IV — Puht-o-muk-si-kim-iks (the Lakes Inside): St. Mary’s Lakes
August 10
We left Little River on the 5th, crossed the big ridge dividing the Arctic and the Atlantic waters, and made camp here on the big prairie at the foot of the Upper St. Mary’s Lake.
In the old days this great valley, hemmed in by gigantic mountains, was my favorite hunting ground after the buffalo were exterminated and there was no more sport to be had upon the plains.
Hugh Monroe, or Rising Wolf, was, of course, the first white man to see these most beautiful of all our Northern Rockies lakes; with the Piegan Blackfeet he camped at them in 1816, and long afterward, with his growing family of hardy sons and daughters, this became his favorite hunting and trapping ground. When, in the 1830’s, that valiant and much beloved missionary, Father De Smet, S.J., was visiting the various tribes of this Northwest country, Monroe was engaged to take him to a conference with the North Blackfeet, then camping on the Saskatchewan River. En route they camped at the foot of the lower of these lakes, and there erected a large wooden cross, and named the two sheets of water, St. Mary’s Lakes. Later on, the Stevens expedition named them Chief Mountain Lakes, but that name did not last. Monroe and his brother trappers were all Catholics, and they continued to use the name that the great priest had given them, and on the maps they are St. Mary’s Lakes to-day.
During my long friendship with him, Monroe told me many stories of his adventures here in early days. This was his favorite mountain resort on account of the great numbers of moose that inhabited the heavily timbered valley and mountain slopes, and of the great variety and numbers of fur animals that were found here. The valley swarmed with elk and deer; there were countless flocks of bighorn and goats on the mountains, and herds of buffalo everywhere along the lower lake, and below it; but Monroe liked best of all the flesh of moose, and killed large numbers of them every season that he camped here.
His method of catching wolves was simple and unique. He would build an oblong, pyramidal log pen about eight by sixteen feet at the base, and eight feet in height, the last layer of logs being placed about eighteen inches apart. Easily climbing the slope of this, the wolves would jump down through the narrow aperture at the top to feed upon the quantities of meat that had been placed inside to decoy them, but they could not jump out. Often, of a morning, the trapper and his sons would find ten or more big wolves imprisoned in the trap, and, powder and ball being very costly, they would kill them with bow and arrows, skin them, and drag the carcasses to the river and cast them into it, then take the hides home and peg them on the ground to dry. In this manner they would often, in the spring, have several hundred wolf pelts to pack in to Fort Benton for sale, and prime pelts sold at five dollars each, in trade. Their catch of beaver, otter, mink, martin, and fisher was also large.
Monroe always camped at the foot of the lower lake, near the outlet, and was there more than once attacked by roving war parties of Assiniboines, Crows, and even the Yanktonais. The horses were kept at night in a strong corral just back of the lodge, and in the daytime were watched by some member of the family while they grazed on the rich prairie grasses. All the family—John and François, the sons, Millie and Lizzie, the daughters—and even the mother had guns, flintlocks, and a good supply of powder and ball. Early one morning a large war party was discovered approaching the camp, sneaking from bush to bush, some crawling on all fours through the high grass. Lizzie opened fire upon them and killed her man, and then the fire became general on both sides. But the Monroes, in their trenches surrounding the lodge, had the best of it from the start, and eventually made the enemy retreat with a loss of five of their number. Late the following night the Assiniboines crept in to make another attack, but the Monroes were expecting them, waiting for them, and in the bright moonlight could take fairly accurate aim. They again drove them off, with a loss of two more of their number, and that time they kept going. Nothing more was seen of them. But for some days the Monroes did not venture far from their camp.
I first saw the St. Mary’s Lakes in October, 1882, in company with Charles Phemmister, James Rutherford, Charles Carter, and Oliver Sanderville, all old plainsmen, good company, and best of hunters. We outfitted for the trip at the Old Agency, on Badger Creek, Blackfeet Reservation, and started northward. There was no trail after leaving the crossing of Little or Milk River, and we struck up country toward the big gap in the mountains, in which we knew the lakes must lie, and that evening camped on the shore of a large prairie lake that was black with ducks. I shot a dozen or more of them as they flew over a long point, and to my surprise and delight found that they were all canvasbacks and redheads, and very fat from feeding upon the wild celery beds of the lake. I named the sheet of water Duck Lake.
The next day we made a trail down the long hill, and camped at the foot of the lower lake, close to the outlet. Then began two weeks of most glorious sport. We shot elk, deer, and several grizzlies in the valley, and bighorn on a mountain that I named Flat Top, and combed that mountain from one end to another and on all sides for an animal known to us as the Rocky Mountain ibex. We had seen several skins of them, bought from the Stony Indians by Captain John Healy, of Fort Whoopup and Fort Benton fame, but none of us nor any man of our acquaintance—and we knew every trapper and trader in the country—had ever seen one of the animals alive. Of course we found none, as this sub-Arctic animal, which we later learned is a true antelope, and not an ibex or goat, seldom leaves the high cliff mountains for the outer and lower ones of the range. When, later, we did find them, we in our ignorance named them Rocky Mountain goats, and that is the common name for them to-day, despite the fact that they are antelopes.
On this first visit to the St. Mary’s Lakes country I was so impressed by the grandeur of its mountains, the beauty of its many lakes, and its plenitude of game, that thereafter for many years it was, more than anywhere else, my home. In 1883 I brought out to the lakes a good boat that I had had built for me at Fort Conrad, and with it learned that both lakes were alive with whitefish and Mackinaw, Dolly Varden, and cutthroat trout. During the summer of this year I named Red Eagle Mountain and Red Eagle Lake, after my uncle-in-law, Red Eagle, owner of the Thunder medicine pipe, and one of the most high-minded, gentle-hearted Indians that I ever knew. In the autumn of this year Dr. George Bird Grinnell joined me, and we hunted around the lower lake, and went up Swift Current far enough to see what we thought would possibly prove to be a glacier. We had not then time to learn if our surmise was correct. During our hunt Dr. Grinnell killed a large ram at long range, offhand, with one shot from his old Sharp’s rifle, on the mountain next above Flat Top, and I therefore named it Single-Shot Mountain.
In the summer of this year I also named Divide Mountain, because it is the outermost mountain on the Atlantic-Arctic watershed. At the same time I named Kootenai Mountain, also for a very good reason. Some members of that tribe were encamped beside me at the foot of the upper lake. I noticed often that they would ride out of camp at daylight and return at noon or a little later with all the bighorn or goat meat that their horses could carry, and finally I asked them where they went to make their killings so quickly.
“Come with me to-morrow and I will show you something,” one of them answered. And the next morning I rode with him up Red Eagle Valley and part way up a mountain, where we tied our horses and went on afoot for a couple of hundred yards. Then, looking down into a coulée, we saw a dozen or more bighorn in the bottom of it and killed four of them. They had been eating salty clay and drinking from a salt spring that oozes from the ground there, so I named the place Kootenai Lick, and also gave the mountain the name Kootenai. Thereafter I knew where to go for bighorn when I wanted one.
In 1884 I named Almost-a-Dog Mountain, after one of the few survivors of the Baker massacre, which took place on the Marias River, January 1, 1870. At that time Colonel E. M. Baker, with a couple of companies of cavalry from Fort Shaw, Montana, was trying to find the camp of Owl Child, a Piegan Blackfoot, and murderer of a settler named Malcolm Clark, and arrest him. By mistake he struck the camp of Heavy Runner and his band of friendly Indians, and, although the chief came running toward him waving his letters of recommendation and his Washington medals, Baker ordered his men to begin firing, and a terrible massacre ensued, the Indians firing not one shot in defense, as about all the able-bodied men were at the time on a buffalo hunt. When the firing was over, two hundred and seventeen old men and women and children lay dead and dying in their lodges and in the camp. The soldiers then shot the wounded, collected the lodges and property of the Indians in great piles, and set fire to them and departed.9
In the autumn of 1885 Dr. Grinnell, J. B. Monroe, and I made a trip up Swift Current River, and discovered and roughly measured the big glacier at the head of its middle fork, Dr. Grinnell killing a big ram on the ice while we were traversing it and avoiding its deep crevasses. That evening Monroe and I named the glacier in honor of Dr. Grinnell, and also named the mountain to the north of it after him. On the following day we were joined by Lieutenant—now Major—J. H. Beacom, Third Infantry, and he gave my Indian name, Apikuni, to the high mountain between Swift Current and the South Fork of Kennedy Creek. Upon our return to Upper St. Mary’s Lake, Dr. Grinnell named Little Chief Mountain, Monroe gave Citadel Mountain its name, and I named Yellow Fish, Goat, Going-to-the-Sun, and Four Bears Mountains. Yellow Fish (O-to-ko′-mi) was an Indian who often hunted with us, and Four Bears (Nis-su′-kyai-yo) was the Blackfeet camp crier, and a most amusing man.
It was in 1886, I believe, that we three, and my old-time friend, William Jackson, one-time scout for General Custer and General Miles, cut a trail to the head of the St. Mary’s Valley and discovered the great sheet of ice which we named the Blackfeet Glacier. We at the same time named Gun-Sight Pass, and named the peak just west of the glacier, Mount Jackson. It should be Sik-si-kai′-kwan (Blackfeet Man), Jackson’s Indian name. He was a grandson of Hugh Monroe, a real plainsman, and one of the bravest men I ever knew.
Going-to-the-Sun has been climbed this day, and a flag has been planted upon its summit, by Paul E. Walker, Esq., of Topeka, Kansas. Owing to a high cliff upon its upper shoulder, the mountain has always been considered unclimbable. But after long search, and with no little risk, Mr. Walker finally worked out a way up the wall, and out upon the extreme crest, and was undoubtedly the first man, white or red, ever to stand there. He reports that a magnificent view of the mountains and plains is to be had from the great height.
Notes
9 The above is an extract from an affidavit by the late Joseph Kipp, who was Baker’s scout and guide at the time. Back