By Museum of the Mountain Man Staff
In the early 19th-century fur trade, New Year’s often eclipsed Christmas as the primary festive occasion in remote areas. While Christmas was frequently quiet, or entirely unobserved, New Year’s tended to bring camaraderie, feasting, and lively celebration.
An early example appears during the Astorians’ westward expedition of 1811–1812: Wilson Price Hunt made no mention of Christmas at all. On December 24, 1811, he wrote only of cold, muddy trails and weary travel:
On the 24th I [at last] turned away from the Canoe River, remembrance of which will always cause us some moments of unhappiness. We traveled west, crossing hills by a trail that was sometimes level enough, more often irregular, but always good. A little snow fell and a little rain.[1]
Hunt’s next entry did not occur until December 28, when he again focused on the terrain and noted the birth of Marie Dorion’s child on December 31.[2]
Hunt was then asked to pause a day to celebrate the New Year. As Washington Irving later described,
This was particularly urged by the Canadian voyageurs, with whom New-Year’s day is a favorite festival; and who never willingly give up a holiday, under any circumstances. There was no resisting such an application; so the day was passed in repose and revelry; the poor Canadians contrived to sing and dance in defiance of all their hardships; and there was a sumptuous New-Year’s banquet of dog’s meat and horse flesh.[3]
Hunt’s own entry for January 1, 1812, recorded a more modest account of the celebration:
My people asked me not to travel on the 1st of January without first celebrating the new year. I agreed to the idea willingly because most of them were very tired from having daily no more than a meager meal of horse meat and from carrying packs on their shoulders while crossing the mountains.[4]
John C. Luttig recorded the New Year’s holiday a year later in 1813. His entry of January 1 noted:
January the 1st, The new year was ushered in by firing a Salute and paying the Complement of the Season, every One seemed rejoiced of having lived to see another year, fine moderate weather in the Evening several Rees arrived, they brought a Present for Mr. Manuel, but he would not accept it, I took it and paid pretty high.[5]
Alexander Ross described New Year observances some years later in 1824-25. On Saturday, December 25, 1824, he wrote: “Considerable indians; the peace pipe kept in motion. All the people a dram.” The following day, he noted: “No work today. Ordered the men to dress and keep the Sabbath.” For January 1, 1825, Ross recorded a more formal observance: “At daybreak the men saluted with guns. They were treated to rum and cake, each a pint of rum and a half pound of tobacco.”[6]
Similarly, John Work’s journals often reflect an emphasis on New Year festivities. For example, in January 1826, his Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) brigade received extra rations, including venison, buffalo tongue, flour, and rum. Musket volleys, rum, cake, and tobacco marked the occasion:
At daylight they ushered in the new year with a volley of musketry … With this and the pint given to each of them, they soon contrived to get nearly all pretty drunk. They appeared to pass the day comfortably enjoying themselves.[7]
Peter Skene Ogden, who often endured meager provisions at Christmas, also reserved celebration for the New Year. On Sunday, December 25, 1826, he recorded: “Christmas. I did not raise camp and we are reduced to one meal a day.” But on January 1, 1827, he noted more festivity in the HBC camp: “New Year’s commences with a mild day. The men paid me their respects. I gave each a dram and tobacco. Goat killed.” [8]
The following year, Ogden made no mention of Christmas at all, but recorded news of the fur trade: “Arrival of one of our men from Sickly River relieves me of anxiety. He reports they have 100 beavers and are not far. Our total number of beaver exceeds my expectations.” In 1828, New Year’s celebrations were briefly noted, but Ogden largely focused on weather and daily life:
January 1. The men paid me their respects and were politely received. The Americans followed the example and received the same treatment. The Americans leave for Salt Lake. The hunters are now making snow shoes as the depth of snow keeps increasing. The others pass their time in gambling. No cards are sold to the men at Ft. Vancouver. Still they procure them.[9]
Even in places where Christmas was traditionally observed, such as the Spanish provinces of New Mexico and California, New Year’s remained central. While in Perdido, a small town south of Santa Fe, New Mexico, James Ohio Pattie described attending a Spanish fandango on New Year’s Eve, 1827: “All our company were invited … we had the pleasure of dancing with the handsomest and richest of them.”[10]
That same year, Harrison G. Rogers highlighted the spiritual side of the holiday at Mission San Gabriel, in California. He sent New Year’s greetings to the Padre that combined celebration with moral reflection: “Standing on the threshold of a New Year, I salute you with the most cordial congratulations and good wishes … Therefore my advice to all the human family is to be faithful, devoted to God, kind, benevolent … live for eternity.”[11]
Sometimes the celebrations extended to Epiphany, or “Old Christmas Day.” Rogers recalled that on January 6, wine flowed, music played, and occasionally tempers flared: “Some of the men got drunk and two of them … commenced fighting … I went among them and pacified our men by telling them what trouble they were bringing upon themselves if they did not desist.” [12]
John Work’s later journals reinforce the notion that New Year’s was often more consistently celebrated than Christmas. On January 1, 1831, Work noted: “Satdy, 1. Clear mild weather. This being Newyears day none of the people went a hunting, they endeavored to regale themselves the best way they could … Each man was treated with a dram of rum and some cakes in the morning.”[13]
Trapper Warren Ferris also remembered the first day of 1833:
The first of January, 1833, or New Years day, was spent in feasting, drinking, and dancing, agreeable to the Canadian custom. In amusements such as riding, shooting, wrestling, etc. when the weather was fair, and in the diversion of card playing when the state of affairs without would not permit athletic exercises, the month of January passed away, during which, we had changed our camp three times, in order to obtain better grass for our faithful animals. The weather was generally fine, but little snow had fallen, and we usually found plenty of game near our camp – therefore time passed away not only comfortably but pleasantly.[14]
Ferris’s account of 1834 also emphasized New Year’s celebrations:
The new year was ushered in with feasting and merriment, on dried buffalo meat, and venison, cakes and coffee; which might appear to people constantly accustomed to better fare, rather meagre variety for a dinner, not to say a feast. But to us who have constantly in mind the absolute impossibility of procuring better, and the no less positive certainty, that we are often compelled to be satisfied with worse, – the repast was both agreeable and excellent; for think not, that we enjoy, daily, the same luscious luxuries of cake and coffee, that announces the advent of 1834; by no means.[15]
Taken together, these accounts demonstrate that New Year’s was often the primary festive occasion for fur traders. Scarce provisions, harsh winters, and isolation meant Christmas was often modest, or skipped entirely, while New Year’s offered a reason to gather and feast. Cultural influence from French Canadian, Scottish, and Spanish traditions shaped these rituals, blending merriment with the rhythms of frontier life.
All images courtesy of Dave Bell – Wyoming Mountain Photography.
[1] Wilson Price Hunt, The Overland Diary of Wilson Price Hunt, Hoyt C. Franchère, ed. (Ashland, OR: The Oregon Book Society, 1973), 51.
[2] Wilson Price Hunt, The Overland Diary of Wilson Price Hunt, Hoyt C. Franchère, ed. (Ashland, OR: The Oregon Book Society, 1973), 51-52.
[3] Washington Irving, Astoria: Or, Anecdotes of an Enterprise Beyond the Rocky Mountains, Edgely W. Todd, ed. (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1964), 308.
[4] Wilson Price Hunt, The Overland Diary of Wilson Price Hunt, Hoyt C. Franchère, ed. (Ashland, OR: The Oregon Book Society, 1973), 52.
[5] John C. Luttig, Journal of a Fur-Trading Expedition on the Upper Missouri, 1812-1813,Stella M. Drumm, ed. (St. Louis, MO: Missouri Historical Society, 1920), 110.
[6] T. C. Elliott, ed., “Journal of Alexander Ross—Snake Country Expedition, 1824,” The Quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society 14, no. 4 (December 1913): 387.
[7] T. C. Elliott, ed., “Journal of John Work, Dec. 15th, 1825, to June 12th, 1826,” The Washington Historical Quarterly 5, no. 4 (October 1914): 264.
[8] T. C. Elliott, ed., “The Peter Skene Ogden Journals,” The Quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society 11, no. 2 (June 1910): 212.
[9] Peter Skene Ogden, “Journal of Peter Skene Ogden; Snake Expedition, 1827-1828,” The Quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society 11, no. 4 (December 1910): 367-368.
[10] James Ohio Pattie, Pattie’s Personal Narrative of a Voyage to the Pacific and in Mexico, June 20, 1824–August 30, 1830, Timothy Flint, ed. (Cleveland, OH]: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1905), 167.
[11] Harrison Clifford Dale, ed., The Ashley-Smith Explorations and the Discovery of a Central Route to the Pacific, 1822–1829 (Cleveland, OH: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1918), 213-214.
[12] Harrison Clifford Dale, ed., The Ashley-Smith Explorations and the Discovery of a Central Route to the Pacific, 1822–1829, with the Original Journals (Cleveland, OH: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1918), 219-220.
[13] John Work, The Snake Country Expedition of 1830-31; John Work’s Field Journal, Francis D. Haines, ed. (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1971), 61.
[14] Warren Angus Ferris, Life in the Rocky Mountains, 1830–1835, Leroy R. Hafen, ed. (The Old West Publishing Company, Denver, CO: 1983), 260.
[15] Warren Angus Ferris, Life in the Rocky Mountains, 1830–1835, Leroy R. Hafen, ed. (The Old West Publishing Company, Denver, CO: 1983), 310-311.