Seventy Years on the Frontier Part 9

In the fall of 1857 a report was sent by the engineers who were with General Johnston's army at Fort Bridger, and who had crossed the plains that year, to the Quartermaster's Department at Washington, stating it was impossible to find subsistence along the road for the number of animals it would require to transport the freight necessary for the support of the army. General Jessup, who was then Quartermaster of the United States Army at Washington, and as fine a gentleman as I ever met, gave me this information, and asked me if it would deter me from undertaking the transportation. I told him it would not, and that I would be willing to give him my head for a football to have kicked in Pennsylvania Avenue if I did not supply the army with every pound that was necessary for its subsistence, provided the Government would pay me to do it. We satisfied him after the first year's work had been done that we could do even more than I a.s.sured him could be done.

There is no other road in the United States, nor in my opinion elsewhere, of the same length, where such numbers of men and animals could travel during the summer season as could over the thoroughfare from the Missouri River up the Platte and its tributaries to the Rocky Mountains. In fact, had it been necessary to go east from the Missouri River, instead of west, it would have been impossible in the nature of things to have done so, owing to the uneven surface of the country, the water being in little deep ravines and, as a rule, in small quant.i.ties, often muddy creeks to cross, at other times underbrush and timber that the animals could have roamed into and disappeared, all of which would have prevented progress had we started with such an enterprise east instead of west. But the country west of the Missouri River for hundreds of miles, so far as making roads for travel of large numbers of animals is concerned, is as different from the east as it is possible for two landscapes to be. The whole country from the west border of the Missouri, Iowa, and Arkansas was thoroughly practical, before inhabited by farmers, for carrying the very largest herds and organizations of people on what one might term perfectly natural ground, often being able to travel hundreds of miles toward the sunset without a man having to do one hour's work in order to prepare the road for the heaviest wagons and teams.

The road from Missouri to Santa Fe, N. M., up the Arkansas River, a distance of 800 miles, was very much like the one up the Platte River, and over which millions of pounds of merchandise were carried, and where oxen almost invariably, but sometimes mules, did the work and subsisted without a bite of any other food than that obtained from the gra.s.ses that grew by the roadside.

The roads all running west from the Missouri River came up the valleys of the Platte, Kansas, or Arkansas rivers, running directly from the mountains to the Missouri River. These rivers had wide channels, low banks, and sandy bottoms, into which a thousand animals could go at one time, if necessary, for drink, and spread over the surface, so as not to be in each other's way, and whatever disturbance they made in the water, in the way of offal or anything of that kind, was soon overcome by the filtering of the water through the sand, which kept it pure, and thousands of men and animals could find purer water on account of these conditions.

Then again the first expedient in the way of fuel was what was called buffalo chips, which was the offal from the buffalo after lying and being dried by the sun; and, strange to say, the economy of nature was such, in this particular, that the large number of work-animals left at every camping-place fuel sufficient, after being dried by the sun, to supply the necessities of the next caravan or party that traveled along.

In this way the fuel supply was inexhaustible while animals traveled and fed upon the gra.s.ses.

This, however, did not apply to travel east of the Missouri River, as the offal from the animals there soon became decomposed and was entirely worthless for fuel purposes. This was altogether owing to the difference in the gra.s.ses that grew west of the Missouri River on the plains and in the Rocky Mountains and that which grew in the States east of the Missouri. Thus the fuel supply was sufficient for the largest organizations of people who, in those days, were traveling on the plains. Armies, small and great, that found it necessary to cross the plains, found sufficient supply of this fuel, and it seemed to be a necessity supplied by nature on the vast open and untimbered plains lying between the Missouri River and the Rocky Mountains, far beyond the Canadian line to the north, without which it would have been practically impossible to have crossed the plains with any degree of comfort, and in cold weather would have been absolutely impossible.

The small groups of timber growing along the streams would soon have been exhausted if used for fuel, and there would have been nothing to supply those who came later.

History records no other instance of like nature, where an immense area of country had the same necessity and where that necessity was supplied in such a manner as on the vast plains west of the Missouri River. These chips would lay for several years in perfect condition for fuel.

CHAPTER XVII.

"THE JAYHAWKERS OF 1849."

In this year a number of gentlemen made up a party and started for the far West. During that fearful journey they were lost for three months in the "Great American Desert," the region marked on the map as the "unexplored region." General Fremont, with all the patronage of the Government at his command, tried to cross this desert at several points, but failed in every attempt. This desert is bounded by the Rocky Mountains and Wasatch range on the east and the Sierra Nevada on the west. From either side running streams sink near the base of the mountains, and no water exists except alkali and the hot springs impregnated with nitre.

The party arrived at Salt Lake late in the season of '49. It was thought by the older members of the company to be too late to cross the Sierra Nevada by the northern routes. No wagon had ever made the trip to the Pacific Coast by way of the Spanish Trail from Santa Fe to the Pacific, but it was determined to undertake this perilous journey. Captain Hunt, commander of the Mormon Battalion in the Mexican War, agreed to pilot the train through to Pueblo de los Angeles for the sum of $1,200. The weather south being too warm for comfortable travel, the party remained in Salt Lake City two months, leaving that place October 3, 1849. Upon their arrival at Little Salt Lake, a few restless comrades, angry that the party did not go through by the northern route, formed a band and determined to cross the desert at all hazards, and thus save hundreds of miles' travel via Los Angeles route. The sufferings they endured can not be described.

The survivors have since been scattered through the country, and have never come together since they separated at Santa Barbara, on the Pacific, February 4, 1850, until the twenty-third anniversary of their arrival was celebrated at the residence of Col. John B. Colton. The following letter will explain:

GALESBURG, ILL., January 12, 1872.

DEAR SIR: You are invited to attend a reunion of the "Jayhawkers of '49," on the 5th day of February next at 10 o'clock in the forenoon, at my house, to talk over old times and compare notes, after the lapse of twenty-three years from the time when the "Jayhawkers" crossed the "Great American Desert."

In the event that you can not be present, will you write a letter immediately on receipt of this, to be read on that occasion, giving all the news and reminiscences that will be of interest to the old crowd?

Yours fraternally, JOHN B. COLTON.

A short sketch of the party's wanderings may not be amiss. On the 5th of April, 1849, a large party of men, with oxen and wagons, started from Galesburg, Ill., and vicinity for the then newly discovered gold-fields of California. To distinguish their party from other parties who went the same year, they jestingly took the name of "Jayhawkers," and that name has clung to them through all the years that have come and gone.

They encountered no trouble until after leaving Little Salt Lake, when taking the directions given them by Indian Walker and Ward--old mountaineers, who gave them a diagram and told them they could save 500 miles to the mines in California by taking the route directed--the Jayhawkers branched off from the main body. They found nothing as represented, and became lost on the desert, wandering for months, traversing the whole length of the Great American Desert, which Fremont, with all the aid of the Government at his call, could not cross the shortest way, and laid it down on the map as the "unexplored region."

They cut up their wagons on Silver Mountain and made of them pack-saddles for their cattle. Here thirteen of their number branched off, on New Year's day, taking what jerked beef they could carry, and started due west over the mountains, which the main party could not do on account of their cattle, but when they came to a mountain they took a southerly course around it. Of these thirteen, but two lived to get through, and they were found by ranch Indians in a helpless condition, and brought in and cared for. They had cast lots and lived on each other until but two remained. When questioned afterward in regard to their trip, they burst into tears and could not talk of it.

The main body of Jayhawkers kept their cattle, for they were their only hope; on these they lived, and the cattle lived on the bitter sage-brush and grease-wood, except when they occasionally found an oasis with water and a little gra.s.s upon it. The feet of the cattle were worn down until the blood marked their every step. Then the boys wrapped their feet in raw hides, as they did their own. Many died from exposure, hunger, and thirst, and were buried in the drifting sands where they fell, while those who were left moved on, weak and tottering, not knowing whose turn would be next. But for their cattle, not a man could have lived through that awful journey. They ate the hide, the blood, the refuse, and picked the bones in camp, making jerked beef of the balance to take along with them. People who are well fed, who have an abundance of the good things of life, say: "I would not eat this; I would not eat that; I'd starve first." They are not in a position to judge. Hunger swallows up every other feeling, and man in a starving condition is as savage as a wild beast.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ALEXANDER MAJORS.

R. H. HASLAM ("Pony Bob"). PRENTISS INGRAHAM.

JOHN B. COLTON. W. F. CODY ("Buffalo Bill").]

After many desert wanderings and untold suffering, they at last struck a low pa.s.s in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and emerged suddenly into the Santa Clara Valley, which was covered with gra.s.s and wild oats and flowers, with thousands of fat cattle feeding, a perfect paradise to those famished skeletons of men. There were thirty-four of the party who lived to reach that valley, and every one shed tears of joy at the sight of the glorious vision spread before them and the suddenness of their deliverance.

The boys shot five head of the cattle, and were eating the raw flesh and fat when the ranch Indians, hearing the firing, came down with all the shooting irons they could muster, but seeing the helpless condition of the party, they rode back to headquarters and reported to Francisco, the Spaniard who owned the ranch and cattle. He came down and invited them to camp in a grove near his home, bade them welcome, and furnished the party with meat, milk, grain, and everything they needed, and kept them until they were recruited and able to go on their way. Verily, he was a good Samaritan. They were strangers, and he took them in; hungry, and he fed them; thirsty, and he gave them drink. In the grand summing up of all things, may the n.o.ble Francis...o...b.. rewarded a thousandfold.

They reached the Santa Clara Valley the 4th of February, 1850, and on that day each year they celebrate their deliverance by a reunion, where in pleasant companionship and around the festive board they recount reminiscences of the past, and live over again those scenes, when young and hopeful, they lived and suffered together.

There are but eleven of the survivors of that party alive to-day, and these are widely scattered east of the Rocky Mountains and on the Pacific Slope. Some are old men, too feeble to travel, and can only be present in spirit and by letter at the annual reunions. Gladly would every Jayhawker welcome one and all of that band, bound together by ties of suffering in a bond of brotherhood which naught but death can sever.

The names and residences of the original party are as follows:

John B. Colton, Kansas City, Mo.

Alonzo C. Clay, Galesburg, Ill.

Capt. Asa Haines, Delong, Knox County, Ill., died March 29, 1889.

Luther A. Richards, Beaver City, Neb.

Charles B. Mec.u.m, Perry, Greene County, Iowa.

John W. Plummer, Toulon, Ill., died June 22, 1892.

Sidney P. Edgerton, Blair, Neb., died January 31, 1880.

Edward F. Bartholomew, Pueblo, Colo., died February 13, 1891.

Urban P. Davidson, Derby P. O., Fremont County, Wyo.

John Groscup, Cahto, Mendocino County, Cal.

Thomas McGrew, died in 1866, in Willamette Valley, Ore.

John Cole, died in Sonora, Cal., in 1852.

John L. West, Coloma, Cal., since died.

William B. Rude, drowned in the Colorado River, New Mexico, in 1862.

L. Dow Stevens, San Jose, Cal.

William Robinson, Maquon, Ill., died in the desert.

---- Harrison, unknown.

Alexander Palmer, Knoxville, Ill., died at Slate Creek, Sierra County, Cal., in 1853.

Aaron Larkin, Knoxville, Ill., died at Humboldt, Cal., in 1853.

Marshall G. Edgerton, Galesburg, Ill., died in Montana Territory in 1855.

William Isham, Rochester, N. Y., died in the desert.

---- Fish, Oscaloosa, Iowa, died in the desert.

---- Carter, Wisconsin, unknown.

Harrison Frans, Baker City, Baker County, Ore.

Capt. Edwin Doty, Naples, Santa Barbara County, Cal., died June 14, 1891.

Bruin Byram, Knoxville, Ill., died in 1863.

Thomas Shannon, Los Gatos, Santa Clara County, Cal.

Rev. J. W. Brier, wife, and three small children, Lodi City, San Joaquin County, Cal.

George Allen, Chico, Cal., died in 1876.

Leander Woolsey, Oakland, Cal., died in 1884.

Man from Oscaloosa, Iowa, name not remembered, died in California.

Charles Clark, Henderson, Ill., died in 1863.

---- Gretzinger, Oscaloosa, Iowa, unknown.

A Frenchman, name unknown, became insane from starvation, wandered from camp near the Sierra Nevada Mountains, captured by the Digger Indians, and was rescued by a United States surveying party fifteen years after.