Histories: Trempealeau Co. Historical Accounts:
"History of Trempealeau County Wisconsin, 1917":
Chapter 6:
"Virginia," the First Steamboat and Beltrami
-As transcribed from pages 61 - 62
The
first steamboat to ascend the upper Mississippi, the "Virginia," passed
Trempealeau Mountain in May, 1823, and arrived at Fort Snelling, near
the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers, May 10. A
number of prominent people were aboard. Steamboat traffic thus being
opened, Trempealeau Mountain, a landmark and a point of interest to all
travelers, became widely known. J. Constantine Beltrami, who explored
the Red River of the North and the sources of the Mississippi River,
was one of the passengers aboard the "Virginia" when it made its first
trip to Fort Snelling. Of Trempealeau he says:
"From this spot (118 miles from Prairie du Chien) a chain of mountains,
whose romantic character reminds one of the valley of the Rhine,
between Bingen and Coblentz, leads to the Mountain which dips into the
water. This place would exhaust all my powers of expression if I had
not seen Longue Vue. Amid a number of delightful little islands,
encircled by the river, rises a mountain of a conical form equally
isolated. You climb amid cedars and cypresses, strikingly contrasted
with the rocks which intersect them, and from the summit you command a
view of valleys, prairies, and distances in which the eye loses itself.
From this point I saw both the last and the first rays of a splendid
sun gild the lovely picture. The western bank-presents another illusion
to the eye. Mountains, ruggedly broken into abrupt rocks, which appear
cut perpendicularly into towers, steeples, cottages, &c., appear
precisely like towns and villages."46
Resources
for the above information:
46
- J. C. Beltrami; A Pilgrimage in Europe and America Leading to the
Discovery of the Sources of the Mississippi and Bloody River (London,
1828), II, 178-179.
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