the frontiersman who came back from the
dead for revenge
[Music]
the year was 1822 but in the missouri
republican newspaper was an ad requiring
100 enterprising young men to trap
beaver along the missouri river for a
period of up to three years it was a new
company who would soon be known as the
Rocky Mountain Fur Company one of the
men to apply was Hugh glass a 40 year
old frontiersman from Pennsylvania his
later newspaper accounts are to be
believed he had already led a colorful
life
having been a pirate as well as having
lived for a number of years with the
pony Indian tribe glasses career got off
to an eventual start with the Rocky
Mountain Fur Company soon after he
joined them on his first trip his route
was attacked by the semi-nomadic era
carrot tribe the attack killed ten
trappers and injured 14 others glass was
one of the wounded having been shot in
the leg this event was of more
significance than was first realized as
it resulted in the very first Indian War
west of the Missouri glass was not badly
wounded and after a brief recuperation
at Fort Kiowa which is located in what
is now South Dakota he set out in early
September 1823 on a trapping expedition
to the Yellowstone River the terrain in
the area was rugged consisting of
rolling hills Plains ravines and large
patches of grassland the following
account of what happened next is drawn
from newspaper reports as glass never
formally recorded what actually happened
to him on this ill-fated expedition and
though there was no doubt that there was
some embellishment to the story it's
mostly known to be true on the way to
the Yellowstone River area while hunting
for food near the Grand River glass
disturbed a female grizzly bear and her
two cubs the bear savagely attacked
glass probably out of a protective
maternal instinct glass and the other
man managed to kill the bear but glass
was left badly mauled with a broken leg
and cuts that were so deep they exposed
his ribs almost tore off his scalp and
ripped the flesh on his back
the other members of the expedition were
convinced that glass would not live for
long
despite this the group dragged glass
along on a litter for two days but then
the group came to the conclusion that
glass was not going to make it they
decided to leave glass behind and the
leader of the expedition asked for
volunteers to stay behind with glass in
order to give him a decent Christian
burial to fellow trappers John s
Fitzgerald and a man identified as
bridges volunteered to stay behind
probably enticed by the eighty dollar
bonus the company offered them for doing
so as the others left the two horridly
started to dig glasses grave knowing
they were deep inside hostile Native
American territory a short time later
glass and the two men were attacked by
an arrow current raiding party in the
ensuing skirmish Fitzgerald and bridges
grabbed all the equipment and took
flight in the confusion the air acara
ignored glass and chased after the other
two none of them would return for him
another version of the story was that
after five days of waiting for glass to
die the two men lost patience and just
gather up all the equipment and left
either way glass found himself alone in
the South Dakota wilderness with no
supplies or weapons all he had were the
clothes he was wearing and a bearskin
hide glass quickly realized his only
chance of survival was to get to the
nearest settlement but that was Fort
Kiowa which was over 200 miles away
glass bound his broken leg the best he
could and started to stumble and crawl
south using a local predominant landmark
called Thunder Butte which was a 2700
foot high steep sided Hill as a
navigation aid meanwhile Fitzgerald and
bridges had caught up with the main
trapping party and reported that glass
was now dead
having passed away due to his wounds in
the first week glass did everything he
could do to survive eating berries
insects and snakes along the way his
progress was slow and it looked like he
would never make it to the fort alive
but then by luck he came upon a pack of
wolves devouring a buffalo calf they had
just killed glass waited patiently in
hiding until the Wolves had had their
fill and moved on glass managed to then
scavenge a sizable amount of buffalo
meat
this allowed him to set up camp and
spend a few days resting and
recuperating it is said in order to
prevent gangrene in his wounds glass
allowed maggots to eat the dead infected
flesh with rest and food glass recovered
sufficiently enough to continue his
journey south at a much faster rate than
before on reaching the Missouri River
there are two main differing versions of
what happened next
he either managed to get a simple hide
boat off some friendly Lakota or he
himself managed to build a crude raft
alone either way he then floated
downstream reaching Fort Kiowa by
mid-october six weeks after first
setting off glass was lucky he was
traveling when he did as the
temperatures were still quite mild
another month would see the onset of
winter and his chances of surviving such
a journey in these conditions would have
been minimal once he recovered glass
went to the local trading post and as a
member of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company
he could get credit there there he
purchased a rifle shot powder and set
out to find the two men who he had felt
betrayed him he eventually found bridges
at a camp at the mouth of the Bighorn
River but glass seeing how repentant a
19 year old was forgave him concluding
that Fitzgerald was the real villain
glass had found out that Fitzgerald had
joined the army he attract all the way
to Fort Atkinson and what is now
Nebraska where Fitzgerald was stationed
once there he confronted him but was
forced to spare his life as an army
captain intervened telling glass that
killing a United States soldier was a
capital offense and he would be hunted
down and hanged if he did the captain
arranged for glasses rifle to be
returned to him which Fitzgerald still
had and he was to be given $300
compensation for the hardships he had
suffered glass left the fort and for the
next decade worked in the region as both
a trapper and a hunter in 1833 he is
thought to have died and after that date
he was never seen or heard from again
and thus was the beginning of the legend
that was Hugh glass subscribe for more
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