Legends of the Old West - FRONTIER TRAGEDY Ep. 3 | Donner Party, Part 3

Episode Date: October 18, 2023

The Donner Party faces another punishing trip across a desert before it finally reaches the Sierra Nevada Mountains on the border between Nevada and California. The party has lost a ton of time, but the travelers still believe they can make it over the mountains and into central California before winter. They make it as far as Truckee Lake – now Donner Lake – before they become trapped by blizzards. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join Apple users join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes, bingeable seasons and bonus episodes. Click the Black Barrel+ banner on Apple to get started with a 3-day free trial. For more details, visit our website www.blackbarrelmedia.com and check out our social media pages. We’re @OldWestPodcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. On YouTube, subscribe to LEGENDS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: hit “Join” on the Legends YouTube homepage. To purchase an ad on this show please reach out: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On October 7th, 1846, James Reed and his traveling companion Walter Herron left the camp of the Donner Group. The Donner-Reed wagon train was less than 200 miles from the California border, and it was split into two groups. The Donner Group was two days ahead of the Reed Group. James Reed, head of the Reed family, had been banished from his group after he killed a man during an angry scuffle. Reed had ridden ahead to the Donner Group, where Walter Herron volunteered to go with Reed to California. The two men followed the Humboldt River, taking turns riding the one horse they had between

them. Without the cumbersome wagon train, they logged at least 25 miles a day, sometimes as many as 40. But Reed's thoughts were always on his family. Whenever and wherever he could, he scrawled out crude maps and notes and left them on the path. Reed and Heron's meager provisions ran out in a few days, spurring them to hunt for food. Every once in a while, they were able to shoot a goose. They managed to gather a few wild onions, but those didn't last long. They fought over whether to kill and eat the horse. On a particularly bad day, they stumbled upon some abandoned wagons. There was no food in the wagons, but Reed checked a bucket under one

of them and was able to scrape some animal fat from it. They ate some of the disgusting slime and it made them horribly sick, but they were able to digest enough calories to survive. And then something incredible happened. At a camp near Bear Valley, about 75 miles southwest of Lake Tahoe, they spotted a familiar figure. It was Charles Stanton, who had left the wagon train six weeks earlier with William McCutcheon. They had volunteered to ride ahead of the wagon train to try to make it to Sutter's Fort to find food and maybe help.

Sutter's Fort was a small settlement in the Sacramento Valley. It was the goal of every wagon train headed to Northern California to make it to the outpost before winter. The wagon train had heard nothing from Stanton or McCutcheon since they left. It turned out they made it to the fort, but McCutcheon got sick and had to stay. Stanton was riding back to the wagon train as promised with mules loaded with flour and dried meat. Reed and Stanton exchanged news of their respective experiences, and then rode off in separate directions. Reed and Heron headed west, toward Sutter's Fort and more supplies. Stanton headed east, toward the struggling Donner Party.

Besides food, Stanton had good news. The trail through the Sierra Nevada mountains should be passable for another month, until maybe mid-November. It wouldn't be fun, but the party should be able to make it to California before winter. They had two more legs of the journey to go. They had to make it to the mountains, and then make it through the mountains. As far as they knew, there was still time. They could still do it. From Black Barrel Media, this is Legends of the Old West. I'm your host Chris Wimmer,

and this season we're bringing you the disturbing stories of the Donner Party and the Bender family, a murderous clan known as the Bloody Benders. This is Episode 3, The Donner Party, Part 3 of 4, Trapped. Charles Stanton made it to the wagon train around October 25th, and he was an incredibly welcome sight. A lot had happened between James Reed's banishment on October 5th and Stanton's return 20 days later. This was not the light-hearted, cohesive wagon train that left Independence, Missouri four and a half months earlier. The group that had paused and wasted time to admire the scenery and absorb the sense of adventure was gone. The excruciating trip through the Utah salt flats had pushed them to their limits. Their sense of community was severely tested. And yet, Stanton's arrival renewed their fortitude to keep going, even as the weather turned icy cold as they approached today's city of Reno, Nevada. Among the families

who were still with the Donner Party, there were the Breens, the Kiesbergs, the Eddies, the Murphys, the Reeds, the Graves, the Wolfingers, and the Donners. And they were now at the stage of the journey where they had to make conscious decisions about who lived and who died. And the first tragic case was that of Mr. Hardcoop. On October 7th, not long after James Reed was banished, William Eddy and William Pike rode ahead of their wagons to hunt for food. They were attacked by a band of Paiute. Fortunately, they avoided harm, but they came back empty-handed. And they learned that one of their number was missing, a man known only as Mr. Hardcoop. Hardcoop was a driver for the Keesburg family. According to most sources, Mr. Hardcoop was a Belgian

immigrant. He was about 60 years old and thought of as kindly and helpful. Eddie and Pike questioned Louis Keesburg, who said he didn't know where his driver was. Eddie sent a rider back down the trail to look for Mr. Hardcoop. About five miles back, the rider found Hardcoop and brought him back to the wagon train. Hardcoop told Eddie and the rest of the group that Keesburg had forced him out of the family wagon. Keesburg admitted it, though it was more complicated than the heartless act appeared to be. Keesburg had been forced to abandon one of his two wagons, and there wasn't enough room for Hardcoop in the one that remained. Keesburg's own family was walking most of the time, including his wife, who carried

their infant son. Keesburg had to prioritize the health of his family over the health of Mr. Hardcoop. The next day, the Reed family abandoned a wagon, and other families threw things away that were not vital to survival. The more they carried, the slower and harder the trip would be. They began to march along the Humboldt River, and once again, Mr. Hardcoop was on his own. Hardcoop begged William Eddy for a ride in Eddy's wagon. William Eddy felt sorry for the older man, but he, like Keesburg, had to be practical. They were riding through deep, loose sand, and there weren't enough

pack animals to pull the extra weight on the wagons. He told Hardcoop to walk with them and do the best he could until they reached better soil. Eddy refocused his attention on the exhausting task of managing his family's movements, and he lost track of Hardcoop. When they stopped to make camp that evening, Eddie noticed Hardcoop was no longer with them. Some of the boys mentioned they had seen Hardcoop earlier in the day, sitting shoeless next to some sagebrush. They noticed his feet were black and so swollen they were split open. Later that night, when there was still no sign of Hardcoop, Eddie built a signal fire. He hoped the old man would find his way to the camp. When Hardcoop still hadn't shown up the next day, Eddie asked Patrick Breen and Franklin

Graves if one of them would loan him a horse so he could go back and find Hardcoop. Both men, the heads of large families, said no. The few remaining horses were precious and in poor shape. The animals couldn't be used for such a trip, and there was no time for it anyway. The wagon train had to keep moving forward. As one historian said, no one stepped up to be a hero for Mr. Hardcoop, and no one ever saw him again. As a podcast network, our first priority has always been audio

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grow with Shopify. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com slash realm, all lowercase. Go to shopify.com slash r-e-a-l-m now to grow your business, no matter what stage you're in. Shopify.com slash realm. On October 10th, the wagon train saw a grisly reminder that it was in Paiute country. the wagon train saw a grisly reminder that it was in Paiute country. The display was a month old when the family saw it, and it's hard to know if that was better or worse than if they had found it when it was fresh. It was the desecrated grave of a man they met earlier in their trip.

Paiute warriors had killed him with arrows tipped with rattlesnake venom. The people in his party had no choice but to bury him in a shallow grave in the middle of the trail. Then they ran over the grave with their wagons in the hopes of concealing it. It didn't work. The Paiutes found it anyway. They dug up his corpse, stole his clothing, and then took his scalp and otherwise mutilated his body. The man's rotting remains were on display for future travelers. The warning terrified the Donner party, but it was way too late to turn back now. The next night, October 11th, vicious arguments erupted in camp about John Snyder's murder by James Reed and the likely death of Mr. Hardcoop. Those arguments were so intense

that the group didn't notice that Paiutes stole all of the Graves family's horses. When the theft was discovered, those who had wanted to go back for Hardcoop were now happy to point out some irony. The horses that were so valuable that they couldn't be used to help hardcoop, were gone anyway. The next day, in a marshy area called Big Meadows, Paiutes raided them again. There are many different accounts of the attack, but most agree that they stole or killed about 40 head of cattle and oxen that belonged to the Donners and others in the group. Whatever the number, the wagon train no longer had enough animals left, or at least not enough for a caravan of this size. They had to lighten the load again. People buried some of their possessions with the hope they would come back and retrieve them

someday. One of those was Jacob Wolfinger. He was 26 years old, and he and his wife had no children, but they did have a wagon. Others in the party thought he had a large amount of gold coins or other valuables. So it didn't surprise them that the Wolfingers stopped to bury their wagon for safekeeping. And yes, they buried the entire wagon. It was known to happen in the West. And yes, they buried the entire wagon. It was known to happen in the West. Surprised or not, the rest of the company didn't wait for them. They were unbearably hungry and tired and knew they didn't have a minute to waste.

They had no way of knowing that Charles Stanton was on his way back to them with food. But even so, he was still about 10 days away. So Jacob Wolfinger went to work burying his wagon. He told his wife to go ahead with the rest of the group, and at the last minute, two teamsters, Joseph Reinhardt and Augustus Spitzer, who worked for Wolfinger, volunteered to help. When the rest of the wagon train moved on and left the three men behind to do their work, it was the last time anyone saw Jacob Wolfinger alive. While the men dug a hole before Reinhardt and Spitzer killed Jacob Wolfinger, the wagon train faced another patch of desert. The Humboldt Sink and its surrounding land was a 40-mile stretch of sand and alkali water before the Nevada-California border.

The group trudged into the desert, with their few wagons pulled by mixed teams of scrawny oxen and cows. They reached a fork in the trail and took a route called Truckee, named for a friendly Paiute chief. As they headed up Truckee Canyon, Reinhardt and Spitzer caught up with them. They explained to a distraught Mrs. Wolfinger that Paiutes had attacked them and killed her husband. Some in the group believed the two Teamsters, and some didn't. And just like the case of Mr. Hardcoop, there was no time to ponder. They were about to relive their experience in the Great Salt Lake Desert. 40 miles, no grass, no water, no shade. They traveled mostly at night to avoid the punishing sun. Along the way, they saw dead horses, dead mules, and dead oxen. They also saw discarded furniture

and torn clothing that had been thrown aside by other travelers or left behind by the Paiutes after raids. The final 10 miles of the desert were worse than the first 30. The sand was deeper and they were down to their last rations of water. William Eddy's family had none and he feared his children would die. He suspected the Breen family had about 10 gallons left, so he asked Patrick Breen for a small amount for his kids. Breen denied that he had any. The group was paranoid and scared, and they had been watching each other's stores with eagle eyes.

Eddy pressed Breen, and finally, Breen admitted that he had some, but he had to keep it for his own family. Eddie shoved Breen aside and took some of Breen's water. Their desperation was reaching new levels, and all they could do was try to keep it together for a few more miles. When they saw it, they thought it was a mirage. After a punishing walk through another desert, they had reached the Truckee River. They were now in the spot that would become the city of Reno, Nevada. They drank fresh water until they bloated and lay exhausted on the grassy riverbank. They were weak and hungry beyond measure, but the men used their time to repair the few wagons that were left. They ministered to livestock that had been

wounded by Paiute arrows, and the group suffered another death. William Pike and William Foster were brothers-in-law and good friends. They decided that instead of waiting for Charles Stanton and William McCutcheon to come back with provisions, they would head west themselves. To prepare to cross the Sierras, they packed their few possessions into saddlebags and checked their weapons. While Foster was holding his pistol and probably loading it, the gun accidentally discharged. It fired a bullet into William Pike's back. The worst part was, he didn't die right away. His wife and family tried to comfort him over the next half hour while he suffered before

dying. Then, they dug a shallow grave, buried him, and moved on. On October 25th, the Breen family was the first of the wagon train to see Charles Stanton galloping toward them. They were ecstatic. Stanton had seven mules that were loaded with flour, jerked beef, beans, coffee, tea, sugar, and other sources of nutrition. He also had two companions. Their names were Luis and Salvador, and they were members of an indigenous tribe from Northern California. In addition to the food, they came with great news for the Reed family. James Reed was still alive. Stanton had met Reed and Heron

on the road south of Lake Tahoe, and by now, the two men were probably at Sutter's Fort in the Sacramento Valley. After eating and gathering their strength, the wagon train continued westward, but now with growing fear. In the distance, they could see snow falling in the mountains. It was only the last week of October, but winter had already set in. They thought they would have another month before the serious snows, but already, the trails and roads were covered with a fine dust of white at lower levels, and they knew it would only get worse. After endless crossings of the Truckee River, the party worked their way up a narrow canyon. They camped at a spot called Dog Valley because of large packs of feral dogs

known to roam the area. William Eddy stood guard against dogs and piutes and whatever else. Despite his vigilance, a Native American warrior shot more of their oxen and cows before Eddy could kill him. None of the animals died, but now they were wounded and weakened even more than they were from hunger. At that point in the trip, George Donner and five wagons of the combined Donner families and Mrs. Wolfinger were behind the Breen's and Eddie's by about a day. The Donner brothers, George and Jacob, figured they could catch up with another good day of travel. They made good time until they started up a steep rise. An axle on George Donner's wagon broke. It overturned with his daughters inside. Fortunately, four-year-old Georgia and three-year-old Eliza were not badly hurt.

But as seemed to be the case with their entire journey thus far, an unforeseen ordeal created yet another problem. George and Jacob immediately cut down a tree to start carving a new axle. Jacob was putting the final touches on it when the chisel slipped from his grasp. The sharp edge sliced the back of George's hand, which had been steadying the new axle. It hurt like hell, but George's wife, Tamsin, washed it and bandaged it as best she could. The group tried to relieve some of the tension by joking that it could have been a lot worse, without knowing, of course,

that it would get much worse. It was the last week of October, and they still had 150 miles to go. and they still had 150 miles to go. To enter California, the travelers would have to climb more than 7,000 feet to what was called Fremont Pass. Today, it's known as Donner Pass. Then, like now, it's a low notch in the Sierra Nevada mountain range located at the sharp elbow cut of California's border with Nevada. They were at the mouth of what was Truckee Lake, now known as Donner Lake. On October 31st, as George Donner nursed his wound, the lead party with the Breen's and the Graves reached Truckee Lake. They skirted the north shore and headed toward the granite slope of the Sierra Nevadas. The men cut limbs from pine trees to feed their hungry and exhausted cattle. It wasn't ideal,

but the cattle couldn't graze on grass. It was already covered with snow. They came across an abandoned cabin and took note in case they needed to take refuge later. That night, as October turned to November, they camped under a full moon. They noticed a large halo around it, which told these Illinois farmers all they needed to know. A storm was approaching. And sure enough, the snow began to fall the next morning.

John Breen later wrote of that horrible first day of trying to hike up to Fremont Pass in spite of the snow. They traveled one or two miles, watching the snow pile up to the axles of their wagons. Finally, they decided the wagons would have to be left behind entirely. They packed some blankets and whatever else they could onto the few oxen they had left. But by then, in the time it took them to repack their stuff, the snow level rose to the point where they couldn't really move at all and couldn't see the road anymore. They turned back to slightly lower elevation in the abandoned cabin. It had been built two years earlier by the first people to take wagons

over the Sierra Nevadas on that road. It leaked so badly that nine members of the Breen family opted out of it. They chose to bundle up in their wagon along with their dogs. The next day, another storm hit. They realized that rain at the lake meant it was snowing up in the pass.

At daybreak, they decided to try again. They had traveled 2,500 miles and were only about 100 miles from Sutter's Fort, but it might as well have been another 2,500. Maybe the most demoralizing part was that they realized they had missed being able to enter the pass by just one day. All those late starts, the delays for a hundred reasons, the god-awful Hastings Cut-Off. If they had just been one day faster, they would have made it through the mountain pass before the snow hit. At first light, they tried again, but didn't even make it two miles before the road was so completely blocked that they had to go back to the cabin. When they got to the valley, they killed the last of the cattle in despair. They needed the hides to cover the top of the shack, and they needed the meat to

eat. By now, the Reeds, Graves, Keysburgs, and Eddies were all together, along with Stanton, Weeds, Graves, Keesburgs, and Eddies were all together, along with Stanton, Luis, and Salvador, and some others. And they added a new injury to the list. Louis Keesburg hurt his foot. While hunting a few days earlier, he stepped on a willow stub that pierced his moccasins and drove deep into the ball of his foot. He and his wife washed and dressed the wound as best they could, but it quickly became infected and inflamed. Finally, another member of the party was able

to cut out the willow stub, but the wound continued to torment Keesburg. Up to now, the Donner family had not experienced the problems at Truckee Lake or the Mountain Pass. Thanks to the broken axle and George's injury, which was now infected like Keesburg's foot, the Donner Group was still at least a day behind the Breenes and the Graves. Those families sent riders back to the Donner Group to warn them that snow blocked their passage. The Donner Group tried to hurry forward, and it eventually reached a spot on Alder Creek, about seven miles northeast of Truckee Lake, where the other families were camped.

The Donners thought they'd found a spot that was relatively free of snow, where they could at least build a cabin. And it was free of snow. For half a day. And then, the snow came in a blinding fury. It was early November 1846, and it was only the beginning of winter. Because the Donner family camp was near Alder Creek, it became known as the Alder Creek Camp. Counting both Donner families and several single men, there were 21 people at Alder Creek.

George Donner tried to help his family and their hired hands build a cabin that could withstand the worst effects of the storm, but his injured hand rendered him all but useless, and his brother Jacob was already feeble from hunger. It was mostly the women and children who cut down trees and turned them into logs. The wagon drivers and oxen dragged the logs into place. The walls of the new cabin were only four logs high when the snow began to fall. When it started, it didn't stop for eight consecutive days. The snow prevented them from building proper cabins, so the group built structures called brush sheds. They placed pine branches all around the trunks of trees, almost like a teepee. On top of the branches, they laid raincoats, quilts, and anything else

that could keep out the cold and snow. Over the next few days, some of the animals died. Over the next few days, some of the animals died. The Donner party used the hides to cover the pine branches. The party gnawed the tiny amount of meat left on the scrawny dead animals and sucked the marrow out of the bones. For eight days, they did nothing but try to keep fires going under their crude tents. The snow was so heavy that George Donner's family couldn't see his brother's camp 300 yards up the creek unless they had a decent fire going with enough smoke to cut through the snow.

Joseph Reinhardt and another single man sheltered with George. So did Mrs. Wolfinger, who did not yet know that Reinhardt helped kill her husband. Seven miles away, the rest of the family suffered in what was later called Lake Camp. Lake Camp, near Truckee Lake, was actually two camps. In one, there were Louis Kiesberg and his family, the Breen family, and some single men. The Breen family had commandeered the abandoned cabin, while the others managed to build crude shelters. There were also the Eddy, Murphy, Foster, and Pike families, and some unattached Teamsters. They built fairly sturdy cabins, including one erected against the

flat side of a large boulder. In the second compound of Lake Camp, half a mile downstream, there were the Graves family and the Reed family. The Graves family built a fairly sturdy cabin. It had two rooms, each with its own fireplace, separated by a log wall. Charles Stanton, Luis, and Salvador lived there too. As of mid-November, there were 81 people trapped in separate camps in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Half were under the age of 18, and many of those were infants or young children. During brief pauses in the snow, some of the travelers tried to make their way over the mountains to get help. A party of 13 led by Franklin Graves and Charles Stanton left on November 12th, all bundled up and with a little piece of meat among them for energy.

They managed to get about a mile through snow drifts, but the snow was at least 10 feet deep. They were forced to turn around. By that time, there were only about a dozen sickly cows and oxen left between the families. only about a dozen sickly cows and oxen left between the families. There were very few animals to hunt, though there was a brief celebration on November 13th when William Eddy shot and killed a bear before the bear nearly killed him. Families began to barter with each other over the sickly animals that remained. They offered gold or money they had in their possession,

or they promised extremely high interest rates for future earnings in California. In a larger sense, none of it really mattered. The meat from all the animals that remained wouldn't even be close to enough to keep people alive for the winter. As they grew more desperate, day by day, their thoughts turned to the man they had banished, James Reed. He had left the caravan six weeks earlier with Walter Heron. Surely they had been fast enough to make it through the mountain pass before the snows, but no one knew for sure. At Lake Camp and Alder Creek Camp,

all the Donner Party could do was wait, and hope that it didn't get much worse. Next time on Legends of the Old West, it's the final chapter in the story of the Donner Party. As winter deepens and the families become more desperate, they take the extreme measures that made them infamous pioneers in American history. The worst case scenario plays out next week on Legends of the Old West. Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week to receive new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials, and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website, blackbarrelmedia.com. This series was researched and written by Julia Bricklin.

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