The Mammoth Book of the West (12 page)

3 travelled 18 miles Tem. 29 deg. of Fah.

4 crossed the colorado of the west a stream of 40 Rods wide 2 feet deep dis. 16 miles

5 traveled 15 miles camped on Blacks Fork near half the company confined by sickness

6 traveled 2 miles Lay By on account of the sick Tem 90 Deg. of Fah.

7 Lay By Sick get worse Mr. S Sublett & three others staid with us they ware from California Wrote home By them. Tem. 105

8 We Left the main croud with 7 waggons travelled 16 miles some Rain

9 16 miles Braught us to Bridger Shoshone in abundane

Mr Joseph Walker et al from California

10 Lay By Indians visited us in great numbers

11 traveled 18 miles Cam[p]ed on muddy a bad camp

12 traveled 18 miles Camped at a good Spring

13 Crossed the Bear River mountain Rain 25 miles

14 16 miles Brought us to Smiths fork

15 traveled 22 verr[y] Bad Roads hard Rain

16 traveled 14 miles more Rain

17 21 Braught us to the Soda Spring

18 Lay By Rain thunder and Lightning

19 Left our company with our 2 waggons alon never shall I forget the deep Regret at a Leaving our friends passed the old Crater travaled 12 miles

20 our oxen sensable of the impropriety of Leaving their as well as our friends Left camp and ware overtaken 3 miles from the Soda Spring so that we only got to portneif River 7 miles

21 traveled 22 miles Crossed divers streams

22 traveled 21 to the Blue Spring 5 miles from fort Hall

23 passed Ft hall traveled 14 miles to portneiffe River.

24 traveled 18 mils passed the American falls of Snake or Saptin River.

25 travelled 18 miles to Casua Bad Road

26 Left the Oregon Road traveled 22 miles up the casua or Raft River good Road

27 traveled up casua 18 miles Rain Lightning and thunder

28 20 miles Braught us to a good Spring Road Bad Crossed over to goose creek [
deleted:
10 miles]

29 we came 10 miles

30 travelled 15 miles

31 we came 18 miles Tem. 30 deg. Fah morning

August the 1 traveled 17 miles

2 passed a verry hot Spring 20 miles Struck the head of Marys River

3 met Black harriis and applegate who had Been to view a new Road to oregon and designed meeting the emigrants to turn them into it travelled 20 miles Tem 88 of Fah.

4 Traveled 17 miles down Marys Rive. Tem. 90

5 This day we came 20 miles sevral diggers [Indians]

6 passed sevral Remarkabley hot Springs 20 miles

7 Came 14 miles

8     ″     17 miles hot Springs

9     ″     16 miles

10   ″     20 miles quit steril[e]

11   ″     23 miles   ″       ″   

12   ″     18 miles Natural Soap

13   ″     18 miles Salaeratus visited by Large party of Indians

14 Travelled 22 miles (Rain Lightning

15   ″     20 miles. divergence of new oregon road

16   ″     20   ″   Extreme Sterility

17   ″     25   ″   to day we Suffered for water as the Road Left the River for 14 miles Rain

18 Lay By Joined By Col. Russell of Mo. & 8 others packing Tem. 42 morning 96 noon

19. 20 miles Braught us to the Sink of Marys Riv Vegetation entirely disappear water verry bad

20 traveled all day and all night passed some Boiling Springs quite salt distance 40 miles making 60 miles that 8 of us had 12 gallons of Water Extreme suffering Reached Trucky

21 Lay by all day Tem 100 of Fah.

22 Entered the Siera Nevada or Cascade mts up Trucky vally 15 miles Tem 87 deg of Fah.

23 Traveled 18 miles Bad Road

24      ″        10 miles came to timber Tem 94 deg Fah

25 Crossed a spur of the mts 12 miles Tem 84.

26 travelled 12 miles good Road Tem 32.

27      ″        8 miles Trucky Lake Tem 30

28 travelled 1 mile up the worst mountain that waggons ever crossed sevier frost Tern 28

29 got up the mts. Distance 2 miles

30 travelled 3 miles Lay by the Ballance of day

31      ″        15 miles on top of the mt. Bad Road Tem 22 at day Light & 60 at Sun down

Sept 1 travelled 7 miles Bad Bad Road Bear sign Tem. 40 deg morn

2 traveled 7 miles of distressing Road

3rd      ″        8 miles ove if possable worse Road

4 Lay by to Rest our oxen

5 travled 16 miles principally upon the top of a high Spur of the mountain our Oxen are worn nearly out we have but three that are able to Render service and we have as steep a hill befor us as we have Left behind us Heaven only knows how we are to get Along Our Oxen are almost perishing for food and nothing grows in this hateful valley that will sustain life.

6 Lay by to day as yestardys Long drive has well nigh done for the oxen. We cut down Oak Bushes and trees, for them to Brows on, or such of them, as are able to Stand on their feet.

7 the indians drove off two of Mr. Stanley’s ablest Oxen; tho’ we succeeded in Recapturing one of them We unloaded our waggons and packed the Load near a mile on our horses We then took four of the best yoaks of Oxen and put to the empty waggons with a man at each wheel and by such exertions as I have seldom saw used we got the wagons up one at a time and proceeded about 5 miles grass verry Scarce and dry Our oxen are as near gone as I ever saw oxen to be driven at all

8 This morning we found that the Indians had taken off another one of Stanley’s oxen, it was seen by following the trail that they had taken him up a steep hill and carfully Covered Evry track for the distance of a mile he was taken
probably whilst I was on guard. I do not know how he managed to affect this Roguery it must have been very Sly W[e] travelled 11 miles and Stoped at a Small patch of dry grass and no water for the Cattle or horses

9 we traveled 3 miles and Stoped for the day at a Little grass and a hole of water one of Mr. Craigs Best oxen has gave out; the hills have got much Smaller and the Rocks are not so much in the way as on any part of the Road Since we Struck the waters of Trucky River

10 Lay by all day our oxen are so near worn out and our provisions are getting scarce

11 Started on slow went about 6 miles today we had to Leave an ox on the Road

12 we traveled 7 miles and Stopt we are in five miles of the first settlement today we left another ox we have but two oxen to our waggon

13 We this morning got into the Valley and stoped at Cap. Wm. Johnsons Whare we ware Recieved in the most Kind and hospitable manner We made several trades Bought a beef swaped our broak down oxen for fresh ons this day our company Lay by and so for several days distance 5 miles

“Never take no cut ofs and hury along as fast as you can.”

This advice, penned in an 1847 letter from an overlander to his eastern kin, was based on terrible experience. The writer was one of the emigrant party led west by George Donner in the summer of 1846 with California their goal, but tragedy their eventual destination.

It started easily enough. Although the emigrant party took the name of George Donner, its captain, it was originated by James Reed, a businessman of Springfield, Illinois, who was descended from Polish nobility (his family surname was Reednoski). Reed had been a private in the same company as Abraham Lincoln during the Black Hawk War of 1832, when Illinois troops had driven Sauk Indians from their tribal lands and slaughtered them in the Bad Axe Massacre. Afterwards, Reed had become a manufacturer of cabinet furniture, a farmer and railroad speculator. His wife, Margaret, suffered from “sick headaches”, and it was because of these that he decided to go west, hoping that the climate of California would improve her health. When Reed told his ageing Springfield neighbours the Donner brothers, George and Jacob, that he was heading west, they invited themselves along. So did Hiram
Miller and Gersham Keyes. Nine wagons in all left Springfield in early 1846, rolling to Independence, Missouri, their jumping-off point for the wilderness, without incident.

On 12 May 1846 the emigrants, with George Donner as their elected wagonmaster, left the frontier for the trail west. Chimney Rock, Red Buttes, Courthouse Rock and other landmarks came and went in carefree miles. More recruits were picked up along the way, and by the time the Donner party reached the Little Sandy River in Wyoming in late July it numbered some 60 wagons and 300 souls. Here the plans were laid for the remainder of the journey. The Donner brothers had read the
Emigrant’s Guide to Oregon and California
by the land speculator Lansford W. Hastings, and wanted to take the author’s advice: depart the regular California trail at Fort Bridger, “thence bearing west southwest, to the Salt lake; and thence continuing down to the Bay of St Francisco.” Hastings modestly called this route – which he estimated would reduce the travelling time to California to 120 days – the “Hastings Cutoff”. At the meeting on the Little Sandy, mountain men guides argued against the new trail. As a result, the train split in two. The majority took the usual route via Fort Hall in Idaho; 88 others, under George Donner, headed for Fort Bridger, where Hastings had promised to join the Donners and lead them along the Cutoff.

When the party reached Fort Bridger on 3 August 1846, they found that the adventurer was leading another group westward, but had left word that he had marked the trail for them. For good measure, George Donner hired a Fort Bridger guide named Juan Baptiste to pilot the emigrants around the southern end of the Great Salt Lake and to the head of Weber Canyon. There they found a note from Hastings stuck on a stick. It asked them to wait until he
could lead them through the Wasatch Range.

So began the first of many fateful delays. After eight days, George Donner sent a messenger to find Hastings. The messenger returned without Hastings but with his instruction to proceed along a new trail. At this point, Juan Baptiste refused to accept any further responsibility and returned to Fort Bridger. After pushing past countless, time-consuming boulders, the party emerged onto the blinding white alkali flats of the Great Salt Lake Desert.

According to Lansford W. Hastings, this parched wasteland would take two days to cross. It took the Donner party almost a week. Behind them in the sand they left most of their valuables, four wagons, and 300 head of oxen and cattle. Paiutes began to raid the stock and the wagons, making it dangerous to leave the train’s vicinity. Hunting had to be abandoned. With food low, it was decided on 18 September to send two men on to Sutter’s Fort in California for supplies. Charles Stanton and William McCrutchen volunteered, and left on fast horses. The rest of the party struggled onwards to the distant Sierras.

By now the emigrants were weak in body and morale. Old man Hardcoop was struck by illness and left to die by the side of the road. Arguments and bickering broke out constantly. A man named Wolfinger was murdered. James Reed quarrelled with the driver of another family, John Snyder, when their wagons became entangled on a grade. Snyder attacked Reed with his whip; Reed drew a blade in self-defence and killed him. Reed was banished to the desert alone, unarmed and on foot (although his family and friends secretly supplied him with a horse and rifle).

On 19 October Charles Stanton returned from Sutter’s Fort. With him were two of Captain Sutter’s Indian guides and a mule train of food. At Truckee Meadows they fed and rested. Not until 23 October did the pioneers’ wagons begin snaking, towards the jagged peaks of the Sierra
Nevada. The first snow of winter began to fall, a month early. The wagons ground upwards. At Alder Creek, George Donner’s wagon broke an axle, the remaining 15 schooners going around the hapless family and on to the high water that is now Donner Lake. There, on the evening of 28 October, they camped in cabins abandoned by earlier overlanders. A final push and they would be through the mountains. That night a snowstorm struck. When the emigrants awoke in the morning, the ground was deep in snow and the Truckee Pass was blocked. The Donner Party was snowbound in the high sierras.

Panic set in. Some emigrants hurriedly fashioned tents out of their wagons’ canvas tops, others holed up in the shanties. The Donners themselves failed to arrive. Eventually, Charles Stanton waded back to Alder Gulch, where he found George and Jacob Donner bedridden. Mrs Tamsen Donner was feeding them, her five children and their hired hands on strips of cowhide. They could not be moved to the main camp up at the lake. Blizzards continued to howl down from the mountains. The animals began to die in droves, of cold, or of suffocation in the drifts. Patrick Breen Sr, an Irish-born farmer and patriarch of the Breen clan amongst the emigrants, commenced writing a diary, his thoughts turned inwards by the ordeal. On December 1st he noted:

Still Snowing wind W about 5½ or 6 feet deep difficult to get wood, no going from the house Completely housed up looks as likely for snow as when it Commenced, our cattle all Killed but three of four of them, the horses & Stantons mules gone & Cattle suppose lost in the Snow no hopes of finding them alive.

The first emigrant died of starvation on 15 December. He was Bayliss Williams, a hired man of the Reeds. It was
clear that someone must go for help, or the whole party would perish from hunger. Fifteen of the strongest survivors (eight men, five women and the two Indian guides) volunteered to try to reach Sutter’s Fort. Led by Charles Stanton, the “Forlorn Hope”, as the party of volunteers was called, left on 19 December wearing improvised snowshoes and carrying six days’ rations.

Shortly after the volunteers left, news came up to Donner Lake from Alder Gulch of four deaths among the party there. By now all the cattle had long since died, and for most there were only hides left to eat. Patrick Breen shot his dog Towser for food. The drifts reached the roofs of the shanties. “We pray to the God of mercy to deliver us from our present calamity,” wrote Breen on the first day of 1847, while he and the others huddled waiting for rescue.

It was a long time in coming. The “Forlorn Hope” had run into tribulations beyond comprehension. Stanton had developed snow blindness and was left to freeze to death. A violent storm on Christmas night caused the demise of four of the party through hypothermia. The starving survivors stripped the flesh from the bones of the dead, roasted it and ate it, their weeping eyes unable to look each other in the face. The remaining flesh was carefully packed and labelled, so that no one would eat their kin. The band struggled on. Two more men died and were eaten. When this obscene food ran out the Indians, who had refused to eat human flesh, were shot and butchered. Finally, the survivors stumbled into Johnson’s Ranch on 18 January 1847. Of the 15 who had hazarded the journey from Donner Lake, only seven – two men and five women – came through alive.