Pike's peak?/Though overshadowed by Lewis and Clark, Zebulon Pike's

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Aug 7, 2000 | by Deb Acord

Zebulon Pike's mission was straightforward: to further explore the hundreds of square miles acquired by the United States in the 1803 Louisiana Purchase. The celebrated 8,000-mile journey of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark already had pierced its borders. Pike was commissioned to probe deeper into the "Vast Unknown," sorting myths of volcanoes and unicorns from the stiff realities of the Rocky Mountains, especially a big one he called "Grand Mountain."

On Nov. 25, 1806, Lt. Zebulon Pike and three of his men set out to climb a mountain. Until they reached its summit, they thought it was the peak they had spotted more than 100 miles back.

They were wrong.

In the nearly 200 years since that climb, historians have sparred over which mountain Pike, Dr. John Robinson and Privates Theodore Miller and John Brown ascended. Some said it was Grayback, a modest, 9,348-foot peak. Others were sure the evidence pointed to Black Mountain, 10,132 feet, or Blue Mountain, 9,858 feet, to the east of Black. Still others thought Pike had climbed Cheyenne Mountain, 9,565 feet, farther north and west.

They were wrong, believes a Colorado Springs attorney who has been tirelessly researching the climb for years. With the aid of some of Pike's exhaustive journals as their guide, John Patrick Michael Murphy and others believe the group climbed to Mount Rosa's distinctive 11,499-foot summit, located five peaks to the southwest of Pikes Peak.

Murphy, a Colorado Springs native and longtime member of the Colorado Mountain Club, is one of a small group of history buffs and historians who are Pike fans. He believes the climb by Pike and his men was one of the most important facets of his expedition in the American West, even though the explorer never stood on the mountain named for him.

"For nearly the last decade, historians have been discussing which peak was Pike's," Murphy says. "And now, I think, and others do, too, the evidence points to Rosa."

James McChristal, a historian and author of "Pikes Peak: Legends of America's Mountain," believes Murphy is right.

"I think he has a good handle on what happened," he says. "The only way you could ever prove Pike's route without a doubt was if you found a button from a soldier's uniform or something on the ground. That's not going to happen. So John had to rely on his knowledge of the terrain and the timing of different hikes. That's what lends credibilty to his research."

Unexplored wilderness

In November 1806, Zebulon Montgomery Pike and a corps of 15 men (his original group of 23 had split into two) began moving across what we know as Colorado. It was an unexplored wilderness - hundreds of square miles of land acquired as part of the Louisiana Purchase. Pike and his men explored the area for months, enduring bitter cold and snow, and sometimes going days without food.

And when Pike left in February 1807, never to return, he left an indelible mark on the area that today is named after him.

To be fair to Pike, mountain climbing wasn't on his official to- do list. After all, many folks back east thought the Rocky Mountains that wove through Colorado were shallow hills. But when Pike spotted the first imposing peak in the distance, he realized they were much more.

"Nov. 15, 1806: At two o'clock in the afternoon, I thought I could distinguish a mountain to our right, which appeared like a small blue cloud; viewed it with my spy glass, and was still more confirmed in my conjecture ... in half an hour they appeared in full view before us. When our small party arrived on the hill they with one accord gave three cheers to the Mexican mountains. Their appearance can easily be imagined by those who have crossed the Alleghenies; but their sides were whiter, as if covered with snow, or a white stone."

Pike knew these mountains weren't like the gentle Alleghenies back east, but that's all he knew. He was the first man to see and record observations of any mountain west of the Mississippi. He wanted to be closer, to climb, to stand on the highest point of the land.

It was mid-November, and the weather was changing. Pike's men were ill-equipped for snow and higher altitudes, but they were brave and sure of their leader, Murphy says.

When Pike first spotted the "small blue cloud," he and his men were likely near Las Animas, about 110 miles from Colorado Springs, according to his journal. For 10 days, they marched toward its hazy hump and when they reached modern-day Pueblo, they set up camp. The mountain still loomed on the horizon, and on Nov. 23, Pike decided to take three of his men and climb it.

"Marched at ten o'clock ... encamped at night in the point of the grand forks (of a river). As the river appeared to be dividing itself into many small branches and of course must be near its extreme source, I concluded to put the party in a defensible situation and ascend the north fork to the high point of the blue mountain, which we conceived would be one day's march, in order to be enabled from its pinical (sic) to lay down the various branches and positions of the country."