Fort Musselshell

The post's best witness was a gunsmith and merchant named Lee, who settled at the mouth of the Musselshell in 1868 hoping to build a trading and shipping post that could compete with Fort Benton, some 160 miles upriver. He kept a journal there for five years, through 1872. It was published in 2011 by Stoneydale Press of Stevensville as Life and Death at the Mouth of the Musselshell, 1868-1872, its editor adding sketches of some two hundred people Lee named.

What the plaque says

Fort Musselshell Fort Musselshell was located on the Missouri River about 35 miles north of here. It was a trading post in the '60s and '70s and as such had a brief but colorful career. The only whites in that part of the state were woodchoppers for the Missouri River steamboats, wolfers, trappers and Indian traders. The River Crows and Gros Ventre Indians traded there. A buffalo robe brought them 3 cups of coffee, or 6 cups of sugar, or 10 cups of flour. It was a tolerably profitable business from the traders standpoint. The Assiniboine and Sioux regarded this post as an amusement center where bands of ambitious braves could lie in ambush and get target practice on careless whites. During the cattle days of the 80's the mouth of the Musselshell became a cattle rustlers hangout but after a Vigilance Committee stretched a few of them they seemed to lose interest.

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Kerchival City — steps away
• Bearpaw Shale and the Inland Ocean — steps away