DISQUIETING RUMORS OF REDMEN. CONSOLIDATION FOR SAFETY. THE POISONOUS
HUMBOLDT.
Soon after passing the summit of the Rocky Mountains there were rumors
of a hostile attitude toward emigrants on the part of certain Indian
tribes farther west. For a time such information seemed vague as to
origin and reliability, but in time the rumors became persistent, and
there developed a feeling of much concern, first for the safety of our
stock, later for our own protection.
Measures of precaution were discussed. Men of our train visited those
of others, ahead and behind us, and exchanged views regarding the
probability of danger and the best means for protection and defense.
We were forced to the conclusion that the situation was grave; and
the interests of the several trains were mutual. As the members of the
different parties, most of whom previously had been strangers to one
another, met and talked of the peril which all believed to be
imminent, they became as brothers; and mutual protection was the theme
that came up oftenest and was listened to with the most absorbing
interest.
By the time we had crossed the Green River these consultations had
matured into a plan for consolidation of trains, for greater
concentration of strength. A. J. Drennan's company of four or five
wagons, immediately ahead of us, and the Dr. Kidd train, of three
wagons, next behind us, closed up the space between, and all three
traveled as one train. Thus combined, a considerable number of
able-bodied men were brought together, making a rather formidable
array for an ordinary band of Indians to attack. Every man primed his
gun and thenceforth took care to see that his powder was dry.
Still the youthful element occasionally managed to extract some humor
out of the very circumstances which the older and more serious members
held to be grounds for forebodings of evil. One morning after we had
left camp, a favorite cow was missing from the drove. "Jack" Aston and
Major Crewdson, both young fellows, rode back in search of the stray.
From a little hill-top they saw, in a ravine below, some half dozen
Indians busily engaged in skinning the cow. "Jack" and the Major
returned and merely reported what they had seen. They were asked why
they had not demanded of those "rascally" Indians that they explain
why they were skinning a cow that did not belong to them. "Jack"
promptly answered that, as for himself, he had never been introduced
to this particular party of Indians, and was not on speaking terms
with them; furthermore, neither he nor the Major had sufficient
knowledge of the Indian language properly to discuss the matter with
them.
The route pursued led to the north of Great Salt Lake, thence
northwesterly. Our line of travel did not therefore bring us within
view of the Mormon settlements which had already been established at
the southerly end of the great inland sea.
We camped one night approximately where the city of Ogden now stands,
then a desolate expanse of sand-dunes. A group of our men sat around
the camp-fire that evening, discussing the probability of a railroad
ever being constructed over the route we were traveling. All of them
were natives or recent residents of the Middle West, and it is
probable that not one had ever seen a railroad. The unanimous opinion
was that such a project as the building of a railroad through
territory like that over which we had thus far traveled would be a
task so stupendous as to baffle all human ingenuity and skill. Yet,
some twelve years later, the ceremony of driving the famous "last
spike," completing the railroad connection between the Atlantic and
Pacific, was performed on a sand flat very near the spot where we
camped that night. The intervening period saw the establishment of the
"pony express," which greatly facilitated the mail service
(incidentally reducing letter postage to Pacific Coast points from
twenty-five to ten cents). That service continued from the early
sixties until through railroad connection was made.
After the consolidation of trains as described, our next neighbor to
the rear was Smith Holloway, whose "outfit" consisted of three wagons,
with a complement of yokewise oxen and some horses and mules; also a
large drove of stock cattle, intended for the market in California,
where it was known they would be salable at high prices. He had with
him his wife, a little daughter, and Jerry Bush, Mrs. Holloway's
brother, a young man of twenty-one years; also two hired men, Joe
Blevens and Bird Lawles. Holloway kept his party some distance behind
us, he having declined to join the consolidation of trains in order to
avoid the inconvenience that the mingling of his stock with ours would
entail, with reference to pasture, and camping facilities.
A mile or two behind Holloway were the trains of Captain Rountree, the
Giles company, Simpson Fennell, Mr. Russell, and others, equipped with
several wagons each, and accompanied by some loose stock.
All these were traveling along, a sort of moving neighborhood;
incidentally getting acquainted with one another, visiting on the road
by day and in the camp at evening time; talking of the journey, of
the country for which we were en route, and our hopes of prosperity
and happiness in the new El Dorado--but most of all, just then, of the
probable danger of attack by savage tribes.
More than ever rumors of impending trouble were flying from train to
train. Some of these were to the effect that white bandits were in
league with Indians in robbing and murdering emigrants. The well-known
treachery of the savages, and the stories we heard of emigrants having
been slaughtered also by whites--the real facts of which we knew
little of--were quite enough to beget fear and suggest the need of
plans for the best possible resistance.
Up to this time there was frequent communication between trains, a
considerable distance ahead and behind. As at home, neighbor would
visit neighbor, and discuss the topics of the day; so, from time to
time we met persons in other trains who gave out information obtained
before leaving home, or from mountaineers, trappers or explorers,
occasionally met while we were yet on the eastern slope of the
Rockies; men who were familiar with Indian dialects and at peace with
the tribes, enabling them to learn much that was of importance to the
emigrants.
Dissemination of news among the people of the various trains near us
was accomplished not only during visits by members of one train to
those of another, but sometimes by other methods. One of these, which
was frequently employed in communicating generally or in signaling
individuals known to be somewhere in the line behind us, was by a
system of "_bone-writing_."
[Illustration: Bone-writing]
There were along the line of travel many bare, bleached bones of
animals that had died in previous years, many of them doubtless the
animals of earlier emigrants. Some of these, as for example, the
frontal or the jaw-bone, whitened by the elements, and having some
plain, smooth surface, were excellent tablets for pencil writing. An
emigrant desiring to communicate with another, or with a company, to
the rear, would write the message on one of these bones and place the
relic on a heap of stones by the roadside, or suspend it in the
branches of a sage bush, so conspicuously displayed that all coming
after would see it and read. Those for general information, intended
for all comers, were allowed to remain; others, after being read by
the person addressed, were usually removed. Sometimes when passing
such messages, placed by those ahead of us, we added postscripts to
the bulletins, giving names and dates, for the edification of whomever
might care to read them. It was in this way that some of the
developments regarding the Indian situation were made known by one
train to another.
Thus we progressed, counting off the average of about eighteen miles a
day from the long part of the journey that still lay before us, when
we reached Thousand Springs, adjacent to the present boundary line
between Utah and Nevada. This, we were told, was the source of the
Humboldt River. We were told, too, that the four hundred miles down
the course of that peculiar stream--which we could not hope to
traverse in much less than one month--we would find to be the most
desert-like portion of the entire trip, the most disagreeable and
arduous, for man and beast. Such was to be expected by reason of the
character of that region and the greater danger there of Indian
depredations; also because the passage through that section was to be
undertaken after our teams had become greatly worn, therefore more
likely to fail under hard conditions. Furthermore, scarcity of feed
for the stock was predicted, and, along much of the way, uncertainty
as to water supply, other than that from the Humboldt River, which
was, especially at that time of the year, so strongly impregnated with
alkali as to be dangerous to life.
Nearly all the face of the country was covered with alkali dust,
which, in a light, pulverulent state, rose and filled the air at the
slightest breeze or other disturbance. It was impossible to avoid
inhaling this powder to some extent, and it created intense thirst,
tending toward exhaustion and great suffering. We knew that sometimes
delirium was induced by this cause, and even death resulted from it in
cases of very long exposure under the worst conditions.
Sometimes for miles the only vegetable growth we found along the river
was a string of willow bushes, fringing its course, and scattered,
stunted sagebrush, growing feebly in gravel and dry sand, the leaves
of which were partly withered and of a pale, ashy tint. Feed for the
animals was very scarce. It was not possible, over much of the way, to
get sufficient fresh water for the stock, therefore difficult to
restrain them from drinking the river water. Some did drink from that
stream, despite all efforts to prevent it, the result being that many
of them died while we made our way along the sluggish Humboldt.