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The Denis Julien Inscriptions

Charles Kelly photographed this Denis Julien inscription in 1931 when Julian H. Steward took him to the site near the confluence of the Uinta and Duchesne rivers. Note: this and many other historic and prehistoric rock carvings were often enhanced with chalk by photographers, a practice discouraged nowadays. USHS collections.

The Denis Julien Inscriptions

BY JAMES H. KNIPMEYER

To THE STUDENT OF EARLY WESTERN HISTORY, or of the mountain men and fur trade in particular, the name Denis Julien may not be known. But to devotees of Utah history—especially that of the Colorado River region from the 1830s and early '40s—his name will perhaps be very familiar. As a trader and trapper Julien was not famous like some of his contemporaries such as Jim Bridger, Kit Carson, or even Antoine Leroux and Old Bill Williams. However, what is noteworthy about him was his inclination for carving his name or initials and the date on the rocks and canyon walls by which he was traveling.

In Utah at least seven known inscriptions are attributed to Julien, while an eighth one is located only about two miles across the state line in Colorado. There are also an additional two reliably reported carvings that have evidently not been seen, or at least not brought to the attention of the general public, in recent times.1 Of the ten writings generally given as having been inscribed by Julien, not all are accepted as authentic by historians and other interested parties. At least two of the eight known inscriptions are believed by many to be spurious. Of course, no determination can be made concerning the two Julien inscriptions not seen in recent times.

The facts known about Denis Julien's life and trading and trapping career are few. What is of record concerning him is principally included in two articles. The first was by Utah historian Charles Kelly in a 1933 issue of Utah Historical Quarterly. The most complete is by Colorado River historian Otis R. "Dock" Marston and appears in the ten-volume set edited by LeRoy R. Hafen, Mountain Men and the Fur Trade. Therefore, just a brief summary of his background will be given here. 2

The first written documentation existent concerning Julien consists of baptismal records from the old Saint Louis Cathedral in Missouri of three children born to him and his wife in 1793, 1798, and 1801. When or where he himself was born and how he came to the Midwest is not known. Based on the baptismal dates of his children, historians estimate that Julien may have been born somewhere between 1771 and 1775. The Julien family is known to have been French-Canadian, and more than likely he or his immediate ancestors migrated to the predominantly French town of St. Louis sometime after its founding in 1764.

The few records mentioning Julien during the mid-portion of his life are mainly found in the fur trade archives of the Missouri Historical Society in St. Louis and indicate activity in the midwestern part of what is now the United States. His name appears in the ledgers of St. Louis fur baron Pierre Chouteau in 1803 and 1805, the latter instance to trade with the Indians in present-day Iowa. From 1805 until 1819 he owned property south of Fort Madison. Mention of his trade with the "Ioways" was also made in records for 1807, 1808, and 1810. His name is listed as a witness to the Iowa Treaty of 1815. In 1816 Julien was granted a license to trade on the Missouri River, and that same year he is mentioned as having; sold some furs to Cabanne & Company. The license was renewed in 1817. In 1819 he applied to the American Fur Company for trade goods. The year 1821 found the name Denis Julien as a property owner in the village of Prairie du Chien on the Mississippi River in wnat is now Wisconsin. In 1822 he again appears in the ledgers of Pierre Chouteau's French Fur Company, this time for the purchase of supplies. Entries in the post sutler's journal at Fort Atkinson on the Missouri River in present-day Nebraska mention Julien in 1824 and 1825.

The 1825 entry, made on December 26, noted that Julien had shot and wounded another man. No other mention of Denis Julien appears after this in the Midwest. Sixteen months later his name is listed as a member of a party led by Francois Robidoux from Taos, New Mexico, to recover some furs cached in the land of the Ute Indians. This would have been in what is now western Colorado or eastern Utah. Perhaps Julien's shooting scrape at Fort Atkinson prompted a removal to a new territory in the Southwest. He may have come to the Taos and Santa Fe area with one of the fur-trading Robidoux brothers, who are known to have led parties from Fort Atkinson to Santa Fe in 1826.

The April 1827 mention of Denis Julien ends the "paper trail" that is presently known about him. All other information comes from hearsay and his own carved inscriptions. Fortunately for modern historians, he left several of the latter from which can be traced at least some of his movements.

Ute Indian oral traditions from the Uinta Basin area of northeast Utah claim that in 1828 four men, James and William Reed, Auguste Archambeau, and Denis Julien, established a small trading post near the junction of the Whiterocks and Uinta rivers. Lending some support to this story is the presence of the earliest known Julien inscription. It is located ten miles downstream from the Reed trading post, near where the Uinta flows into the present-day Duchesne River. It reads "Denis Julien 1831."

Though undoubtedly seen before, from the several other names and dates around it, in recent times this inscription was first noted by Julian H. Steward in 1931 who had come to the nearby town of Whiterocks to attend the annual Sun Dance of the Ute Indians. A few days later he showed it to Charles Kelly, who recognized the name and its significance. It was photographed at this time and was first published in the July 1933 issue of Utah Historical Quarterly. Afterwards it was Kelly who first contacted the Missouri Historical Society in St. Louis and began the accumulation of what little has come to light about the early life of Denis Julien.

In the incised inscription the name Denis is printed in individual capital-style letters. The last name Julien has the first four letters printed with only the "J" capitalized. The "J" has the commonly used hook at the bottom and cross-bar at the top. The last two letters, "en," are carved in script-fashion with the letters joined together.

In chronological order the next inscription is one dated in 1832. This is no doubt the least known of the reported Julien inscriptions. Unfortunately, this particular inscription is also one of the two Julien writings that have not been located or seen in recent times. The name and date were first recorded by geologist Grove K. Gilbert in his Field Notebook 1 for 1875. On page 19 of his notes, under the date of July 4, one entry simply says, "D Julien 10 Mai 1832." Gilbert wrote nothing else in connection with it, and the notation lay hidden in his notes until they were published by the Geological Society of America in 1988. 3

The probable location of the 1832 Julien signature was narrowed to a mile or so stretch of the canyon of Ivie Creek, some eighteen miles southwest of Emery, Utah, by making use of the brief entries in Gilbert's field notes. A good campsite has been found on the south side of Ivie Creek with an outcropping of rock containing several inscriptions, one dating back into the 1870s, but no Julien was located. If it was here at one time, it has evidently weathered away as the 1875 one is even now in the process of doing. Either the inscription has simply been missed, it has eroded away, or perhaps it was destroyed during road construction of either U.S. Highway 50 or its successor, Interstate 70, both of which traverse the canyon. 4

Since the only report of the 1832 Julien inscription comes from the 1875 entry of Gilbert, there is no way of knowing anything about its general appearance or style. Significantly, however, one important detail can be inferred. Gilbert's original entry renders the name "D Eulien." This was obviously a misreading of the old style block French "J" which is written like a capital "I" with a horizontal line through the center. It is easy to see how this could be mistaken for an "E."

Unlike the above Julien inscription, the next is probably the most often seen and well known. Located near the mouth of Hell Roaring Canyon, a tributary of the Green River in Labyrinth Canyon, this inscription includes Julien's name and the day, month, and year he carved it: "D. Julien 3 Mai 1836." Unlike any of the other inscriptions attributed to him, however, this one is also accompanied by a crude cutting of what appears to be a boat with a mast and another enigmatic symbol that has been variously interpreted to be a flying sun or a bird in flight.

In late March and early April of 1893 the steamboat Major Powell made a trial voyage from near the town of Green River, Utah, down to Spanish Bottom on the Colorado River and then returned. William H. Edwards, who was in charge of the steamer, wrote to Colorado River voyager and historian Robert B. Stanton in 1908 stating that it was on this trip that he first saw the Julien inscription cut on the wall of Hell Roaring Canyon. 5 The first published photograph of the inscription was taken by Ralph G. Leonard in 1904 and appeared in the August 1905 issue of Outing Magazine.

Two particular characteristics in the name Julien should be noted in the Hell Roaring inscription. The capital letter "J" is carved like the old style block letter, looking like a combination capital letter "I" and "E." The letters "J, u, 1, i" are incised separately, while the "e" and "n" are joined together in script fashion.

Thirteen days later Julien carved his next inscription, again along the Green River, upstream from Bowknot Bend. This one reads "D. Julien 16 Mai 1836." After his recognition of the "Denis Julien 1831" inscription near Whiterocks, Charles Kelly had corresponded with Frederick S. Dellenbaugh, Colorado River historian and member of Maj. John Wesley Powell's second expedition down the Green and Colorado river canyons in 1871-72. Replying to Kelly, Dellenbaugh indicated that the 16 Mai Julien inscription had been found by prospectors. 6 This find must have been sometime between April 1893 and March 1895, for, as indicated above, William H. Edwards claimed to have seen the Hell Roaring Julien inscription in 1893. However, in an interview in Denver's Rocky Mountain News on March 10, 1895, he stated that there were three Julien inscriptions found on the cliffs of the Green River, evidently including the one of 16 Mai.

Dock Marston's biography of Julien includes an illustration of the inscription above Bowknot Bend. The caption indicates that it was sketched by Dellenbaugh from an R. G. Leonard photograph. This would seem to indicate that Leonard photographed both the 3 Mai and the 16 Mai Julien inscriptions during his 1904 river trip. A photograph of the 16 Mai inscription is on file at the Utah State Historical Society in Salt Lake City with a notation crediting "J. Stone-1909." However, the diaries and journals of members of Julius S. Stone's 1909 Green and Colorado river expedition make no mention of this inscription, only the one lower downstream near the mouth of Hell Roaring Canyon.

In the 16 Mai inscription the capital letter "J" has the more common hook at the bottom. The "J, u, 1," and "i" appear to be printed letters (although chalk enhancement has created some ambiguity), while the, "e" and the "n" are connected script style.

The next inscription may or not be in correct chronological order. It is the other carving along with the one reported along Ivie Creek Canyon, that has not been seen, or at least reported, in this century. Its exact wording is not known, and even its supposed location has been the subject of much debate.

In the 1908 letter from William H. Edwards to Robert B. Stanton mentioned earlier, Edwards also stated that it was on the March-April 1893 cruise of the steamboat Major Powell that he first saw the Julien inscription between four and five miles above the head of the Colorado in Stillwater Canyon. This then, along with the 3 Mai and 16 Mai inscriptions, would be the third Julien cutting that Edwards said was to be found on the cliffs of the Green River in his Rocky Mountain News interview of 1895.

In neither source, however, does Edwards give an exact rendering as to how this inscription read. In the 1931 letter from Dellenbaugh to Kelly, Dellenbaugh indicated that the inscription read only "D. Julien 1836." He also stated that it had been found by one Lee Valentine, who then told Edwards about it. Valentine was briefly a settler—from August 1892 to September 1893—on what is now known as Valentine Bottom on the Green River. As far as recorded information is concerned, the 1893 sighting by the crew of the Major Powell was the last time this inscription was seen. There are no known photographs or sketches of it.

Edwards, in a March 11, 1907, letter, gave the location of this inscription as four or five miles up the Green River "on the right shore going down [river]. . . ." In the 1908 letter already cited, he adds that it is "on the west wall. . . ." Therefore, of course, efforts to locate it have concentrated on the west bank of the river in the vicinity of Water Canyon. But in a 1981 letter the acting superintendent of Canyonlands National Park, in which the inscription is purportedly located, related an intriguing point. In re-examining the old published report of the sighting, a researcher (not named) realized that the boat was moving upstream and the observer probably meant his right, which would be the east bank. Careful searches have now been made on both sides of the river but have not been successful. 7

About eight river miles downstream from the above-discussed inscription is another that is often debated by river historians and aficionados. High up the talus slope below the mouth of Lower Red Lake Canyon, scratched very faintly on one side of a huge rock boulder, is the name "Denis Ju " with a date of 1836. Denis and the first part of the last name can be made out, but the ending is now illegible. Below the names are some other markings that can no longer be deciphered. On a third line, and very readable, however, is the year 1836.

This inscription was brought to light in recent times and made public knowledge in the summer of 1973. Mark Lindquist of Oregon, a member of a Student Conservation Aid group that was working on the Lower Red Lake Canyon trail, found the inscription and showed it to National Park Service rangers the following day. 8 However, it seems to have been known, at least to a few, long before this time.

In his book A Canyon Voyage, published in 1908, Dellenbaugh mentions what is evidently this inscription twice. Speaking of the 3 Mai D. Julien carving, he states that the same inscription was also found just below the mouth of Grand River. Prior to 1921 the junction of the Green and Grand rivers in southeastern Utah formed the Colorado. After that date the Grand's name was changed to the Colorado and "added" to the original. A few pages later in the book, in telling of his expedition's camp at the junction of the rivers and their passing a "singular canyon" on the left, or east side (present Lower Red Lake Canyon), Dellenbaugh notes that later the name "D. Julien-1836" was found near this point.

River-runner Harry L. Aleson possibly saw the inscription in 1951. In his diary entry for September 6, he says: "I drift down to top of Rapid No. 1 . . . Scout & find shelter rings, Moki campsite. On largest rock—to left of top of Rapid No. 1 is faint record of Julien visit in Mai 1836. . . ." 9 This appears to match, in some respects, the location and appearance of the Julien inscription described above. But it is precisely this location and appearance that cause some researchers and historians to question its authenticity.

First of all, each of the other Julien writings along the Green or Colorado rivers is located low down, close to river level. Except for the 1831 inscription near Whiterocks and the 3 Mai inscription at Hell Roaring Canyon, all of them are found near the shore. Even in these two instances they are inscribed on the first good rock surfaces away from the river shore across bottomlands. The inscription below the mouth of Lower Red Lake Canyon is not far back from the river itself but is located close to 600 feet above it, near the top of the talus slope.

Second, unlike all of the other Julien inscriptions discussed so far, the name here is entirely done in script. Unfortunately, the letters "en" in the last name can no longer be made out, so it cannot be seen if they are in the same style as the other inscriptions. Also, the other Julien inscriptions have been clearly and deeply incised into their respective rock faces, while this one has been but lightly scratched onto the surface of the boulder.

One river historian contends that perhaps Julien climbed up to this spot to have a view downriver. 10 From here the first three rapids of Cataract Canyon can be seen. Unlike the sites of the other inscriptions, whose locations would have made them good campsites with a corresponding availability of time for leisurely engraving, Julien would not have camped here. Rather, he would have made his camp down by the river. This was simply an observation point for the river downstream. He would not have spent much time here, but perhaps upon seeing the prehistoric petroglyphs carved on one side of the rock boulder he might have hastily added his name and the date.

The next Julien inscription—located the farthest downstream along the Green-Colorado river system of those commonly accepted by most historians—was actually the first to be discovered. It was seen by railroad surveyor Robert B. Stanton and two companions on June 20, 1889. It was sketched, somewhat inaccurately, by Stanton in his field notes,11 but evidently was seen only twice after that time, in 1891 and again in 1921. Not until April 3, 1964, was it relocated and first photographed by Dock Marston and the other two members of his party.

This Julien inscription was located in the lower part of Cataract Canyon along the east bank of the Colorado River not far below the mouth of Cove Canyon. It is now covered by the waters of Lake Powell. The rising of the reservoir water behind Glen Canyon Dam prompted the search by the Marston party. From its first sighting during high water in the summer of 1889, it was generally believed that the inscription could only have been carved from a boat. But at lower water levels in either spring or fall it could have been easily placed from above a dry sandbar, which in turn would have been a quite adequate campsite.

The Cataract Canyon inscription read simply, "1836 D. Julien." The 1889 Stanton sketch shows the characteristic individual, printed letter style, with the old-fashioned French capital "J." It also shows the concluding "e" and "n" as being separate from one another. However, the 1964 photographs taken by the Marston party clearly show the "e" and "n" joined together in the usual script style.

The three remaining Julien inscriptions are all located higher up in the Green-Colorado river system. The carving in Desolation Canyon of the Green River has been cut into a face of a huge talus boulder near the mouth of Chandler Canyon, an eastern tributary. It seems to have first been described in a letter from George E. Stewart of Roosevelt, Utah, to Dock Marston dated August 29, 1967.12 Stewart had been down to the mouth of Chandler Canyon "over the past weekend" and located the inscription then. Evidently, though, he had first seen it sometime earlier, for he also comments that Julien had not carved his full name there "as my memory said it did," just initials.

The Desolation Canyon inscription, in fact, does consist only of the initials "D J." There is no date of any kind. The inscription is attributed to Julien because the style of lettering is characteristic of many of his other carvings; i.e., the block letter style and the old-fashioned

The highest upstream inscription is located in upper Whirlpool Canyon of the Green River, just a couple of miles below Echo Park in Dinosaur National Monument. This is the only Julien inscription known at the present time that is located outside of Utah. It is situated in a small alcove that is now almost completely screened from the river by tamarisk. Before the advent of this exotic shrub, however, the alcove would have provided a good campsite for a river voyager.

A worker on the then-proposed Echo Park damsite in the 1950s noted the inscription, but not until August 1975 did two National Park Service employees, Glade Ross and Steve Petersburg, find the marking by utilizing the 1950 notes.13 The inscription consists of the initials "D J" and about two feet away the date of "1838." Once again, the "J" is carved in the old fashioned manner.

Chronologically, the last Julien inscription is located in the Devils Garden section of Arches National Park, north of Moab, Utah. This inscription gives the full name "Denis Julien" and a date reading "9 6re 1844." It was seen and reported in recent times by National Park Service ranger Jim Stiles in July 1977.14 However, other names and dates incised into the same rock face show that it was seen several times between 1892 and the mid-1940s. But these individuals evidently attached no significance to the inscription and made no report of it.

The Devils Garden of Arches is a ridge topped by row upon row of huge, parallel sandstone fins, bounded on the west by the sunken trough of Salt Valley. It is on a flat, desert-varnished surface near the base of one of these fins that the Julien and other carvings are found. The spot is blocked off from Salt Valley by a line of sand hills.

Along with the one below Lower Red Lake Canyon, this inscription is perhaps the most hotly debated. One point of contention is that the Arches inscription is located about fifteen miles in a direct line from the Colorado River. Except for the Ivie Creek Canyon signature, all of the other Julien inscriptions are found within two or three hundred yards of a large flowing stream. Even the 1831 Whiterocks carving was very near the Uinta River, a tributary of the Green. Though the floor of Salt Valley is only a half-mile away, in the Devils Garden area that wash carries running water only after a rainstorm. But the wide, open valley does offer an easy avenue of travel southeast from the Green River-Tavaputs Plateau area to the Colorado by way of either Salt Wash or Cache Valley. The inscription site itself would make a good sheltered, but dry, campsite, as attested to by the others who have left their names there.

The Arches inscription is similar to that below Lower Red Lake Canyon, not only in that it gives the full name Denis Julien but also in that it is incised into the rock surface in script rather than printed style. Because it is not done in the common fashion of the other signatures and because it is not located in an area similar to that of the other inscriptions, this is thought by some to be a fake made in recent times.

There is, however, one very good argument against this assumption: the "desert varnish" into which the Julien and accompanying inscriptions are incised. The formation of the chemical compound manganese dioxide on the surface of the sandstone creates this socalled desert varnish. As time passes it becomes progressively darker as more manganese dioxide is deposited. Therefore, on a single, relatively small rock surface, exposed to the same amount of weather and weathering, the darker the desert varnish the older it is.

On the desert varnished surface at the base of the sandstone fin in Devils Garden, a simple comparison can be made between the prehistoric Anasazi petroglyphs, the 1844 Denis Julien inscription, and an inscription dated 1892. Simply put, the Anasazi petroglyphs are darker than the Julien, and the 1892 inscription is lighter. The Julien must, therefore, be older than 1892, and thus the possibility of its being placed there spuriously is greatly diminished.

Among the many questions concerning Denis Julien, two are the most intriguing. First, are all of the inscriptions attributed to Julien authentic, or are some of them hoaxes? Second, what eventually happened to this little-known individual?

Of the ten signatures accepted by at least some writers and historians, it is probable that any or all of them could have been done by the hand of Denis Julien. Even with their unusual locations, the two most questionable inscriptions, those below Lower Red Lake Canyon and in the Devils Garden area of Arches, could have been done by him.

Most of the arguments among Colorado River historians, both professional and amateur, as to the authenticity of the various Julien inscriptions revolve around the style of writing or carving—printed letters as opposed to script. These arguments are in no way conclusive, though, because in the four most accepted inscriptions—in lower Cataract Canyon, Hell Roaring Canyon, above the Bowknot, and near Whiterocks—Julien was not even consistent in how he made the capital letter "J." The first two were done in the old-fashioned style and the last two with the hooked bottom. Yet the authenticity of these four has not been questioned. All of the inscriptions with the full last name of Julien are consistent in rendering the last two letters, "en," in script fashion.

As for script or printing, it is enlightening to compare the two known written (on paper, as opposed to stone) signatures of Denis Julien with the carvings below Lower Red Lake Canyon and in Arches. On September 16, 1815, Julien was one of a dozen witnesses to a treaty made with the Iowa tribe of Indians at Portage des Sioux in eastern Missouri. His name, while written very small and now faint, is clearly identical in style to the two above carvings.

On December 24, 1821, Julien was one of a number of signees of a petition to the U.S. Congress from the inhabitants of the town of Prairie du Chien in what was then Michigan Territory, asking for protection from confiscation of their land titles. Julien's signature on this document is also extremely close to those carved in script fashion on sandstone in present southeastern Utah, the only difference being that the capital "J" is completely different from any of his ten incised signatures. This emphasizes the fact that he was not consistent in his written or incised rendering of the "J" of his surname. 15

Not previously discussed are the characteristic styles of two of the numerals in Julien's dates—the "1" and the "3." In every case where one or both of these numbers was carved, they were done in the same way. The "1" invariably was made with a short stroke affixed to the top of the numeral. The same is true of the "3," where the stroke is always placed at the beginning of the top loop. What is not consistent, even among the "accepted" four, and even occasionally within the same inscription, is the placement or absence of a horizontal foot at the base of the "1." Therefore, on the basis of style, workmanship, and location, none of the ten Julien inscriptions can be proven as genuine or false.

As for what happened to Julien after the carving of his last known inscription in Arches in 1844, there is one intriguing bit of information. In an interview conducted in May 1976 with Dock Marston, one of the interviewers, John F Hoffman, commented that newspaperman Lute Johnson reported that Julien became a California pioneer, died, and was buried there. Johnson even said that he was listed in a directory in California. Hoffman was evidently referring to an October 2, 1938, Denver Post article. In it Johnson mentions a brief record of "de Julien" in biographical dictionaries in which he is called a Canadian voyageur who died in California. Hoffman himself stated he was not able to find Julien listed in any type of directory. 16

So what did ultimately become of Denis Julien? From the information known at the present time this question cannot be positively answered. However, from what is known about his life, the regions he frequented, his contemporaries, and events that were taking place around him at the time, a possible scenario can be postulated.

Throughout his life, from the baptismal records in St. Louis, Missouri, to at least 1844 in eastern Utah, Julien seems to have been in contact with the Robidoux family. Headed by patriarch Joseph Robidoux II, the French-Canadian family had migrated from Quebec to St. Louis by 1771. There M. Robidoux entered into the burgeoning fur trade. So both the Robidouxs and Julien were engaged in the fur trade; they were in St. Louis at the same time; and in that close-knit French colony of the late 1700s and early 1800s they could not have helped but know of one another.

Joseph Robidoux had six sons, all of whom engaged in the fur trade to one extent or another. Joseph III, in partnership with Pierre Chouteau, traded with the "Ioways" just as Julien did. In 1819 he established a fort or trading post on the west side of the Missouri River across from present-day Council Bluffs. At that time Julien was also trading on the Missouri. The post was taken over in 1823 by Jean Pierre Cabanne with whom Julien had dealings earlier. Fort Robidoux, or Cabanne's Post as it came to be called, was just a few miles below Fort Atkinson where Julien transacted business in 1824 and 1825.

As mentioned earlier, Julien may have gone to New Mexico sometime in 1826 with one of the Robidoux brothers. Antoine, Michel, and Isidore all are known to have made trips from the Council Bluffs-Fort Atkinson area to Santa Fe in that year. 17 Also, as stated earlier, it is known that Julien accompanied a party led by Francois Robidoux from Taos in 1827 to recover some cached furs.

In 1838 Antoine Robidoux established a trading post usually known as Fort Uintah, near present-day Whiterocks, Utah. According to Ute Indian oral traditions, the basis for this post was the already established Reed trading post, supposedly founded by Denis Julien and three others in 1828. But perhaps Julien continued to stay in the area. In 1842 a missionary on the way from Oregon wrote in his diary of attempting to preach at Fort Uintah to a company including "French." 18 Later the same year a traveler stopping over at the post recorded in his journal that trade was conducted principally with trappers frequenting the Green, Grand, and Colorado rivers and their tributaries.19 According to his carved inscriptions, this is precisely what Julien was doing.

In late September 1844 another of Robidoux's trading posts, Fort Uncompahgre on the Gunnison River of western Colorado, was attacked by Ute Indians. The one American present was spared and sent to Fort Uintah to tell the people there to abandon the post. This was promptly done. But the trouble with the Utes had actually begun back in the fall of 1843 when a company of New Mexican volunteers, after an unsuccessful raid against Navajos, had evidently vented their frustrations by falling upon and killing ten friendly Utes and taking three others captive. 20

This may explain the location of Julien's September 1844 inscription in Arches. As a veteran frontiersman traveling through territory inhabited by unfriendly Indians he would have trod warily and perhaps chosen to avoid the usual trails crossing the Colorado River at either the present-day sites of Moab, Utah, or Grand Junction, Colorado. Furthermore, when making camp he would have probably taken the precaution of not staying in the open area of Salt Valley but moving instead to the nearby but shielded spot by the sandstone fins of Devils Garden.

Soon after the abandonment of Fort Uintah, Antoine Robidoux moved back to his brother's trading post on the Missouri River at what would eventually become St. Joseph. Another brother, Louis, had gone to California in 1843 and purchased land there. In the summer of 1844 he returned to Santa Fe for his family. They left for California for the final time in November of that year.

Based on the baptismal dates of his children, in the fall of 1844 Denis Julien would have very likely been around seventy years of age. Fort Uintah had been abandoned and Antoine Robidoux was preparing to return to Missouri. Louis Robidoux, on the other hand, was moving on to California. It is certainly possible, therefore, based on surrounding circumstances and the single reference to his listing in a biographical dictionary, that Denis Julien could have accompanied the Louis Robidoux family, lived out the remaining span of his life, and died in California.

NOTES

Mr Knipmeyer lives in Lee's Summit, Missouri.

1 An inscription found in Glen Canyon of the Colorado River and now beneath the waters of Lake Powell is sometimes mentioned as possibly having some connection with Denis Julien because of its evident French wording and date: "Ian ce. 1837 V. Lay." All of the Julien inscriptions, however, contain either his name or initials.

2 Unless otherwise noted the biographical information on Julien is based on Charles Kelly, "The Mysterious D Julien," Utah Historical Quarterly 6 (1933): 83-88; and Otis Dock Marston, "Denis Julien," in LeRoy R Hafen, ed., The Mountain Men and the Fur Trade of the Far West (Glendale, Calif.: Arthur H Clark, 1969), 7:177-90.

3 Charles B Hunt, Geology of the Henry Mountains, Utah, as Recorded in the Notebooks of G. K. Gilbert, 1875-76, Geological Society of America Memoir 167 (Boulder, Colo., 1988), p 27.

4 Steven Reneau of Los Alamos, New Mexico, recognized the name "D Eulien" (sic) and contacted the editor of Gilbert's notebooks. Hunt conducted and initiated several searches for the historic inscription without success.

5 Edwards's statement was made in response to a November 2, 1908, letter from Stanton requesting information on "the two inscriptions of D Julien," and is now located in the Stanton Collection at the New York City Public Library The actual 1908 letter from Edwards is no longer existent, but its contents are quoted in Stanton's unpublished manuscript "The River and the Canyon."

6 Frederick S Dellenbaugh to Charles Kelly, August 23, 1931, Kelly Collection, Utah State Historical Society, Salt Lake City.

7 A historian from California who researched the history of the Canyonlands area during the 1970s stated unequivocally in a 1980 letter that the Denis Julien inscription had not really been lost, only to historians. He claimed knowledge of one commercial river-running operation that had been showing the inscription to its customers for several years John F Hoffman to the author, February 20, 1980, in author's possession.

8 Ken Mabery, National Park Service, to the author, December 15, 1977.

9 Typescript copy of diary entitled "Notes on Green River Trip," Aleson Collection, Utah State Historical Society.

10 John F Hoffman to the author, June 14, 1978, in author's possession.

11 Stanton Collection.

12 Marston Collection, Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

13 Dennis B Davies, Dinosaur National Monument, Utah, to the author November 11, 1977, in author's possession.

14 Otis R "Dock" Marston to the author, September 13, 1977, in author's possession.

15 Photostatic copies of the Treaty with the Iowa, 1815, and the Petition to Congress by inhabitants of Prairie du Chien, 1821, were obtained from the National Archives and Records Service, Washington, D.C.

16 In an August 20, 1968, letter from George E Stewart of Roosevelt, Utah, to Otis R Marston, Stewart stated that a Mrs. Denver had told him that she had located definite information that Julien was alive after 1836 Unfortunately, no such material was ever forthcoming.

17 Marston, "Denis Julien," 7:184.

18 Joseph Williams, A Narrative of a Tourfrom the State of Indiana to the Oregon Territory in the Years 1841-42 (Cincinnati, 1843), pp 80-84.

19 Rufus B Sage, Scenes in the Rocky Mountains (Philadelphia, 1846), p 182.

20 Janet Lecompte, Pueblo, Hardscrabble, Greenhorn: The Upper Arkansas, 1832-1856 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1978), pp 137-38.