OOOPPPSIE! Forgot to say "BIG THANKS, JOSS!"
Please pardon my Faux Paux, my feeble brain is still tuckered from shoveling out from under this morning's snow, that was still on top of yesterday's snow that was...ah, you get the idea.
It does makes one wonder at how the Market Hunters ever got their Buffalo hides to the nearest town or Railhead in weather like this. I've read a few articles in hobbyist shooting magazines about them but don't recall anything on how seasonal they were. Did they stop hunting in the winter and hunker down in town or did the higher price for winter hides make it so they had to go out and do the best they could in raw weather?
Old journals and historical books oft-times tell of harsh winters where even a horse-drawn sleigh couldn't get anywhere on the vast Prairie due to the depth and consisitency of the snow, anywhere from knee deep and higher. Folks today will get frazzled when 1/2" of snow falls and they think the whole world is going to shut down, but think about how hard it had to be for the Market Hunters out on the flats or hunkered down in a Willow break on a frozen river going nowhere.
A supply of fresh meat was no doubt 'catch as catch can'. There had to have been times when all they had to eat was Buff roast and hump meat seasoned with gunpowder. Kit Carson's stories of 'Boudiens' (sp?) always sounded interesting. He told of how his fellow Market Hunters made sausages from fresh-killed Buffalo intestines that were turned inside-out, stuffed with chopped hump, heart and whatever other leftover fat they could find, well-seasoned with whatever spices they had and gunpowder, then roasted on sticks over an open fire.
OK, hungry yet?
Thanks again Joss & Marshal, this is great!
Best regards and good reading!
'Ol Gabe