Pathfinder: John Charles Fremont and the Course of American Empire (review)

Numerous books have addressed aspects of John C. Frémont's career or covered his entire life. For example, Allan Nevins's monumental favorable two volumes were published in 1928, and revised in 1939 and 1955. Analysis of Frémont's role as an explorer is effectively summarized in William H. Goetzmann's classic Army Exploration in the American West, 1803-1863 (1959). Ferol Egan stressed flowery descriptions over analysis in his lengthy biography (1977). Andrew Rolle used a psychoanalytical approach emphasizing Frémont's character (1991). Tom Chaffin offers this latest in a line of full biographies.

Chaffin's subtitle reveals his theme: army lieutenant Frémont, a colorful and vibrant figure, propelled and advanced the "Course of American Empire" from the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific Coast. The author hammers home this thesis. He does not overlook Frémont's activities in the Republican party, including running as its first presidential nominee in 1856, or his contentious assignments as a volunteer Union general in the Civil War. Stressing his theme, most of Chaffin's 550 pages cover the years before 1860 and dwell on 1838-48, when the Pathfinder made his greatest contributions to American continental exploration and expansion, including controversial actions in California during the U.S.-Mexican War. Chaffin also provides context by thoroughly describing Frémont's closest associates, including Senator Thomas Hart Benton (Frémont's father-in-law), explorer Joseph Nicollet, and U.S. Secretary of War Joel Poinsett.

Although Chaffin's endnotes may seem sparse, it is evident that he has studied the abundant primary sources pertaining to Frémont and his wife, Jessie Benton Frémont, but no author will duplicate the length of Nevins's work. Chaffin writes well and his biography will inform and entertain most readers. He describes the Pathfinder's expeditions and harrowing western adventures (some in detail) and analyzes the expeditions' contributions to geography and science—which Chaffin points out were not always as accurate as Frémont asserted. Furthermore, Chaffin does not neglect Frémont's faults. Even if Frémont's father-in-law was a prestigious U.S. senator, and if senior commanders, such as General Stephen W. Kearny, wanted to embellish their own records, Chaffin implies that Frémont was obtuse about how junior officers should relate to colonels and generals. Chaffin delineates Frémont's poor judgment in business and his questionable railroad investments. He died almost penniless in 1890, decades after his fame had faded.

Chaffin meets his objective of writing a full biography, and it is a fair-minded study that is neither overly favorable to Frémont nor condemns him. On the other hand, he may let down readers by the relentless use of the term "empire" for American expansion, comparing the distant overseas subordinate colonies of the British Empire to the way the United States added contiguous lands that became coequal states in the Union—without an index entry to Great Britain, Britain, or England, despite the many times Britain is discussed. Describing the Frémont-Kearny controversy in California, Chaffin is twice in error (pp. 259, 370) by asserting that Kearny was a Military Academy graduate and implying that his supposedly being a West Pointer contributed to the antagonism between them. Readers can expect that this will not be the last word on the flamboyant Pathfinder.