LA CROSSE COUNTY HISTORICAL SKETCHES


ers either by an open attack on the
passing craft or by some trick or de-
vice to lure them ashore. An Indian
would sometimes disguise himself
as a white man or compel a captive
to stand on the shore and beg for
help from the passing boat. When
the boat came ashore the Indians
would suddenly appear and attack
the boat. River traveling was espe-
cially dangerous during Indian up-
risings. During the Red Bird dis-
turbances a keel-boat on its return
from Fort Snelling was attacked by
a   band   of Winnebagoes    off the
mouth of the Bad Ax with a num-
ber of casualties. Besides the In-
dians the early boatmen were of-
ten called upon to face the more ser-
ious attacks of river pirates. These
pirate bands would    stop  passing
boats, murder their crews, and take
their cargoes. At last the plundering
of trade and danger to life became
so imminent that for the     mutual
protection and assistance, voyages
were usually made in convoys of
from two to twenty boats and as a
result the pirates were ultimately
driven from their haunts. However,
some of these pirates haunts had to
be dispersed by a summary appli-
cation of lynch law by the boatmen.
   This vigorous struggle with na-
ture, Indians and river pirates de-
veloped a distinct type of men-the
rivermen. The early rivermen were
a hardy, adventurous type, accus-
tomed to constant peril and priva-
tion and to severe and continuous
work, fearless in character, reckless
in habits and lax in morals. The
rude and carefree life in the open
held an attraction for these boatmen
who made the banks of the Missis-
sippi echo with their songs, boister-
ous jokes and jest. They were often
boisterously   rough    and   some-
times   criminally violent in   the
quiet river   towns,    but  usual-
ly  they   were    under   the   in-
fluence of careless merriment rather
than malice. At night, after "tying
up," they put their time in gaming,
carousing, story telling, boxing or
wrestling. Hard and fatiguing was
the life of the boatmen, yet it was
rare that any of them changed their
occupation. There was a charm in
the excesses, in the frolics and in
the fightings they anticipated at the
end of the voyage, which    cheered


them on to the levity and volubility
which were so conspicuous in their
characters.
   Just as there has been an evolu-
 tion in the type of boats and in the
 men who manned these boats, so
 there has been an evolution in the
 productions shipped on the upper
 Mississippi river. Most of the early
 shipments down the river consisted
 of furs from   the  northwest and
 Canada. In 1720 the exports from
 New Orleans were valued at $62,-
 000, of which 65 per cent consisted
 of skins from the upper country.
 Since the Illinois country, boch on
 the Illinois and Mississippi rivers,
 was settled by pioneers from French
 Canada by 1720,     the  shipments
 down the river included other arti-
 cles than the fruits of the chase;
 agricultural products were shipped
 by the Mississippi for use on the
 Gulf coast, which did not produce
 enough food for its support during
 the first half century of the colony's
 existence. In 1763, $80,000 worth
 of deer skins and $4,000 worth of
 tallow were shipped down the Mis-
 sissippi from upper Louisiana, and
 by 1804 the annual value of the
 fur  trade   of  upper   Louisiana
 amounted to $203,750. After the
 exploitation of the upper Mississippi
 for its furs there was really little
 transportation on this part of the
 Mississippi before the era of the
 steamboat. Taking the period 1822
 to 1826 as a basis, the following
 would be about the proportion of the
 traffic enjoyed by the several dis-
 tricts constituting the great valley:
 Ohio basis, 49; lower Mississippi,
 42; and upper Mississippi, 9. The
 little commerce on the upper Missis-
 sippi was  confined  principally to
 supplying the miners in the Galena
 lead mines, opened in 1826, and the
 government forts, as well as the
 transportation of lead to St. Louis.


 BIBLIOGRAPHY:-Saxon, Lyle, Father Mis-
sissippi, 1927; Lanman, Charles, Summer in the
Wilderness, 1847; Gould, E. W., Fifty Years on
the Mississippi, 1889; Dunbar, Seymour, A His-
tory of Travel in America, 1915; Usher, Ellis B.,
Wisconsin, 1914; Glazier, Willard, Down the
Great River, 1890; Gale, George, Upper Missis-
sippi, 1867; Mitchell, S. Augustus, Illinois in
1837; Merrick, George B., Old Times on the
Upper Mississippi, 1909; Mrs. Van Cleve, Three
Score Years and Ten, 1888; Walker, C. B., The
Mississippi Valley, 1881.