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Jim Beckwourth was known among the
mountain men as the “Gaudy Liar” a compliment within a group of men
who valued the skill of story-telling, tall tales and the ability to spin
out a story in any way so long as it wasn’t boring.
The "true" details of Beckwourth's life, appropriately
enough, are shrouded in myth and mystery. Many of the facts and much
of the mystery come from Beckwourth's own account. In 1856 he teamed
up with a would-be journalist and temperance reformer (albeit with a
drinking habit) named T. D. Bonner to write The Life and Adventures of
James P. Beckwourth, a lengthy recitation of adventures, bloody
battles, close calls, and hairbreadth escapes - most starring Jim
Beckwourth as the hero. Beckwourth was born in Virginia in
1798. His father, Jennings Beckwith, was a white man; his mother was
apparently Beckwith's African-American slave. The family moved to
Missouri, perhaps for the relative tolerance that the frontier gave to the
interracial liaison. Beckwourth was apprenticed to a St.
Louis blacksmith, a useful profession that may have brought him to the
attention of General William Ashley. Ashley and Major Andrew Henry
were partners seeking to exploit the fur wealth of the upper Missouri
River country. Their company
is associated with many of the legendary mountain men who emerged during
this period. In 1822 the company advertised for adventurous men to
explore the upper Missouri River and beyond in search of fur. The group
recruited a veritable who's who of future mountain men: Jedediah
Smith, Thomas Fitzpatrick, Etienne Provost, William Sublette, Jim
Bridger, Hugh Glass and David Jackson joined
the company in its first years. Jim Beckwourth was among these, perhaps
starting his employment as a blacksmith. Beckwourth may have played a role
in the early exploration of Wyoming's South Pass and subsequent
expeditions along the Bear, Weber, and Green rivers. What seems certain is
that he was trapping in the Utah region by 1825, and he frequented the
area over the next few years, often trapping in the Cache and Salt Lake
valleys. In that famous year of the first
mountain man rendezvous at Henry's Fork (1825),
Beckwourth began to establish his reputation as a master storyteller,
telling heroic and improbable tales with himself at the center.
Beckwourth also looked and dressed the part. Six feet tall
and strongly built, he wore his dark hair to his waist and frequently
sported braids, ribbons, earrings, gold chains, and Crow leggings. The "facts" of
Beckwourth's life are impressive enough. Simply to endure and
survive in this unforgiving region implied that his hunting and survival
skills were excellent. In 1828 he was captured and adopted by the
Crow Indians (after another mountain man, in a tall tale told to Crow
warriors, had described Beckwourth as a long lost Crow, stolen by a
Cheyenne raiding party when he was just a child).
Beckwourth willingly became a member of the tribe.
He may have enjoyed the lack of racial prejudice among the Crow and
may also have welcomed the relative sexual license that the lifestyle of
the Indians permitted. Beckwourth
became a "war chief" and participated in many battles, events
that he gives great weight to in his life's account.
Beckwourth's adventurous spirit led
him to participate in the Seminole War of 1837-38 in Florida.
Returning to the West, he earned a substantial sum selling whiskey
to the Cheyenne and operating saloons in New Mexico.
In the late 1830’s, he and other partners established what may have been the strangest trading establishment in the west know as El Pueblo (at the future site of Pueblo, Colorado). The crude adobe fort became “home” to a mélange of Americans, French coureurs de bois, Canadian Iroquois, Mexican trappers and traders, Negroes and European immigrants. Rent was free, and cheap Mexican whiskey was paid for in beaver. This post became something of a destination resort for mountain men who didn’t want to winter over in the high mountains, but didn’t want the long journey to return to St. Louis or Taos. In the 1840s Beckwourth crisscrossed California, as a gambler, prospector, guide (a famous pass is named for him), and horse thief. He served (perhaps unwillingly) as a guide for Colonel John Chivington at the notorious Sand Creek Massacre of the Cheyenne in 1864. In 1866 he returned to the Crow people and died near the Bighorn River. For more
information regarding Jim Beckwourth see also: The
Life and Adventures of James P. Beckwourth, by Beckwourth, James P,
published by Harper and Brothers, 1856.
Many other editions.
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