Article content In the most recent Ponderings, we accompanied David Thompson, wife Charlotte, their three small children, along with their crew on their 1807 Howse Pass trade excursion. This was Charlotte’s first experience exploring the Rockies. Although the mountains and scenery were glorious, the reality of the terrain and waterways put them all in precarious situations. “As harrowing and frightening as it was for even the strongest of men, what is not written [in David’s Journals] is that Charlotte made the same crossing with three small children in tow.” After overwintering at Kootenae House, first trading post in the Columbia Basin, starvation and attack by the Peigans [Pikani] loomed over the Thompson party as they made their way eastward over the Rockies. It was June 1808. At one point in their journey, while crossing a stream, one of the pack horses “began to behave wildly, nearly crushing my children to death with his load being badly put on, which I mistook for being vicious. I shot him on the spot and rescued my little ones.”