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Historical Facts of the Oregon Trail and America's Manifest Destiny
by
O. Ned Eddins

Astorians Fur Trade Fur Trappers Oregon Country David Thompson Historical Landmarks Historical Facts Rendezvous Joseph Walker
Fort Bonneville Myth

The Oregon Trail pioneered by the Astorians opened up a new way of life for a great many Americans. The first non-missionary wife and the first white children traveled the Oregon Trail in 1840. This was the family of Joel Walker, the brother of mountain man Joseph Walker (Lavender). By the same token, the Oregon Trail sounded the death knell for a great many Native Americans. The first settlers over South Pass on the Oregon Trail signaled the end for millions of buffalo and the Plains Indians. Forty-six years after the first pioneers traveled the Oregon Trail...the last buffalo hunt was held in the Judith Valley (Ewers), and the vast majority of Plains Indians were on reservations.

The history of the Fur Trade and the Oregon and Mormon trails cannot be separated. The Rocky Mountain Fur Traders and Mountain Men not only paved the way West, they often led the wagon trains. A great many people paid a huge price to live, or even to survive, in this country. Western migration was not easy for anyone. Oregon Trail pioneers struggled West for free land and a better life; Mormon emigrants went West to escape religious persecution. White Americans took the land that Native Americans had taken from other Native Americans. Striving for a better life, religious persecution, and one people taken another peoples land are the cornerstones of World History.

America’s Manifest Destiny was the beginning of the end for several hundred thousand Native Americans and millions of buffalo. Forty-six years after Joel Walker's family traveled over the Oregon Trail to the Oregon Country in 1840, the last buffalo hunt was held in the Judith Valley of Montana, and the vast majority of free-roaming Plains Indians were confined to reservations.

World history centers around one people taking another peoples land...and is seldom, if ever, by peaceful means. America's Western Expansion from Colonial times through settlement of the Oregon Country is what it was and cannot be changed. Americans should quite bellyaching about the past, i.e. Indian genocide, African slavery, and get on with making this a better country for all Americans. Only in America are we constantly reminded of several hundred-year-old injustices as though they happened yesterday.

As this country expanded and defined itself, there is no doubt that tragedies occurred, i. e. Trail of Tears, Moravian Massacre. Native Americans were not innocent bystanders; they committed many atrocities as well. Similar wrongs have happened throughout world history, and are still happening today in Russia and in many third world and Muslim countries. Despite what we may want to believe, this has been the pattern for all developing countries, and it was going on long before there was an America. From a biblical sense, it started with Cain and Abel.

There are many misconceptions in western history that are hard to understand. Is it because the writers were too lazy to do the research, promoting political agendas, biased, blinded by the you-did-me-wrong syndrome, or relying on one source for their information? Who knows? The one thing that is true is there is a lot of misinformation, especially on the Internet. Since this in a non-politically correct site, I am going to name one of the worst, endoftheoregontrail.org. This should be the most factual site on the internet in terms of the Oregon Trail, but it is not. Many of the Astorian-Fur Trade errors are so flagrant that there is no question about them, i. e. John Day arrived in St. Louis with Robert Stuart. I emailed them well referenced corrections to some of the obvious errors a couple of years ago. The last time a web search landed me on the site nothing had change, and probably never will.

Do not get me wrong. There are undoubtedly mistakes on this site, especially in grammar...when it comes to grammar, I am a little like one of my favorite Presidents...but hopefully no major history ones. Several mistakes have been pointed out, and the corrections were promptly made. I appreciate it when someone takes the time to point out an error, or make a comment, we are all striving to learn, and one thing that is great about the internet is the free exchange of ideas.

One of life's truths is...no one learns anything by someone agreeing with them.

Oregon Trail Marker on the Continental Divide at South Pass

Manifest Destiny was a political phrase of the nineteenth century. The term was a catch phrase expressing the belief that the United States was divinely inspired to spread its form of democracy and freedom across North America. The term was used to justify the United States territorial expansion to the Pacific Ocean. The phrase was coined in 1844 by New York journalist John L. O'Sullivan in his magazine the Democratic Review.

In 1806, Lt. Zebulon Pike explored the Great Plains and into the Rocky Mountains. Lt. Pike referred to the plains as "the Great American Desert". Pike's opinion was confirmed by Major Steven Long, who led an expedition West in 1819. Long concluded that the entire region was unfit for human habitation. William Ashley expressed the same view in a letter to Fort Atkinson. And so any route to the Oregon Country was of little interest to most people until 1840 when the first non-missionary family traveled over what would be the Oregon Trail.

The number one traveler of the Oregon trail was Ezra Meeker. Meeker went West over the Oregon Trail in 1852. At the age of 76, Meeker, accompanied by two oxen, a driver and a dog, went from Puyallup, Washington to Washington, D.C.. Meeker wanted to bring the Nation's attention to the Oregon Trail, which was being plowed under by civilization. Ezra Meeker made three more journeys to the East: another with an ox team, by an automobile in 1915, and by an airplane in 1924. The "Champion" of the Oregon Trail died at the age of ninety-eight.

Of the men on the Oregon Trail, sixty percent of the family men were farmers. Craftsmen and merchants were around twenty percent, while physicians, lawyers, teachers, and other professionals made up about twelve percent.

Independence, Missouri was the major departure point in the early years of the Oregon Trail. Hiram Young, a former slave, owned the largest business in Independence: he made wagons and ox yokes.

Winter Quarters near Florence (Omaha), Nebraska was the primary departure point for the Mormon Trail.

The Mormon Trail followed the north side of the Platte River, whereas, the Oregon Trail followed the south side. The two trails joined on the North Platte River, and then continued on to Fort Bridger. At Fort Bridger the trails separated. The Oregon Trail headed for Fort Hall, the Mormon Trail for the Great Salt Lake Valley.

Two trading posts built in 1834, Fort William (Fort Laramie) by William Sublette and Fort Hall by Nathaniel Wyeth, would have a lasting effect on travel over the Oregon Trail and the Mormon Trail [not Fort Hall]. Along with Fort Bridger which was built in 1843, these posts were the major supply and layover points on the Mormon, California, and Oregon trails for hundreds of thousands of weary travelers.

Mountain men that had explored the country in search of beaver often led the wagon trains over the Oregon Trail. Two of the most famous guides were Thomas Fitzpatrick, Moses "Black" Harris, and Joseph Walker.

Chimney Rock was considered by many as the end of the prairie and the start of the mountainous part of the Oregon and Mormon trails.

The prairie was the grasslands from central Canada to Mexico and from West of the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains. According to Chittenden, plains and prairie are basically interchangeable terms. Plains was used more as a descriptive term for travel. Example, pioneers went across the plains to reach Oregon.

From 1840 to 1860, the total number of people that traveled the Oregon, California, and Mormon Trails is estimated to be between 315,000 and 320,000. During the twenty-nine year period for the major use of the three trails, it is estimated that over 500,000 Oregon and Mormon pioneers and California gold seekers traveled over the trails.

The glory years of the Oregon Trail and Mormon Trail ended with the completion of the transcontinental railroad at Promontory Point, Utah in 1869. The Oregon Trail travel was greatly diminished after 1869, but it was still occasionally used during the Civil War and as late as 1880.

Oregon Trail pioneers were mostly middle class, successful people. It required from eight hundred to a thousand dollars for a wagon, oxen, and enough supplies to live a year without planting or harvesting a crop. For many families it took three to five years to save enough for the trip west.

Prairie Schooner - Fort Seminoe

Conestoga wagons were too big and heavy for the Oregon Trail. Converted farm wagons, called Prairie Schooners were used with primarily oxen pulling them. The oxen were driven by a man or woman walking along side.

Wagon Jack - Oregon Trail Center Montpelier, Idaho

Two items often carried in a wagon train was an odometer and a wagon jack. The above wagon jack is courtesy of the Oregon California Trail Center in Montpelier, Idaho. The Oregon Trail Interruptive Center is actually located on the Oregon Trail. The Oregon Trail Center has an excellent hands-on interruptive program along with a pioneer and railroad museum. http://www.oregontrailcenter.org/HistoricalTrails/OregonCaliforniaTrails.htm.

On the Oregon Trail, one out of every five women were in some stage of pregnancy and nearly all married woman traveled with small children.

Many Pioneers had a milk cow tied to the tailgate of the wagon. After milking the cow, the milk sat until the cream raised to the top. Each morning, the cream was poured into a churn carried in or on the side of the wagon. As the churn bounced along over the rough trail, the cream turned to butter.

After a few days on the trail, the travelers settled into a well-defined daily routine. Wake before sunup; yoke the oxen, cook the breakfast (usually warm johnnycakes and bacon); and hit the trail. There was an hour break for lunch, and at about 6 p.m., the wagon trains stopped for the night. It is often stated in Pioneer Journals that the wagons were circled to provided a corral for the livestock.

This I doubt. In small trains this may be true, but a wagon train of say one hundred wagons would have at least four-to-six hundred oxen or more, milk cows, and saddle horses. A hundred wagons could not make a circle big enough to hold that many animal, and even if it did, what did the animals eat? The grass in the circle would be tramped down and covered with several inches of manure in a matter of hours. In the vast semi-arid areas of the Oregon Trail, animals would have to eat at least ten-to-twelve hours at night to have enough strength to pull the wagons and produce milk.

Ox Bell

Made in France, this Basque bell is twelve by six inches. Copied by Mormon blacksmiths, these bells were often called the Nauvoo bell by Mormons pioneers. Strapped around the neck of oxen, the clanking bell made it easier to find the oxen when turned loose to feed.

Oxen are called steers up to three years old, after that the steer was called an ox. A pair of oxen weighed up to three thousand pounds.

Journals kept by Mountain Men, Pioneers, and Emigrants are often the only primary source of information, but they are not necessarily factual. Seldom do writers see the same event in the same way; two examples are the Battle of Pierre's Hole and the Tonquin disaster. Just as many writers (and newsmen) of today, the early writers tended to over emphasize the bad and the exciting parts and leave out the endless days of boredom on the overland trails. This tends to give the reader, as well as history, a distorted view of the actual happenings.

Oral Histories are not fact...they are stories passed from generation to generation. An ethnologist, Dr. George Grinnell studied the Cheyenne Indians. Dr. Grinnell's findings showed that oral histories [the same is probably true of handed-down white oral histories] were relative accurate for three generations.

The abundance of grass and good water next to Independence Rock made it a welcome stopping point for every wagon train. The goal was to arrive at Independence Rock by the 4th of July in order to beat the winter snows in the Blue Mountains of Oregon. Some emigrants, including my great-great grandfather in 1847, carved their names, dates, or initials on Independence Rock. In 1860, Sir Richard Burton calculated that there were between forty and fifty thousand names written on Independence Rock.

Independence Rock covers twenty-seven acres next to the Sweetwater River. Seven hundred feet wide, nineteen hundred feet long, and one hundred and thirty six feet high, the solitary rock is over a mile in circumference.

Ice Slough was a shallow basin just before South Pass. The ponds and springs there were covered with turf. Ice from the previous winter was insulated under two feet thick turf and could be dug out during the hot summer months.

South Pass marked the halfway point on the Oregon Trail. Expecting a narrow alpine pass, emigrants were surprised by the gradual approach leading to a broad, flat plain some twenty miles wide.

Pacific Spring

Pacific Spring was the first dependable water on the Pacific side of the Continental Divide. Located in this area was Gilbert's Station, a Pony Express Station, and the turn off for the Lander Cutoff. Indians burned down the Pony Express Station in 1862; the exact location has never been determined.

There were two major cutoffs on the Oregon Trail. The Sublette Cutoff separated from the Oregon Mormon trails at the Parting of the Ways on the west about fifteen miles west of Pacific Spring, and rejoined the Oregon Trail at Bear River near Cokeville on the Idaho Wyoming border. The Sublette Cutoff was across desolate dry land that cut forty-six miles, or about three days travel, off the journey. The waterless semi-arid land crossed by Sublette's Cutoff was arguably one of the worst stretch on the Oregon Trail. The first wagon train to travel over it was led by Caleb Greenwood in 1844.

The other Oregon Trail cutoff was the Lander Cutoff. The trail left the Oregon Trail at Pacific Spring and rejoined the Oregon trail near Fort Hall, Idaho. In 1858, Frederick Lander, who had surveyed it the year before, and one hundred and fifteen men, many recruited from Salt Lake City's Mormon emigrants, constructed the road in less than ninety days at a cost of sixty-seven thousand eight hundred and seventy-three dollars. The Lander Cutoff was the only government funded part of the Oregon Trail.

Steamboat Springs was a three-foot geyser that emitted a high-pitched whistle similar to steamboats on the Missouri River. Steamboat Springs was the principal feature of a group of mineral springs collectively known as the Soda Springs. Located on the outskirts of Soda Springs, Idaho, these springs are now covered by the Alexander Reservoir. One minister proclaimed that, "Hell is not more than a mile from this place."

Fort Hall was established by a fur trader Nathaniel Wyeth in 1834. Wyeth sold it to Hudson's Bay Company in 1837. After Oregon became a United States Territory in 1846, Hugh Grant, the Hudson's Bay trader, continued to buy furs from Americans, primarily Thomas, Peg-leg, Smith. Grant abandoned Fort Hall in 1848.

A few miles off the Oregon Trail, Fort Hall was used by the emigrants as a rest place and a place to repair wagons. Fort Hall was not a place where emigrants could re-supply.

The California Trail separated from the Oregon Trail at Raft River nearby were the City of Rocks.

The Blue Mountains in Oregon were about half as high in elevation as South Pass, but they were the hardest mountain range to cross on the Oregon Trail.

One estimate has one of every seventeen travelers (men, women, children) dying in route to the Oregon Country (Bailey). Mattes used a conservative figure of twenty thousand deaths for the entire two thousand miles of the Oregon Trail. This corresponds to one grave for every one hundred and sixty-seven yards. Between 1849 and 1853, Asiatic Cholera was the greatest killer on the trail.

Across Nebraska was the deadliest area for cholera. Ninety-six percent of all cholera deaths occurred prior to reaching South Pass. Cholera was first reported in the United States between 1832-1834. St. Louis lost a tenth of its population to this disease, including my great-great grandfather Gilby and five of his six children.

One emigrant diary stated that the road from Independence to Fort Laramie was a graveyard. Another emigrant put the number of burials at 1,500 to 2,000 at this point on the trail, while yet another put the number of deaths around 5,000.

Cholera continued to appear during the 1850's, but its appearance considerably diminished after 1853. After Cholera, wagon accidents, crossing rivers, and accidental gun shot wounds accounted for most of the deaths. Hundreds of children and adults drowned trying to cross the Kansas, North Platte, Green, Snake, and Columbia rivers.

Despite Hollywood's "Indians circling the wagons", it is estimated that between 1840 and 1860, three hundred and fifty to four hundred emigrants were killed by Native Americans.

A major confrontation with Native Americans occurred near Ft. Laramie in 1854. The arrogance and stupidity of Lt. John Grattan has remained in history as the "Grattan Massacre". It began when a lame cow wandered into a nearby Sioux village, which the Indians promptly ate. Lieutenant Grattan with twenty-eight soldiers left Fort Laramie to punish the Sioux. The Sioux offered a horse for the lame cow, but Grattan didn't even bother to refuse the offer. He ordered his men to fire, killing the village chief. Gratten and his men were promptly “massacred” by the Sioux.

Some Indians called the Prairie Schooners, "horsecanoes" or "winged canoes", and the Oregon Trail as "the Great Medicine Road."

On a single day in June 1850, more than 2,000 people and 550 wagons passed through Fort Laramie.

Restored Settler's Store at Fort Laramie

Pioneers frequently used a "Roadside Telegraph." Messages, on scraps of cloth, animal skulls, rocks, bark, leaves, etc., were left beside the trail for other wagon trains, or hopefully, that someone would carry a message back East.

In 1836, Narcissa Whitman and Elisa Spaulding were the first white women to cross South Pass, attend a mountain man rendezvous on Horse Creek, and travel on to Oregon.

Narcissa Whitman Eliza Spaulding Marker - South Pass

The Whitmans and Spauldings traveled to the 1836 rendezvous with wagons. On the advise of several mountain men, the heaviest wagon was left at the rendezvous. But Dr. Whitman refused to leave the light wagon. At Fort Hall, Doctor Whitman's driver deserted, so he took off two wheels of his wagon transforming it into a cart. Reaching Fort Boise, Dr. Spaulding was so strongly urged to relinquish the idea of taking his cart that he left it at Fort Boise...many internet sites claim the Whitmans traveled all the way to Washington in a covered wagon.

A series of waterfalls on the Columbia River at the Dalles forced pioneers to decide whether to build a raft and float down the Columbia River, or after 1846, use the safer Barlow Toll Road around Mt. Hood.

The first non-missionary family to travel the Oregon trail was the wife and children of Joel Walker, brother to Joseph Walker, in 1840. Manifest Destiny had begun for hundreds of thousands of Americans over the Oregon, Mormon, and California trails.

Wagons on the Oregon Trail averaged one- to two-miles an hour, which averaged out about one hundred miles a week. At this rate, it took five month to reach Oregon. Over the years the average number of days to reach California or Oregon were estimated by John Unruh, Jr.:

1841-1848: California:    157.7            Oregon: 169.1
1849: California:              131.6              Oregon: 129.0
1850: California:              107.9              Oregon: 125.0
1850-60: California:         112.7              Oregon: 128.5
1841-1860: California:     121.0              Oregon: 139.6

The end of the Oregon Trail was at Oregon City, not quite two thousand miles from Independence, Missouri.

The Mormon Trail ended in the Salt Lake Valley, which was one thousand and thirty-two miles from Winter Quarters.

The Oregon Country was the territory west of the Continental Divide from northern California to the southern tip of Alaska. The settlement of the Oregon Country boundary at the forty-ninth parallel in 1846, and the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on February 2, 1848 brought the western states of Washington, Idaho, Oregon, California, Nevada, and parts of Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Arizona under the American flag.

Despite Mexico losing the "Mexican War", the American government paid the Mexican government fifteen million dollars and assumed debts of another three million two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for a total cost of eighteen million two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Part of this settlement was the Mexican Government relinquishing any claims over the annexing of Texas into the Union.

The Guadalupe Hidalgo treaty ended the Mexican War, and increased the size of the United States by about one-third (this includes Texas)--an addition greater than that of the Louisiana Purchase.

At various times, Spain, Russia, England, and the United States had claims on the Oregon Country. The only people with a real claim on the land were the American Indians that had lived there for over twelve thousand years. Why didn't they have any say in the negotiations? The reason is:

In 1452, the Catholic Pope Nicholas V issued to King Alfonso V of Portugal a proclamation declaring war against all non-Christians throughout the world, and specifically sanctioning and promoting the conquest, colonization, and exploitation of non-Christian nations and their territories. This “Doctrine of Discovery” gave Christian countries the rights to the lands of non-Christians.

In 1823, the United States Supreme Court decided in the Johnson v. McIntosh decision that, "as a result of European discovery, the Native Americans had a right to occupancy and possession." But "tribal rights to complete sovereignty were necessarily diminished by the principle that discovery gave exclusive title to those who made it." Chief Justice John Marshall observed that European nations had assumed "ultimate dominion" over the lands of America during the Age of Discovery, and that upon "discovery" the Indians lost "their rights to complete sovereignty, as independent nations," and retained only a right of "occupancy" in their lands" This law is still on the books of the United States Legal system.

It was the Doctrine of Discovery that gave Rene-Robert La Salle the right to stand at the mouth of the Mississippi River and declare that all of the drainage of the Mississippi River belonged to the King of France. La Salle called his new discovery Louisiana.

Two Presidents, Jefferson and Polk, acquired the territories that mapped the outline of the United States.

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Citation: Eddins, Ned. (article name) Mountainsofstone.com. Afton, Wyoming. 2002.

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Mormon Trail Fur Trade Facts

The trivia information comes from a wide variety of sources including this website. The main sources are listed below. If I have missed a site, please let me know, and I will add it.

References:

Merrill Mattes, The Great Platte River Road.

John Unruh, Jr. The Plains Across: The Overland Emigrants and the Trans-Mississippi West, 1840-60

http://www.americanwest.com/trails/pages/oretrail.htm.

http://www.canadiana.org/hbc/hist/hist10_e.html

http://www.over-land.com/trore.html#general

http://www.nps.gov/whmi/educate/ortrtg/ortrtg4.htm

http://www.nativeamericans.com/