William Sublette

William Lewis Sublette (born September 21, 1799 in Stanford , Kentucky , † July 23, 1845 in Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania ) was an American fur trader , mountain man and trapper . According to him, this is Sublette County in Wyoming named.

Life

William Sublette was born in Stanford Kentucky on September 21, 1799 and moved with his family to St. Charles , Missouri , in 1817 . In 1823 he and his brother Milton became a member of William Henry Ashley's Rocky Mountain Fur Company in St. Louis . He took part in Ashley's first expedition to the Rocky Mountains with Jim Bridger , Jedediah Smith , David Jackson and other Mountain Men . In 1824 he explored the north-west of the Rocky Mountains with Smith, in the area of ​​today's Teton Range , including the Jackson Hole , which he named after his partner David Jackson. In 1826 he explored the geysers of Yellowstone Park with Jackson .

Along with Jedediah Smith and David Jackson, Sublette acquired William Ashley's shares in the Rocky Mountain Fur Company during the rendezvous of 1826. Sublette was briefly interested in the Santa Fe trade, but returned to the Rocky Mountains after Smith's death in 1831 and attended the 1832 rendezvous at Pierre's Hole. He was wounded while fighting with Indians. The news of Sublette's car trip to the rendezvous at South Pass and back spread through the newspapers. Until then, the Rocky Mountains were considered an insurmountable obstacle for cars. From then on, small and later large groups of settlers followed what later became known as the Oregon Trail to the west.

Together with his partner Robert Campbell, Sublette founded a new trading company. The company was later sold to the American Fur Company .

William Sublette died in Pittsburgh on July 23, 1845 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ John D. Unruh, Jr .: The Plains Across. The Overland Emigrants and the Trans-Mississippi West, 1840-60 . University of Illinois Press, 1993 (first printed in 1979), p. 29