The Indifferent Stars Above (35 page)

Reason Penelope Tucker and his sons: Many additional tidbits about the Tuckers can be found in Neelands.

a great, windswept sea: For more detail about life on the St. Joseph Road and the terrain, see Mattes, 142–49.

sat smugly by and watched: The story of Billy Graves's encounter with the resin-weed Indians, including the dialogue, is from his own account in “Crossing the Plains in '46.”

“exposed to the public gaze”: Ellsworth, 112. Many other details of the Black Hawk War, including the abduction of the Hall sisters, are drawn from the same source.

“Ye sons of thunder!”: Ibid., 121.

on either side: During his imprisonment Black Hawk was taken to Washington, D.C., and shown to President Andrew Jackson. In the following months, he was paraded through the major eastern cities, shown off as a kind of war trophy. But the lust for vengeance gradually faded, and Black Hawk became a kind of celebrity in the East, with people lining up in long queues to see him and hear him talk.

“look at the bed for her”: Virginia Reed's letter to her cousin Mary C. Keyes on July 12, 1846, reprinted in Morgan, 278. Here and elsewhere I have maintained Virginia's spelling, as I think it lends a certain charm and authenticity to her voice.

the popular “Virginia Reel”: Smith, Mary Ann Harlan. Mary and her father, George, traveled across the plains ahead of the Donner Party that summer.

particular notice of each other: It should be noted that Mary Ann later hotly disputed that she and Snyder had been involved in any kind of romance. Writing to Charles McGlashan on July 18, 1879, she took him to task for alluding to the supposed romance in his
History of the Donner Party
: “Drop that trash out and insert more useful history…. It was all real life of a sterner style” [McGlashan Papers, folder 14]. However, her brother Billy seemed to acknowledge the romance in one of his own letters to McGlashan on March 30, 1879: “As to your ‘Romance' I suppose it is as true of the majority of them. But I don't altogether approve [of publishing it]” [McGlashan Papers, folder 16].

“wildest and most beautiful scenery”: Stanton's letter to Sidney Stanton, June 12, 1846, reprinted in Morgan, 554–57.

“to embrace the women”: Ibid.

“their horses after a hard chase”: Tamzene Donner, June 16, 1846, reprinted in Morgan, 561.

“the trouble is all in getting started”: Ibid.

C
HAPTER
F
OUR—
D
UST

had begun to intrigue him: For much more about the life and times of Mariano Vallejo, a thoroughly interesting character, see Rosenus. Many of the details about Casa Grande are drawn from his book, as are the figures on Vallejo's wealth and income.

“so many exalted personages”: Rosenus, 110.

linseed oil and ferric oxide: William Todd listed the materials used to fashion the first bear flag in the
Los Angeles Express,
January 11, 1878.

disemboweled and left to die: Bryant recounts the brutal deaths of Cowie and Fowler in chapter 23 of
What I Saw in California.

chasing them off: The killing of Edward Trimble is described in the
Jefferson Inquirer,
July 21, 1846, reprinted in Morgan, 596–99.

each night and morning: Mattes, 64.

four sets of twins: Lockley, 264.

the sexual appetite in particular: Horowitz, 63. For more on sex and contraception in the 1840s, see Horowitz, Brodie, and McCutcheon.

on the road to California: We know that Elizabeth Graves brought oil of hemlock with her, because in April of 1879, W. C. (Billy) Graves was present when the site of his family's cabin at Donner Lake was excavated. Among the other items found that day was a sealed tin that still contained traces of the oil. Graves identified it as his mother's.

“the misrepresentations of L. W. Hastings”:
Oregon Spectator,
June 25, 1846. Reprinted in Morgan, 567.

“Hastings published his book of lies”:
Oregon Spectator,
June 25, 1846. Reprinted in Morgan, 569.

“it may be impossible if you don't”: James Clyman's words of advice to Reed were recorded by Ivan Petroff in 1878 and appear in Morgan, 58–59.

“so much of a roundabout course”: Ibid.

five hundred feet above the surrounding desert: Sadly, the spire of Chimney Rock has eroded considerably since 1846 and now stands approximately 350 feet tall.

with their rivals the Crow: Charles T. Stanton to Sidney Stanton, July 5, 1846. Reprinted in Morgan, 582–87.

killed the day before for the purpose: Ibid.

the valley of the North Platte: B. F. E. Kellogg to Preston G. Gesford, July 5, 1846. Reprinted in Morgan, 580–82.

from the slough behind the fort: Rosenus, 155.

C
HAPTER
F
IVE—
D
ECEPTION

the John McCracken family: W. C. (Billy) Graves mentions that only the William Daniels family and the John McCracken family accompanied the Graves family west of Fort Laramie in “Crossing the Plains in '46.”

“you had better come”: B. F. E. Kellogg to Preston G. Gesford, July 5, 1846. Reprinted in Morgan, 580–82.

was becoming particularly unpopular: For a further description of Louis Keseberg, see W. C. (Billy) Graves's letter of April 14, 1879, to Charles McGlashan [McGlashan Papers, folder 16].

“as far as possible, anticipate them”: “Rules for Wives,”
Illinois Gazette,
July 25, 1846.

“their wives, mere housekeepers”: “Rules for Husbands,”
Illinois Gazette,
July 25, 1846.

“to the day of his death”: Lockley, 88.

“that led me to this step”: Charles Stanton to his brother, May 12, 1846, reprinted in Morgan, 533.

along with their husbands and children: The listing of the original Donner Party members and their kinship is derived from the roster in Kristin Johnson's
Unfortunate Emigrants,
294–98.

“selfish adventurer”: Tamzene Donner's characterization of Hastings is drawn from a diary entry written by Jessy Quinn Thornton, who traveled
in loose association with the Donners up until July 20. The entry is reprinted in Kristin Johnson's
Unfortunate Emigrants,
22. As Johnson mentions in her own notes, his comment could be the result of hindsight, as at least parts of his diary seem to have been written after the subsequent tragedy.

“a faint resemblance to habitable houses”: Bryant, 142.

“with plenty of water and grass”: James Reed to Gersham Keyes, July 31, 1846, reprinted in Morgan, 279–80.

“excellent and accommodating gentlemen”: Ibid., 279.

wood, twisted iron, and gore: Details of the difficult passage through Weber Canyon are drawn from an account given in
The California Gold Book
by William Wallace Allen and Richard Benjamin Avery and reprinted in Morgan, 418–19.

and with their dark destiny: There is some controversy over where and on what date the Graves family overtook and joined the Donner Party. I have chosen to adhere to W. C. Graves's own account that the meeting occurred on August 10. This date was later reinforced by the recollections of both Mary Ann and Lovina Graves. For a detailed discussion of the arguments surrounding this and alternative dates, including August 12 and August 16, see Kristin Johnson's article “When Did the Graves Family Join the Donner Party?” in
Crossroads,
Summer 1996, online at www.utahcrossroads.org/index.html.

Reed's Gap: The Miller-Reed Diary, reprinted in Morgan, 262. More of Reed's account of the crossing of the Wasatch can be found in a statement Reed made much later, in two parts, in March and April of 1871, in the
Pacific Rural Press.

not working as hard as they ought: Reed's dissatisfaction with the pace of the roadwork in the Wasatch was reported in the
California Star
on February 13, 1847: “Mr. Reed and others who left the company, and came in for assistance, informed me that they were sixteen days making the road, as the men would not work one quarter of their time.”

as the grade got steeper: For an account of crossing the steep ridge now known as Donner Hill, see John Breen's statement in Eliza Farnham's
California, Indoors and Out,
reprinted in Kristin Johnson, 142–43.

C
HAPTER
S
IX—
S
ALT,
S
AGE, AND
B
LOOD

and of which gender: Laderman, 22.

where they lived, and how well: Ibid., 24.

covered with white cloth: Ibid., 31.

for transport back home: Ibid., 115.

$24 billion a year in the United States: National Casket Retailer Association Web site.

$20,000 mahogany caskets: Forest Lawn Memorial Park general price list.

photographs of the deceased: “Achieve Immortality with Ink After Life.”

salt desert that evening: It was Virginia Reed who reported, in
Across the Plains in the Donner Party,
that they set out in the evening.

“illusions similar to the mirage”: Bryant, 178.

“made the mothers tremble”: John Breen quoted by Farnham and reprinted in Kristin Johnson's
Unfortunate Emigrants,
144.

“women were mad with anger”: The Miller-Reed Diary, reprinted in Morgan, 267.

some as few as one a year: Larkin, 166.

halitosis and tooth decay: McCutcheon, 162.

not mass-produced until the 1880s: “Everyday Mysteries.”

a nineteenth-century case of road rage: In sorting out the various accounts of what happened between James Reed and John Snyder on October 5, 1846, and trying to arrive at a true version, I have looked for points of consensus among the various reports and discounted any statements that seemed notably slanted, particularly those from members of the Graves or Reed families. That said, however, I do think one observation made by Billy Graves many years later is worthy of note here. Writing to McGlashan on March 30, 1870, he asked rhetorically, “Do you think that a company of over thirty men of a good education and brought up in a civilized country could have been heartless enough to banish and drive out into the wilderness to starve to death a man mearly [
sic
] for accidentally killing a man in self-defense?” [McGlashan Papers, folder 16]. In the end, I am inclined to attribute a bit more culpability to Reed than to Snyder. Reed was widely reputed to have an inclination toward arrogance, and it was he, after all, who pulled a knife, albeit after Snyder had threatened him with a whip stock.

Joseph Reinhardt and Augustus Spitzer: That Wolfinger was reputed to be carrying a large amount of money was reported by Houghton, in Chapter 6.

significant liberties with the facts: There has been some controversy over whether Reinhardt made a deathbed confession that he had killed Wolfinger as Eddy later reported, because Eddy had presumably already left on the snowshoe expedition when Reinhardt died. However, Leanna Donner,
then eleven, was also present at the confession and reported it thirty years later: “Joseph Reinhardt was taken sick in our tent, when death was approaching and he knew there was no escape, then he made a confession in the presence of Mrs. Wolfinger that he shot her husband.”

“finally concluded to take the California road”: George W. Tucker in a letter to McGlashan on April 5, 1879 [McGlashan Papers, folder 51]. Tucker mentions in the same letter that he and his family hoped that the Donner Party had turned around and returned to Truckee Meadows.

the other side of the mountains: See Bryant, 52–53, for details of his meeting with Reed on October 28, 1846.

bent on owning a piece of it: See Mullen, 188, for mention of Reed's petition to acquire, along with Bryant and Dunleavy, Long Island in the Sacramento River.

in place for three or four days: McGlashan, 55.

bullet entered Pike's back: That William Pike was shot and died after Stanton rejoined the company, rather than before as has sometimes been reported, is based on McGlashan's flat-out statement of the fact on page 55.

“more than tongue can tell”: Mary Murphy to Green T. Lee, May 25, 1847, an excerpt from which appears as a note in Kristin Johnson's
Unfortunate Emigrants,
43.

a month earlier than usual: For evidence that it had snowed as early as October 7 at Donner Pass, see the “Diary of James Mathers,” reprinted in Morgan, 243–45. For more about the weather on October 31 and November 1, 1846, see McLaughlin, 3–5.

C
HAPTER
S
EVEN—
C
OLD
C
ALCULATIONS

prairie dogs on a white prairie: McGlashan, 209.

“which they did all night”: Bryant, 59.

difficult for him to use the hand: The exact nature of the wound to George Donner's right hand is described variously in different accounts. See Rarick, 125, for one version.

hauled the logs to the site: See Elitha Donner's account, quoted in Hardesty, 59.

sixteen people sharing 450 square feet: The physical description of the Murphy cabin in particular is drawn from the archaeological record presented in Hardesty. Some details about the other two cabins also come from this source.

complete the double cabin: Details about the Graves-Reed double cabin are derived from Mary Ann Graves's letter to McGlashan, April 16, 1879 [McGlashan Papers, folder 14]. In a letter to McGlashan, April 15, 1879 [McGlashan Papers, folder 38], Patty Reed later insisted vehemently that Franklin Graves did not build the Reeds' half of the cabin—that the Reeds' teamsters, Eddy, Stanton, and Luis and Salvador did so. However, her assertion is contradicted by a number of others who were there. Patty's sharp words here and elsewhere are reflective of hard feelings between the Reeds and the Graveses that lingered through the lives of all the survivors and well beyond. For a different point of view, it's worth considering what Georgia Donner Babcock had to say in a letter to McGlashan on May 26, 1879: “I'm sorry that [the Reeds] could not come nearer doing right by their fellow travelers than they have done by representing themselves as they have. I am willing that their feelings should be spared as far as possible but expected them to consider the feelings of others” [McGlashan Papers, folder 2].