Frederick Samuel Dellenbaugh

A Lookout for Redskins—The River a Sluggard—A Gunshot!—Someone Comes!—The Tale of a Mysterious Light—How, How! from Douglas Boy—At the Mouth of the Uinta—A Tramp to Goblin City and a Trip down White River on a Raft—A Waggon-load of Supplies from Salt Lake by Way of Uinta Agency—The Major Goes Out to Find a Way In.

Our thoughts now were mainly directed to pushing on to the mouth of the Uinta River and picking up our advance party, which by this time must have gotten in touch with the Uinta Agency. We felt gratified that another of the long line of canyons was a thing of the past and that for a brief time we would have easy water, so far as rapids were concerned. We were reminded that this was Indian country by discovering on a smooth face of rock wall not far from camp a lot of drawings pecked into the stone. They represented figures of natives, bison, elk, deer, mountain sheep, grizzly tracks, etc., and as they were the first pictographs I had ever seen I was particularly interested. The bison pictures indicated the former presence here in this valley of that fine animal. Numbers indeed once ranged these hills and valleys, but they had all disappeared many years before our voyage. We were on the lookout for Indians. As long as we were encompassed by the mighty walls of the canyons there was little probability of our meeting with any of the original people of this soil, but the valley now opening wide before us was their favourite haunt. Two divisions of Utes roamed the surrounding region. On the west it was the Uinta Utes who, we knew, were peaceable, and on the east it was the White River Utes, whose status as to peace and war was at that period somewhat vague and uncertain. We expected no trouble with any of them, yet the possibility of running at any moment on a band gave added interest and colour to the voyage. This was intensified by the feeling that we had suddenly been thrown out of doors, unprotected, as the huge, dominating precipices broke so suddenly back on both sides, leaving us hardly a rock with which, in case of necessity, to emulate the example of Roderick Dhu. Probably if we had travelled here on horseback in the open there would not have been this sense of having left our fortification behind.

July 12th the boats proceeded down a river so sluggish that the term "down" seemed a misnomer, and we actually had to row; had to work at the oars to make the boats go; these same boats which so recently had behaved like wild horses. This was not to our taste at all, the weather being extremely hot. But there was no help for it. The boats fairly went to sleep and we tugged away at their dull, heavy weight, putting the miles behind and recalling the express-train manner of their recent action. On each side of us there were occasional groves of cottonwoods and wide bottoms bounded by low hills. After about ten miles of steady pulling we discovered that we were only 2-1/2 miles from our starting place in a straight line. Here there was a superb cottonwood grove, massive trees with huge trunks like oaks, on the left. We found the remains of a camp-fire and decided that our advance party had come this far from Island Park the first day. They had accomplished a phenomenal run, but it showed what might be done with light boats and a full crew. As Steward desired to make some geological examinations at this point, Prof. announced that we would stay till morning. Another cause for stopping was a gale which blew with great force, making rowing exceedingly hard work, and it was hard enough anyhow with no good current to help.

Steward wished to go across the river, and I went with him. We tramped with our Winchesters on our shoulders for several hours, examining rocks and fossils. On our return we found that Andy was occupied in boiling a goose which Prof.'s sure aim had bestowed on the larder, and we had the bird for supper. If it was not one of the fossils it certainly was one of the "oldest inhabitants," which are found in every locality, and though a steady diet of bacon enthused us with an ambition to masticate this noble morsel, it had to be relegated to the impossibilities. We had a good deal of entertainment out of it, and while so engaged every ear caught the sound of a faint, distant gunshot. This was proof that we were no longer alone, and the question was, "How many Indians are there?" We simply waited developments. Night came on and the fierce wind died away completely as the sun went down. We gave no more thought to the shot, but all went to bed without even leaving a watch, so confident was Prof. that there was no enemy, and no danger of a surprise. He was always "level-headed" and never went off on a tangent doing wild or unwarranted things. He was a man of unusually sound judgment.

In the absence of Cap. the duty of reading barometer had fallen to me, and sometimes, when waiting for the hour to arrive, I had to sit alone for a time when the others already had turned in. It was that way on this night, and I waited with some impatience for nine o'clock to come. For the purpose of reading the scale we used a small bull's-eye lantern belonging to a transit instrument, and it threw out a long beam of light. I entertained myself by flashing this beam of light in various directions to the distress of one member lying near not asleep, who was somewhat nervous as to the character of the Indians responsible for the shot.

"Confound it," he growled, "you'll have the whole Ute tribe down on us! You know they are not far off!"

Of course I desisted in my "signalling," but Prof., not yet asleep, spoke up saying he did not believe any Indians would bother us. Finishing the observations I put out the lantern, and settled in my blankets. At that instant there was the flash of a light through the trees and then it glowed steadily for a moment and went out. My nervous neighbour saw it too. "There," he cried, "an answer to your confounded signal!" Several saw it. "The evening star setting beyond the hill," they declared, derisively, but we two maintained that it was nothing less than a light near by. Then sleep ruled the camp. In the middle of the night there was a sudden terrific cracking, rending, and crashing, starting all to their feet except Clem, who was not wakened by it. What had happened? We perceived in a second. One of the enormous limbs, weakened by the wind, had broken off and dropped to the ground in the middle of the camp. Luckily no one was under it and no harm was done, but for a moment, in connection with the light episode and the gunshot, it gave us a shock. Every one laughed, and soon the camp was still again. The sun was well up before we awoke. Immediately the discussion of the strange light came up, and it formed a lively and amusing topic, not only then, but ever after for months. Breakfast became a stirring debating scene, when plump into the midst of our hilarity, as if to emphasise the declarations of the nervous member, there came a sharp call from beyond a line of bushes. Almost on the instant appeared an Indian mounted on a dark bay horse trotting towards us exclaiming, "How, how!" and holding out his hand in token of friendship. His long black hair hung behind in two tails braided with red and black cotton cloth. The scalp at the part was painted vermilion, and around each eye was a ring of the same bright colour. His shirt was of the kind called hickory, and his leggins were of red woollen stuff. Altogether he was a good looking specimen of his race, and about twenty-five years old. How many more might be behind we could not tell.

He dismounted and Clem grasped him warmly by the hand, exclaiming with his most cordial smile, "Well, how are all the folks at home?" to which the visitor of course made no answer. Not one of our party understood Ute, and I had never seen a "wild" Indian at such close quarters before. The man motioned for something to eat, so Andy gave him a plate of breakfast, but there was a twinkle in Andy's blue eye, for the breakfast consisted largely of the rejected goose. When the red man's vision rested on the goose he gave a grunt of disgust and made no effort to even taste it, though he relished the other things and a cup of hot coffee. I have noticed that all Indians are very fond of coffee. We gleaned that he was alone with his squaw, and had a wickiup down the river a short distance. Doubtless he had examined our camp the previous night. The barometer hanging to a tree-branch caught his eye, and I tried by signs to explain it to him with no success except to convulse the whole crew. At length with the exclamation "Squaw," he rode away and came back with his fair partner riding behind. By this time we were packed up and we pushed off, the pair watching us with deep interest. About a mile and a half below by the river, we came on them again at their camp, they having easily beaten us by a short cut. Here was his wickiup made of a few cottonwood boughs, and in front of it the ashes of a fire. Our side immediately claimed this was the light we had seen, and the discussion of this point continued until another night put an end to it. In the bough shelter sat the blooming bride of "Douglas Boy," as he called himself, Douglas being the chief of the White River Utes. She was dressed well in a neat suit of navy-blue flannel and was lavishly adorned with ornaments. Her dress was bound at the waist by a heavy belt of leather, four inches wide, profusely decorated with brass discs and fastened by a brass buckle. She was young and quite pretty, and they were a handsome couple. He intimated that he would be grateful to be ferried across the river, here almost half a mile wide, so his blankets, saddles, and whole paraphernalia were piled on the boats, while the two horses were driven into the water and pelted with stones till they made up their minds that the farther shore offered greater hospitality, and swam for it. Then the squaw and the brave were taken on separate boats. She hesitated long before finally trusting herself, and was exceedingly coy about it. She had probably never seen a boat before. At last, overcoming her fear she stepped tremblingly on board and in a few minutes we had them landed on the other side, where we said farewell and went on.

In the afternoon we discovered a number of natives on the right bank and landed to see what they were. Nothing more terrible than several badly frightened squaws and children occupied the place, the men being away. We thought this call on the ladies would suffice, and presenting them with a quantity of tobacco for their absent lords, we pulled away, leaving them still almost paralysed with fright and astonishment at our sudden and unexpected appearance and disappearance. The valley was now very wide, and the river spread to a great width also, giving conditions totally different from any we had found above. Rowing was real labour here, but Prof. was eager to arrive at the mouth of the Uinta the next day so it was row, row, with a strong, steady, monotonous stroke, hour after hour till we had put twenty miles behind when we stopped for the night. Next morning the same programme was continued from seven o'clock on, with a brief halt for dinner. About four a storm came up, compelling us to wait an hour, when on we pulled, with a temperature something like 100°F., in the shade, till sunset, when about forty miles from our starting point, we arrived at the mouth of a river on the right, which we thought must be the Uinta. But finally as there was no sign of our advance party we concluded there must be a mistake. There was so little current in the tributary we thought it might be something besides a river, the mouth of a lake perhaps, and that the Uinta was farther on. About a mile down in the dim light there appeared to be a river mouth, but on reaching the place there was nothing of the kind. Several signal shots were fired. They fell dead on the dull stillness of the night which was dropping fast upon us. We took to the oars once more and pulled down nearly another mile till the dark grew so thick it was not prudent to proceed, and Prof. ordered a landing on the left where we made a hasty cup of coffee to refresh the inner man, and turned in, much puzzled and troubled by the absence of any kind of a signal from the advance party. Some one suggested that they had all been killed, but Prof. met this with scornful ridicule and went to sleep. When daylight came a river was discovered less than half a mile below our camp coming in from the east. Prof. knew this to be White River from the map, the mouths of White and Uinta rivers having long been quite accurately established. The mouth of the Uinta must therefore be where we had been the night before, and Prof. walked back till he came opposite to it. We then got the boats back by rowing and towing, and landed on the right or west bank about a quarter of a mile above the mouth of the Uinta, where the old time crossing had been, and which we had passed unnoticed in the evening light. Here were the ashes of a camp-fire, and after much searching a tin can was found with a note in it from the Major, saying they had all gone out to the Agency, and that we were to wait here.

A large cottonwood tree stood on the low bank where travellers before had camped, not in going up and down the river, but on their way across country. It was a very old tree and its bark presented many marks, names, and dates, and I regret now that I did not copy them for reference. This was one of the known crossings for a long period, in fact, it was through this valley that Escalante, the first white man to cross Green River, travelled in 1776, and it is possible that he may have camped under this very tree.[10] We settled there to wait, harassed by multitudes of voracious mosquitoes. All day we remained, expecting the absentees, but the sun went down and still there was no word. About seven o'clock while we were eating supper, some shots and yells from the west took us to the top of the bank, and we saw two horsemen galloping towards our position. We soon made them out to be Cap. and Jones. They brought a large mail, a portion of it the same we had tried to stop at Salt Lake, and have returned to us at the Gate of Lodore, and they reported that the Major had gone out to Salt Lake. We built up a good fire, and by its light everyone was quickly lost in letters from home.

The next morning we got the Dean out of the bushes where she had been well hidden, and moved across the river with the whole outfit, to a place in front of a half-finished log cabin called Fort Robideau, after the trapper of that name, who years before had roamed this country. A road crossing here from Golden to Provo, 413 miles long, was laid out in 1861 by Berthoud and Bridger for the Overland Stage Company, but the Civil War and the building of the Union Pacific had prevented its realisation.[11] The cabin had no windows or doors, but for summer that was not a defect. The mud roof was intact, and we used the cabin for headquarters, though we preferred to sleep out on the ground. Back of the building a wide level plain spread away and deer and antelope ranged there in large numbers. Any short walk would start up antelope, but we had other matters on our mind, and made no special effort to shoot any. It would have been easy for a trained hunter to get all he wanted, or even for one of us to do it had we dropped other things and given our minds to the work.

The following Monday, July 17th, Prof. and Beaman left for the Agency, and on Friday of the same week Jack returned accompanied by a man named Basor, driving a large four-horse waggon loaded with supplies for us. We were in need of them. We had been completely out of soap for two weeks or more, and a box of that essential article was broken open the first thing. Jack also brought from the Agency garden some lettuce, new potatoes, and turnips. Not having tasted any vegetables for two months, these were a great treat. The same afternoon Basor went away taking letters from us with him to be sent to Salt Lake. One of the special things he had brought was three long, narrow pieces of flat iron made by the Agency blacksmith from old wagon tires, for the keels of the boats, which were badly worn by scraping on shoals and rocks in our portaging and letting-down operations.

On the next Monday, Cap., Steward, and I with five days' rations on our backs as well as blankets enough for the warm nights, and our rifles, started on a journey up White River to a place called Goblin City by one of the earlier explorers who had crossed the valley. As we were going through some heavy willows about noon, I discovered standing still before me and not a hundred feet away the finest stag I have ever seen. He stood like a Landseer picture, head erect and alert with huge branching antlers poised in the air. He was listening to my companions who were a little distance from me. My gun being tied to my pack for easy travelling I could not quickly extricate it and before I could bring it to bear he dashed through the willows and a sensible shot was impossible. I admired him so much that I was rather glad I could not shoot. We came across a great deal of game, antelope, mountain sheep, and deer but we never seemed to have the opportunity to stalk it properly. When we finally came in sight of the Goblin City it was six o'clock of the second day and we had travelled steadily. At the farther end of a level little valley surrounded by cliffs were numerous small buttes and square rocks, almost in rows and about the size of small buildings, so that there was a striking suggestion of a town. We slept near the river and spent the next morning in examining the locality. When we had completed the observations I got dinner while Steward and Cap. with our gun-straps and some buckskin strings made a raft from small cottonwood logs we found on the bank. Upon this weaving affair we all three embarked to descend the river in order to meander the course as well as to save our legs. Steward and Cap. stood at either end with long poles while I sat in the middle and took the compass sights as we passed along. There were some sharp little rapids full of rocks, and sometimes it was all we could do to stick on, for the raft being flexible naturally would straddle a big rock and take the form of a very steep house roof. The banks were thick with currant bushes loaded with ripe fruit and we kept a supply of branches on the raft to pick off the currants as we went along. Everywhere there were many fresh tracks of bears for they are fond of this fruit, but if they saw us we failed to see them, though some of the tracks appeared to have been made not more than a few minutes before. As we drifted between high banks there was a violent crashing of bushes and a beautiful fawn, evidently pursued by bear or wolf, plunged through and dropped into the stream. Cap. took a shot at it from the wobbling raft but of course failed. The fawn landed at the bottom of a mud wall ten feet high and for a moment seemed dazed, but by some herculean effort it gained the plain and sped away to freedom and we were not at all sorry to see it go. All the next day we kept on down White River on the raft and at seven o'clock were still five miles from camp in a direct course and no food left. As the stream meandered a great deal we parted from it and went to headquarters on foot.

We now expected hourly the return of Prof. and the Major, but another day passed without them or any message. The next day was Saturday and it faded away also without any event. Just after supper there was a hail from the west bank and on going over with a boat we found there Prof., Beaman, and an Indian. The Major had not come because Captain Dodds, commanding the party which was charged with the taking of rations for us to the mouth of the Dirty Devil River, our next supply station, had sent word that he could not find a way through the unknown region. The Major concluded that he would have to go and try it himself. His plan was for us to go on and he would join us again August 25th at Gunnison Crossing, at the end of the Canyon of Desolation, the next canyon of the series. Gunnison Crossing was an established point with a trail leading there from east and west. We were to wait for him till September 3d in that neighbourhood, and if he failed to arrive we were to go on and get through as best we could on the rations remaining. Our present intercourse with the world was now terminated by our sending the Indian who had come with Prof. back to the Agency with our mail. Prof. had brought in some fresh beef which was a great treat but there was little of it and after a couple of meals we were on bacon and beans again. Had an Indian from the Agency been hired for the purpose of hunting, we might have had plenty of venison during our stop here. Sunday our old acquaintance Douglas Boy came to camp and was employed to make moccasins to save our shoes. Some new shoes had been sent in to us, but for climbing and walking the rawhide-soled moccasins were excellent and would save our shoes for river work. The Indian had a beaded cap pouch which I secured from him for some vermilion and he was ready to trade, but the next day Jack caught him trying to steal our buckskin by hiding it in his blankets which rudely sundered our business relations. Jack himself acquired the art of moccasin-making and he made each of us an excellent pair in his spare time. Steward and I went back up White River to finish our work but the raft timbers were gone and we could find no others, so we had to do what we could on foot. When we returned I discovered some ginger among the supplies and thinking it time for variety in our bill of fare, and it being Cap.'s birthday, I made a large ginger-cake which was voted prime. We ate half of it at one sitting with an accompaniment of lime-juice "lemonade."

At the Agency Prof. found out that Douglas Boy had eloped from the White River country with his squaw, who was betrothed to another, and when we first met him he was engaged in eluding pursuit. According to Ute law if he could avoid capture for a certain time he would be free to return without molestation to his village. Beaman photographed him and a number of the Uintas under the direction of the Major, who wished to secure all the information possible about the natives, their language, customs, and costumes. We now spent several days arranging our new supplies in the rubber sacks, putting the iron strips on the boat-keels, and doing what final repairing was necessary. The topographers plotted the map work, and all finished up their necessary notes and data. By the afternoon of Friday, August 4th, all was in readiness for continuing the voyage. We had now descended 1450 feet from our starting point towards sea-level and we knew that the next canyon would add considerably to these figures.

line drawing, tipis

line drawing, boat on shore