Mclean County ND Archives Biographies.....Sears, Louis 1831 - 
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 July 17, 2008, 11:24 pm

Author: Unknown

LOUIS SEARS.

  Louis Sears was born in Montreal, Canada, Sept. 18, 1831. He came to Lockport,
New York, in 1851, via Kingston, and from Lockport to Hamilton in 1852. The same
year he went from Hamilton to St. Louis, taking the stage to Niagara Falls, the
steamer Buffalo to Toledo, thence by rail to Chicago, and canal to La Salle.
During the winter of 1853 he was at Vandalia, Ill. In 1854 he went to St. Louis
and was hired by Charles P. Choteau, of the American Fur Co. to go to Fort
Benton, Montana as boatpuller. On this trip there were two boats with eight or
nine men in each, and Jas. Kipp had charge of the boats. The pilot was a mulatto
named "Pelosche," who spoke French. Andrew Dawson was in charge at Fort Benton
when Sears arrived there. In the spring of 1855 he returned to St. Louis with
the mackinaw boats which the company sent back loaded with buffalo robes. Later
in the year he returned up the Missouri to Fort Union, this time for the
opposition company of Primeanx, Jos. Picotte & Booise. Honore Picotte, the uncle
of Joseph, furnished the capital for this enterprise. McKenzie was post trader
at Fort Union and for the American Fur Co. Edward Lambert was head carpenter
there. Sears soon gave up his job and left the post in company with Mitchelle.
They reached Fort Berthold in September, after a voyage of nine days in a
buffalo boat, and later in a wooden canoe, which they stole from two French
trappers, Carifelle and Vitepoche. At Ft. Berthold Sears hired out to the
opposition company in charge of John McBride. F. F. Gerard was at that time head
of the American Fur Co. post. During the spring of this year a son of Joseph
Picotte was just recovering from the small pox on the steam boat that came up
the river to trade for the opposition company. The Indians all along the river
caught the small pox from him, the Sioux, the Rees at Fort Clark, the
Grosventres at Fort Berthold, and the Assiniboines at Fort Union. During the
winter of 1855-6 Sears carried goods on a pack horse to the opposition trading
post at the Grosventre winter camp at the month of the Little Missouri, in
charge of Charles Malnouri. Sears recalls that an English nobleman, Sir George
Gore, wintered in the vicinity of the trading post. The Sioux had stolen all his
horses and plundered his wagons leaving him without supplies. McBride helped him
through the winter by furnishing him the necessary outfit and supplies. During
this winter Louis Lepage, a Creole, died at Fort Berthold. Sears speaks of the
very large number of dogs at Fort Berthold, which was made necessary by the lack
of horses there, occasioned by the Sioux raids among the Grosventres. A stranger
entering their village was liable to be attacked by a score of fierce curs. The
usual precaution taken by traders was to wrap up in an Indian robe or blanket,
and thus attired like one of the tribe they could pass the dogs without
difficulty. In the spring of 1850 he went down to Fort Clark with Mitchelle as
an employe of the opposition company. The Indians at this place disliked this
company very much because they had brought the small pox to them, and very
little trading could be carried on with them. In 1857 he returned to St. Louis
and later near Denver, Colorado, he spent four years hunting. In 1862 he joined
an emigrant wagon train of 100 wagons bound for Oregon. He remained in Oregon
and Washington fourteen years, leaving Oregon in 1876. He next located at the
Crow agency at the mouth of the Yellowstone, in 1877. In 1882 he was established
at Pine Ridge agency, S. D., moving to Poplar Creek, Montana, in 1801. In 1003
he moved to Elbowoods, N. D., where he now resides.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

COLLECTIONS OF THE State Historical Society OF NORTH DAKOTA
VOL. I

BEING FIRST ANNUAL REPORT OF THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF NORTH DAKOTA TO THE
GOVERNOR OF NORTH DAKOTA FOR YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1906.

BISMARCK, N. D.
TRIBUNE, STATE PRINTERS AND BINDERS 
1906


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