green corn on July 20th.[85]

In accordance with the plans outlined for the year 1820 it was proposed
to open a road between Council Bluff and the new post on the
upper Mississippi. To survey the route Captain Stephen Watts Kearny led
a party which consisted of four other officers, fifteen soldiers, four
servants, an Indian guide and his wife and papoose, eight mules, and
seven horses. The route led from Council Bluff across what is now the
northern and northwestern part of the State of Iowa to Lake Pepin, and
then along the Mississippi to the new post. From July 25th to July 29th
they remained with Leavenworth's men, visiting the Falls of St. Anthony,
examining the country, and on July 26th going with Lieutenant Green and
Miss Gooding to the east side of the Mississippi. Here Lieutenant Green
and Miss Gooding were married by Colonel Leavenworth, who as Indian
agent for the "Northwest Territory" could perform his duties on the east
bank of the river, but not on the west, which was in the Missouri
Territory.[86]

The fact that the Falls of St. Anthony constituted the most noticeable
landmark of the vicinity led to the application of its name to the
military works. The first official inspection of Fort St. Anthony
occurred some time between May 13, 1824, and June 13, 1824. General
Winfield Scott, as the inspector, was received with all the honor and
entertainment that the frontier post could provide. He left favorably
impressed with the work that had been done.

"I wish to suggest to the general-in-chief," wrote General Scott in his
report, "and through him to the War Department, the propriety of calling
this work _Fort Snelling_, as a just compliment to the meritorious
officer under whom it has been erected. The present name is
foreign to all our associations, and is, besides, geographically
incorrect, as the work stands at the junction of the Mississippi and
Saint Peter's rivers, eight miles below the great falls of the
Mississippi, called after Saint Anthony. Some few years since the
Secretary of War directed that the work at the Council Bluffs should be
called Fort Atkinson in compliment to the valuable services of General
Atkinson on the upper Missouri. The above proposition is made on the
same principle."

A general order on January 7, 1825, directed that the suggested change
should be made. Thereupon Fort Snelling began its career as the guardian
of the Northwest.[87]

III

FORTY YEARS OF FRONTIER DU