[88] Historian Charles McGlashan later called this snowshoe party the "Forlorn Hope". They became the anonymous subjects of J. Ross Browne's story about his severe discomfort upon learning that he was staying with alleged cannibals, printed in Harper's Magazine in 1862. Year by year, traffic over what was now called Donner Pass increased. Delayed by a series of mishaps, they spent the winter of 1846–1847 snowbound in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Having traveled an extra 125 miles through strenuous mountain terrain and dry desert, the disillusioned party’s resentment of Hastings, and ultimately, Reed, was increased tremendously. The initial group included 32 men, women and children. [F] They spent several days trying to recover cattle, retrieve the wagons left in the desert, and transfer their food and supplies to other wagons. They packed lightly, taking what had become six days' rations, a rifle, a blanket each, a hatchet, and some pistols, hoping to make their way to Bear Valley. The individual that wrote this story is a good writer. They returned without him, reporting they had been attacked by Paiutes and he had been killed. With James and Margaret Reed were their four children, Virginia, Patty, James, and Thomas, as well as Margaret’s 70-year-old mother, Sarah Keyes, and two hired servants. [52] Snyder had been seen to hit James Reed, and some claimed he had also hit Margret Reed,[53] but Snyder had been popular and Reed was not. Margret Reed and her children were also now without a wagon. [179] In 1962, the Emigrant Trail Museum was added to tell the history of westward migration into California. [91][92], The group became lost and confused. Antonio, Patrick Dolan, Franklin Graves, and Lemuel Murphy soon died and in desperation, the others resorted to cannibalism. The Eddys were forced to walk, carrying their children and miserable with thirst. However, with only meager rations and already weak from hunger the group faced a challenging ordeal. [99][100] After several more days—25 since they had left Truckee Lake—they came across Salvador and Luis, who had not eaten for about nine days and were close to death. Sixty members and associates of the Breen, Graves, Reed, Murphy, Keseberg, and Eddy families set up for the winter at Truckee Lake. Several of the group saw visions of lakes and wagon trains and believed they had finally overtaken Hastings. Continuing to encounter multiple obstacles, on October 16th, they reached the gateway to the Sierra Nevada on the Truckee River (present-day Reno) almost completely depleted of food supplies. She died in 1935. [66][67] But the desert soon came to an end, and the party found the Truckee River in beautiful lush country. But what if it wasn't just history? On October 5th at Iron Point, two wagons became entangled and John Snyder, a teamster of one of the wagons began to whip his oxen. The three bodies, including that of Isaac Donner, had been cannibalized. On May 25th the train was held for several days by high water at the Big Blue River near present-day Marysville, Kansas. Women also store more body fat, which delays the effects of physical degradation caused by starvation and overwork. Also along with them were two teamsters, Noah James and Samuel Shoemaker, as well as a friend named John Denton. On August 6, the party found a letter from him advising them to stop until he could show them an alternate route to that taken by the Harlan-Young Party. When they discovered the Donner girls at Truckee Lake, they returned to Alder Creek to inform Tamsen Donner. [17] Also traveling with the Donner brothers were teamsters Hiram O. Miller (29), Samuel Shoemaker (25), Noah James (16), Charles Burger (30), John Denton (28), and Augustus Spitzer (30). Though he strongly suggested that the party take the regular wagon trail rather than this new false route, Reed would later ignore his warning in an attempt to reach their destination more quickly. Eliza Donner Houghton also believed Keseberg to be innocent. It was printed in various forms at least five times and photographed in part. Hastings stayed at the fort to persuade travelers to turn south on his route. On February 5, the first relief party of seven men left Johnson’s ranch, and the second, headed by James Reed, left two days later. Details * It was October 28, 1846 and the Sierra snows had started a month earlier than usual. October 28th, an exhausted James Reed arrived at Sutter’s Fort, where he met William McCutchen, now recovered, and the two men began preparations to go back for their families. News came that Jacob Donner and three hired men had died. In the Donner Party tragedy, two-thirds of the men in the party perished, while two-thirds of the women and children lived. He also neglected to mention any cannibalism at Alder Creek. The letter successfully allayed any fears that the party might have had regarding the Hastings cutoff. The next day, they arrived at the lake camp to find that both of their sons had died. Is It True That Only Cockroaches Can Survive A Nuclear. Nine of Reed's ten oxen broke free, crazed with thirst, and bolted off into the desert. [51] But George Donner, the party's leader, was a full day ahead of the main wagon train with his family. A smaller group opted to head for Fort Bridger and needed a leader. Some weeks later, Tamsen Donner had arrived at his cabin on her way over the pass, soaked and visibly upset. Some of the men tried to hunt with little success. Many other families' cattle and horses had also gone missing. The next day, on May 12, 1846, they headed west again in the middle of a thunderstorm. (Last Privacy Policy Update July 2020), Byways & Historic Trails – Great Drives in America, Soldiers and Officers in American History, Alva Gould – Discoverer of the Famous Gould and Curry Mine, Honest Miner To a Poker-Playing Politician, Old Tom – A Typical Mining Camp Character, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, Colorado. Camp, Charles L. and Yount, George C. (April 1923) "The Chronicles of George C. Yount: California Pioneer of 1826,", Richard Henry Dana, Jr., Twenty-Four Years Later(1869), p. 48. Stewart reprinted the letter with the original spelling and punctuation but amended it to ensure the reader could understand what the girl was trying to say. The members of the party were neither well-nourished nor accustomed to camping in snow 12 feet (3.7 m) deep and, by the third day, most were snowblind. George's younger brother Jacob (56) also joined the party with his wife Elizabeth (45), teenaged stepsons Solomon Hook (14) and William Hook (12), and five children: George (9), Mary (7), Isaac (6), Lewis (4), and Samuel (1). Enter Highway Number(s) You can also call 1-800-427-7623 for current highway conditions. Though Sarah Keyes was so sick with consumption that she could barely walk, she was unwilling to be separated from her only daughter. Five days later, on August 30th, the group began to cross the Great Salt Lake Desert, believing the trek would take only two days, according to Hastings. [28] Because Jim Bridger's trading post would fare substantially better if people used the Hastings Cutoff, he told the party that the shortcut was a smooth trip, devoid of rugged country and hostile Native Americans, and would therefore shorten their journey by 350 miles (560 km). According to Farnham, seven-year-old Mary Donner suggested to the others that they should eat Isaac Donner, Franklin Graves Jr., and Elizabeth Graves, because the Donners had already begun eating the others at Alder Creek, including Mary's father Jacob. Their food supplies ran dangerously low, and in mid-December some of the group set out on foot to obtain help. Never take no cutoffs and hurry along as fast as you can. A few days later their last few cattle were slaughtered for food and party began eating boiled hides, twigs, bones and bark. The salvage party found the Alder Creek tents empty except for the body of George Donner, who had died only days earlier. After three days, the water was gone, and some of the party removed their oxen from the wagons to press ahead to find more. We use cookies. One of them, Joseph Reinhardt, confessed on his deathbed that he had murdered Wolfinger. Both turned back before getting to Bear Valley, and no further attempts were made. The party traveled about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) west of the summit, but this trip too was aborted, and they returned to the lake on November 23. After a few miles of rough terrain, an axle broke on one of their wagons. [23], Several other families joined the wagon train along the way. [80] After the departure of the snowshoe party, two-thirds of the migrants at Truckee Lake were children. Margaret Breen insisted that she and her family did not cannibalize the dead, but Kristin Johnson, Ethan Rarick, and Joseph King—whose account is sympathetic to the Breen family—do not consider it credible that the Breens, who had been without food for nine days, would have been able to survive without eating human flesh. Keseberg said he put a blanket around her and told her to start out in the morning, but she died during the night. He helped to acquire the land for a monument and, in June 1918, the statue of a pioneer family, dedicated to the Donner Party, was placed on the spot where the Breen-Keseberg cabin was thought to have stood. Their neighbor, 40-year-old bachelor Patrick Dolan, traveled with them. In the meantime, the Graves family caught up with the Donner Party, which now numbered 87 people in 23 wagons. The Breen family consisted of Patrick Breen (51), a farmer from Iowa, his wife Margaret ("Peggy", 40), and seven children: John (14), Edward (13), Patrick, Jr. (9), Simon (8), James (5), Peter (3), and 11-month-old Isabella. 348–354). [73][J] The Eddys and Kesebergs joined the Breens, attempting to make it over the pass, but they found 5–10-foot (1.5–3.0 m) snowdrifts, and were unable to find the trail. These rescuers included veteran mountain men, most notably John Turner,[129][130] who accompanied the return of Reed and McCutchen. [105] He was joined by McCutchen, who had been unable to return with Stanton, as well as some members of the Harlan-Young party. On the sixth day, their food ran out and for the next three days, no one ate while they traveled through grueling high winds and freezing weather. Thanks to my grandmother, in the late 50s, earlier 60s, she purchased 224 acres of land in Elko, Nevada which the Hasting trail is included. However, the successful Reed was determined his family would not suffer on the long journey as his wagon was an extravagant two-story affair with a built-in iron stove, spring-cushioned seats, and bunks for sleeping. Their journey from Truckee Lake had taken 33 days. [136][137][138], Three members of the relief party stayed, one at Truckee Lake and two at Alder Creek. The terrible ordeals of the caravan continued to mount when on October 12th, their oxen were attacked by Piute Indians, killing 21 one of them with poison-tipped arrows, further depleting their draft animals. Only three mules reached California; the remaining animals perished. He told McGlashan, "I often think that the Almighty has singled me out, among all the men on the face of the earth, in order to see how much hardship, suffering, and misery a human being can bear! Additionally, the party had little knowledge about how to interact with Native Americans.[31]. Over the next week, two more attempts were made by other small parties, but both quickly failed. This page was last edited on 16 January 2021, at 17:38. Lewis Keseberg had moved into the cabin and could barely move due to an injured leg. Long distance trucking is grueling in itself; add winter weather and it can be unbearable. The 22 people with the Donners were about six miles behind at Alder Creek. Your email address will not be published. Along the entire journey, others would join the group until its size numbered 87. An 1847 story printed in the California Star described Keseberg's actions in ghoulish terms and his near-lynching by the salvage party. [57], The trials that the Donner Party had so far endured resulted in splintered groups, each looking out for themselves and distrustful of the others. Without the guide they had been promised, the group had to decide whether to turn back and rejoin the traditional trail, follow the tracks left by the Harlan-Young Party through the difficult terrain of Weber Canyon, or forge their own trail in the direction that Hastings had recommended. The days were blisteringly hot and the nights frigid. The cabins had no windows or doors, only large holes to allow entry. [121] Patty and Tommy Reed were soon too weak to cross the snowdrifts, and no one was strong enough to carry them. [28][33] At Fort Laramie, Reed met an old friend named James Clyman who was coming from California. Jim Bridger and his partner Louis Vasquez assured the Donner Party that the Hastings Cutoff was a good route. William Eddy was alone; most of the Murphy family had died. Journalist Edwin Bryant reached Blacks Fork a week ahead of the Donner Party. The story of the Donner Party, which looms so large in America’s folklore, is not only a metaphor for Manifest Destiny, but also a microcosm of the U.S. All able-bodied men were required to clear brush, fell trees, and heave rocks to make room for the wagons. [107][108], Two guides deserted Reed and McCutchen with some of their horses, but they pressed on farther up the valley to Yuba Bottoms, walking the last mile on foot. "[172][173], The Donner Party episode has served as the basis for numerous works of history, fiction, drama, poetry, and film. Ox and horse bones were boiled repeatedly to make soup, and they became so brittle that they would crumble upon chewing. Keseberg built a lean-to for his family against the side of the Breen cabin. [9][A], Arguably the most difficult part of the journey to California was the last 100 miles (160 km) across the Sierra Nevada. Finding the party at the south shore of the Great Salt Lake, Hastings accompanied Reed partway back to point out the new route, which he said would take them about one week to travel. Baylis Williams (24) went along as handyman and his sister, Eliza (25), as the family's cook. [153] In 1846, an estimated 1,500 people migrated to California. [30] The members of the party were comfortably well-off by contemporaneous standards. At Reed's urging, the group chose the new Hastings route. On February 19th, the first party reached the lake finding what appeared to be a deserted camp until the ghostly figure of a woman appeared. No other vehicles were invo… The Donner Party wasted no time in administering their own justice. On their eighty mile journey through the Salt Lake Desert, they had lost a total of thirty-two oxen; Reed was forced to abandon two of his wagons, and the Donners, as well as man named Louis Keseberg, lost one wagon each. Stay at home,—you are in a good place, where, if sick, you are not in danger of starving to death. A few days later, Hardkoop sat next to a stream, his feet so swollen they had split open; he was not seen again. Their arrival brought the Donner Party to 87 members in 60–80 wagons. [24] German immigrant Lewis Keseberg (32) joined, along with his wife Elisabeth Philippine (22) and daughter Ada (2); son Lewis Jr. was born on the trail. With nearly all his cattle gone, Wolfinger stopped at the Humboldt Sink to cache (bury) his wagon; Reinhardt and Spitzer stayed behind to help. Member of General Stephen W. Kearny's company, June 22, 1847[151], News of the Donner Party's fate was spread eastward by Samuel Brannan, an elder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a journalist, who ran into the salvage party as they came down from the pass with Keseberg. Eddy eventually succumbed to his hunger and ate human flesh, but that was soon gone. Some of the migrants seemed emotionally unstable. At last, we were all in the wagons. Donner hired a replacement driver, and the company was joined by the McCutcheon family, consisting of 30-year-old William, his 24-year-old wife Amanda, their two-year-old daughter Harriet, and a 16-year-old named Jean Baptiste Trudeau from New Mexico, who claimed to have knowledge of the Native Americans and terrain on the way to California. (Rarick, p. 71), The location has since been named Donner Spring where the Donner Party recuperated, at the base of, Reed's account states that many of the travelers lost cattle and were trying to locate them, although some of the other members thought that they were looking for his cattle. Donner Pass I80 traffic updates reporting highway and road conditions with real-time interactive map including flow, delays, accidents, construction, closures, traffic jams and congestion, driving conditions, text alerts, gridlock, and live cameras for the Lincoln Highway area and Nevada county. It was October 20 and they had been told the pass would not be snowed in until the middle of November. Although some survivors disputed the accounts of cannibalism, Charles McGlashan, who corresponded with many of the survivors over a 40-year period, documented many recollections that it occurred. [47] The remaining serviceable wagons were pulled by mongrel teams of cows, oxen, and mules. The others continued to Sutter's Fort, where Virginia Reed wrote, "I really thought I had stepped over into paradise". Twenty-three people were chosen to go with the rescue party, leaving twenty-one in the cabins at Truckee Lake and twelve at Alder Creek. [42], Luke Halloran died of tuberculosis on August 25. I don’t believe any of us knows what we are capable of doing if put in the same situation and circumstances? [113][114], A rescue party including William Eddy started on February 4 from the Sacramento Valley. After struggling on the walk over the pass, John Denton slipped into a coma and died. The California Gold Rush spurred a sharp increase, however, and 25,000 people went west in 1849. Both the Breen and Graves families prepared to go. [111] The paranormal aspects of Yount's dream are considered in the Rev. It was October 20 and they had been told the pass would not be snowed in until the middle of November. On July 19th the wagon train arrived at the Little Sandy River in present-day Wyoming, where the trail parted into two routes – the northerly known route and the untested Hastings Cutoff. [166], Mary Graves to Levi Fosdick (her sister Sarah Fosdick's father-in-law), 1847[167]. [32] By the time the Donner Party reached Blacks Fork on July 27, Hastings had already left, leading the forty wagons of the Harlan-Young group. -Sage advice given by a survivor of the Donner Party incident to her cousin who was coming to California. Jacob and George went into the woods to fashion a replacement. The letter stated that Hastings would meet the emigrants at Fort Bridger and lead them on his cutoff, which passed south of the Great Salt Lake instead of detouring northwest via Fort Hall (present-day Pocatello, Idaho.). [I] He also brought news that Reed and Herron, although haggard and starving, had succeeded in reaching Sutter's Fort in California. Mike first heard about the Dyatlov Pass incident on a climbing expedition in 2011 and since then has become obsessed with the case. Reed and McCutchen stood looking up at Emigrant Gap, only 12 miles (19 km) from the top, blocked by snow, possibly on the same day the Breens attempted to lead one last effort to crest the pass from the east. All the cabins were buried in snow. Reed had recently read the book The Emigrants’ Guide to Oregon and California, by Landsford W. Hastings, who advertised a new shortcut across the Great Basin. "Many books tell the Donner story, but none digs as deep for the truth as Ethan Rarick's Desperate Passage: The Donner Party's Perilous Journey West...With personal details...bringing a human touch to the story, Desperate Passage succeeds in rescuing the Donner Party from 162 years of infamy. Clyman warned Reed not to take the Hastings Cutoff, telling him that wagons would not be able to make it and that Hastings's information was inaccurate. Mrs. Graves was in charge of eight, and Levinah Murphy and Eleanor Eddy together took care of nine. The relief party soon departed with four more members of the party, leaving those who are too weak to travel. (1999). When one, Nicholas Clark, went hunting, the other two, Charles Cady and Charles Stone, made plans to return to California. Satisfied, the emigrants rested for a few days at the fort, making repairs to their wagons and preparing for the rest of what they thought would be a seven-week journey. [161], Virginia Reed to cousin Mary Keyes, May 16, 1847[L], A few of the widowed women remarried within months; brides were scarce in California. It took almost another two weeks to travel out of the Wasatch Range. Spam or Self-Promotional The list is spam or self-promotional. Reed and McCutchen found Elliott's mutilated body. [79] Life at Truckee Lake was miserable. He returned to Blacks Fork to leave letters warning several members of the group not to take Hastings's shortcut. TRUCKEE — Eastbound I-80 near Donner Summit was shut down after a big rig caught fire on Sunday afternoon. The drivers cracked their whips. [D], As the Donner Party made its way across the Wasatch Range of the Rocky Mountains, the Graves family, who had set off to find them, reached them. "Donner Party Deaths: A Demographic Assessment", Dixon et al., 2010; Robbins Schug and Gray, 2011. Keseberg brought a defamation suit against several members of the relief party who accused him of murdering Tamsen Donner. Within days, they found the terrain to be much more difficult than described. Hopeless, they retraced their steps where five feet of new snow had already fallen. [157] The few who ventured over the pass in the next few years found bones, other artifacts, and the cabin used by the Reed and Graves families. Despondent, they turned back to Sutter's Fort. King, Joseph; Steed, Jack (Summer 1995). Her five youngest children were: John Landrum (16), Meriam ("Mary", 14), Lemuel (12), William (10), and Simon (8). Residents of Yerba Buena, many of them recent migrants, raised $1,300 ($35,700 in 2019) and organized relief efforts to build two camps to supply a rescue party for the refugees. The shortcut had probably delayed them by a month. The rest of the pioneers stayed at what would become known as “Starved Camp.”. Donner Party Map, courtesy Donner Party Diary. The Breens occupied one cabin, the Eddys and the Murphys another, and the Reeds and the Graves the third. The Harrowing Mystery Of The Dyatlov Pass Incident In January of 1959, nine young Soviet hikers died under mysterious circumstances while trekking through the Ural Mountains in what's now known as the Dyatlov Pass incident. 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