1869
Three leave Powell’s Grand Canyon expedition
Convinced they will have a better chance surviving the desert
than the raging rapids that lay ahead, three men leave John Wesley Powell’s
expedition through the Grand Canyon and scale the cliffs to the plateau above.
Though it turned out the men had made a serious mistake, they
can hardly be faulted for believing that Powell’s plan to float the brutal
rapids was suicidal. Powell, a one-armed Civil War veteran and self-trained
naturalist, had embarked on his daring descent of the mighty Colorado River
three months earlier. Accompanied by 11 men in four wooden boats, he led the
expedition through the Grand Canyon and over punishing rapids that many would
hesitate to run even with modern rafts.
The worst was yet to come. Near the lower end of the canyon, the
party heard the roar of giant rapids. Moving to shore, they explored on foot
and saw, in the words of one man, “the worst rapids yet.” Powell agreed,
writing that, “The billows are huge and I fear our boats could not ride
them…There is discontent in the camp tonight and I fear some of the party will
take to the mountains but hope not.”
The next day, three of Powell’s men did leave. Convinced that
the rapids were impassable, they decided to take their chances crossing the
harsh desert lands above the canyon rims. On this day in 1869, Seneca Howland,
O.G. Howland, and William H. Dunn said goodbye to Powell and the other men and
began the long climb up out of the Grand Canyon. The remaining members of the
party steeled themselves, climbed into boats, and pushed off into the wild
rapids.
Amazingly, all of them survived and the expedition emerged from
the canyon the next day. When he reached the nearest settlement, Powell learned
that the three men who left had been less fortunate–they encountered a war
party of Shivwit Indians and were killed. Ironically, the three murders were
initially seen as more newsworthy than Powell’s feat and the expedition gained
valuable publicity. When Powell embarked on his second trip through the Grand
Canyon in 1871, the publicity from the first trip had insured that the second
voyage was far better financed than the first.