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A Triggering Event: A Fur Trade Close Call

By Vic Nathan Barkin
June 12, 2026

On April 24, 1831, a company of seventy men under John Gantt and Jefferson Blackwell left St. Louis on a trapping and trading venture bound for the Rocky Mountains. Twenty-two year-old Zenas Leonard was hired on as a clerk, trapper and trader, and kept a detailed record of the expedition.

According to Leonard, the brigade left St. Louis, going up the Missouri River to the mouth of the Kansas River, which they ascended. Following the Republican Fork, they then crossed overland to the Platte River, travelling up to its confluence. Heading up the North Platte, they reached the mouth of the Laramie River on August 27, 1831. While encamped there, they encountered Thomas Fitzpatrick with a small party of Rocky Mountain Fur Company men heading to St. Louis.

Fitzpatrick, viewing Gantt and Blackwell as interlopers, was most unhelpful during their meeting, but he agreed to allow Captain Blackwell with a couple of men to accompany him back to St. Louis to obtain more supplies for the following summer.

Gantt then divided his men into three companies, to better exploit the fur resources of the area. One party under Captain Gantt himself went up the Sweetwater. A second party worked the Timber Fork under Captain Washburn, and a third party under Captain A.K. Stevens, of which Leonard was a member, ascended the Laramie River.

The three parties separated on September 4^th 1831 “after shaking hands all round” and 21 men, including Leonard under Stevens continued upriver until September 20^th when they stopped on the bank of a small creek to rest. At this junction, signs of beaver were seen, and two men were sent out to explore and trap.

^{Image Courtesy of The State Historical Society of Missouri}

They had meandered the creek till they came to beaver dams, where they set their traps and turned their horses out to pasture; and were busily engaged in constructing a camp to pass the night in, when they discovered, at a short distance off, a tremendous large Grizzly Bear, rushing upon them at a furious rate.- They immediately sprang to their rifles which were standing against a tree hard-by, one of which was single and the other double triggered; unfortunately in the hurry, the one that was accustomed to the single trigger, caught up the double triggered gun, and when the bear came upon him, not having set the trigger, he could not get his gun off; and the animal approaching within a few feet of him, he was obliged to commence beating it over the head with his gun. Bruin, thinking this rather rough usage, turned his attention to the man with the single triggered gun, who, in trying to set the trigger (supposing he had the double triggered gun) had fired it off, and was also obliged to fall to beating the ferocious animal with his gun; finally, it left them without doing much injury, except tearing the sleeve off one of their coats and biting him through the hand. (Full text)

These two trappers had rifles similar enough to be mistaken for one another, at least in that panic situation.

For those unfamiliar with a “double trigger” (aka: double set trigger) rifle, the rear trigger “sets” the front trigger turning it into a “hair” trigger. Neither the rear or front trigger fires the gun by its self, but once the rear trigger is “set”, the front trigger releases the rear which is held under spring pressure, thus hitting the lock’s sear, firing the rifle. There are other assemblies which do in fact allow firing using the front trigger without setting the rear trigger first, but this was obviously not the case with the rifle in this story.

A “single triggered” rifle is just that. When the trigger is depressed it releases the sear nose from the tumbler’s full-cock notch, allowing the cock (referred to today as the hammer) to fall.

A third variation referenced in the AFC orders, although not mentioned in Leonard’s tale, is called a “double-phase/single-set trigger”. This is similar in operation to a “double set trigger” except that the single trigger is pushed forward to “set” it to a hair trigger. The rifle can be adjusted to be fired either set or unset.

“Double-set” and “single-set” triggers require a “fly” in the lock’s tumbler to prevent the sear nose from catching on the half-cock notch, and use a “set screw” in the trigger plate to adjust the “hair trigger”. Single triggers do not need either a fly or a set screw.

Regarding Leonard’s journal, how and why would two similar rifles have two different trigger configurations? The American Fur Company (AFC) was already the big dog as far as purchasing power was concerned, having direct relationships with manufacturers on the east coast and overseas. Their competition did not.

A clue leading to how two trappers might have wound up with nearly identical rifles but with different trigger configurations was in a purchase order from the AFC to four Lancaster, Pennsylvania gunsmiths under a single contract in early 1831. It is excerpted here:

Christopher Gumph
24 to 30 Rifles Single Trigger @ $11.00
10 of the above Rifles are to have a set trigger and fly in the lock @ $11.25
Henry Gibbs
24-30 Rifles same as above @ $11.00
John Dreppard
24 to 30 Rifles same in all respects as those to be furnished by Henry Gibbs.
Jacob Fordney
10 Rifles double triggers @ $12.00
2 Rifles single triggers same as those above at $11

An associated “Invoice” identifying the actual quantities, prices and date shipped specifies that the order was sent to the “American Fur Company St Louis”. In it is detailed:

10 (C Gumpf)	Rifles _ Fly & set screw single trigger	$11.25	
20 (C Gumpf)	   “    _  Plain single trigger			$11.00	
24 (H Gibbs)	   “    _  Plain single trigger			$11.00		
24 (J Dreppard) “   _  Plain single trigger			$11.00	 
10 (J Fordney)	   Double trigger			$12.00
2 (J Fordney)	   “    	      Single      “			$11.00	
______________________________________________
90 Rifles			New York 25th February 1831

^{Image Courtesy of the Missouri Historical Society, Saint Louis, MO.}

Jacob Fordney’s 10 “double trigger” rifles along with 40 single trigger rifles by Dreppard, Gibbs and Fordney were shipped to St Louis on February 25, 1831. We don’t know when they shipped from St. Louis. We do know the Christopher Gumpf rifles (20 single trigger and 10 single set trigger) were shipped from St. Louis to the “Upper Missouri Outfit” (UMO) on May 21, 1831.

What can we ascertain out of all of this? Leonard stated, “Each man was furnished with the necessary equipments (sic) for the expedition — such as traps, guns, &c.; also horses and goods of various descriptions, to trade with the Indians for furs and Buffaloe robes.”

It is evident from Leonard that these two trappers had very similar rifles, if not by made the same gunsmith, possibly from the same group of gunsmiths. There is no objective evidence pointing to Gantt and Blackwell purchasing directly from the American Fur Company in 1831. It was, however, a general practice of the AFC to subvert their rivals such as the Rocky Mountain Fur Company financially through any means possible including selling supplies to their rival’s competitors which included Gantt and Blackwell.

Was it just a fluke that Zenas Leonard’s two trapper buddies happened to have identical or at least similar rifles with different trigger configurations at the very same time the AFC was known to have been intentionally ordering the same? Something deep down says no. For now though, this whole scenario remains an intriguing mystery, with too many coincidences not to be connected.

Bibliography

Kaufman, Henry J. The Pennsylvania-Kentucky Rifle. New York, NY: Bonanza Books, 1960.
Leonard, Zenas. Narrative of the Adventures of Zenas Leonard. Edited by Milo Milton Quaife. Chicago, IL: The Lakeside Press, 1934.
Gowans, Fred R. Rocky Mountain Rendezvous. Layton, UT: Peregrine Smith Books, 1985.
Hafen, Leroy R. Broken Hand, The Life of Thomas Fitzpatrick, Mountain Man, Guide and Indian Agent. Denver, CO: The Old West Publishing Company, 1973
Swagerty, William R, ed. Papers of the St. Louis Fur Trade, Part 3: Robert Campbell Family Collection from the St. Louis Mercantile Library Association; Reel 17. St. Louis MO: Missouri Historical Society and the St. Louis Mercantile Library Association. Available here.

Additional Resources

Track of the Wolf – Trigger Assembly Examples

Bicentennial Moments – April 1826

By Museum of the Mountain Man Staff
March 31, 2026

Two hundred years ago this month—April 1826—the Rocky Mountain fur trade was in its prime. Demand for felt hats in the eastern United States and Europe was strong, and American trapping brigades pushed ever deeper into the West. They competed fiercely not only with one another but also with the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC).

Most trappers had spent the previous months in the relative quiet of winter camps. But across the West in April 1826, men were on the move. Spring was one of the best trapping seasons of the year, and brigades wanted to take advantage of pelts still thick from winter growth and waterways finally open enough to set traps along banks and channels. Two significant events that month would shape the season.

Ashley’s Relief Expedition Reaches Jedediah Smith

While trappers prepared for spring hunts, supply lines far to the east were struggling in the harsh winter.

In October 1825, William Ashley and his new partner, Jedediah Smith, returned to St. Louis, Missouri and immediately began organizing a new supply train.[1] Ashley remained in St. Louis to manage the partnership’s business affairs, while Smith quickly departed again for the mountains –late in the season.[2]

Accompanying him was Robert Campbell, who was starting what would become a long and profitable fur trade career. Around sixty or seventy men managed a pack string of about 160 mules.[3] Campbell later remarked, “We left St. Louis on the first of November. It was wrong to start at that season, because we had the winter to encounter.”[4]

The winter of 1825-1826 was severe on the prairie, as snow blanketed the plains and covered the grass that pack animals depended upon. Deteriorating conditions and a lack of forage and supplies forced Smith’s caravan to halt on the Republican Fork of the Kansas River. Nearly a third of the horses and mules were lost to starvation. Morale suffered, and exposed to cold and uncertainty, nearly half of Smith’s men eventually deserted. Facing the collapse of the expedition, Smith dispatched Jim Beckwourth and Moses “Black” Harris back to St. Louis with an urgent appeal for help.[5]

Ashley responded quickly. His relief expedition left in mid-March 1826 and caught up with Smith near present-day Grand Island, Nebraska, on the Platte River by the end of April.[6] Ashley noted in his diary, “Went & brought up the Party of M Smith opposite the Encampment on the 24th.”[7] The meeting came none too soon: Smith’s reduced company was in no condition to continue.[8] (For more on Smith and Campbell’s winter on the Republican Fork and Ashley’s Journal, see “William H. Ashley’s Newly-Discovered 1826 Fur Trade Journal” in The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal, Volume 8, available here.)

With fresh men, horses, and mules, Ashley altered the plan. He directed Smith and Harris to press ahead to the mountains to inform the brigades that supplies were on the way.[9] Ashley then pushed the reinforced train up the Platte, toward South Pass, and on to the Bear River and the upcoming rendezvous.[10]

In April 1826, after a winter marked by hunger, desertion, and loss, the fur trade enterprise of Smith and Ashley was back on track, and the supply line—vital to the mountain men’s success—was restored just in time for the summer rendezvous in Willow Valley, modern day Cache Valley, Utah.[11].

^{Image Courtesy of Dave Bell, Wyoming Mountain Photography}

Ogden Meets the Americans–Again

Meanwhile, another April encounter was unfolding farther west.

Peter Skene Ogden of the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) entered the spring of 1826 with unfinished business. The previous year, he had suffered defeat and humiliation in the Snake Country at the hands of Johnson Gardner and a party of American trappers.[12] (This dramatic encounter is explored in “‘Now We Go’: Snake Country Freemen and the Desertions of May 1825” in The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal, Volume 12, available here.) He had lost freemen to desertion, endured taunts, and left the region.[13] Editor E.E. Rich wrote that “after his brush with the Americans under Gardner in 1825, he seems to have become allergic to them.”[14]

Yet in 1826, Ogden once again found himself in charge of the HBC’s Snake Country Brigade.[15] Despite any personal misgivings, he was moving directly back toward the scene of the previous year’s humiliation, and toward renewed competition with the Americans.

When American winter camps broke up toward the end of February, several trapping parties were formed. One of these parties included a number of HBC deserters from the previous year.[16] It was, of course, this group that soon crossed paths with Ogden’s brigade.

In March, Ogden received reports from Native sources that a party of Americans and Iroquois was no more than three days’ march from his camp on the Portneuf River, a development he did not welcome.[17] On March 20, 1826, he wrote, “I dread meeting with the Americans.”[18] Memories of the 1825 encounter with Johnson Gardner’s brigade were still fresh and likely came with more than a little apprehension.

By Sunday, April 9, 1826, Ogden’s fears were realized when he was “surprised by the arrival of a party of Americans and some of our deserters of last year, 28 in all.”[19] Although Ogden never named the leader of the American party, it appears that Jim Bridger and Thomas Fitzpatrick may have been among its members.[20] Reflecting in his journal, Ogden noted, “if we were surprised they were more so from an idea that the threats of last year would have prevented us from returning to this quarter, but they find themselves mistaken.”[21]

The encounter, however, unfolded very differently from the tense confrontation of 1825. Ogden recorded:

The strangers paid me a visit and I had a busy day settling with them, and more to my satisfaction and the company’s than last year … our deserters are already tired of their new masters and from their manner will soon return to us.[22]

In fact, some of the deserters reportedly promised to return to the HBC’s Flathead Post in the fall, a development that must have been sweet vindication for Ogden.[23] Just as important, he noted with evident pride that “not one of our party appeared the least inclined to desert; so much to their credit.”[24]

For Ogden, the meeting of April 9, 1826, marked a reversal of fortune. Two hundred years ago this month, a confrontation he had dreaded instead restored his confidence.

Two Hundred Years Later: A Bicentennial Moment

Two hundred years ago this month, the Rocky Mountain fur trade reached a noteworthy moment. Ashley’s relief expedition finally caught up with Smith after a punishing winter had stalled men, animals, and determination alike, while Ogden faced American rivals in Snake Country—what could have been a bitter confrontation instead ended in satisfaction for Ogden and the HBC. These events capture the trade at its height: fierce rivalries, fragile supply lines, shifting loyalties, and endurance tested by distance and winter. In April 1826, timing, preparation, and a bit of luck mattered as much as beaver pelts themselves.

[1] LeRoy R. Hafen, ed., “A Brief History of the Fur Trade in the Far West,” in The Mountain Men and the Fur Trade of the Far West, vol. 1 (Glendale, CA: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1965), 83–84.

[2] Dale L. Morgan, ed., The West of H. William Ashley, 1822–1835 (Denver: Fred A. Rosenstock, The Old West Publishing Company, 1964), 143.

[3] William R. Nester, From Mountain Man to Millionaire: The “Bold and Dashing Life” of Robert Campbell (Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 2011), 17.

[4] Morgan, ed., West of William Ashley, 143.

[5] Nester, From Mountain Man to Millionaire, 17-18.

[6] Ibid., 18.

[7] Dr. Jay H. Buckley, “William H. Ashley’s Newly-Discovered 1826 Fur Trade Journal,” The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal, 8 (2011):25.

[8] Morgan, West of William Ashley, 143-144.

[9] Ibid., 144.

[10] Ibid.

[11] Fred R. Gowans, Rocky Mountain Rendezvous: A History of the Fur Trade Rendezvous, 1825–1840 (Layton, UT: Gibbs M. Smith, Inc., 1985), 64.

[12] Thomas H. Holloway, “‘Now We Go’: Snake Country Freemen,” The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal, 12 (2018): 56–59.

[13] Ibid.

[14] E. E. Rich, ed., “Peter Skene Ogden’s Snake Country Journals, 1824-26” (London: Hudson’s Bay Record Society, 1950), lvi-lix, 154-155.

[15] Peter Skene Ogden, “Journal of the Snake Country Expedition, 1825–1826,” T. C. Elliott, ed., Oregon Historical Quarterly 10, no. 4 (1909):335.

[16] Morgan, West of William Ashley, 146.

[17] Ibid.

[18] Ogden, Snake Country Journals, 1824–26, 144.

[19] Ogden, “Journal of the Snake Country Expedition,” 359.

[20] Harrison C. Dale, “The Ashley-Smith Explorations and the Discovery of a General Route to the Pacific” (Glendale, CA: Arthur H. Clark, 1941), 162-163.

[21] Ogden, “Journal of the Snake Country Expedition,” 359.

[22] Ibid., 359-60.

[23] Ibid.

[24] Ibid.