Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 4.djvu/405

 Letter of fur traders Jedediah S. Smith, David E. Jackson, and Wm. L. Sublette—1830.

Gives an account of the taking of the first wagons to the Rocky Mountains and of the Hudson's Bay Company post, Fort Vancouver, and its operations in the Oregon Country. An argument for the termination of the convention of 1818.

The letter of Smith, Jackson, and Sublette forms part of Senate Executive Documents 39, 21st Congress, 2d session, pp. 21-23. The whole document is taken up with a consideration of "the state of the British establishments in the valley of the Columbia, and the state of the fur trade, as carried on by the citizens of the United States and the Hudson's Bay Company," as shown in the communications of Gen. W. H. Ashley, Joshua Pilcher, J. D. Smith, David E. Jackson, and W. L. Sublette, and William Clark and Lewis Cass.

October 29, 1830.

The business commenced by General Ashley some years ago, of taking furs from the United States territory beyond the Rocky Mountains has since been continued by Jedediah S. Smith, David E. Jackson, and William L. Sublette, under the firm of Smith, Jackson, and Sublette. They commenced business in 1826, and have since continued it, and have made observations and gained information which they think it important to communicate to the government. The number of men they have employed has usually been from eighty to one hundred and eighty; and with these, divided into parties, they have traversed every part of the country west of the Rocky Mountains, from the peninsula of California to the mouth of the Columbia River. Pack horses, or rather mules, were at first used, but in the beginning of the present year, it was determined to try wagons, and in the month of April last, on the 10th day of the month, a caravan of ten wagons, drawn by five mules each, and two dearborns, drawn by one mule each, set out from St. Louis. We have eighty-one men in company, all mounted on mules, and these were exclusive of a party left in the mountains. Our route from St. Louis was nearly due west to the western limits of the state and thence along the Santa Fé trail about forty miles, from which the course was some degrees north of west, across the waters of the Kanzas, and up the Great Platte River, to the Rocky Mountains, and to the head of Wind River, where it issues from the mountains. This took us until the 16th of July, and was