Albert C. Peale Papers
Language: English
Date: 1874, 1877
Contributor: Peale, A. C. (Albert Charles), 1849-1914
Subject: Military service | Warfare | Wyoming--History | Colorado--History | Geology | Expeditions
Type: Text
Genre: Diaries
Extent: 2 volumes
Description: See the "Bound Volumes" section of this collection for two diaries: one from July to November 1874, and one from May to October of 1877. The 1874 diary documents the expedition along the various branches of the Gunnison River, describing the landscape, the requirements for negotiating the terrain, and the local tribes, likely the Ute. Includes lists of camp numbers and locations and names of pack animals. Contains various loose items: Notes, pressed leaves, and receipts. The 1877 diary was written primarily in western Wyoming. Begins with a description of Peale's journey from Philadelphia to Cheyenne, Wyoming by train, with stops at Chicago, Council Bluffs, Iowa and Omaha Nebraska. It then continues with daily entries recording events at each of the 72 camps made by the expedition, which are also indexed at the back of the volume by date and mileage. Includes reference to many Indian encounters. For example, on Tuesday June 7, 1877, one of the expedition members met a Shosoni woman who reported that there had been a fight between the whites and the Sioux. In addition, the expedition members saw many lodges of the Bannock along the Snake and Salt Rivers as well as other Indian camps along the ledges of Crow Creek, such as those above the ranch near Smith Fork where one of the boys spoke very good English as noted on June 29. Describes a number of encounters with Shoshoni, such as one in July when almost all of the Shosoni men asked for tobacco. On August 8, Peale reports that two teamsters were killed at the local agency by Bannocks. On the 23rd, he notes that in Montana Gibbon had had a fight with the Indians and lost 300 new guns, ammunition, artillery and commissary stores in Montana.
Collection: Albert C. Peale Papers Mss.SMs.Coll.5