The American mountain man casts a long shadow over our nation’s history, a legendary figure brought to life in Hollywood blockbusters like “The Revenant” and “Jeremiah Johnson.” These captivating tales of wilderness survival and raw adventure, featuring rugged frontiersmen such as Hugh Glass and the infamous Liver-Eating Johnson, fuel our imaginations about the untamed Old West. But as the lore only seems to grow, how much of what we believe about these iconic figures is hard fact, and how much is woven from campfire stories and silver screen magic?
On Our American Stories, we’re joined by historian Ashley Lebinski to unearth the truth behind one of the most mythic characters of the American frontier: Liver-Eating Johnson, known to many as Jeremiah Johnson. Ashley helps us navigate the incredible journey of this powerful man, revealing the historical reality behind the legend and exploring why his story, intertwined with artifacts and popular culture, continues to fascinate us about the early American wilderness and the men who shaped it.
📖 Read the Episode Transcript
Speaker 2: Here’s Ashley.
Speaker 3: I used to run this very large museum in the American West, and on display at that museum there was a firearm called a hack and rifle and a booie knife with a sheath.
Speaker 2: And these two things belonged to a man named Liver-Eating Johnson, although that was not really his name. His name was John Johnston with a ‘T’.
Speaker 3: But he also at some points in his life went by John Garrison, John Johnson with no ‘T’ because spelling standardization wasn’t a thing in the 1800s, Jack Johnson, and then by his prolific, mythic name, Liver-Eating Johnson. And,
Speaker 2: A lot of people who’d come to…
Speaker 3: The museum would also call him Jeremiah Johnson.
Speaker 2: And the reason behind that was because of a movie that was starring…
Speaker 3: Robert Redford, called “Jeremiah Johnson,” in 1972. And so basically, you’ve got the man, you’ve got his artifacts, and then you’ve got a whole host of nonsense somewhere in the middle in order to kind of understand who he was and why people are so obsessed with him even today.
Speaker 2: Now, part of that really plays…
Speaker 3: Into people’s fascination with the American West, especially the early American West. So before trains, before mass migration out West, you know, these rugged men, kind…
Speaker 2: Of scary-looking men a little bit that would go out West and they were basically mapping the terrain. But then they were…
Speaker 3: Also hunting, trapping, trading with Native Americans. And all of those people that went out there had very kind of iconic stories. One of them is Ugh Glass, who, you know, was attacked by a bear and then abandoned by his people and basically had to drag himself to afford. So all of these stories are just larger than life. So it makes perfect sense that Liver-Eating Johnson’s story is no different. And because of the movie, because of a novel by Vartis Fisher called “Mountain Man,” his life is just larger than life. Actually, so here’s a few things we do know about him:
Speaker 2: That are true.
Speaker 3: So he was born John Garrison, but he did change his name to John Johnston at some point. And like I said, his name appeared in newspapers and records as John Johnson without the ‘T’; that again is because it didn’t have spell check on in their newspaper reports. So he actually was born in 1824, and he lived in Little York, New Jersey.
Speaker 2: And kind of like…
Speaker 3: The start of a lot of stories about, you know, rugged, violent men:
Speaker 2: Is that he grew up in a very violent home.
Speaker 3: And so he was one of six siblings, and he had an alcoholic father who really kind of beat up on him. And so it kind of starts that beginning to understanding his life.
Speaker 2: He stood at six feet tall; he was over 200…
Speaker 3: Hundred pounds, so just this really impressive-looking person.
Speaker 2: But this idea of his violent…
Speaker 3: Nature is also what kind of mules this mythology behind who he is, and a lot of that comes from an academic book that was written in the middle of the 20th century called “Crow Killer.” And the…
Speaker 2: Book is fascinating. I highly recommend the read.
Speaker 3: However, it’s based almost exclusively on oral tradition, and oral tradition was a huge part of Native American customs—the mountain man custom when you were moving out West. And so it’s understandable: you’re sitting around the campfire, you’re telling stories, and one of the stories that was told was about Liver-Eating Johnson. And this story was passed down, and it begins in 1847.
Speaker 2: The previous winner, John Johnston, was…
Speaker 3: Living out West, and he married a flat had Indian woman. And right…
Speaker 2: After their nuptials, he was called away to…
Speaker 3: Go do work, and he left her at their cabin. And when he returned in May of 1847, he found her murdered by the Crow Indians. So the story goes, he declared war on the coronation, and that he single-handedly killed dozens of Crow warriors. And ultimately, he was attacked by a Blackfoot…
Speaker 2: Chief, the wolf, and several of his men. And the…
Speaker 3: Story gets so weird. So they capture him, and it says that he was able to chew through his leather cuffs that they shackled him with, and he attacked a guard with a kick and a blow to the face, and that he cut off that man’s leg and ate it as he kind of made his grand escape and got back to safety. And that he continued to kill these Crow warriors until 1868. He was tired of fighting, and he rode into the camp of Crow Chief Gray Bear, which would blossom into a lifelong friendship. So this is part of that story. The other part of that story is the Liver-Eating part. So if you believe the part about eating a leg, I mean, I guess it doesn’t sound totally crazy.
Speaker 2: That he would be eating livers.
Speaker 3: But this story basically said that he was carving out the livers of his foes, so the Crow warriors, and eating them. And part of that story, if I understand it correctly, is that to the Crow Nation,
Speaker 2: You know, the liver was considered the way…
Speaker 3: To pass on to the afterlife. So in a sense, he was eating their souls. But this story kind of kept going and growing bigger and bigger, passed on by different tribal nations, passed on by different mountain men, and then, you know, basically immortalized in this academic book that then became a novel, became a…
Speaker 2: Movie, and here we are.
Speaker 3: The interesting part of this, though, is there is primary source documentation from this time period that don’t put him in the West in 1847. They actually put him in the Mexican-American War around this time, and his obituary, actually in the Carbon County Democrat, states that he went to shore for leave and never came back after violently attacking a lieutenant in his command. But a military pension that Johnson claims in 1884, states that he was in the Navy…
Speaker 2: Until the 1860s.
Speaker 3: The primary source documentation implies that he always had a great relationship with the cronation.
Speaker 2: And in fact, he had issues.
Speaker 3: And declared war on the Blackfeet and the Sioux, which does kind of follow the trajectory of a lot of mountain man history. The Blackfeet and the mountain men really didn’t get along. And the piece about the liver? Actually, there’s some reports that say that that was a joke that he started. And I guess, be careful things you joke about because it becomes basically like a game of ‘telephone’ when you pass on oral histories. So if you don’t want to believe that he was, you know, in the West, and, you know, until the 1860s, or even if you want to believe that he was out there earlier, because I will say, when I was running the museum, nobody cared when I corrected the story. They still wanted to know the story as they, you know, saw it when they watched the movie. But there are some things that we know after that time period. So he moved out West in the 1860s, and he was a deputy sheriff in Montana. So he spent some time in Colson, Montana, and then he moved to Red Lodge, Montana, and he did fight in the Plains Indian Wars. But he stayed there until 1899, when he was admitted to the Santa Monica National Soldiers’ Home. And he died on January 21st, 1900, so right at the turn of the 20th century, which is actually pretty late when you consider the mountain man era. By that point, you’re getting a much more modern America. The Transcontinental Railroad, you know, is put into place. People are living out in the American West, so it’s kind of, you know, this bygone era that he’s now passing away.
Speaker 2: And, you know, things really…
Speaker 3: Change as you get into the 20th century.
Speaker 2: After the Robert Redford became…
Speaker 3: Out in 1972, “Jeremiah Johnson,” Robert Redford actually had his body removed and moved to Cody, Wyoming. And I don’t know why Cody, but I mean, there’s a lot of Western stuff in Cody.
Speaker 2: So if you’re planning on visiting his grave, he’s not in California anymore.
Speaker 3: You can go to this small town of 9,000 people, and there’s this repurposed ghost town of old buildings that were from all over the West that they’ve kind of put together. So you…
Speaker 2: Can go and see them all in one place.
Speaker 3: And if you walk about 20 yards out of that little ghost town, you can go and visit his grave. And a lot of people go because of Robert Redford as well.
Speaker 1: And a terrific job on the production and editing by Greg Hangler, and a special thanks to Ashley Lebinski. And by the way, Ashley’s done some terrific storytelling for us, and that includes Annie Oakley, Eli Whitney, “The Story of the Cult Revolver,” and Sarah Winchester. Go to OurAmericanStories.com and take a listen. We’re very grateful to have her as a regular contributor here on Our American Stories. The Story, the Myth, and the Facts of Mountain Man Jeremiah Johnson here on Our American Stories.
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