Background
Zenas Leonard was born near Clearfield, Pennsylvania, the son of Abraham and Elizabeth (Armstrong) Leonard.
( "A completely trustworthy account of Rocky Mountain trap...)
"A completely trustworthy account of Rocky Mountain trapping, 1831-35, including experiences with Walker's expedition from Salt Lake to California, 1833, of which it is the chief first-hand authority."--U.S.iana In the spring of 1830, Leonard, a native of Clearfield, Pennsylvania embarked on an expedition across the Rocky Mountains, in the capacity of clerk to the company. One misfortune after another happening to the company, he was deprived of all in the fall of 1835—after an absence of 5 years and 6 months. Written in response to popular demand, Leonard's account of these years, based in large part on ‘a minute journal of every incident that occurred,’ is recognized as one of the fundamental sources on the exploration of the American West. A free trapper until the summer of 1833, when he entered the employ of Captain B. L. E. Bonneville, Leonard was part of the group sent under command of Captain Joseph Walker to explore the Great Salt Lake region—an expedition that resulted in Walker's finding the overland route to California. The Narrative ends in August 1835, with Leonard's return to Independence. Zenas Leonard (March 19, 1809 – July 14, 1857) was an American mountain man, explorer and trader, best known for his journal Narrative of the Adventures of Zenas Leonard.Leonard worked for his uncle in Pittsburgh before moving to St. Louis and working as a clerk for the fur company, Gannt and Blackwell. In 1831 he went with Gant and Blackwell's company of about 70 men on a trapping and trading expedition. Living off the land (Leonard reported that "The flesh of the Buffaloe is the wholesomest and most palatable of meat kind"), Leonard and his associates endured great privation while amassing a fortune in furs; the horses died in the harsh winter and the party was at times near starvation. They survived, in part, by trading with Native Americans. Among the more helpful tribal members he reported encountering was a negro who claimed to have been on Lewis & Clark's expedition, and who may have been the explorer-slave York. In 1835 Leonard returned to Independence, Missouri with enough wealth in furs to establish a store and trading post at Fort Osage. He continued to trade along the river for the rest of his life. Leonard's journal was published in book form by D.W. Moore of Clearfield, Pennsylvania in 1839, after being serialized in the Clearfield Republican. It includes many details of the different tribes with which his parties interacted. As it is in the public domain, there are numerous reprints.
https://www.amazon.com/Adventures-Mountain-Man-Narrative-Leonard/dp/1549682717?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1549682717
(Leonard's adventures provide a remarkable insight into th...)
Leonard's adventures provide a remarkable insight into the American fur trade, giving the perspective of a trapper and adventurer.
https://www.amazon.com/Narrative-Adventures-Zenas-Leonard-Mountains/dp/1589760743?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1589760743
(A special two-books-in-one edition containing two classic...)
A special two-books-in-one edition containing two classic accounts of the early Westerners This good value Leonaur edition combines the personal narratives of two of those unique early Americans who explored the interior of the North American continent when it was still a vast untamed wilderness occupied only by its wild creatures and tribes of indigenous Indians. Zenas Leonard was born in 1801 in Pennsylvania. In 1831 he joined a trapping and trading brigade which launched him into a lifelong career as a 'mountain man.' Leonard fought at the Battle of Pierre's Hole,' explored the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada and roamed the Crow country along the Yellowstone. This highly regarded classic is partnered here by James Ohio Pattie's riveting account of his experiences in the South-West. In 1824 the Pattie's embarked on a trapping and trading expedition that would bring hardship, imprisonment and, for some of the party, death. This is an account of adventure, of hunting, of fights with native Indians, bandits and of collisions with Mexican authorities. Whilst some have accused Pattie of telling tall tales, there can be no doubt that his is an essential narrative for all those interested in this fascinating history of frontier America. Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their spines and fabric head and tail bands.
https://www.amazon.com/Towards-Far-Horizons-Explorers-Trappers-/dp/1782823883?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1782823883
Zenas Leonard was born near Clearfield, Pennsylvania, the son of Abraham and Elizabeth (Armstrong) Leonard.
His schooling, described by his publisher as "a common school education, " appears to have been meager.
Leonard worked on his father's farm until the day he was twenty-one, when he announced his intention of striking out for himself. At Pittsburgh he found employment in the store of an uncle, remaining there several months. Determined to be a trapper in the Far West, he went to St. Louis, and in April 1831, as a clerk, left for the mountains with the party of Gantt and Blackwell. He was at the rendezvous in Pierre's Hole, Idaho, in the summer of 1832, and took part in the famous battle of July 18, of which he has left an account. At the Green River rendezvous of 1833 he met Bonneville and was engaged as a member of Walker's California expedition. With this party, which after great privations and several bloody encounters with Indians, crossed the Utah and Nevada deserts and scaled the Sierras, and which was probably the first company of American whites to see the Yosemite Valley and the giant Merced sequoias, he reached the coast in November. Returning by a more southern route, and traversing what has since been known as Walker's Pass, the expedition reached Bonneville's camp on Bear River in July 1834.
For another year Leonard remained in the mountains, trapping in various directions and undergoing many perilous experiences. In the summer of 1835 he returned with Bonneville and in the fall reached his old home. After a few months he returned to the West, settling in Sibley, Missouri, on the site of Old Fort Osage, and engaging in the Indian and Santa Fé trade. He died in Sibley.
It was in Clearfield that he wrote the account of his travels, which was published in part in the Clearfield Republican, and as a whole in book form under the title, Narrative of the Adventures of Zenas Leonard (1839). In 1904 it was republished, with an introduction and notes by W. F. Wagner, under the title, Leonard's Narrative; Adventures of Zenas Leonard, Fur Trader and Trapper, 1831-1836. Though, owing to the theft or loss of a part of his journal, Leonard is sometimes faulty as to incident and oftener faulty as to dates, his work is highly valued, and as a contemporary depiction of the daily life of the trapper is surpassed only by the Journal 1834-1843 (1914) of Osborne Russell. Of Leonard's personality little is known.
(A special two-books-in-one edition containing two classic...)
( "A completely trustworthy account of Rocky Mountain trap...)
(Leonard's adventures provide a remarkable insight into th...)
Leonard married Isabelle Harrelson, by whom he had two children.