love to All of You……………………Poppa Bear