William Bent’s revenge: dynamiting America’s biggest frontier fort in 1849 to spite government officials

Cholera Destroys Bent’s Fort Trading Empire

The reconstructed Bent’s Old Fort in southeastern Colorado stands as a monument to one of the American frontier’s most dramatic endings.

This massive adobe fortress, known as the “Castle of the Plains,” was once the most successful trading post in the West.

Visitors today can walk through the carefully rebuilt rooms and watch the 20-minute documentary film that tells the fort’s remarkable story.

But the original fort met a violent end in 1849 when its own owner, William Bent, packed it with explosives and blew it up rather than let the U. S. government take it. This wasn’t just a business dispute gone wrong.

It was the desperate act of a man who watched disease destroy everything he had built over 16 years, as a cholera epidemic wiped out half his Cheyenne trading partners and shattered the foundation of his frontier empire.

Gold Rush Travelers Spread Deadly Sickness West

Folks heading to California during the 1849 Gold Rush brought an invisible killer with them. Over 25,000 people traveled the Overland Trail, not knowing they carried cholera bacteria in their water.

Between 6,000 and 12,000 people died on the California, Mormon, and Oregon trails in just six years.

Travelers spread the disease by going to the bathroom near rivers like the Platte and washing dirty clothes in drinking water. The tiny bacteria stayed in water for long periods before making people sick.

Rivers Became Highways for Spreading Sickness

The Missouri and Platte Rivers turned into paths for cholera as white settlers moved along these waterways. Traders took the disease north along the Missouri to distant forts and trading spots.

Native Americans who drank from the dirty Platte River got sick and passed the disease to other tribes during meetings. The sickness also moved south from St.

Louis to New Orleans, creating a web of bad water that reached many frontier communities.

Summer Celebration Turned Tragic for Plains Tribes

In summer 1849, the yearly Kiowa Sun Dance became the starting point for a terrible disease outbreak.

Osage, Comanche, Southern Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Apache tribes came together for this important ceremony, not knowing about the danger.

The Kiowa later said this cholera outbreak was the worst thing they ever lived through, even worse than smallpox nine years earlier. Hundreds of Kiowa died, and many others killed themselves out of despair.

Cheyenne People Lost Half Their People in Weeks

The 1849 cholera outbreak hit the Cheyenne tribe hard, killing half their people, including William Bent’s mother-in-law, Tall Woman. By 1852, about two-thirds of the Southern Cheyennes had died.

Reports told of survivors too weak to bury hundreds of dead family members. Arapaho stories describe people who chose to end their lives rather than face cholera’s awful symptoms.

The disease moved through tribal communities so fast that it left survivors deeply hurt and changed tribal life forever.

Bent’s Business Partners Died Almost Overnight

William Bent spent 16 years building trading ties with Plains Indian tribes, mostly the Cheyenne. The huge death toll among these tribes crushed his business network.

As fur demand dropped and cholera killed his trading partners, business at the fort slowed to almost nothing. Bent knew he needed to change to stay in business.

He wanted to build a new trading post closer to Big Timbers, near where the surviving tribes spent winter.

War with Mexico Changed the Western Trading World

The Mexican-American War ended in 1848 with the United States taking New Mexico, which ruined Bent’s profitable trading with Mexico.

Fights broke out between American Indians and settlers as more people pushed into Indian Territory. General Stephen Watts Kearny’s Army used Bent’s Fort during the 1846 attack on Mexico, which made William Bent angry.

These problems, plus his brother Charles Bent’s death in 1847, led William and his partner St. Vrain to try selling the fort to the US Army.

Army Tried to Buy Bent’s Life Work for Cheap

The War Department offered William Bent only $12,000 for his big fort and trading business after the Mexican War. Bent thought this amount was way too low for the impressive adobe building and business he built.

When the Army refused to pay more, William decided to leave the fort rather than take such a small amount. He refused to let the government take his valuable trading post for almost nothing.

Everything Worth Keeping Got Packed and Moved

Before taking action, William Bent carefully took all his goods and trading supplies from the fort. He moved every useful item to his planned new location, showing his business smarts even in this tough time.

The moving process probably took weeks to finish. Bent made sure nothing useful stayed behind for the government to claim.

This careful emptying of the fort showed his attention to detail during his failing business.

Explosives Destroyed America’s Greatest Trading Post

According to historian Savoie Lottinville, William Bent blew up his fort in August 1849 after taking everything valuable. Rather than let the Army have it for cheap, he put explosives inside and set fire to the building.

Bent probably didn’t use enough black powder to totally destroy the thick adobe walls.

Instead, he placed explosives to ruin the most important parts, including fireplaces, cooking rooms, the well, blacksmith shop, and other useful features.

Ruins Stood as a Reminder of Broken Promises

The old fort wasn’t completely destroyed, as ruins stayed visible for decades afterward. This dramatic act ended America’s most successful frontier trading post after 16 years.

Bent’s Fort had been the only major white American settlement on the Santa Fe Trail between Missouri and Mexican settlements.

Its destruction marked the end of fairly peaceful trade between Americans and Plains Indian tribes, forever changing life on the frontier.

New Beginning Rose from the Ashes

William Bent built a wooden stockade trading post as a temporary replacement in 1849. By fall 1853, he built a rectangular limestone trading post at Big Timbers, smaller than his original adobe fort.

He put this new fort near Cheyenne and Arapaho camping grounds, showing he still wanted to trade with Indians despite recent troubles.

Six years later, the US government bought this new fort, renamed it Fort Wise, and changed it for military use.

Visiting Bent’s Old Fort

Bent’s Old Fort in La Junta, Colorado lets you explore the site where William Bent blew up his trading post during the 1849 cholera outbreak. Adult tickets cost $10, but kids under 16 get in free.

The park grounds are open daily 9am-4pm. For summer 2025, join guided tours on Saturdays at 9am and 11am, or at 11am on Sundays, Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays. Tours last 75 minutes with a 25-person limit.

Your America the Beautiful pass works here too.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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