Episode 2: Blacks in the American West, Part I: Explorers, Trappers, Frontiersmen, and Pioneers

“For most of American history, it was not considered to be convenient to acknowledge that black people had the same qualities as those other people who came into the West — the potential for heroic behavior, the potential to be an explorer, the potential to be important in that difficult environment and circumstance.” That’s a quote from Dr. Darrell Millner, professor emeritus of black studies at Portland State University. While I may have my qualms with that particular University at the moment, I believe Dr. Millner is spot on in his assessment of the representation of Blacks in the American West. William Loren Katz in his book The Black West would say, quote, The significance was that the real cast of characters had to be revealed. Black men and women had to ride across the pages of textbooks just as they rode across the western plains. End quote. While this isn’t a textbook but rather a podcast, I hope the black men and women in this episode and the two to follow will ride across your mind much like they did across this nation as they made their way to the wild western half of America.

Later on in my research for this episode, almost as I was wrapping it up, I came upon an amazingly in depth report by Shirley Ann Wilson Moore, PHD, that she wrote for the National Park Service entitled SWEET FREEDOM’S PLAINS: African Americans on the Overland Trails 1841-1869. Her piece is fantastic and in the Preface of that report she says this, quote, it is difficult to speak of a quote unquote “representative” African American Western experience because of the many unique circumstances that shaped black western emigration. End quote. I couldn’t agree more, which is why this episode will be a journey through the area of the west and southwest going in and out of chronological order and never sticking to one geographical region but rather bouncing between them as I try to weave together a wonderful collection of stories and the biographies of incredible people that for one reason or another were heading to the American west. This episode, much like the buffalo kingdom episode will focus on the borderlands more so than the actual geographical boundaries of the American southwest but if you listen to the introduction episode, you’ll understand why I’m allowed to do that. Also, this is my podcast.

One more note on this episode, I am not black, I am a white dude that grew up in Georgia in the 90s where seeing people of color all around me in school, on the playground, and in town was normal and something that I apparently took for granted because when, at 16, my family moved to Edmond, Oklahoma one of the first things I asked my parents was “where are all the black people?” I recently began to ask myself that same question again while growing increasingly fond of and obsessed with the American Southwest. Thankfully, I am not the only one and recently there has been an enormous body of work written about this very topic. There were countless articles and many books I used to help with this and the subsequent two episodes that will be released shortly after this one. The reason I mention that I’m white is because in today’s political climate, I almost hesitated to do this episode. But, seeing as how I don’t give a damn about the current political climate and its silliness and because this topic was fascinating and became even more so as I began to dig in, I’m hoping that you, my dear listeners, will also enjoy learning about all of these fascinating people with me. I’m sure some of them, maybe not the more private mountain men, but I’m sure some of these historical characters would be happy knowing future people are learning of their hardships and their triumphs even if their stories are being told by yours truly, a silly white dude. So without any further adieu, let’s dive in.

The first non indigenous peoples to enter the southwestern United States were Spanish and some of those Spanish brought with them black slaves from Africa. The first known example being, Mustafa Azemmouri, also known as Esteban de Dorantes, or Estevan, Esteven, Estevanico, Estebanico the Black Man, Stephen the Black, and even the Black Mexican. We will call him Steven. Steven was black, obviously and a Berber Moroccan born slave who in 1528 washed ashore in Galveston Texas after a hurricane wrecked the ships he had been sailing on making him the first African to reach the Southwestern United States. He wasn’t alone though, and soon Steven and the 15 other men that survived would become enslaved by coastal Indians. After five years of enslavement in Texas, he’d thankfully escape with the four other surviving Spaniards further inland and into the arms of friendlier Indigenous Americans. The man that led this group of runaway slaves was Álvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, and it would take the survivors eight years while traveling over 15,000 miles to reach Mexico City.

Steven would later become part of an expedition in 1539, led by Friar Marcos de Niza from Mexico City into the far north of New Spain. Along the way though, frictions developed between he and the Friars because Steven continually accepted the gifts of Turquoise and women that the indigenous Americans were offering him. Not only was he accepting these gifts, but he was demanding even more of them. Sick of Steven, the Friars allowed he and his native friends to go ahead of the expedition which would prove his undoing. Once he reached the Zuni town of Hawikuh, which would later be named Cibola and which had been founded in the year 1,200 AD, and which lay just east of the border of modern day Arizona and New Mexico, once Steven had reached Hawikuh, the indigenous leaders of the city essentially put him in jail in a hut on the outskirts of town where they questioned him for three days about what he was doing and why he was there to which Steven responded that he was part of an entourage of White Men that was coming to instruct them about things in the sky like god and religion. Ultimately, these elders didn’t believe him because they wondered why the white men would send a black man such as himself. And also they were probably sick of him asking for more women and turquoise. So, unfortunately for Steven, they killed him. But they did let his native American friends go. Once the Friars that had lagged behind arrived they sent word back to Mexico City of Steven’s death… and the accompanying news that there be riches in these hills.

One man in particular that heard of those riches and tall buildings that held said riches, knew he had to get up there and see for himself. That man was Francisco Vázquez de Coronado who headed north in 1541 on a long and arduous treasure hunting expedition that would ultimately take him all the way to Kansas via Northern Mexico, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma. On this trip, which like I said in Buffalo Kingdom, I will cover one day, probably in an episode that covers both de Vaca and Coronado’s expedition, Coronado brought with him a thousand people including some African slaves and the expedition’s Friar, Juan De Padilla who himself brought a free black man who served as Padilla’s interpreter. Following the expedition the two, Padilla and his interpreter, would stay behind with the Indians in or around Kansas and it’s possible that the black interpreter became a Franciscan Friar himself although historians do not know his name.

In 1598, on Juan De Oñate’s expedition to impose Spanish rule over New Mexico, there were at least 5 people of African descent with two being soldiers and three being female slaves. Being a black enslaved soldier during this time was a good way to become emancipated and there were probably quite a few on many a Spanish adventure to the future American  , which was then known as New Spain, that we don’t have good details of. Such as Isabel de Olvera who had an African father and an Indian mother and who accompanied the Juan Guerra de Resa Expedition which was sent to colonize Santa Fe, New Mexico two years after Oñate. While on this trip though, Isabel had a signed affidavit attesting to her freedom from both marriage and slavery which is a remarkable and rather interesting document but one that makes sense when you realize that she was accompanying an expedition filled with 73 soldiers and she wanted her status as a free woman of color to be recognized. Unfortunately, it is not known what would happen to Isabel de Olvera but I would read that by 1750, 25% of Albuquerque’s population had discernible African ancestry.

During the French Revolution, stay with me on this one, the new Republic of liberté, égalité, and fraternité freed its slaves and outlawed the practice. This wasn’t a problem for the average peasant or city dweller on the European continent but it had dramatic affects on the island of Hispaniola where the French owned half of it and named it Saint-Domingue. Here the French colonizers were outnumbered by their black slaves ten to one and these slaves produced a large chunk of the French economy which at the time, Napoleon needed because all of Europe was against the French and their contagious revolutionary ideas and were hellbent on getting rid of it militarily by invading France. So   , the people on Haiti hadn’t rebelled completely and actually Napoleon even hatched a plan to possibly use black Haitian soldiers to invade, through Louisiana, and free Southern American slaves with the ultimate goal of possibly taking over the Southern United States… let that sink in. But soon, the Haitians would rise up and revolt, using the same language that the United States and France used and they would throw off the yoke of bondage. Napoleon would then send 50,000 troops to the island to take it back for France and nearly all of those troops would die from disease alone. Actually, 345,000 Spanish, British, French, and mostly Haitians would die in this ten year war for Haitian freedom. Napoleon, realizing the island was unrecoverable, and his plan for the Americas was over, decided to cut his losses and he sold 828,000 square miles of land in North America to the United States in 1803 in what would become known as the Louisiana Purchase.

Thomas Jefferson, after these incredible turn of events unfolded, rejoiced in his almost doubling of the territory of the US and commissioned the Army Corp of Discovery Expedition that would later become known to us as the Lewis and Clark Expedition with finding, and I’m quoting Jefferson the most direct and practicable water communication across this continent, for the purposes of commerce. End quote. Jefferson also tasked Captain Meriwether Lewis and Lewis’ close friend and Second Lieutenant William Clark with securing these lands for the United States, from the indians of course, and to find out what kind of riches lay ahead. Along with Lewis and Clark were 43 other individuals including a man named York, an African American, and the only one to be on the expedition. York grew up with Clark and was his childhood playmate but he was also his slave. York was over 6 feet tall, over 200 pounds, not all of it being muscle, and was quote unquote as black as a bear. Obviously, a black bear. Rather curiously, because so much of the trip was on water, York was one of the only men on the expedition who could swim.

But the best part about York’s story in the American west was his relationship to the American Indians. He became the native American’s favorite sight when the Americans were traveling through their territories. A quote from Clark’s journal, I ordered my black servant to dance which amused the crowd very much, and somewhat astonished them, that so large a man should be active. End quote. These Indians would actually come from miles around to see York who quote excited their curiosity very much. And they seemed quite as anxious to see this monster as they were the merchandise which we had to barter for their horses. End quote. At some point, a chief of the Mandan spit on his fingers and tried to rub off York’s black skin color as if it were warpaint. He didn’t believe he wasn’t a painted white man until York showed the chief the hair on his head that had been hiding underneath his hat. This moment’s been captured in the Charles Russell painting from 1908 cleverly titled, York. It’ll be up at the site.

Here’s another quote from Clark about York. By way of amusement he told them [them being the Indians] that he had once been a wild animal, and caught, and tamed by his master; and to convince them showed them feats of strength which, added to his looks, made him more terrible than we wished him to be. End quote. While the entire expedition had no problem cavorting with almost every tribe they came across as they made their way to the pacific ocean, it seems York had it even easier. At one point, an Arikara husband gave York his wife for the evening going so far as to bar a member of the expedition to check on York while he was in the tent WITH the Arikara man’s wife! Native American children would follow him around seemingly in every village only to run in mock terror when York would turn around and view them. It wasn’t all fun and games for York though. He did have to gather food, set up camp, build shelters, paddle upstream, and do a good bit of the portaging.

Now, I know a little bit about the art of the portage. And by a little bit, I mean I spent one weekend a few months ago in June of 2021 camping with 2 friends and two canoes in the north woods of Wisconsin. To reach our campsite we had to portage our two very heavily loaded down canoes across  [WAHT IS THE DISTANCE OF THE PORTAGE WE DID THERE?!] which is the length of a canoe up a hill and down it in air so thick with mosquitos that it drove us mad. The first canoe we carried across the land was full and the three of us liked to have ripped our arms out carrying it so the second one we emptied, carried everything across the land, and then carried the canoe… during our weekend we mentioned the old French fur trappers since my best friend in Wisconsin and the one that invited me along on this fishing and camping trip is French. We also talked about lewis and Clark and how hard it must have been for them way back then. It was hard for us and our canoes and equipment are all so much lighter. But honestly… I don’t know how they survived the mosquitos… I’m dead serious. You pull your pecker out to pee and it’s covered in mosquitos in seconds. Don’t get me started on going number two. Anyways! Back to York and his incredible feats of strength and showing off.

The Mandans called him Great Medicine because they apparently called everything they didn’t understand that and the Mandans weren’t alone in not understanding York. A member of the Flathead tribe would later say of him quote one of the strange men was black. He had painted himself in charcoal, my people thought. In those days, it was the custom for warriors, when returning home from battle, to prepare themselves before reaching camp. Those who had been brave and fearless, the victorious ones in battle, painted themselves in charcoal. So the black man, they thought, had been the bravest of his party. End quote. Clark would name some places after York, some that still exist like York’s Eight Islands in Montana, York would get to have considerable freedom while on the journey as he was able to travel among the Indian villages to trade, and he even got to kill an Elk. While no source specifically says it was with a rifle, which would have been rare for a slave at that time to learn to shoot, I don’t see him corralling an Elk off a cliff and retrieving it for dinner for the crew so my assumption is, he new how to use a rifle. And for what has to be a first in American history, York actually got to vote while on the expedition. Sure, it was for a place to set up camp and it was possibly symbolic but… a black man, a slave no less, actually voted on an important issue.

Clark and York would eventually have a bitter falling out. Clark would deny him the opportunity to live with his family in Louisville and even beat and imprison York before finally freeing him although he never spoke of him again except to say he’d die of Cholera. But that may not have been York’s fate in the end. A well traveled American Fur Trapper named Zenas Leonard later published a memoir of his travels throughout the west where he describes a large and dark black man, a man fitting the description and age of York, living with the Crow as an exalted individual with four wives. The black man never gives Zenas his name but I believe him to be York. I know my feelings on the narrative bear no weight to the facts but I like that story for him.

Also, speaking of people we think as distant seeing a black man for the first time, I once read an article about the American war in Vietnam from the perspective of a north Vietnamese soldier who said that the first time they saw an American black man they thought he had been burned all over. When they understood it was his skin that was black, they realized the myth of the black American was actually true. These stories are one hundred and sixty years apart but they’re both interesting.

Not long after York explored with Lewis and Clark, a man named Edward Rose began to venture out into the West as well. Rose was a quarter black, a quarter Cherokee, and half French Canadian infamous Frontiersman who was described as being colorful, reckless, moody, and mysterious and because of a severe cut on his nose from a fight, he gained the nickname… cut nose. In 1807 Cut Nose Rose was tasked with going up the Missouri River and traveling to the Rocky Mountains where he found the Crow Indians. Once there, he fully embraced the Crow’s way of life and dress and after trading his favorite rifle for a wife, he counted himself as one of them. The person who tasked him with going up to the Rockies and being a fur trapper was a man named Manuel Lisa and when Rose returned to him some time later with little to show but a new lifestyle, the two fought about it with fists and Rose, being a man large of stature had to be subdued by 15 other men. Regardless of his penchant for fighting, Rose was still much in demand and highly trusted. And Katz who wrote The Black West, would say of him quote There was nothing that an Indian could do, that rose did not make himself master of. End quote. Eventually he headed back to the Crow where he then earned the nickname Five Scalps. Apparently during a battle with a Hidatsa war party he out warriored his Crow companions and stormed a rock outcropping. During the storming though, he took some Hidatsa bullets to his war shield and was knocked down and appeared dead to his friends. But rather miraculously he would get up, overtake the enemy party, and hack them to pieces with his ax.

Two years later, in 1809, Andrew Henry, who was an army officer, miner, frontiersman, trapper, and co owner of the very successful rocky mountain fur company, obviously a very interesting guy on his own, but Andrew Henry in 1809 asked Rose to be an interpreter for him with the Indians of the area. Of course Rose agreed, but subsequently he tore off with a bunch of loot. It’s at this point that I should probably mention Rose was most likely a river pirate on the Mississippi… although that’s not exactly substantiated with evidence, the rumors and his future conduct would suggest it could be quite true.

Five Scalps Cut Nose Rose shows up once again in 1811 when a man named Wilson Price Hunt hires Rose to take him to Astoria, Oregon. Hunt was actually employed by a man named John Jacob Astor who had a monopoly on the fur trade for quite some time with the American Fur Company. Astor ALSO co owned the Rocky Mountain Fur Company with Andrew Henry, the guy Rose had stolen a bunch of goods from a few years earlier and a guy I almost mentioned in my last podcast about bison because of how many hides he procured through various means during this time. Especially using Indian hunters. Anyways… So Hunt hires Rose but he wasn’t really feeling it so eventually Hunt, to placate the now mutinous Rose, offers him a horse and half a years pay which obviously Rose agrees to before taking Hunt all the way to Oregon. Rose even helped the team map out the Big Horn Range in Northern Wyoming.

Not learning his lesson, Manuel Lisa would hire him again but it wouldn’t go well and once that expedition was over, Rose would end up marrying an Omaha Chief’s daughter and having two children. Unfortunately, true to character, Five Scalp Cut Nose Rose would continue to get into trouble. He’d get hooked on the whiskey somethin’ fierce, be brought to Sant Louis in chains, eventually make it back out to Oregon where he’d sell some Arapaho women as wives to white men, and finally settle down once more with some indigenous Americans. This time, the Arikara.

The next and last we hear of Edward Rose was in 1833 when he inexplicably gets killed by the same Indians he had just been living with, the Arikara. He was on the Yellowstone River in early spring when the Indians came upon and killed him and two other men. His luck had run out… One of those men he was killed with was Hugh Glass. The Hugh Glass from the Revenant… Leonardo Dicaprio’s character. The man who was attacked by a grizzly and mauled almost to death before crawling and stumbling 200 miles to Fort Kiowa in Western South Dakota in 1823. The more you learn about these infamous characters the more incredible this whole period was and how fierce the wilderness must have been. Katz says it best when he says these mountain men must have quote consummate Wilderness skills and an ability to cement relations with the native Americans. End quote. Although sometimes, at least for Cut Nose Five Scalps Rose, those relations didn’t always work out.

In 1821 the US Army wanted to establish trade with the Indians at the mouth of the Arkansas River and Upper Rio Grande. Both of these places are in Central Colorado but you have to travel through Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, and New Mexico to follow the rivers and get there. To accomplish this, The Army hired a man to head that way named Jacob Fowler as a surveyor and gave him the rank of second in command. First in command was a man named Colonel Hugh Glenn who Fowler had met during the war of 1812. Glenn and Fowler subsequently become friends and business partners following the war and it appears Fowler came along with Glenn for the sole purpose of having some adventure. Well he’d definitely find it on the Glenn-Fowler Expedition of 1821-22.

The expedition would be made up of a diverse group of twenty one men including some French, Spanish, Americans, and African Americans. One of those African Americans was Fowlers own slave who went by the name of Paul but who Fowler would write as P A L L. If you read Fowler’s journal, he can’t write at all, it’s barely legible English so I’m assuming he meant Paul.   Fowler, and Paul, and the whole gang set out from Arkansas and would eventually cross into Kansas where they ran into some of my good old buddies, the buffalo. After traveling through Kansas and making it to Colorado, the party would split up and Fowler would be assigned to build a habitable house and horse corral at modern day Pueblo. Since Fowler and Paul occupied this site for a month, they rank as that city's first settlers. The nearby town of Fowler is even named after Jacob.

During the expedition they also ran into much elk and many indigenous Americans such as the Kiowas. This expedition was also some of the first Americans to see the Spanish Peaks, two of my favorite mountains which the Indians who once lived there called the Breasts of the world. I’ll have pictures up on the site. Of the mountains, of course! Meanwhile Paul, although he was a black slave, could ride a horse, hunt lost horses down, and at one point in the Southern Colorado Rockies, he even shot and killed a deer with a rifle. According to Fowler it was the first time Paul had ever done so in his life. Not many slaves at the time were taught to shoot or use firearms as I mentioned with York. After reaching Santa Fe, New Mexico, the whole group were thrown a Spanish fiesta or as they put it, fandango, in their honor. Shortly after that, the group headed north to Taos where it appears the women of the Pueblo could not get enough of tall Paul. I’ll read a rather long excerpt from Fowler’s own journal because it’s just a great story. I have slightly edited the entry to be legible.

Sunday, 10th of February, 1822. Remained in the village all day but sent out two parties of troops to remain out till the first of May next. Here it may be remembered that a captain and sixty men of the Spaniards came in from the Arkansas with Colonel Glenn and little party, and now the same Captain and party has crossed the mountains again. But before he left home has introduced Colonel Glenn and Mr. Roy to his family consisting a wife and two daughters both young women the old lady having paid us visit in the morning appeared in a few minutes quite familiar and as well acquainted with us as if she had known us for several years though she did not stay more than about half an hour. But in the afternoon a boy came with a message for Colonel Glenn, Mr Roy, and the Negro who after some ceremony accompanied the two gentlemen but with some reluctance alleging that he was not satisfied to go without his master alleging as the ladies appeared more attached to him than to the white men. That there might be some mischief intended and under those doubts he went as I before stated and from the statement of those two gentlemen I will endeavor to state what followed…

It is a custom with the spaniards when introduced to embrace with a close hug. This ceremony so embarrassed Paul and made him so shamed that if a small hole could have been found he would certainly have crept into it. But unfortunately there was no such place to be found and the trap door through which they descended into the room being shut down (For they went in at the top of the house) [he’s talking about the pueblo style in Taos and those communities] there was no possible way for him to make his escape. Now they having but one bed in the house and that so large as to be capable of holding the three couples of persons. There were all to lodge together and the mother of the daughters being oldest had of course the first choice of boys and took Paul for her chap, taking hold of him and drawing him to the bedside sat him down with her arms around his shoulders and gave him a kiss and slipped her hand down into his britches. But it would take a much abler hand than mine to describe Paul’s feelings at this time being naturally a little religious, modest, and bashful. He sat as near the wall as was possible and it may be supposed he endeavored to creep into it for such was his attachment to the old lady that he kept his eyes turned constantly up to the trap door. And to his great joy some person opened it to come into the same room, but Paul no sooner saw the light (for the rooms are dark) that he sprang from the old lady and was out in an instant and made to our lodging as fast as possible where the other two soon followed and told what had happened to Paul. End Quote.

Fowler and Paul returned to northern Kentucky on July 27, 1822, after an absence of 13 months and 13 days and being weighed down with eleven hundred pounds of furs. While on their trip, Glenn, Fowler, and Paul also succeeded in establishing trade and mapping out the rivers and terrains of some of my favorite areas in the southwest. But the most lasting impact in my mind, is poor Paul’s encounter with some thirsty ladies in Taos.

Not  long after Fowler and Paul’s trip through the plains and to the southern Rockies, James Beckwourth, or Jim, a heralded black fur trapper, would explore similar landscapes and gain an incredible amount of western lore surrounding his persons and he’d probably become the most famous African American mountain man in all of the west. He’d meet some amazing figures of history and even a few people discussed in this episode and he’d work in the American west from Montana to New Mexico and all the way over to California for the next five decades. Beckwourth is kinda the Forest Gump of the era and he’d participate in dang near every single important episode in the American west of the time from trapping rendezvous to the bear flag rebellion, to the sand creek massacre and just about everything in between. He could probably have his very own episode but instead he’ll be a star character in this one.

His story begins in Virginia in the year 1805, or 1800, or 1798, or… sadly, there is no consensus, and some of that is due to Beckwourth himself who was constantly rewriting his own story… which would be a theme throughout his entire life. So he was indeed born a slave in Virginia but his first plan of action after being freed by his white owner… who, also happened to be his father… was to leave St Louis and the blacksmith shop his father owned and head to Illinois to some lead mines before briefly staying in New Orleans. Then, by 1824, Beckwourth had signed up to work with the aforementioned General William Ashley and his Rocky Mountain Fur Company in the exploration of the Rockies, where for the next three or four years, Beckwourth would travel through what is now Montana, Wyoming, Utah, and Colorado. He’d meet Edward Cut Nose Rose, narrowly avoid freezing and starvation, gain wisdom from the native Americans, and explore the American west until around 1828, when he would settle down with the Crow nation, gain up to ten wives at one time, with one of them being the chief’s daughter, and have several kids. He’d learn the Crow language and they’d give him the names Morning Star, the Antelope, Enemy of Horses, Bobtail Horse, the Medicine Calf, and Bloody Arm. He would later say of that particular name quote my faithful battle-ax was red with the blood of the enemy. End quote. According to him, Jim would gain the title of war chief and he’d lead something called the dog clan as he constantly wielded his battle-ax. During this time he would also continue to trap and sell furs but to Astor’s American Fur Company instead of the Rocky Mountain. It seems this was the only period in his life where he was not constantly wandering but then again, the Crow were a nomadic people. It’s also clear that this may have been the happiest in his life since he dedicates half his biography to it.

While he may have had many wives, there was one woman in particular during his time with the Crows that Beckwourth truly became infatuated with and her name was Pine Leaf. Pine Leaf had been captured from the Gros Ventre tribe out of North Central Montana when she was only ten years old and raised by the Crow with her twin brother. Unfortunately the twin would be killed by the Crow’s enemy the Balckfeet and on that day, Pine Leaf swore that she would never get married until after she’d killed one hundred enemies herself. Jim would try relentlessly to win her over but she told him that day would only come when the pine leaf turned yellow (Pine’s are Evergreens) or quote when you find a red headed Indian. End quote. Beckwourth had this to say of her quote and when I engaged in the fiercest struggles, no one was more promptly at my side than the young heroine. She seemed incapable of fear; and when she arrived at womanhood, could fire a gun without flinching and use the Indian weapons with as great dexterity as the most accomplished warrior. End quote. While Jim told some tall tales, I’ll get into that in a bit, it does seem that Pine Leaf is a real historical woman. She would be described in 1856 by Edwin Denig, a contemporary of Beckwourth and a fellow trapper who would later work for the Smithsonian. Denig though, called her Woman Chief but her background is identical to Jim’s description of her in his own biography.

Despite her not yet achieving one hundred slain enemies by her own hand, and after a death scare where it was believed Jim had perished but ultimately returned, she renounced her war path and agreed to marry him. Five weeks later though, Jim would leave the crow and never see Pine Leaf again. She would die in 1854… according to Denig, by the same tribe that she came from, the Gros Ventre.

So after almost a decade with the Crow, it seems Beckwourth could placate his wanderlust no more. That and he would grow disillusioned with constant warfare against their Blackfeet enemies and according to him, he had a desire to return to quote unquote civilization where he could make some real fame and fortune. He said of the time quote I had encountered savage beasts and wild men . . . . And what had I to show for so much wasted energy, and such a catalogue of ruthless deeds? End quote. While civilization, fame, and fortune may have been his stated desire for leaving the Crow, he wouldn’t find it in his next venture where he ended up attempting to fight in the US Army… but was instead assigned the task of being a civilian wagon master in the baggage division during the second Seminole War way down in Florida in 1839. Jim wound up serving under Zachary Taylor, who would become a future US President. During this time in his biography though, he would leave it rather devoid of exaggeration… but he would say this about his time there: I wanted excitement of some kind -- I was indifferent of what nature, even if it was no better than borrowing horses of the Black Feet. The Seminoles had no horses worth stealing, or I should certainly have exercised my talents for the benefit of the United States. End quote. After ten months of shipwrecks, delivering goods, possibly scouting, and doing a whole lot of waiting around in the jungles and swamps of early 19th Century Florida, where 3 soldiers died from disease for every one that died from a Seminole spear, arrow, or bullet, Beckwourth quit that war. Quick fact I did not know about the Seminole War in Florida: it was the longest and most expensive in both financial cost and human lives of any of the Indian Wars in United States History. AND, the Seminoles, who are not even from Florida never actually surrendered. The war only ended when the US declared it was over and forced a few Seminoles to Oklahoma… Now back to the west!

As always with Jim, the mountains were calling and by around 1840 he was back in the Rockies as a trader, trapper, and guide. He’d be just north of Denver at a place known as Fort Vasquez, hired by Louis Vasquez and an Andrew Sublette where he’d be trapping and trading with the Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux. All, it should be mentioned, were enemies of the Crow. At the fort, Jim was named agent in charge and trying to prove himself a brave and trustworthy men to the Indians, loudly said this to the gathered tribes, quote. I have killed a great Crow Chief, and am obliged to run away, or be killed by them. I have come to the Cheyennes, who are the bravest people in the mountains, as I do not wish to be killed by any of the inferior tribes. I have come here to be killed by the Cheyennes, cut up, and thrown out for their dogs to eat, so that they may say they have killed a great Crow Chief. End quote. William Bent, a fellow trader told Beckwourth, quote, You are certainly bereft of your senses. The Indians will make sausage-meat of you. End quote.

But sausage meat they did not make of him, and instead, with the added benefit of twenty gallons of whiskey, he gained their trust and over that autumn, and winter, Jim and crew made a healthy amount of bucks for Sublette and Vasquez. Although, not quite healthy enough and only a year later, the whole venture would be bottoms up. The next one with William Bent and Bent’s brother also didn’t pan out but his relationship with the Cheyenne certainly would. 

Beckwourth would soon enough continue his ceaseless wandering and leave Colorado for New Mexico where he would form a partnership with the Cheyenne in Taos and become mostly independent. Also while in Taos, he would marry yet again, this time to a woman named Maria Luisa Sandoval who John C Fremont, whom I will discuss in great detail about shortly, would even say he saw with Beckwourth in New Mexico. The two had a daughter named Matilda and they would all eventually move north back into Colorado to a town called Pueblo. The same town Fowler and Paul had been the first occupants of. But wanderlust was calling and Jim would abandon Pueblo, the Cheyenne, Matilda, and Luisa for greener pastures in California in 1844. And I thought I had the travel bug…

Of course he picked the exact time of the beginning of the Bear Flag Revolt and the Mexican American War to head to California. Both of these I will go into some good detail in a little bit. But in 1846, once the war broke out with Mexico and after participating in the Second battle of Cahuenga Pass also known as the battle of Providencia which wasn’t really a battle and which ultimately only ended with the loss of one horse and one mule… which, oddly enough, was the exact same ending of the first battle of Cahuenga Pass way back in 1831. This second battle though would ultimately result in the two sides of the quote unquote, battle, joining forces and reinstating a man named Pio Pico as Governor of California. I’ll mention Pico a little more later on with the rest of the California bit. After this, Jim would just head back to Santa Fe instead of being captured by the Mexican forces that were beginning to surround him but on the way he’d steal eighteen hundred horses which he would say, quote, we found roaming the California ranchos and started with our utmost speed from Pueblo de Angeles. This was a fair capture and our morals justified it, for it was war-time. End quote. Pueblo de Angles being present day Los Angeles, of course.

He’d make it back to Pueblo, Colorado where he found Luisa had remarried although he wasn’t bothered by this and was actually looking forward to enjoying, quote, once more the sweets of single blessedness. End quote. By this point, the dude had been married like fifteen times. There are marriages I haven’t even talked about because they're just so brief and too numerable. Anyways!

One of the most successful hotels of the time in Santa Fe was co-owned by Jim although he left the day to day operations to his partner. In the mean time, he would serve as a courier for the US Army during the then raging Mexican American war. His only duty for them would be to carry dispatches between the Southwest and Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. He’d say of the job, quote, The occupation was a tolerably good one, and I never failed in getting my dispatches through. I enjoyed facilities superior to almost any other man, as I was known to almost all the Indians through whose country I passed. End quote.   

After returning to Santa Fe from one of his courier deliveries, he would hear the news of the Taos Revolt by the Mexican and Indians of that town. Jim’s old boss and brother to William Bent, Charles Bent, had recently been assigned interim governor of New Mexico after the inhabitants surrendered without firing a shot. Almost immediately the American soldiers began acting like conquerers forcing Charles Bent to write to the Army, quote, to interpose your authority to compel the soldiers to respect the rights of the inhabitants. These outrages are becoming so frequent that I apprehend serious consequences must result sooner or later if measures are not taken to prevent them. End quote. Measures were not taken and on January 17th, the inhabitants revolted. Charles Bent would be shot through with arrows and scalped in front of his own family. Thankfully, his family, and the wife and family of Kit Carson, who I will talk at length about later, would escape. But the one time governor of New Mexico, Charles Bent and most other American officials would not be so lucky. In response, the Army gathered 300 soldiers and 65 volunteers, including Jim, to crush the rebellion. And eventually, that’s what they would do although one of the battles involved the Americans breaking down an adobe wall of a church and firing a cannon into it. Afterwards, the Army would hang a total of 28 men in Taos for murder during the insurrection and Beckwourth would witness them all. One of these men though, a Hipolito Polo Salazar was hanged for the strange crime of treason. A year later the US Supreme Court would overturn that conviction but… a lot good it did the swingin’ Salazar.   

Jim would quit New Mexico a year later and head back west to California just moments before the Gold Rush and just in time to help solve a murder. But not just any murder, oh no, it would become one of the most brutal and infamous atrocities in early California history. Of course Jim had to be there. As soon as he got to California he signed up to carry dispatches and mail from Monterey to Nipomo, which is just north of Santa Maria on the coast. One of his favorite rest stops along the route was a place called the Mission of San Miguel, which was actually owned by a man named William Reed. Jim loved the Reed family and the mission so one night when he arrived, he thought it was odd that no one seemed to be home. But then he’d find the body of a man in the kitchen which forced him back to his horse where he grabbed his pistols, lit a candle, and began to search the house. Jim had this to say about what unfolded: In going along a passage, I stumbled over the body of a woman; I entered a room, and found another, a murdered Indian woman, who had been a domestic. I was about to enter another room, but I was arrested by some sudden thought which urged me to search no further. It was an opportune admonition, for that very room contained the murderers of the family, who had heard my steps and were sitting at that moment with their pistols pointed at the door, ready to shoot the first person that entered. This they confessed subsequently. End quote. Jim turned around, escaped on his horse, and gathered a posse of about fifteen men to search the grounds. He would write this about the incident: On again entering the house, we found eleven bodies all thrown together in one pile for the purpose of consuming them; for, on searching further, we found the murderers had set fire to the dwelling, but according to that Providence which exposes such wicked deeds, the fire had died out. End quote. When he means consume, he means burn, not Hannibal Lecter the lot of them. The dead included Jim’s friend William Reed, his wife, their two young sons, one an infant… a midwife, her daughter, and young grandson, Reed’s brother in law, an Indian and his grandson, and the Reed’s cook. Mr Reed suffered a gunshot wound to the head and all of the others were hacked to death with axes. The five perpetrators were caught near Santa Barbara and all of them were tried before as Jim puts it, quote, we shot them. End quote.

By 1850, Beckwourth would be engaged in mining and prospecting in various parts of the gold region of California. He himself wouldn’t pan for gold but he’d assist those who did. He’d open a store in Sonoma before selling it and moving to Sacramento where he’d gamble and play cards. At this time he was also a guide in the mountains where he’d talk of wrangling with both grizzly bears and Indians. I’ll read you a great story from his book:

We had come upon a party who manifested the utmost friendship toward us; but I, knowing how far friendly appearances could be trusted to, cautioned my partner on no account to relinquish his gun, if the Indians should attempt to take it. They crowded round us, pretending to have the greatest interest in the pack that we carried, until they made a sudden spring, and seized our guns, and attempted to wrest them from our grasp. I jerked from them, and retreated a few steps; then, cocking my gun, I bade them, if they wished to fight, to come on. This produced a change in their feelings, and they were very friendly again, begging caps and ammunition of us, which, of course, we refused. We then walked backward for about one hundred and fifty yards, still keeping our pieces ready should they attempt further hostilities; but they did not deem it prudent to molest us again. End quote.

In that same year, Jim would be credited with quote unquote discovering, because it was originally a path taken by Native Americans, but he would discover a lower elevation pass in the Sierra Nevada Mountains northwest of Reno that would be named after him. Later Beckwourth Pass would become part of Beckwourth Trail which he labored to build up and which he heavily promoted its use of by incoming emigrants. Beckwourth Trail allowed people to travel more quickly and even more safely to the California Gold Fields during the heavy days of the incoming 49ers. It would cut off 150 miles of trail, a lot of it very steep, and which included The Donner Pass. Jim himself would even led the very first American family and their wagon train through it in the summer of 1851. In that wagon train was a young future California Poet Laureate named Ina Coolbrith who called Jim, quote, one of the most beautiful creatures that ever lived. He was rather dark and wore his hair in two long braids, twisted with colored cord that gave him a picturesque appearance. End quote. There was so much celebration of this first wagon train through his pass that once it reached the nearby town of Marysville, the party almost burned the whole place down.

He’d settle down in 1852 in a place known now as Beckwourth, California but what he called Beckwourth Valley on the western end of the Beckwourth Trail that had the Beckwourth Pass in it and there, he would open a hotel and trading post. He would also claim his house was the only one between it’s very foundation and The Great Salt Lake far to the east. It was also at this time he would meet a man named Thomas D Bonner who was staying at the hotel. Jim would tell Bonner his stories, and the man would write them down. The semi autobiography was titled The Life and Adventures of James P. Beckwourth, Mountaineer, Scout, and Pioneer, and Chief of the Crow Nation of Indians and was published in 1856. Bonner, who was a journalist and justice of the peace in California wrote of him quote probably no man ever lived who has met more personal adventure involving danger to life. End quote. I just have to mention this real quick about his biographer. First of all, during the telling of the story, he would misspell and misquote and misrepresent quite a few facts, which is whatever. I suppose it happens for entertainment value and Beckwourth himself would do the same for the rest of his own life. But what really made me laugh was that Bonner was once the head of the new Hampshire temperance society, as in the movement in the United States to ban alcohol, but who had been forced to emigrate to California when he started drinkin’ again. Bonner would also never send Jim any money from the sale of the highly popular book.

After ranching and welcoming pioneers into California, Beckwourth would grow restless as usual and he’d move to Denver where he’d become a storekeeper again and marry a black woman named Elizabeth Lettbetter. During this time he’d also be appointed by the Government to become an Indian Agent. He’d get into a few scrapes with the law including beating a charge of manslaughter but after the unfortunate death of their young child, the marriage between Jim and Elizabeth would break up and Jim would move in with a Crow woman. Then, in 1864, after essentially being compelled under threat of violence, he became a guide for Colonel Chivington’s 3rd Colorado Cavalry Regiments against the Arapaho and his old buddies the Cheyenne. What would follow has become known as The Sand Creek Massacre.

On November 28th, of 1864, while flying an American and a white flag of peace, chief Black Kettle of the Cheyenne along with the older men of the band, and most of their women and children, and with a few Arapahos, were sleeping near the banks of the Sand Creek when Chivington ordered his 425 men to point the artillery and their rifles into the base of the teepees and to subsequently open fire. Two of his officers, a Captain Silas Soule and a Lieutenant Joseph Cramer, and their men refused his orders, but the rest of the soldiers would go on to kill around 160 helpless sleeping or fleeing native americans. To add insult to injury, after the initial carnage many soldiers would hunt down and kill the escaping indians and a few soldiers would commence to mutilating the dead and dying.  Mary Prowers Hudnal, whose father and grandfather would die in the massacre would later say this: Grandfather Ochinee (One-Eye) escaped from the camp, but seeing all that his people were to be slaughtered, he deliberately chose to go back into the one-sided battle and die with them. End quote.

After the massacre, Beckwourth, who claimed not to have participated, would be summoned as a witness before Congress where he swore under oath that he’d retraced his steps and begged the surviving Indians for peace. But the damage was done and the Cheyenne, from then on, refused to trade with him. Captain Soule, who refused to open fire, would also give damning testimony of the incident but would be murdered for his words only weeks later.

Now in his 60s, Jim would go back to trapping. One such trapping incident in ’66 resulted in three of his fellow trappers being murdered by Blackfeet or drowning. He was the only survivor. That same year he’d again be a guide for the US Army against the Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota’s in Red Cloud’s War. By now, the army were armed with breech-loading Springfield rifles which double or tripled the rate of fire for soldiers and the end was drawing near for freedom for the indians.

Later that year while working as an interpreter for the military expedition of Colonel Henry Carrington, he would begin to feel sick on the journey to a Crow village, have considerable nose bleeds and headaches, and once reaching the village, he would stay in the lodge of chief Iron Bull where he would ultimately die. His last journey was being buried by his host as a Crow Indian, on a platform in a tree.

This man’s life was truly, astounding. There are endless good quotes from his book that I suggest everyone read, no matter how accurate the finer details are. Because, here’s the thing about Beckwourth: he would become known as a teller of tall tales… and a later 1892 edition of his biography would come with a preface by Charles Godfrey Leland, who was a writer of the time that during the civil war, signed up to fight for the Union and who would get to do so at Gettysburg. You know, one of the largest single collection of casualties for Americans in history… where around 50,000 American boys and men would lose their lives, get injured, or disappear in a single battle… which would be considered the turning point of the civil war and which battle would halt the southern rebel’s advance into the north. So, that Gettysburg… Anyways, Charles Godfrey Leland said of Beckwourth, quote, Some one said of him that some men are rarely worthy of belief, but that Jim was always Beckwourthy of un-belief. End quote. By the way, Leland was also credited with coining the term emancipation instead of abolition in American society. So obviously, Leland was an ally to the cause of the blacks in the United States.

To continue this train of thought though, in an even earlier review of the Beckwourth biography in 1856, an abolitionist newspaper called The National Era had one of its journalists say, quote, I knew Jim intimately and he was the biggest liar that ever lived. End quote, and that, quote, we can fancy a lurking smile at the thought how glibly he [meaning Jim] puts together such a discordant mass of material brought out from the storehouse of memory, where there is no one at hand positively to contradict him. End quote. I will definitely have a little bit more to say on this tall tale stuff in a little bit but know that Jim Beckwourth may have accomplished and been a part of more momentous events in the American West and Southwest certainly than any white man of the time but possibly of any mountain man at any time. I’m not poking fun at him when I call him the Forest Gump of the west but that’s really just the best comparison in terms of someone showing up everywhere all the time in an incredible part of history. He should truly be someone we learn about and are talking about in our collective culture. And like I said, he probably could have gotten his own podcast. But there’s a whole lot more amazing people and stories to come in this one.

Final note on Beckwourth that I forgot to mention, To celebrate his life, in 1951, Universal Pictures released the Western movie Tomahawk… in which Beckwourth was payed by Jack Oakie… a white man.

Another mysterious mountain man I came across quite a few times was named Moses Harris but who went by Moses Black Harris and who would gain the nickname The Black Squire. At first I hesitated to add him because there is literally nothing historians know about his past, not even where he was born, although some sources claim he’s from South Carolina. We just don’t know a single thing about his early life and he certainly never told anyone while he was alive. We don’t know if he was married prior to his adventures, we don’t know his parents, and there’s no record of his birth, so we definitely don’t know if he was actually a black man. Although Alfred Jacob Miller, a painter known best for his western scenes painted Harris and described him as quote, of wiry form, made up of bone and muscle, with a face apparently composed of tan leather and whip cord, finished off with a peculiar blue black tint, as if gunpowder had been burnt into his face. End quote. And Dr. Darrell Millner, who I quoted earlier, said the nickname “Black” for Harris was likely a reference to his race and that quote My final personal conclusion was that he was indeed “black” for a pretty simple reason. . . . In the writings of his mountain man contemporaries, that’s what they call him. . . . Those were insulting “fighting words” if he did not consider himself to be that [black], and goodness knows those mountain men didn’t need much of an excuse to start a fight—in effect, he would have been in constant combat. End quote. Even though he was literate and even though he was described by other contemporaries as being white, like by Jim Beckwourth himself, or even native American and even though there’s no records of him being born at all, I still believe Harris was indeed of some African descent. So I am siding with Professor Millner and I’m going to assume that the Black Squire was indeed, that; A black man.

The first time Moses Black Harris appears in the historical record is in 1822 when he is hired by The Rocky Mountain Fur Company who essentially had a monopoly on the fur business in the area of the Rocky Mountains and which was also owned by the same John Jacob Astor who hired Rose. Unfortunately for both Harris and an employee of the company, William Ashley, along with almost 100 other men including Edward Cut Nose Rose and Hugh Glass, they would all suffer what would be described as the worst disaster in the history of the western fur trade just a year later. In June, up the Missouri River from St Louis, Rose and another man by the name of Stephens, after hearing that their expedition might be attacked, went into the Arikara camp to try and talk to some native women to gain information. Unfortunately for the Stephens fellow, he would be killed and subsequently hacked to pieces. When the fur trappers learned of all of this they rather fittingly grew leery of what would meet them in the morning. And what met them in the morning was hundreds of yards worth of Arikara warriors aiming loaded rifles at their position from atop the river’s fortified bluff. When the dust settled, 14 men were killed, 11 injured, and most of the horses and provisions were lost in the Missouri. The opening of the Revenant, the movie I have mentioned a few times, and stars DiCaprio, is a great fictionalization of this battle that in a famous quote unquote one take shows the brutality and fierceness that would have characterized this situation. But, Harris would be seemingly undeterred by the whole affair.

A few times I came across references to him from other trappers who said that Harris was a quote man of great leg end quote who was capable of huge feats of endurance and was known for huffing it across vast landscapes and in various weather, including deep snow. It was said that other trappers wouldn’t even accompany him for fear of being left behind to die if they slowed down or stopped. One man who wasn’t afraid though, was the man, Jim Beckwourth himself, who accompanied the Black Squire on an expedition in 1825 to gather horses for Ashley and the Fur Company from the Pawnee Village some several hundred miles away… in winter. While it is known that the trek happened, it is not known if what Beckwourthy of unbelief claims, actually occurred but it is incredible that these two men of color ever united in the vast wilderness of the American West. According to Beckwourth, once they arrived at the Pawnee Village, they found it deserted cause the Indians had moved onto their winter quarters. Once Harris realized the next trading post was another thirty miles away… well this is what Beckwourth has to say about the ordeal in his autobiography, quote. On the fifth day we struck a large Indian trail, which bore evident marks of being fresh. My companion now gave entirely up, (his companion being Moses Black Harris) and threw himself to the ground, declaring he could go no farther. He pronounced our position to be thirty miles from the trading-post. I endeavored to arouse him to get up and proceed onward, but he could only advance a few rods at a time. I felt myself becoming weak; still, I had faith that I could reach Ely's, if I had no hinderance; if I lingered for Harris, I saw we should both inevitably perish. He positively declared he could advance not a step farther; he could scarcely put one foot before the other, and I saw he was becoming bewildered. In the dilemma I said to him, "Harris, we must both perish if we stay here. If I make the best of my way along this trail, I believe I can reach Ely's some time in the night" (for I was aware that the Indians, whose trail we were following, were proceeding thither with their peltry). But Harris would not listen to it. "Oh, Jim," he exclaimed, "don't leave me; don't leave me here to die! For God's sake, stay with me!" I did my best to encourage him to proceed; I assisted him to rise, and we again proceeded upon our journey. End quote. They’d make it with the help of some Indians who fed them, guided them, and nursed them back to health.

In the 1830s Harris would also lead caravans that brought supplies to the fur trappers who were heading further westward like he had once done. He’d take the supplies to something called the Rocky Mountain Rendezvous which was held annually and which featured, according to Beckwourth himself, quote, mirth, songs, dancing, shouting, trading, running, jumping, singing, racing, target shooting, yarns, frolic, with all sorts of extravagances that white men or Indians could invent. End quote. The Rendezvous included whites, Indians, wives, children, whores, tourists, African Americans, and plenty of whiskey. On the way to these rendezvous Harris would also occasionally bring missionaries from back east who planned on preaching to the Indians and the frontiersmen. One such missionary woman was enamored with Harris and called him charming, kind, welcoming, helpful, and she described how she was delighted to be in his presence. On a trip two years later though in 1838, a different missionary woman would write rather negatively about the shenanigans of the fur trappers at night who would get drunk, dance half naked, bang drums, shoot their guns, and carry a scalp among them while approaching the missionary’s tents. This woman’s name was Myra Eells, which, no harm intended on her but that’s such a villainess name. Anyways she’d say about her Rendezvous experience quote No one could describe the horrible scene they presented. Could not imagine that white men, brought up in a civilized land, can appear to so much imitate the Devil. End quote. Not all those men were white though, as we all know now.

In 1839, Moses Black Harris was hired to take a separate group of missionaries as far as the Oregon Territory. The Oregon territory at that time was described as everything west of the Rocky Mountains and north of the California border. Slowly but surely during the next few years, Harris would fall in love with this territory. 5 years later in 1844, he’d be hired by a man named Nathaniel Ford who’d been seduced by the promise of free land in the Willamette Valley but that party would also be joined by another one led by Cornelius Gilliam and Harris would lead all nearly 700 of them to their promised land. For quite some time after this, Harris would stay in Oregon and his fondness would grow so much that he wanted to see that land fly under the glorious stars and stripes because at that time, it was claimed by the Hudson Bay Company and the British. Harris would get so enraged by this non manifest destiny promise that he’d write a letter to a Saint Louis Businessman named Thornton Grimsley saying how he, meaning Harris, would lead an army of United States soldiers to expel the British and their Indian friends from the area and allow it to be settled by Americans if needs be. Thankfully in 1846, the US acquired Oregon diplomatically, although it wouldn’t get easier for blacks to settle the area. More on that in just a bit though.

While leading these settlers and missionaries out west, Harris would regale them of his earlier adventurous times in the great plains and the rockies. While I’m sure his stories were fantastic he was also described as being the darnedest liar and that lies tumbled out of his mouth like…. Well the quote is boudins out of a buffler’s stomach. But try as I might I can’t quite clamp down what the hell that means. Buffler obviously refers to my friend the buffalo and Boudin might mean some sort of French New Orleans style blood sausage… but.. well it’s still a great quote and something that I feel like if I were a mountain man of the time, I would have understood so I’m passing it on to y’all. One of the reasons why he was called such a big fat liar was because he would often tell the tale of him coming upon a petrified forest way out west almost to the coast. He said this petrified forest had petrified and frozen so quickly that the birds in the trees had even turned to stone and that those birds had turned to stone SO FREAKIN QUICKLY that they’d even been frozen mid song… such a place hasn’t been found as of yet. While he may have lied a lot, I’m sure he also left out a lot too. Like the times he would get frustrated at fellow companions and shoot at them during disputes… but… don’t we all leave out the time we shoot at our friends during arguments?

The trouble with the argument that Harris was the biggest liar of the time is obviously that the aforementioned Beckwourth also held that title. And Beckwourth was a man that Harris had hung out with, risked life and limb with, and was also black with. Maybe being black or half black or questionably black in a time when that wasn’t quite accepted meant that you were always perceived as a liar… or maybe spending half your life in the wilderness talking to yourself or the wildlife around you makes you stretch the truth occasionally. Especially when it’s tough to have someone corroborate your stories. By the 1870s, Beckwourth’s tales would be known as quote little more than campfire stories. End quote. I like to believe both men led incredible lives and both men told tall tales. I myself, am currently writing a novel called Adventure; A Misrememberance that is largely based off of my own many awesome travels and stories but is also peppered with incredible and sometimes fanciful completely made up additions. I was partially encouraged to write it by people who read my journals and doubted that I had actually done the things within them but mostly encouraged by one of my favorite authors, Jim Harrison whose Brown Dog and more importantly, Wolf; A False Memoir novels were similarly based in half truths and fancifulness. Much like Hemingway, and I suppose a lot of other writers in history have done. Maybe living in the wilderness and seeing what they had seen and doing what they had done in those many years among wonderfully beautiful scenes of danger and immensely glorious landscapes makes one stretch some truth just to sound that little bit more fantastic to oneself. But when those slight fantasies are said or dictated or written and read by those who haven’t even come close to living such a lifestyle, the stories can be scoffed at as absurd. Which they are or can be. I refuse though, to believe that these men’s stories aren’t to be believed simply because the men who were telling them are black, which some of the current authors suggest, like Katz himself who fails to mention the petrified story of Harris’ in his arguing that these men of color weren’t believed in their day solely because of their said skin color alone. I just think these guys told great stories. And sometimes those stories were a little bit on the stretched of truth side. Harris’ story isn’t done mind you, I just had to get that little aside out of the way.

In 1845 Harris would again be called upon to be a part of history when he lead a rescue team to find the infamous Lost Wagon Train of Stephen Meek in the high desert of Oregon. Long story short, this guy, Stephen Meek, led 1,000 settlers and 200 wagons over terrain that wasn’t proven but was a short cut only to ultimately get them stuck at a deep ravine and leave them starving and wandering around for help. It wasn’t quite the Donner Party, but it wasn’t fun and games either. So Harris assembled a team that included a man named Joel Palmer who had at some point been a part of the Meeks group. Palmer would later say that it took them two weeks to get this lost group of settlers across the huge canyon using a system of pulleys and levers and ropes. He also said that about 40 of the 1,000 settlers would die due to the adventure but that Harris saved many many more lives that would have been lost otherwise.

After the Meek rescue Harris would continue in the area of Oregon building reliable and well used wagon trails to California, trapping yet again, and continuing to be a guide. But in 1849, Cholera, not the harsh winters or the Indians would claim Moses. A man named Gerald wrote a letter describing the circumstances of his death which was reprinted in several Missouri newspapers at the time. The letter said quote Within the last 24 hours I have seen the eyes close in death, of three individuals at the hotel…all victims of cholera, after but a few hours warning. The first was “Black Harris,” the well-known mountain guide. He had been chosen to lead us across the Rocky Mountains, but poor fellow, he goes before us on another journey. But in [his] last moments he whispered to a bystander that away in the mountain fastnesses, far from the haunts of any other white man, among some unknown tribe of Indians, he had a wife and two children, the only objects on earth for which he could desire to live. End quote. So maybe he had a wife and family after all.

One last note on the Black Squire: a fellow explorer, guide, and trapper named James Clyman would later write a poem about the man:

The bones of old Black Harris

Who often traveled beyond the far west

And for the freedom of human rights

He was a free and easy kind of soul

Especially with a belly full.

I only mention this little poem because would a white man in the 1840s out west with the nickname Black Squire have been concerned with human rights? I am of a high degree of doubt.

Keeping the story in Oregon, In the summer of 1844, George Washington Bush, a free African American who had once served under Andrew Jackson in 1815 during the War of 1812 and who also worked briefly as a fur trapper for the British Hudson’s Bay Company, traveled with a party of Missourian emigrants on the Oregon Trail to that Territory. Led by The Black Squire himself, the party consisted of Bush and his family, and four other white families including a family led by a man named Michael T Simmons who was an Irishman. Because of his knowledge of the area from his fur trapping days, Bush became an indispensable guide to the party along with Harris. He was also most likely the wealthiest. For the journey west he brought with him the profits from the sale of his farm, almost all of his belongings, and some $2,000 in silver coins. According to a 22 year old British emigrant and friend to Bush, John Minto, he was also funding two of the families, including Simmons’ on their journey. Not only was Bush wealthy and knowledgable of the area, he was also a skilled hunter. When they were around 600 miles from their final destination, they grew rather hungry and according to Minto, Bush would hand out firearms and say, quote, Boys you are going through a hard country. You have guns and ammunition. Take my advice: anything you see as big as a blackbird, kill it and eat it. End quote. Minto would also say of him, quote, Bush was one of the most efficient men on the road. End quote.

But as they got nearer to Oregon, the party heard rumors of what was happening in that territory’s legislative body. Peter Burnett, a newly elected member of the Oregon provisional government, would introduce a bill that same year Bush and party were approaching that banned slavery… which one would argue, was a good thing. But the same bill also banned free blacks from living in the territory… So Oregon definitely didn’t want slavery, but they didn’t want free blacks either whom they called roaming vagabonds. The white people of the territory were even afraid that the Blacks and the Indians would one day rise up together and overthrow the steady trickling whites of the area. Oregon eventually became the only state to enter the Union with a Constitutional provision that denied admission to African Americans. That Oregon Black Exclusion law of 1844 became known as the lash law because if a black person over the age of 18 didn’t leave Oregon by 1846, they’d be subjected to 20 to 39 lashes from a whip. And that would be repeated every six months until that person left the territory. Thankfully that law would be amended only six months after it was enacted and instead of lashes, the black person would be… oh not thankfully, the person would be forced to work for a white employer for a certain period of time. That sounds suspiciously like something else… these exclusion laws or ones similar that barred blacks from entering the territory weren’t removed until nineteen… twenty six…

So Bush and his party were hearing rumors of all of this on their way at which point they all unanimously agreed to head north of Oregon and across the Columbian river  into territory jointly claimed by The US and the British. But shortly after that in 1846, the two countries compromised on immigration and the place they were staying was incorporated into the Oregon Territory which reignited their initial problem. Thankfully, the Irishman Simmons,

then an elected member of the legislature, sponsored a bill that would pass, to exempt the Bush family from the exclusion of blacks and to grant him a 640 acre homestead that would later be called Bush Prairie. The family would continue to give to those around them as they brought the first sawmill, gristmill, mower, and reaper to the area, they’d run a free roadside motel, and when times were tough he’d share from his plentiful crops with those in need. It’s been suggested that the fact that they went north of the Columbia and settled in that land is the reason Washington is in the United States today. Much later, after he had long since passed, his son would serve in the Washington State Legislature from 1891 to 1895.

Now’s a good time to talk about The Pathfinder and his many adventures. In 1842 a man named John C Fremont, but who would later be known as The Pathfinder, joined the Army Corp of Topographical Engineers for the sole purpose of being an Adventurer… I really wish being an adventurer was still a job today… anyways, the Army wanted to survey and map the route to Oregon known as the Oregon Trail and Fremont was their man. So he got together a team which included some Delaware Indians, A German Prussian, some French, Kit Carson, THE Kit Carson, and his 18 year old personal valet and free black man named Jacob Dodson. Although Dodson would not be the only black man on his expeditions.

A quick note about Kit Carson, by this point in 1842, he was 33 years old and had been traveling the west as a fur trapper for 16 years so he knew a little bit about the area, which is why he was hired as a guide. Well that and the fact that he could speak 7 Indian languages.

So for the next five months, Fremont, Dodson, and crew walked the prairie, charted rivers, and climbed an almost Fourteener in Wyoming now named Fremont’s Peak where he planted an American flag and claimed all of the rocky mountains and the lands to the pacific for the United States. While that makes it sound like they had an easy time, it was more like a descent into hell than an ascent up the mountain. Two of the climbers would throw themselves onto rocks and exclaim that they could go no higher and Fremont himself would get dizzy, have headaches, and vomit. Presumably suffering from altitude sickness, he decided he could not continue so he gave the Barometer which was used to measure the altitude of the peak, to a half French, half black man named Johnny Janisse who carried it almost all the way to the top making him one of the first black mountaineers in the American West. Despite the occasional set back, Fremont’s expedition was a roaring success. So much so that he was awarded a second expedition which would leave the following year in 1843.

This second Fremont expedition had the more loftier goals of mapping, describing, and bringing back botanical samples from the second half of the Oregon Trail. They were to also find an alternate route through the Southern mountains, and they were to push all the way to the Pacific Ocean on the Columbia River in Oregon Country. So on May 29th, Fremont, Dodson, and this second expedition, which had the added benefit of being armed with a 12 pound howitzer cannon, although they would never use it against humans, they would use it against my old friend, the buffalo, but I digress… this second expedition left Missouri for the 6,475 mile round trip adventure that would take them all the way to California. It’s believed that Dodson was one of the first black men to enter the territory of Nevada. Just beyond that territory when they become stuck high up in the Sierra Mountains in the dead of winter, Dodson was asked to go ahead of the main party to scout a safe path out of the mountains which he successfully completed. Fremont would actually ask him to be a member of several successful scouting parties throughout this and subsequent journeys. Dodson would eventually become a rather important member of the team after eleven of the other members of the party left and Fremont would say of him quote he performed his duty manfully throughout the voyage. End quote. This second expedition would take them to modern day Sacramento, Las Vegas, Nevada, The Great Basin, and they’d see Lake Tahoe. Dodson was probably the first black man to ever see it since the others were some of the first white men to ever see it. While in California they stayed near Sacramento at a place called Sutter’s Fort which was owned by a Swiss-Mexican Immigrant named John or Johan Sutter. Sutter actually called this little territory of his the Empire of New Helvitia or Helvitia… I’ve never heard it spoken, it meant New Switzerland and he had his own private army that wore gaudy red uniforms that were imported from France. Ah, the good ole days… when you can just declare some land your own empire, raise your own army, and import your uniforms in hideous colors from a foreign empire… speaking of empires, Sutter bought land known as Fort Ross on the Pacific Ocean from the Russians which effectively ended their occupation of Northern California. Sutter, just a super interesting guy, would also discover gold on his land setting off a wave of immigrants in later years which would bring 90,000 people from all over the world to California. 4,000 of those people would actually be African Americans. Fremont obviously fell in love with this place and became good friends with Sutter and while there, Fremont and the expedition would learn from the rapidly growing number of American settlers that Mexican authority over the territory was quite weak. This will be important for the third expedition. Once home, Fremont would write up a lengthy and scientific study on the expedition which would have an initial printing of 10,000 copies and which would help countless settlers and immigrants who ventured west. Some of them, the Mormons, we’ll get into in just a little bit.

Back in D.C. a third expedition was quickly planned and put together that had Fremont, Dodson, and crew survey the central Rockies, the Great Salt Lake region, and part of the Sierra Nevadas for the war department of the united states. This was now 1845 and the US had just done a little annexation of a little place called Texas and Mexico wasn’t happy. By 1846, war would break out between the two nations but we’re not there yet.

So in June of 1845 around 60 heavily armed men again led by Kit Carson, would leave for a scientific expedition and head towards California. Although the president himself at the time, President Polk, in a secret meeting would tell Fremont that if war broke out with Mexico, to take California for the United States. Fremont wouldn’t have to be told twice.

Fremont, Dodson, and crew left from Missouri again and cut straight west through the Great Basin, into California through the Donner Pass, the one where in exactly a year from now a group of American settlers would get stuck in the extreme cold of the high Sierra Nevadas and have to resort to eating each other… that Donner Pass. Once in California they headed straight for Fort Sutter again. But he wouldn’t stay there long. By February of 1846, Fremont and his men, after illegally traipsing through Mexican California drumming up American patriotism and scouting out defensive areas, settled near Monterey where he climbed to the top of modern day Fremont Peak and planted the US Flag. Obviously, the Mexicans were not happy about this expedition so under Commandante General Jose Antonio Castro, a group of Mexican military men got into a four day standoff with Fremont and his crew which ended with the expedition fleeing north into Oregon.

In Oregon, for inexplicable reasons, Fremont, Dodson, Carson, and crew, after being told by local American settlers that some Wintu Indians were going to attack them, massacred anywhere from 150 to 600 of them. Kit Carson would say quote, it was a perfect butchery. End quote. Not a single member of the expedition was injured or killed in the attack. Not long after that, a couple members of the expedition would be killed by Klamath Indians which would result in 14 Klamath Villagers being killed by the expedition. Again, not a single member was injured or killed in this subsequent massacre. There’s a quote by a member of the expedition who claims to have not participated in the Wintu massacre but who said, I think that I hate an Indian as badly as anybody and have as good reason to hate them, but I don't think that I could have assisted in that slaughter. It takes two to fight or quarrel but in that case there was but one side fighting and the other side trying to escape. End quote. Sometimes you meet such exciting men who through their stories you kinda start to look up to… and then you read about the two, not one, but two massacres they perpetrated. Possibly three a bit later. It sucks. But I wasn’t there with Fremont or Dodson or Carson so who knows what was going through their minds. One more interesting side note about this time, although Dodson isn’t a part of it, and I don’t want to take too much away from him, but at one point Carson’s gun misfired and he was about to be shot by a poisoned Klamath arrow when Fremont saw it, galloped over, and trampled the Indian with his horse… War is hell, man. Anyways!

A few weeks later, the whole expedition would re-enter Mexican California where they’d steal 170 horses from Castro, gain a bunch of new volunteers and followers, and turn their scientific expedition into a military one. Not long afterwards, 34 armed men of Fremont’s expedition would capture Sonoma, the largest settlement in Northern Mexican California.

A little bit about Mexican California though, it wasn’t a place filled with patriotic Mexicans who were willing to die for a government that had only existed for 20 years and that was extremely corrupt and all the way down in D F, or Mexico City. Most of these Rancheros actually preferred to be under the protection of the United States or even better, to become their own country. Enter, the Bear Flag Rebellion.

On June 15th, Rebel California Settlers, mostly Americans, who called themselves Osos, Spanish for Bear, declared a separate republic and elected an American, William Ide as its first President. Quick note, the flag that they hoisted was actually designed by Abraham Lincoln’s Nephew William Todd. I’ll put a picture of the flag up at the site. Also present at this event were seven other Black men whose names were James Duff, Charles Gains, Billy Gaston, Joe McAfee, and a bodyguard to U.S. Army Lieutenant Archibald Gillespie named Ben. One black man in attendance, John Grider, would find the paint that was put onto the flag and later hoist it. He’d settle the area afterwards for 60 years where he’d live as a very talented horse trainer and veterinarian.

Obviously, Fremont joined the rebels and began capturing and executing members of the Mexican Government in northern California until he effectively overthrew it. It was at this time that Brevet General John C Fremont began signing his correspondence as Military Commander of U.S. Forces in California. After consolidating his forces with the Osos Rebels, the expedition was renamed The California Battalion on July 5th and all of the men were enlisted into the US Navy… Including Dodson, which was forbidden at the time for Blacks to serve but it seems Fremont could care less. Then on July 9th, the Bear Flag Republic ended when the American Flag was raised in its place.

Fremont, Dodson, and the California Battalion would take San Francisco, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles and ultimately Fremont would, without any authority, sign the Treaty of Cahuenga, which ended the hostilities and which would ultimately be enforced despite it’s non legal binding. But just a few months later, Dodson and his companions would have one more famous incident. In March, Fremont, who held Los Angeles, heard rumors of an upcoming attack by Mexican forces. So needing to alert the Army all the way up in Monterey, Fremont, a man named Pio Pico, who had been the last governor of Mexican California, and Jacob Dodson rode there and back, an 840 miles round trip journey, in only 8 days with 76 hours of those 8 days being on the back of a horse. That was rather momentous for the time.

While Fremont would be dishonorably discharged from the army, return out west, and later run for president, Dodson would stay in DC and eventually become a messenger for the United States Senate. Then when war broke out between the states, he would raise an army of 300 black men to fight for the Union. But, unfortunately, Lincoln would refuse the regiment’s service since colored men could not fight for the United States.

Lincoln’s a bit of a confusing person when it comes to African Americans. He once said himself that he wanted all the lands of the new territories out west as quote homes for free white people. End quote. A certain area of land in Central America which would have been named Lincolnia was proposed by Republicans during the civil war as a place to relocate all blacks in the country after the President asked for a plan of their resettlement. During the war though, Fremont would rejoin the Army and move back east where he’d be given full command of the Department of the West by Lincoln. The west he was fighting in was Missouri and that was a rough state to be in during the Civil War where half the state were Rebs and the other half were Union. It’s at this point I should mention that if you are issuing commands as a president of the united states to John C Fremont, you absolutely must not be vague, cause this man will go all out, and rightfully so. Lincoln gave him full command of Missouri, no oversight. So, to punish the Rebels, on August 30th of 1861 Fremont declared Martial law and emancipated all slaves in Missouri. A shocked Abraham Lincoln would command Fremont to overturn this decision but Fremont would refuse and say quote I thought that was the whole point of the war. End quote. Because of this refusal, President Lincoln would dismiss him from his command. Later in the war Lincoln would confide privately that he sympathized with Fremont’s intentions but that Fremont had overreached. Of course, Lincoln would ultimately issue the emancipation proclamation and free all slaves in the United States so in the end, his legacy is one of freedom, justice, and righteousness but… Fremont definitely beat him to it and it’s hypothesized that if Fremont had won the 1856 election, the civil war would have started then. I’m inclined to believe it.

Even before they were published, some of Fremont’s notes on the west from his first expedition had somehow made it into the hands of a man named Joseph Smith who would eventually suggest his followers, the Mormons, build a settlement by the Great Salt Lake so that they could escape the tyranny from non church members that met them in Illinois and Missouri. Then, after Smith’s martyrdom, Brigham Young would gain a copy of one of those 10,000 notes that were printed on completion of Fremont’s second expedition, further cementing the fate of the members of the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints.

The growing church, while mostly anglo white Americans, did have blacks among its congregation. Joseph smith would baptize, and ordain the priesthood, and give leadership positions to the church’s new black converts. Joseph Smith himself, quite a departure of thinking for the time, wrote in his journal that enslaved people owned by mormons should be brought quote, into a free country and set free. Educate them and give them equal rights. End quote. He’d later say that black people actually have souls and are human and that given an equal environment, they’d be on the same level as whites. The doctrine Smith espoused condemned all forms of human bondage and for a time, in the beginning, the church was rather vocal in its opposition to slavery. Mormon newspapers would condemn the institution that had turned the US into, quote, an asylum for the oppressed. End quote. Joseph Smith even ran for President in 1844 with one of his platforms calling for the, quote, breakdown of slavery. End quote. And the destruction of the, quote, shackles from the poor black man. End quote.

But, Joseph Smith would be shot and killed while in prison in Missouri as the members would be murdered, tarred and feathered, and would lose their rights as citizens. Maybe out of fear of further violent persecution, the church would eventually relent on slavery and ask members to keep out of interfering with it. Then Brigham Young would become the next leader of the church and he would ultimately be the one to lead the Saints into Salt Lake and keep slavery alive in Utah. But first he had to get there.

Oscar Crosby, Hark Lay, and Green Flake, all slaves of southern Mormons accompanied Young on that initial journey. They were essentially sent ahead of their masters to help prepare a settlement and they became a vital part of the pioneering trek. They even helped to improve the wagon trail they would use to enter the Salt Lake Valley. Green Flake actually drove the first wagon into Emigration Canyon and by the time other members began arriving, he’d already planted some crops and built a comfortable log cabin for James and Agnes Flake, his owners. He’d shortly after become emancipated and he’d live out the rest of his days in Idaho Falls. Although, he would frequently return to Salt Lake City for the annual Pioneer Days celebration and would ultimately be buried in Union County, Utah. Oscar Crosby, only two weeks after reaching the Salt Lake Valley was baptized into the church.

It’s estimated that in those first four years of Mormon settlement in the Salt Lake Area that 110 to 119 slaves and free Blacks would arrive. One of those brave men and women was John Burton who’d been born into slavery in Virginia in 1797 but was eventually baptized into the church when his owners, John and Susan Burton converted. But after John Burton, the white man, died, he would end up staying with Susan Burton, now widowed, and the family as they headed West. In modern day Nebraska, as the Mormons prepared to go to the Rockies, in a place called Winter’s Quarters, Burton actually lived next to Green Flake and there he dug graves for those who had not made it. But he himself would make it in 1847, driving a wagon train into the valley and not long after arriving, he too would plant crops and prepare a place for his owners. But the church had other plans and it would send the Burtons and crew to southern Utah to create more colonies in that region. John Burton would continue to lead wagons and accompany the family during that harrowing journey along cliffs and canyons, which if you’ve been to southern Utah, you understand why it’s called canyon country.

In 1850, John would receive his Patriarchal Blessing from the church and in 1861 he’d donate $15 to the building of a meeting house in Parowan, Utah where they eventually settled. A Patriarchal Blessing in the LDS religion is a sacred gift that only worthy members can receive that have words of promise, counsel, and lifelong guidance that are intended solely for the recipient of the blessing. I got mine when I was 17 and it’s tucked away in my important papers. I should probably read it again one of these days. Back to John Burton though. Just before he died in southern Utah, he had a letter written for him to a Mary Jane Robinson in 1865. He couldn’t write so he must have had it penned and the letter said, quote, Mary Jane, I am glad that you thought enough of me to mention me in your letter. Tell Aunt Maria that I have not forgot her kindness to me. Tell your Father that I was glad he sent me a shirt for I was in want of one. I understand that you have a good prospect of having plenty of fruit. Be so kind as to send me a little if you have a chance. I am suffering with chills and fever, but I feel good in spirits. I rejoice everyday of my life in the spirit of Mormonism. Give my respects to all the family. Most respectfully, John. End quote.

According to the census of 1850, Utah had 24 free persons of color and 26 slaves within the territory. Those Blacks and Black Mormons in the region were farmers, laborers, carpenters, store clerks, midwives, teamsters, calling holders within the church, and band members who would provide entertainment and music.

In 1851 the free Black couple of Mary Ann and Elijah Abel arrived in the valley from out east and immediately helped to build the Salt Lake Temple. Elijah Abel had actually been given the higher Priesthood by Joseph Smith and was even called to be a member of the Quorum of the Seventy and went on two missions for the Church. One to Ohio, and one to both New York and Canada. But in Salt Lake City he was a carpenter and up until the day he died he was still a member of the Seventy and even served a third mission. In the Church, the quorum of the Seventy are an organization that assist the quorum of the twelve apostles which is also an organization that assist he prophet and president. They’re important men within the church who historically and still travel around the world in service of the Church. Elijah Abel was one of those important men although in 1852, Brigham Young banned the Priesthood for blacks and shortly after that he would make slavery legal in Utah. In the 1860 census there would be only 59 blacks in Utah but 29 of them were enslaved. It appears that Elijah Abel’s priesthood was never taken away from him but he was denied an important Mormon practice known as sealing which is when couples and families become sealed together for time and all eternity, including in the afterlife. He asked three times until he died if he could receive this blessing in the temple from the leaders of the church but they denied him all three times. He died without being forever tied to his wife and children in the afterlife.

Although Young never owned any slaves himself and would seemingly help freed and enslaved blacks and encourage slave holding southern mormons to free their slaves, he still allowed slavery and did not allow blacks to hold the priesthood in Utah. Ultimately though, Young would begin to use religious language to justify slavery and the bondage of blacks and in 1852 he said quote, I am a firm believer in slavery. End quote. That was quite a departure from his predecessor. And it’s quite a sad position for him to have taken which contradicts teachings of the church… but then again, even with the near perfect document that is the united states constitution, slavery still existed. Including among those who wrote the document. I revere Jefferson and Washington but I don't understand why they didn’t free their slaves. I recently listened while on a road trip to Oklahoma, Mike Duncan’s amazing book Hero of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution where he describes this Frenchman who so strongly advocated for that after helping America gain it’s own freedom… well if you’re a fan of American history, you should listen to it and to Mike Duncan’s other amazing podcasts. Anyways, Black members of the church wouldn’t be able to receive the priesthood until 1978… Nineteen… Seventy eight. Not Eighteen Seventy Eight. And having the higher priesthood is necessary for reaching the highest kingdom of heaven for LDS members. But in Eighteen sixty two, Congress would pass the Territorial Abolition Act which freed all slaves in united states territories, and that included Utah.

Hark Lay, one of those three that I mentioned that first drove into the Salt Lake Valley, would later change his name to Hark Wales after gaining his freedom and he’d move to Los Angeles. But eventually he’d come back to Utah in the 1870s and he’d invest in an ore company, become a miner, and ultimately settle down with Green Flake’s daughter, Lucinda.

One of the most impactful people of African descent that came over with the Mormons would absolutely have to be Biddy Mason. Bridgett, or Biddy, was a black female slave born in Georgia in 1818 but was eventually given away as a wedding present at age 18 to Rebecca & Robert Smith who lived in Mississippi. She at that time, was living in South Carolina. So she’d already travelled, most likely on foot, quite a few miles. But her journey was nowhere near finished. 11 years later in 1847, and after the Smiths had converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the whole Smith clan and their slaves, 90 people in all, would trek 2,000 miles westward to the Salt Lake Valley. By this time Biddy had three children, all of them most likely from Robert Smith himself and all of them girls, one of whom was so small that Biddy carried her on her back during the long trek. Once in Salt Lake though, Young would ask the Smiths to not only head to San Bernardino to set up a Mormon Colony but also to free their slaves. Smith agreed to the former but refused the latter and brought them with him to the desert community which was the farthest reaches of the LDS Church at that time. Just like she had done for 2,000 miles before, Biddy and the other slaves again, had the luxury of walking behind the wagon trains as they made their way through the harsh terrain of the Colorado Plateau, the tall mountains, and the Mojave Desert to California. Now I’ve visited and driven through and all over that whole area: Salt Lake City, Southwestern Utah, Southern Nevada, Northwestern Arizona, and Southeastern California and… that must have been an incredibly difficult journey. It’s actually pretty much the exact route of interstate highway 15. I can’t imagine it would have been easy for any of them, let alone a young woman with 3 children who had to walk the entire way. And yes, of course, the mormons, the faith I actually grew up with and have been talking about for quite a bit, will definitely be covered in a podcast as they were so influential in the settlement of the American southwest. But back to Biddy… WHO fortunately for her became a free woman the moment she set foot into California… a fact I’m sure Smith had no idea about and a fact that didn’t bother him all that much once he did learn about it because he didn’t actually free anyone from anything and instead hid his family and slaves in a canyon in Santa Monica.

Smith and the gang stayed there a while until he hatched up a plan to head back east to Texas in 1855 to sell his slaves and make some money. By this point, he’d fallen out with the church and had fallen on hard times. But thankfully, local forces, not happy about a southern mormon slave holder hanging out in the Santa Monica Mountains, were against the Smiths and eventually the Los Angeles County Sheriff, a man named Frank Dewitt, was called in to seize the Smith’s property and set them free. So Biddy and the others awaited their trial, which was paid for by black members of the community in Los Angeles and which would ultimately set them free, in the Sheriff’s jail quote unquote for their safety.

Then finally in 1856, Biddy, her three kids and ten other blacks were freed from Robert Smith who never even bothered to show up in court. The judge, after granting them their already legal right to freedom hoped that she and the other blacks would quote become settled and go to work for themselves—in peace and without fear. End quote. That’s exactly what Biddy was about to do. Once a free woman, Biddy, having never been given a last name, chose the surname Mason after a Mormon apostle in San Bernardino before moving to Los Angeles. This is where her story gets truly incredible.

Once in Los Angeles, Biddy moved into the home of Robert Owens, a black man born into slavery himself in Texas and who had originally alerted the Sheriff to the Smith’s slaves presence and had helped pay for their trial. Biddy’s daughter would soon marry Charles Owens, Robert’s son, and their child, would go on to be one of the most influential and THE wealthiest black man in late nineteenth century Los Angeles. His name would be Robert Owens Jr. But back to Biddy. After moving to LA, Biddy would become a well respected and rather famous nurse and midwife who would eventually become one of the first black women to own property in Los Angeles. Then in 1872, she and her son in law, Charles Owens founded the First African Methodist Episcopal Church, which was the city’s first black church. She even owned and donated the land to the church that it was built on. Then by the 1890s…. She had accumulated over $300,000 worth of land and investments which made her the wealthiest African American woman in all of los Angeles and probably the wealthiest black woman west of the Mississippi! Like so many other former slaves that found themselves in her position she gained a loving nickname, hers was Granda Mason although, she was occasionally known as Aunt Biddy. She also donated to many charities, fed the poor and the needy and the imprisoned, she paid for development projects, and she may have even ran an orphanage. She died at age 73 in 1891 and, I’m confused by this because of her accomplishments and the sources I read couldn’t explain it either, but she was buried in an unmarked grave… that is until the late 80s, 1980s, when the first black mayor of Los Angeles, Tom Bradley and several thousand members of the congregation she helped found finally gave her a tombstone.

Another amazing black woman of the era was named Clara Brown and she was born in the year 1800, but when her owner died in 1856, she became a free woman and she promptly headed west to Kansas. Her sole purpose in doing so was to find her long lost children and husband. While in bondage she had been married and had given birth to four daughters and a son who had all been sold to separate families and she heard, once freed that one of her daughters, Eliza, was out west. Once in Kansas, she continued her journey and persuaded a group of prospectors heading to Pike’s Peak, the highest peak on the southern front range just south of present day Colorado Springs, to bring her along as a cook. So for the next eight weeks the almost 60 year old Clara Brown sat in the back of a covered wagon as they bounced across the great plains until they reached modern day Denver. That means she was one of the first black Americans to settle modern day Colorado. But her daughter Eliza was not in Denver. That did not stop her from staying busy and accomplishing many firsts though.

By 1865, Brown had opened up a laundry service, served as a nurse, organized the first methodist church in her own home, helped two methodist ministers found the union Sunday school, she owned 16 lots in the city and 7 houses, and had saved $10,000, which is over 164,000 dollars in today’s money. After the war she continued to look for her family, including Eliza, but the search was mostly fruitless. That failure though allowed her to pay for the journey, settlement, finding of work, and education of twenty six formerly enslaved men, women, and children from Kentucky to the West where more opportunities lay. This and her many other philanthropic endeavors and her general nature earned her the nickname, the angel of the rockies. That angel though faced many hardships including losing the documents that proved she owned land and even having her own home and other properties burn up. After recovering from that bad stroke of luck with the help of other Coloradoans, she was the angel of the rockies after all, In 1879, the then governor of Colorado, a Frederick Walker Pitkin, sent Clara Brown to Kansas as an official representative of himself and the state to invite blacks who’d recently moved to Kansas and persuade them to continue going west all the way out to Colorado and Denver. Much like she had many years before.

To help facilitate the many black families she sent westward towards the promise of a job most likely in mining, she paid for these people’s way with her own funds, which by 1880 had been thoroughly and completely depleted. But her story ends beautifully and in 1882 after a letter writing campaign proved fruitful, she finally found her daughter Eliza Jane in Council Bluffs Iowa. After all these years. Their story even made local headlines in Iowa. The two then lived together in Denver until the angel of the rockies, aunt Clara brown passed away three short years later in her sleep at age 85. Her funeral was completely funded and attended heavily by The Colorado pioneers association, the mayor of Denver, and the governor of Colorado who just a few years prior had said of her quote she is one of the best old souls that ever lived and is respected and loved by all who know her. End quote. And the mayor of Denver, John L Routt said during her graveside services that Clara Brown was quote the kind old friend whose heart always responded to the cry of distress, and who, rising from the humble position of slave to the angelic type of noble woman, won our sympathy and commanded our respect. End quote. Today, she has an honorary chair in the Central City Opera House and there’s a stained glass portrait of her in the state capitol building of Colorado.

Jumping back in time a little, the first concrete evidence for the arrival of blacks in California would have been in 1768 when Spanish Captain Gaspar de Portola’s army marched from New Spain into the area to cut off Imperial Russian troops who were heading down from Alaska. Portola’s army would have had African servants and slaves from Bolivia, which yes, is in South America but 2/3 of the population of Bolivia at that time was comprised of people with African descent. Not long after that in 1781 Los Angeles was founded by forty four settlers including twenty six who had some degree of African Ancestry. In a 1790 Spanish census of the state, all the major areas of occupation had around 18 percent of their population as black, which being so seemed to have little bearing on one’s wealth or standing within the community. Francisco Reyes, who descended from some black ancestry would become mayor of modern day Los Angeles at that time. And much later, in the 1840s, twice governor Pio Pico, whom I discussed earlier, was also of African descent. And an interesting note about Pico, his ranch in San Diego would later become Camp Pendleton, the United States Marine Base.

Sticking to Pico’s time, in 1841, a half Danish, half African man from the Virgin Islands named William Leidesdorff would land in modern day San Francisco but later make his way slightly eastward to become neighbors with John Sutter of the previously mentioned Sutter’s Fort fame, placing him squarely in the crosshairs of history. Not only would he meet Fremont and Pico, but he’d later become the first African American in the US Diplomatic service after being named vice consul of California to the US. He’d even denounce Americans in California at the time who opposed American intervention as, quote, more Mexican than the Mexicans themselves. End quote. William, because I’m unsure of how to pronounce his Danish last name, would usher the Americans into the port of San Francisco, spend an evening with Captain Montgomery of the US Navy discussing plans of action, and raise the American Flag in the town plaza. Not long after, William would construct that city’s first hotel, establish its first public school, organize its first horse race, and launch the city’s first steam powered ship. When he died young at the age of 38, the city’s flags flew at half mast, the school’s children stayed home, the businesses closed, and cannons were fired in his honor.

After the California Gold rush began, hundreds of thousands of people would flood into the territory and try to strike it rich and plenty of those people were African Americans. Many of them planned to use California as a way to escape slavery forever while others, newly freed, hoped to make enough money to purchase the rest of their family and carry them back to that coast and to the supposed freedoms it held. And it did hold freedoms for many, as we’ve seen. Unfortunately, not for all of those blacks who would make the journey.

Three such black men would be known to history as Negro Joe, Little West, and Smith and they would all become lost in what we now call Death Valley in 1849. The sufferings of their company of pioneers in the area would even give the place it’s name. But we’re unsure of those three’s ultimate fate.

George Alfred Frazier Monroe was a magnetic character who was known by his employer as, quote, the best all-round reinsman in the West. End quote. And also, quote, he was a wonder in every way. End quote. Monroe left Georgia at age 11 in 1855 and by 22, he’d made it to California and took a job driving for the A.H. Washburn and Company stage line through the treacherous cliffside roads into Yosemite. By 1879 his legendary driving skills had earned him a spot as the driver of the then ex president Ulysses S Grant and his wife. The 26 mile journey was make your palms sweat scary and at one point the stagecoaches wheels were grating along the granite cliffside while the other wheels were inches from a thousand foot drop into oblivion. And apparently Ulysses was not a backseat driver. He actually sat up front next to Monroe during that harrowing drive and would later marvel that Monroe would quote throw those six animals from one side to the other to avoid a stone or a chuckhole as if they were a single horse. End quote. In his entire career he never once caused injury to a single passenger, horse, or coach, unless you count some scratches to the wheels.

By the time he passed away in 1886, he’d also driven two more presidents into Yosemite. Those presidents being James A. Garfield and Rutherford B. Hayes. And even one man that just won’t quit this podcast, General William Tecumseh Sherman. He’d later learn the nickname the “Knight of the Sierras.” But in an unfortunate twist of fate, he actually died as a passenger of a stagecoach when it overturned… if only he had been the driver.

A couple months ago I read about a man in the March & April 2021 issue of Archaeology Magazine named Nathan Harrison whose stone cabin on Palomar Mountain just outside of San Diego had recently been rediscovered and was being excavated. It was an interesting read and one that somewhat prompted me to do this episode in the first place. He was the region’s first black homesteader and he seemingly lived an exciting life.

Nathan Harrison was probably born in the 1830s in Kentucky, but by the 1850s, he’d made his way over the Mississippi, across the great plains, and through the Sierra Nevadas to strike it rich with his owner during the Gold Rush. Once his owner had died though, it appears he gained his independence and migrated down south to settle the area known as Rincon which was at the base of Palomar Mountain. Historians know he converted to Catholicism and was married twice, both times to different Luiseño Indian women of that community but by the 80s, he would be on the mountain itself and one of the first non natives to do so. The Luiseño probably gave him the land he claimed as his own on the mountain, which stood 4,000 feet above sea level. Another factor in building a cabin so far out of the way may have been the attitudes of the mostly once southern white run towns nearby like Los Angeles and Escondido. Escondido even had sundown laws meaning if you were black, you couldn’t be out past sundown lest you invited upon yourself a short drop and a sudden stop by roving gangs of pissy white men. So despite Harrison having to go into town occasionally, he would never stay overnight. I should give a brief description of the megafauna of the area though. Palomar Mountain at that time was thick with bears unafraid to chew through bear traps and mountain lions which to this day are a threat to solo hikers and runners. So his time on the mountain wasn’t clear of dangers either. I reckon I’d still take on a bear or lion than a gang of racists if I were an independent Black man. While the area’s changed a little since then, one of the big differences would be the disappearance of a clear view of the ocean that once existed. A quote by an Allan Kelly from 1908 who at seven trekked up the mountain with his family that I’m pulling from the magazine who said, quote, he had a lovely spot: a far distant view to the ocean… about an acre of good soil for a garden and a few apple and pear trees. End quote. Seth Mallios, an archaeologist at San Diego state university, who launched the excavation would say of Harrison’s cabin, quote, I think living on the mountain was in part a safety issue… Mallios also said … when you venture up to the site you just feel removed from everything. You are high above the valley , you can see people coming from miles and miles away, and no one is going to sneak up on you. End quote.

At first Harrison was a rancher but as he aged and that became more difficult, he switched his way of living to tourism and by 1890 he was sharing water, tools, and stories with those attempting to head to the top of the mountain where a hotel resided. Among some of the artifacts found, according to the magazine were Kodak Brownie camera lenses,  automobile inner tubes and horseshoe nails, spent cartridges, writing utensils, and a large number of liquor bottles. It appears visitors, which started appearing in cars around the 1910s knew to expect his hospitality and care in exchange for such important things as buttons, whiskey, and gin. The travelers also began to expect his stories which he’d give them in great detail about his time on the mountain. But he’d curiously leave out his time in the Antebellum South.

One thing Harrison maintained for his entire time at Palomar was his non threatening appearance. White visitors never mentioned him carrying a rifle, and although he was probably the most photographed person in the entire area of San Diego at that time, only one of the thirty one surviving pictures of him have a rifle in it. And, while his neighbors said he rode a white horse around the property, visitors would never record it. Down the mountains and in the towns along the coast, it became harder and harder for black men to stay independent and maintain such a free way of life. Harrison even hid his literacy until his deathbed in 1920.

During the Trail of Tears, the Southern quote unquote five civilized tribes of Choctaws, Cherokees, Chickasaws, Creeks, and Seminoles brought their slaves with them to the Indian Territory of Oklahoma. Just like their old neighbors in the South, black slavery had become a large part of these tribes, or some of these tribes, culture and way of life. For many, the slaves even served to help bridge the two worlds of the whites and the Indians by being used as interpreters. But, just as in the South, the Native American tribes also feared, especially all the way out in Oklahoma where the law was less entrenched, for the potential of a slave uprising. This was especially true for the Cherokees, who were the largest slave holding tribe.

Then, on the morning of November 15th, 1842, the dreaded slave revolt had begun when twenty five slaves locked their masters and overseers inside their own homes as they slept. They then stole guns, horses, mules, ammunition, food, and supplies and headed south towards Mexico with their women and children. As they passed through the Creek Nation though, ten more slaves would join them and the word was spreading. Once they’d reached the Choctaw Nation they ran into two slave hunters, one a white man and one a Delaware Indian, who were returning with a family of escaped slaves. Obviously, they set this family free… and killed the slavers. By now, the Cherokee Militia, under Captain John Drew, and 87 men, had been sent by the Cherokee National Council to bring them back. And then, with only seven more miles to go before reaching the Red River and Texas, which would have been out of reach for the militia, they were surrounded. The temporarily free slaves gave up without a fight. Five of them were executed for the murder of the two slave hunters, and most of the others were sent to the hard labor work of shoveling coal on steamboats on the Ohio, Arkansas, and Missouri rivers by a Cherokee man named Joseph Vann, who had owned most of the original revolters. Two years later, Joseph Vann would explode, literally, in the Lucy Walker Steamboat disaster… it would be an ironic twist of fate… if one hundred other people hadn’t also perished.

While the revolt ultimately failed, by 1851 it had inspired over 300 other slaves to flee Indian Territory for Mexico, Kansas, or further west. The Cherokees would go on blaming free and armed black Seminoles who lived nearby which caused the Nation to pass a law commanding all free African Americans, except former Cherokee slaves, to leave the nation.

Since I’ll be covering the civil war in the southwest in a later podcast, I’ll skip over the Upper Creek Chief Opothleyahola and the harrowing story of the blacks and Indians that fled to Kansas under his leadership on what became known as the Trail of Blood On Ice in 1861, but know it’s a very tense story that’s often overlooked.

The Indian territory of Oklahoma, especially after the Civil War, was a popular place for people to escape from the law. Murderers, bootleggers, horse thieves, stage coach and train robbers, and all manner of outlaw took advantage of its many hiding places and questionable jurisdiction. Enter Bass Reeves who would serve as a Deputy US Marshal in an area that included 75,000 square miles of Arkansas, Texas, and Oklahoma.

Bass was born in 1838 as a slave in Arkansas, but he would grow up in Northern Texas and by 1875, he’d be one of or THE first black US Marshal hired West of the Mississippi River. He was hired by Judge Isaac C Parker out of the federal court house at Fort Smith because the judge understood that Indians, just across the Arkansas border trusted blacks more than whites. Also, Bass had spent a considerable amount of time living in Indian Territory going so far as to say he knew it, quote, like a cook knows her kitchen. End quote. In the early 1860s, after getting into a fight with his master over a card game, Bass knocked the dude out cold. Obviously, he had to flee or face the rope so he headed north into Oklahoma where he’d fight Civil War battles for the Union Seminoles and Creek Indians. He even became close friends with the briefly mentioned Opothleyahola.

Described as quote unquote invincible, Bass was over six feet tall, fearless, and such an excellent shot that later in life he’d be barred from competing in some shooting competitions. In 1909, the Muskogee Times Democrat wrote of him, quote, in the early days when the intidan country was overridden with outlaws, Reeves would herd into fort smith, often single handed, bands of men charged with crimes from bootlegging to murder. He was paid fees in those days that sometimes amounted to thousands of dollars for a single trip… trips that sometimes lasted for months. End quote.

One time, in pursuit of two outlaws in the Chickasaw Nation, Bass camped 28 miles from the home of the outlaws mother before dressing up like a vagabond and walking to her door. The two boys weren’t there but she let this weary traveler in at which point he said he too was running from the law and showed her the three holes that were in his hat… holes he had just before the rouse shot through himself. The mother delighted in this and suggested he team up with the two youngins, which, once they’d arrived was agreed upon by all. After agreeing to leave the next morning, Bass convinced them that he should stay in the same room as them lest something terrible happen in the night which… depending on what side of the law you’re on, would indeed happen. Once the two were asleep the Marshal, without waking them, handcuffed the two outlaws, kicked them awake, and marched them the 28 miles back to camp. For the first the miles, the mom would follow with cursing and yells… not that you can blame her.

Deputy US Marshal Bass Reeves would kill 14 and arrest over 3,000 men and women while wearing the badge with one of them even being his own son… after being accused of killing his wife and hiding in Muskogee, Bass took up the responsibility of bringing him in. Which he did without violence. Later his son would be released and live out his days as a quote unquote model citizen… but still, he did kill his wife.

After his 35 years as a deputy marshal, he served two years as a police officer in Muskogee, before dying a year after that from complications with his liver. The Muskogee Phoenix would write an obituary of him in 1910 after his death and in it was a great paragraph that sums up his luck as a lawman. Quote, Reeves had many narrow escapes. At different times his belt was shot in two, a button shot off his coat, his hat brim shot off and the bridle rein which he held in his hand cut by a bullet. However, in spite of al these narrow escapes and the many conflicts in which he was engaged, Reeves was never wounded. And this, notwithstanding the act that he never fired a shot until the desperado he was trying to arrest had started the shooting. End quote.

Although a Spanish led 1792 census found that 263 men and 186 women of African descent were found among Tejas’ 1,600 residents, that number seems to have decreased considerably once the US would annex it some 50 years later. Before that though, in 1831 when the quote unquote father of Texas, Stephen F Austin called for American settlers to join him in the then Mexican territory, a Mr. Greenbury Logan, a black man who had gained his freedom from his white father in Kentucky, answered the call along with 300 other families. Once Logan had arrived, Austin personally gave him a quarter acre plot and Texas citizenship. He would then set himself up as a blacksmith before buying a woman named Caroline, setting her free, and marrying her.

Mexican Tejas did not allow slavery and at least 400 other free blacks were also in the territory with full rights. Despite the freedoms allotted him though, in 1835 when the American Colonists would rise up, Logan would answer the call and join. He’d be given the rank of private and participate in two victorious battles: The Battle of Valejo and the Battle of Concepción. But then, during the battle of Bexar, a Mexican city that would later become San Antonio and the first major campaign of the Texas Revolution, of his own account, Logan was the third man to be shot and fall after he volunteered to storm the works. The bullet would pass through his right arm and leave it essentially useless for the rest of his life and leave him permanently disabled. After the war, the Texas Legislature would say of Logan that he served, quote, with distinguished alacrity. End quote. Afterwards he opened a boarding house, a tavern, and a store in Brazoria with his wife.

Unfortunately, as the Texas territory grew in power, so too did the slaveholders which inversely affected Logan and the other black’s rights as freemen. The very year after his injury, the Legislature would bar any person of color from residing in the territory. Then in 1837, Logan would petition the Texas Congress to be, quote, authorized to remain permanently and enjoy all the rights, privileges, and immunities of free Citizens. End quote. The following year he would indeed be granted those rights.

But his petitioning wasn’t over and in 1841, unable to work as efficiently and now constantly accompanied by a white man who helped him because of his disability, he asked for a pension in the form of a remission of taxes… historians are not sure if it was granted or not and by around 1868, Logan would pass away in a much different Texas than the one he fought and bled for some thirty years before.

Other prominent Black families would see similar fates in Texas; like the Ashworths. They were so prominent and respected, they had the 1840 Ashworth Bill named after them. It’s true name would be An Act For the Relief of Certain Free Persons of Color and it would allow them and other free blacks who had been in the territory since before the Declaration of Independence from Mexico in 1836 to stay. Although a later shoot out between an Ashworth and another free black man with a Sheriff Deputy that ended in Deputy Deputy’s death… yes, his name was Deputy Deputy, would change that for them. After the murder, twelve more people would be killed when vigilantes tore through the free black community and shortly afterwards, the Ashworth family would essentially lose it all.

An 1857 pamphlet circulated by the committee on slaves and slavery in The Texas House of Representatives said quote our slaves are the happiest three millions of human beings on whom the sun shines. End quote. I believe the  three millions referred to all of the slaves in the south but the sentiment had taken root in that very southern of a state which would explain why blacks during this period began fleeing in earnest to Mexico. Some white United States visitors were furious that the blacks in that country were treated better than the whites that would visit. Even worse yet were the many parties of whites that illegally crossed into Mexico to retrieve runaway slaves which would create diplomatic nightmares for the likes of Presidents James K Polk and Zachary Taylor. By 1861, the start of the civil war, there would be 4,000 now free blacks living on the other side of the Rio Grande.

But in Texas and at the Civil War is where I’m going to end this episode because the next one is about Black Cowboys and this is exactly when and where their story would truly take off. Obviously there are countless amazing stories by so many other blacks and african Americans that occurred before, during, and after this whole period I just discussed. There are so many instances of nameless blacks, nameless to us of course, but blacks with indians or blacks on their own that people traveling west wrote about in their journals or told about later. Some would carry white flags for their owners through Apache territory in the hopes that indians wouldn’t kill them after they discovered the Apaches were curious at the black man’s skin. Other indians would later tell about their excitement and fear of seeing blacks among the wagon trains. One native american woman thought she and her tribe saw two white men on fire but it had just been two blacks wearing red shirts. More journals and diaries than I could ever read recorded more nameless blacks than I could ever write about heading west. Some of them would be slaves the entire journey, some would escape, some would be freed… but most who headed west would be forever nameless. Even most of the men and women I’ve told you about today have no living ancestors that historians know of… I could keep going on and on and it’s tempting… but I feel as if this is a great introduction to the subject. And a very great stopping point. I hope y’all enjoyed the ride… and stay with me for part 2.

Black Cowboys in the American West: On the Range, on the Stage, Behind the Badge Edited by Bruce A Glasrud & Michael N Searles

Jedediah Smith and the Opening of the West By Dale Lowell Morgan

A Newer World: Kit Carson, John C. Fremont and the Claiming of the American West by David Roberts

The Life and Adventures of James P. Beckwourth: Mountaineer, Scout, and Pioneer, and Chief of the Crow Nation of Indians By James P. Beckwourth & T. D. Bonner

The Amazing True Story of Nathan Harrison by Daniel Weiss in Archaeology Magazine, March/April 2021

The Black West by William Loren Katz

Sweet Freedom's Plains: African Americans on the Overland Trails, 1841–1869 by Shirley Ann Wilson Moore

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