Passage of Despair
On a freezing February evening high in the Sierra Nevadas, a rescue party was looking for a group of settlers they had been told were stranded in the deep snows around Truckee Lake. But as they surveyed the area not a soul was to be seen. Somewhat perplexed, the rescuers began shouting out. Their calls were answered when a gaunt, terribly emaciated woman appeared from a hole in the snow. Taken aback by the ghastly sight, the rescue party could only look on as a few more people emerged and the original woman asked a distraught question: “Are you men from California or do you come from heaven?”
These men had found the survivors of an ill-fated wagon train named the Donner Party. Over the coming weeks and months, various rescue teams would extract the survivors from their camp around Truckee lake. But the story of these survivors began nearly a year earlier in Springfield, Illinois. Theirs is a tale of bad luck and poor decisions.
Manifest Destiny
The suffering at Lake Truckee began innocently enough. It was 1846 and Americans had begun traveling west in ever greater numbers. They were inspired by many things. Many sought the wealth promised by the rich farming land, others the freedom to practice their faith. For some, it simply promised a fresh start.
George Donner was one such individual who was drawn to the west. Ever since he had been born in North Carolina in 1784 he had slowly moved his family west, chasing new opportunities as the country expanded. In Springfield, he met a like-minded individual in James F. Reed. Reed was a veteran and prosperous individual in Springfield. He was also an ostentatious and domineering man, one who was intrinsically drawn to opportunity and expansion. He saw that in California. But he was not purely motivated by opportunism, he also hoped that California’s weather would improve his perpetually ill wife Margret’s quality of life.
Having found each other in the thrall of California Fever, Donner and Reed decided to organize a group to head west. Together with Jacob Donner, George’s brother, their families, hired teamsters, and nine wagons, the group started west for Independence, Missouri on April 15, 1846.
Nearly a month later the group arrived in Independence and prepared to set off on the Oregon Trail. Experience had set the traveling season well by 1846. Start too early and there would be no grass for the multitude of livestock that accompanied the trains to graze upon. Start too late and they risked catching rainstorms in the east and snow in the west. Therefore, most wagon trains left between mid-April and mid-May. The Donner-Reed Party was on the backend of this timeline but still within the limits as they set off from Independence on May 17. A week and 100 miles later they caught the 50-wagon Russell Train led by Colonel William Henry Russell.
Soon after joining the Russell Train, the Donner-Reed Party had its first setback and tragedy. Heavy rains had swollen the Big Blue River in Kansas rendering it unfordable by wagons. To cross, the settlers were forced to improvise a raft and ferry the wagons across one by one. The Russell Train spent five days camped on the banks of the Big Blue River and it was during this period that Reed’s mother-in-law Sarah Keyes succumbed to Tuberculosis. She was buried on the river’s west bank.
Having finally cleared the Big Blue River on May 31st, the train once again resumed its westward march towards Fort Laramie. The train went through a leadership change and more wagons joined, but the 300-mile trek from the Big Blue River was generally uneventful and they arrived in Fort Laramie on the 27th of June. Capturing the high spirits of the early journey, George Donner’s wife Tamsen wrote, “indeed, if I do not experience something far worse than I have yet done, I shall say the trouble is all in getting started.”
Hastings and Clyman
As the Russell Train trudged west, an ambitious attorney and grizzled mountain man were traveling east from California. James Clyman was a man born into a life of hunting, trapping, and reading the land. He was also a man who had family back east. And in the spring of 1846 he was traveling back to visit them. Included in this eastbound wagon train was Lansford Hastings. Hastings was a man of high aspirations. In 1842 he had led a small group of settlers over the Oregon trail and determined the area needed to be taken from Mexico. Having completed the Oregon Trail and considering himself an expert on overlanding, he sailed home and published the Emigrants Guide to Oregon and California. His intent was to inspire settlers to bloodlessly take over California by sheer numbers. For his efforts, he hoped to gain a role in its government. His book also contained a bit of advice:
“The most direct path would be leave the Oregon Route, about two hundred miles east of Fort Hall; thence bearing west south west, to the Salt Lake; and thence continuing down to the bay of San Francisco.”
The path Hastings described would come to be known as Hastings Cutoff and it claimed to shave hundreds of miles off the normal route. There was just one problem with it, Hastings had never actually traveled the route. It was this that he sought to rectify in 1846. He stated his intentions of scouting the route and recruited members of the eastward group to join him. Clyman, with his deep knowledge of the area, accepted. At the turn-off on the Humbolt River, Hastings, Clyman, and a few others split from the main group traveling the established trail. Even without wagons, it was a difficult route and Hastings’ team only beat the main group to Fort Bridger by less than a week.
Nevertheless, Hastings billed it as a success and sent riders out to the westbound wagon trains advertising the new route. Hastings sweetened the advertising by promising to guide the groups himself. Jim Bridger, the proprietor of Ft. Bridger, stood to profit greatly from Hastings’ new route and quickly became an avid supporter.
James Clyman had serious reservations. His small, experienced party had struggled with the crossing. A man with a deep understanding of the land, he saw little chance of wagons and their accompanying livestock being able to complete the route. As he continued west he advocated for the traditional Fort Hall route to anyone who would listen.
Eventually, Clyman made it to Fort Laramie where he spotted a familiar face in amongst the camps. It was his old comrade James Reed. Together they had served under a young Abraham Lincoln during the Black Hawk Indian War. Continuing his crusade against the Hastings Cutoff, Clyman warned his friend about the route. However, it appears Reed had already read Hastings’ book and respected the man. Clyman foretold the story of the Donner Party, but James Reed’s innate stubbornness led him to wave off his friend's warnings. He sensed an opportunity to save time.
The Donner Party
The Boggs company, to which the Russell Train had been renamed after the leadership change, celebrated the 4th of July in Fort Laramie before resuming their trek. Shortly thereafter they encountered one of Hastings’ riders. He spread word of the cutoff and Hastings’ intention to lead the passage. For those interested parties, they would have to separate from the Oregon Trail at the Little Sandy River; which the Company reached on July 19th. The following morning, most of the Boggs Company moved on towards Fort Hall. But a smaller group had decided to take Hastings up on his offer.
The Donner-Reed party made up the core of this group, but all told 74 people associated with seven families chose to attempt the cutoff. They included: the Donners, Reeds, Murphys, Breens, Kesebergs, Wolfingers, and McCutcheons who joined a few days later. The new train’s first order of business was to elect a leader. As the most respectable members of the group, James Reed and George Donner were the primary nominees. The group selected the charitable George Donner over the less popular Reed.
One week later the newly formed Donner Party arrived at Fort Bridger, but already things were not right. Hastings had left a week earlier with the 40 wagons of the Harlan-Young Party. Promised a guide, the Donner Party would only receive notes along the way detailing the route. Some members of the group, including Tamsen who considered Hastings “a selfish adventurer”, were unhappy to be off the main trail. This development set them further ill-at-ease.
Jim Bridger happily attempted to alleviate any concerns. He told of a smooth trip with plentiful water that would shave 350 miles off their trip. He noted a two-day crossing of a dry lake bed, but this he claimed, was the only real obstacle. Above everyone else, James Reed was sold on the prospect and wrote that he had believed they could cover the 700 miles to the trail's terminus at Fort Sutter in seven weeks. What Bridger had failed to tell them was that the journalist Edwin Bryant had been through a week earlier to have a look at the new trail. Much like Clyman, Bryant was deeply troubled by what he had seen and left letters to any travelers at Ft. Bridger urging them to rejoin the main trail. The Donner Party never saw these letters, and Jim Bridger never mentioned them. Despite any misgivings, the group set off on July 31.
The Cutoff
Initially the passage seemed all that Hastings had promised and the Donner Party made good time. The smooth journey ended at the mouth of Echo Canyon in Utah. Here they found a note left by Hastings warning the route ahead was impassible and recommended sending riders up to link up with him so he could come back and guide them along an alternate route. Following the advice, Reed and two others rode off and quickly caught Hastings while the rest of the Party laagered at Echo Canyon.
Once again, Hastings failed to live up to his promise. Instead of returning to guide the Donner Party, he took Reed to the top of a mountain and showed him the route he recommended. Four days after he had left, Reed returned with the news. The group now faced a crucial decision: Follow the Harlan-Young route, follow the new path, or return to Ft. Bridger and the main trail. This was the point of no return. It was a fraught decision that Reed, having been the only one to see the new path, played a heavy role in. Eventually, they decided to take Hastings’ advice and new route.
Their choice led to a bushwhacking adventure. Every minute of the day suddenly became consumed with clearing brush, cutting down trees, and moving boulders to clear a path where one had never been. Their pace slowed to a pitiful two miles a day. Reed’s dream of covering the 700 miles in seven weeks looked very bleak indeed.
During this time another family joined the Donner Party. It was the Graves family and they are notable for having been the last family to leave Independence. This further evidences that the Donner-Reed party was towards the back of the year's migrations. Likewise, the Graves likely chose to catch up to the Donner Party on the Cutoff in an attempt to guarantee their arrival before winter. But it was to be a painful journey yet.
From August 11 to August 30th the Donner Party battled their way through the Wasatch Mountain Range. Tempers were starting to wear thin under the back-breaking labor and looming threat of winter. The group began pointing fingers at each other for the choice of route; the wisdom of James Reed was called into special question. Worse yet, some of the poorer families were beginning to run through their stores. And on August 25th, tuberculosis claimed another victim. This time it was Luke Halloran who had been taken in by the Donners at Little Sandy River.
The Party’s release from the mountains at the end of August quickly turned from a blessing to a curse. Before them was the inhospitable Great Salt Lake Desert. With fatigued oxen and scarce running water, the vast, flat expanses of the desert must have been soul-crushing to the Party as they looked upon it. They had no choice but to press on. A half-destroyed note from Hastings told them it was a two-day, 40-mile crossing.
As had become a theme in the Cutoff, the desert proved far harsher than promised. Wagon wheels sank deep into the salt hindering movement and by day three of the two-day trip, water reserves were depleted. It would take three more days and 80 miles to clear the desert. It had claimed no human lives but the group lost numerous horses, cows, and oxen to thirst. Some oxen were simply abandoned while still yoked to their wagons, unable to drive on. The Reed family was among the worst hit, nine of their ten oxen bolted into the desert seeking water and were never seen again.
During their respite on the other side of the desert. James Reed suggested that two men ride ahead to Fort Sutter to obtain extra provisions and carry them back. Charles Stanton and William McCutchen took up the lonely challenge. Meanwhile, having spent a few days resting, policing up errant cattle, and brewing a deep hatred for Hastings and occasionally each other, the group pressed on. Ahead of them lay 40 more miles of desert before the trail eased through the Ruby Mountains.
Finally, on the 26th of September, the Donner Party rejoined the main trail at the Humbolt River. Their shortcut had taken them two months, one month longer than the same journey would have on the normal trail. Now they were in a desperate race against winter
The Snow Comes
The Cutoff may not have been costly in terms of human lives, but it had taken a severe toll on the integrity of the group. In the Cutoff, the group had been able to keep their festering divisions at bay to ensure their communal survival. Upon rejoining the easily followed main trail, the families turned inward, focusing on getting their own to Fort Sutter. In an attempt to make better time, the Donner families pushed ahead of the group and in George’s absence, the first avoidable death occurred.
While climbing up a hill a Reed family wagon got entangled with one from the Graves family. A violent scuffle broke out between the Graves’ wagon driver John Synder and Reed’s teamster. When Reed intervened Synder turned on Reed and cracked his skull with a whip handle. Reed retaliated by fatally stabbing John Snyder. Synder was a popular member of the group, and without George Donner or any United States law west of the Continental Divide, it was up to the members of the wagon train to dispense justice. Despite some calling for Reed to be hung, it was decided that he be banished from the group and be forced to ride to Fort Sutter alone.
A few days later Mr. Hardkoop died, he had been riding with the Kesebergs but had been kicked out to save weight in the wagon. Nearing his 70s, Mr. Hardkoop only made it two days before he sat down and was abandoned by the wagon train, never to be seen again.
Further agitating the settlers were raids by the Paiute Indians. Over the course of a few days, they shot or stole 39 cattle and chased away every single one of the Graves’ horses. The lack of livestock forced both the Eddy family — a part of the Graves family — and the Wolfingers to abandon their wagons. While caching his wagon Wolfinger was also killed. The two men helping claimed it was the Paiutes, but the rest of the train was suspicious. A suspicion that history would prove correct, the men had murdered Wolfinger.
The only good piece of news that happened during this time was that Charles Stanton had returned from Fort Sutter on October 25th. With him were seven mules carrying desperately needed supplies, two Native American guides, and word from Fort Sutter that the passes often stayed open well into November; plenty of time to clear them. Stanton brought a sense of hope. Having traveled 2,500 miles, Fort Sutter was under 200 miles away. So close were they that James Reed had already arrived in Fort Sutter. Unfortunately for the Donner Party, the weather was closer.
Two days later, another man passed away. This time it was William Pike who had been accidentally shot by his father-in-law. As they buried him in Truckee Canyon, the snow began to fall.
The Pass
With their exhausted mongrel mix of oxen, horses, and cattle towing virtually empty wagons, the settlers drove desperately for the Pass. But beast and wagon were already pushed to their limit. George Donner's wagon broke an axle eight miles east of Truckee Lake and forced a stop for repairs. The rest drove past the lake in preparation for a summit attempt the following day. It was not to be.
During the intervening night, the snow resumed and buried the pass. While Stanton and one of the Indian guides made the summit on foot, the pass was now impassible by wagons or the exhausted people. One day had separated them from a successful journey and a winter filled with frozen misery, starvation, cannibalism, and death. Of the 81 settlers who bedded down near Truckee Lake that night, only 45 would make it out alive.
