Why kit carson was famous

He set out on his own journey, to Santa Fe, and learned exploring and trapping skills along the way, courtesy in part of a friend of his father named Matthew Kinhead. His command of languages was expansive, despite the fact that he never learned to read or write.

Carson stayed in Santa Fe for a time, working a series of odd jobs. Carson was a trapper for more than a decade, at times working for three famous trapping companies: the American Fur Company, the Hudson's Bay Company , and the Mountain Fur Company.

Carson traveled the West with Jim Bridger and other famous mountain men. He also worked with experienced trapper Thomas Fitzpatrick and, later, noted explorer John C.

Carson became known for his accuracy in identifying geography, a skill that came in handy on the expeditions that he led. In one episode of irony, Carson went after a group of Native Americans who had kidnapped a European woman in New Mexico and, when he found her, also discovered that she had a novel that featured him as a hero. In , he married an Arapaho woman named Singing Grass.

They had two children. He married two other times, once to another Native American woman, and once to a Mexican woman, and had numerous children. He hunted antelope, deer, and other animals. He returned to the fort several times in the next few years. They set out in and arrived in the middle of the Mexican-American War. Army in the Battle of San Pasqual, at one point rescuing the forces led by Gen.

Kearny ordered Carson to lead his troops west to California. At the battle of San Pascual , with Kearny's tired men losing the battle, Carson, along with two others, was able to slip through enemy lines to call for reinforcements.

Later, President James K. Polk — called Carson a hero and appointed him lieutenant in the mounted on horseback rifle regiment. However, the Senate rejected this appointment, and Carson returned to Taos.

By Carson had settled near Taos to farm and do occasional scouting for army units fighting hostile tribes. Carson also served in the Office of Indian Affairs, first as an agent and then as a superintendent of Indian affairs for the Colorado Territory. In he became the agent for several southwestern tribes. For years, Carson worked to keep peace and to ensure fair treatment of Native Americans.

Carson disagreed with many of Meriwether's policies and thought that Native Americans were being treated unfairly. In their conflicts boiled over when Meriwether suspended Carson. Meriwether later arrested Carson, charging him with disobedience and cowardice. Carson soon apologized and got his job back working as an agent. With the outbreak of the Civil War —65 , Carson left his position with Indian Affairs and was soon appointed a lieutenant colonel commanding the First New Mexico Volunteer Regiment.

The Civil War was a war between the northern states and southern states that was fought to decide whether or not slavery would be allowed in new territories, and whether or not the South would leave the Union to form an independent nation.

During the war, Carson fought against invading Confederates soldiers from the southern states at the battle of Val Verde. Carson also directed successful campaigns against the Apache and Navajo from until In his last battle he defeated the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache tribes in the Texas panhandle. In he was appointed as brigadier general an army officer who is above a colonel of volunteers. For the next two years Carson held assignments in the West until he left the army in In Carson was appointed superintendent of Indian affairs for the Colorado Territory.

He never had a chance to work in this position. He died May 23, , at Fort Lyon, Colorado. Although Carson's later career serving his country in the army and establishing relations with Native Americans was impressive, the name Kit Carson will forever bring to mind thoughts of the wild frontier and westward expansion.

Carson, Kit. Kit Carson's Autobiography. Edited by Milo Milton Quaife. Chicago: R. Reprint, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, Carter, Harvey L. I jumped to my rifle and threw down my spelling book, and thar it lies. As he grew in stature and reputation, Kit learned to compensate for his lack of a formal education by employing a series of good secretaries and adjutants. He enjoyed having books read to him. He was fond of the poetry of Byron and thoroughly enjoyed a biography of William the Conqueror.

That was the closest thing to profanity anyone ever heard Kit utter. But, he was a great smoker. Carson was more at home in Spanish than in English. He adopted the dialect of his aristocratic third wife, Josefa, and Spanish was the language he and his friends spoke at their homes in Taos. Carson was also fluent in a third language, French. As a trapper and frontiersman, he could also converse in Navajo, Apache, Comanche, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Crow, Blackfoot, Shoshone, Piute and Ute, and he also knew the sign language used by mountain men throughout the West.

Two weeks later his mother gave birth to her 10th child. His stepfather apprenticed him to a saddlemaker, David Workman, in Franklin, Mo. In those days, Franklin was the starting and stopping point for anyone traveling west. The lure of the West was too strong for the young man. He ran away in , joining a trading party headed toward the Rocky Mountains.

In Carson arrived in Taos, a northern outpost of Mexico. The town, which was popular with traders and trappers, would become his home. Carson worked as an interpreter down in Chihuahua and became a teamster at the Santa Rita copper mine. During the next five years, Carson had a series of extraordinary adventures and gained valuable knowledge about the Western wilderness and the native people and animals who occupied it. He traveled from Taos to California and as far north as present-day Idaho.

He fought Indians, the elements and, occasionally, other trappers. He crossed the vast Mojave Desert, where he nearly died of thirst and starvation. In the high Rocky Mountains he experienced blizzards and frostbite. He learned to exist on any food he could find—horse, pregnant mule and sometimes dog. He knew the famous missionary Dr. Marcus Whitman. Trapping was a lucrative trade. In Taos in April , Carson received several hundred dollars for his role in the Young expedition.

It was the most money he had ever seen in his life. The Reverend Samuel Parker traveled west to present-day Idaho to meet the mountain men and trappers. That same year he was wounded in a fight with Blackfoot Indians. In the summer of , Kit Carson and a French trapper became rivals for the affections of a pretty Arapaho girl named Waanibe. In a scene reminiscent of a medieval joust, the two men fought a duel. Carson won. He and Waanibe, also called Alice, were married. They had one daughter, Adaline, but in , Alice died giving birth to a second child.

But in short order, she divorced him Indian style. Kit came home one day to find his belongings and Adaline outside. Making-Out-Road went home to her family. By then, the era of the fur trade was drawing to a close. Settlers were beginning to trickle into lands once known only to the buffalo and the Indians. Kit Carson realized he had to change with the times.

There was another, more important reason to change careers. Kit Carson was smitten with Josefa Jaramillo, daughter of a wealthy and influential Taos family. The first time he saw Josefa, she was wearing a bright yellow dress.

It was love at first sight. Her beauty was legendary. Although only in her early teens, she was well dressed and already quite refined. When she was 19, a visitor to Taos, Lewis H. Carson joined him, taking Adaline with him.

While in Missouri, Carson met John C. Kit and Josefa were married in Taos on February 6, , which otherwise was a typical year for him. He met up with Captain Philip St. George Cooke, who needed the now famous expeditionary scout to take a letter to the governor of New Mexico. Along the way he fought a little battle with the Utes. While they were on the Mojave River a party of Indians stampeded the livestock.

Two men, in a savage desert, pursue day and night an unknown body of Indians into the defiles of an unknown mountain—attack them upon sight, without counting numbers, and defeat them in an instant. His services as a scout, hunter and Indian fighter were in demand. Kit Carson was fast becoming a legend in his own time. Every schoolboy knew about his daring deeds.