John Charles Fremont and the exploration of the American West.

• Author: Kreyche, Gerald F.
• Position: USA Yesterday - Biography

ONE OF THE NEARLY forgotten men who helped make Manifest Destiny a reality in the 19th-century American West was John Charles Fremont. Throughout his time on Earth, he alternately was regarded as a hero and a goat. a braggart and a humble man. His life began hi scandal and poverty, but he acquired fame mad fortune, only to lose both--though not until he had experienced an incredible existence of adventure and service to the fledgling nation.

A friend of powerful people and illiterate mountain men and Indians, he was a paradox of gentility and wilderness-toughness. As an explorer, general, politician, idealist, and man of action, Fremont's legacy deserves renewed recognition.

Fremont was born in Savannah, Ga., in 1813, the illegitimate son of Anne Beverley Whiting. She ran away from a pressured marriage of convenience to elderly Major John Pryor and fell in love with a Frenchman named Jean Charles Fremon, who contemporary research suggests was a small-time politician from Quebec, Canada. Fremon possessed a number of skills, and he taught French at the esteemed William and Mary College and later at an exclusive school in Richmond, Va. He engaged in a series of secret trysts with Whiting and, when rumors of her infidelity turned into public facts, Fremon was forced to resign. Following an open confrontation with Pryor, the couple ran away together, eventually winding up in Savannah, where Charles was born. Although Anne's family credentials went back to the American Revolution, she was virtually ostracized by the class-conscious southern society. She didn't marry Fremon until Pryor died. The Fremons moved to Nashville. Tenn., where the infant Charles narrowly missed death from a stray bullet during a duel--"an affair of honor" between future Pres. Andrew Jackson and the brother of politician Thomas Hart Benton.

After this, the family moved to Norfolk, Va., and, with the death of Pryor, Jean and Anne were married by a Catholic priest. Jean died in 1838, and Anne, now the mother of three children, moved to Charleston, S.C., where the widow's family fortune changed--at least in regard to the young John Charles Fremon.

The teenager John found it easy to make friends from all walks of life, who couldn't help but be charmed by the handsome youth whose inchoate talents were becoming obvious. His luck and personality were such that nearly everyone he met wanted to sponsor him to higher things. At an early age, he got a job clerking at a law firm and the owner generously helped John take studies at a first rate prep school, after which he entered the College of Charleston. A good linguist, John combined a background in the classics with strong interests in mathematics astronomy, and engineering. On the verge of graduation, however, he lost interest in school and was ousted from the college. (Later in life, he returned to get his degree.)

He obtained a teaching position, and good fortune found him invited to a series of breakfast meetings with Joel Poinsett, at that time U.S. Ambassador to Mexico. It is ironic that the latter is remembered mostly for bringing iron the U.S. some colorful Mexican plants that became known as pointsettias. In fact, Poinsett, a confidant of presidents, was instrumental in winning the Seminole Wars and was the founder of the Institute for Promotion of Science.

These tete-a-tetes, to which others who also showed promise were invited, opened the door to Fremon's career opportunities. Poinsett helped Fremon secure a job teaching mathematics to sailors aboard the Navy ship, Natchez, which made a two-year voyage around South America. Upon Fremon's return, Poinsett helped him obtain a position connected with two survey trips to wilderness areas led by a West Point captain. The latter took place in Cherokee country, acquainting Fremon with that "civilized" tribe. A prodigious worker and a fast learner. Fremon gained valuable field experience and fell in love with the wilderness. Meanwhile, Poinsett became Secretary of War and exercised even more influence on Fremon's future.

Fremon's next break came when he received a second lieutenant's commission in the Army's Corps of Topographical Engineers, an elite group of highly educated scientists, and he became an assistant to the world-famous scientist-cartographer Joseph Nicollet. A French Legion of Honor winner, Nicollet was assigned to survey the area between Ft. Snelling on the Mississippi River and what today is Pipestone National Monument in southwestern Minnesota.

Fremon was an all-around "gofer," but also a substantial help to Nicollet in producing an excellent map of that area. (Mention should be made that when Job became an adult he added an accent mark over the "e" in his name as well as me letter "t" to end it. Henceforth, he was known as John Charles Fremont.)

Through his connection with Nicollet, John met many famous movers and shakers, including Benton, the senior senator from Missouri. The latter's passion was to serve as an apostle for opening up the American West, so that the incipient western movement would make this a two-ocean country. St. Louis already was the jumping-off point for the fur trade and mountain men, as, earlier, explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark made that vicinity their point of departure for their expedition to the Pacific Northwest.

When Fremont met the Senator, he was introduced to the politician's 15-year-old daughter, Jessie. The two fell in love and a scant two years later eloped. Fremont was 28, but the 17-year-old was mature beyond her years and, like her father, had an iron will. She became a gifted writer as well. The elopement was carried off with the help of Sen. J.J. Crittenden's wife. Besides making other arrangements in secret, she obtained a Catholic priest to perform the clandestine ceremony.

Jessie, a favorite of her father and a great help to him in his office, infuriated the Senator with her marriage, but, being a realist, he resolved to make the most of the situation and use his son-in-law to further his own dreams of westward expansion. Mrs. Benton was no less miffed by her daughter's elopement, as the Senator's wife had aspirations of her daughter becoming the wife of a president.

Although Fremont already was well-known in Washington, the alliance with the Senator gave him further prominence, and his career was riding high. Indeed, together with Nicollet, Fremont participated in a consultation with Pres Martin Van Buren.

A second expedition with Nicollet seasoned the young Fremont in map-making and survey work, and in gathering botanical specimens. He was ready to go out on his own and was given the assignment to survey the Platte River that empties into the Missouri River at Omaha, Neb., and travel as far as the Sweetwater River in Wyoming. The Platte often was described as a mile wide, an inch deep, too thin to plow, and too thick to drink The Sweetwater obtained its name because it was fresh and not alkaline.

By 1842, the Oregon Trail had opened up and beckoned would-be settlers to rich farmlands. This emigration had been made possible by the discovery of South Pass in south-central Wyoming, which permitted wagon travel and, hence, families to cross the Continental Divide. Geographical and topological details about this part of the country were urgently needed as westward fever caught the nation.

Fremont gathered his supplies which included all sorts of scientific equipment and a rubber boat made especially for the expedition. The latter proved very useful in conveying...