Marie Dorion and The Astoria Expedition

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Lisa was not only in a competition race with Hunt, but he was also trying to catch up with Hunt so they could pass through Sioux country together. The word was out that the Sioux were upset, insisting on collecting a sizable payment from all river-men. Lisa sent a message to Hunt to wait up, but Hunt pressed forward.

On May 26, 1811, Hunt met up with three veteran hunters, who were on the way to St. Louis–Edward Robinson, John Hoback and Jacob Reznor. They had been with Henry the previous year and had spent a few months at Fort Henry. Although they were headed back to Kentucky, Hunt persuaded them to join him and go all the way to the Pacific Ocean. They in turn persuaded Hunt to change his route. Instead of following Lewis and Clark’s path to the Forks, through Lemhi Pass, and north to the Lolo Trail, they told him he should take a southern route to avoid the Blackfeet. Those three were about Hunt’s only experienced mountain men, although one of the partners, Ramsey Crooks, had been trading up the Missouri.

Lisa caught up with Hunt just below the Arikara village, near the northern border of present-day South Dakota, and together they reached that Indian village at the mouth of Grand River on June 12. Hunt’s new plan called for him to leave his boats there and go overland, but his departure was delayed until July 18, because of the difficulty of bargaining for horses. When at last his party left, he had only 82 horses, most of which were used as pack animals. The partners, plus Pierre Dorion and the two children, rode, but Marie walked until after additional horses were obtained from the Cheyenne and Crow Indians.

Lewis and Clark had wintered with the Mandans, just upriver from the Arikaras (in present-day central North Dakota). They started out early in the year, when the ice melted, reaching their goal in early November. Hunt wintered in Missouri, did not reach the Arikaras until June, 1811, and did not get underway overland until the middle of July. Thus he was forced to spend the following winter trying to get through the mountains, not reaching Astoria until February, 1812.

Hunt left the Arikaras moving west and southwest, crossing into present-day Wyoming near its extreme northeast border. They skirted the northern side of the Black Hills, within view of Devil’s Tower, continuing in an approximate straight line to cross the Powder River just south of its junction with Crazy Woman Creek.

It was a few miles south of that area, near present-day Kaycee, where 65 years later the Battle of Powder River and the Battle of Dull Knife occurred. Cheyenne chief Little Wolf was camped there when General George Crook’s forces under J.J. Reynolds attacked on March 17, 1876. Both Little Wolf and Dull Knife were there when Colonel Ranald Mackenzie struck on Thanksgiving Day that same year.

Between the Powder River and the Big Horn Mountains to the west, Hunt’s party bisected the region where the famous Bozeman Trail was to run along the foot of the Big Horn Mountains from Fort Laramie north to Montana Territory. That first attempt to create a road in the Powder River country sparked the Red Cloud War of the 1860s. The point at which the Bozeman Trail intersected with Hunt’s route was very near where Fort McKinney would be erected in 1877. Just to the north was where Fort Kearny would be built and where the Fetterman Fight and Wagon Box Fight would take place.

While with the Arikaras, Hunt had employed a veteran mountain man named Edward Rose, although Hunt did not trust him. Rose had been an employee of Lisa, and he had lived with the Crow Indians. Before abruptly leaving the Astoria Expedition, Rose and some Crow friends helped Hunt and the others make two difficult mountain crossings, showing them the Powder River Pass in the Big Horn Mountains of north-central Wyoming. That 9,666 foot pass, which was previously unknown to them, is between the 12,420 foot Mather Peak and 10,555 foot Hazelton Peak.

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Tags: Adventurers & Trail Blazers, Expeditions, People, The Wild West, Wild West, Women's History

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