Forging a Fur Empire – Expeditions in the Snake River Country 1809 – 1824

Alexander Ross, the pioneer recorder of the early fur trade in the far northern West, led a beaver trapping expedition in 1824 into the vast, unfamiliar territory east of trading posts in the Pacific Northwest. He and his men ventured deep into Snake River country in present-day Idaho and Montana. In this narrative, based on the accounts left by Ross and others, historian and legal scholar John Phillip Reid describes the experiences of the earliest Hudson’s Bay Company fur-trapping expeditions—ventures usually overlooked by historians—and explores the interaction between the diverse cultures of the Pacific Northwest.

Ross recorded in exquisite detail the endless vexations of managing a brigade drawn from the widest possible mixtures of ethnic backgrounds and nationalities—his men included métis (or mixed-bloods), Americans, Canadians, and Native “freemen” (independent contractors) from over a dozen Indian nations. Ross’s accounts reveal the consequences of running low on supplies and having to butcher the animals, and how hunting game for sport threatened the stock of ammunition and the condition of the horses. Entire expeditions were at the mercy of the most careless trapper and the weakest horse. Hiring guides was chancy, for local tribesmen did not always know the locations of beaver streams, or even the terrain ahead. Religion could be problematic, as well; both French Canadians and Iroquois refused to work on Catholic holy days.

ISBN – 978-0-87062-402-5
229 Pages
Hardback
6.5″ x 9.5″

University of Oklahoma Press, 2011