The Oregon Trail: Sketches of Prairie and Rocky-Mountain Life
- Pages
- about 466
- Category
- History
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 8.6 h at 250 wpm
From the opening
Last spring, 1846, was a busy season in the City of St. Louis. Not only
were emigrants from every part of the country preparing for the journey
to Oregon and California, but an unusual number of traders were making
ready their wagons and outfits for Santa Fe. Many of the emigrants,
especially of those bound for California, were persons of wealth and
standing. The hotels were crowded, and the gunsmiths and saddlers
were kept constantly at work in providing arms and equipments for the
different parties of travelers. Almost every day steamboats were leaving
the levee and passing up the Missouri, crowded with passengers on their
way to the frontier.
In one of these, the Radnor, since snagged and lost, my friend and
relative, Quincy A. Shaw, and myself, left St. Louis on the 28th of
April, on a tour of curiosity and amusement to the Rocky Mountains. The
boat was loaded until the water broke alternately over her guards. Her
upper deck was covered with large weapons of a peculiar form, for
the Santa Fe trade, and her hold was crammed with goods for the same
destination. There were also the equipments and provisions of a party
of Oregon emigrants, a band of mules and horses, piles of saddles and
harness, and a multitude of nondescript articles, indispensable on
the prairies. Almost hidden in this medley one might have seen a small
French cart, of the sort very appropriately called a “mule-killer”
beyond the frontiers, and not far distant a tent, together with a
miscellaneous assortment of boxes and barrels. The whole equipage was
far from prepossessing in its appearance; yet, such as it was, it was
destined to a long and arduous journey, on which the persevering reader
will accompany it.
The passengers on board the Radnor corresponded with her freight.
A short sample. Read the whole book
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