This story is about William Bent. He was born in St. Louis in 1809, one of four sons of a Missouri Supreme Court Justice. William Bent followed his older brother, Charles into the fur-trading business.

Charles helped William build Bent's Fort. It was a massive adobe building on the north bank of the Arkansas River. At Bent's Fort they sold Mexican blankets, New Mexico sheep, buffalo robes, pelts from the Rocky Mountains, horses, mules, and food. 

Several years later William wanted to close the fort and sell it to the government. When the goverment would not pay him for the fort he blew it up. He said, "If I can't have it nobody can."

When he was living at the fort William Bent married a Cheyenne named Owl Woman. They had 4 children. She died in 1847.

William Bent's son, Robert, was forced to lead Colonel John Chivington to the place where Black Kettle and the Cheyenne were camped on Sand Creek. When the army got there they killed more than two hundred Cheyenne men, women and children. They took their scalps to show to people in Denver. Two of William Bent's children where killed. The Sand Creek Massacre happened on November 29, 1864.

This made William Bent so sad he just wanted to die. He moved to Kansas and died in 1869.

We got our information from:
Colorado Kids Dig Up The Past by Crystal Gordon, Steve Karsten and Micah Richey.
and from this Internet article.