Who is peter skene ogden

Ironically, both parties were trespassing on Mexican territory. Fearful of additional desertion and losses, and also to avoid possible diplomatic repercussions, Ogden gathered the remainder of his brigade and retraced his steps to Flathead Post.

Undoubtedly, had Ogden not been forced to withdraw, his journals would have provided the earliest and most complete account of what became the Utah Territory. Ogden indicates that at this spring he had his first view of the Great Salt Lake; whether this meant his first view during this expedition or his first time ever is uncertain.

There is no book-length biography of Ogden. The two best sources on his career as a trapper and explorer are his own works: Edwin E. Rich, ed. Davies, ed. Phillips, Fred M. All rights reserved. Spurning a legal career, in Ogden won a clerkship with the North West Company NWC and became a fiercely loyal, even brutal, partisan of the firm—at the time embroiled in a bitter contest with the London-based Hudson's Bay Company HBC for control of the vast trapping grounds south and west of Hudson Bay.

Already bilingual in English and French, he quickly acquired Native languages as well. His violent bullying of opponents, however, made the short, but burly Ogden notorious. In , after being implicated in the death of an Indian trapper, Ogden was sent farther west, across the continental divide to Spokane House on the Columbia River.

Only after sailing to London to plead his own case was he grudgingly granted admission into the new HBC. Ogden quickly matured from his unpromising beginning as a young hellion—"humorous, honest, eccentric, law-defying Peter Ogden's major importance to Oregon history is his contribution to geographic knowledge gained as chief trader in charge of the six consecutive Snake Country Brigades that operated out of Fort Vancouver between and The purpose of these far-ranging expeditions was twofold: first to trap out the streams of the vaguely defined Snake Country of the intermountain West, creating a "fur desert" to discourage American trappers from continuing west toward the Columbia, and second to explore the rivers and mountains of the vast, unknown region.

Although Ogden's first brigade ended in near disaster, owing to the belligerence of American fur-traders he encountered and the defection of many of his own men to the Yankees, his trappers became the first non-Indians to sight Great Salt Lake. Subsequent expeditions yielded high profits for the company, as well as much more raw data for cartographers in London.

Ogden's second, third, and fourth forays thoroughly traced the drainage systems of the Snake River Plain, southwestern Oregon and northern-most California, and central and southeastern Oregon. Because the route of the brigade was misinterpreted for many years, only recently has Ogden been credited not only with documenting Mount Shasta and the Klamath River but also with the first crossing of strategic Siskiyou Pass, which links California and Oregon, as well as with exploring the Rogue and Umpqua rivers.

During the fifth trip, Ogden traced the entirety of Nevada's Humboldt River and discovered other features of the northern Great Basin. On the boat trip back to Fort Vancouver, Ogden's journal for his longest trek was lost to the waters of the Columbia. Signing up enhances your TCE experience with the ability to save items to your personal reading list, and access the interactive map.

Peter Skene Ogden, fur trader, explorer born c. Peter Skene Ogden was one of the most important and turbulent personalities in the North American fur trade in the first half of the 19th century. He spent his first years in the fur trade as a servant —21 of the North West Company. In , Ogden began a series of trapping expeditions to the Snake River country. He did this, and more, for on six separate expeditions he obtained a better knowledge of the puzzling geography of this region than any other explorer.