Dragoons Return from Expedition of the American West (24 AUG 1845)
The expedition departed Fort Leavenworth on May 18, 1845 with fifteen officers and approximately 250 soldiers of the 1st Dragoons. Historian Frank Schubert described the expedition as “two parts show of force and one part reconnaissance.” The primary mission was to emphasize the U.S. military presence in the region. First, the dragoons would travel up the Platte River, along which the Oregon Trail ran, and demonstrate their authority to the various Native American bands whose frequent tribal wars were endangering emigrants on the trail. They would then march southeast through Colorado and follow the Santa Fe Trail back to Kansas. This would place Kearny’s command close to Mexican territory and indicate to the Mexican government the U.S. Army’s ability to reach it.
The expedition’s secondary mission was general reconnaissance and mapping of the territory. Lt. John C. Frémont and Josiah Gregg had recently completed their maps of the Oregon and Santa Fe Trails, respectively. Kearny’s cartographer, Lt. William B. Franklin, was instead instructed to map the area between these two trails from Fort Laramie, Wyoming, to Bent’s Fort, Colorado. The 22-year-old Franklin had graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1843 before being assigned to the hydrographic survey of the Great Lakes with the Corps of Topographical Engineers.
In April 1845, Franklin was ordered from Washington, D.C., to meet Kearny at Fort Leavenworth. He arrived at the fort on May 22—four days after the dragoons departed. Franklin raced to catch up and reached the column on May 31. He then commenced to document his observations of the topography, weather, natural resources, and wildlife. Franklin took pains to describe the travelers met on the trail, the fortifications built by the various fur trading companies in the region, and the expedition’s encounters with local indigenous tribes who were deeply distrustful of the Army.
On June 30, the expedition reached South Pass before turning back toward Fort Laramie, then south to the fur trading posts at Fort St. Vrain and Bent’s Fort. The route allowed them to converse with western indigenous camps, which Franklin remarked was of great importance to Kearny, and provided Franklin the opportunity to observe the environment. Arriving at Bent’s Fort in southeastern Colorado on July 29, the dragoons continued their journey down the Arkansas River and along the Santa Fe Trail, finally returning to Fort Leavenworth on August 24.
The expedition had covered 2,200 miles in ninety-nine days. Kearny’s own report of the expedition was credited by historian Mendell Lee Taylor as having “vitally affected the development of this northwestern area.” Using the map previously drawn by Frémont, Franklin sketched the routes from Fort Leavenworth to the Platte River, from St. Vrain to Bent’s Fort, and east back to Leavenworth. Franklin’s map also included the “Grand River” west of Longs Peak, which was the name for the Colorado River at that time.
The map no doubt aided Kearny a year later on his march to seize New Mexico by way of Bent’s Fort (https://www.dvidshub.net/news/545743). Likewise, Franklin’s sketches and accompanying report of the expedition helped lay a foundation for successive mapping of the area and possibly supported the Army during its numerous clashes with indigenous tribes in the latter part of the nineteenth century.
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Article by Erin E. Thompson, USAICoE Staff Historian. New issues of This Week in MI History are published each week. To report story errors, ask questions, request previous articles, or be added to our distribution list, please contact: TR-ICoE-Command-Historian@army.mil.
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