depending upon this man for their lives. What would become of his family
if justice was meted out to him? Soon there developed an undercurrent of
opinion that it was probably better to waive punishment than to endanger
the lives of the family; but the council would not be swerved from its
resolution. At sundown of the third day the criminal was hanged in the
presence of the whole camp. This was not done until ample provision had
been made to insure the safety of the family by providing a driver to
finish the journey. I came so near to seeing the hanging that I did see
the ends of the wagon tongues in the air and the rope dangling
therefrom.
From necessity, murder was punishable with death. The penalty for
stealing was whipping, which, when inflicted by one of those long ox
lashes in the hands of an expert, would bring the blood from the
victim's back at every stroke. Minor offenses, or differences generally,
were arbitrated. Each party would abide by the decision as if it had
come from a court of law. Lawlessness was not common on the Plains. It
was less common, indeed, than in the communities from which the great
body of the emigrants had been drawn, for punishment was swift and
certain.
The greater body of the emigrants formed themselves into large companies
and elected captains. These combinations soon began to dissolve and
re-form, only to dissolve again, with a steady accompaniment of
contentions. I would not enter into any organized company, but neither
could I travel alone. By tacit agreement our party and the McAuleys
travelled together, the outfit consisting of four wagons and thirteen
persons--nine men, three women, and the baby. Yet although we kept apart
as a separate unit, we were all the while in one great train, never out
of sight and hearing of others. In fact, at times the road would be so
full of wagons that all could not travel in one track, and this fact
accounts for the double roadbeds seen in so many places on the trail.
[Illustration: Giving chase to the buffaloes.]
CHAPTER FIVE
THE WESTWARD RUSH
WE crossed the Missouri on the seventeenth and eighteenth of May. The
next day we made a short drive, and camped within hearing of the shrill
steamboat whistle that resounded far over the prairie.
The whistle announced the arrival of a steamer. This meant that a dozen
or more wagons could be carried across the river at a time, and that a
dozen or more trips could be made during the day, with as many more at
night. Very soon we were overtaken by this throng of wagons. They gave
us some troubles, and much discomfort.
The rush for the West was then at its height. The plan of action was to
push ahead and make as big a day's drive as possible; hence it is not to
be wondered at that nearly all the thousand wagons that crossed the
river after we did soon passed us.
"Now, fellers, jist let 'em rush on. If we keep cool, we'll overcatch
'em afore long," said McAuley.
And we did. We passed many a team, broken down as a result of those
first few days of rush. People often brought these and other ills upon
themselves by their own indiscretion.
The traveling had not progressed far until there came a general outcry
against the heavy loads and unnecessary articles. Soon we began to see
abandoned property. First it might be a table or a cupboard, or perhaps
a bedstead or a cast-iron cookstove. Then feather beds, blankets,
quilts, and pillows were seen. Very soon, here and there would be an
abandoned wagon; then provisions, stacks of flour and bacon being the
most abundant--all left as common property.
It was a case of help yourself if you would; no one would interfere. In
some places such a sign was posted,--"Help yourself." Hundreds of wagons
were left and hundreds of tons of goods. People seemed to vie with each
other in giving away their property. There was no chance to sell, and
they disliked to destroy their goods.
Long after the end of the mania for getting rid of goods to lighten
loads, the abandonment of wagons continued, as the teams became weaker
and the ravages of cholera among the emigrants began to tell. It was
then that many lost their heads and ruined their teams by furious
driving, by lack of care, and by abuse. There came a veritable
stampede--a strife for possession of the road, to see who should get
ahead. It was against the rule to attempt to pass a team ahead; a wagon
that had withdrawn from the line and stopped beside the trail could get
into the line again, but on the march it could not cut ahead of the
wagon in front of it. Yet now whole trains would strive, often with bad
blood, for the mastery of the trail, one attempting to pass the other.
Frequently there were drivers on both sides of the team to urge the
poor, suffering brutes forward.
[Illustration: _United States Geological Survey_
The Platte River. Along this old stream the Oregon Trail wound its way
for nearly five hundred miles.]
We were on the trail along the north side of the Platte River. The
cholera epidemic struck our moving column where the throng from the
south side of the Platte began crossing. This, as I recollect, was near
where the city of Kearney now stands, about two hundred miles west of
the Missouri River.
"What shall we do?" passed from one to another in our little family
council.
"Now, fellers," said McAuley, "don't lose your heads, but do jist as
you've been doing. You gals, jist make your bread as light as ever, and
we'll take river water the same as ever, even if it is most as thick as
mud, and boil it."
We had all along refused to dig little wells near the banks of the
Platte, as many others did; for we had soon learned that the water
obtained was strongly charged with alkali, while the river water was
comparatively pure, except for the sediment, so fine as seemingly to be
held in solution.
"Keep cool," McAuley continued. "Maybe we'll have to lay down, and maybe
not. Anyway, it's no use frettin'. What's to be will be, 'specially if
we but help things along."
This homely yet wise counsel fell upon willing ears, as most of us were
already of the same mind. We did just as we had been doing, and all but
one of our party escaped unharmed.
We had then been in the buffalo country for several days. Some of the
young men, keen for hunting, had made themselves sick by getting
overheated and drinking impure water. Such was the experience of my
brother Oliver. Being of an adventurous spirit, he could not restrain
his ardor, gave chase to the buffaloes, and fell sick almost to death.
This occurred just at the time when we encountered the cholera panic. It
must be the cholera that had taken hold of him, his companions argued.
Some of his party could not delay.
"It is certain death," I said, "to take him along in that condition."
They admitted this to be true.
"Divide the outfit, then," it was suggested.
Two of Oliver's companions, the Davenport brothers, would not leave him;
so their portion of the outfit was set aside with his. This gave the
three a wagon and a team.
Turning to Buck, I said, "I can't ask you to stay with me."
The answer came back as quick as a flash, "I'm going to stay with you
without asking."
And he did, too, though my brother was almost a total stranger to him.
We nursed the sick man for four days amidst scenes of death and
excitement such as I hope never again to see. On the fifth day we were
able to proceed and to take the convalescent man with us.
The experience of our camp was the experience of hundreds of others:
there were countless incidents of friends parting; of desertion; of
noble sacrifice; of the revelation of the best and the worst in man.
In a diary of one of these pioneers, I find the following: "Found a
family consisting of husband, wife, and four small children, whose
cattle we supposed had given out and died. They were here all alone, and
no wagon or cattle in sight." They had been thrown out by the owner of a
wagon and left on the road to die.
From a nearby page of the same diary, I read: "Here we met Mr. Lot
Whitcom, direct from Oregon. Told me a great deal about Oregon. He has
provisions, but none to sell; but gives to all he finds in want, and who
are unable to buy."
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Pioneers on the march.]
CHAPTER SIX
THE PIONEER ARMY OF THE PLAINS
DURING the ox-team days a mighty army of pioneers went West. In the year
that we crossed (1852), when the migration was at its height, this army
made an unbroken column fully five hundred miles long. We knew by the
inscribed dates found on Independence Rock and elsewhere that there were
wagons three hundred miles ahead of us, and the throng continued
crossing the river for more than a month after we had crossed it.
How many people this army comprised cannot be known; the roll was never
called. History has no record of a greater number of emigrants ever
making so long a journey as did these pioneers. There must have been
three hundred and fifty thousand in the years of the great rush
overland, from 1843 to 1857. Careful estimates of the total migration
westward from 1843 to 1869, when the first railroad across the continent
was completed, make the number nearly half a million.
The animals driven over the Plains during these years were legion.
Besides those that labored under the yoke, in harness, and under saddle,
there was a vast herd of loose stock. A conservative estimate would be
not less than six animals to the wagon, and surely there were three
loose animals to each one in the teams. Sixteen hundred wagons passed us
while we waited for Oliver to recover. With these teams must have been
nearly ten thousand beasts of burden and thirty thousand head of loose
stock.
Is it any wonder that the old trail was worn so deep that even now in
places it looks like a great canal? At one point near Split Rock,
Wyoming, I found the road cut so deep in the solid sandstone that the
kingbolt of my wagon dragged on the high center.
The pioneer army was a moving mass of human beings and dumb brutes, at
times mixed in inextricable confusion, a hundred feet wide or more.
Sometimes two columns of wagons, traveling on parallel lines and near
each other, would serve as a barrier to prevent loose stock from
crossing; but usually there would be a confused mass of cows, young
cattle, horses, and men afoot moving along the outskirts. Here and there
would be the drivers of loose stock, some on foot and some on horseback:
a young girl, maybe, riding astride and with a younger child behind her,
going here and there after an intractable cow, while the mother could be
seen in the confusion lending a helping hand. As in a thronged city
street, no one seemed to look to the right or to the left, or to pay
much attention, if any, to others, all being bent only on accomplishing
the task in hand.
The dust was intolerable. In calm weather it would rise so thick at
times that the lead team of oxen could not be seen from the wagon. Like
a London fog, it seemed thick enough to cut. Then again, the steady flow
of wind through the South Pass would hurl the dust and sand like fine
hail, sometimes with force enough to sting the face and hands.
Sometimes we had trying storms that would wet us to the skin in no time.
One such I remember well, being caught in it while out on watch. The
cattle traveled so fast that it was difficult to keep up with them. I
could do nothing but follow, as it would have been impossible to turn
them. I have always thought of this storm as a cloudburst. Anyhow, in an
incredibly short time there was not a dry thread left on me. My boots
were as full of water as if I had been wading over boot-top depth, and
the water ran through my hat as though it were a sieve. I was almost
blinded in the fury of the wind and water. Many tents were leveled by
this storm. One of our neighboring trains suffered great loss by the
sheets of water on the ground floating away camp equipage, ox yokes, and
all loose articles; and they narrowly escaped having a wagon engulfed in
the raging torrent that came so unexpectedly upon them.
Fording a river was usually tiresome, and sometimes dangerous. I
remember fording the Loup fork of the Platte with a large number of
wagons fastened together with ropes or chains, so that if a wagon got
into trouble the teams in front would help to pull it out. The quicksand
would cease to sustain the wheels so suddenly that the wagon would drop
a few inches with a jolt, and up again the wheel would come as new sand
was struck; then down again it would go, up and down, precisely as if
the wagons were passing over a rough corduroy road that "nearly jolted
the life out of us," as the women folks said after it was over, and no
wonder, for the river at this point was half a mile wide.
Many of the pioneers crossed rivers in their wagon boxes and very few
lost their lives in doing so. The difference between one of these
prairie-schooner wagon boxes and that of a scow-shaped, flat-bottomed
boat is that the wagon box has the ribs on the outside, while in a boat
they are on the inside.
The number of casualties in that army of emigrants I hesitate to guess
at. Shall we say that ten per cent fell on the way? Many old plainsmen
would think that estimate too low; yet ten per cent would give us five
thousand lives as one year's toll paid for the peopling of the Oregon
Country. Mrs. Cecilia McMillen Adams, late of Hillsboro, Oregon, kept a
painstaking diary when she crossed the Plains in 1852. She counted the
graves passed and noted down the number. In this diary, published in
full by the Oregon Pioneer Association, I find the following entries:
June 14. Passed seven new-made graves.
June 16. Passed eleven new graves.
June 17. Passed six new graves.
June 18. We have passed twenty-one new graves today.
June 19. Passed thirteen graves today.
June 20. Passed ten graves.
June 21. No report.
June 22. Passed seven graves. If we should go by the camping grounds,
we should see five times as many graves as we do.
This report of Mrs. Adams's, coupled with the facts that a parallel
column from which we have no report was traveling up the south side of
the river, and that the outbreak of cholera had taken place originally
in this column coming from the southeast, fully confirms the estimate of
five thousand deaths on the Plains in 1852. It is probably under rather
than over the actual number.
To the emigrants the fact that all the graves were new-made brought an
added touch of sadness. The graves of previous years had disappeared,
leveled by the storms of wind or rain, by the hoofs of the stock, or
possibly by ravages of the hungry wolf. Many believed that the Indians
had robbed the graves for the clothing on the bodies. Whatever the
cause, all, or nearly all, graves of previous years were lost, and we
knew that the last resting places of those that we might leave behind
would also be lost by the next year.
One of the incidents that made a profound impression upon the minds of
all was the meeting with eleven wagons returning, and not a man left in
the entire train. All the men had died and had been buried on the way,
and the women and children were returning to their homes alone from a
point well up on the Platte, below Fort Laramie. The difficulties of the
return trip were multiplied on account of the throng moving westward.
How those women succeeded in their attempt, or what became of them, we
never knew.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: In an instant each Indian had dropped to the side of his
horse.]
CHAPTER SEVEN
INDIANS AND BUFFALOES ON THE PLAINS
OUR trail led straight across the Indian lands most of the way. The
redmen naturally resented this intrusion into their territory; but they
did not at this time fight against it. Their attitude was rather one of
expecting pay for the privilege of using their land, their grass, and
their game.
As soon as a part of our outfits were landed on the right bank of the
Missouri River, our trouble with the Indians began, not in open
hostilities, but in robbery under the guise of beggary. The word had
been passed around in our little party that not a cent's worth of
provisions would we give up to the Indians. We believed this policy to
be our only safeguard from spoliation, and in that we were right.
Our women folks had been taken over the river with the first wagon and
had gone on to a convenient camp site nearby. The first show of weapons
came from that side of our little community, when some of the bolder
Pawnees attempted to pilfer around the wagons. No blood was shed,
however, and indeed there was none shed by any of our party during the
entire journey.
[Illustration: Demanding pay for crossing.]
Soon after we had left the Missouri River we came to a small bridge over
a washout across the road, evidently constructed by some train just
ahead of us. The Indians had taken possession and were demanding pay for
crossing. Some parties ahead of us had paid, while others were
hesitating; but with a few there was a determined resolution not to pay.
When our party came up it remained for that fearless man, McAuley, to
clear the way in short order, though the Indians were there in
considerable numbers.
"You fellers come right on," said McAuley. "I'm goin' across that bridge
if I have to run right over that Injen settin' there."
And he did almost run over the Indian, who at the last moment got out of
the way of his team. Other teams followed in such quick succession and
with such a show of guns that the Indians withdrew and left the road
unobstructed.
Once I came very near to getting into serious trouble with three Indians
on horseback. We had hauled my wagon away from the road to get water, I
think, and had become separated from the passing throng. We were
almost, but not quite, out of sight of any wagons or camps.
The Indians came up ostensibly to beg, but really to rob. They began
first to solicit, and afterwards to threaten. I started to drive on, not
thinking they would use actual violence, as there were other wagons
certainly within a half mile. I thought they were merely trying to
frighten me into giving up at least a part of my outfit. Finally one of
the Indians whipped out his knife and cut loose the cow that I was
leading behind the wagon.
I did not have to ask for my gun. My wife, who had been watching from
within the wagon, saw that the time had come to fight and handed my
rifle to me from under the cover. Before the savages had time to do
anything further they saw the gun. They were near enough to make it
certain that one shot would take deadly effect; but instead of shooting
one Indian, I trained the gun so that I might quickly choose among the
three. In an instant each Indian had dropped to the side of his horse
and was speeding away in great haste. The old saying that "almost any
one will fight when cornered" was exemplified in this incident; but I
did not want any more such experiences, and consequently thereafter
became more careful not to be separated from the other wagons.
On the whole, we did not have much trouble with the Indians in 1852. The
great numbers of the emigrants, coupled with the superiority of their
arms, made them comparatively safe. It must be remembered, also, that
this was before the treaty-making period, and the Indians of the Plains
were not yet incensed against white men in general.
Herds of buffalo were more often seen than bands of Indians. The buffalo
trails generally followed the water courses or paralleled them. But
sometimes they would lead across the country with scarcely any
deviation from a direct course. When on the road a herd would
persistently follow their leader, whether in the wild tumult of a
stampede or in leisurely grazing as they traveled.
A story is told, and it is doubtless true, of a chase in the upper
regions of the Missouri, where the leaders of the buffalo herd, either
voluntarily or by pressure from the mass behind, leaped to their death
over a perpendicular bluff a hundred feet high, overlooking the river.
The herd followed blindly until not only hundreds but thousands lay
struggling at the foot of the bluff. They piled one upon another till
the space between the river and the bluff was bridged, and the last of
the victims plunged headlong into the river.
Well up on the Platte, but below Fort Laramie, we had the experience of
a night stampede that struck terror to the heart of man and beast. It so
happened that we had brought our cattle into camp that evening, a thing
we did not usually do. We had driven the wagons into a circle, with the
tongue of each wagon chained to the hind axletree of the wagon ahead.
The cattle were led inside the circle and the tents were pitched
outside.
[Illustration: A night out on the range.]
Usually I would be out on the range with the oxen at night, and if I
slept at all, snuggled up close to the back of my good ox, Dandy; but
that night, with the oxen safe inside the enclosure, I slept in the
wagon.
William Buck and my brother Oliver were in a tent near by, sleeping on
the ground.
[Illustration: _L. A. Huffman_
A remnant of the buffalo herds that once roamed the Plains.]
Suddenly there was a sound like an approaching storm. Almost instantly
every animal in the corral was on its feet. The alarm was given and all
hands turned out, not yet knowing what caused the general commotion. The
roar we heard was like that of a heavy railroad train passing at no
great distance on a still night. As by instinct all seemed to know
suddenly that it was a buffalo stampede. The tents were emptied of their
inmates, the weak parts of the corral guarded, the frightened cattle
looked after, and every one in the camp was on the alert to watch what
was coming.
In the darkness of the night we could see first the forms of the
leaders, and then such dense masses that we could not distinguish one
buffalo from the other. How long they were in passing we forgot to note;
it seemed like an age. When daylight came the few stragglers yet to be
seen fell under the unerring aim of the frontiersman's rifle.
We were lucky, but our neighbors in camp did not escape loss. Some were
detained for days, gathering up their scattered stock, while others were
unable to find their teams. Some of the animals never were recovered.
When not on the road, the buffalo were shy, difficult to approach, and
hard to bag, even with the long-range rifles of the pioneers. But for
over six hundred miles along the trail, a goodly supply of fresh meat
was obtainable.
[Illustration: The prairie wagon used as a boat.]
CHAPTER EIGHT
TRAILING THROUGH THE MOUNTAIN LAND
AS the column of wagons passed up the Platte in what is now western
Nebraska, there was some relief from the dust. The throng was visibly
thinned out; some had pushed on beyond the congested district, while
others had lagged behind. The dead, too, had left room upon the road.
When we reached the higher lands of Wyoming, our traveling became still
more pleasant. The nights were cooler, and we had clearer, purer water.
As we gradually ascended the Sweetwater, life grew more tolerable and
discomfort less acute.
We were now nearing the crest of the continent. The climb was so
gradual, however, as to be hardly observable. The summit of the Rocky
Mountains, through the South Pass, presents a wide, open, undulating
country. The Pass offers, therefore, an easy gateway to the West.
Passing Pacific Springs at the summit, we rolled over to Big Sandy
Creek. At this point we left the Salt Lake Trail (known also as the
Mormon Trail) and took the Sublette Cut-off over to Bear River. This
was a shorter trail to the Oregon Country, made by William Sublette, one
of the American fur traders of the early days. The earlier emigrants to
Oregon went on to Fort Bridger before leaving the Salt Lake route.
[Illustration: _Howard R. Driggs_
The big bend of the Bear River in Idaho.]
The most attractive natural phenomenon encountered on the whole trip was
found at the Soda Springs, near Bear River in Idaho. Some of the
springs, in fact, are right in the bed of the river. One of them,
Steamboat Spring, was spouting at regular intervals as we passed.
Just after leaving Soda Springs our little company of friends separated.
The McAuleys and William Buck took the trail to California, while with
Oliver and the Davenport brothers we went northwest to Oregon. Jacob,
the younger of the brothers, fell sick and gradually grew worse as the
journey grew harder. Shortly after reaching Portland the poor boy died.
Thomas McAuley settled in the Hobart hills in California and became a
respected citizen of that state. When last I heard of him he was
eighty-eight years old.