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life-size Monument installed Fall 2022 in Pueblo, Colorado

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Charles Autobees was a trader, trapper, and mountain man in the American West.

Autobees was born in 1821 in St. Louis, Missouri, to Francis Autobees and Sarah T. Tate. His mother was believed to have been a Delaware Indian, and his French-Canadian father may have had Native American heritage as well. His mother was widowed either before or shortly after Charles’ birth and soon married Bartholomew Tobin, with whom she had a second child, Tom Tate Tobin, in May 1823. When Charles was just 16 years old, he went west to work as a beaver trapper.

He soon returned to St. Louis, Missouri briefly, and when he went west again to Taos, New Mexico, his 14-year-old brother Tom Tobin came with him in the company of Ceran St. Vrain. Charles lived as a mountain man and trader for several years, often working with such names as William Bent, Ceran St. Vrain, Kit Carson, James Bridger, and James Beckwourth. He was also a familiar figure among numerous Indian tribes, including the Arapaho, Blackfoot, Cheyenne, Teton Lakota, Navajo, and Ute. During these years, he learned to speak several tribal languages and Spanish. 

In 1853, he homesteaded a ranch near the junction of the Huerfano and Arkansas Rivers in Colorado. He was “married” to an Arapaho woman named Sycamore. Settling amid Ute territory, most other area pioneers were driven away by the tribe. However, when they threatened Charles, he and his wife, Sycamore, both fought steadily against them for more than two hours before the Ute finally retreated. In 1861, he became one of the first three County Commissioners of Huerfano County, Colorado Territory. Over the years, he operated a ferry across the Arkansas River, ran a saloon near Fort Reynolds, Colorado, and acted as a scout during the Indian wars.