Career
He was a native of Phelps, Ontario County, New New York He headed west in the spring of 1819, stopping a few months in Detroit, Michigan, before continuing west to Fort Snelling. She was born around 1804–1806 and died on March 29, 1867, at Shakopee, Minnesota.
During his life on the frontier he served as a government interpreter of the Dakota language (including for the Treaty of Traverse des Sioux).
He worked as a miner, a trapper, and on a steamboat on the Mississippi River. He also ran trading posts in several locations, and farmed.
From 1839 to 1862 he operated a trading post along the Saint Croix River - its location became the town of Prescott, Wisconsin, named for him. His papers are in the Minnesota Historical Society library.