Utah Historical Quarterly Volume 15, Number 1-4, 1947

Letters of O. G. Howland to the Rocky Mountain News I Camp—Mouth of Bear River, On the Green, June 19, 1869.1 Dear News:—As I wrote you, we started the twentyfourth ultimo from Green River City and got along rapidly to the mouth of Henry's Fork, sixty miles by river, in about ten hours' time, without rowing a stroke. Here we camped until the thirtieth and then ran down by Flaming Gorge in flaming style, then through the Cation of the Rapids and Kingfisher Canon to Beehive Point, ten miles by river, in a short hour. Next day we made a mile and a half and entered Red Caiion with a rush. In this caiion we would run a bend in the river and prospect ahead with our light boat, and signal the large boats to come on if all was right. The river here has some very heavy rapids, and our boats had to be bailed at almost every one we ran. This caiion is about thirty-five miles by river, and the average fall will exceed fifteen feet to the mile; perhaps twenty feet would be a nearer estimate. W h e n in the rapids, we ran with the speed of the wind. W e ran an estimated distance in a rapid of three quarters of a mile in two minutes. At another time, where the current was more confined and the rapids were swifter, we passed the flagboat, which had hauled in shore, and those in her said we passed them as rapidly as a railway train at its highest speed—sixty miles an hour. However, this was slow to some rapids we have run since. At the tail of these rapids, on either side, usually, occurs a calm or nearly calm cove, into which we could run to bail our boats if we shipped more water than we could conveniently carry through the next rapids.

W e had to let our boats down past some bad rocks once in this caiion, and made a portage of 200 yards past Ashley Falls—so named by us from finding on the rock there, this: "Ashley, 1825." W e got through this caiion to Brown's Little Hole on the 2nd day of June. Here we lay until the morning of the fourth, and then went sweeping down through another caiion of about six miles length, past the mouth of Red Creek, into the upper end of Brown's Hole, then through Swallow Canon, which, by the way, is as smooth all the way—three miles—as a mirror, and camped in the Hole until the morning of the sixth, and ran down to the head of Ladore [sic] Canon at the lower end of Brown's ^Reprinted from the Denver Rocky Mountain News, July 17, 1869.

Although Howland speaks of a previous letter to die News, this has not been found.