Early history revolved around Carroll Trail, Fort Maginnis

              Early History revolved around Carroll Trail, Fort Maginnis
By John R. Foster
12-16-1984 Lewistown News-Argus newspaper article
NOTE: The following article is based on a talk delivered Oct. 27, 1984 at the 11th annual Mon-tana History Conference held at the Yogo Inn at Lewistown.
The Carroll Trail was a short lived and relatively insignificant part of Montana's total transportation history. Many Central Montanans in fact, know little or nothing about it. But its long-term political impact on Central Montana was profound. Had it not been for the polities in developing Carroll Road Lewistown in the 1870's might well have become headquarters for the Crow Indian Reservation. If it had, inevitable conflict would have followed when gold and grass were discovered by white settlers in 1880. And the face of Lewistown and Central Montana as we know it today might be vastly different.
Talks with the Crow Indians on moving to Central Montana.
In 1873 when the rich grasslands of the Judith Basin were still uninhabited by the white man the United States government was negotiating with the Crow Indian Tribe located then in the Gallatin Valley near present day Livingston about relocating on a Central Montana reservation south of the south of the Missouri and west of the Musselshell rivers. New settlers in the Gallatin wanted the Crows out and the Crow Nation was willing to move.
On Aug 16, 1873 the Crows negotiated an agreement with the United States Government exchanging their lands south of the Yellowstone for a half a million “newly withdrawn acres in the Judith Basin. While this agreement was signed it still had to be ratified by Congress. Anticipating, however, that Congress would ratify the Crow Treaty, the progressive Montana merchants, Nelson Story and Charles Hoffman, sent their agent, Peter Koch, to Central Montana to establish a Trading Post in what was to be the heart of the new Crow Reservation.
In November and December of 1873, Koch completed Fort Sherman a log structure located just below the mouth of Big Casino Creek on the south bank of Big spring Creek in what is today Lewistown. In this first “permanent” structure built in the Judith Basin, Koch was ready to do business with the Crows. At the same time that the U.S. Government was negotiating with the Crows about moving to Central Montana in 1873, the Northern Pacific Railroad had just laid tracks into Bismarck, N.D. From this emerged the Carroll Trail.
Carroll Trail based on dream
The early pioneers dreamed of a good wagon road to Helena downriver from Fort Benton. The promoters of the Carroll Trail the railroad, a steamship interest and the Diamond R. Freight Outfit decided to do just that. The railroad would bring eastern freight to Bismarck where it would be loaded onto steamboats, transported up the Missouri to a point 30 miles upriver from the mouth of the Musselshell, which was to be known as Fort Carroll, and transported from there by Diamond R wagons on what was to become the Carroll Trail, through Central Montana to Helena. The Carroll promoters claimed that Fort Benton, until then the head of navigation on