Rotting Face

In April 1837, the steamboat St. Peter’s left St. Louis and headed up the Missouri River to deliver supplies to the trading posts of Pratte, Chouteau & Company. No one had an inkling the voyage would change the history of the Great Plains. In addition to trade goods, the steamer also carried one of the deadliest pestilences known to man: smallpox.  Physicians know it by its scientific name, the virus variola major. The Indians called it “rotting face.” Unbeknownst to the boat’s