Henry took his young men in keelboats up the Missouri to the mouth of the Yellowstone, where they spent the winter. In the spring of 1823 he set out for the Blackfoot country to the west. Again, as in 1810, these Indians proved to be most inhospitable, scalping four of his recruits and driving him back to his fort. Meanwhile General Ashley organized another expedition and proceeded upriver without incident until he arrived at the villages of the Arikara. There his plans were upset by a treacherous attack in which thirteen of his men were killed and many others were wounded. Colonel Leavenworth hastened to the rescue, but his campaign against the Indians was something of a fiasco. Soon afterward Ashley returned to St. Louis, Henry returned to his post on the Yellowstone, and a third contingent started overland under the command of Jedediah Smith. In February 1824 this last group made the first crossing of South Pass from east to west, their discovery of rich beaver fields in Green River Basin opening a new era in fur trade history. In June they split into four parties. Fitzpatrick, heading east for Fort Atkinson to report the situation to Ashley, rediscovered the Platte route of the returning Astorians; Sublette, Bridger, and others went southwest to explore the Bear River country and lay claim to the discovery of Great Salt Lake; and Smith, with six unidentified companions, went north. The details of their course are given in Washington Hood’s Original draft of a report of a practicable route for wheeled vehicles across the mountains, written at Independence, August 12, 1839. After striking the Colorado, or Green river, make up the stream toward its headwaters, as far as Horse creek, one of its tributaries, follow out this last mentioned stream to its source by a westerly course, across the main ridge in order to attain Jackson’s Little Hole, at the headwaters of Jackson’s fork [Hoback River]. Follow down Jackson’s fork to its mouth and decline to the northward along Lewis’s fork [Snake River], passing through Jackson’s Big Hole to about twelve miles beyond the Yellowstone pass [sic], crossing on the route a nameless beaver stream. Here the route passes due west over another prong of the ridge [Conant Pass], a fraction worse than the former, followed until it has attained the headwaters of Pierre’s Hole, crossing the Big Teton, the battleground of the Blacksmith’s fork; ford Pierre’s fork eastward of the butte at its mouth and Lewis fork also, thence pass to the mouth of Lewis fork. Subsequently the Smith party encountered a Hudson’s Bay Company brigade under Alexander Ross, giving first notice that Americans would actively contest British claims to Oregon. This expedition to the Jackson’s Hole country was also significant as the first in an amazing series which has established Jedediah Smith as perhaps the foremost explorer of Western America.