Old Bill Williams, Mountain Man

By Alpheus Favour

Book Overview

Born during the American Revolution, Williams was a child of the early frontier. In his young manhood he became an itinerant preacher and appointed himself a missionary to the Osages, who soon converted him to their lifeway. The Osage girl he married died after bearing his two daughters. From this point on, Old Bill forsook civilization and made the wilderness his home. He was a master trapper and so identified himself in signing his name. He was one of the guides of the Sibley survey of the Santa Fe Trail in 1825 and some twenty years later was a guide with two different Fremont expeditions

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0806116986
• ISBN13: 9780806116983
• Release Date: March 1981
• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
• Length: 260 Pages
• Weight: 0.72 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.4" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Great book about a legendary mountain man.

My favorite book surrounding the history of the mountain men era was, up until this book, "Jedediah Smith and the Opening of the West. Dale Morgan's book is a classic by any standard and contains a detailed discussion of all the events which were coinciding with the actions and events of Jed's life. One of the minor complaints with his book is that at times you can loose track of where and what Jed is attempting. Alpheus Favour's book is presented in a similar fashion (although printed about 20 years earlier than Dale's book). Alpheus, however, condenses the surrounding history and brings Old Bill Williams more to the forefront. It's a wonderful account of Old Bill's life. He was one of the many unsung heroes of the West. In other books, you will find only scant descriptions of him. These books also seem to perpetuate without any new references the common misconceptions about Old Bill (blame for Fremont disaster, smallpox bio-warfare, etc.). These accusations are hard to verify and likewise, hard to reject. However, I think that Alpheus presents enough data to bring these accusations under further scrutiny and possibly promote the idea that these accusations be dropped. The life of the mountain man was not as PC as our "civilized" life today and we should not read the accounts of the mountain man through PC goggles. They fought and killed Native Americans and at the same time they lived with and intermarried with Native Americans. Their work as it were led to the near destruction of beaver and Buffalo yet their knowledge of the terrain was crucial for the passage of Americans to Oregon and California. In our eyes of today, yes we see that these men lived a bittersweet life. Old Bill was one the best and most restless. He was born in the foothills of North Carolina and died in the headwaters of Wannamaker Creek in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado. He was living proof that once the mountains enter your blood (Appalachian or Rockies), it is hard to get them out. Wandering spirits are never conquered.

Old Bill Williams

Although never quite reaching the pantheon of Mountain Men, Old Bill Williams spent most of his life among the fur-trapping greats (including Jed Smith, Kit Carson, Tom Fitzpatrick, and Joseph Walker), traveling throughout most of the Rocky Mountain West from 1825-1849. He considered himself a master trapper, though his solitary ways limited what was known about him. Alpheus Favour's book on Williams was written 70 years ago and is still the only book-length study of his life; it's doubtful it could be improved upon. Williams was born in North Carolina in 1787 but grew up near St. Louis. Unlike most Mountain Men he was educated and could read (a different source says he knew Greek and Latin, but Favour makes no mention of this) write, and keep accounts. A religious man, he first was an itinerant preacher and made an excursion to the Osage Indians to convert them, though they seem to have converted him. He lived and traded with them for a number of years, and then in 1825 served as an interpreter on the Sibley survey of the Santa Fe Trail. This was when his trapping days began and for the next two decades Williams trapped throughout the West, from the Yellowstone country to California to Taos, which might be considered his homebase, since it was the place he often returned to. He had a number of Indian wives and children by them, fought often with the Blackfeet, was a spectacle when drunk, went on horse-stealing expeditions, and cheated the Indians on occasion when trading with them. In other words, he was rather par-for-the-course as far as Mountain Man behavior went. His most controversial act occurred in 1848 when John Fremont hired Williams to guide him across the Southern Rockies on his fourth expedition, conducted to find a railroad route through the mountains. It was a foolhardy dead-of-winter expedition, which everyone, including Williams, tried to talk Fremont out of attempting, but Williams went anyway. Why is a good question, though no answers are forthcoming. The expedition was a disaster, with huge snows and sub-zero temperatures, and 11 men died before the expedition escaped the mountains. Fremont, of course, blamed Williams. The charge was that Williams deliberately misguided the group, hoping to come back later to claim abandoned supplies for himself. A second charge against Williams was that he engaged in cannibalism when starvation threatened the party. Favour dismisses both charges. Shortly after Fremont and the remaining men made it back to Taos, Williams was sent with another member of the expedition, Dr. Benjamin Kern, back to the mountains to retrieve equipment left there; on their return they were attacked by Utes and killed. Favour was a lawyer and a western enthusiast, and this was his only book (he also wrote a monograph on Arizona state laws). He has researched his subject deeply and writes with clarity and authority. He finds Williams appealing, but is not enamored by him. It's a good biography, a classic of the Old

Old Bill Williams, University of North Carolina, 1936

Thesis: William Sherley "Old Bill" Williams, was one of the greatest mountain men and was not responsible for the failure of Fremont's 4th expedition in 1848 to California. Content: After fighting in the Revolutionary War, Bill's father, Joseph Williams moved from the western mountains of North Carolina, across the Mississippi River to the area near St. Louis. There, Bill was raised near trading posts, becoming familiar with traders, mountain men and Indians, learning to live off of the land, hunt and trap. Early in adulthood he became a circuit preacher, becoming a self-appointed missionary to the near-by Osage tribe. The Osage, instead of being converted, did the converting and adopted Williams into the tribe where he married, and lived among them, as one of them. After his first wife died he and an old acquaintance, Paul Ballio, opened a trading post among the Osage. By the time this venture failed Williams had developed a reputation for understanding the native tribes, and more importantly, being trusted by them. He was recruited in 1825 to go on a government expedition to establish a trade route to Santa Fe from St. Louis. Arriving in Toas with the expedition, he was discharged from their services. Instead of returning to Missouri he stayed for many years in the Rocky Mountain west roaming from New Mexico as far north as what would become Idaho, Wyoming and Washington. During his time in the west he trapped and traded as a free trapper, never being employed by any of the fur companies of the period. Generally free-trappers worked in small groups through the trapping seasons of fall and early spring, coming to rendezvous in the summer, to sell their furs. Old Bill gained a reputation as a loner, earning the nickname of "Old Solitaire". He also worked from time to time leading trading expeditions to California and other destinations. As the fur trade became less lucrative Old Bill led trading expeditions more frequently. In August of 1845 John C. Fremont hired Old Bill to lead his Third Expedition to the Salt Lake country. In 1848 Fremont volunteered to locate a southerly route through the mountains for a railroad into California. Again, he hired Bill Williams to guide his expedition. On this trip, according to Favour, due to Fremont's ego and blind determination, of the thirty-two that entered the mountains that winter, only 21 came out alive. Most of the 11 dead either froze or starved. Those that survived were barely living when they walked out of the mountains. Shortly after surviving this debacle Old Bill was killed trying to retrieve goods abandoned on the expedition. He was 62. Fremont laid the blame for the failed expedition on Williams, who was dead by then and could not defend himself. Critique: Favour is a sympathetic biographer going as far as to call Old Bill Williams the greatest mountain man. His sources are recorded in copious footnotes, but his arguments sound nostalgic, and many are family remembra

Affable read of legendary mountain man

Alpheus Favour is both accommodating and forthright in his treatise of Bill Williams' life and times. Since Williams did not leave behind any diaries or journals himself, the author extensively researches through other pertinent documentations of the day to establish his whereabouts and accomplishments. Examples would be:Attempted preacher to the Osage Indians;Guide to the Sibley Santa Fe road survey;Trapper extraordinaire;Friend to several Indian tribes;With the 1833 Joseph Walker expedition to California;Horse stealing adventures;Indian battles;Guide to Fremont's third and fourth expeditions.A prominent figure of the early American West and oftentimes overlooked for his achievements.

One of the best of the fur trade books.

The greatest tribute paid to a book of history is to reprint it several times; to honor its scholarship, judgment, and lasting contribution. Few books merit that tribute more than this one. Updated information may conflict with some of the author's details and certain of his generalizations, yet this work stands virtually unchallenged as the only true and complete biography of William Sherely Williams. Favour, an amateur historian, died in 1939, three years after the publication of Old Bill Williams, the only book he ever wrote. Favour can be proud of his achievement which ranks with the best of the fur trade books.Williams was born in North Carolina in 1787, moved to the Missouri frontier, and began trapping while in his teens. He served in the War of 1812, was in Indian trader, an itinerant preacher, scout, explorer, and mountain man. Williams, as Favour points out, was the most noteworthy of the hundreds of mountain men in the Missouri River Country. Equally important is the revealing portrait of the mountain men and their lives. In Bill Williams, the author found those unique traits possessed by this singular group of men who led a young nation through uncharted lands to a rendezvous with the Pacific. Bill Williams' image was unlike that of the typical hero. He was a study in contrasts. Williams was tall and redheaded, dirty and disheveled, had a knowledge of Greek, Latin, and comparative religion, and ate primitive frontier food including raw calf legs. Physical strength, ability to endure thirst, scanty rations, and fatigue counted for little unless a mountain man also had determination, courage, and fortitude. Williams and a few others possessed all of these traits yet the majority of mountain men, including Williams, died of disease, hunger, Indians, or exposure.Williams emulated Indians in dress, deportment, speech, and conduct. If being taken for an Indian was the highest compliment a trapper could receive, it wasn't such for Old Bill Williams. Whether it was lifting a scalp, hunting buffalo, or stalking an enemy, Williams did it better than any Indian and was pround of his sobriquet - Master Trapper. Williams stood out from his contemporaries regardless of the method of comparison: bringing in the most fur, outfighting and outdrinking anyone, or simply living past his 61st birthday.Williams' six decades of life spanned the fur trade era and through his eyes the author presents that adventurous time with clarity and understanding. Williams traversed the West, battled the Ute, Apache, and Blackfeet, wandered the great mountains and parks of Arizona and Colorado, and blazed new trails. His horse stealing excursions were a legitimate enterprise by fur trappers' standards. He excelled in this field and stole hundreds of horses from California to Mexico, including horses owned by unfriendly Indians.As a guide to Fremont's fourth expedition, which sought a railroad route through the S