The Tragedy of the Donner Party Episode 1 Manifest Destiny

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
My name is Eric Gaskell, and you're listening to the
Distorted History podcast and program. I can't give you many
nails and enjoy a blunder look. I'm rasling, I'm gottor

(00:24):
ba a long struggle for freedom, it really is a revolution.
Every year for September October I try to do a
sort of spooky series to that end. In the past
I've covered topics like the Satanic Panic, the Oshe Oil Murders,

(00:46):
the Salem witch Trials, and the Lizzie Borden murders. But
this year I've decided to take on an arguably even
darker subject as a tackle detail of the Donner Party,
a story that is one of the most infamous tales
in American history. It is a tale illow westward expansion
and manifest destiny at its heart. Then it is a
tail of sellers hoping to start over in a new land,
get their dreams of a break feature would turn into

(01:09):
the most terrible nightmares ass The tale of the Donner Party,
above all El's, is a story of terror, tragedy, desperation
and survival in some of the worst conditions imaginable. Ass
The story of the Donner Party is one of how
eighty one people became trapped in the Sierra Mountains in
the winter of eighteen forty six and forty seven, and
how only forty five left those mountains. Yet before I

(01:30):
begin telling that tail, however, first, like always, I want
to acknowledge my sources for this series, which primarily are
Michael wass Is The Best Land under Heaven, The Donner
Party in the Age of manifest Destiny, Daniel James Brown's
The in Different Stars Above, the harrowing Saga of the
Donner Party, and Dee Brown's Wondrous times on the Frontier
America during the eighteen hundreds. And like always, a full

(01:52):
list of these and any other sources like websites that
I used, will be available on this podcast Bluesky and
KOFE pages. Plus for anyone who doesn't want to be
bothered skipping through commercials, there is always an ad free
feet available to subscribers at patreon dot com slash Distorted History.
And with all that being said, let's begin. Before we
get to the events in this Year of Honors, or

(02:12):
even what tragic mistakes led to them getting trapped in
the snowbound mountain passes, we first need to talk about
what inspired these various families and individuals to pack up
their lives to start over in California, which wasn't even
a part of the United States at the time. Indeed,
in eighteen forty six, one is now California was very
much stelly part of Mexico. The members of the Donner

(02:33):
Party many others around this time then were opting to
pack up and take a dangerous journey to settle in
a different country altogether. Plus, keep in mind, this is
still several years before gold was discovered, sparking the California
Gold Rush. Now, one of the motivating factors for some
of these western bound settlers was the Panic of eighteen
thirty seven and the subsequent economic depression had spawned The Panic,

(02:54):
youca was based at least in part on heavy speculation,
as people invested in things that did not actually exist.
Speculators who see inspired by the potential of railroads and
canals like the newly constructed Erie to open up the
West first settlement began buying a plan where they believed
towns could be built thanks to these new forms of transportation. Additionally,
speculators also heavily invested in railroads that did not actually

(03:17):
exist in any meaningful way, yet essentially betting on the
potential that they might one day carry a lot of
goods and passengers in between places that in some instances
didn't even exist yet either. So, with investors feeding off
of one another's greed and unreasonable confidence, prices began to
rise higher and higher, until finally the bubble burst, as
it always does. This then led to three hundred and

(03:40):
forty three the nation's eight hundred and fifty banks collapsing
in the span of just two months, and soon the
effects of this could be felt all across all aspects
of the economy. For example, wheat that had cost fifty
cents a bushel to produce was suddenly only fetching a
return of twenty five cents. Faced with such economic hardships,
some thought to try their luck further. West was always

(04:00):
the promise of a better life over the next hill.
This had been a long standing tradition in the United
States since the very beginning. There was always supposed to
be better land off to the west, that if you
were able to make their enclaiment, you would have a
better life than the one you had now. This idea
had fueled westward expansion from the very beginning, and had
at the time of our tale, just recently gotten supercharged

(04:22):
thanks to the burgeoning belief that it was the country's
destiny to spread across the entirety of the continent and
in doing so bring the American form of government with them,
an idea that had only recently been given a name
when New York publisher John O'Sullivan, in the July August
eighteen forty five issue of the United States Magazine and
Democratic Review, argued not only in support of the annexation

(04:43):
of Texas, but for all the Oregon territory as well,
which at the time was at the heart of a
border dispute with Great Britain, with O'Sullivan writing that such
moves were justified by a quote, the right of our
manifest destiny to overspread and to possess the holy continent,
which Providence has given us for the development of the
great experiment of liberty. The phrase manifest destiny and the

(05:05):
idea that it embodied seemed to strike a chord with
the populace. Now, to be clear, this wasn't exactly a
revolutionary idea, as it matched the policies of the government
and the general attitude the people held already. After all,
the government and land speculators were already actively acquiring land
and encouraging settlers to move on to it with the
promise of it being fresh, untouched and exceedingly fertile lands

(05:27):
which were not only perfect for farming, but whose vast
forest could provide a seemingly endless supply of lumber in
which potentially contained untouched veins of rich mineral wealth. It
also wasn't just the government and speculators who were encouraging
westward expansion, but also Protestant preachers as well, as they
liked to claim that America was chosen by God and
that it was thus their holy duty to spread and

(05:49):
grow over the continent. What O'Sullivan really did, then, was
to give this pervasive belief and attitude a name that
could serve as a rallying cry in propaganda. Indeed, this
line of things, if thinking of just general racism, served
to help and justify the theft of lands from their original inhabitants,
as it was the destiny of white Americans to claim
all these lands. It was and not only God's plan,

(06:12):
but also just the natural course of things due to
the superiority of the White Rays. As such, it was
fine to steal the Native Americans land and kill them
f necessary, because not only were they supposedly inferior, but
because it was God's will and our destiny. This ingrained
idea that it was only a matter of time before
all the kind it was a part of the United

(06:33):
States likely helps to explain why so many were willing
to travel to and settle in what was at the
time still the Mexican province of Alta, California as the
Mexican American War, which ultimately led to the annexation of
the lands that would one day become California, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada,
and Utah, did not officially start at the behested President
James K. Polk until after the Donners and their travel

(06:56):
companions had already set off on their journey to California. Indeed,
the news of this war likely was not the least
bit surprising to the members of the Donner Party or
any of the other travelers on the trail that year,
as Polk was described as being quote single minded and
fanatical when it came to claiming more Western lands, as
the Donners and their fellow travelers were not the only

(07:17):
ones who had designs on California. Paulk, in fact, from
the very beginning of his term as president, had been
looking to acquire more land, with his eyes especially focused
on California. He had, after all, run on the idea
of manifest destiny. To that end, when there was a
dispute over territory between Texas and Mexico, Polk was eager
to offer to purchase not only the disputed territory, but

(07:39):
also California and New Mexico as well, an offer that
fell on deaf ears as the Mexican government flatly refused
to meet with his representatives. Paul, however, refused to take
absolutely not for an answer, and instan looked a provoke
a war so he could then lay claim to the
land he so desired through conquest. To that end, he
sent American troops into Texas and to the disputed land

(08:01):
with orders to claim it by force, at which point
the Mexican soldiers, who were occupy in the territory that
they believed they owned, then responded as one would expect
to sut an invasion as he fired upon the invading
military force. This, however, was exactly the excuse that Polk
was looking forward to declare war as he claimed that
Mexican soldiers had invaded American land and shed American blood. Now,

(08:23):
to be clear, not everyone was taken in by Polk's
little treck. Northerners in particular, suspected that this was all
just deployed by the southern born Polk to expand the
nation's safeholding territory so as to further increase the power
of these slaveholders. That being said, many would support the
war as he bought into the propaganda of manifest destiny.
So while Congress, when presented with Polk's built a declare

(08:45):
war on Mexico, wanted to, you know, take time to
discuss this pretty important and questionable decision, Polk was outraged
as he viewed any delay to be treason iss Congress, then,
due to the support that Polk had dimmed up with
his rhetoric, had no real choice but to pass the
bill forty two to two. With his declaration of war
and now in hand, Polk then made his designs unmistakable

(09:06):
to his cabinet. All started when a Secretary of State,
James Buchanans, suggested that they should make it clear to
other governments that this wasn't some crazy war of conquest
like those carried out by the old European kingdoms that
America claimed to be so much better than, but instead
a simple conflict to defend Texas and its border. To that,
and Buchanan suggested that they should declare and make it

(09:26):
unambiguous to the other governments in the world that they
had no designs on California or any other Mexican territory,
to which Polk responded angrily that if they had the opportunity,
they most certainly would quote acqua California or any other
part of Mexican territory which we desire. Polk then and
most certainly provoked this war with Mexico with the aim
of acquiring the territory that he had been rebuffed from purchasing.

(10:21):
The members of the Donner Party had their own aims
for California, although their desire for land was on a
much smaller scale than President Polk's. As they were simple farmers.
They were, however, used to picking up stakes and moving
west in the homes of finding better and more fertile
lands to farm. It was a bit of a family tradition,
in fact, that had been started by George Donner Senior,

(10:41):
who had been born in seventeen fifty two in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
This immigrant family of farmers settled in North Carolina, where George,
along with his brother, joined and fought in the militia
during the Revolutionary War. Now, George would eventually return and
settle down on a farm with his wife Mary. The
couple then eventually had eight children, sons and four daughters,
with their eldest son, who was their fourth child, being

(11:04):
given his father's name George as well. It is this
George Junior who would eventually give the Donner Party its name.
For the time being, though George Junior and all of
his siblings had jobs to do on the farm, Eventually
some of the members of the extended Donner clan would
take it upon themselves to leave North Carolina for the
promise of lands in the West, with George Senior finally

(11:24):
making a decision to uproot his family in seventeen ninety
nine to move to what was at the time the Frontier.
As George Senior's family moved across the Appalachian Mounds and
across the length of Tennessee as they major way to Kentucky,
where speculators promised they would find the most fertile land
on the continent. It was then in this new land
where in eighteen oh nine George Junior went Susannah Holloway,

(11:46):
who at the time of their wedding had already given
birth to their first child. Now, Susannah, like most women
of that time and place, had little formal schooling, but
she did have quite a bit of experience as a
farm hand. The couple was then going to have six children, Mary, William, Sarah, Lydia, Elizabeth,
and Susannah. Yet while they had started a life together
in Kentucky, the Donners would not stay there, as by

(12:08):
eighteen twenty one, thanks to the federal government quote unquote
purchasing the tribal lands of the Delaware in Miami tribes
in Indiana, the extended Donner family, including George Senior and
all his various sons and their families would pick up
stakes once again as they purchased some of those newly
acquired lands. Shortly after this move, however, tragedy would strike
as George Junior's wife, Susanna would die thereby, leaving George's

(12:31):
mother's sisters and sisters in law to pitch and help
care for his six children while George worked the farm. Now,
it has to be said that the Donners weren't struggling
as farmers. Indeed, they were fairly successful in their endeavors
wherever they went. Instead, it seems that the main driving
factor behind picking up stakes and moving like they did
was believe that they were exhausted the land where they were,

(12:52):
so they were regularly looking to move to quote unquote
untaunched and supposedly more fertile lands in the West. Basically,
it seems like the general leaf was that the land
over the next hill was better and more fertile than
the land they were on, so sight unseen, they and
many others like them would essentially gamble that the grass
was in fact greener on the other side. That being said,
it seems that Illinois actually held such promise, as despite

(13:15):
its general lack of trees, the soil underneath the prairie
grasses would prove to be incredibly fertile ground for planting crops.
The soil there, in fact, was so rich with nutrients
that there wasn't even the need to use manure to
fertilize the soil so as the extended Donner family caught
one of the news of the rich soil in the
new state of Illinois, that decided to once again pack
up and head further west to purchase land and start

(13:36):
anew Now, this would be the final stop for George Senior,
as this is where he would finally settle down for good,
in no small part because he was quite old by
this point. Plus, to land they purchase and settled down
on was quite good. Acid bordered the Sangamon River, which
in Podolwanamie translates roughly to where there is plenty to eat,
a name which, by the way, strongly suggests that the

(13:59):
Potto Wannamy did not exactly give this land up willingly. However,
with the original inhabitants driven off one way or another,
the Dunners, upon arriving, found themselves in possession of rich,
fertile farmland, plenty of fresh water, and stands of old
growth oak and wanna trees that would provide ample fuel
and lumber. That being said, it was not exactly easy
to start farming in those purring lands, as these standard

(14:21):
wooden plats of the day were not up to the
task of cutting through the top layer of sod. This
then required much larger plows that needed eight pairs of
oxen to pull along, and even then, the thick earth
at a habit to sticking to the plow, thus requiring
the plowing process to be stopped regularly so the plows
themselves could be cleaned. It was and only John Dyre's
eventual invention of a steel plow that eased this heavy

(14:43):
burden on the farmers. It was also here in Illinois
that George Junior found a new wife and the childless
widow Mary Blue Tenant, and together the couple would have
a pair of daughters, Elitha and Leanna, while William, his
only son from his first marriage, was also married around
this time to one Elizabeth Hunger. George Junior and Mary, though,
would not be together for long, as she would dine

(15:04):
eighteen thirty seven at the age of thirty seven. Between
the sudden loss and the panic of eighteen thirty seven
taking a sledge hammer to the local economy, George Junior
would opt to take his two little girls and head
down to the recently independent Republic of Texas to check
out the land that was on offer there, a move
in which he was accompanied by his grown son William
and his family. Together then George and William purchased them

(15:27):
land about fifty miles south of Houston. Soon though, they
came to the conclusion that the grass was not always
greener on the other side, as the land here was
marshy and nowhere nearest fertile as he sailed back in Illinois,
nor was he climate exactly friendly. And there was also
the fact that this land was home to stank sworn,
some mesquitoes, and alligators. Pluster was the local Native American tribe,

(15:48):
the karen Kawa, who had a terrifying reputation. Indeed, privateer
and slave trigger Jean Lafitte would describe them as being
quote demons of Hell. This small part of the Donner
clan would then only plant a single crop in this
land before deciding to abandon this place and return to
Illinois by eighteen thirty nine. It was then upon this
return that George Junior met the diminutive thirty seven year

(16:11):
old schoolmarm Tamson Eustace Dozier, who was some twenty years
junior when the barely five foot tall woman was reportedly
taking her students on a botany field trip. Now Tamson
was likely quite different than most of the women George
Junior was used to encountering as Tamson, as the youngest
child of a wealthy New England mariner, was well educated
and well read. She was a woman who was schold

(16:32):
in art, wrote poetry, and was passionate about botany. Now,
Tamson had previously been married and had a son. However,
she had tragically lost both her husband and her son
to a flu epidemic, while also suffering a miscarriage of
her unborn daughter, all in quick succession. It had then
understandably taken Tamson some time to recover from the series
of losses, but she eventually came out to Illinois at

(16:55):
the request of her brother, who asked her to come
and to utor his two sons after he lost his wife,
a task that Tamson would prove to be so successful
at that she would be invited to teach at the
local school, which is where she was teaching when she
happened to meet the fifty seven year old George daughter,
which again meant that he was twenty years older than
she was. However, George was prosperous, well respected, and still

(17:16):
in good health and so in May eighteen thirty ninety
two in wed Tamson then, in addition to becoming a
caring mother for George's youngest daughters from his previous marriage, together,
they would add three more daughters to the family, Francis, Eustace, Georgia,
Ann and Eliza Poor. Their marriage then seems to have
been a happy one, as Tamson would write of George, quote,
I find my husband a kind friend who does all

(17:38):
in his power to promote my happiness, and I have
as fair prospect for a pleasant old age as anyone.
With all this being said, then it seems like this
would have been a good time for George to settle
down for good. His wife certainly seemed content where they were,
and his experience in Texas should have shown George Junior
and the daughters in general that the grass was indeed
not always grinner on the other side. Therefore, maybe they

(18:01):
should stick with what they had when they had a
good thing. Another major figure in the story of the

(18:57):
Donner Party is James Fraser Reid. Now Raid had come
to Illinois not in search of rich farmland, like the Donners,
but because the land was rich in lead, which was
in high demand. Following the War of eighteen twelve. The
Reids were a Polish immigrant family whose name had been
Reidanovsky before they moved to Ireland after their homeland was
carved up and divided among the larger powers of Russia, Prussia,

(19:19):
and Austria. James reed Than had been born in Ireland
in November eighteen hundred to a Scotch Irish mother, Marcia
Fraser Reid, who was part of the Scottish client Fraser.
It was and with other members of the Fraser family,
that his mother would settle with in Virginia when following
James's father's death, she brought him to America. Young James
would then be scold in Virginia until he was about

(19:40):
eight or nine years old, and which point he would
be employed in his uncle's general store until he was
about twenty. It was and at that point that Reid,
lured by tales of rich lead mines in Illinois Wisconsin,
headed west as he moved to the burgeting mining town
of Galena, which was a hard scrabble place where, especially
during the winter months, motasu had and no place else
to go. Attempted to ease their overwhelming boredom with booze,

(20:04):
a tactic which sometimes led to disagreements that were on
occasion settled through so called stone duels, contests where men
would take positions beside piles or river rocks that they
would then proceed to chuck at one another until one
of them was either knocked out or killed. It was then,
after a few years of working in this environment, that
Read assembled enough money to begin investing in various business

(20:27):
ventures in Sangamon County, the home of Springfield, Illinois, and
also the place where the Donners had settled down. It
was also where Reid would soon join a militia company,
along with such figures as a young but rising Illinois
politician named Stephen A. Douglas, a young man at a
west point named Robert Anderson who in thirty years would
be in command of Fort Sumter when it came under
attacked by the Confederates, and a young storekeeper and political

(20:49):
hopeful named Abraham Lincoln. These men had joined this militia
company to take part in the Blackhawk War, an event
that will probably cover at some point, but in short,
as they understand it now without conducting moreks of research,
was result of a group of a thousand or so
Native American men, women children, led by Sokwa named Blackhawk,
crossing the Mississippian entering Illinois, intending to reclaim land, land

(21:11):
that had been lost through a treaty that they probably
rightly did not view as being valid, land which also
notably contained sacred burial grounds that the American settlers were
plowing up. To be clear, it seems that Blackhawk could
apparently hope to avoid conflict, but the simple appearance of
his people in their traditional lands was apparently enough to
set off a panic. Now, this particular militia unit that

(21:32):
was full of figures who would one day become famous
at it form. Because of this panic, would not see
any action. However, Read and Lincoln would bond over the
shared experience. Meanwhile, Read, thanks to his investments including a
general store, would earn enough money to purchase a farm
of his own, as well as enough to start a
starch factory. Yet, for all his success in business, Read's

(21:53):
personal life was a bit more of a mixed bag,
as while he was described as being bright and energetic,
he was also considered to be overbearing. He also had
been engaged to one Elizabeth Keyes, the youngest sister of
one of his new friends. However, Elizabeth would die before
they ever went thanks to a cholera epidemic that claimed
thousands of lives. Reid, then, in a relatively short amount

(22:14):
of time, would begin courting and eventually marry Elizabeth's sister, Margaret,
who husband had also died in that same cholera epidemic.
Margaret herself, it has to be said, though, was in
such poor health that Reid and her were married while
she was still bedridden due to illness. Reid, meanwhile, despite
not formally adopting Margaret's daughter of Virginia, would still form
such a strong bond with his new step daughter that

(22:35):
when she was older, she would describe him as de
quote most loving and indulgent stepfather than ever lived. Then,
in addition to Virginia, the Knew couple would add three
more children to their family with Patty, James Fraser, and
Thomas Keys. Life then was fairly comfortable for Read, with
his farm, his store, his starch factory, and his various
landholdings that all seemed to be sound and profitable investments.

(22:57):
Taken to further add to this prosperity, Read, in eighteen
thirty s seven was awarded a contract to construct a
rail line between Springfield and Sacramon, a rail line that
was made possible by the state legislature's Internal Improvement Act
that had been approved by, among others, Read's own friend,
Abraham Lincoln. This contract then seemed to be yet another
boon for James Reed, who even had a sawmill constructed

(23:19):
along the river so as to produce the railroad ties
necessary for this project. With this sawmill being constructed at
the end of the proposed rail line, a location where
a new village would spring up that would be named
Jamestown in honor of him. That being said, the railroad
and its construction would not prove to be particularly popular. Indeed,
the difficulty in its construction and the ongoing maintenance of

(23:41):
it would prove to be a bit of a drain
on Reed. To offset this, James would seek to diversify
by expanding a sawmill by partner with a skilled cabinet maker. Together,
then Read and his new partner would produce chairs, various
types of furniture, ornamental fencing, and even Venetian blinds, a
venture that seemed to work well for several years, at
least until that is, his partner, the guy with the

(24:02):
actual experience and skills as a woodworker lost his left
hand to a bus all Meanwhile, the railroad that had
once seemed a clear pathway to riches continued to deteriorate
until the state finally gave up on it in eighteen
forty seven as they stalled it off for about two
point five percent of its original cost. Jamestown then suffered
without its railroad connection until it too had to be

(24:22):
sold at a tax sail. As all of this was happening,
Reid trying to keep his mill running by now grinding
corn and wheat into flour and meal, but still his
debts kept mounting. Now Reid would find some relief by
taking a job as a US pension agent, which many
was put in charge of dispensing money from the garment
to veterans, a job that he potentially received due to
his friendship with the rising political star Abraham Lincoln. Yet

(24:45):
still even this additional income was insufficient, and so Reid
was forced to mortgage some of the real estate that
he owned as well as his mill. Meanwhile, putting even
further stress on the reads with the fact that he
and his wife would have yet another child around this time.
Their fifth, a son they named Gersham France. Unfortunately, though
Gersham was a sickly child, and the stress and worry
for caring for the poor boy only made Margaret stabilitating

(25:07):
migraines worse. One then can easily see why James Reed
would find the idea of starting over someplace new appealing.
As his once comfortable and profitable little empire had crumbled
peace by piece over the last few years. The idea
of pulling up stakes and escaping from all that mounting
stress and issues to settle someplace to and start fresh
then had to be incredibly appealing. The promise of California

(25:29):
then was especially attractive, since it wasn't some unknown hope
that the land there was good as a mighty situation
where George Donner went down to Texas only promise of
good land, only to find trouble when he got there
and purchased them. Reid had actual reports from people who
already made the journey out to California, as a number
of people from nearby Springfield, including one of his wife
Margaret's brothers, had been a part of a wagon train

(25:50):
The hand left Springfield in eighteen forty five, heading for
the Oregon Country. Along the way. Though, upon reaching Fort
Hall on what is today Idaho, where the caravans stopped
to repud supplies, the members on the caravan would be
approached by a grizzled old fur trapper and trail guy
named Caleb Greenwood, who started telling these settlers all about
the wonders of California, as he supposedly eighty year old Greenwood,

(26:12):
as well as his three half Indian sons, were all
in the employee of one John Sutter. Now Sutter was
a Swiss immigrant who had arrived in California back in
eighteen thirty nine with a collection of workers from Hawaii
in tow. Sutter would then settle in the Sacramento Valley,
where he had a fort belt to defend against the
local Native American tribes who might not take too kindly

(26:32):
to his plans of invading their lands, as his ultimate
goal was to found the colony of New Helvisha, which
he hoped would one day be home to Swiss immigrants
like himself. In the meantime, Sutter came to dominate the
local Miewank Indians to a combination of bribery and brutality,
namely kidnapping, starvation, and slavery. In particular, Sutter would pay
his Native American workers in a currency that he made

(26:54):
himself out of ten. They could only then be spent
in Sutter's own store. Then, after the day's work was done,
oftentimes Sutter would lock his Native American labors away in
pens or rooms that were lacking in any kind of
sanitary arrangements. Additionally, the Swiss immigrant was also known to
sell Native Americans, including their children, into slavery to pay
off his own debts. Meanwhile, should one grow tired of

(27:15):
the system or decide that they should leave for the
hunting season, Sutter was known to send posses of loyal
Native American soldiers after his workers to capture and or
punish them. For example, one time, after learning that a
local groups of postley had plans to steal some of
his horses, Sutter, based upon those rumors alone, without any
crime actually being committed, led a raid on the Miwa camp.

(27:36):
In doing so, as the sun crested the horizon one
morning in eighteen forty, Sutter and his men, without any warning,
opened fire on the village with guns and cannons, killing
thirty people in the process. Yet, while Sutter had managed
to create his own private little kingdom in the Sacramento Valley.
His dreams of a Swiss colony would fade, although they
would be replaced with dreams of wealth garnered from American

(27:58):
sellers who came to populate the planned Annah Suttersville, a
vision given to him by one Lanceford W. Hastings, a
lawyer from Mountain Fern in Ohio. Hastings, you see, who
was described as tall and dashing at twenty three years old,
had gone west in eighteen forty two looking for opportunities.
Hastings and apparently took quite well to his Western travels
as he adopted the look of the mountain men, as

(28:19):
he took to wearing buckskin suits trend with beaver fur. Now,
to be clear, Hastings wasn't just playing dress up, as
he does. Seem to have proven to be fairly adept
at this frontier's man lifestyle. The thing was, though, Hastings
had far greater ambitions than being a mountain man or
just another sailor. Hastings had the dream of becoming a
wealthy and important figure in these lands, hoping ultimately to

(28:41):
become a political figure of some in Port and then
Hastings saw a partner, and so he felled his head
with the prospects for great wealth possible for a person
who owned vast amounts of land in the region like
Sutter did, should they manage to attract a vast number
of American settlers to come and join them, as someone
like John Sutter could sell of chunks their sizeable holdings
to these eager settlers. Sutter and Hastings then began laying

(29:04):
out plans for the future Sutterville, which lay about three
miles east of his fort, with Sutter promising Hastings in
return for sending settlers his way, he would have a
big house in a general store built for the Ohio lawyer,
which was in addition to some fairly significant landholdings. An
He planned Sutterville to ensure that he too could profit
off of this enterprise. Hastings, meanwhile, seeing the potential for

(29:25):
even greater opportunities for himself, also sent a letter to
the at the time Secretary of State John Calhoun, running
of a potential revolution in California against Mexico, noting, as
he did, quote if the US does not give the
people of Oregon in California a government of some kind.
Soon an attempt will be made at organizing an independent government,

(29:45):
basically just trying to get the American government to support
his scheme by sending in their forces to help take
over the territory, which would only make it that much
more attractive to American settlers and make him that much
more important of a figure for bringing all this about.
In the meantime, Hastings also set his mind to encouraging
immigration to these Western territories through other means. Namely, he

(30:05):
began writing a guidebook that would both extolled the grandeur
impossibilities of these lands as while showing potential immigrants the
way to make the journey. Which brings us back to
the grizzled old fur trapper and trail guide Caleb Greenwood
and his three sons, as they were among a number
of agents that had been hired by Sutter to try
and convince settlers to instead of going to their intended
destination of the Oregon Country, to take the path down

(30:28):
into Sutter's fort in the Mexican province of Alta, California.
Greenwood in particular was apparently quite the good talker and
lar to boot, as he was able to convince about
one hundred members of the Springfield caravan, including Margaret's brother
and Mary Todd, Lincoln's nephew, to head to California. Now,
it should be noted that as this part of the
caravan headed into these eras, they split into multiple small groups,

(30:49):
with each one determined to find their own way through.
None of them, though, had an easy time of it,
as while they all would eventually stagger into Sutter's Fort,
they did so with a significantly minister out of cattle
than what they had started out with, as he had
been forced to consume a fair number of them during
the crossing of the mountains, which just goes to illustrate
just how difficult the crossing was even in the best

(31:11):
of conditions, as they were all thankful that they had
made it through the mountains before the snow started to fall. Now,
it should be noted that Margaret's brother did not actually
think too highly of the landworth the people he found
in California upon arriving, and so he ultimately chose to
leave for Oregon like he had originally planned. Yet, despite
these warnings, James Reed saw promise in California as it

(31:31):
gave him a chance to start anew and get away
from his troubles in Illinois, troubles like the numerous debt
collectors who are increasingly coming to visit his home, a
situation that not many seemed to feel much sympathy for
Read for due to the fact that he, despite these issues,
continued to wear the finest suits while also continuing to
present his borderline arrogant manner beam While on top of
escaping from his growing financial issues, Reid also believed that

(31:54):
the climbate in California would be beneficial to his wife, Margaret,
who remained frail nation to leave Illinois behind, became even
stronger following the death of the couple's youngest child, Gersham Francis,
in December eighteen forty five. As the tragic passing of
the eleven month old childhood been six since his birth,
had only made Margaret's frail condition worse. Reed then began

(32:16):
making plans to organize his own caravan that would make
the journey west, and indeed, as he did, he found
others who were also interested in these new prospects, most
notably the Donner brothers, George Junior and Jacob. Now, as
I have hopefully established, the Donners George, in particular, Onlike Reed,
had no real reason to move, as their life in
Illinois was pretty comfortable and prosperous, the land was quite good,

(32:38):
and Onlike Creed they hadn't made any catastrophic business decisions. Indeed,
George's wife, Tamsend was quite content where they were and
was thus surprised when her husband put an ann in
the paper that read quote a good farm for sale,
as George was looking to sell the family's two hundred
and forty acre farm, which included a farmhouse with three
brick chimneys, a productive orchard, eighty eight beakers of good timber,

(33:01):
and a good well for water. It seems and that George,
even at his age as he was in his early
sixties at this point, still remained restless and wasn't willing
to fully settle down just yet. George, then, who had
spent his entire life looking for the next opportunity, looking
for better land than where he currently resided, had apparently
found his next obsession in California, and he was taking

(33:22):
his family, including Tamson, along for the ride. With his
brother Jacob, even at age fifty six and not many
best of health, still ready to follow his older brother
George's lead wherever he went. Tamson, then, even though she
didn't want to leave behind the life and garden she
had created for herself in Illinois, also wondered what was
best for her husband and her children, so she did
not protest when this decision was made. Instead, she went

(33:45):
along with her husband's plans. She then, in an attempt
to put the best face on this situation, started looking
forward to the new plan she would get to study
in their new home and the new school for girls
that she intended to set up once they got settled in. Meanwhile,
as he daughters were making in their preparations, James Reid's
financial situation became even more untenable as a circuit court

(34:05):
in March eighteen forty six ruled in favor of William Butler,
one of his debtors. Butler uci had previously loan Read
one thousand dollars, and with Read now unable to repay
that loan, all of his lands, including his mell, now
faced immediate foreclosure. Indeed, in an effort to pay off
Reed's long list of creditors, all of his property and
holdings were being inventoried so they could be put up

(34:26):
for a public sale. James Reid's once prosperous little empire
then had all but collapsed, and so now more than ever,
he was motivated to leave Illinois behind and start over
in California. Now, the Donners and the Reeds were far
from alone in their sudden fascination within drive to go
to California, as prior to this, most settlers who were
looking to move further west, hoping for a fresh start

(34:47):
and a chance to better their fortunes, had traveled not
for California but for its northern neighbor, Oregon. Indeed, in
eighteen forty five, just one year prior to these events,
some twenty seven hundred individuals that set out for Missouri
heading one, but only Torda and sixty. Of those individuals,
less than a tenth had been bound for California, while
most had been heading for Oregon. Come eighteen forty six, though,

(35:09):
the Dinner in Red Clans would be among the nearly
sixteen hundred who traveled to California, a number that actually
outstripped the twelve hundred who were bound for Oregon. Now,
in preparation for their trip, reading the Donners did what
research they could to best prepare themselves for their westward journey,
as they had a long ways to go to reach
their destination, a journey that was far longer than any

(35:30):
they had undertaken thus far in their lives, and won
those through harsher and more untamed lands than any they
had ever known. This research would include consulting letters from
those that had already made the journey west that had
been reprinted in local papers. Most importantly, though, the reads
and the donners were heavily influenced by Lanceford W. Hasting's
nineteen forty five book, The Immigrants Goide to Oregon in California,

(35:51):
that he had published in Cincinnati after raising the money
for its printing. This book then was basically the embodiment
of manifest destiny, as it was specifically toss to encourage
American settlement in Oregon in California, despite Great Britain also
laying claim to the Oregon territory in Mexico very much
being in control of California, not to mention all the
various Native Americans who still called those lands home as well. Hastings, though,

(36:15):
looked to alleviate any such concerns of such complications in
California as he assured his reader's quote the higher order
of Mexicans in point of intelligence are perhaps about equal
to the lower class of our citizens, and dat he
would assert that quote they are scarcely a visible grade
in the scale of intelligence above the barbarous tribes by
whom they are surrounded. Hastings then was suggesting that it

(36:37):
would be easy for what American settlers to come in
and take over these lands because they were so much
smarter than they people who currently resided there. Plus, as
for the aforementioned barbarous tribes, while Hastings would assure as
readers that most of them had already been killed off
as he run about now abandoned villages filled with human
skulls sites which were largely the result of the diseases

(36:58):
carried by the European colonizers. Plus, Hastings himself had personally
helped in the population, as the group he had traveled
with from Oregon to California and massacred some twenty to
forty Native Americans along the way. Mainly though the twenty
three year old's book was ended up promoting the lands
and climate of California and Oregon and their quote inexhaustible resources,

(37:19):
as while the book did provide some practical information and
advice for how to survive on the trail, most of
it was concerned with the wondrous lands that awaited settlers
at the end of their journey. Now, while Hasting's book
was very influential and won't play a significant role in
our tale, it was also not the only resource they
relied upon. Among the other accounts read by Reid and

(37:39):
or the Donners was that of John C. Fremont, who
wrote off his experiences exploring the Western eighteen forty two
and forty three. Specifically, he had surveyed the Oregon Trail,
the Oregon Territory, and the Sierra Nevada Mounds of California. Indeed,
when Fremont's report of the exploring expeditions to the Rocky
Mounds of the year eighteen forty two and to Oregon
and Noise, California in the years eighteen forty three and

(38:02):
forty four was published, he was dubbed the Great Pathfighter
part of the press as it became sort of the
living embodiment of manifest destiny. Notably, Fremont's account, in addition
to providing information about various Native American tribes, the locations
and ways to find drinkable water and greasing grass for livestock.
Also included an account of the winter of eighteen forty
three and forty four, a time when his expedition had

(38:24):
to deal with some deep Sierra snow on the way
down the western sob of the mountains before arriving at
Sutter's Fort, a tough and challenging experience that, while it
did not claim the lives of any of his men,
did come at the cost of half of their horses
and mules. Indeed, it seems that the one universal piece
of advice given to all settlers making the journey west
was that they had to cross the Sierra Nevadas before

(38:45):
the snow started to fall, lest they be trapped. Meanwhile,
in addition to this research, as a part of their
preparations for this journey, the sellers sought letters of introduction
they would help them get established in their new home.
To this end, while George's dnner had no interest in
the church, his wife, as well as his brother and
sister in law, were all regular attendees, and so they
would procure a letter of introduction from their preacher. Re Meanwhile,

(39:09):
with his own significantly higher ambitions and desire to be
constantly seen as a gentleman of wealth and good standing
looked for more as his spiders colossal financial collapse and
the fact that he owed money to a large number
of people in Illinois, Red looked to make sure that
he would be welcomed among the upper crust of California
when he arrived to this and he secured a letter
of introduction from Thomas for the Governor of Illinois himself,

(39:31):
who would write of Reid's quote correct and gentlemanly deportment
as a citizen, as well as his quote very efficient
in businesslike habits as a man. Meanwhile, in his efforts
to rebuild his wealth, read also petitioned some prominent Illinois
politicians in the hope that they would appoint him to
be a quote sab Indian agent west of the Rocky Mountains,
a government position which, as we see throughout multiple episodes,

(39:54):
offered excellent chances for graft. Notably, as Reid was preparing
for this trip, he also made sure to kill carefully
pack his Masonic countfit and the various symbols of his
high standing among the organization, as he had achieved the
rank of royal arch Mason, hoping as he did, that
these connections would serve him on a new home. In
the meantime, Read also mo to make use of these

(40:14):
connections now as he reached out to his Masonic brother
James Maxie, who had left Springfield to run a general
store in Independence, Missouri, which was notable as Independence was
the main starting point for wagon trains heading west on
both the Santa Fe and California Slash Oregon Trails. Maxie
then regularly dealt with people heading out and or returning
from the trail, so he had some inclination as to

(40:35):
what to expect on the trail and how others prepared
themselves for their journey to that and he encouraged Read
to get a good gun and a horse for hunting
buffalo while on the trail, as well as the largest
oxen he could find the pull the wagons. Additionally, Maxie
also encouraged Reid and his companions from Springfield to try
and reach Independence as early as possible, so as to
give their various livestock time to rest before departing, and

(40:57):
to give themselves time to make sure they had all
the pre visions they could possibly need with the obvious
preference being they would purchase the provisions from his store.
Maxi would also pass along information to read that a
large company of fellow travelers were set to leave around
mid May, clearly indicating that it would be a good
idea to join this group, as safety in numbers was preferred.

(41:18):
As you see westrodbound travelers often formed groups that do
so out of an abundance of caution, fearing potential Native
American attacks, and because many understood that they were non experienced, skilled,
or prepared enough to make such a journey on their own.
It took a special skill set to make such a
long journey through the untamed wilderness, and most of these
travelers lacked such skills, especially when they came from setled

(41:39):
areas in communities where one typically didn't have to worry
about the threat of potential Native American attacks or how
to guide oxen. Speaking of oxen, the worthy preferred animal
for pulling wagons, as the rhythm in which they moved
whileslarer than horses or mules, was more consistent and gentler
on the wagon. Additionally, oxen were a preferred choice for
this task as horses than not thrive off the prairie grasses,

(42:01):
while the oxen could not only live off the grass,
but also off the sage brush and most of the
other vegetation that they would encounter. Plusty big birds were
also less likely to run off, and there were also
a fair sight cheaper than both mules and horses. Still,
the fact remained that everything about the American West and
traveling through its wilderness was potentially dangerous and even deadly.

(42:22):
Just the simple act of crossing rivers presented the risk
of drowning both men and animal. Meanwhile, there's also the
weather on the open plains, as you would be traveling
with limited options for shelter through lands where hail, thunderstorms,
and tornadoes were all threats during the summer, as were
heat waves, floods, and prairie fires. Not to mention these
swarms of insects, they could make life miserable or even

(42:42):
deadly due to the diseases they carried. Nothing in fact
about this journey West was easy. Only humans or the
animals they brought with them. The wagons themselves were dangerous,
as one could potentially fall under the wheels and be
maimed or killed as a result. Meanwhile, in addition, to
that danger, the wheels could become crammed full of mud
that required regular cleaning just to keep going. Additionally, the horses, mules,

(43:04):
or oxen that you had pulling the wagons, if approached
in the wrong way, could potentially lash out violently and
name or even kill you. The people you were traveling
with were also a source of potential danger, as accidental
gunshot wounds and deaths were fairly common simply because everyone
had guns and many of them weren't exactly careful in
handling them. Plus, if you have guns with you or

(43:25):
they are easy to access at all times and at
times you are drunk, then chances are there will also
be times when heavily intoxicated people are handling deadly weapons,
which you know is a recipe for disaster. Out nighttime
brought rest after a long day of travel, as well
as the opportunity for companionship and even potentially some kind
of entertainment as the various travelers gathered around the campfires

(43:48):
as after their meal, the various members of these wagon
trains might sing and dance. Wall failers played the popular
songs of the time like Turking the Straw, O, Susanna, Joe,
Bower's Betsy from Pike and soap Sud's defence. For some, though,
instead of relief, night brought terrors, as some were terrified
of every sound being the portent of an attack by
Native Americans, who, for whatever reason, were not huge fans

(44:11):
of these invaders. Meanwhile, there was a fairly narrow window
to undertake these journeys, as you didn't want to leave
too early because then there would be no grass or
other vegetation for the livestock to eat. But you also
couldn't wait too long because again there was one universal
warning for these westward travelers, and that was to make
it through the Sierra Nevadas before these noists came and

(44:31):
blocked the passages. As such, the time when the settlers
left was of utmost importance, as the Dinner and Reed

(44:56):
families were preparing for their journeys to California. James Reed,
George Johner, and his brother Jacob each had three wagons
to carry their various provisions, furniture, clothing, books, and whatever
other goods the families felt necessary to start their new
lives with in California, with the wagons for all three
families being reportedly quite heavy, despite read being left completely
destitute so as to pay off as many creditors and

(45:18):
his debts. Indeed, all of his property was supposed to
be sold off at a public auction. However, in doing so,
the justice on the piece at Reed fought his bankruptcy
paperwork with who also happened to be a mason like himself,
made a point of exempting from the sale three hundred
pounds of bacon and two pounds of pickled pork, which
were properly loaded into Reed's wagons, where it joined a

(45:38):
selection of fine wines and brandies that Reid had not
included in his list of properties to be sold off,
which was also in addition to the sizeable amount of
funds that he had to have scrolled away just to
pay for the wagons and the oxen for this journey. Now,
while each of the three families each had three wagons,
the third of Reed's wagons was quite notable, as it,
in particular was fairly large and extravagant compared to the rest.

(46:01):
As you see, while it was generally considered to be
good advice to not overload the wagons as it would
slow progress and tire out the animals, they ignored that
advice for this one in particular, as you see, Margaret
Read's utterly mother refused to be left behind, so they
built a two story wagon complete with spring cushioned seats
and bunks on the second floor, in addition to also
installing an iron cook stove with a chimney pipe running

(46:23):
through the top of the wagon. All these wagons, per
the advice that they had been given, would be pulled
by teams of oxen, which would in turn be joined
by a number of cows that they brought along for
milk and some beef kettle, and a number of horses
for riding. Aditionally, the donners carried with them an ample
supply of cash to help them get started in their
new home and to cover the purchase of any additional
supplies that were required along the way. For example, they

(46:46):
had secret pockets sewn into the buckskin girdles and members
of the family would wear for hiding away. They're spending money,
which was in addition to the ten thousand dollars they
had stitched into the folds of a quault. Also joining
the families on this journey, where teams two so were
basically higher hands. These were primarily single, young men in
search of adventure and opportunities whose job of was to
walk alongside the teams of oxen, hence he named Teamster,

(47:08):
from where they would crack whips to keep the beast
of burden moving forward in an orderly fashion as they,
like the vast majority of the people undertaking this journey,
would not actually be riding in the wagons, as they
were primarily there to carry the goods and various supplies
that were taking with them, and for the truly sick
and or infirm. Pretty much everyone else then walked as
much as possible so as to lighten the load. Meanwhile,

(47:31):
in addition to keeping the oxen moving and on track,
the teamsters also had the responsibility of setting up camp
every evening and being the ones responsible for the care
of the livestock and whatever other tasks those who had
hired them might have on any given day. In all, then,
the Dinner read Party was a very well supplied group
as they set off, caring for each person over ten
years old two hundred pounds of flour, fifteen pounds of

(47:53):
coffee and sugar, one hundred pounds of bacon, fifty pounds
of salt and rice, five pounds of pepper, three to
five eye bushels of corn meal, fifty pounds of dried
apples and peaches, and the same for the children under ten,
with the exception of half the amounts of stuff like
flour and bacon. Additionally, each family also had to make sure,
just in case something happened and they got separated from

(48:13):
the rest, that they had the tools necessary to fix
their wagons. Not to mention, they also had to carry
with them all the various pants and various implements to
cook their meals with while on the road. Meanwhile, for
each man in the group, they carried at least a
rifle or a shotgun, complete with five pounds of gunpowder
and twelve pounds of lead or fifteen pounds of shot.
Also in their wagons were ample seeds and farming implements

(48:35):
to get them started in their new homes, not to
mention their various pieces of furniture that they were taking
with them and a large number of books. The families
also made sure to bring along with them balts of
fairly inexpensive cotton fabric and various colors and prints, along
with a number of ribbons, handkerchiefs, glass bean necklaces, brass
rings and pocket mirrors, all of which could potentially be

(48:55):
traded with Native Americans along the way, which was all
in addition to the more expensive bolts of fabric like silk, satin,
and velvet that they intended to use to trade for
land for the Mexican residents of California once he arrived.
Which is all to say that these wagons, especially as
they set off, were quite heavy as they were packed
to the brim with goods, with George Donner making one
concession to reality by leaving his father's treasured cannon ball

(49:17):
behind in Illinois. With all the preparations in place, then
the Reeds and the Donners set off from their homes
on the fourteenth of April eighteen forty six. Now there
was quite a bit of fuss as they set off,
because again, this wasn't just moving to a different place,
and nor was it simply leaving behind everyone and everything
you had known for years, if not for your entire lives.
For some of the younger members of this party, as this,

(49:39):
to be clear, was pretty much like saying goodbye for
good because you were simply highly unlikely to actually see
the people you left behind ever again. As keep in mind.
Outside of letters, there was no way to really easily
stay in touch, and nor was there any easy or
liable form of transportation in between where they were leaving
and where they were going to. This then was effectively

(50:00):
goodbye for good, as even if things went well, you
were unlikely to ever see any of the friends and
family members who were staying behind. To that end, James
Reid hoped to try one final time to talk his
friend Abraham Lincoln into joining him on this journey to California,
which Lincoln was supposedly strongly tempted to do. Lincoln, though,
was not in attendance that day, and so we did

(50:20):
not have the opportunity to deliver his final sales pitch. Klaus.
Lincoln's wife Mary Todd wasn't exactly keen on heading for
the unknown and untamed lands of California, and anyway, leaving
now would have men abandoning his political career, which was
very much on the rise. Yet, while Abraham Lincoln wasn't
there to see reading the others off, many others were,
and so as a result of having to say all

(50:42):
these goodbyes, the wagon train didn't actually make it out
of Springfield that first day, Asa instead set up camp
on the western outskirts of town. In all, the three
families to party from Springfield, Illinois, and their combined nine
wagons consisted of sixty four year old George daughter, his
forty four year old wife Tamsen and her three young children,
and six year old Francs, four year old Georgia and

(51:02):
three year old Eliza. Also joining them were George's older
daughters from his previous marriage, fourteen year old Elitha Coomey
and twelve year old Leanna. Then it was George's younger brother,
the fifty six year old Jacob, who traveled with his
forty five year old wife Betsy and their children nine
year old George, seven year old Mary, five year old Isaac,
four year old Samuel, three year old Lewis, and Betsy's

(51:23):
two sons from a prior marriage, fourteen year old Salomon
Hook and thirteen year old William Hook. The Donners also
brought with him a quartet of teams to his fifteen
year old Noah James, twenty five year old Samuel Shoemaker,
twenty eight year old John Denton of Sheffield, England, who
was a gunsmith, and twenty nine year old Hiram Owens Miller,
who has skills as a blacksmith. Meanwhile, the Reed family

(51:45):
consisted of forty six year old James Reed, his thirty
two year old wife Margaret, Margaret's daughter twelve year old Virginia,
the couple's three children, eight year old Martha, five year
old James Junior and three year old Thomas, and of
course Margaret's seven year old mother, Sarah Keys. They both
the special wagon to accommodate. The family also brought their employees,
the thirty one year oality Eliza Williams, who, while Deff

(52:07):
was a first class cook, and er al bino half
brother Bilas Williams, who, due to being an albino, would
sleep in the wagons during the day and thus was
responsible for tending the livestock and the campfires during the night.
Then there were their trio of Teamster's twenty five year
old James Smith, twenty seven year old Walter Herder out
of Virginia, and twenty eight year old Milford or Milton Elliott,

(52:27):
who had worked in Reed's mill for several years before
the bankruptcy, during which time had grown close to the
family and even taken to calling Margaret Reid, MA. When
the extended Red and Donner families finally got under Wayne
earnesty day after they initially tried to leave, They anticipated
would take them roughly three weeks to travel from Springfield,
Illinois to Independence, Missouri, where they planned to replenish their

(52:48):
supplies before joining up with a larger wagon train setting
off for California for a journey that they then anticipated
taking them an additional four to six months to complete. Now,
it seems that not much of interest note happened during
this initial leg of their journey. Notably, though, during this
part of their travels, the Donner party were marching along
a route that had seen approximately just as much death

(53:09):
and tragedy as this group would eventually experience, as they
happened to be traveling along the same path that had
been used by the Poddo Watamee Indians in eighteen thirty
eight when they were forced by the Indian Removal Act
to leave their homes and head west to Lands in Kansas.
It was then during this ten week trip that the
six hundred and sixty mile trail earned the name of
the Poddo Watamee Trail of Death, as some forty one

(53:30):
pod of Wanamee most of them children died along the way,
not realizing the parallels in their own journey. On the
tenth of May, twenty five days after departing from their
homes in Springfield, the families would reach Independence, Missouri, which
at the time was the westernmost city in the US,
largely because it was the furthest point that steamboats could reach,
as sudjets sat on the edge of the frontier, and

(53:51):
thus became the jumping off point for Western pioneers and settlers.
The Santa Fe, the Oregon and California Trails and all
started in Independence, thereby earning the city the Moniker the
queen city of the Trails. The members of the Donner
and Reed party were then surprised by the cast they
found in the city. It was, after all, quite the din.
As residents went about their business and are interacted with

(54:13):
the fund of immigrants passing through, They then one of her.
Numerous conversations being carried out in a number of different languages,
as English, Spanish, German, Italian, and a number of Native
American tongues like Osage, Chocdaw, and Chickasaw, among others, were
all likely to be heard at some point during their
time in the city. Indeed, Tamsen would write to her
sister back in Newburyport, Massachusetts, before setting off from Independence,

(54:35):
and while doing so she would comment about her time
in the city by saying, quote, I can give you
no idea of the hurry of this place at this time.
It is supposed there be seven thousand wagons start from
this place this season. Now, wagon trains typically did not
depart from Independence until about the middle of May, as
that was the appoint when the grass had grown to
the point that he could sustain the livestock. The daughter

(54:57):
read party then were assumingly on schedules. After resupplying, they
departed from Independence on the twelfth of May. In doing so,
they started off by following the Santa fe Trail until
the pathway split as one road led down south to
Santa Fean and ultimately Chiuaua, Mexico, while the other headed
to the northwest, there by taking travelers toward Oregon in California.
This then was a trail used by many travelers departing

(55:19):
and returning to Independence, and thus the going should have
been fairly easy. However, this year, torrential rains made for
slow going. As he turned the well worn trail to mud,
mud which clung to wagon wheels and animals alike. This
process of trying to make it through this month and
sow to progress to something like four miles on their
first day out, when eight to twelve miles a day
was fairly typical for a wagon train, with eighteen to

(55:41):
twenty being most possible on a good day. At being said,
by the next day their group actually matched despite the
rain and bad roads, to travel sixteen miles. This, however,
proved to be quite exhausting, so when they arrived at
a campsite on the hard Grove Creek on the fifteenth,
the Donner Reed party opted to rest for two days
to recover before attempting to cross the nearby Big Blue River.

(56:03):
Now forming a river was one of the most dangerous
parts of life on the trail and a wagon train,
as it could lead to a whole number of bad
things happening. Wagons could get stuck in the river, bottom
axles could be broken during the crossing, and the various
livestock could be swept away by the current, as could
the wagons themselves. Indeed, less than a week prior to
the Donner Red crossing, a wagon from another group at

(56:23):
capsized when attempting this ferry crossing. The Donner and Red wagons, however,
would make it through this crossing without issue. Things that
were going pretty well so far, but they were about
the past to points from where they would not be
able to get aid for some time. As the following
day they would pass through a hamlet known as Little
Santa Fe, which represented the last spot for miles where
there was a blacksmith who could fix a bust and

(56:45):
wheel where they could refill their buckets of axle grease. Indeed,
soon they would pass beyond the borders of the United
States itself, as just a little ways beyond Little Santa
Fe was the land that the American government had deemed
quote unquote permanent Indian Frontier, or the Indian Territory Lands,
where many of the Eastern tribes which had fallen victim
to the Indian Removal Act had been sent to a

(57:06):
swath of land that was supposed to eventually be the
home of all Native American tribes, and as such it
was the quote unquote solution to the so called Indian problem,
land that was supposed to belong to the tribes for
all time and land that would before too long be
carved up and stripped away to be given to white settlers,
regardless of previous promises. Now to be clear, as they
traveled through these land, sing members of the Donner Reed

(57:28):
Party were not alone, as since they were still fairly
close to independence, the road was chock full of other wagons,
some of which, like those bound for Santa Fe, were
manned by experienced drivers who were not sellers but hired
hands who were carrying goods for merchants, men who were
used to traveling these routes and thus were able to
give the inexperienced settlers like those of the Donner Reed
Party advice, which, among other things, included information about the

(57:52):
various Native American tribes they were liable to encounter along
the way. And indeed, the members of the Donner Reed
Party would soon meet their first Native Americans, as when
when they came to the Kahar River, they found a
group there operating a ferry that charged a dollar for
every wagon they carried across. After paying this fee, the
following daily Donner Reid Party would catch up with and
join a much larger caravan, as was typical of travelers

(58:13):
making such a journey, as there was believed to be
safety in numbers. The newcomers, though, first had to be
evaluated before being accepted into the caravan to make sure
they weren't troublemakers who could potentially endanger the lives of
everyone else in the group, which is where their letters
of introduction Reads in particular, came in handy. Meanwhile, also
working in their favor was the fact that they had

(58:34):
met some of the other members of this caravan while
they were in independence, as this group had been setting
off around the same time that the smaller party was arriving,
at which point the Donners and Reads had been encouraged
to hurry up and join with this larger party. It
was and as a result of the letters of introduction
and the good word from the other members of the caravan,
that the families were unanimously welcomed in the two families

(58:56):
and had joined with the so called Russell Party, as
it was led by one William Henry Russell, a lawyer
and politician who had been named a Kentucky Colonel. Now
Russell was a bit of a flamboyant character who had
been given the nickname Ol due to an incident when
hunting one night, as upon hearing a chorus of alice hooting,
Russell responded to their apparent query of who by calling out,

(59:16):
quote why des I Colonel William Henry Russell of Kentucky,
a bosom friend of Henry Clay. Meanwhile, in addition to
al also making up the rest of this party were,
according to Eliza Donner, quote lawyers, journalists, teachers, students, farmers,
and day labors. Also a minister of the gospel, a
carriage maker, a cabinet maker, a stonemason, a jeweler, a blacksmith,

(59:38):
and women verse in all branches of women's labor. Now,
the basic routine for a day travel on the road
consisted of getting up early in the morning to get
some campfires going. The women then started preparing breakfast while
the men often helped out running up the livestock. Then,
after eating a meal that typically involved bacon and bread
that had been cooked the night before, the caravan would
send off traveling till around midday, when and they would

(01:00:00):
stop for an hour or two to rest the oxen
in the other livestock. As the animals are given the
opportunity to graze, The people would have their own meals
after which they would set off again to travel until
four or five o'clock, when they looked to stop at
some place where there was hopefully good grass and fresh water.
As they set up care for the night, they would
be settlers, often part their wagons in a square for protection.

(01:00:21):
The animals then would be left to graze while campfires
were built, tents were set up, and dinner was cooked.
Now Tamsen Donner would break up the monotony of these
days of travel by taking advantage of this opportunity to
study the unfamiliar floora that she was surrounded by as
he traveled through the Landso would one day become Kansas. Indeed,
others in the party noted how she was often seen
kneeling among the plants as she studied collective specimens and

(01:00:43):
took notes on them. While Tamson was embracing her seeming
the unending fascination with the walder round her, in particular
fascination with all the ferro supplants she had never seen before,
she found that she was not alone, as according to
her daughter Eliza quote, mister Edwin Bryant, mister and missus
Thorn and my mother were enthusias ca astic searches for
botanical and geological specimens. Now the day after the Donners

(01:01:04):
and the Reids joined the Russell party, things started off
pretty normally, with the exception that a few of the
members of the caravan might have been suffering from hangovers
thanks to the celebration of the night before. Their fine
day of traveling, though, would be disrupted when during their
mid day break the wind shifted any sky turned dark.
They were then forced to travel the rest of the
day through a drenching thunderstorm that not only made their

(01:01:25):
travel miserable that day, but it also guaranteed that any
days to come their progress would be hampered by thick,
cloying mud. The extended Russell party then came upon a
Greek which, thanks to these state banks on both sides,
had no easy way to afford. This then slowed their
progress further as they had to lower the wagons down
by ropes and then had to haul them up using
the same method on the other side, a physically demanding

(01:01:47):
and time consuming process, but spirits in general seemed to
never remained high as round about this time, yet another
group of emigrants caught up with the caravan, a group
that was readily accepted into their ranks and welcomed warmly,
as this latest group consisted of family members of some
of those already traveling within the party. Indeed, as a
part of the celebration around these latest arrivals, since the
new group was led by a descendant of Daniel Boone,

(01:02:08):
the men in the caravan quickly set up a shooting
contest so they can all compete while also practicing for
potential future buffalo hunts. Yet, for as much as the
feeling was that there was safety in numbers when traveling
through the frontier, the fact remained that large caravans had
a tendency to move slower than smaller ones, as it
just in general took time to get such a large
group going, and indeed, during the day they would be

(01:02:29):
strung out for miles on end. As a result, Shortly
after adding to their numbers, the Russell group soon subtracted
some as some thirteen wagons departed the following morning intent
on going it on their own, a happenstance which was
apparently not all then uncommon for such caravans. Meanwhile, during
their crossing of Kansas, the Russell caravan would find themselves
one night camping near a pair of villages belonging to

(01:02:51):
the tribe from where Kansas would get its name. Now,
the Call tribe, by this point were starting to struggle
thanks to unwanted white missionaries and members of their tribe
signing away their lands without the approval of the rest.
The village's leader, hard Chief, though, promised to prevent his
people from raiding the caravans livestock during the night in
exchange for gifts, and indeed, the following morning, after suffering

(01:03:12):
no losses to their herd, the caravan members were actually
good to their word, as he handed over a decent
supply of bake and flour and various other goods to
the chief to distribute to his people. Things had gone
so smoothly, in fact, that so many tribes young warriors
run alongside the caravan as it traveled during the day
to provide protection as he escorted them through their lands.
These warriors even helped the pioneers out by showing them

(01:03:33):
so called prayer potatoes or prairie turnups that could be
eaten raw, roasted, or even ground up and us as
a seasoning. According to one of the pioneers, Edwin Bryant,
a former newspaper editor from Kentucky the white egg sized
roots quote flavor is more agreeable than that of the
finest irish potato. Still, despite such a discovery, in such
smooth relations with the native tribe, the fact of the

(01:03:54):
matter remained that their large group did indeed seem to
be moving quite slowly. As a result, some were beginning
to worry, especially as some among them began to complain
of feeling ill. Now, Brian, the newspaper editor, somehow was
put in charge of the caravan's medicines and was more
careful than others and dulling them out, a policy which
he believed was in the best interest for all, as
he would note that quote the propensity of those afflicted

(01:04:17):
by disease on this journey is frequently to devour medicine
as a wood food, under the delusion that large quantities
will more speedily and effectively produce a cure. The reverse
is the fact, and it is sometimes dangerous to trust
a patient with more than a single doze. The illnesses, though,
were only of a minor concern in Brian's eyes, because quote,
I'm beginning to feel alarmed at the tardiness of our

(01:04:38):
movement and fearful that winter will find us in the
snowy mounds of California, or that we shall suffer from
the exhaustion of her supply of provisions. In saying so,
though Brian would add that quote, I do not fear
for myself, but for the women and children of the immigrants.
Singular as it may seem, there are many of a
present party who have no just conception of the extent
and labor of the journey before them. They appear to

(01:04:59):
be desires of shortening each day's march as much as possible,
and when once encamped, are reluctant to move except for
the benefit of fresh grass for the cattle and a
more convenient and plentiful supply of would for the purpose
of cooking. The attitude among at least some of the
party then was lacks a days ago, as they didn't
feel like they needed to rush and could simply take
their time without consequence. Yet, despite the growing worry among

(01:05:20):
some that they were taking too long thanks to yet
another powerful thunderstorm, as they came upon the Big Blue River,
they found it so swollen from the rain water that
its current was moving at a clip of some fifteen
miles an hour, which was too fast and too strong
to attempt a crossing at that moment, a situation that
delighted some and disturbed others. As a maid camp and
alighted to wait a day for the current to ease

(01:05:42):
before attempting a crossing. However, when during that delay another
thunderstorm rolled in and added even more water to the
big Blue, the talk amongst some in the caravan, especially
among the young single men, turned to making a change
in leadership. Things then eventually got to the point that
a motion was proposed, voted upon, an approve moved to
create a committee that had the power to try caravan

(01:06:03):
leaders with tyranny or neglect of duty. Now, seeing as
how he was the caravan leader, and thus this committee
was designed specifically for him, William al Russell was none
too pleased, and as such he promptly resigned from his
position as the leader of the caravan. In doing so,
he was joined by several others who were leaders of
their group. Untild Finally, leadership fell to none other than

(01:06:24):
the aforementioned Edwin Bryant, and which point Bryant called for
the newly created committee to be disbanded and for all
the old leaders who had just resigned to resume their duties.
As such, the proposed mutiny of sorts was completely undone,
and things just carried on as they had before. Still,
the fact remained that while the level of the Big
Blue had fallen some fifteen inches, it was still dangerous

(01:06:44):
to try and forward. So the following morning, the group
began the process of constructing a large log raft so
as to ferry the wagons across, something that it feels
that they probably could have been doing the previous two
days while they waited and had attempted coups, because it
took them the entire day to construct this. Meanwhile, it
was during this delay along the Big Blue River that
the first member of the Donner Reed party would die,

(01:07:07):
as in the twenty ninth of May, Margaret Reid's seven
year old mother Sarah would findly lose her long battle
with consumption aka to berculosis, a death that further delayed
the construction of the raft. As such, work was put
aside out of respect for the dead, as all prepared
for the funeral, a process which included digging a grave
and felling a tree to be turned into a coffin.
Some even searched and located a smooth slab of stone

(01:07:29):
in which they carved Sarah's name and date of death. Then,
once these preparations were done, a full funeral procession and
ceremony were carried out. It was then the day after
the funeral, after some more work on the makeshift ferryboat
was finished, that they finally launched it and set about
transporting the wagons across the still raging river. As even
with this raft and the level on the Big Blue

(01:07:49):
further reduced thanks to their delay, the crossing would not
be easy as the current was still quite formidable. As
keep in mind, crossings were typically difficult and dangerous, and
this one was made even more so by the weight
of the wagons involved, as they first had to lower
them down these steep banks of the river using robes
to be put onto the raft, and then they had
to be pulled across the Big Blue using nothing more

(01:08:11):
than they strength of those in the caravan. As a result,
only nine wagons made the crossing that first day. A
process then was continued the following day, but they were
not helped out by the visit of yet another rainstorm,
which was accompanied by a sudden drop in temperature. It
then took some fifteen hours of working in those cold,
wet conditions to get the remaining wagons across, which involved

(01:08:32):
a number of the men who were assisting and pulling
the wagons across doing so while standing in water up
to their armpits. This then left them exhausted, sore, and cramped,
as they shivered violently from the cold tempers and were
understandably fraid, to the point that two of the teamsters
got into an actual knife flight before others disarmed them.
This incident aside, though it seems, with the obvious exception

(01:08:53):
of Margaret Reid, who was mourning her mother's death and
plagued by a mighty migraine, that spirits were generally good,
as after a long delay, they were finally back on
the road. A few days after this, though, the caravan
would split after a pair of men bound for Oregon
had a dispute where one man, feeling that the other
was not pulling his weight, then to take his oxen
from the other man's wagon, thereby leaving the man and

(01:09:14):
his family stranded. Now, others tried to negotiate a resolution
between the two warring parties, but things eventually got to
the point that it was decided that the two men,
along with the eight in the twenty wagons heading for Oregon,
should depart from the rest of the Russell caravan, including
the Donna Reed party, who were all heading for California.
That being said, seeing as how the trail they were

(01:09:34):
on would not divide for some time to come, they
would continue to travel the same route. So since neither
group could actually travel at a much faster rate than
the other, they wouldn't remain within a day's ride of
one another for some time to come. Now, by the
fourth of June, the various members of the caravan were
sick of subsisting on just the sultan meat they had
brought along with them. They wanted fresh meat, and so

(01:09:55):
a group of them set off after a wolf, hoping
to slay it. Yet, despite chasing the the beast for miles,
it ultimately managed to elude them. All was not lost, however,
as soon their scouts spotted a herd of antelope still
lusting after fresh meat, a party was swiftly organized and
outfit with the best horses they had. The antelopes, meanwhile,
remained oblivious as he would be. Hunters split into two

(01:10:16):
parties to approach the herd from two sides. Yet as
they closed within about a half a mile, the antelope
suddenly became aware of their presence, at which point the
whole herd took off. According to Edwin Bryant, the antelope
then quote fled almost with the fleetness of the wind.
I never saw an animal that could run with the
apparent ease, speed, and grace of these. They seemed to
fly or skim over the ground. So bounding and buoyant

(01:10:38):
are their strides, and so bird like their progress. The hunters,
and try as they mind, could not catch up with
the antelope. They, however, would not return completely empty handed,
as they happened to fine and bring down a deer
in a patch of woods near their camp that night,
which represented the first significant hunting success and the first
bit of fresh meat they had since setting off. Meanwhile,

(01:10:58):
for as much as they feared, they need if Americans
who called this region home, the real threat they faced
during the stretch of their journey was from the countless
mosquitoes that swarmed about them and their livestock at all times,
biting and drinking their blood. It was so bad, in fact,
that the cattle actually managed to pull up the stakes
they were tied to in an attempt to run away
and flee the constantly biting insects, while the horses would

(01:11:19):
be kept awake winnying in pain all night from the
biting to the point that they were found in the
morning with blood running down their flanks. The humans, of
course suffered as well as in addition to the butting,
they also took ill, suffering from severe diarrhea chisen fevers
as a result of these insects and the blood borne
diseases like malaria that they carried. Time, though, marched on,
and so did the caravan as they actually seemed to

(01:11:41):
recognize that they didn't really have the luxury of taking
their time, so they started pushing harder. As through the
first week of June, the caravan averaged eighteen to twenty
miles a day in an effort to make of for
the time that they had lost, and doing so, they
pushed up into what would become Nebraska and toward the
Platte River, a waterwhere that many travelers before and after
them would follow as it traveled for an extended distance

(01:12:03):
in a reliably westward direction. The Platte River then was
an important landmark in these otherwise flat plains that were
notably also the home of the massive buffalo herds that
they had heard so much about, which they notably had
not yet seen themselves, although the evidence of their existence
was plentiful in the form of buffalo chips or prairie
oak as some Tota calling the dried buffalo dung, which

(01:12:24):
the travelers knew from their guide books was an invaluable
source of fuel for their campfires due to the overall
lack of trees in the region, a bit of knowledge
that had likely at some point been passed on from
the prairie tribes like the Lakota who called this region home.
Soon enough, though, the Russell party would come across one
of the massive herds of buffalo that these various tribes
subsisted off of, herds that were apparently still fairly sizable

(01:12:47):
in eighteen forty six. Indeed, Edwin Bryant would write at
one point quote, I have seen not less than a
thousand of these animals today without going off from the
wagon trail. Meanwhile, the fact that the men who killed
the first two buffalo to provide the caravan with fresh
mate were being praise for their act did not seem
to sit too well with James Reid, who seemed to
constantly need to feel like he was better than everyone else.

(01:13:09):
So he sent off the following day running his prize
horse Lauchus, hoping to prove that he was the quote
best and most daring horsemen in the caravan, and that
he had the quote best horse in the company. Reid
then proceeded to bring down a bull and a large
calf using his pistols from the back of his prized horse,
while the others he rode with that day he failed
to bring down the bull that they were after. He

(01:13:30):
and his companions then took as much meat as they
could from the animal's cast before quote, leaving the balance
for the wolves, which are very numerous, a practice that
William al russwould make note of as well in a letter,
as he wrote, quote, we find thousands of buffalo and
kill more than we can eat. It is really a
fine sport. This wasteful hunting process stands in stark contrast

(01:13:50):
in the way the tribes who called these lands home
made sure to make extensive use out of every part
of such animals. Yet, even if he had been aware
of this at the time, me like he still would
not have cared, as just like he had hoped, he
and his horse were showered with the praise he so desired.
The thing was, though, such wasteful habits would eventually have
an impact on these seemingly endless herds of buffalo, because

(01:14:12):
they were in fact not endless. Eighteen forty six, however,
was before the full damage of these white travelers was
felt by the Lakota and the other local tribes. So
as the party rode on into their lands, they did
not come under attack. Now, granted, some were already taking
note of the dwindling number of buffalo, but it had
not quite hit the tipping point just yet, so Mole

(01:14:32):
there were rubbings of discontent, it had not reached a
point of open conflict. Indeed, before their eventual departure from
these lands, the Lakota would make a point of encouraging
the caravan to move on quickly, not because they were
hostile to them, but because their words were eager to
make war on other tribes, and they didn't want members
of the caravan to get caught in the crossfire. Meanwhile,

(01:14:53):
round about the same time, Edwin Brian would emits these
largely barren planes bear witness to a wedding, a funeral,
and birth take place in three separate camps of travelers.
In one camp, a young boy who had his leg
shatowed after falling underneath the wagon's wheel, would die following
a desperate attempt to amputate his leg that had become gangrenous. Brant,
you see, had been summoned to the camp by the

(01:15:14):
desperate family in the hopes that he could help. Brian,
though despite the reputation he had apparently gained among his
fellow travelers, wasn't actually a doctor and only had some
very basic medical training. Plus, by the time he was
summoned to examine the boy, he believed it was already
too late and the boy would die amputation or no amputation.
The desperate mother, however, was insistent, and so a camel

(01:15:37):
driver who claimed to have aided in such operations in
the past, then volunteered to make the attempt. However, just
like Brian had predicted, it was already too late for
the boy. The leg had been allowed to fester for
too long, and as a result, he died soon after
the amputation was finished. Yet, as Brian and his companion
made the slow sat right back to their own camp.
They happened to pass by another wagon trains campsite where

(01:16:00):
a young fifteen year old girl named marrying Lucy Lard
was marrying the twenty two year old teamster who had
been hired to drive one of her family's wagons. Brian
and his companion were invited to join in and witness
the simple ceremony that featured a plain on frosted cake
and no music or dancing. Yet Stella was quite the
shift and moon from the last camp they had visited. Then,
as he left the happy couple behind, Brian and his

(01:16:22):
companion would be reminded of the tragedy they had witnessed earlier,
as it could see in the distance the torches for
the funeral procession for the young boy in the other camp.
It was then in this moment that a rider from
yet another nearby camp approached a pair with the joyous
news that a woman had just given birth to a
baby boy, a sequence of events that led Brian to
write quote, I could not help but reflect upon the

(01:16:44):
seeing their concurrence of the events of the day. A
death and funeral, a wedding, and a birth had occurred
in the wilderness with in a diamate of two miles
within two hours time, and tomorrow the places where these
events had taken place would be deserted and unmocked, except
for the grave of the unfortunate boy deceased. It is then,
with that picture of life on the trail, that I
will leave you for this week. The story of the Donners, however,

(01:17:07):
is far from over. But the continuing tell of their
journey to California and the horrors that'll wait them we'll
have to for now remain a story for another time.
Thank you for listening to Distorted History. If you would
like to help out, please rate and review the podcasts
and tell your friends if you think they'll be interested.

(01:17:28):
If you would like ad free in early episodes, I
set up such a feed over at patreon dot com
slash Distorted History. By paying ten bucks a month, you
will gain access to the special ad free feed available
on Spotify or likely through your podcast app as long
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post sources on koffee and Twitter, though, as it's just
a convenient place to go to access that information. Regardless.

(01:17:51):
Once again, thank you for listening, and until next time

(01:18:14):
is inala

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The Tragedy of the Donner Party Episode 1 Manifest Destiny

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