Community History

Picture circa 1957

Many of you have commented on the unique names of our streets that capture the feeling of Hidden Hills.

 Who was Annie Oakley?

Whether it be a pistol, rifle, or shotgun, the legendary markswoman Annie Oakley was masterful with them all. Dubbed "Little Sure Shot" (she was 5 feet tall) her sharp shooting in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show won her many awards and captivated audiences far and wide. Her name remains synonymous with firearms and entertainment.

Born in a log cabin on the Ohio frontier, Annie Oakley began shooting game at age nine to support her family. She quickly proved to be a dead shot and word spread so much that at age sixteen, Annie went to Cincinnati to enter a shooting contest with Frank E. Butler (1850-1926), an accomplished marksman who performed in vaudeville. Annie won the match by one point and she won Frank Butler's heart as well. Some time later they were married and she became his assistant in his traveling shooting act.

Frank recognized that Annie was far more talented and relinquished the limelight to her, becoming her assistant and personal manager. In 1885 they joined Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, run by the legendary frontiersman and showman Buffalo Bill Cody.For seventeen years Annie Oakley was the Wild West Show's star attraction with her marvelous shooting feats. At 90 feet Annie could shoot a dime tossed in midair. In one day with a .22 rifle she shot 4,472 of 5,000 glass balls tossed in midair. With the thin edge of a playing card facing her at 90 feet, Annie could hit the card and puncture it with five or six more shots as it settled to the ground. It was from this that free tickets with holes punched in them came to be called "Annie Oakleys." In a celebrated event while touring in Europe, Wilhelm, Crown Prince of Germany, invited Annie to shoot a cigarette held in his own lips. She accomplished this challenge, as always effortlessly.

In this period Annie Oakley was easily recognizable by the numerous shooting medals that adorned her chest.In a train wreck in 1901, Annie suffered a spinal injury that required five operations and even left her partially paralyzed for a while. Although she recovered very well, Annie toured less frequently during the latter part of her career. Nonetheless, her shooting expertise did not wane and she continued to set records. In a shooting contest in Pinehurst, N.C. in 1922, sixty-two-year-old Annie hit 100 clay targets straight from the 16 yard mark.Annie Oakley died of pernicious anemia on Nov. 3, 1926, in Greenville, Ohio, at the age of sixty-six. A legend in her own time, the remarkable life of Annie Oakley would be celebrated in the 1946 Herbert and Dorothy Fields musical Annie Get Your Gun.

Who was Jim Bridger?

He was the first non-indigenous man to behold the beauty of the Great Salt Lake and on that same trip he saw geysers but when he boasted of their existence, no one believed him.

Born on St. Patricks Day in 1804, Jim Bridger was a mans man. Known for his outstanding skills as a beaver trapper, he was also highly skilled in tracking, hunting, and perhaps most importantly, for guiding prospectors and settlers through many different rugged terrains. Many said he had a photographic memory when it came to land; if he visited a place once, he knew the land forever. In fact, he was the first one to discover and trek across what was then appropriately referred to as Bridgers Pass, and is now called Interstate 80.

Also known as Old Gabe and Blanket Chief, Colonel Bridger was not only fluent in English, Spanish, and French, but he also spoke six Native American languages as well. He was the youngest member of a Missouri expedition lead by, ironically, General Ashley. Sometime between 1824 and the 1830s, that group located permanently along the Blacks Fork. There, Mr. Bridger settled down and began another chapter of his life; store owner. His two-acre parcel featured a safe haven for cattle, his personal residence and a store that was completely stocked with groceries, liquor, tobacco, ammunition, and other staples.

As he eyesight began failing rapidly, Mr. Bridger moved to a farm in Kansas City where he died at the age of 77 in 1881. He was buried in Kansas for 25 years until 1904 when Major General Dodge, the Union Pacific engineer, arranged to have his remains moved Mt. Washington Cemetery where an impressive statue was erected to honor his life accomplishments. Major Dodge felt immense gratitude to Colonel Bridger as he had helped him plan the Union Pacific railway route out west, making them the first. Jim Bridger was remembered for his incredible skills as one of the great frontiersmen, hunters, and trackers but friends always exclaimed about his storytelling skills and sharp sense of humor.

          Who was Bill Cody?

Buffalo Bill Cody has been glamorized and criticized for over 100 years because of his role as a government scout, buffalo hunter, and Wild West Show promoter.

William Cody became Buffalo Bill when he proved his marksmanship by killing 69 buffalo to his opponent's 46, in a contest with Billy Comstock, a renown scout and guide. The contest took eight hours and netted Buffalo Bill $500 in prize money.

Preserving the Western Way of Life
During these years and his years as a Pony Express Rider, Buffalo Bill became very familiar with the West and sought to show the world what the western way of life was like.

Early in the 1880's, Buffalo Bill began to carry out a cherished idea. He gathered some of the remaining elements of the Western frontier and began to exhibit this unique and fading way of life in the Eastern United States and Europe.

With his exhibition, "Wild West," he toured America and Europe for tweny years. Thousands of people experienced the talents and traditions of legendary Wild West figures like Sitting Bull, Annie Oakley and Calamity Jane. The Wild West Show was considered a circus, by some, for a ring was set up inside a tent, and within it were demonstrations of horse-riding, cattle-roping and mock battles between cowboys and Indians. Buffalo Bill made a fortune from his show, which he invested in lands in Nebraska and what is now Cody, Wyoming.

The Wild West Show performed in Scott County several times. The very last Wild West Show was held in Davenport, Iowa in 1913. Four years later, William "Buffalo Bill" Cody died and was buried in Park of the Red Rocks on Lookout Mountain near Golden, Colorado. 

  Who Was Jed Smith?

Jedediah Strong Smith entered California's San Bernardino Valley to become the first American to cross the southwestern part of the American continent. Smith was not your typical mountain man. He was tall, silent and never used tobacco or profanity, never boasted. Reared a Methodist, Smith was a devout Christian who always remained a gentleman even in the wildest frontier company. He was cool under pressure, with strength and leadership ability that was grounded in his faith. 

As he explored the areas of the West, Smith filled his journal describing the wonders of God's creation. When he faced hardship or peril, he looked to Scripture for strength. In 1823 he was almost killed by a grizzly bear. The bear came out of the thicket and mauled Smith violently, throwing him to the ground, smashing his ribs and literally ripping off his scalp. His head  was in the bear's mouth and it chewed off his ear, but somehow, perhaps playing dead, Smith survived. The scalp was hanging on to his head by an ear. As he waited for his men to come with help, he found comfort in the 23rd Psalm. The men found him in such condition and were horrified. Calmly, Smith instructed Jim Clyman to sew the hanging flesh back on. Clyman did the best he could, but thought nothing could be done for the severed ear. Smith insisted that he try. According to Clyman, "I put my needle sticking it through and through and over and over laying the lacerated parts together as nice as I could with my hands." Within a few days, Smith was again leading his expedition forward.

In 1826 Smith led an expedition to California in search of beaver. The farther west he went, the more difficult the journey. Even the horses died, and the men had to cross the Mohave Indian country on foot. Whether it was Indians, hunger, or thirst, Smith faced hardship by turning to the Lord in prayer. Smith was not only the first American to travel by land to California, but the first to cross the Great Basin and the first (in early 1828) to reach Oregon by going up the great central valley of California, then west through the foggy winter mountains of present Trinity and Humboldt Counties, then up the coast to Oregon. It was Jedediah Smith, who, first named Mount Lassen "Mount Joseph." Jed Smith, on his second trip to California in the spring of 1828, was looking for Rio San Buenaventura supposedly connecting the Great Salt Lake with the Pacific, and caught sight of majestic Mount Lassen, the first white man to see it. It was he who first gave Lassen Peak the name "Mount Joseph," a name it bore for a generation. It officially was christened "Mount Saint Joseph" in 1841 by a U. S. Government exploration party. Why the name Joseph? When Jed's men, half starved from the Mojave Desert, first reached California, it was a kindly padre named Joseph who welcomed them in Christian mercy, succored them with sustenance and blessing. Harrison Rogers accompanied Jedediah Smith and wrote of Jos Snchez, the genial padre, mayordomo of San Gabriel Mission, who welcomed and fed the ragged trappers after their near starvation crossing the Mojave. He wrote: Old Father Snchez has been the greatest friend that I ever met with in all my travels. He is worthy of being called a Christian as he possesses charity in the highest degree, and a friend to the poor and distressed. I ever shall hold him as a man of God, taking us in when in distress, feeding and clothing us, and may God prosper him and all such men.In the 1840s, a Danish immigrant named Peter Lassen explored the Lassen area and was recognized as the primary Yankee discoverer and trailblazer opening up northern California to later English-speaking settlement, preparing the way for Bidwell, Reading, Ide, and others. Smith's Mount Joseph was to become, in due time, the peak we know today as "Mount Lassen." For more on Jedediah's trek through northern California in the spring of 1828, go here. In his lifetime, Smith would travel more extensively in unknown territory than any other single mountain man. He traveled in the central Rockies, then down to Arizona, across the Mojave Desert and into California making him the first American to travel overland to California through the southwest. In a most amazing journey, he also came back from California across the desert of the Great Basin. The heat became so unbearable Smith and his men had to bury themselves in sand to keep cool. Smith's letters home to his relatives reflect his faith. In one he wrote that Jesus is always entreating us with His love, and uses every means except compulsion to bring us to Him, that we may have life more abundantly. An 1832 eulogy in the Illinois Monthly called Jedediah Smith "a man whom none could approach without respect, and whom none could know without esteem." 

Who was Joseph Walker?

Joseph Rutherford Walker was the second white man to cross the Sierra Nevada and the first to do it in an east-to-west direction. When he left California the following year, he made a southerly crossing over a relatively low Sierra pass that still bears his name. While crossing the Sierra Nevada in 1833 Walker and his party were the first white men to gaze upon the Yosemite Valley. They were also the first to see the huge redwood trees that became known as "Sequoia gigantea."

Walker was born in Tennessee in 1798 and raised on the Missouri frontier. In 1832 he joined a party of 110 hunters and trappers under the command of B.L.E. de Bonneville. Bonneville was a French-born U.S. Army officer who was detached from active service and ordered to lead a military intelligence gathering expedition through the far west. Bonneville's adventures during the escapade were chronicled colorfully by Washington Irving in the Adventures of Captain Bonneville, U.S.A., published in 1837. The captain's two most important accomplishments were the leading of wagons through the South Pass and sending Walker to spy on the Mexicans in California.

  Walker's detachment consisted of 70 men, including Zenas Leonard, his second-in-command, clerk, and journal keeper. Walker's orders were to find a way to the Pacific through the "unknown country to the west." Walker did not follow Jedediah Smith's route to California, however. Instead of striking south from the WasatchMountains, Walker led his men on a westward arc around the north shores of the Great Salt Lake to the headwaters of the Humboldt River, then known as "Mary's River."

 Walker followed the Humboldt River to its sink, where he was confronted by 800-900 Paiute Indians. When warning shots failed to disperse the braves, Walker's men fired into them, killing 39. The following year, having made a southerly exit from the Sierra Nevada, Walker's group was again confronted by hostile Paiutes, and 14 more braves were slain by Walker's muskets. These battles may have contributed to the endemic hostilities of the southern route.

Historians are not sure where Walker and his men crested the Sierra Nevada, and a great deal of speculation has been indulged in. The most likely ascent was along a route that led to and over the Sierra Nevada in the vicinity of the TiogaPass. This conclusion follows from the fact that after cresting the Sierra the expedition worked its way west along the divide between the Tuolumne and Merced rivers. This in turn is supported by Leonard's description of the rugged terrain they crossed, the sighting of the Yosemite from the northern rim of the valley, and their observations of the redwoods in the lower foothills. Furthermore, according to Zenas Leonard's account of the journey, the ascent of the eastern Sierra Nevada was made relatively quickly once the expedition headed west into the range. It is steep and rugged but relatively short, and it could be climbed by men on horses in two to three days. It also is aligned with the trails over which Walker probably traveled that ultimately developed into the Tioga Road.  The only other thing that can be said with certainty is that Walker's descent from the Sierra crest was longer and more difficult than the ascent. During the descent Walker lost 24 horses, 17 of which provided nourishment for his famished followers. They were traveling more or less blind. But their route had its rewards. "In two or three days," Leonard recorded, "we arrived at the brink of the mountain. This at first was a happy sight, but when we approached close, it seemed to be so near perpendicular that it would be folly to attempt a descent." Walker took out his spyglass and inspected the "plain" (i.e., valley) below. Leonard had no need of a spyglass. "On looking on the plain below with the naked eye," he wrote, "you have one of the most singular prospects in nature. From the great height of the mountain ... we found ... a beautiful plain stretched out toward the west until the horizon presents a barrier to the sight. From the spot where we stood to the plain beneath, must at least be a distance of three miles. As it is almost perpendicular, a person cannot look down without feeling as if he was wafted to and fro in the air, from the giddy height."

 Gazing at the grandeur of the valley, Walker considered descending into the plain below to make his way west from there. The descent was obviously too steep and precipitous, however. Men and horses would have to be lowered over two thousand feet by ropes. Working their way west from the rim of the Yosemite Valley, Walker and his men finally made their way into the foothills. There they came upon groves of sequoia gigantea, the huge redwood trees that are the largest plants on earth. "Big trees," they called them, recording another historic first.

 Emerging from the Sierra Nevada into the San JoaquinValley, Walker's party worked its way north by following the San JoaquinRiver. Walker eventually came to Yerba Buena and San FranciscoBay. This route is consistent with Walker's military orders, as the Mexicans staffed a presidio at Yerba Buena.

He then turned south and traveled down the Peninsula to the Santa ClaraValley, where he turned west and climbed over the Santa Cruz mountains. The expedition came out of the mountains on the coast near Point Ano Nuevo. Walker's expedition then made its way down the coast to another presidio at Monterey. His interest in coastal settlements is further evidence of the military character of his expedition.  The irony of Walker's group is that unlike the Smith and Pattie parties, who were entirely innocent but treated as hostile, the Mexicans welcomed Walker and his men warmly with open arms. There was considerable friction and rivalry between the Mexican civil officials at San Diego and the military dons at Monterey, however, and it occasionally ripened into rebellion.

Don Juan Bautista Alvarado, the military governor at Monterey, offered Walker a large land grant, which Walker politely refused, no doubt mindful of the touching irony of being offered the olive branch by the unwitting victim of his espionage. When Walker left Monterey, however, several of his men remained behind to become expatriate dons.

 Walker left Monterey to rendezvous with Bonneville in the Rocky Mountains on Feb. 14, 1834. He was disinclined to return the way he had come, however, so he and his group worked their way south along the eastern edge of the San JoaquinValley. Eventually Walker discovered a relatively low-lying pass (5,250 feet) through the mountains by ascending the Sierra Nevada up the gorge of the Kern River to LakeIsabella, then moving along the South Fork of the Kern River to the pass, which is located south of OwensPeak. From the pass the Walker party descended the eastern Sierra Nevada into the OwensValley. 

The pass through which Walker took his eastbound expedition is named for him. It can be found in KernCounty along California Highway 178 about 10 miles east of its intersection with Highway 14 near the town of lnyokern. 

 The adventures of Walker and his group were recorded by Zenas Leonard and published by him in 1839 as the Narrative of Zenas Leonard. Leonard later settled down as a fur trader and storekeeper in Missouri, but Walker continued his trips to and from California. In 1843 Walker led another expedition to California in company with Joseph Chiles, who had first entered California with the Bidwell party in 1841. The two men hoped to lead the first wagon train into California, and they selected Walker's Pass as the best way to crest the Sierra Nevada with wagons. The approach was too rugged, however, and the settlers were forced to abandon their wagons in the OwensValley before going into the mountains. The group traveled west through the Central Valley and wound up in southern Santa ClaraValley near the present city of Gilroy. 

Walker also served as a guide for Charles Fremont's second and third expeditions (1844-1846). During the third expedition in 1846 Walker was more than a scout, however. While Fremont parleyed with the Mexicans at Monterey, Walker was in charge of the main body of Fremont's small army, which had been left in the Santa ClaraValley. He was also with Fremont when the aggressive pathfinder assumed a defensive position at the top of Mt.Gavilan for the Hawk's Peak Incident, where Fremont all but dared Alvarado to come and get him. When the Mexican general approached Hawk's Peak with overwhelming force, Fremont and his men quietly slid down the backside of the mountain and headed back to the SacramentoValley where Fremont would help foment the Bear Flag Rebellion. After the Mexican War, Walker continued his expeditions, and he is regarded as an important explorer of the southwest. He died in 1876 in ContraCostaCounty, where he had spent the last 10 years of his life. On his tombstone is engraved his discovery of Yosemite.

   Who was John C. Fremont (1813-1890) ?

One of the most famous and popular of explorers, grew up the illegitimate child of a prominent woman of Virginia society, and a penniless French refugee. The circumstances of his birth made the young Fremont an ambitious man, a social climber. Throughout his career he would seek out the patronage of powerful men, first in Charleston, South Carolina, where he went to college, and later in Washington, D.C. His first important patron was diplomat Joel Poinsett, who obtained for Fremont his first assignment, helping the army survey the southern Appalachian mountains. Poinsett later helped organize the Corps of Topographical Engineers, a group of surveyors and mapmakers at the service of the army. Poinsett saw to it that Fremont was named to the Corps’ first major Western project, an expedition into the country between the upper Mississippi and Missouri Rivers in 1838. The leader of this expedition was Joseph Nicolett, who became Fremont’s mentor and taught him his trade.

Fremont’s next big conquest was to marry Jessie Benton, the daughter of the very influential senator from Missouri, Thomas Hart Benton (1782-1858). Benton, Democratic Party leader for over 30 years in the Senate, championed the expansionist movement, a political cause that became known as "Manifest Destiny." Basically the expansionists believed that the North American continent, from one end to the other, should belong to the citizens of the United States—and that getting those lands was the country’s destiny. This movement became a crusade for politicians like Benton, and in his new son-in-law, making a name for himself as a western topographer, he saw in Fremont a great political asset. Benton was soon pushing through Congress appropriations of money to be used for surveys of the Oregon Trail (1842), Oregon Territory (1844), and the Great Basin and Sierra Mountains to California (1845). Through his power and influence, Benton got Fremont the leadership of these expeditions. Although they seemed like routine surveying trips, making maps and describing the land, Fremont had the unofficial job of writing descriptions that would make the West, and western travel, appear as attractive as possible to Americans living east of the Mississippi. Although only adequate at the first job of making maps and surveying, Fremont proved to be a master promoter in his second job. With his wife Jessie’s help, Fremont’s written, published accounts of his expeditions became wildly popular with the public, and he became known as the "Pathfinder." Fremont’s expeditions, while not accomplishing a great deal scientifically, were very important in advancing the cause of Manifest Destiny. "The soil of all this country is excellent, admirably adapted to agricultural purposes, and would support a large population." (Fremont, 1843)

Senator Benton’s strong belief in westward expansion led him to change from being strongly for slavery, to being against it. Unfortunately his home state of Missouri was pro-slavery and he lost his bid for re-election in 1851. He spent his remaining years writing. Fremont’s later years were not as successful as his expeditions. Although he became wealthy when land he purchased in California struck gold, he lost it all through poor business judgment. He was an unsuccessful candidate for President in 1856 (even his father-in-law publicly sided against him), and during the Civil War he was stripped of his command by President Lincoln. The family eventually had to live off the publication earnings of wife Jessie. The Pathfinder died in 1890 a forgotten man.

   Who was "Kit" Carson?

    Who was Benjamin Bonneville?

Benjamin Bonneville was an explorer and military man. Born April 14, 1796 in Paris, France, Benjamin Bonneville moved to the United States in 1803, attended the United States Military Academy at West Point and was assigned to Fort Smith in the Arkansas Territory in 1821

Discrepancies are written about why but in 1832, Benjamin Bonneville took a leave of absence from the military and led an 110 men expedition into Wyoming Territory, funded partially by John Jacob Astor supposedly to trap and trade. 

The trapping expedition for furs went poorly but the expedition to explore new territory went great.    Benjamin Bonneville built a trading post on the Green River, the Walker expedition took Benjamin Bonneville to California as well as two trips to the Columbia River in Oregon Territory 

Benjamin Bonneville's journals were published by Washington Irving. Benjamin Bonneville Returned to active duty in the Army in 1835.  Benjamin Bonneville fought in the Mexican War and became a lieutenant colonel. In the 1850's Benjamin Bonneville received a command of a post in the Oregon Territory and was also active in the Civil War.

      Who was William Bent?

Following the Spanish and French explorations of the 1790s into what is now Colorado, various trading forts sprung up across Colorado's Eastern Plains. The most famous was Bent's Fort. William Bent established not one, but three forts along the Arkansas River, in what would become Colorado Territory. The original sites of Bent's forts have been excavated and well documented, one of which is now reconstructed and attracts tourists world wide.

William Bent, of French Canadian descent, and a fur trapper by trade, came west with his brother Charles, in the 1820s. At the age of twenty, William opened the territory's first stockade along the Arkansas River, near the mouth of Huerfano Creek. The Bent brothers expanded their trade to include Ceran St. Vrain of Mexico, and established the the Bent-St. Vrain trading empire in the southwest. While Charles Bent and Ceran St. Vrain opened numerous trading posts stretching from Wyoming, to Colorado, and New Mexico, William opened a second post, which would become a military fort, also on the Arkansas River, fourteen miles west of present day Las Animas.

Now known as Bent's Old Fort, it was constructed in early 1833. Famous traders and scoutsmen such as Kit Carson, Jim Bridger, Charles Autobees, Jim Baker, and Black Kettle, all passed through this historic post. The site became the most important trading post on the Santa Fe Trail between Independence, Missouri and Santa Fe, New Mexico. Following the Mexican War of 1847-1848, the government offered to buy the fort. When negotiations broke down, William Bent set explosives to blow up his fort in 1849. Some say he refused to let the fort be taken over, others say the fort held bad memories, including the death of his brother Charles, and his wife, Owl Woman.

In 1853, William Bent built his third and final fort down river on the Arkansas, again along the Santa Fe Trail, in the Big Timbers area.

Identified as Fort William, it was the first to receive a trading license under American rule. Still standing and a national historical site, it is now known as Fort Lyon. Despite the ever present Indian opposition, the fort was primarily a major supply service for the trappers, and Mexican trade, along the Santa Fe Trail, until 1864, when it became the headquarters for Colonel Chivington's massacre of the Indians at Sand Creek.

For over forty years, William Bent was known as the "Peace Keeper" with the Native Americans. A friend to the Indians, he married Owl Woman, daughter of Indian Chief Gray Thunder. Smallpox swept the Indian nation, killing half of the Cheyenne, including Owl Woman. Upon her death, Bent married her sister, Yellow Woman, as was the Indian custom. Bent encouraged rival tribes to make peace and work together with the white man. However, his son George, visiting his Cheyenne mother's people at Sand Creek, became an innocent bystander to the slaughter commanded by Colonel Chivington in 1864.

George Bent, wounded in the battle, recovered at the Fort Lyon Hospital, where is father William watched over him. George later returned to the Cheyenne people, and fought furiously against the white man, leading raids and causing terror across the Eastern Plains. William disowned his son George, who later attempted to murder his father. William Bent continued to negotiate for peace between the white man and the Indian, testifying before congressmen assembled at Fort Lyon in August of 1865, against the actions of Colonel Chivington at the Sand Creek battle.

William Bent died of pneumonia in 1869, still trading and seeking peace with the Indians and the encroaching white men. He was buried in the Las Animas Cemetery, the seat of Bent County, named for the great frontiersman.

Who was John Colter?

  Who was Thomas Fitzpatrick?

Thomas Fitzpatrick, one of eight children, was born in County Cavan, Ireland. Little is known about his early life, but by the time he was 17 he had arrived in the United States. In 1823 he accompanied William Ashley's fur trading expedition up the Missouri River, and he participated in the Arikara War that summer.

For the next 17 years Fitzpatrick and other trappers crisscrossed the Rocky Mountains and the central and northern plains searching for beaver. He worked for companies headed by Ashley and later by Jedediah Smith and others. In 1830 one company sold its business to Fitzpatrick, James Bridger, and three other trappers, who formed the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. Four years later the company was dissolved, although Fitzpatrick, Bridger, and Milton Sublette soon combined to continue trading. In 1836 the powerful American Fur Company forced them out of business, and Fitzpatrick became an employee of that organization.

That same year Fitzpatrick began his work as a guide; he led the Marcus Whitman and Samuel Parker missionary party west to the annual trappers' rendezvous in the mountains. In 1837 Fitzpatrick escorted Sir William Drummond Steward and artist Alfred Jacob Miller to the summer rendezvous. Four years later he led the Bidwell-Bartleson train to Ft. Hall and took a missionary party into country dominated by Flathead tribes. In 1843 Fitzpatrick led John C. Frémont's second expedition to California; he guided Col. Stephen W. Kearny's expedition to the Rocky Mountains in 1845. The next year, meeting Kearny's army marching to California, he guided it to Socorro in New Mexico, where he and Kearny met Kit Carson carrying dispatches to Washington, D.C. Kearny gave the messages to Fitzpatrick and sent him east. Then Kearny used Carson as guide to California. In Washington,

Fitzpatrick learned that he had been appointed agent for the tribes of the Upper Platte and Arkansas regions, so he returned west. The Native Americans knew and respected him, calling him Broken Hand or Bad Hand because of an injury he had received years earlier. For the next 8 years he worked with tribes such as the Arapahoe, Cheyenne, Shoshone, Sioux, Commanche, and Kiowa of the central plains. While serving as agent, Fitzpatrick married Margaret Poisal, and when he died in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 5, 1854, he left two small children, Andrew and Virginia.

Who was William Ashley?