Album: Artifacts of Fort Union: Weapons

Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site

Between 1828 and 1867, Fort Union anchored the fur trade on the Upper Missouri River. Although the original post did not survive intact to the present day, material goods produced and used by the fur trade post’s employees and trading partners did. In the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, archeologists unearthed about a million individual fur-trade-era artifacts that many layers of soil had protected from the weather. Today, these artifacts offer clues as to what life at Fort Union may have been like while it was in operation. This photo gallery contains images of artifacts that were excavated at the fort prior to its reconstruction in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Future excavations will likely add to this vast and best-of-its-kind collection of fur-trade-period artifacts. Park staff will add new artifact images and descriptions in the coming months and years. As you browse the gallery’s current and future images, click on the image to see a larger version. Click on the hyperlinked “More” in the description beneath each image to read the full text about each object.