American West E-Book

Alice Barnes-Brown

• Herausgeber: Fox Chapel Publishing
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Serie: Visual History
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Seitenzahl: 343

Beschreibung

As the American Revolution drew to a close and the colonies claimed independence from Britain, the United States' gaze turned west to the vast expanse of land that was seemingly ripe for the taking. After all, according to their Manifest Destiny, it was their God-given right to expand. In American West, uncover the resistance that these enterprising settlers faced, from the Native Americans to the unforgiving terrain. Discover the reality of what life was like on the frontier, and meet some of the key figures in creating the legend of the Wild West, including Billy the Kid and Wyatt Earp. Elsewhere, find out how the Native Americans suffered at the hands of the western settlers, from wars and legislation that stripped them of their rights, to attempts to crush existing cultures.

Leseprobe

A

MERICA

N

W

ES

T

History of the Wild West

and Westward Expansion

✯

1803–1890

✯

VISUAL HISTORY CONTRIBUTORS

Alice Barnes-Brown, Walter Borneman, Nell Darby

A

MERICA

N

W

ES

T

History of the Wild West

and Westward Expansion

✯

1803–1890

✯

©2023 by Future Publishing Limited

Articles in this issue are translated or reproduced from

American West

and are the copyright of or licensed to Future Publishing Limited, a Future plc group

company, UK 2022.

Used under license. All rights reserved. This version published by

Fox Chapel Publishing Company, Inc., 903 Square Street, Mount Joy, PA 17552.

For more information about the Future plc group, go to

http://www.futureplc.com

.

e-ISBN: 978-1-6374-1259-6

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

To learn more about the other great books from Fox Chapel Publishing, or to find a retailer near you,

call toll-free 800-457-9112 or visit us at

www.FoxChapelPublishing.com

.

We are always looking for talented authors. To submit an idea, please send a brief inquiry to

[email protected].

As the American Revolution drew to a close and the colonies claimed independence from Britain, the

United States’ gaze turned west to the vast expanse of land that was seemingly ripe for the taking. After

all, according to their Manifest Destiny, it was their God-given right to expand.

In

American West

, uncover the resistance that these enterprising settlers faced, from the Native

Americans to the unforgiving terrain. Discover the reality of what life was like on the frontier, and

meet some of the key figures in creating the legend of the Wild West, including Billy the Kid and Wyatt

Earp. Elsewhere, find out how the Native Americans suffered at the hands of the settlers, from wars and

legislation that stripped them of their rights, to attempts at crushing existing cultures.

WELCOME

CONTENTS

61

72

26

08

How Was the

West Won?

From Jefferson to Geronimo,

discover the wars, people, and

events that moved the American

frontier to the west

BUILDING THE

FRONTIER

22

From Revolution to

Rebirth

The American Revolution turned

a group of strong-willed European

colonies into a federation of

(largely) independent states

28

Discovering the

American West

They ventured across the country

through unknown terrain, facing

danger and discovery at every

turn. This is the vast journey of

Lewis and Clark

34

Mountain Men

Join the hardy pioneers who lived

and died in the wilderness beyond

the western frontier

38

A Promised Land

During the days of westward

expansion, a Great Awakening of

religious fervor swept through the

American frontier

42

From Sea to

Shining Sea

After the Treaty of Paris ended

hostilities with the British in 1783,

Americans looked West to expand

their new nation

50

The Indian

Removal Act

President Andrew Jackson’s

controversial legislation removed

tens of thousands of Native

Americans from their own land.

The exodus became known as the

Trail of Tears

56

Riding the Trail

Journalist and politician Horace

Greeley famously stated, “Go West,

young man.” He had no idea just

how arduous and dangerous a trip

he was suggesting

60

American

Conqueror

Meet the forgotten eleventh

president who shaped the United

States into a continental giant —

but hastened its fall into civil war

66

The State Made of

Gold

How one man’s accidental

discovery of gold would go on to

change the face of the Californian

landscape forever

72

How the Path to

the West Led to

War

As the United States spread

westward, one question divided

the nation: would the new states

be Slave States or Free States?

THE WILD

WEST

78

The Homestead

Acts

The Homestead Acts hastened the

settlement of the American West,

creating new opportunities for

some and issues for others

80

Fight for Survival

Native Americans fought

desperately to retain their way of

life in the face of encroachment

onto their lands by White settlers

86

The Taming

of the West

Discover how railways and barbed

wire transformed the frontier into

America’s heartland

70

66

78

79

22

92

The Hunt for Billy

the Kid

The iconic Wild West story is

fraught with embellishment and

myth. What was the real history of

the hunt that made the legendary

lawman Pat Garrett?

100

Wyatt Earp’s Wild

West

Wyatt Earp took the law into his

own hands and became a hunted

outlaw himself

112

Closing of

the Frontier

When the director of the US Census

Bureau announced the “closing of

the frontier” in 1890, the Wild West

lost its wildness

LEGACY OF THE

FRONTIER

120

Dealing with the

Native Problem

The frontier had a problem—Native

Americans. But Richard Henry Pratt

had a plan: turn them into White

Americans

128

Was the West

so Wild?

Over the past 150 years, the Wild

West has been depicted as a lawless,

violent place—but why, and was it

really so bad?

132

The Original Wolves

of Wall Street

The USA has always held

competitive capitalism in high

regard, but at one time its entire

economy was taken hostage by a

few opportunistic men

136

F.J. Turner

Frederick Jackson Turner argued

that the Frontier was to thank for

forming the character of America

and its people

138

“Other Wests

Than Ours”

The Wild West is more than an

American phenomenon: from

Russia to Canada, vast landscapes

and greed have shaped identities

8

8

AMERICAN WEST

Louisiana Purchase

Washington, D.C.

On July 4, 1803, exactly 27 years after the American colonies declared their

independence from Britain, President Thomas Jefferson signed an agreement to buy

a vast tract of North America from France. By paying $15 million to Paris, Jefferson

secured 827,000 square miles of territory stretching from the Gulf of Mexico to the

Canadian border, nearly doubling the size of the United States in the largest single-land

gain in American history. Jefferson initially only sought to buy New Orleans and its

environs, but Napoleon was bogged down in war with Britain and the French colonies

of the New World held little value to him. When the French emperor offered a much

larger area for less than three cents an acre, the American negotiators were quick to

agree. The land they bought eventually became part of 15 US states and 2 Canadian

provinces, taking in New Orleans, Denver, St. Louis, and Calgary.

July 4, 1803

HOW WAS

THE WILD

WEST WON?

From Jefferson to Geronimo, discover the wars,

people, and events that moved the American

frontier west during the 19th century

HOW WAS THE WILD WEST WON?

9

9

Lewis and Clark

St. Louis, Missouri Territory

Two years, four months, and ten days

after setting out, 32 men (and a dog)

returned to St. Louis having traveled

from the Mississippi to the Pacific Ocean

and back again. Captain Meriwether

Lewis and his friend, Second Lieutenant

William Clark, had been commissioned

to map the newly acquired Louisiana

Purchase and to find a safe route across

the continent, allowing the USA to lay

claim to the Pacific coast before any

European powers did. The expedition

largely traveled by boat, following the

course of the Missouri and Columbia

Rivers across the Great Plains and Rocky

Mountains. They encountered at least 24

Native Americans tribes, without whose

help the expedition would have starved

during the winter months—only the

Teton-Sioux treated the White explorers

with a degree of suspicion. Along the

way, Lewis and Clark discovered more

than 200 new plant and animal species

and drew 140 maps of their route. One

member of the party died on the trip,

probably caused by appendicitis.

Cry of Dolores

Dolores Hidalgo, Mexico

The small town of Dolores Hidalgo

near Guanajuato stamped its name

in Mexican history in September

1810 when Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla,

a Catholic priest, rang his church

bells in the early hours to gather

his congregation. He spoke to the

assembled crowds, giving what became

known as the Grito de Dolores (Cry of

Dolores), calling on the people of his

parish to leave their homes and join

him in a rebellion against the Spanish

colonial government. Six hundred men

joined his insurrection and, although

he would be captured and executed

within a year, his was the first step in

the Mexican War of Independence. That

conflict would end, 11 years later, with

Mexico as an independent country.

Rocky Mountain Fur Company

St. Louis, Missouri

An ad in an 1822 edition of the Missouri Republican sought out 100 men

who were prepared “to ascend the river Missouri to its source, there to

be employed for one, two, or three years.” The work they were going to

carry out was fur trapping, a lucrative trade since beaver fur was highly

fashionable at the time. The trappers were often the first White men to

explore the treacherous terrain, and it was dangerous work. Among those

employed by the Rocky Mountain Fur Company was Hugh Glass, who

would be abandoned without supplies in the wilderness during an 1823

expedition and forced to travel 200 miles back to Fort Kiowa alone.

September 23, 1806

September 16, 1810

The White House and

Capitol are attacked by the

British in the War of 1812

Washington, D.C.

August 24, 1812

S.S. Savannah becomes the first

steamship to cross the Atlantic

Liverpool, UK

June 20, 1819

Mexico wins

independence from Spain

Mexico City, Mexico

September 27, 1821

The Missouri Compromise allows

slavery in western territories

south of latitude 36°30′

Washington, D.C.

May 8, 1820

1822

Abraham Lincoln is born in

a simple one-room log cabin

Hodgenville, Kentucky

February 12,

1809

10

10

AMERICAN WEST

Trail of Tears

Mississippi

The first tribe displaced by the Indian Removal

Act was the Choctaw nation, who agreed to

give up 11 million acres of ancestral land in

Mississippi in exchange for 15 million acres

in Oklahoma. It was agreed that the Choctaw

would gather in November 1831 at Memphis and

Vicksburg to be relocated. However, conditions

were harsh and the US government did little

to relieve Choctaw suffering. Flash floods

prevented any travel by wagon and rivers were

clogged up with ice. Rations were limited to

a handful of boiled corn, one turnip, and two

cups of heated water per day, and incompetent

guides got the Choctaw lost in the Lake

Providence swamps. Of 17,000 Choctaws who

left Mississippi, up to 6,000 died en route on a

trek described by a tribal chief as a “trail of tears

and death.” However, few lessons were learned

and the removals of the Chickasaw, Creek,

Seminole, and Cherokee tribes would also turn

into death marches.

Bonneville Expedition

St. Louis, Missouri

Benjamin Bonneville left Missouri in May 1832 with 110

men and orders from John Jacob Astor to establish a new

fur trapping operation to rival the Hudson’s Bay Company.

The expedition trekked across present-day Wyoming, Idaho,

Nevada, and Oregon and a secondary party discovered

a route along the Humboldt River and across the Sierra

Nevada to California. Bonneville may have been laying the

groundwork for a possible invasion of California, then part

of Mexico, and the path he discovered was eventually used

as the primary route to the gold fields during the California

Gold Rush. However, the expedition failed in its primary aim

to trap beaver fur—the Hudson’s Bay Company refused to

allow their traders to do business with Bonneville and many

Native Americans also refused them.

Indian Removal Act

Washington, D.C.

President Andrew Jackson was an ardent

believer in manifest destiny, the idea that

the USA should expand into the west, but

the inconvenient truth was that Native

American tribes already occupied much

of the land he coveted. His solution was

the Indian Removal Act, which allowed

the president to negotiate with tribes to

move west of the Mississippi in exchange

for their ancestral lands in the east.

The act was controversial and narrowly

passed the House of Representatives; it

was particularly opposed by Christian

missionaries. However, Jackson was

blunt—he saw the demise of the Native

American tribes as inevitable, a judgement

sadly proven true.

November 1, 1831

May 1832

May 28, 1830

Thomas Jefferson dies

on Independence Day

Monticello, Virginia

July 4, 1826

Davy Crockett loses his seat in the Congressional

Election after opposing the Indian Removal Act

Tennessee

March 4, 1831

HOW WAS THE WILD WEST WON?

11

11

Texan Revolution

Gonzalez, Mexican Texas

When Mexico won independence from Spain,

the province of Texas had a population of only

3,500. Hoping that an influx of settlers would

stop Native American raids, the bankrupt

Mexican government allowed immigrants

from the United States into Texas. Soon

Tejanos (Mexican-Spanish Texans) were

outnumbered by Anglos (English-speaking

Texans). Relations between the two groups

were tense and, in October 1835, the Anglos

rose in rebellion against the Mexican Army,

earning a victory in a small skirmish at

Gonzalez. The Texan journey to become the

Lone Star State had begun.

October 2, 1835

Oregon Trail

Independence, Missouri

Fur trappers may have been among the first to explore the west,

but large-scale migration required an easier route than those

which the trappers were able to take. By 1836, a trail had been

cleared from Independence, Missouri to Fort Hall, Idaho. A

missionary party led by Henry Spalding and Marcus Whitman

became the first wagon train of migrants to set off to settle west

via the trail. Each year, the trail was cleared a little further until

it reached Oregon City, a stone’s throw from the Pacific coast.

Annual improvements also made the route better, with bridges,

ferries, and resurfaced roads making the journey quicker and

safer. Some 400,000 people traveled along the Oregon Trail to

reach the coast and wagon trains continued to be the main form

of migration until the Transcontinental Railroad.

Battle of the Alamo

San Antonio, Mexican Texas

The Texan Revolution that began at Gonzalez soon pushed Mexican troops out of the province, but the

Mexican government responded with a fierce counter-attack—and nowhere was it more vicious than the

Alamo. The Catholic mission and fortress, garrisoned by around 200 revolutionaries, was surrounded by

a Mexican army numbering around 1,800. A 13-day siege ended on March 6 when the Mexicans launched

a frontal assault. Two attacks were repulsed, but a third broke the walls and nearly all the revolutionary

combatants were killed, including politician-turned-soldier Davy Crockett. Although the Alamo was a

defeat for the Texan revolutionaries, it was a turning point in the war. Buoyed by a desire for revenge

against General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, many Texans flooded to the revolutionary armies and six

weeks later the Mexicans were defeated at the Battle of San Jacinto. The Mexican government withdrew

from the province and Texas became an independent republic.

1836

March 6, 1836

Mormons are forcibly evicted

from Jackson County

Missouri

November 6-23, 1833

Andrew Jackson leaves the White

House after two terms as president

Washington, D.C.

March 4, 1837

12

12

AMERICAN WEST

Annexation of Texas

Texas

The life of the independent Texan republic was short. Most

Texans favored

joining the United States, although there

was little enthusiasm for the cause in Washington, D.C.. Only

when President John Tyler moved into the White House did

things begin to change—Tyler was fiercely independent of

party politics and a great believer in westward expansion.

Over his four years in office, he gradually changed minds

and, under his successor James Polk, Congress passed a

resolution accepting Texas as the 28th state.

Battle of the Neches

Tyler, Texas

In order to avoid relocation under the Indian Removal

Act, many members of the Cherokee nation moved to

the new republic of Texas during the 1830s. Initially

welcomed by President Sam Houston, attitudes began to

change when Mirabeau Lamar was voted into power. He

demanded that the Cherokee move out of Texas and into

the territory provided for them by the USA. After only

three days of negotiation, Texan troops moved against

the Cherokee. Eighteen were killed as the Cherokee

retreated into a ravine, the following day around 100

were killed near the source of the River Neches. Faced

with annihilation, the Cherokee reluctantly moved out of

Texas and into Indian Territory.

Donner Party Tragedy

Nevada mountains

When 87 settlers left Missouri for California in May 1846,

they were full of hope for the future. Within months, their

dream had turned into a nightmare. The pioneers were led

by George Donner and James Reed, but the choice of route

they made was not the best. They lost time by following

an alterNative path that diverted from the Oregon Trail

and Reed killed a fellow settler in an argument and was

banished from the group. Wagons and cattle were lost on

the Humboldt River before the party tried to cross the

Sierra Nevada mountains in November. A heavy snowfall

trapped them on a high pass and, as food supplies ran

low, a group set out on foot to seek help. Rescue parties

eventually arrived after four months, but not before

several of the survivors had resorted to cannibalism.

The Donner Party was not the only wagon train to

suffer fatalities on the trek west, but tales of desperate

settlers eating each other led to it becoming one of the

most infamous.

December 29, 1845

July 15-16, 1839

Winter 1846-47

Mormon War

Missouri

New Yorker Joseph Smith’s religious

visions led him to establish a new Christian

church, the members of which were called

Mormons. Smith and his followers moved

west in 1831, settling around Independence,

Missouri, a place which they thought

would be the location for the City of Zion.

However, tensions between the Mormons

and the rest of the Missouri population

quickly grew, particularly as non-Mormons

suspected that the newcomers sold their

votes to the highest bidder. During election

day in Gallatin County in 1838, a crowd

tried to prevent Mormons from voting and

a brawl developed. Attempts to calm the

situation failed and skirmishes broke out

between Mormon and non-Mormon mobs,

culminating in the Haun’s Mill Massacre

where 17 Mormons were killed. Despite the

killings, Joseph Smith and the Mormon

leaders were blamed for the violence and

nearly all Mormons were forced to leave the

state, retreating east to Illinois.

August 6-November 1, 1838

George Custer is born

New Rumley, Ohio

December 5, 1839

Mormon leader Joseph Smith is killed by a

mob breaking into Carthage Jail

Carthage, Illinois

June 27, 1844

Mexico declares

war on the USA

Mexico City

April 25, 1846

13

13

HOW WAS THE WILD WEST WON?

California Gold Rush

Sutter’s Mill, California

Early on a winter morning, James Marshall noticed some

shiny flecks in the water channel feeding a sawmill. He had

discovered gold. News quickly filtered out and, over the next

seven years, 300,000 prospectors—nicknamed forty-niners

after the peak year of the gold rush—flocked to California

hoping to make their own valuable discovery. Many traveled

overland, diverting from the Oregon Trail at Fort Hall in

Idaho, others sailed from the east coast on steamships. The

population of California boomed and the land was quickly

adopted as a state after it was ceded from Mexico, but most

who sought a quick buck were disappointed as nearly all

prospectors failed. Those who did best were the merchants

who supplied the miners, but undoubtedly those who did

worst were the Native Americans who were driven off the

land claimed by forty-niners—100,000 were killed through

violence or starvation in what has subsequently been

named the Californian Genocide.

January 24, 1848

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

Guadalupe Hidalgo, Mexico

Skirmishes along the unclear border between Mexico and the USA sparked

open conflict in 1846 when Mexican troops attacked American soldiers in the

disputed zone. However, Mexico was soundly defeated in the resulting war—

several provinces were occupied by the USA, and the army of Major General

Winfield Scott even captured Mexico City. The resulting peace treaty saw

Mexico accept Texas (which it had still claimed ownership of) as part of the

United States, and it also ceded the Mexican provinces of Alta California and

Nuevo Mexico to the US—land that subsequently became California and New

Mexico. For the first time since westward expansion had begun there was a

clear border between the USA and Mexico.

February 2, 1848

A Mexican raid kills Geronimo’s wife and

children, spurring him to retribution

Janos, Mexico

March 5, 1851

Colt’s Manufacturing

Company is formed

Hartford, Connecticut

1855

Second Bonneville Expedition

attacks Apache tribes

Arizona

May-July 1857

14

14

AMERICAN WEST

Quantrill’s Raid

Lawrence, Kansas

The west was as fractured by the Civil

War as the east—Texas and Louisiana

were among the states that seceded from

the USA to form the Confederacy, while

Oregon and California remained loyal

to the Union. Although few set-piece

battles took place in the west, mainly due

to a lack of Confederate manpower, there

were extensive guerrilla raids carried out

by roving bands of unofficial soldiers.

Among them were William Quantrill’s

Confederate raiders, who targeted the

pro-abolition town of Lawrence for

retribution. Around 450 guerrillas

attacked the settlement, looting and

killing any men they came across; 164

died, most of whom were civilians,

several of whom had surrendered.

Quantrill had a list of men he specifically

sought out, including Senator James

Lane who had led his own raids against

Confederate targets, but Lane escaped

through a cornfield.

August 21, 1863

August 17-December 26, 1862

Pony Express

St. Joseph, Missouri

The Pony Express may have had a short life, but

during its 19 months of operation it helped to

link the east and west coasts as never before.

Messages and letters were carried by horse

riders who set out from Missouri and raced

from one station to the next, changing to a fresh

horse at every stop, until they reached the final

destination at Sacramento, California. It took

about ten days to deliver a message from east

to west, but even that was slow compared to

the new technology that would soon render the

Pony Express obsolete: the telegraph.

April 3, 1860

Mountain Meadows Massacre

Mountain Meadows, Utah

The migrants who left Arkansas for California as part of

the Baker-Fancher wagon train crossed Utah Territory in

the middle of the Utah War, a year-long conflict between

Mormons and non-Mormons. Suspicion of the settlers led the

Mormons to attack the wagon train, disguising themselves as

Native Americans to avoid reprisals. The settlers put up stern

resistance until several members of the Mormon militia

approached under a White flag. The settlers left the safety of

their wagons and the Mormons turned on them, killing all

over seven years of age. Around 130 men and women were

murdered in the most infamous bout of paranoid hysteria

that struck the west.

September 11, 1857

Dakota War

Dakota Territory

Fed up with settlers encroaching onto their

territory and late annuity payments from the US

government, in 1862 the Dakota tribes along the

Minnesota River decided to act. When a Dakota

brave killed five White settlers, his tribal chiefs

decided to respond with further attacks aimed at

pushing White settlers out of their reservation.

Over the next few months, several pitched battles

between the Dakota and the US Army gradually

crushed the Natives, although not before 77

soldiers and up to 800 settlers were killed. Thirty-

eight Dakotan prisoners were sentenced to death,

some of whose trials lasted only five minutes, and

the rest of the Dakotans were expelled and pushed

further west. The United States had sent a signal

that it was prepared to act ruthlessly against any

Native Americans who defied its authority.

Bombardment of Fort Sumter

begins the Civil War

Fort Sumter, South Carolina

April 12, 1861

Transcontinental

telegraph line

is completed

Sacramento, California

October 24, 1861

Battle of Gettysburg

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

July 1-3, 1863

Sam Houston,

Founding Father of

Texas, dies

Huntsville, Texas

July 26, 1863

Great Flood causes

widespread damage

California, Oregon, and Nevada

December 1861-January 1862

HOW WAS THE WILD WEST WON?

15

15

Thirteenth Amendment

Washington, D.C.

As long as the United States had existed, it

was split into states that outlawed slavery and

states in which slavery was legal; the resulting

tension within the country contributed to the

outbreak of Civil War. At the end of the conflict,

slavery was abolished throughout the nation

by the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment.

Areas in the west which had previously included

slaves—Texas, New Mexico Territory, and Utah

Territory—now needed to manage the transition

of hundreds of thousands of people from slavery

to freedom. However, racial equality was still a

long way off. Former slave states passed racist

Black Codes which discriminated against freed

blacks, and White supremacist organizations

like the Ku Klux Klan used violence and

intimidation to support their twisted ideology.

Hickok-Tutt Shootout

Springfield, Missouri

The Wild West was a lawless place and it was often left for

people to find their own justice. Several disagreements

over unpaid gambling debts, a stolen watch, and their

mutual affection for the same women led Davis Tutt and

James “Wild Bill” Hickok to face off in Springfield town

square on a hot summer morning in 1865. The two stood

side-by-side, drawing and firing their pistols at the same

time—the first known quick-draw duel. Tutt’s shot missed,

but Hickok struck Tutt through the heart. Hickok was

arrested and tried for murder but controversially acquitted

after the jury found he acted in self-defense. The legend of

Wild Bill was born.

December 18,

1865

July 21,

1865

Transcontinental Railroad

Promontory Summit, Utah Territory

The ceremonial driving of a golden spike into the ground in Utah Territory officially

opened the first Transcontinental Railroad to through traffic. Travel across the United

States was now quicker and more comfortable, and migration to the west increased as

the risks posed by the journey were reduced. However, the railroad cut across migration

paths on the Great Plains and had a catastrophic effect on the buffalo population.

Railroad companies initially employed buffalo hunters to help feed the laborers

building the line, then whole herds were wiped out to prevent them blocking the line—

some companies even offered buffalo hunting by rail, where hunters could shoot from

the comfort of a train carriage.

May 10, 1869

Abraham Lincoln is assassinated by

a Confederate sympathizer

Washington, D.C.

April 15,

1865

Brothers Jesse and Frank James commit

their first armed bank robbery

Liberty, Missouri

February 13, 1866

Civil War hero Ulysses Grant

becomes president

Washington, D.C.

March 4,

1869

16

16

AMERICAN WEST

Colt .45

Hartford, Connecticut

No self-respecting frontiersman would have left the house

without his revolver, and more than any other the Colt .45

was the gun that won the west. The “Peacemaker” became

an instant favorite from its introduction in late 1873 due

to its balance and ergonomic design and, by the end of the

century, nearly 200,000 had been shipped to customers for

$17 by mail order. The six-shooter was the preferred sidearm

of gunmen on both sides of the law, including Wyatt Earp and

Jesse James, and was used in some of the most notorious

shootouts, battles, duels, and murders of the Wild West.

1873

Powell Geographic Expedition

Nevada

In reaching the confluence of the Colorado and Virgin Rivers in

Nevada, John Wesley Powell’s small party of explorers completed the

first passage by White men through the entirety of what they called

Big Canyon. Despite losing one of their three boats and having four

out of ten men leave the expedition—including three who walked

away just two days from their final destination and were never seen

again—the three-month mapping of the vast river valley was a great

success. Powell returned for a second expedition two years later, this

time giving his destination a new name: Grand Canyon.

Yellowstone National Park

Montana Territory and Wyoming Territory

President Ulysses Grant put his signature on an act of dedication in 1872 which made

Yellowstone the first national park in the USA, and probably the world. Grant had been

convinced by a number of vocal explorers and scientists, the most enthusiastic of whom

was Ferdinand Hayden, that the headwaters of the Yellowstone River contained ecological

treasures that should be protected by federal law. However, the creation of “a public park or

pleasuring ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people” was not a universally popular

measure—many locals feared that preventing Yellowstone from being sold or settled would

restrict the local economy. Even after the foundation of the national park, the region remained

largely unexplored until a number of expeditions over the next two decades gradually revealed

the wonders of Yellowstone to the American people. The chance to see the Old Faithful geyser

and grizzly bears now draws 3.5 million visitors to Yellowstone every year.

August 30, 1869

March 1, 1872

Buffalo Bill appears on

stage for the first time

Chicago, Illinois

December 1872

17

17

HOW WAS THE WILD WEST WON?

Barbed wire

DeKalb, Illinois

The patent that Joseph Glidden

was granted in 1874—a steel wire

with sharp points at regular

intervals—was the invention that

did more than any other to tame

the west. Land could be enclosed

and livestock contained at low cost

for the first time. Rather than cattle

roaming across the open range, the

movement of whole herds could now

be controlled. However, the invention

of barbed wire also made the job of

the cowboy largely unnecessary and

this iconic figure of the west began

to disappear.

November 24, 1874

Wild Bill Hickok is shot and

killed while playing cards

Deadwood, Dakota Territory

August 2, 1876

18

18

AMERICAN WEST

Gunfight at the OK Corral

Tombstone, Arizona Territory

Tombstone was typical of many frontier towns—it grew rapidly after the discovery of silver in the local area and

law enforcement struggled to cope with the bandits and criminals who flocked to the town. A feud developed

between town Marshal Virgil Earp and a gang of cattle and horse smugglers known as the Cowboys, with repeated

threats made by both sides. Things came to a head when Earp, with his brothers Morgan and Wyatt and temporary

policeman Doc Holliday, attempted to disarm five Cowboys in a narrow street close to the rear entrance of the OK

Corral. A gunfight followed during which 30 shots were fired in 30 seconds, killing three Cowboys and wounding

Virgil, Morgan, and Doc Holliday. The gunfight was largely forgotten until it was resurrected as the subject of a

Hollywood blockbuster, and has now come to symbolize

the brutality and danger of frontier justice.

Battle of the Little Bighorn

Little Bighorn River, Montana Territory

During a Sun Dance ceremony at Rosebud Creek, Lakotan leader Sitting Bull had a vision of “soldiers falling into his camp

like grasshoppers from the sky.” Later that month, his vision came true. The US Army was planning to force the Lakota,

Cheyenne, and Arapaho back to their reservations and away from the Black Hills, where prospectors had discovered gold.

George Armstrong Custer, a Civil War veteran who commanded the 7th Cavalry, spotted the Native American encampment and

decided to attack immediately—a big mistake. Stern defense drove the cavalry back and Custer was surrounded, retreating

to a hill with around 210 men. Not one of them survived the next wave of Lakota and Cheyenne warriors. However, although

Little Bighorn is famous as the site of Custer’s last stand, it was also the location of the Native Americans’ last stand. The tribes

scattered as US reinforcements arrived; Sitting Bull escaped to Canada, many others returned to the reservations, and the

Black Hills were forcibly ceded to the US.

June 25-26, 1876

October 26, 1881

Crazy Horse, a Lakota veteran of Little Bighorn, is

fatally stabbed while under military guard

Fort Robinson, Nebraska

September 5, 1877

Billy the Kid escapes from prison,

where he is awaiting execution

Lincoln County, New Mexico Territory

April 28, 1881

19

19

Western frontier is closed

Washington, D.C.

Following the eleventh US Census, exactly 100 years after

the first, Superintendents Robert Porter and Carroll Wright

announced that there was no longer a western frontier of the

United States beyond which there was unsettled territory. The

United States had claimed and settled the entire landmass from

Boston to Los Angeles and New Orleans to Seattle. The era of the

Wild West was over. However, it was an age of expansion that had

come at a great cost. The same census recorded a total of 248,253

Native Americans living in the United States, down from 400,764

identified in the census of 1850.

Surrender of Geronimo

Skeleton Canyon, Arizona Territory

For over three decades, a medicine man had led raids against Mexico

and the United States as part of the long-lasting Apache campaign

to resist being moved onto reservations by the new White settlers.

Geronimo finally surrendered to First Lieutenant Charles Gatewood,

one of the few US soldiers with whom he had some respect, in 1886.

The US government took no chances with their new prisoner—he

had, after all, previously surrendered twice before fleeing to resume a

life of raiding. This time, Geronimo and his followers were kept under

close supervision at US forts in Florida, Alabama, and Oklahoma. He

became something of a celebrity, appearing at the St. Louis World Fair

in 1904 and meeting President Roosevelt in 1905. Geronimo died in

1909, having been both a prisoner and a celebrity for the last 23 years of

his life.

Assassination of Jesse James

St. Joseph, Missouri

By the 1880s, former Confederate soldier-turned-robber Jesse

James was living in fear. Driven into hiding by a $5,000 bounty

for his capture, he was living in Missouri with his wife, Zerelda,

and two brothers, Charley and Robert Ford. What James didn’t

know was that the Ford brothers had decided to betray him.

When James put down his pistols to dust a picture, Robert saw

his chance. He drew his own pistol and fired, hitting James

in the back of his head. The Ford brothers were arrested for

murder but pardoned by the state governor within a day, and

another infamous anti-hero of the Wild West passed into legend.

Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show

Omaha, Nebraska

As the western frontier began to close, a few pioneers began to

see the potential for profit by portraying the Wild West on stage.

Among the first was William “Buffalo Bill” Cody, a former buffalo

hunter-turned-showman. He formed his own circus-like attraction,

Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, which toured throughout the US and

Europe, combining reenactments of historical events with displays

of sharp-shooting and horsemanship. Many notable figures joined

the troupe, including Sitting Bull, Calamity Jane, and Annie Oakley.

The story they peddled was a romanticized

view of the western

frontier, leading to the development of many half-truths that are now

indelibly linked with the Wild West.

April 3, 1882

May 19, 1883

June 2, 1890

September 4,

1886

Butch Cassidy robs his

first bank

Beaver, Utah Territory

June 24, 1889

William Temple Hornaday

estimates that there are fewer

than 300 buffalo left in the wild

Great Plains

March 7, 1888

22

From Revolution to

Rebirth

The American Revolution turned a

group of European colonies into a

federation of (largely) independent

states

28

Discovering the

American West

They ventured across the country

through unknown terrain, facing

danger and discovery at every

turn. This is the journey of Lewis

and Clark

34 Mountain Men

Join the hardy pioneers who lived

and died in the wilderness beyond

the western frontier

38

A Promised Land

During the expansion days, a Great

Awakening of religious fervor

swept the frontier

42

From Sea to

Shining Sea

After the Treaty of Paris finally

ended hostilities with their

long-time British enemy in 1783,

Americans looked West to expand

their new nation

50

The Indian

Removal Act

President Andrew Jackson’s

controversial legislation removed

tens of thousands of Native

Americans from their own land.

The exodus became known as the

Trail of Tears

56

Riding the Oregon

Trail

Journalist and politician Horace

Greeley famously coined the

phrase: “Go West, young man.”

however, Greenley had absolutely

no idea just how arduous and

dangerous a trip he was suggesting

60

James Polk:

American

Conqueror

Meet the forgotten eleventh

president who shaped the United

States into a continental giant

— but hastened its fall into

devastating civil war

66

California: The

State Made of Gold

How one man’s accidental

discovery of gold would go on to

change the face of the Californian

landscape forever

72

How the Path to

the West Led to

War

As the United States spread its

territory westward, one question

divided the nation: would the

new states be Slave States or Free

States?

BUILDING

THE FRONTIER

50

70

22

66

42

34

22

22

AMERICAN WEST

“G

ive me liberty or give me death!” Even today, the

general perception of the American Revolution

is of committed freedom fighters opposing

a tyrannical king, almost a black-and-White

affair. Events like the “shot heard round the world,” the British

defeat at Yorktown in 1781, and the signing of the Declaration

of Independence are well-remembered to this day. Founding

Father Patrick Henry’s fiery rhetoric to the Second Virginia

Convention in 1775 delivered one of history’s most quoted lines.

But this isn’t quite as accurate as it might seem—the real

story is far more complex than that. Colonial desire for westward

expansion (and resentment of the British curbing it) was one of

many factors that eventually led to war.

The American Revolution saw the birth of a new nation

and the military defeat of its former colonial master. That

wasn’t the original intention. Initially, the First Continental

Congress demanded only greater autonomy for American

colonies within the British Empire. They weren’t demanding

full independence at first, just a greater say in their own internal

affairs. Not until 1775 did the Second Continental Congress

vote for independence, and by then the Revolutionary War

was underway.

King George III wasn’t a tyrant, either. The monarch saw

the situation as challenging parliamentary rule in England’s

American colonies, not as a pretext for suppressing dissent and

increasing his personal power. If anything, George III wanted to

pacify the colonies with minimum bloodshed, not brutally bring

them to heel.

For decades, colonists had been learning the practicalities

and procedures of self-government. To effectively run the 13

Colonies as colonies, nevermind a loose coalition of largely

independent states, much decision-making lay in the hands

of colonial officials. They were obliged to implement policy

decisions made by parliament, but day-to-day governance was

largely in their power. They learned government on the job, and

in time, it paid off.

Over time, an increasing spirit of independence grew

among many colonists. It wasn’t so much explicit support

for independence from Britain, but more of a feeling that the

colonies could govern themselves. They effectively already

did. As frustration with London grew (and London in turn took

an increasingly harder line towards its American colonies)

an increasingly large, vocal lobby formed favoring full

independence in fact, not just in spirit. As the second United

States president John Adams later put it: “The Revolution was

effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the

hearts and minds of the people.”

Colonial desire for unfettered expansion existed long

before it actually happened. Independence existed as an idea

before becoming a possibility, never mind a reality. The skills,

experience, and desire to end British rule existed long before the

Revolutionary War and Declaration of Independence.

Over time, attitudes hardened on both sides. Many British

politicians saw the Continental Congress as upstart rebels and

traitors to the crown. George III took a reasonable personal

position, wanting limited discussion and possibly reform

while never allowing the colonists to forget that they were

British subjects. Publicly, however, he supported the position

of parliament—the colonies were British territory subordinate

to Parliament, and they would remain so. The colonists were

British subjects whether they liked it or not. They would submit

to British rule, peacefully or otherwise.

The American Revolution turned a group of European

colonies into a federation of (largely) independent states

FROM

REVOLUTION

TO REBIRTH

Words by Robert Walsh

The 1773 Boston Tea Party has become

almost iconic, the most famous expression

of colonists’ increasing frustration with

British rule

Slaveowner, land speculator, and orator,

Patrick Henry is forever known for saying

“Give me Liberty or give me Death!”

When General Cornwallis surrendered

at Yorktown in 1781, it wasn’t the end of

the American Revolution—it was really

the beginning

24

24

AMERICAN WEST

Within the colonists themselves, there

was also division between those who wanted

to pursue greater autonomy and those who

were advocating full independence. Some

were prepared to fight for independence if

necessary, while others were ready to fight

for Great Britain. These divisions were often

bitter and frequently personal.

Abraham Lincoln later said that a

house divided will not stand. Initially, the

colonists were divided and some of them

remained so. After signing the Declaration

of Independence, Benjamin Franklin is

said to have described the need for unity

in the bluntest of terms: “We must all hang

together or, most assuredly, we will all hang

separately!”

By no means were all colonists anti-

British and pro-Independence—in fact,

many supported increased taxation and

the colonial status quo. At the same time,

others opposed taxation and supported

increased autonomy but rejected outright

the idea of full independence. Still prepared