Redwood County, Minnesota - Chapter 19: River Transportation, 1916

Minnesota received its name from the longest river which lies wholly within this state, excepting only its sources above Big Stone lake. During a hundred and sixty years, up to the time of the organization of Minnesota Territory, in 1849, the name St. Pierre, or St. Peter, had been generally applied to this river by French and English explorers and writers, probably in honor of Pierre Charles Le Sueur, its first white explorer. The aboriginal Sioux name Minnesota means clouded water (Minne, water, and sota, somewhat clouded), and Neill, on the authority of Rev. Gideon H. Pond, poetically translated this to mean skytinted. The river at its stages of flood becomes whitishly turbid. An illustration of the meaning of the word has been told by Mrs. Moses N. Adams, the widow of the venerable missionary of the Dakotas. She states that at various times the Dakota women explained it to her by dropping a little milk into water and calling the whitishly clouded water "Minne sota." This name was proposed by General H. H. Sibley and Hon. Morgan L. Martin, of Wisconsin, in the years 1846 to 1848, as the name of the new territory, which thus followed the example of Wisconsin in adopting the title of a large stream within its borders.

During the next few years after the selection of the territorial name Minnesota, it displaced the name of St. Peter as applied in common usage by the white people to the river, whose euphonious ancient Dakota title will continue to be borne by the river and the state probably long after the Dakota language shall cease to be spoken.

The Chippewa name for the stream, Ash-kiibogi-sibi, "The River of the Green Leaf, ' ' is now nearly forgotten, and the French name St. Pierre is known only by historians.

The picturesque river which gave our commonwealth its name had always been an important feature in the geography and history of this northwest country.

The geologist reads in the deep erosion of this valley, and in its continuance to Lake Traverse, which outflows to Lake Winnipeg and Hudson bay, the story of a mighty river, the outlet of a vast ancient lake covering the Red river region in the closing part of the Glacial period. What use, if any, the primitive men of that time made of this majestic stream, we know not.

Many and varied have been the scenes enacted upon its banks, scenes of thrilling adventure and glorious valor, as well as of happy merriment and tender love. It was for centuries the arena of many a sanguinary conflict, and the blood of the Iowas, Dakotas, Ojibways, and white men, often mingled freely with its flood.

For generations unknown the only craft its bosom bore was the canoe of the Indian. Then came the French traders, with their retinue of voyagers, who made our river an avenue of a great commerce in Indian goods and costly furs. For over a hundred years fleets of canoes and mackinaw boats, laden with Indian merchandise, plied constantly along the river's sinuous length. The sturdy voyagers, however, left to history but a scant record of their adventurous life. A brave and hardy race were they, inured to every peril and hardship, yet ever content and happy; and long did the wooded bluffs of the Minnesota echo with the songs of old France.

The first white men known to have navigated the Minnesota were Le Sueur and his party of miners, who entered its mouth in a felucca and two row boats on September 20, 1700, and reached the mouth of the Blue Earth on the thirtieth of the same month. The next spring he carried with him down the river a boat-load of blue or green shale which he had dug from the bluffs of the Blue Earth, in mistake for copper ore. Much more profitable, doubtless, he found the boat-load of beaver and other Indian furs, which he took with him at the same time. This is the first recorded instance of freight transportation on the Minnesota river.

In the winter of 1819-20, a deputation of Lord Selkirk's Scotch colony, who had settled near the site of Winnipeg, traveled through Minnesota to Prairie du Chien, a journey of about a thousand miles, to purchase seed wheat. On April 15, 1820, they started back in three Mackinaw boats loaded with 200 bushels of wheat, 100 bushels of oats, and 30 bushels of peas. During the month of May they ascended the Minnesota from its mouth to its source, and, dragging their loaded boats over the portage on rollers, descended the Red river to their homes, which they reached early in June.

The Mackinaw or keel boats used on the river in those days were open vessels of from twenty to fifty feet in length by four to ten feet in width, and capable of carrying from two to eight tons burden.

They were propelled by either oars or poles as the exigencies of the river might require. The crew usually comprised from five to nine men. One acted as steersman, and, in poling, the others, ranging themselves in order upon a plank laid lengthwise of the boat on each side, would push the boat ahead; and as each, in rotation, reached the stern, he would pick up his pole and start again at the prow. Their progress in ascending the river would be from five to fifteen miles per day, depending upon the stage of the water and the number of rapids they had to climb.

Dr. Thomas S. Williamson, the noted missionary to the Indians, in describing his first journey up the valley of the Minnesota, in June, 1835, gives an interesting account of how he shipped his wife and children and his fellow helpers, Mr. and Mrs. A. G. Huggins, with their goods, on one of these boats, which was nine days in making the trip from Fort Snelling to Traverse des Sioux.

In the correspondence of Mrs. S. R. Riggs, the wife of another famous missionary to the Sioux, is found a vivid picture of a Mackinaw boat, belonging to the old Indian trader, Philander Prescott, in which she ascended the Minnesota in September, 1837. It was about forty feet long by eight feet wide and capable of carrying about five tons. It was manned by a crew of five persons, one to steer, and two on each side to furnish the motive power. Oars were used as far as to the Little Rapids, about three miles above Carver, and thence to Traverse'des Sioux poles were employed. The journey consumed five days.

Illustrative of the size and capacity of some of the canoes used by the traders, we find George A. McLeod in April, 1853, bringing down from Las qui Parle to Traverse des Sioux forty bushels of potatoes, besides a crew of five men, in a single canoe twenty-five feet long by forty-four inches wide, hollowed out of a huge Cottonwood tree.

The first steamboat to enter the Minnesota river was the Virginia on May 10, 1823. She was not a large vessel, being only 118 feet long by 22 feet wide, and she only ascended as far as Mendota and Fort Snelling, which during the period between the years 1820 and 1848 were about the only points of importance in the territory now embraced within our state. Hence all the

Except for these landings at its mouth, and save that in 1842 a small steamer with a party of excursionists on board ascended it as far as the old Indian village near Shakopee, no real attempt was made to navigate the Minnesota with steamboats until 1850. Prior to this time it was not seriously thought that the river was navigable to any great distance for any larger craft than a keel boat, and the demonstration to the contrary, then witnessed, has made that year notable in the history of the state.

On June 28, 1850, the Anthony Wayne, which had just arrived at St. Paul with a pleasure party from St. Louis, agreed to take all passengers for $225 as far up the Minnesota as navigation was possible. They reached the foot of the rapids near Carver, the captain decided not to continue the passage, turned the steamboat homeward. Emulous of the Wayne's achievement, the Nominee, a rival boat, arranged another excursion July 12, ascended the Minnesota, passing the formidable rapids, placing her shingle three miles higher up the river. The Wayne, not to be outdone, on July 18 with a third excursion party, ascended the river two or three miles below the present city of Mankato. The success of these boats incited the Harris' line to advertise a big excursion on the Yankee, and that steamer reached a point on the Minnesota river a little above the present village of Judson, in Blue Earth county.

The steamer Excelsior, in the summer of 1851, conveyed the treaty commissioners, their attendants and supplies to Traverse des Sioux, and later the Benjamin Franklin No. 1 ascended the river with a load of St. Paul's excursionists to nitness the progress of the famous treaty. In the fall the Uncle Toby conveyed to Travers des Sioux the first load of Indian goods under the new treaty.

The springing up of embryo towns in the Minnesota Valley stimulated steamboat transportation, and during the early season of 1852, the steamboat Tiger made three trips to Mankato. The midsummer rains having restored the navigable condition of the river, the Black Hawk was chartered in July for three trips to Mankato. She also made during the season two trips to Babcock's Landing, opposite the present site of St. Peter, and one to Traverse des Sioux. The Jenny Lind and Enterprise were also engaged in the traffic.

waters of the Sioux Reservation and the erection in its vicinity of Ft. Ridgely. The necessity thus created, of transporting to such a distance up the river the large quantity of supplies required annually by both soldier and Indian, gave an impetus for years to the steamboat traffic of the Minnesota.

The West Newton, Capt. D. S. Harris, secured the contract to convey the troops with their baggage from Fort Snelling to the new post. She was a small packet, 150 feet long and of 300 tons burden, and had been bought the summer before by the Harris brothers to compete with the Nominee in the Mississippi river trade. She left Ft. Snelling on Wednesday, the twentyseventh of April, 1853, having on board two companies of the Sixth U. S. Regiment, in command of Captains Dana and Monroe. To help carry baggage, she had two barges in tow. The Tiger had also departed from St. Paul on the twenty-fifth, and the Clarion on the twenty-sixth, each with a couple of barges in tow, heavily loaded with supplies for the new fort and the agencies. The West Newton, being the swiftest boat, passed the Clarion at Henderson, and the Tiger near the Big Cottonwood, and thence to the site of the new fort (Ft. Ridgely) at the mouth of Little Rock creek, was the first steamer to disturb the waters of our sky-tinted river.

The Minnesota this year remained navigable all summer, and a number of boats ascended it to Ft. Ridgely and the Lower Sioux Agency, while others went to Mankato and other points. The passenger travel, as well as the freight trade, was excellent.

The winter of 1853-1854 was mild and open; the river broke up early without the usual freshet. Owing to the success of the prior season, the boatmen had great expectations. They were, however, doomed to disappointment. Capt. Samuel Humbertson, who owned the stern wheel steamboat, Clarion, had sold it and purchased a fine new boat, 170 feet long with thirty-eight staterooms, which he called the Minnesota Belle. May 3, with a large load of immigrants and freight, he started up the Minnesota. His new boat failed to climb the Little Rapids, near Carver, and he had to abandon the trip. A rainfall a few days later swelled the river, and enabled the Black Hawk to reach Traverse des Sioux. The Iola and Montello, during the summer, ran fairly regular trips between Little Rapids and Traverse des Sioux supplementing the Black Hawk, Humboldt and other boats plying below the rapids.

Large keel boats, denominated barges, propelled after the ancient method by a crew of men with poles, became common on the river this year. Andrew G. Myrick placed two of these barges on the river in charge of the Russell boys. These vessels were from 50 to 60 feet long, 10 to 12 feet wide, and with sides 4 to 5 feet high, along the top of which was fastened a plank walk, for the use of the pole men. A small low cabin for the cook was built in the stern, and during foul weather a big tarpaulin was spread over the goods. A full crew consisted of a captain, who also acted as steersman, ten to a dozen pole men, and a cook. With a fair stage of water the usual speed up stream was twelve to fourteen miles a day, but if sandbars or rapids interfered a mile or two would be a hard day's journey. Down stream, however, they would travel much faster. Most of the supplies for Ft. Ridgely and the Sioux Agencies, as well as for all up river towns, had to be transported this year in such barges.

The snowfall in the winter of 1954-1855 was again light, consequently the Minesota continued low during the following spring. Louis Robert, having the contract this year to deliver the Sioux annuities, took them up to the agency late in October in the Globe, of which Edwin Bell was then captain. Within two miles of the landing the boat struck on a rock, and the goods had to be unloaded on the river bank. While Captains Robert and Bell were gone to carry the Indian money, amounting to $90,000 in gold, to Ft. Ridgely, the Indians, who were gathered in force to divide the provisions, carelessly set fire to the dry grass, which was quickly communicated to the pile of goods, and most of them, including fifty kegs of powder, were destroyed.

Of his experiences, Capt. Edwin Bell had said: "In 1855 I had command of the steamer Globe, making trips on the Minnesota river, and in the early fall of that year we carried supplies to the Sioux at Redwood Agency. The Indians would come down the river several miles to meet the boat. They were like a lot of children, and when the steamboat approached they would shout, 'Nitonka Pata-wata washta,' meaning 'Your big fire-canoe is good. ' They would then cut across the bend, yelling until we reached the landing.

"In the fall of that year, 1855, their supplies were late, when I received orders from Agent Murphy to turn over to the Indians twelve barrels of pork, and twelve barerls of flour. As soon as we landed, we rolled the supplies on shore. I was informed that the Indians were in a starving condition. It was amusing to see five or six of them rolling a barrel of pork up the bank, when two of our deck hands would do the work in half the time.

"A young Indian girl stood at the end of the gang plank, wringing her hands and looking toward the boat, exclaiming 'Sunka sanieha, ' meaning 'They have my dog.' The cabin boy told me the cook had coaxed the dog on board and hid it. I could speak the language so as to be understood, and I motioned to the girl and said, 'Niye kuwa,' meaning 'Come here.' She came on board, and I told the cook to bring the dog to me.

When the dog came, she caught it in her arms, exclaiming, 'Sunka wasta, ' meaning 'Good dog.' She then ran on shore and up the hill. It seemed to me that white people took advantage of the Indian when they could, even steamboat cooks.

"When the flour and pork were on level ground, the barrel heads were knocked in, and the pork was cut in small strips and thrown in a pile. Two hundred squaws then formed a circle, and several Indians handed the pieces of pork to the squaws until the pile was disposed of. The flour was placed in tin pans, each squaw receiving a panful.

"Later, in the same season, we had an unfortunate trip. The boat was loaded deep. Luckily Agent Murphy and Capt. Louis Robert were on board. We had in the cabin of the boat ninety thousand dollars in gold. About three miles below the agency, we ran on a large boulder. After much effort, we got the boat afloat. Major Murphy gave orders to land the goods, so that they might be hauled to the agency. We landed and unloaded, covering the goods with tarpaulins. There were about fifty kegs of powder with the goods. While we were unloading, the agent sent for a team to take Captain Robert and himself, with the gold, to the agency. Then we started down the river. We had gone only a few miles, when we discovered a dense smoke, caused by a prairie fire. The smoke was rolling toward the pile of goods, which we had left in charge of two men. When we reached the ferry at Red Bank, a man on horseback motioned us to land, and told us that the goods we left were all burned up and the powder exploded. This was a sad blow to the Indians.

"The following is a list of the steamboats running on the Minnesota river, during high water, in the year 1855 and later-. Clarion, Captain Humberson; Globe, Capt. Edwin Bell; Time and Tide, Capt. Nelson Robert; Jeannett Roberts, Capt. Charles Timmens; Mollie Moler, Captain Houghton; Minnesota, Captain Hays; and the Prank Steel and Favorite, both side-wheel steamers. These boats were drawn off when the water got low; and when the railroad paralleled the river, all boats quit running. "On the sixteenth day of December, 1895, I called on Governor Ramsey again, to talk over old times, forty-five years after my first call. What changes have taken place since then ! When I started to leave, I thought I would see how much the governor remembered of the Sioux language. I said, 'Governor, nitonka tepee, washta.' 'What did you say, captain?' asked the governor. I replied, 'Nitonka tepee, washta,' 'Why, captain,' said he, 'that means, my house is large and good;' and, with a wink, ' Captain, let 's have a nip. ' Of course we nipped, and said ' Ho ! ' All old settlers will know the meaning of the Sioux exclamation, 'Ho!' " abundant supply of water in the river next spring. The navigation of the Minnesota for the season of 1856 was opened on April 10 by the Reveille, a stern-wheel packet, in command of Capt. R. M. Spencer. Four days later, the Globe, with Nelson Robert as captain, departed from St. Paul for the same river, and she was followed the next day by the H. S. Allen.

The Reveille was considered a fast traveler, and as an instance of her speed it is recorded that on her second trip of this year she left St. Paul at 2 p. m. on Thursday, April 17, with 132 passengers and a full load of freight, and arrived at Mankato by Saturday; and that leaving the latter place at 5 a. m. the next day, she reached St. Paul by 8 p. m. that evening, after having made twenty-four landings on the way.

On May 5, the Reveille landed at Mankato a company of settlers numbering two or three hundred, known as the Mapleton Colony; and the following Saturday (May 10) the H. T. Yeatman landed at South Bend a company of Welsh settlers from Ohio, numbering 121 souls. The Yeatman was a large stern-wheel boat, about the largest that ascended the Minnesota, and this was her first trip. She continued in the trade only a few weeks, while the water was high. Her captain was Samuel G. Cabbell. Regular trips were made this year by several boats to Ft. Ridgely and the Lower Sioux Agency, and some ascended to the Upper Agency, at the mouth of the Yellow Medicine river.

The time table of Louis Robert's fine packet, the Time and Tide, issued for this season, shows the distance from St. Paul to Yellow Medicine to be 446 miles. To an old settler who actually traveled on a Minnesota river steamboat in those early days, the idea of a time table may seem rather amusing; for if there was anything more uncertain as to its coming and going, or more void of any idea of regularity than a steamboat the old time traveler never heard of it. Now stopping in some forest glen for wood, now tangled in the overhanging boughs of a tree with one or both smoke-stacks demolished, now fast for hours on some sandbar, and now tied up to a tree to repair the damage done by some snag, while the passengers sat on the bank telling stories, or went hunting, or feasted on the luscious wild strawberries or juicy plums which grew abundantly in the valley, were common occurrences in steamboat travel. Many a pioneer remembers the Time and Tide, and how its jolly captain, Louis Robert, would sing out with sonorous voice, when the boat was about to start, "All aboard! Time and Tide waits for no man," and then add, with a sly twinkle in his eye, "and only a few minutes for a woman." Though we of today may think such method of travel tedious, yet it had many pleasant features, and to the people of that time, unaccustomed to the "flyers" and "fast mails" of today, it seemed quite satisfactory.

The Minnesota river trade was unusually brisk in 1857 owing to a good stage of water. Two new boats entered this year, the Frank Steele, a side-wheel packet, owned by Capt. W. F. Davidson, and the Jeannette Robert, a large stern-wheel packet, owned by Capt. Louis Robert. The total trips made during the season was 292, of which the Antelope made 105.

The winter of 1857-1858 proved very mild, and the Minnesota river broke up unusually early and was kept in good navigable condition during the season. The Freighter was the only new boat to engage in the trade this year. There were 179 arrivals at Mankato from points above as well as below the former, though did not exceed twenty-five or thirty. The total number of trips was 394, the Antelope again heading the list with 201 to her credit.

In 1859, the river broke up early after a mild winter, and the Freighter arrived at Mankato, the first boat, on March 27, having left St. Paul two days before. An abundant rainfall kept the river in good navigable condition its entire length through most of the season. The Favorite, an excellent side-wheel packet of good size, built expressly for the Minnesota trade by Commodore Davidson, entered as a new boat this spring.

As the water was quite high in the upper Minnesota, Capt. John B. Davis, of the Freighter, conceived the idea of crossing his boat over from the Minnesota to Big Stone lake and thence to the Red river, and accordingly, about the last of June he attempted the feat. Whether the crew found too much whiskey at New Ulm or the boat found too little water on the divide, authorities differ, but all agree that the captain and his crew came home in a canoe about the last of July, passing Mankato on the twentyfifth of the month, having left his steamboat in dry dock near the Dakota line. The Freighter was a small, flat-bottomed, squarebowed boat. The Indians pillaged her of everything but the hull, and that, half buried in the sand about ten miles below Big Stone lake, remained visible for twenty or thirty years. The captain always claimed that if he had started a month earlier his attempt would have been successful.

The navigation on the Minnesota in 1860, owing to the low water, was mostly confined to the little Antelope, in her trips to Shakopee and Chaska. Of 250 arrivals at St. Paul she had to her credit 198. The new boat Albany, of very light draught, also the Eolian, which had been raised from the bottom of Lake Pepin, where she had lain since the spring of 1858, and the Little Dorrit were put into the trade instead of the Frank Steele, the Time and Tide and the Favorite, which came up as far as St. Peter for a trip or two. The Jeanette Robert managed to get up as far as Mankato a few times, and during a small freshet in July, made one trip to the Sioux Agency.

The spring of 1861 opened with a big flood in the Minnesota. The first boat, the Albany, left St. Paul on March 30, and arrived at Mankato April 1. She was officered by J. V. Webber, captain (who was now the owner, having purchased her from the Davidson company in March), Warren Goulden, first clerk, and Moses Gates, engineer. It was claimed by the older Indians and traders that the upper Minnesota was higher this spring than it had been since 1821. In April the Jeanette Robert ascended farther up the river by two miles than any steamboat had ever done before, and might easily have accomplished what the Freighter attempted and failed to do in 1859, to wit, pass over into the Red river, if she had tried ; for the two rivers were united by their high flood between lakes Big Stone and Traverse.

This season the Minnesota Packet Company, of which Capt. Orrin Smith was president, put two first class boats, the City Belle and Fanny Harris, into the river to compete with the Davidson and Robert lines. The Fanny Harris, on her first trip, which occurred during the second week of April, went to Ft. Ridgely, and brought down Major (afterwards General) Thomas W. Sherman and his battery to quell the southern rebellion, which had just started. With her also went the Favorite, and brought down Major (afterwards General) John C. Pemberton, with his command of eighty soldiers, the most of whom being southern men, were much in sympathy with their seceding brethren.

The barges of Captain Cleveland were kept busy in the traffic between Mankato and points below. The first shipment of wheat in bulk from the Minnesota was made in June of this year, 1861, on one of these barges. It comprised 4,000 bushels, and was taken direct to La Crosse. Heretofore it had been shipped in sacks. Wheat had now become the principal export of the valley. During the earlier years all the freight traffic on the river had been imported, but by this time the export of trains had grown to be an important item. With so many Indians in the valley the shipment of furs, which at first had been about the only export of the country, still continued valuable ; but furs, because of their small bulk, cut but little figure in the boating business. This year the value of the furs from the Sioux agencies was $48,416; and from the Winnebago country, $11,600.

From this time there was a gradual reduction in river traffic. In 1866 the St. Paul and Sioux City railroad reached Belle Plaine, and connections were there made with boats for points higher up the river. In October, 1868, Mankato was reached, and in 1871 the Northwestern railway reached New Ulm, which practically ended the navigation of the Minnesota river.

In 1868 the Pioneer was chartered by D. L. Bigham in the spring, loaded with lumber at St. Paul, and the trip to the Redwood Falls landing successfully made.

In 1869 the business men of New Ulm bought the Otter for $3,000. This boat had a capacity of some 3,000 bushels of wheat. Trips were made between Mankato and New Ulm several times each week, and a number of trips were made to Redwood county.

Later the St. Anthony, a St. Croix lumber boat, brought lumber to D. L. Bigham. Bringing lumber to the upper Minnesota was a hazardous proceding in those days, and the lumber was sometimes scattered along the river banks from Carver to New Ulm.

The Tiger continued to ply the river, and once in a while made a record run. It ia recorded that on May 14, 1870, the Tiger made the trip from the Redwood Falls landing to Mankato in thirteen and a half hours.

The Osceola, a small boat, owned by Mark D. Flowers and Captain Hawkins, ascended the Minnesota as far as Redwood once in 1872, twice in 1873 and once in 1874, the water having been low and navigation difficult.

In 1875 a large warehouse was built at the landing on the Minnesota, called Riverside, by a company, for the purpose of providing storage, and to give an outlet by the river for the wheat crop, of which 60,000 bushels were brought and stored during the next fall and winter. In the spring of 1876 two side-wheel steamboats arrived at Riverside, laden with lumber, and took out the wheat in store and a large amount from Redwood and private parties. To warehouse men, and to Daniels & Son, who had opened a general store and built a hotel, the transportation scheme seemed solved, but it proved only a case of inflated hopes. In a few days it was learned that the boats were stranded on a sandbar at the mouth of the Blue Earth river, and the parties who shipped the wheat were called on to furnish sacks and men to transfer the grain to the railroad. This practically put an end to the Riverside and steamboat transportation scheme. The warehouse and hotel were removed to Redwood Falls and used in building an elevator and hotel there.

Capt. Leroy Newton made a further effort to utilize the river. He took a large barge and rigged a wheel at the stern, which was propelled by an ordinary eight-horse thresher power. This, however, proved unsuccessful, though it was of some help to reach New Ulm, which was the end of his run.

and Wayman X came up the river ; and ten years later one trip was made by the Alvira. For another ten years no steamboat was seen on the Minnesota until, taking advantage of a freshet in April, 1897, Captain E. W. Durant of Stillwater, ran his boat, the Henrietta, a stern-wheel vessel 170 feet long with forty staterooms, on an excursion to Henderson, St. Peter and Mankato. (Compiled from articles in the collections of the Minnesota Historical Society.)