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LETTER FROM ELLIS A. STOKES.
The following letter was addressed by Mr. Stokes to his friend, Mr. Charles Smith, of Lebanon.
Sacramento City, Sept. 13, 1849
Our company left Independence on the 23d of April. The first day that I was on the plains I was enraptured; it was the most beautiful sight I ever saw. You could see for miles a perfect meadow of wild flowers, some of them variegated, and of all sizes and colors. It was the largest flower garden I ever saw. We traveled the first day about two miles and encamped. The next day we traveled about ten miles to a place called the Lone Elm Tree, a beautiful spot; it is called the Lone Elm because there is but one tree there, and none others within ten or twelve miles of it. The next day we reached the line between Missouri and the Great Plains, and remained there ten days. On the morning of our departure every thing was in great confusion, but we finally got the train under way; Steve drove our team; George had for a riding animal a very wild Mexican mule which he was afraid to mount, and at last it broke away from him; and Uncle Jos. Tolbert, who was in our mess, lost his rifle gun and went back to find it. He mounted a mule and it threw the old fellow and skinned his nose and face very badly. He came to the wagon where we were, cursing the whole mule family, and declaring he would not mount another soon; he kept his word and did not ride any for five hundred miles. You would have laughed if you had seen the fellows on the plains getting thrown from their mules; some of them would go eight or ten feet in the air; none were hurt, however, with the exception of an old Dutchman, a member of our company, who had never been on an animal of any kind before. The mule that he was on was a gentle one, but some of the boys, for mischief, told him whenever the mule started to run to stick in his spurs and hold on, and it would stop. He followed their directions to the letter. The mule started across the plains goaded by the spur. The more he tried to stop it, the faster it ran; his hat came off and his long hair hung streaming in the wind. The mule taking a circuit came back to the camp and threw the fellow off, though without hurting him materially. He never mounted a mule with spurs on again. The train finally got under way and we had no more trouble with the mules.
I did not keep a journal, and it would be tedious to both of us if I had to relate all that occurred each day. I will only give you some of the most important items of our journey. I saw nothing of interest until we came to the South Fork of Platte River, where were two or three thousand Indians of the Sioux Nation. Some of the women are very good looking—the majority of them are mere brutes; I saw them eat the vermin which they picked off their own bodies. These Indians are not hostile, and they treated us very kindly and traded with us; but they are great thieves, and we had to watch our animals very closely while amongst them. A great many emigrants lose their stock at this place. After we got on the banks of the Platte river we were in the Buffalo country. Our company killed a number of them. I did not have an opportunity to kill any myself as I had no horse to hunt them on. There is scarcely a stick of timber on the Platte river—the only fuel you have to cook with is buffalo chips; but the greatest curiosities I saw on this part of the route were the Chimney and Court House Rocks. This latter is about six miles from the road, and as soon as I saw it I thought of the old Lebanon Court House—it is precisely the shape of it, all solid stone. Art could not have made it more perfect in appearance. The Chimney Rock is in sight of the Court House Rock, and is about two hundred feet high, tapering gradually to the top, the base being twenty feet or more in circumference. I admired these singular piles of rock very much.
We were now within a short distance of the Rocky Mountains. Before we began their ascent we stopped at Fort Laramie, a rough looking place, containing four or five log houses surrounded by a mud wall, amongst them a store, containing, I should think, ten dollars’ worth of goods. I saw here some pigs and chickens, making me think of the old farm yard at home. Our company dissolved here by mutual consent and made an amicable division of the property, having found they could not travel peaceably together. Our mess—composed of the four Lebanon boys and Uncle Joseph Tolbert, called by the company the Raging Tads—sold its heavy wagon and purchased a light one. Those arrangements made, we left Fort Laramie, each mess now free from the company, and hereafter to travel on its own hook and take care of itself. We left the Fort together, but did not remain in that position long; those who had the best teams went ahead. We had the poorest mules when we left the States, but having taken good care of them we had now the best, and were the first to begin the ascent of the Rocky Mountains. And then it was up and down hill all the time. I tho’t it an up-hill business.
These mountains are almost entirely barren. There are no trees—nothing but rocks upon rocks, except an abundance of fine water, which we found bubbling up in
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There is a huge pile of rock on the other side of the mountains called Independence Rock, from the fact that the first emigrants to Oregon celebrated the 4th of July there. There are a great many names cut in it. After leaving the main mountain we had to travel thro’ a desert of fifty-two miles, from the Big Sandy to Green River. We took in a keg of water and started at 5 o’clock in the evening. Steve drove the first part of the night and I the latter. We had to travel all night over the hilliest road I ever saw. We reached Green River the next day at noon, and had to ferry ourselves across it. I saw nothing of interest until we came to the Mary or Humboldt River. We traveled on this river until we saw it sink and disappear through the sand—the strangest phenomenon I ever witnessed. The river is quite large where we struck it, and continues so for three hundred miles, where it sinks and you see nothing more of it. Leaving the Sink of this river we had to cross another sandy desert of fifty miles. We started at 4 o’clock in the evening and traveled all night through sand a foot deep. We got within ten miles of Carson River about 9 o’clock the next day, and had to take our mules from the wagon and drive them to the river for water before we could proceed further. I almost perished from thirst myself before we reached it. We drove our mules back next evening and took our wagon to the river without further trouble. We finally got over the river safely, but hundreds have perished there I have since learned. I saw hundreds of dead mules and horses on the road when we passed through, and we were among the first companies this season. When we were safely through how thankful I was. We encamped on a most delightful spot on the Carson River where we had grass and water plenty, and stayed there two days to recruit our animals.
We traveled up the Carson River some distance, and until we came in sight of the Sierra Nevada mountains. We were in a short time at their base. I looked with admiration and delight upon these mountains, so grand and lofty. In crossing the mountain we had to pass through a cannon [sic]—a narrow passage with rocks several hundred feet high on each side of us. If you were to see it you would say it was impossible to take a wagon through. We upset our wagon in crossing a rocky creek in this cannon [sic], and George and I had to remain with the wagon while Steve drove the mules three miles to grass. We remained there in the mountains all night with the wagon alone. The next day we got thro’ safely and came to the main mountain. Just to look at this mountain it would seem impossible to take a wagon over it; but there was no other way, so we went to work, and with hard labor got our little wagon to the top. In some places the mountain was almost perpendicular, but we surmounted every difficulty and began the descent, which is very gradual. Some of the pines growing on the sides of the mountain are the largest trees I ever saw.
After we got over the Sierra Nevada we found things very dry and parched. We reached Sacramento City on the 12th of August. It is situated on the Sacramento River, about one hundred and sixty miles from San Francisco. When we arrived here there were only five or six houses, that is frame houses, in the place; there were a great many tents, however. Timber is very scarce here, pine lumber selling at one dollar per foot. Sam Brannon, the Mormon who preached at Waynesville five or six years ago, and who was then worth nothing, is here and owns property to the amount of a million and a half dollars, making him the richest man in California. John McGinley is doing business in this place; he is in good health.
Sutter’s Fort, so much talked about in the States, is situated about a mile from Sacramento City and river. The Captain does not own it now, and it has been suffered to go to ruin. There is plenty of gold here, but to tell you the truth about it, it is the hardest work in the world to get it, and not more than one man in fifty who goes to the mines succeeds in making anything. Mining is considered the hardest and most unhealthy work in the world. As to myself, I have undergone a great amount of hardship in getting here, and I have made up my mind that the country(?) owes me twenty thousand dollars, and I am determined to have it or spend the remainder of my days here.
Ellis A. Stokes.