← Legends of the Old West
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- [00:01]
Chris Wimmer
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- [00:40]
Matthew Kearns
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- [00:40]
Chris Wimmer
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- [01:14]
Matthew Kearns
On August 23, 1823, Hugh Glass was attacked by a grizzly bear that was protecting her cubs. Clawed, chewed and mauled. None of the other mountain men in Andrew Henry's company thought Hugh Glass would make it. Henry left two men, seasoned trapper John Fitzgerald and young greenhorn Jim Bridger, to wait until Glass succumbed to his wounds and then provide him a proper burial two days later. Glass hadn't died, and Fitzgerald and Bridger were worried that they would find themselves surrounded by hostile Native Americans or surprised by another bear. Fitzgerald convinced Bridger to abandon Glass, a decision Bridger regretted for the rest of his life. When they left, they took Glass rifle and knife and left him with the hide of the grizzly bear that had attacked him. They had killed the bear, removed the hide and used it to cover Glass while he suffered. But Hugh Glass refused to die. Pulling himself along, then crawling, then limping his way hundreds of miles back to civilization, Glass focused on revenge against Fitzgerald and Bridger. When Glass finally found Bridger at Fort Henry, where the Missouri river meets the Yellowstone river in the northwest corner of modern day North Dakota, Glass had a change of heart. He decided Bridger, who was just 20 years old, was too young and scared to have known better. Glass forgave Bridger and set off to find Fitzgerald, but was disappointed to discover that his archenemy had joined the army and was now under the protection of Colonel Henry Leavenworth at Fort Atkinson in modern day Nebraska. Glass was able to reclaim his rifle from Fitzgerald, but he was not able to exact stronger revenge against the man who had betrayed him. In the summer of 1824, with his battle for survival and quest for revenge now done, Hugh Glass left Fort Atkinson. He had his trusty rifle and $300 in his satchel. The soldiers of the 6th Regiment were captivated by the living legend, and they passed the hat. They collected $300 to give to Glass to help him get restarted. It was a small fortune for a man who had survived on virtually nothing for the past year. With the money, glass returned to St. Louis. The city was a hub of activity, a crossroads for traders, trappers and adventurers. Glass saw an opportunity to turn his hard earned notoriety into something more substantial. He partnered in a venture to move goods along the Santa Fe Trail, a burgeoning route that promised new fortune in the uncharted territories of the West. Three years earlier, in 1821, William Becknell, a pragmatic trader from Missouri, had blazed the Santa Fe Trail. Becknell had lost a fortune in the Panic of 1819, and he owed creditors the equivalent of more than $28,000 in today's money. He gathered $300 in trade goods, set off to Santa Fe, and hoped the fur trappers who swarmed the area would be willing to pay premium prices for his wares. Others were trying the same thing at roughly the same time. But Becknell's expedition was the first to successfully navigate the perilous road from Missouri to Santa Fe, New Mexico. His journey marked the opening of a significant trade route that became vital to the fur trade and the broader push of American expansion westward. The Southwest would be a welcome change of pace For a time, but Hugh Glass couldn't resist the spell of the Northern Rockies. He would reunite with his fellow mountain men at the annual rendezvous and then suffer an attack in the same region that would prove deadly for the 7th Cavalry 40 years in the future. From Black Barrel Media, this is an American frontier series on legends of the Old West. Hi, I'm your host, Chris Wimmer. And this season we're beginning regular stories of the earliest days of American expansion across the continent. In this series, we'll focus on the lives and legends of mountain men Jedediah Smith, Hugh Glass and Jeremiah Johnson. This is episode four. Hugh Glass, that reckless breed of men. Before William Becknell's trailblazing, the Spanish authorities had tightly controlled New Mexico and barred foreign trade. But when Mexico gained its independence From Spain in 1821, the region opened up, presenting lucrative opportunities for American traders. Becknell seized his chance and led a small party of men and pack Mules laden with goods, they faced numerous challenges. Treacherous terrain, lack of water, and the constant threat of attack from Native American tribes. But their success on the Santa Fe Trail proved the viability of the route. Now free of the trade ban imposed by the Spanish government, the people of Santa Fe were eager to pay top dollar for goods that had previously been unavailable. When Becknell left Santa Fe a month after his arrival, he had turned $300 of goods into $6,000 of revenue, around $140,000 today. It was a windfall, and the Santa Fe Trail quickly became a critical artery for the fur trade. Traditionally, trappers and traders, like those of the Ashley Henry Fur Company had to navigate the Missouri river, threading their way through territories controlled by the Blackfeet, the Sioux and the Arikara. The Santa Fe Trail offered an alternative. It allowed traders to transport furs and Goods Overland from St. Louis to Santa Fe, bypassing the most perilous sections of the Missouri River. The route significantly reduced the risks and opened up new markets for American goods in the Southwest. Over the course of three years, big canvas covered wagons, which would soon become common in westward expansion, began to replace the less efficient pack mules used by Becknell. The wagons quickly revolutionized the trade and ushered in another new era of the Santa Fe Trail. And at the same time, one of the fur trade's pioneers, Andrew Henry, was making his exit. Henry had been a stalwart figure in the early days of the Ashley Henry Fur Company, which he founded with William Ashley. He had led the expedition during which Hugh Glass was mauled by a grizzly bear and then abandoned. The dangers and difficulties of the fur trade had taken their toll on Henry. By 1824, he decided it was time to retire from the relentless grind of trapping and trading. He returned to St. Louis, where he dissolved his partnership with Ashley. And as Andrew Henry was returning to Missouri to live a quieter life. In 1824, Hugh Glass was leaving Missouri on another adventure. Glass and his partners loaded their wagons and hit the trail to Santa Fe. The vast southern plains stretched out before them. And as it turned out, the trip wasn't much of an adventure. If there was any such thing as a typical trek across hundreds of miles of raw territory, this one was it. Hugh Glass and his group reached Santa Fe without much excitement. They found a bustling market town that was alive with energy. Traders, adventurers and Native Americans mingled in the sun drenched plazas and exchanged goods and stories from far flung places. Hugh Glass, a hardened mountain man with a reputation forged in the wilderness, felt out of place among the merchants and their neatly ordered goods. Unlike William Bacnell, who, who had turned his initial investment into a small fortune, Glass $300 stake didn't yield the same return. He didn't lose money, but he also didn't make enough to convince him to trade his days as an explorer for days as a merchant. Santa Fe, despite all its allure and opportunity, couldn't compete with the call of the wild. Glass Heart remained tethered to the rivers and forests, to the life he knew best. With little hesitation, he sold his remaining goods and outfitted himself for another venture into the wilderness. The headwaters of the Gila river beckoned. Glass believed the river, which runs through modern day Southern Arizona, was still rich with the promise of untapped furs.
- [10:18]
Narrator
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- [12:13]
Matthew Kearns
Setting out from Santa Fe Glass Traveled southwest, crossing the rugged terrain that led to the Gila River. The Gila river, with its winding tributaries and hidden valleys, offered the seclusion and resources Glass sought. He set his traps and waited, the quiet of the wilderness a comforting companion. But he soon discovered that the beaver population in the area had been significantly depleted. Overtrapping had rendered the streams nearly barren. Undeterred, Glass pushed further into unknown territories. Rumors swirled among the trappers and traders in the region, Whispers that Glass had ventured farther than most. Some said he traveled as far as the convergence of the Gila and Colorado rivers, a remote and treacherous expanse seldom seen by white men. Those tales, though difficult to verify, added to the mystique surrounding Hugh Glass. Whether driven by necessity or sheer wanderlust, he continued to push the boundaries of the known world. Two years before Jedediah Smith ventured down to southern California, Hugh Glass may have gotten close if he traveled into the deserts of southern Arizona. In early 1825, as Smith was leaving the Flathead outpost in northern Montana and was heading for the first mountain man rendezvous, Hugh Glass was arriving in Taos, New Mexico. Taos was a small but vibrant community in the mountains above Santa Fe. It was a haven for trappers and traders, and it wasn't surprising that it would become the home of the most famous of the next generation of mountain men, Kit Carson, the following year. Taos was a place where stories were exchanged over campfires, and deals were struck in the smoky interiors of adobe buildings. Hugh Glass fit right in. His rugged demeanor and legendary survival tale earned him a measure of respect among the seasoned men in town. In Taos, Glass resupplied and reconnected with old acquaintances. The town was a crossroads of cultures where the influences of Spanish, Native American, and Anglo settlers blended into a unique tapestry. For a time, Glass enjoyed the relative comfort of the settlement, but the wilderness always called him back. While Glass was in Taos, a significant event was unfolding Farther North. In July 1825, William Ashley organized a mountain man rendezvous at Henry's fork of the Green river, the first of what would become 16 annual events in the northern Rocky Mountains. Jedediah Smith, whose success in the Green river valley had sparked the idea for the rendezvous, was there, along with the young and ambitious Jim Bridger. The rendezvous was a melting pot of stories and strategies, a place where fortunes were made and legends grew. But Hugh Glass was notably absent. His solitary nature and relentless pursuit of new trapping grounds had taken him far from the gathering of his peers. By a Point. In 1825, Hugh Glass determined that the waters of the Gila river out west and others closer to Taos were essentially trapped out. If he was going to find Peltz, Glass knew he needed to head north into modern day Utah. Glass knew that venturing north would be a challenge. The land was beautiful but treacherous. Its rivers and valleys hid both wealth and furs and the constant threat of attack from native tribes. Glass knew he couldn't do this trip alone. He joined forces with the renowned trapper and trader, Etienne Provo. They assembled a team and headed for Utah. But the first trip didn't last long. While trapping and canoeing down a river, Glass's group spotted a lone Native American woman along the bank. The woman, a Shoshone, was an unexpected and potentially dangerous encounter. The Shoshone were known to be hostile toward white traders who worked with their enemies. And the Shoshone were at war with another local tribe, so tensions were already high. Hoping to avoid conflict, Glass and his men approached the woman with an offering of beaver meat. But their sudden presence startled her and she screamed at the top of her lungs. The piercing scream echoed through the trees and alerted nearby Shoshone warriors. Within moments, arrows rained down on Glass and his men. One of Glass's trappers fell dead almost immediately with an arrow through the chest. Then Glass was hit. An arrow embedded itself in his back. Despite the chaos, he managed to rally his men and retreat swiftly from the ambush site. When the trappers were able to regroup, they kept retreating. Glass endured the agonizing pain of the inflamed wound as they traveled more than 700 miles back to T. When the group finally arrived home, Glass faced another harrowing ordeal. With no formal medical facilities available, he relied on the crude but effective skills of a fellow trapper. Using only a straight razor, the man carefully extracted the metal arrowhead from Glass back. The procedure was excruciating, but Glass endured it with the stoicism that had become his hallmark. If a full grown grizzly couldn't kill Hugh Glass, one arrow sure as hell wouldn't do the job. Over the next few months, Glass allowed his wound to heal as he recuperated in Taos. Yet even in recovery, Glass mind never strayed far from the wilderness. Glass joined ETN Provo on another expedition, this time venturing farther into the Utah territory. The party aimed to explore new trapping grounds and trade with various Native American tribes as they pushed deeper into uncharted regions. They eventually reached the Great Salt Lake. Hugh Glass and ETN Provo were among the first white men to see the lake. The discovery of the lake so to speak is usually credited to Jim Bridgerton, who was also in the area at the time. Whichever explorer was the first white man to lay eyes on the Great Salt Lake. The discovery of the lake was a significant moment, and it marked a key point in the westward exploration of the American frontier. In that regard, Etienne Provo, a man many people have never heard of, made a sizable contribution. He continued trapping in the Utah wilderness for another 15. He died in 1850 at the age of 64, and the Provo River, Provo Canyon, and the town of Provo, Utah, are all named in his honor. In the summer of 1826, the second Mountain man rendezvous came and went, and Hugh Glass was a no show at that rendezvous. William Ashley Soldier, the Ashley Henry Fur Company to Jedediah Smith, David Jackson, and Bill Sublet. The new owners renamed the company the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. Meanwhile, Hugh Glass completed a trip with ETN Provo and then went back to the life of a solitary trapper. He stayed up in the northern Rockies and traversed the Yellowstone country. In the summer of 1827, trappers and traders converged on Bear Lake in the northeast corner of Utah for the third rendezvous. Two of the three new owners of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company were able to attend with little difficulty. But one of the three men had been on a journey for the record books, though no one knew the extent of it at the time or if the man had even survived. In attendance as well for the first time was Hugh Glass. He was there when the other mountain men fired a cannon to welcome the return of Jedediah Smith. Jedediah Smith had spent the entire year between the rendezvous of 1826 and the rendezvous of 1827 making his historic trip to California. He had traveled down through Utah, then through southern Nevada, and then through the Mojave Desert to the Los Angeles area, and then all the way down to San Diego, then back up through California's Central Valley before crossing the Sierra Nevada mountains and surviving a punishing trek across the high deserts of Nevada and Utah. For the first time in years, Glass was able to talk with the man who had saved his life on the beach during the Arikara attack four years earlier in the summer of 1823. That had been two months before Glass was mauled by the bear and three months before Smith survived his own bear attack. They exchanged stories and showed the scars of their bear encounters, though Smith conceded that Glass had had the worst experience. The rendezvous was a blend of business and festivity. Traders, trappers, and Native Americans exchanged goods, stories and camaraderie. Beaver pelts, the lifeblood of the fur trade, were purchased at $3 per pound. The Rocky Mountain Fur Company under Smith, Jackson and Sublette appeared to have had a successful year, primarily due to the markup of goods and supplies sent west by William Ashley under his new business venture. As the sole supplier of the company, however, there was grumbling among the trappers about the high prices of Ashley's goods. It was a perennial complaint in the harsh realities of frontier life. The 1827 Bear Lake rendezvous took a darker turn when a violent skirmish erupted with members of the Blackfeet Nation. According to trapper Daniel Potts, the conflict involved about 20 Blackfoot warriors who entered the camp to murder a man and woman from the Snake Tribe. The white traders were allied with the Snake Tribe trappers. Another friend of Hugh Glass, James Beckwourth, who was known for his flair for embellishment, claimed it was an all out battle involving more than 300 trappers and their native allies. According to Beckwourth, the white trappers and the Snake trappers fought the Blackfeet for six hours. If it was true, the length of the battle probably would have set a record for the longest sustained battle in the west. Until the Battle of the Rosebud in the summer of 1876. As Jim Beckwourth claimed, the Blackfeet lost 173 men. Some historians have called Beckwourth the quote immaculate liar based on his propensity to exaggerate and storytell better than any other mountain man. So it's more likely that the battle was a skirmish. While a small number of white trappers were injured, none died, but multiple Native Americans lost their lives, though the exact number remains unknown. Despite the conflict, the rendezvous continued and wrapped up around July 13. Glass, like many others, left the gathering with new supplies and new stories, ready to face the challenges of the upcoming year. A year later, the trappers and traders returned to Bear lake for the 1828 Summer Rendezvous and once again Hugh Glass was in attendance. This time the anticipation was palpable. As the trappers gathered, another significant engagement loomed. Approximately 200 to 300 Blackfoot warriors attacked Robert Campbell's party just a few miles from the rendezvous site. The situation was dire, but the proximity to the rendezvous proved fortunate. 60 to 70 trappers and several hundred friendly Native Americans rushed out to reinforce Campbell's group. According to some accounts, the Blackfoot warriors retired before the reinforcements arrived and avoided a full scale battle. This year's rendezvous lasted through the early part of July. Unlike previous years, there was no pack train to return the furs to St. Louis. So the partners of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, Smith, Jackson and Sublet, took on the responsibility themselves. The added effort proved worthwhile. The furs sold in St. Louis that year were valued at $35,810, which would be more than a million dollars today. By any measure, it was a fantastic year for the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. And that was starting to cause tension among the trappers. The owners of the Rocky Mountain Company were making money on furs, and they were making money on the goods that were sold at the Rendezvous through their supplier, William Ashley. As the 1828 rendezvous ended, Hugh Glass set out to see if he could do something to help his fellow independent trappers.
- [25:41]
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- [25:46]
Narrator
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- [26:32]
Matthew Kearns
So you want to be a marketer? It's easy. You just have to score a ton of leads and figure out a way to turn them all into customers. Plus manage a dozen channels, write a million blogs, and launch 100 campaigns all at once. When that's done, simply make your socials go viral and bring in record profits. No sweat. Okay, fine, it's a lot of sweat. But with HubSpot's AI powered marketing tools, launching benchmark breaking campaigns is easier than ever. Get started@HubSpot.com marketers in the summer of 1828, the American Fur Company, founded by one of America's first millionaires, John Jacob Astor, initiated the construction of Fort Union at the junction of the Yellowstone and Missouri rivers. The fort was strategically placed near the abandoned Fort Henry, the second of the two locations that used that name. At the confluence of the Yellowstone and the Missouri. The fort was ideally located to dominate the fur trade in the Upper Missouri region. Kenneth McKenzie, head of the newly formed Upper Missouri outfit, directed the establishment of the fort as a critical hub for trading at the 1828 rendezvous. Rumors circulated that the Upper Missouri outfit would soon be in a position to send a supply caravan to the Rockies. The whispers sparked hope among independent trappers who were eager for competitive pricing and new supplies. To confirm the validity of the rumors, the trappers asked Hugh Glass if he would venture north to learn the truth. In the late summer or early fall of 1828, Glass arrived at Fort Floyd, about 120 miles short of the future home of Fort Union. MacKenzie was headquartered at Fort Floyd while Fort Union was being built and Hugh Glass consulted the company man about his plans. Late that fall, MacKenzie dispatched men and goods to the Fort Union site and he offered Hugh Glass a job. Glass accepted part time work as a hunter for the Upper Missouri outfit at Fort Union. He supplied meat to the fort and spent his spare time trapping in the surrounding areas. Glass's reputation as a legendary mountain man preceded him, and he quickly became a respected figure among the men of the outfit. The esteem in which Glass was held by his peers was evident when they christened a keel boat in his honor, naming it the Old Glass. Furthermore, the high bluffs along the south side of the Missouri east of its junction with the Yellowstone became known as Glass Bluffs, a name that endures to this day. During his time at Fort Union, Glass formed a good relationship with Kenneth McKenzie. McKenzie valued glass expertise and knowledge of the land, and Glass found the semi structured life at the fort a welcome respite from the relentless unpredictability of a lone trapper's existence. Fort Union clerk James Hamilton took a particular interest in Hugh Glass. Hamilton was captivated by the tales of survival and adventures, and he began documenting Glass's experiences with the intention of eventually publishing them. Unfortunately, the manuscript has been lost to time, leaving only the echoes of Glass's stories to be passed down through oral history and fragmented accounts. That's one of the reasons why Hugh Glass's life outside of his famous encounter with the bear and quest for revenge is shrouded in mystery. Fall turned to winter and Glass's movements in the New Year of 1829 are not well documented, but it's assumed he attended the 1829 rendezvous at Pierre's Hole. By the spring of 1830, Glass was back in the Upper Missouri region, trapping and hunting while based at Fort Union. The American Fur Company's ledger books from 1831 to 1833 have a log for Hugh Glass, which marked a transition from the life of a solitary trapper to a more settled existence. During that time he was joined by Johnson Gardner, another renowned trapper. Gardner, like Glass, had chosen the upper Missouri country for its rich trapping grounds and the relative stability offered by the trading post. The Gardner River, Gardner's Hole, and the town of Gardner, Montana, are all named for Johnson, Gardner. For Glass and Gardner, their years at Fort Union represented a balance between the rugged independence of the trapper's life and the emerging structures of the fur trade industry. The sun was setting on the brief era of the free ranging, fur trapping mountain men. In the fall of 1832, the American Fur Company expanded its influence in the Yellowstone region by building Fort Cass at the junction of the Yellowstone river and the Bighorn River, a place that would be pivotal to the stories of Custer, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and the Battle of the little bighorn. 44 years in the future, Fort Cass was strategically positioned to cultivate trade with the Crow Nation. Samuel Tullock of the American Fur Company supervised construction, and keen listeners might perk up at the name Tullock. In the area of the Bighorn River, Tullock's Creek is a stream in southern Montana that was a signpost for Custer's detachment in June of 1876. When Custer and the 7th Cavalry reached the creek, Custer was supposed to send messenger George Herondine to ride to General Alfred Terry's column so that the two units could coordinate an attack on Sitting Bull's village. But Custer refused to let Herndine leave, and thus General Terry's column had no idea where Custer was or what he was doing. In 1832, Samuel Tullock's new fort quickly became a focal point for the region's fur trade. Shortly after its completion, Hugh Glass relocated from Fort Union to Fort Cass. His role as a hunter was crucial in supplying meat to the fort, and his presence added a layer of security and expertise to the fledgling outpost. As fall passed into winter, Glass settled into his routine. At Fort Cass, however, the call of the wilderness remained strong. In the early spring of 1833, at 49 or 50 years old, Glass departed Fort Cass to trap beaver a short way downriver from the fort. Two other trappers went with him. They were all seasoned and confident, but as they ventured out onto the frozen Bighorn river, they were unaware that danger lurked nearby. It would be an abrupt and somewhat shocking end to Hugh Glass's story, even though the action was all too common in the West. As Glass and his companions crossed the ice, they were ambushed by a large party of arikara who were concealed on the opposite bank. The arikara, who were intent on stealing horses, had been scouting the area around Fort Cass when they spotted the trappers the attack was swift and vicious. The warriors overwhelmed and shot all three men. Within seconds, Hugh Glass and his two friends were dead on the frozen river. The warriors scalped the trappers, stole everything of value and left the trappers bodies on the ice. Jim Beckwourth, a friend of Hugh Glass and another member of Ashley's Hundred, provided an account of Hugh Glass demise. He claimed to have been at Fort Cass in the spring of 1833 and discovered the bodies of the three trappers lying on the ice. Beckwourth's version of the story, while vivid, included details that don't match other verifiable accounts from the period. Nevertheless, he described the burial of the trappers and the profound emotional reaction of members of the Crow Nation to their death. Beckwourth said, we returned together and buried the three men amid the most terrible scenes I had ever witnessed. The crying was truly appalling. The three men were well known and highly esteemed by the Crows. When their bodies were lowered to their last resting place, numberless fingers were voluntarily chopped off and thrown into the graves. Hair and trinkets of every description were also contributed and the graves were finally filled up. The story did not end with the burial of Glass and his companions. Some members of the Arikara party moved on to the headwaters of the Powder river where they encountered a group of trappers led by Glass friend Johnson Gardner. The Arikara posed as a friendly tribe and the trappers welcomed the warriors to their campfire. But then one of the trappers noticed a warrior carrying Hugh Glass rifle. It was the same gun that John Fitzgerald had taken from glass 10 years earlier when he left Glass for dead and the one Glass had reclaimed after his improbable survival and legendary quest for revenge. Now the rifle betrayed the men who had killed him, ensuring a final measure of vengeance from Glass. Fellow mountain men. Gardner and his trappers pounced on the Arikara and interrogated them about the rifle and other items that were probably stolen. When the Arikara couldn't provide satisfactory explanations for how they had acquired the items, the trappers scalped the warriors and buried them alive. Hugh Glass Life and death left an indelible mark on the history of the American frontier. His endurance and survival skills stood out even among the toughest and most rugged explorers of the West. A monument to Hugh Glass now stands near the site of the bear attack on the southern shore of the present day Shade Hill Reservoir in Perkins County, South Dakota. The nearby Hugh Glass Lakeside Use Area, a campground and picnic area, serves as a reminder of his extraordinary life. Glass's story, filled with moments of incredible hardship and resilience, continues to inspire. His legacy is one of enduring spirit and unyielding determination, but also a stark testament to the wild, untamed frontier. Because Hugh Glass refused to die, his story will live forever. Next time on Legends of the Old West. It's the first half of the story of the man who became the embodiment of myth and legend in the Mountain man era. He's commonly known as Jeremiah Johnson, and he was nicknamed Liver Eating Johnson and Crow Killer. Though, as you'll hear, virtually every part of his story is up for debate, including his name. That's next week on Legends of the Old West. Members of our Black Barrel plus program don't have to wait week to week to receive new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the Show Notes or On our website blackberrymedia.com memberships are just $5 per month. This series was researched and written by Matthew Kearns. Original music by Rob Valliere. I'm your host and producer Chris Wimmer. Thanks for listening.
- [38:42]
Chris Wimmer
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