Blood in the Borderlands: Conflict, Kinship, and the Bent Family, 1821-1920

Blood in the Borderlands: Conflict, Kinship, and the Bent Family, 1821-1920

by David C. Beyreis
Blood in the Borderlands: Conflict, Kinship, and the Bent Family, 1821-1920

Blood in the Borderlands: Conflict, Kinship, and the Bent Family, 1821-1920

by David C. Beyreis

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Overview

Finalist for CSAW’s Outstanding Western Book of 2021
Historical Society of New Mexico’s Gaspar Pérez de Villagrá Award 
Santa Fe Trail Association's Louise Barry Writing Award


The Bents might be the most famous family in the history of the American West. From the 1820s to 1920 they participated in many of the major events that shaped the Rocky Mountains and Southern Plains. They trapped beaver, navigated the Santa Fe Trail, intermarried with powerful Indian tribes, governed territories, became Indian agents, fought against the U.S. government, acquired land grants, and created historical narratives. 

The Bent family’s financial and political success through the mid-nineteenth century derived from the marriages of Bent men to women of influential borderland families—New Mexican and Southern Cheyenne. When mineral discoveries, the Civil War, and railroad construction led to territorial expansions that threatened to overwhelm the West’s oldest inhabitants and their relatives, the Bents took up education, diplomacy, violence, entrepreneurialism, and the writing of history to maintain their status and influence.

In Blood in the Borderlands David C. Beyreis provides an in-depth portrait of how the Bent family creatively adapted in the face of difficult circumstances. He incorporates new material about the women in the family and the “forgotten” Bents and shows how indigenous power shaped the family’s business and political strategies as the family adjusted to American expansion and settler colonist ideologies. The Bent family history is a remarkable story of intercultural cooperation, horrific violence, and pragmatic adaptability in the face of expanding American power.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781496222039
Publisher: UNP - Bison Books
Publication date: 05/01/2020
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 270
File size: 2 MB

About the Author

David C. Beyreis has a PhD in history from the University of Oklahoma and teaches history at Saint Mary’s School in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Table of Contents


List of Illustrations
Introduction
Chapter 1: Into the West: The Bents and St. Vrain to 1834
Chapter 2: Marriage, Business, and Diplomacy in the Great Plains: William Bent and His Family, 1834-1846
Chapter 3: Marriage, Business, and Diplomacy in New Mexico: Charles Bent and His Family, 1834-1846
Chapter 4: Collapse: The Final Days of Bent, St. Vrain and Company, 1846-1849
Chapter 5: Fifty-Niners, Freighters, and School Children: The Bent Family, 1849-1861
Chapter 6: The Road to Sand Creek: William Bent and His Family, 1861-1865
Chapter 7: War, Diplomacy, and Land Grants: The Bent Family, 1865-1869
Chapter 8: Reservations, Ranches, and Respectability: The Bent Family, 1869-1920
Conclusion: Contesting the Memory of the Bent Family
Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Index

 
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