![Grape Creek (Colorado)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/Grape_Creek_%28Colorado%29.jpg)
The early history of the Arkansas Valley in Colorado began in the 1600s and to the early 1800s when explorers,
hunters, trappers, and traders of European descent came to the region. Prior to that, Colorado was home to
prehistoric people, including
Paleo-Indians,
Ancestral Puebloans, and
Late prehistoric Native Americans.
With
westward expansion of the United States, Colorado saw a number of trading posts and small settlements established in the
Arkansas
Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...
and
South Platte valleys including
Bent's Fort
Bent's Old Fort is an 1833 fort located in Otero County in southeastern Colorado, United States. A company owned by Charles Bent and William Bent and Ceran St. Vrain built the fort to trade with Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho Plains Indians and ...
and
El Pueblo. Southern Colorado, previously part of
New Spain, was ceded in 1848 to the United States following the end of the
Mexican–American War
The Mexican–American War, also known in the United States as the Mexican War and in Mexico as the (''United States intervention in Mexico''), was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848. It followed the 1 ...
(1846-48). The early history of the Arkansas valley ends with the
Colorado Gold Rush of 1858 when large numbers of
Anglo-Americans
Anglo-Americans are people who are English-speaking inhabitants of Anglo-America. It typically refers to the nations and ethnic groups in the Americas that speak English as a native language, making up the majority of people in the world who spe ...
began to arrive in Colorado. Colorado achieved statehood in 1876.
Native Americans
From prehistoric times until the 19th century, bands of the
Ute people
Ute () are the Indigenous people of the Ute tribe and culture among the Indigenous peoples of the Great Basin. They had lived in sovereignty in the regions of present-day Utah and Colorado in the Southwestern United States for many centuries un ...
occupied the upper Arkansas River valley, roughly upstream from present day
Pueblo, Colorado
Pueblo () is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 111,876 at the 2020 United States Census, making Pueblo the ninth most populo ...
. East of Pueblo on the
Great Plains and along the Arkansas lived the semi-agricultural
Apache peoples of the
Dismal River Culture
The Dismal River culture refers to a set of cultural attributes first seen in the Dismal River area of Nebraska in the 1930s by archaeologists William Duncan Strong, Waldo Rudolph Wedel and A. T. Hill. Also known as Dismal River aspect and Dism ...
.
By the 1730s most of the Apache were driven southward by the
Comanche who had begun to dominate the Arkansas River valley in Colorado. The
Jicarilla Apache, however, survived by moving from the Arkansas River to the Colorado/New Mexico border area and cultivating friendly relations with the Spanish colonists in New Mexico. During the first half of the 19th century, some factions of the
Arapaho
The Arapaho (; french: Arapahos, ) are a Native American people historically living on the plains of Colorado and Wyoming. They were close allies of the Cheyenne tribe and loosely aligned with the Lakota and Dakota.
By the 1850s, Arapaho ba ...
and
Cheyenne
The Cheyenne ( ) are an Indigenous people of the Great Plains. Their Cheyenne language belongs to the Algonquian language family. Today, the Cheyenne people are split into two federally recognized nations: the Southern Cheyenne, who are enr ...
people moved southward into the Arkansas River Valley, becoming allies of the Comanche. Author Hämäläinen postulated a Comanche proto-empire in the early 19th century with an important trading emporium in the
Big Timbers
Big Timbers is a wooded riparian area in Colorado along both banks of the Arkansas River that is famous as a campsite for native American tribes and travelers on the Mountain Branch of the Santa Fe Trail.
Description
The Spanish knew this area a ...
, a
cottonwood forest bordering the Arkansas from
La Junta
La Junta is a home rule municipality in , the county seat of, and the most populous municipality of Otero County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 7,322 at the 2020 United States Census. La Junta is located on the Arkansas Ri ...
downstream to near the Kansas border.
New Spain and Mexico
The Spanish settled in New Mexico called the Arkansas River in Colorado the Rio Napestle. In 1644, Juan de Archuleta led the first known Spanish expedition to the Arkansas River valley in Colorado. Archuleta's objective was to find and force
Pueblo Indians
The Puebloans or Pueblo peoples, are Native Americans in the Southwestern United States who share common agricultural, material, and religious practices. Currently 100 pueblos are actively inhabited, among which Taos, San Ildefonso, Acoma, Z ...
from Taos who had fled Spanish rule to
El Quartelejo, a vaguely defined region from the Arkansas River northward. He found the runaway Pueblos near present day Las Animas. (Some sources state that this expedition took place in 1664.) In 1706,
Juan de Ulibarri
''Juan'' is a given name, the Spanish and Manx versions of ''John''. It is very common in Spain and in other Spanish-speaking communities around the world and in the Philippines, and also (pronounced differently) in the Isle of Man. In Spanish, t ...
led another expedition to El Quartelejo, to recapture runaway Pueblos, crossing the Arkansas River in Colorado.
In 1779, New Mexico Governor
Juan Bautista de Anza
Juan Bautista de Anza Bezerra Nieto (July 6 or 7, 1736 – December 19, 1788) was an expeditionary leader, military officer, and politician primarily in California and New Mexico under the Spanish Empire. He is credited as one of the founding fa ...
led an expedition of more than 600 Spaniards and Indians north into Colorado to punish the Comanche who were raiding the Spanish colonies. De Anza defeated the Comanches south of the Arkansas River near
Greenhorn Mountain
Greenhorn Mountain is the highest summit of the Wet Mountains range in the Rocky Mountains of North America. The prominent peak is located in the Greenhorn Mountain Wilderness of San Isabel National Forest, southwest by west ( bearing 238°) ...
. in 1787, the Spanish established a settlement called San Carlos de los Jupes at the junction of the Arkansas and the
St. Charles River about east of present day Pueblo. The Jupes were a Comanche sub-tribe and the purpose of the settlement was to encourage the Comanches to become sedentary Christians. San Carlos failed within a year.
![Adams onis map](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/96/Adams_onis_map.png)
The
Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase (french: Vente de la Louisiane, translation=Sale of Louisiana) was the acquisition of the territory of Louisiana by the United States from the French First Republic in 1803. In return for fifteen million dollars, or app ...
in 1803 gave the U.S. ownership of a large, but undefined, portion of the Arkansas River Valley. The
Adams-Onis Treaty of 1819 established the border between Spanish Mexico and the United States in Colorado. Spanish territory was south of the Arkansas river and U.S. territory was north of the River. The government of New Mexico attempted to counter growing U.S. influence in its territory by giving large land grants to prominent citizens and encouraging settlement of the land grants. The Vigil and St. Vrain grant of 1843 spanned most of eastern Colorado south of the Arkansas. However, in 1848, the U.S. and Mexico signed the
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ( es, Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo), officially the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits, and Settlement between the United States of America and the United Mexican States, is the peace treaty that was signed on 2 ...
by which New Mexico and southern Colorado became part of the United States.
The Americans
Kentuckian James Pursley or Purcell) is the first American known to visit the Arkansas River in Colorado. In 1805 he traversed the upper Arkansas with a large band of Paducah (
Plains Apache?) and
Kiowa
Kiowa () people are a Native American tribe and an indigenous people of the Great Plains of the United States. They migrated southward from western Montana into the Rocky Mountains in Colorado in the 17th and 18th centuries,Pritzker 326 and e ...
Indians.
The
Zebulon Pike
Zebulon Montgomery Pike (January 5, 1779 – April 27, 1813) was an American brigadier general and explorer for whom Pikes Peak in Colorado was named. As a U.S. Army officer he led two expeditions under authority of President Thomas Jefferson ...
expedition of 1806 followed the Arkansas River upstream to explore for the United States the newly acquired Louisiana territory. Pike and his men strayed into Spanish territory and were arrested and imprisoned.
In 1811 Ezekial Williams (not to be confused with
Old Bill Williams) trapped in the upper Arkansas valley.
William Becknell opened trade between the United States and newly-independent Mexico in 1821 when he established the
Santa Fe Trail. Becknell's pack train followed the Arkansas River from
Missouri
Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee): Iowa to the north, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee to the east, Arkansas t ...
to near present-day
La Junta, Colorado, then turned southwest and followed the Arkansas River tributary, the
Purgatoire River
The Purgatoire River ( es, Río Purgatorio) is a river in southeastern Colorado, United States. The river is also known locally as the Purgatory River or the Picketwire River. ''Purgatoire'' means Purgatory in French. French trappers named the ri ...
, southwest to New Mexico. Wagon trains with trade goods followed this route until 1880.
In 1822 Jacob Fowler and a few men of the
Glenn-Fowler Expedition spent a month living at the future site of Pueblo becoming the first residents, albeit temporary, of the Arkansas River valley in Colorado.
The American interest in the region in the 1820s and 1830s was two-fold: trade with New Mexico via the Santa Fe Trail and
trapping
Animal trapping, or simply trapping or gin, is the use of a device to remotely catch an animal. Animals may be trapped for a variety of purposes, including food, the fur trade, hunting, pest control, and wildlife management.
History
Neolithi ...
for furs, primarily
beaver. This was the era of the
mountain men
A mountain man is an explorer who lives in the wilderness. Mountain men were most common in the North American Rocky Mountains from about 1810 through to the 1880s (with a peak population in the early 1840s). They were instrumental in opening up ...
, Americans, including men of
Anglo
Anglo is a prefix indicating a relation to, or descent from, the Angles, England, English culture, the English people or the English language, such as in the term ''Anglosphere''. It is often used alone, somewhat loosely, to refer to peopl ...
,
French,
American Indian and
African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensl ...
descent, who roamed the
Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...
to trap beaver whose pelts were used to make fashionable
top hats
A top hat (also called a high hat, a cylinder hat, or, informally, a topper) is a tall, flat-crowned hat for men traditionally associated with formal wear in Western dress codes, meaning white tie, morning dress, or frock coat. Traditionally ...
.
Taos, New Mexico
Taos is a town in Taos County in the north-central region of New Mexico in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Initially founded in 1615, it was intermittently occupied until its formal establishment in 1795 by Nuevo México Governor Fernando Ch ...
was the base for many of the mountain men who trapped and explored the Arkansas Valley.
[ From the 1933 book by Hafen titled ''Colorado, the Story of a Western Commonwealth.]
Trappers played an important role in the
westward expansion
The United States of America was created on July 4, 1776, with the U.S. Declaration of Independence of thirteen British colonies in North America. In the Lee Resolution two days prior, the colonies resolved that they were free and independe ...
of the United States: "They knew the easiest routes through the high mountains, which rivers could lead a party to safety and which were likely to lead to tragedy. They could tell you what you could expect to find to eat or drink and what weather or wildlife might be encountered. Much of this wealth of knowledge was passed on by word of mouth."
John Gantt
Gantt's Picket Post, also known as Fort Gantt, was built near the present-day
Las Animas in 1832 by John Gantt and Jefferson Blackwell. It operated as a trading post until some time in 1834. Fort Cass was then built near the present-day city of
Pueblo, Colorado
Pueblo () is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 111,876 at the 2020 United States Census, making Pueblo the ninth most populo ...
by John Gantt, a former Army officer. It was built in May 1834 on the north side of the Arkansas River, about 6 miles below
Fountain Creek
Fountain Creek is a stream that originates in Woodland Park in Teller County and flows through El Paso County to its confluence with the Arkansas River near Pueblo in Pueblo County, Colorado. The creek,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydr ...
.
William Bent
William Wells Bent (May 23, 1809 – May 19, 1869) was a frontier trader and rancher in the American West, with forts in Colorado. He also acted as a mediator among the Cheyenne Nation, other Native American tribes and the expanding United St ...
of St. Vrain & Company attacked
Shoshone Indians trading at Gantt's Fort, killing a few and driving them away. Gantt abandoned his fort that winter. The Bents left their stockade and built Bent's Fort about 70 miles down the Arkansas. The
adobe forts were built by
Mexican laborers hired for construction and other work. Mexican workmen built permanent adobe forts and trading posts as far north and west as Idaho and were a major part of the frontier workforce forming the foundation of the bi-cultural population of Southern Colorado. The trading post operated until some time in 1835.
Bent, St. Vrain & Company
Bent, St. Vrain & Company was a partnership formed in
New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Tiguex
, OfficialLang = None
, Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ke ...
by
Charles Bent
Charles Bent (November 11, 1799 – January 19, 1847) was an American businessman and politician who served as the first civilian United States governor of the New Mexico Territory, newly acquired by the Military Governor, Stephen Watts Kearny, ...
and
Ceran St. Vrain
Ceran St. Vrain, born Ceran de Hault de Lassus de Saint-Vrain (May 5, 1802 – October 28, 1870), was the son of a French aristocrat who immigrated to the Spanish Louisiana in the late 18th century; his mother was from St. Louis, where he was b ...
, traders on the
Santa Fe Trail from St. Louis. In 1832 they entered the Indian trade as licensed traders, completing
Bent's Fort
Bent's Old Fort is an 1833 fort located in Otero County in southeastern Colorado, United States. A company owned by Charles Bent and William Bent and Ceran St. Vrain built the fort to trade with Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho Plains Indians and ...
in 1835 with Charles' younger brother William as manager. William Bent, as well as younger brothers George and Robert later became partners. Marcellin St. Vrain, Ceran's younger brother, who managed
Fort St. Vrain for the firm on the South Platte, was never a partner. In addition to Bent's Fort on the Arkansas and Fort St. Vrain on the South Platte the firm maintained a store in
Taos
Taos or TAOS may refer to:
Places
* Taos, Missouri, a city in Cole County, Missouri, United States
* Taos County, New Mexico, United States
** Taos, New Mexico, a city, the county seat of Taos County, New Mexico
*** Taos art colony, an art colo ...
managed by
Charles Beaubien. The firm's relations with the
Cheyenne
The Cheyenne ( ) are an Indigenous people of the Great Plains. Their Cheyenne language belongs to the Algonquian language family. Today, the Cheyenne people are split into two federally recognized nations: the Southern Cheyenne, who are enr ...
was cemented by the marriage of William with
Owl Woman
Owl Woman (Cheyenne name: ''Mis-stan-stur''; died 1847) was a Cheyenne woman.Varnell, p. 7., a daughter of White Thunder, a well-respected medicine man of the Cheyenne tribe. She was married to an Anglo-American trader named William Bent, with ...
, daughter of White Thunder, Keeper of the
Sacred Arrows of the Cheyenne. A post built on the
South Canadian River
The Canadian River is the longest tributary of the Arkansas River in the United States. It is about long, starting in Colorado and traveling through New Mexico, the Texas Panhandle, and Oklahoma. The drainage area is about .[Kiowa
Kiowa () people are a Native American tribe and an indigenous people of the Great Plains of the United States. They migrated southward from western Montana into the Rocky Mountains in Colorado in the 17th and 18th centuries,Pritzker 326 and e ...]
and
Comanche was only briefly maintained; however, later, two battles were fought at its ruins, by then known as
Adobe Walls.
El Pueblo
![Mexican ranch by Colonel Henry Inman 1897](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Mexican_ranch_by_Colonel_Henry_Inman_1897.jpg)
The fur trade collapsed about 1840 due to over-trapping and changing fashions. Former trappers were forced to seek alternative occupations which led to the establishment of trading and agricultural settlements in the Arkansas River valley of Colorado.
El Pueblo, also called Fort Pueblo, was an adobe settlement and trading post built in 1842 by a group of independent traders at the
ford
Ford commonly refers to:
* Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford
* Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river
Ford may also refer to:
Ford Motor Company
* Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company
* Ford F ...
of the Arkansas about half a mile west of the Fountain River. The exact location of the site is somewhat uncertain but is near First Street and Santa Fe Avenue in
Pueblo, Colorado
Pueblo () is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 111,876 at the 2020 United States Census, making Pueblo the ninth most populo ...
. The course of the Arkansas has changed by floods and the ford is gone, as is all surface evidence of the buildings at the fort. The builders of Fort Pueblo included George Simpson, son of a wealthy St. Louis merchant, who at 23 had set out in May 1841 on the
Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail was a east–west, large-wheeled wagon route and emigrant trail in the United States that connected the Missouri River to valleys in Oregon. The eastern part of the Oregon Trail spanned part of what is now the state of Kans ...
with a mule-drawn wagon. Simpson received a yearly remittance from his father throughout his life. Simpson was side-tracked from his westward journey at
Fort Laramie
Fort Laramie (founded as Fort William and known for a while as Fort John) was a significant 19th-century trading-post, diplomatic site, and military installation located at the confluence of the Laramie and the North Platte rivers. They joined ...
when he was invited by
William S. Williams to join a company of fur trappers. However, he never went but was hired by Robert Fisher a trader for Bent & St. Vrain and journeyed down the Front Range of the Rockies to Bent's Fort where he learned the basics of trading with the Indians. Fisher was his principle associate in establishing Fort Pueblo.
In 1847,
George Ruxton described Pueblo as "a small square fort of adobe with circular bastions at the corners, no part of the walls being more than eight feet high, and round
the inside of the yard or corral are built some half-dozen little rooms inhabited by as many Indian traders, ''coureurs des bois'', and mountain men."
See also
*
John Brown (mountain man)
*
List of forts in Colorado
This is a list of military and trading forts established in the U.S. State of Colorado.
History
The initial forts, built in the first half of the 19th century, were early communities of commerce between Native Americans, trappers, and trader ...
*
Mountain man
**
List of mountain men
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby unio ...
*
Teresita Sandoval
Notes
References
Sources
*
Further reading
* {{Cite book , last=O.L. Baskin & Co , url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011725083 , title=History of the Arkansas Valley, Colorado , publisher=O.L. Baskin & Co. , year=1881 , location=Chicago
Pre-statehood history of Colorado
Arkansas River
Eastern Plains
Pre-statehood history of New Mexico
Forts in Colorado
Pueblo, Colorado
Trading posts