Early Exploration and the Fur Trade in Colorado

The story of Colorado’s early days is etched with the ambition of empires and the rugged individualism of explorers and traders. Long before the establishment of official borders and settlements, the land now known as Colorado served as a vital crossroads in the contest for North American dominance. This narrative unfolds through the expeditions of Spanish conquistadors, the interactions with indigenous tribes, and the subsequent rise of the fur trade, painting a vivid picture of the region’s formative years.

Spain, a pioneering force in the colonization of the New World, extended its reach northward from Mexico, encountering Pueblo Indian villages and even beholding the majestic Grand Canyon of the Colorado River decades before the arrival of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Spain’s claim over New Mexico lacked defined boundaries, stretching as far north as its military could project influence, demanding periodic acknowledgment of Spanish authority from the Native American populations inhabiting the plains and mountains.

The exact timeline of initial Spanish encounters with the Ute Indians of Colorado remains somewhat ambiguous, but historical records suggest that the introduction of the horse to the Utes occurred as early as 1640. Recognizing the immense value of these animals for transportation and hunting, the Utes eagerly sought to acquire them. This desire fueled trade relationships, with Spanish traders venturing into remote Ute villages. The Utes, in turn, journeyed to New Mexican settlements like Taos, exchanging valuable goods such as buckskin, dried meats, furs, and enslaved individuals for horses, knives, and blankets. This exchange fostered a period of relatively peaceful interaction between the Spanish and Ute cultures during the 17th and early 18th centuries, which in turn facilitated Spanish exploration of the frontier north of New Mexico.

By the mid-18th century, rumors of abundant mineral wealth within the distant San Juan Mountains piqued the interest of officials in Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico. Motivated by these reports, Juan de Rivera led three expeditions into the southern Colorado Rockies between 1761 and 1765. His parties comprised soldiers, traders, and padres, who traveled north via Taos and the San Juan River, passing the La Plata Mountains en route to the Dolores River. They then followed the Uncompahgre River to its confluence with the Gunnison River. In 1765, near the Gunnison River, Rivera’s expedition encountered a group of Ute and other mountain Indians, establishing a brisk trade. However, the party returned to New Mexico disappointed, having discovered little in the way of precious metals. Despite this setback, these early expeditions marked significant milestones in the early exploration and the fur trade in Colorado, and New Mexican records indicate that veterans of the Rivera expeditions continued to trade with the northern Indians in subsequent years.

While Rivera sought gold and silver in southwest Colorado, Spain’s European rivals were actively expanding their influence in the New World. By the mid-18th century, England, including its American colonies, controlled substantial territory in North America and was making significant inroads into the Northwest Territories. France had established a strong presence in Canada and was exploring southward, posing a potential threat to Spanish holdings along the Gulf of Mexico. Simultaneously, Russia explored and claimed territory along the west coast, encompassing present-day Alaska, Washington, Oregon, and northern California. The European continent was embroiled in constant conflict and competition for empire, and North American territories became a stage for this historical drama. The early exploration and the fur trade in Colorado happened during a tumultuous time in the history of empires.

Fifteen years after Rivera’s initial expeditions, Fathers Francisco V. Dominguez and Silvestre Velez de Escalante embarked on a mission to discover a strategic communication route between Santa Fe and the missions of California. Believing that a westward route to California through Hopi territory was impractical due to Hopi hostility, they proposed a route through Ute country north of the Colorado River. In 1776, they commenced a five-month, 2,000-mile journey that traversed much of present-day western Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Although the Dominguez-Escalante mission did not achieve its primary objective, it significantly impacted the history and development of the Southwest. The explorers documented the geography, potential resources, and inhabitants of the vast inland region. The information, accounts, and maps generated by the expedition served as a valuable resource for future explorers and settlers, both New Mexicans and Americans, helping them to realize the padres’ vision. The route of the Escalante Trail, partly followed by the expedition, later became known as the Old Spanish Trail, which symbolized the larger contest of empires unfolding in the Southwest. In this era of imperial competition for land and commerce, exploration by merchants proved more effective than military force. The early exploration and the fur trade in Colorado was driven by the goals of empire.

By the dawn of the 19th century, Spain adopted a more protective stance toward the northern buffer of its Mexican holdings. Following the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the Spanish government reversed its earlier policy on Ute trade, prohibiting Americans from engaging in southwestern commerce. The Adams-Onis Treaty, ratified in 1819, established an official boundary between Spanish and American possessions in the Southwest. This agreement placed the southern plains, a significant portion of the western Rocky Mountains, and the entire western plateau region of the American Southwest under Spanish control. Despite the demarcation of this boundary, the Spanish made little effort to defend their northern borderlands. Although the treaty remained in effect until the American annexation of Mexican lands following the Mexican-American War in 1848, its stipulations were largely ignored by a new breed of frontier explorer: the fur trapper. The fur trappers, driven by the pursuit of beaver-rich streams rather than political boundaries, explored areas of western Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming as early as 1812.

The Green River region below the Wind River Range in Utah remained largely untapped by 1821. However, with Mexico’s independence that year, new diplomatic relations between the United States and Mexico opened the area to commercial exploitation. Responding to reports of abundant beaver streams in the Green River Valley and seeking to establish trade relations with the New Mexican government, American entrepreneurs arrived in Santa Fe in 1821, when New Mexico became a Mexican territory.

The earliest fur-trading expeditions originated in the New Mexican trading towns of Santa Fe and Taos, strategically located at the terminus of the newly established Santa Fe Trail. This convenient commercial link to U.S. and international markets facilitated the rapid growth of the fur trading business. William Becknell, the discoverer of the Santa Fe Trail, sought a more direct route to the beaver-rich Green River Valley, bypassing the Old Spanish Trail. In 1824, he led a party north from Taos to the Green River. In August of the same year, William Huddart, accompanied by 14 others, departed Taos, traveled north through the San Luis Valley, crossed the Cochetopa Hills via an ancient Ute and buffalo trail, and proceeded through the Gunnison and Uncompahgre Rivers into eastern Utah to reach the Green River. Around the same time, an expedition led by Kit Carson and Jason Lee followed the Old Spanish Trail along Escalante’s route and met Antoine Robidoux at the mouth of the Uinta River in Utah. By the end of 1824, at least six parties of trappers had journeyed north from Santa Fe or Taos, traversing southwestern Colorado into the Green River region via the Old Spanish Trail or the northern extension of that trail through the Cochetopa Pass route, also known as the Trappers’ Trail. These parties were led by individuals such as Huddart, Becknell, Carson, William Wolfskill, Etienne Provost, and Antoine Robidoux.

Throughout the mid-1820s, the fur brigades of Provost, Robidoux, and Becknell consistently exploited the resources of the Green River until larger trapping expeditions encroached upon this prime beaver habitat. These expeditions were directed by prominent figures in the fur trade, including William Ashley and John Jacob Astor. In the spring of 1824, Ashley dispatched his men to trap the region and arranged a rendezvous on Henry’s Fork of the Green River, where they would exchange their furs for trading goods he had brought from St. Louis, Missouri. The rendezvous system proved highly successful, leading to the proliferation of large-scale trapping operations. Major companies like the Hudson’s Bay Company and the American Fur Companies amassed significant profits from the fur trade. However, by 1826, many of the northern streams had been overexploited, and by the early 1830s, pelt prices began to decline.

The overexploitation of streams and the intense competition among the major fur companies prompted many trappers and traders to migrate south from the Green River Valley. Antoine Robidoux, who maintained a trading post in Taos, constructed a fort near present-day Delta, Colorado, in 1828. From this base, he dispatched trapping parties along the Colorado River as far south as the Gila River and on various streams closer to the fort.

Fort Uncompahgre, Colorado’s first and America’s second "general store" west of the Continental Divide, served as a trading and supply center for the "free trappers" in the area and was situated along the north-south trail used by trappers traveling north from New Mexican settlements. By the mid-1830s, Robidoux had established a direct supply line with his brother’s trade establishments in St. Louis and Fort Osage, Missouri. Bypassing the New Mexican settlements, the Robidoux brothers transported supplies directly through the Gunnison River via Cochetopa Pass to the Fort. Until its destruction in 1844, the fort also served as a supply base for immigrants heading west to California.

Despite the decline of the fur trade, Antoine Leroux, Kit Carson, Charles Autobees, Tom Tobin, and "Uncle Dick" Wootten, along with Robidoux, continued to trap the Gunnison River area in the Fort Robidoux district during the 1830s and 1840s. While these final efforts at independent trapping were underway, several mountain men who had established crucial trails for the fur business turned their attention to California, a distant source of commercial opportunity.

Although New Mexicans initiated commercial trade with California, Americans quickly recognized its potential. New Mexico’s Governor Antonio Armijo organized annual caravans to California in 1829 and 1830. Utilizing knowledge gained from fur trading explorations, Armijo and his party traveled up the Chama River from the New Mexican outpost at Abiquiu. They followed the traders’ trail to the San Juan River, which they traversed through parts of southwestern Colorado in the Four Corners region. They proceeded to the Colorado River and crossed the Old Spanish Trail to California.

Following closely behind Armijo were parties that included explorers such as William Wolfskill, Ewing Young, Kit Carson, and Tom "Peg-Leg" Smith. Although their routes sometimes differed significantly from those of the New Mexican traders, the general course led northwest from Taos to the Colorado River, traversing sections of southwestern Colorado and, via the Old Spanish Trail, onward to California. The Young-Wolfskill party of 1830-1831 is credited with completing the entire distance of the Old Spanish Trail, which became the standard caravan route for the Missouri-Santa Fe-Los Angeles trade. Due to the low snowfall in winter, many early immigrants and traders traveled over Cochetopa Pass to reach California. According to Antoine Leroux, two veteran trappers, William Pope and Isaac Slover, and eight members of their families, made the first such journey from Taos to the Pacific Coast by wagon in 1837.

In 1842, Marcus Whitman and J. B. Chiles, in separate journeys, made the return trip from California to Santa Fe, following the same route as the Slover-Pope party and the Old Spanish Trail through southwestern Colorado.

By the mid-1840s, relations between Mexico and the United States deteriorated. The Texas independence issue and the need to suppress any signs of rebellion in New Mexico and California led to trade restrictions for Americans along the Old Spanish Trail. The imposition of duties further hindered commercial traffic, and with a decreased demand for pelts in New York and London, the era of the trapper and trader in the Southwest drew to a close. However, the accomplishments of the trapper-explorer cannot be measured solely in commercial terms. These unofficial explorers charted the courses of the western rivers, discovered passes through the Rocky Mountains, paved the way for government explorations, and opened the door for European settlement by undermining Indian self-sufficiency. The first permanent foothold had been established in the rugged transmontane west. Although a few mountain man-fur trappers assisted the coming generation of Army explorers in the late 1840s and 1850s, much of the knowledge gained by the trappers had to be relearned and reinterpreted to meet the needs of a more modern generation. Antoine Leroux, who had repeatedly trapped and explored the present-day Gunnison country, was one of the trappers who shared his knowledge with Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri and others seeking information on the best rail route to the Pacific. Leroux later served as a guide on the Gunnison exploration party in 1853, an expedition that significantly influenced future events in southwest Colorado.