Fort Boise
| Fort Boise | |||
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| National Register of Historic Places | |||
 Fort Boise 1849 |
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| location | Canyon County , Idaho | ||
| Coordinates | 43 ° 49 '25.1 " N , 117 ° 1' 13.4" W | ||
| Built | 1834 | ||
| NRHP number | 74000736 | ||
| The NRHP added | 1974 | ||
Fort Boise was a trading post of the Hudson's Bay Company on the Snake River .
location
The fort was located on the east bank of the Snake River north of the confluence of the Boise River and south of the river island Heron Island in what is now Canyon County in the US state of Idaho, about 5 km northwest of the city of Parma and about 30 km northwest of County Seat Caldwell . The exact location of the fort is insufficiently known and can only be determined indirectly.
An area of approximately 6.6 km 2 around the former site of Fort Boise has been under conservation since 1956 as the Fort Boise Wildlife Management Area .
history
In the first half of the 19th century, the territorial affiliation of the Oregon Country , to which the area of today's Idaho belonged, was controversial. The area has been shared by the United States and the United Kingdom since the London Treaty of 1818 . So it happened that the British Hudson's Bay Company built Fort Boise in 1934 as a trading post for the fur trade , in order to create a counterweight to Fort Hall, which was built by the Americans in the same year about 500 km further upstream . The Hudson's Bay Company was able to prevail and took over in 1837 and Fort Hall and also in 1934 by Americans near the present city of Portland was founded in Fort William .
In 1838 Fort Boise was rebuilt a little further downstream. The new fort had a roughly square floor plan with a side length of about 30 m. It contained several buildings grouped around an inner courtyard and was surrounded by an approximately 5 m high palisade , which was later replaced by a wall made of air-dried mud bricks .
When settlers began moving west on the Oregon Trail in the 1840s, the fort's focus shifted from the fur trade to supplying the settlers. Fort Boise became an important rest stop for them, near which they crossed the Snake River at a ford and later also with a ferry.
With the Oregon Compromise of 1846, the area around Fort Boise fell to the USA, which made the situation increasingly difficult for the British Hudson's Bay Company. After a flood from the Snake River damaged much of the fort in 1853, it was only partially repaired. In 1854, when there were increased attacks by Indians in the area, Fort Boise was abandoned and fell into disrepair. The remaining remains probably fell victim to further floods and could no longer be found in the late 19th century.
In 1974 Fort Boise and Riverside Ferry Sites was added to the National Register of Historic Places . A memorial stone on the river bank commemorates the disappeared fort. On the memorial stone an arrow points to the Snake River, which indicates that at least part of the former location is suspected in the river. A reconstruction of the fort was built in neighboring Parma, where the Old Fort Boise Days take place every year.
Interior view from 1849
Memorial stone
Reconstruction in Parma
literature
- Annie Laurie Bird: Old Fort Boise . Ed .: Old Fort Boise Historical Society. Parma, Idaho 1971.
- Robert B. Roberts: Encyclopedia of Historic Forts: The Military, Pioneer, and Trading Posts of the United States . Macmillan, New York 1988, ISBN 0-02-926880-X , pp. 249 .
Web links
- Old Fort Boise In: Pathways of Pioneers , Idaho Public Television, idahoptv.org (American English).
- Oregon Trail: Fort Boise In: MrNussbaum.com (American English).
Individual evidence
- ↑ Location of Fort Boise, 1834-1855. (No longer available online.) In: history.idaho.gov. Idaho State Historical Society, formerly the original ; Retrieved January 6, 2018 (American English). ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ Fort Boise Wildlife Management Area. In: idfg.idaho.gov. Retrieved January 6, 2018 (American English).
- ^ Fort Boise and Riverside Ferry Sites. In: National Register Information System. National Park Service . Retrieved January 6, 2018 (American English).
- ↑ Old Fort Boise Days. Retrieved January 6, 2018 (American English).
