Unit Eleven: Manifest Destiny
Westward Ho! Part I
The Frontier
• One of the driving forces in American history was
the thought of a frontier (an area on the outskirts of
“civilized” society).
• The concept of the frontier has been seen to have
given Americans their individualistic spirit, sense of
self-reliance, determination, and adversity.
• Americans were from the start hungry for more land
to either hunt on for the fur trade, cultivate for
farming, ranch cattle, or as a place away from too
many people.
• The biggest problem with this want for more land
which drove people into the “wilderness” was the
direct encroachment on Indians, which at the start
of colonial times led to conflict between colonialists
(Americans) and Natives.
Mobile Society
• The vast amounts of land in America made
many colonials and later Americans a seminomadic society constantly moving usually West
for more land.
• The constant movement of people developed
Americans into a Mobile Society were people
are free to go where they please, when they
please, and as many times as they wish.
• The push to move West and conquer the whole
of North America was called Manifest Destiny
(the ability by and for God to own North America
from Ocean to Ocean) by John Louis O’Sullivan
in favor of the annexation of Texas.
The Frontier
• The whole of America has at one time or another
been called a frontier to be settled and
organized for the colonies or the states.
• The first barrier to colonial settlement was native
Americas, due to the fact that settlers wanted
the land Indians lived on and many did not care
for living side by side with Indians.
• The colonials and later the states enacted
policies to take the lands away from the Indians,
even though at first relationships were good
between whites and Indians, they slowly got
worse because there was no more room for
Indians on their own land forcing them
constantly Southward or West of the
Appalachians.
Trans-Appalachians
• The second great barrier of settlement was the
Appalachian Mountain chain which keep whites
on its Eastern side.
• The majority of people that crossed over the
Appalachians were not settlers but fur trappers
called Mountain Men.
• The Mountain Men were rugged individuals who
usually had good relations with Indians,
intermarried with the Natives, and used
established Indian trade routes to hunt and
setup outposts to send furs back East.
Trans-Appalachians
• The mass movement of settlers across
the Appalachians did not happen until in
1775 when the Transylvania Company
employed Daniel Boone and others to
cut a Wilderness Road through the
Cumberland Gap (a spot in the
Appalachians) into what is Kentucky today.
• The Wilderness Road became the main corridor
west of the Appalachians, also shortly after this
people began to move southward toward
Mississippi and Alabama.
• People pushed west into these regions because
of increased population on Eastern seaboard
due to immigration and internal births, vast
amounts of land at cheap prices, and because of
a young population (median age was 17)
Frontier Life
• Life on the frontier was hard for the early settlers
west of the Appalachians, because unlike on the
eastern seaboard where land had been cleared
in some areas by the Natives it was not so there.
• The settlers had to clear the land of trees
(mostly done by girdling, which is where a tree’s
lower bark is removed to kill the tree), build a
home (usually a log cabin called a dog trot)
which had to be chinked (holes covered with
clay), and plant a crops.
• Settlers were in the wilderness by themselves
with few white neighbors, but plenty of Indians
who were either friendly or hostile.
Frontier Life
• During this time settlers had many children, on
average usually eight that led to high birth rates,
but also high death rates due to infant mortality
rates being so high (2 out of ten) and their hard
life styles.
• The settlers also had to deal with the isolation,
diseases (cholera, small pox), animals, weather,
and parasites. (most common ringworm and
tapeworms)
• Most settlers used Indian techniques to survive
in these lands and Indian medicines to heal their
sick.
Frontier Life
Girdling Trees
New States
• The policies of the Nationalist Era and the
Jacksonian era led to many new states to
join the union East of the Mississippi,
which included: Indiana (1816), Mississippi
(1817), Illinois (1818), and Alabama
(1819).
• During the early and mid 1800s people
began to move in relative small numbers
West of the Mississippi River known as the
Trans-Mississippian Region.
Trans-Mississippian Region
• The Trans-Mississippian region was made up of
Indian Territory (Great Plains), the Spanish (later
Mexican) Southwest, Western parts of the
Louisiana Purchase, and the Oregon Territory
(co-owned by America and Britain.
• American movement into these areas was small
at first, but during the 1840s and 1850s larger
numbers of settlers began to move into the
region. (It would not be until the completion of
the Transcontinental Railroad after the Civil War
that massive numbers of settlers moved into the
areas populating them)
O Pioneers
• The first people into the Trans-Mississippian
region were mountain men (fur traders and
trappers), who learned the geography of the
area and used Indian knowledge to direct later
settlement into the area (trailblazers) by leading
wagon trains or selling guide books. (most
notable Kit Carson, Jim Bridger, Jedediah Strong
Smith, and Jim Beckwourth)
• The people who moved into the TransMississippian region to settle were called
pioneers (people who settle an unsettled area)
• Most of these people chose to skip over the
Great Plains region (Great American Desert) for
the southwest (New Mexico and Texas), the
Pacific Coast (Oregon, California), and Utah.
O Pioneers
• The pioneers went west by using three different methods
of travel:
– One route was to cross over land (overlanders) in
Conestoga Wagon (prairie schooners) caravans (group
wagon train). This route was called a trek (long
journey) because it took many months through hard
weather, isolated spots, and the fear of Indian attacks.
(Most Indians were friendly to the settlers offering any
assistance needed)
– The other ways were to take a clipper ship all the way
around the tip of South America to the Pacific Coast or
to the isthmus of Panama cross over land and then
take another ship to the Pacific Coast. (fastest, safest,
but expensive route)
The Great American Desert
• Most settlers skipped over the Great Plains
region because of the thought that it was a
Great American Desert of grasslands not
useful for farming, but fine for an Indian
reserve/reservation.
• The land of the Great Plains did not become
enticing to American settlement until the
inventions of Jethro Wood (iron plow), John
Deere (steel plow ), and Cyrus McCormick
(mechanical reaper) allowing for the ability to
plow up the grass lands and to easily collect
wheat, barley, corn, and etc. (later called
bread basket of nation)
Trans-Mississippian Indians
• As Americans moved into the regions west of the
Mississippi they encroached on Native
Americans who were already living in the area of
the Plains and West Coast.
• The largest majority of Indians lived in the Plains
region were either nomadic (wondering place to
place) like the Blackfoot, Arapaho, Cheyenne,
Comanche, Crow, Kiowa, Lakota, Kiowa
Apache, Plains Cree, and Shoshone, or semisedentary (went on long hunts, but lived most of
the time in villages) like the Iowa, Kaw (or
Kansa), Mandan, Missouria, Nez Perce, Omaha,
Pawnee, Ponca, and Santee.
Trans-Mississippian Indians
• When the Spanish introduced the horse to the
region many of the Plains Indians became
excellent horse riders, raised horses, and
developed a new culture around the horse called
the horse culture. (before they had to drag their
supplies with a two pole sled called a travois)
• The horse gave the Plains Indians the
ability to move quickly place to place
following their dominate food source the
buffalo.
• Every part of the buffalo had a purpose for the
Indians including their houses made
of buffalo skins and poles that could
be quickly assembly or disassembled
called teepees.
Trans-Mississippian Indians
• As many Native Americans tribes became more
nomadic and developed into warrior societies
and due to white encroachment many of the
agricultural tribes declined or died off.
• Also forced into the area was the Eastern tribes
who had been pushed into the Oklahoma
territory by the U.S. Government, which also
changed their and the Plains Indians cultures.
• To aid white settlement in the region the U.S.
Government signed the Treaty of Fort Laramie in
1851 with the Cheyenne, Sioux, Arapaho,
Navajo Crow, Shoshone, Assiniboine, Mandan,
Hidatsa, and Arikara to allow for safe passage of
American settlers and geographic boundaries.
Western Trails
• The American settlers that chose to go overland,
chose from six different Western trials to get to
their destination: Oregon Trail (most popular),
Mormon Trail, California Trial, and Santa Fe
Trail.
• The Pony Express Trail was used a quick line of
communication between the East and West, it
operated with young boys (14-21) on horseback
carrying mail and messages.
• The Butterfield Overland Mail Trail was used as
a stagecoach (large armored wagon) route to
deliver mail, carry money, and as a trail for later
settlement into Texas.
Western Trails