Days On the Road E-Book

Sarah Raymond Herndon

• Herausgeber: The Old Pioneer Press
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

Days On the Road

Leseprobe

Days On the Road

Sarah Raymond Herndon

Published by The Old Pioneer Press, 2018.

Copyright

Days On the Road - Crossing the Plains in 1865 by Sarah Raymond Herndon. First published in 1902.

Annotated digital edition published by the Old Pioneer Press. Original material copyright © 2018 Old Pioneer Press. All rights reserved.

Introduction by Damian Stevenson ©2018.

First e-book edition 2018.

ISBN: 978-1-387-81968-3.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Days On the Road

Introduction

We Start

Through Memphis

Bloomfield, Iowa

The Icarian Community

On the Banks of the Big Muddy

On the Banks of the River Platte

A Narrow Escape

We Decide to Go to Montana

The Mountains in Sight

We Celebrate the Fourth

Laramie Plains

We Cross the North Platte

We Overtake the California Train

A Fatal Shooting

We Leave the Train

The Wanderers Return

Bear River Mountain

Sweet Water Canyon

The End of Our Journey

Further Reading: The Life of John Wesley Hardin

Dedicated to the Pioneers of Montana and the ‘Great West,’ who crossed the plains in wagons.

Introduction

THE OREGON TRAIL WAS the route blazed by 1840’s pioneers along a path first carved in boots by trappers and traders decades before. It cut east to west through territory that became six states – Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Idaho and Oregon. From Independence, Missouri to Oregon City on the coast, the meandering path was 2,130 miles long.

With few navigable waterways in the West, the wagon train was the only option. Passengers embarked in late spring, to make the most of what grazing there was but with enough time to hit the mountains before the snows set in. An organized train pulled by horses could get to the Pacific in five or six months if everything went spectacularly well (it rarely did) or nearly twice that time if oxen did the hauling.

Leaving was hard, but not as hard as getting there. Disease took its toll and many perished from fatigue on the hot, dusty road. Accidents happened frequently, like the unintended discharging of a firearm, as occurs in Days On the Road. Bad-timing or unforeseen delay could result in disaster, like winter famine as in the notorious 1846 California-bound Donner Party from Illinois who went from roasting mules to roasting each other after being stuck in towering snow drifts.

Native American attacks were rare but many feared the specter of marauding ‘Indians,’ an unfounded misgiving that probably took root before they left home. In Days On the Road, Sarah Herndon records meeting a pair of would-be gold hunters heading in the opposite direction. Rumors of an Indian attack further up the trail had made them turn around. Sarah, imbued with the pioneer mettle that these men lack, doesn’t mince words when she writes:

“We would not like to be scalped and butchered by the Indians, but it does seem so cowardly to run away from a possible danger ... Poor fellows, how I pity a man that has so little grit.”

Another potential hazard on the journey was mismanagement of the train. Weak captains were challenged by those who thought they could do better and family rifts could see wagons splintering off, headed to the likely doom that came with isolation and straying from the path.

Horses were hard to maintain as water became increasingly scarce further West. Only military convoys could afford the space for fodder. Mules served a purpose but were unreliable. An ox was less fussy, could take the summer heat and was the only beast of burden capable of hauling heavy loads up steep inclines. Most expeditions like the one in Days On the Road used a combination of animals in the rotation. Occasional solo rides on horseback meant more room in the wagon. Herndon follows her family’s schooner from atop a pony whenever terrain permits.

The covered prairie-schooner was the conveyance of choice, a re-imagined, sleeker version of the bulky Conestoga, and it was tailor-made for the Oregon Trail. Evolving over the pre-locomotive decades into a highly durable vehicle, it soon had the comfortable capacity (and optional furnishings) of a home on the road.

Image: Line art drawing of a Conestoga wagon.

THE PRAIRIE SHIP WAS built to withstand varied trail conditions; plain, desert and mountain; and with a lighter frame, it moved faster than the Conestoga. There were many sizes and varieties. Herndon’s ‘mother-ship’ had a load capacity of about 2,000 pounds, which was typical.

Image: A Prairie Schooner pulled by oxen on the Cariboo Road or in the vicinity of Rogers Pass, Selkirk Mountains, c. 1887, by Edward Roper.

HERNDON MENTIONS AN encounter with a couple headed for the Montana gold mines traveling in a more compact, buggy-style vehicle. At the other end of the scale, a freight wagon led by twelve yoke of oxen – twenty-four animals - could haul around seven thousand pounds.

Sadly, many settlers learned the capacity of their wagon too late and were forced to eject precious household items. Trail diaries mention bleached pianos, rocking chairs and other items heaped in the dust by the side of the road. A result of sentimental miscalculation perhaps but also partly attributable to the persuasive sales pitches of unscrupulous businessmen who had convinced departing families that they would need more items on the road than they did.

Image: The part migrants played in growing America is epitomized in the 1872 painting ‘American Progress’ by immigrant John Gast:

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LIKE THE MAIN VEIN of a raggedy highway system, the Oregon interlaced other established routes crisscrossing the West, each leading to a hot-spot. Trains tended to merge whenever going in the same direction. Inclusion was practical. They would indeed ‘circle the wagons’ at night to deter predators and to create a campground atmosphere for the big barbecue of roast deer, antelope or whatever else the hunters were able to snag that day, which was usually something.

Precious provisions were for emergencies, and the pioneers lived off the land most of the time, certainly in the early phase of the exodus. One can imagine the mounds of garbage and other detritus that piled up over the years on what became a mile-wide route by the 1860s. And the hordes of scarfed thieves and dandy mountebanks hawking fake mining claims, quack medicine and anything else they could pass off as genuine to the vulnerable and desperate.

There were established stops on the map from the beginning. Forts, lodges and mission stations were supplanted by hotels and one-horse towns as traffic increased. Outposts of the dying fur trade adapted to the new income stream by expanding dining and rest facilities for weary pilgrims. Supply depots sprouted up along the trail selling a vast array of marked-up goods.

As in Herndon’s book, pioneers were fed and housed by settlers who had blazed before them and planted roots along or close to the trail. Etiquette dictated that children should sleep in a house whenever possible and road-hosts would often oblige, perhaps out of settler camaraderie but more likely because they were excited to have visitors to entertain.

Image: Crossing the frozen Mississippi River.

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FORT LARAMIE WAS A key hub on the Platte River Road where wagons headed for places other than Oregon City branched off. But the most significant split occurred on the other side of the Continental Divide, at Fort Hall. Here the family-farmers continued on to the Pacific Northwest, following the Snake River to the Blue Mountains and beyond them to the Columbia River.  California gold seekers forked southwest toward the unforgiving deserts and, if they made it through them, to the indomitable Sierras, the final barrier to reaching any one of a number of mushrooming strikes or precious ore-rich valleys.

Many more pioneers got rich without ever having to touch a pick or hoe, unless they happened to be selling one. They established markets and department stores and trades and services. Boom-towns like Virginia City, Nevada rapidly came to rival the sophistication of San Francisco, with saloons catering to the elite, offering oysters and Champagne on the bill of fare. 

There really was gold lying on the ground, like the gold-silver rocks found scattered on the slopes of Nevada’s Virginia Mountains in 1859, which became the famous Comstock Lode.

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Image: Comstock’s revolutionary modular mining framework was an engineering concept developed in-house but not patented, leading to mass adoption by the industry worldwide.

BUT WHEN IT DIDN’T pan out, literally, sieves for rivers were swapped for picks and $4 an hour guaranteed in the established mines. You could make double that if you had the skills to get into Comstock, a staggering rate for a miner in 1859-60. 

Image: Bullion Mine, Virginia City, c.1875-77.

THEY KNEW IT WAS A gamble, both miner and farmer. For every fortune-hunter who returned home rich there was a dozen who vanished into the dust, never to be heard from again. During the long, arduous months of travel, hastily-dug roadside graves were a constant reminder of the treacherous path they were on. The grass did turn out to be greener for those who made it to the Pacific Northwest, only it wasn’t a fence they had to scale, but swollen river-fords, wheel-wrecking sloughs, impassable canyons, frozen foothills and countless other obstacles.

Proof that you could arrive safe and flourish was visible in the many towns, cities and states that emerged from the thirty year migration. The Civil War brought the railroads and by 1869 if you saw a mile-long wagon train of pioneers on the plains, it was probably a mirage.

The majority of those who set out somehow arrived safe and a good portion of them even prospered. But the pioneer spirit was in the going, not the outcome. The blazers left permanent rut marks in the earth; proof that they were here; eternal signposts for people heading west.

We Start

AS I SIT HERE IN THE shade of our prairie-schooner, with this blank book ready to record the events of this our first day on the road, the thought comes to me:

“Why are we here? Why have we left home, friends, relatives, associates, and loved ones, who have made so large a part of our lives and added so much to our happiness? Are we not taking great risks, in thus venturing into the wilderness? When devoted men and women leave home, friends and the enjoyments of life to go to some far heathen land, obeying the command: “Go, preach my Gospel, to every creature,” we look on and applaud and desire to emulate them. There is something so sublime, so noble in the act that elevates the missionary above the common order of human beings that we are not surprised that they make the sacrifice, and we silently wish that we, too, had been called to do missionary work.

But when people who are comfortably and pleasantly situated pull up stakes and leave all, or nearly all, that makes life worth the living, start on a long, tedious, and perhaps dangerous journey, to seek a home in a strange land among strangers, with no other motive than that of bettering their circumstances, by gaining wealth, and heaping together riches, that perish with the using, it does seem strange that so many people do it.

The motive does not seem to justify the inconvenience, the anxiety, the suspense that must be endured. Yet how would the great West be peopled were it not so? God knows best. It is, without doubt, this spirit of restlessness, and unsatisfied longing, or ambition—if you please—which is implanted in our nature by an all-wise Creator that has peopled the whole earth.

This has been a glorious May Day. The sky most beautifully blue, the atmosphere delightfully pure, the birds twittering joyously, the earth seems filled with joy and gladness. God has given us this auspicious day to inspire our hearts with hope and joyful anticipation, this our first day’s journey on the road across the plains and mountains.

It was hard to say good-bye to our loved and loving friends, knowing that we were not at all likely to meet again in this life. I felt very much like indulging in a good cry, but refrained, and Dick and I were soon speeding over the beautiful prairie, overtaking Cash, who had lingered behind the others, waiting for me.

“A penny for your thoughts, Cash?”

“I was wondering if we will ever tread Missouri soil again?”

“Quite likely we shall, we are young in years, with a long life before us, no doubt we will come on a visit to Missouri when we get rich.”

We were passing a very comfortable looking farmhouse, men, women, and children were in the yard, gazing after us, as we cantered past.

“Don’t you believe they envy us and wish they were going, too?”

“No, why should they?”

“Oh, because it is so jolly to be going across the continent; it is like a picnic every day for months; I was always sorry picnic days were so short, and now it will be an all-summer picnic.”

“I wish I felt that way; aren’t you sorry to leave your friends?”

“Of course I am, but then I shall write long letters to them, and they will write to me, and I will make new friends wherever I go, and somehow I am glad I am going.”

After we came within sight of our caravan we walked our ponies, and talked of many things, past, present, and future. When within a mile or two of Memphis our first camp was made. Our six wagons, with their snow-white covers, and Mr. Kerfoot’s big tent, make a very respectable looking camp.

As we were provided with fresh bread, cake, cold chicken, boiled ham, pickles, preserves, etc., supper was quickly prepared for our small family of four, and we enjoyed it immensely. Then comes my time to write, as I have promised friends that I will keep a journal on this trip. Mr. Kerfoot thinks the Government is going to smash and greenbacks will not be worth one cent on the dollar, so he has turned all his money into gold coin, and stowed it into a small leather satchel—it seems quite heavy to lift or carry.

As Mrs. Kerfoot was sitting on a camp-chair near our wagons, Mr. Kerfoot came toward her, saying, “Here, mother, I want you to take care of this satchel, it is all we will ask you to do, the girls will cook and wash dishes, the boys take care of the stock, and I will oversee things generally, and we will do nicely.” She accepted the responsibility without a word, and as he walked away she turned to me, and said, “I wish it was in some good bank, I expect nothing else but that it will be stolen, and then what will become of us?”

While I have been writing Neelie (Cornelia) and Sittie (Henrietta) have been getting supper for a family of twelve, no small undertaking for them, as they have been used to servants and know very little about cooking.

When everything was ready, Neelie came to her mother exclaiming, “Come, mamma, to supper, the first ever prepared by your own little girl, but not the last I hope, see how nicely the table looks, Emma and Delia picked those wild flowers for you, how brightly the new tinware shines, let us imagine it is silver and it will answer the same purpose as if it were.”

Her mother smiles cheerfully, as she takes her arm. Cash sneers at Neelie’s nonsense— as she calls it. Mr. Kerfoot nods approval, as Neelie escorts her mother to the table. When all are seated Mr. Kerfoot bows his head and asks God’s blessing on the meal.

Everyone seems to enjoy this picnic style of taking supper out of doors, and linger so long at the table, that Neelie has to hint that other work will have to be done before dark. When at last the table is cleared, she says to Emma and Delia, “Don’t you want to help me wash these nice, bright dishes and put them away?”

They are always ready to help Neelie, and the work is soon done. Amid laughter and fun they hardly realize they have been at work. Mr. Kerfoot insists that we women and the children must sleep in houses as long as there are houses to sleep in. Mother and I would greatly prefer sleeping in our spring-wagon, to making a bed on the floor in a room with so many, but as he has hired the room we do not want to seem contrary, so have offered no objection. The boys have carried the mattresses and bedding into the house, and Neelie has come for me to go with her to arrange our sleeping-room. So goodnight.

Through Memphis

WE WERE UP WITH THE sun this morning after a night of refreshing and restful sleep. Neelie and I commenced folding the bedclothes, ready to be sent to the wagons, when she startled me with a merry peal of laughter, “Look here, Miss Sallie, see ma’s treasure, she has left it on the floor under the head of her bed. Don’t say anything, and I will put it in the bottom of a trunk, where it ought to be, and we will see how long it will be before she misses it.”

She thought of it while at breakfast, and started up excitedly, “Neelie daughter, did you see that precious satchel?”

“Yes, ma, I have taken care of it, and put it where it will not be left lying around loose anymore.”

“Thank you, my dear, I am glad you have taken care of it.”

“Why, mother, I did not expect you to carry that burden around on your arm by day, and sleep with it at night. I only intend for you to have entire charge of it, and put it where the rest of us do not know the hiding place, so that when we are obliged to have some, we will have to come to you to get it. And then give it sparingly, for much, very much depends upon what is in that satchel.”

We came to Memphis about nine A.M.

Court was in session, several friends and acqua [...]