... a party of some sixty or eighty Shoshone or Snake Indians, who were returning from a buffalo hunt to the east of the South Pass. The chief and active hunters of the party were riding good horses. The others, among whom were some women, were mounted generally upon animals that appeared to have been nearly exhausted by fatigue. These, besides carrying their riders, were freighted with dried buffalo meat, suspended in equal divisions of bulk and weight from straps across the back. Several pack animals were loaded entirely with meat and were driven along as we drive pack mules. The apparent increase in the use of the Wind River Valley and adjacent areas was in part a result of Crow amity in the face of a common enemy, but it can also be explained in terms of the Shoshone need to seek their winter store of buffalo meat regardless of dangers. The buffalo herds west of the Continental Divide were greatly diminished by 1840, and, by the end of the decade, the intrusion of emigrants must have decimated the remaining stock. As early as 1842, Fremont commented that he saw no buffalo beyond South Pass (Fremont, 1845, p. 63), and in 1849 Major Osborne Cross observed that "scarcely any were to be met with this side of the South Pass" (Cross, 1851, p. 178). The Major later wrote (p. 182): Game in this section of the country is scarce, compared with the ranges passed over on the route. We had now gone nearly through the whole buffalo range, as but few are now met with on Bear River. Fifteen years ago they were to be seen in great numbers here, but have been diminishing greatly since that time. Despite periodic forays to the east, the report of Indian Agent Wilson of Fort Bridger in 1849 indicates that the generally recognized area of Shoshone occupancy was substantially unchanged (J. Wilson, 1849, p. 1002): Their claim of boundary is to the east from the Red Buttes [near Casper, Wyoming], on the North Fork of the Platte, to its head in the Park, De-cay-a-que or Buffalo Bull-pen, in the Rocky Mountains; to the south, across the mountains, over to the Yam pa pa, till it enters Green or Colorado River; and then across to the Back bone or ridge of mts. called the Bear River mountains, running nearly due west towards the Salt Lake, so as to take in most of the Salt Lake, and thence on to the Sinks of Mary's or Humboldt River; thence north to the fisheries on the Snake river, in Oregon and thence south (their northern boundary) to the Red Buttes, including the source of Green River. Joseph Lane, the Superintendent of Indian Affairs in Oregon territory also wrote in that year that "the Shoshonee or Snake Indians inhabit a section of country west of the Rocky mountains, from the summit of these mountains north along Wind river mountains to Henry's fork...." (Lane, 1857, p. 158).