We publish the following letter from a friend on the plains, which will not fail to be of interest to many of our readers:
    DEAR CALE: I sent you a letter some two weeks ago, in which I gave you all the news worth writing at that time. I avail myself of the present opportunity of giving you a brief account of what is now going on in this part of the world.
    I stated to you in my last letter that Maj. Holdman had made treaties with the Humboldt Indians. Several Indians have been in our camp since he passed, and we did not molest them, thinking that perhaps the Major's good talk and presents to them might induce them to let the emigrants alone. But they have commenced stealing again, and within the last eight days they have taken and drove away some 30 head of cattle from emigrants who were camped at this place. Several parties have been out, but could not recover their stock. The Humboldt River is falling rapidly. There have passed up to this date 41,000 head of cattle and horses, 14,000 head of sheep, 1,200 wagons, and 9,000 souls, and some of the packers report two thirds of the emigration behind yet, but my impression is that half have passed.
    The stock is in better condition than the first which passed. There will be a large amount of stock lost this year on the plains. There is but little grass for 150 miles on the river this side of the sink. Two thirds of the emigration are traveling on the south side of the river.
    There is no sickness among the emigrants yet. I have not seen one new grave on the river. Our old friend Dr. Hearn passed here yesterday. He is going to Sacramento City and from there to Yreka. The Doctor looks well, and says there is no place like California. Nearly all the droves are owned by Californians who are returning with their families to settle permanently in the golden land.
    A difficulty arose a few days ago, at Ripple Creek, between a gentleman by the name of Walker and one of his hired men, in which the latter Mr. Walker in the abdomen, with an Allen's revolver, which caused his death two days afterwards. The man escaped. Mr. Walker has two brothers, and several other men, with their families and considerable stock, were bound for Rogue River Valley.
    I have not heard from Capt. Martin and Mr. Pfouts for three weeks. They are 60 miles below me on this river.
    The prices paid for lame stock are high. Owners will not sell at the prices which were paid last year. I will write by the next opportunity.

    Welborn Beeson calls attention to the fact that 76 years ago, August 16th, his grandfather, John Beeson, filed on a donation land claim on Wagner Creek, near Talent, and that some member of the family has resided thereon ever since. His sister, Mrs. Anna Carter, resides there now.
    Welborn says the emigrant train in which his father crossed the plains and came to Oregon in 1853 was the largest train that ever came to the Rogue River Valley, consisting of 100 wagons, 300 people and 1500 head of cattle. They endured all the hardships of those early days on the plains, including sickness, trouble with Indians, shortage of water at times, storms, etc.
    When they reached the valley they took claims and started to make "little homes in the West." There were lots of Indians here at that time, and they were often very inquisitive and hard to get along with.
    Mr. Beeson said Elmer Oatman's father and his father, Welborn Beeson, Sr., then a boy of 16, stood guard for 100 nights, there being three relays during each night, and often drove away Indians who were prowling around.
    Among some of those in the wagon train of 1853 were the fathers of Fred Wagner, Ed Thornton of Ashland, the Colvers at Phoenix, uncle and father of Elmer Oatman, and the parents and grandparents of many of the Walkers, Wells, Murphys, Mills, Robinsons and Rockfellows--not J. D., but one of his cousins--and others he could not remember, now living in this county, mostly in the southern part.
    Mr. Beeson says his father, at 16, attended school with other children in the old Colver home, now the Blue Flower Lodge, then on the California-Oregon trail, a very rough, dusty cowpath, now the Pacific Highway, a paved and much-traveled thoroughfare. The Colver home was also the place for social, religious, community and other gatherings, and often sheltered the pioneers during Indian outbreaks.

    Friend Hadley--We are now 150 miles only, above Ft. Laramie, after about two weeks of hobbling along with lame cattle and rickety wagons. We all wonder very much that our friends who have been through have not warned us of these two difficulties--especially of the first. For near four weeks we have been compelled to make short drives of five to fifteen miles a day--sometimes stopping entirely. We might have saved much had we known in the beginning what we know now--though we have brought all our cattle through to this point, except two we sold to the traders. Some have lost much more than we have. Within 20 miles of Laramie are probably 25 establishments for trade with emigrants, and their principal traffic is in lame cattle. These traders have now probably in their hands over 1000 head, besides many that have recovered and been sold back to emigrants at from three to five hundred percent profit. The evil begins to show itself about 300 miles below Ft. Laramie; at that point it is at the worst, and above there it stops entirely. From there up, our trouble is entirely with old cases.
    Large-chested cattle, treading heavily on their forefeet--those having soft hoofs--those that haul or crowd in team, and those that in the yoke hurry or fret themselves--are almost sure to become lame. Whatever may be effected by treatment, much more may be by the selection of proper cattle. No yoke of oxen, however valuable, should be brought on the route, unless they are true in the draught, and satisfied to do their part in the yoke--and though I have succeeded perfectly with two [of] the heaviest oxen in the train, and one of them a bull, and they working on the tongue, the worst place in the team, yet, knowing what I do, I would not trust such again for the worth of them.
    In a previous letter I advised emigrants to prepare themselves with iron shoes. We are not now so much in favor of them. We have found that above Laramie the hoof has hardened so that quite commonly it is out of the question to nail on a shoe. The friends of shoeing are now more in favor of having their oxen shod a hundred miles or so east of Kanesville and depending upon other means to protect their cows. It may be the safest course, though it is generally thought that the foot would thus be unfitted for service after the shoe comes off. I believe, and I think our people are all satisfied from our experience, that a safe and perhaps perfectly sure remedy may be used. Several of our working oxen that became tender in the feet we saved by wetting the bottom of the hoof with alcohol, or alcohol and camphor. With the free use of it, twice a day, oxen went through the Black Hills with feet that were tender and threatened to fail when they went in them. Every one treated with it has recovered without becoming actually footsore--and some of them, too, even when kept constantly in the draught. I have such confidence in it that with two quarts for five or six yoke of oxen and a dozen loose cattle, I would depend entirely upon it. A moccasin of leather, rawhide is best, is much used, and if adopted when the foot is first tender will generally save it, but it is quite a trouble and only defends the hoof while it is hardening, while the alcohol hardens it. It is of great use, in connection with spirits turpentine, or tar well beat in, to cure the heel crack.
    An important thing in saving oxen is to have light wagons, light loads and plenty of team. Let the emigrant always bear this in mind. But a wagon should be good, of course--the best. In passing through a dry region like this, every seam in woodwork opens. Few wagons go through here without becoming loose in the felloes and hubs, and producing much trouble. The timber should be of the best kind and perfectly seasoned, and put together by good workmen--otherwise the wagon will fail, or cost more than it's worth to take it through.
    July 24--We are now in the mountains--about four days from the South Pass--in the midst of poor feed, but enjoying a little more rain than for a month past.
    We have heard nothing of symptoms of scurvy, fever or cholera, though a day back of us there was a death by mountain fever on the 4th of July. I have never known, anywhere, a time of such universal good health as has prevailed this season from the Missouri to this point, on both sides of the Platte. The distance is 740 miles, the time eight weeks, and there has not been 30 deaths among 30,000 emigrants. We have heard of but about three cases of sickness, and have known of no deaths except as we have seen by the way, perhaps six or eight graves of this year. A healthy season has had much to do with this state of things, but to a better habit of living is it to be attributed to a great extent. We see no such thing as living constantly on salt food, nor of exposure to conditions to which the system is unfitted. Everybody has milk, and most everybody has an abundance. One fourth of the draught on the road is done by cows giving milk; a large share of the loose stock is the same--and you would be surprised to see the extent to which milk enters into the living of emigrants. The impression that evening-drawn milk of cows traveling in or out of the team is heated and unhealthy is a mistake. Our cows are warm, of course, when they stop at night--rather, they are so in our warmest weather--but in a few minutes they become cool, and there is nothing in the appearance or taste of the milk showing a disturbance of its natural condition. We all use it freely, and I believe perfectly safely. Everybody has fruit, too, and I believe that has much to do with their immunity from disease. No emigrant should come on this road without plenty of dried sour apples and cows giving milk. Their value is incalculable. It is remarkable that all are excessively fond of cornmeal in every form in which it is cooked. Everyone expresses satisfaction or regret as they happen to have it or not. The "cornstarch" substitute is a failure, because it requires eggs to make it good. We think the milk, fruit and meal save us from the diseased anxiety for potatoes and vinegar, as it does from the necessity of using too much salt meat. We have also fresh meat now and then, which helps along our living very much. The swine has no representative on these plains--so we get no new pork--but the antelope and buffalo furnish us an excellent article of fresh beef. From a young buffalo killed by some neighbors the other day we had steak we called fully equal to any we ever had in Watertown, though Watertown, in that respect, be not a whit behind the very chiefest of cities.
    The hard bread manufactured at St. Louis or Kanesville, and obtained at the latter place by emigrants, is bad--always very bad. I believe nobody eats it except when unavoidable. We find we need but very little of such food, and it is about as well to go without as to use that. It is sometimes, though very seldom, needed, and I would advise emigrants to take very little of it. Flour is the staple; it is always the most convenient and the best form of material for bread, except, perhaps, one day in fifteen, when hard bread is needed. Rice seems to be less relished on the road than at home--I presume because we have not eggs to cook with it. The emigrant will find that anything usually cooked with eggs is of little use on the road.
    If a man will bring with him proper fishing tackle, he can get good catfish from the Missouri, Elkhorn and Loup, and the Platte as far up as fifty miles below Ft. Laramie. In the Missouri they catch multitudes going up from 50 to 90 lbs. each. Though poorly supplied with tackle we caught a few fine catfish in the Loup and Platte, and some dace in the small streams.
    The patent wagon lock is thrown away by everybody who has it, and the simple chain substituted. A lock is indispensable, and the common chain is, I believe, universally preferred.
    That which I believe is pronounced the best form of stove is that of the common plate stove, but level at top and bottom, with two holes over the furnace, draught under and over the oven, and flue in the end. 3 or 4 feet perpendicular draught is necessary. We see none such among the hundreds that are thrown away. A stove should be double where most exposed to heat--say half the front end and bottom. At least one camp kettle should be taken besides a dripping pan, coffee kettle, two tin kettles and frying pan.
    The best form of tent is just that of the common house roof--not more than 6 to 6½ feet high, and 10 feet wide, well secured with pins at the edges. With such a form we have found brace ropes and all such securities useless--or nearly so. The three poles used with such a tent may be made very light, and the whole be lighter, more convenient and safer and better than any other form.
    Great care should be used to have ox yokes and bows right--every way right--chains light but good, of right length, with good hooks, and a half dozen or so of good, heavy false links will be found worth their weight in silver.
    Wagon tire should be bolted to the felloe that it may be readily taken off. This is very important. When our tire becomes loose, we take it off, find an old stove by the way and cut it into strips, and put them on the rim of the wheel and set the tire over them. All the irons should be in the common form, because then if one breaks it is easy finding another with which to replace it.
    We are 18 miles by the summit of the South Pass, actually descending towards the level of the common earth--though descending very slowly indeed, and through a region of little feed and less water. We are 7840 feet above the level of the sea, our guidebooks say, and almost to the line of perpetual snow. The Wind River Range of mountains, abutting on our right, loom out almost over our trail with their sides white with snow down almost to our level. The wind comes cold from them, and the moment the sun's heat is obstructed the air feels like that of a winter day. We have passed over, perhaps, the highest point of unbroken surface on the continent--yet we should hardly be conscious of being in a high altitude, so gradual has been our ascent. But the remains of the last winter's snow, here and there lingering on the northern hillsides and the abundance of mosses on their summits, the cold chilling air, and the difficulty in weak lungs to breathe when a little wearied, indicate our situation.
    I have a word to say here in regard to traveling on the Sabbath--the almost universal habit of the road. When we left home, we commenced the experiment of observing that day with accustomed strictness, and to this time have observed it against the practice of every train and the opinion of almost every man we have met. Our experience, though it be that of but a single train, has so convinced our company of the economy and expediency of resting on Sunday, that I think our irreligious men, if traveling by themselves, would from policy do as we have done. We have been on the road six days less than four months--a time sufficient to test whether our teams need such a rest, and whether the rest is given them at the expense of time. We supposed we should fall behind a little, and that we should have only a good conscience--though that be enough certainly--to console us as other trains left us--but now, after 16 weeks of draught, and four weeks of it on the barren sage plains, our cattle are almost every one in good flesh and some of them good beef. I say only what all admit, that our teams are in better condition than those of any other train we can hear of on the road. For four weeks our oxen have been remarked by those who have seen them for their good condition, while in every train near us there are some failing from leanness, and quite a large share of them are so thin that we would not put them in our yokes. We are quite surprised at this difference--especially that it should be so great. Today a company that was to reach the summit of the Pass a fortnight ahead of us is encamped here, satisfied to stop with us over Sunday. A heavy drover, now going through the third time, is satisfied on the point and now lies by with us. A train composed of very prudent men, acquaintances of some of us, left Illinois one day ahead, traveling Sundays. The character of the men was a guarantee of the best management of their team, and it was predicted that they would go through in ten to twenty days less time than we. At the Missouri they were a week ahead, having gained six days. Fifty miles above Laramie we found a note from them, and they were two days only in advance. Another train starting and traveling under similar circumstances has had to stop to recruit, and is now behind us. We have probably lost a far less percentage of cattle than any other company going over the road.
    These are not the only good results of lying by on Sunday--nor are they the most important. Our people have an opportunity that otherwise they cannot possibly enjoy, for those attentions to personal cleanliness, necessary to a healthy condition of body--and for the relaxation and rest required as much by their moral and physical constitutions. While traveling we are necessarily constantly exposed to the vexing, harassing influences incident to the road, and which has done much to deprave and dehumanize those who have gone over it. We need relief from these causes. The patience cannot bear a constant, perpetual abrasion. Even with the healing influences of religion upon us, we feel it. We feel that the mind cannot bear chafing all the time. And Monday morning we feel as we used to, refreshed for another week of toil on the road--another week of the journey of life--another week of the labor of self-control, and of effort to make the most of the enjoyment of the social and domestic relations. I wish all who are to go over this road might hear and believe what I say--that it is no more strange that those who travel Sundays and thus neglect their moral necessities should be prepared to abandon their sick and tumble their dead into holes in the ground than that they should become indifferent to the necessities of their beasts and strew the trail with the carcasses of over-driven and over-beaten cattle.
    One great cause of loss on this road is feeding on alkaline lands. Cattle should, in no case, be halted where there are alkaline salts on the surface. This is the great curse of the Upper Platte, the Sweetwater, and all the streams flowing through the great waste from the Summit west to the base of the Bear Mountains. The low grounds are everywhere more or less covered with saleratus, and thousands feed and herd their cattle in it for three or four weeks of time. They have the alkaline principle constantly in their grass, and to some extent in their drink, and even the dust they inhale is impregnated with it. The system resists the poison more effectually than we ought to expect, for comparatively a small percentage die. Where 200,000 cattle have passed this season, there are, for 400 miles, from one to four carcasses to the mile--and probably one half of this 200,000 are fed on the lime grounds and furnish nine-tenths of the dead. Grass can be everywhere found on the high land. It is in spots--dry but nutritious--thin and scanty but very hearty. Our oxen labor on a morning's feeding of it all day as well as on the low ground grass till 2 o'clock. We esteem it the best grass by great odds. It is not so convenient, and so 100,000 cattle this year are grazed on alkaline feed to be killed or injured for months to come. Crossing the plains again, I would not feed on the low grounds after leaving Wood Creek, 170 miles from Kanesville, unless when I found it utterly unavoidable.
    Aug. 7--We are at the eastern base of the Bear Mountains--still in the region of sand, clay, gravel, drought and barrenness. The west pass of the Oregon route we found saved by a cutoff. The 48 miles without water from the Big Sandy to the Green River, in the common route, the Sublette Cutoff, is avoided by going down the former to where it is but 13 miles across. The "dry stretch" of 26 miles, from the Platte to a tributary of the Sweetwater, is also by going up the Platte, to about 13 miles. Our company is about determined to go to Rogue River Valley to settle. We shall probably take the Brophy Cutoff from the great Columbia River trail--turning to the left at the great level of Bear River and going well to the head of the Humboldt, then down that stream to within 30 miles of its sink, and from there over the northern terminus of the Sierra Nevadas, at this kind a mere range of hills to Rogue River. We thus take a direct road, without mountain passes, with abundance of feed, and no "horrors" but two "dry stretches" 25 miles each, and a horrible tribe of Indians in the Humboldt.
    Speaking of Indians--to this point the Pawnees are the only tribe to be feared, and they only for their proficiency in theft. The emigrant cannot too closely watch and guard his stock till he leaves the Loup Fork. The only safe course, so far, is to have every animal secured nights with a chain and lock, with a man by him with a revolver, and never allow him to go from the hand of the guard during the day. Beyond this there is no risk. From the Loup there is no danger of the kind. The Sioux, Ottoes, Tapoos and Crows are nobler Indians than you have ever seen, and hating the Pawnees implacably. Among all these tribes it is deemed a merit to kill a Pawnee in any place or in any way. They prosecute against them a war of extermination. They are above thefts. I was with them four days in the Black Hills, separated from the train, in search of an ox stolen by a white man, and I found them ever ready to give me the best place in the lodge, with the best buffalo robe and best buffalo meat. I would trust them to any extent. I have not heard of an animal ever having been stolen by an Indian between the Loup Fork and Bear River Mountains, nor do I believe such a thing ever occurred. About the Bear River region were the diggers--miserable robbers--but now, with another tribe, by the agency of the smallpox, they are nearly annihilated. They were a powerful band a year ago, but are now a disunited and wandering handful, hardly recognized as a tribe, and nearly harmless even as thieves.
    As additional advice to those who intend going over this road, they should make their calculations to live as nearly as possible as they do at home. The last place to get good whipstocks is on the west side of the Des Moines. There are some, but not the best, on the east side of the Missouri, going up from Kanesville to the upper ferry. Opposite and about 60 rods above the present eastern landing of that ferry, on the west side of the Missouri, is a good place, and the best place to get good hickory for spare oxbows--three or four of which ought to be taken with every team. A man wants about three dozen common screws; 2 papers 3 oz. and 10 oz. tacks; 2 lbs. shingle and 2 lbs. 6d nails; a saw, hammer, good axe, spade, ½, ¾ and inch augers with one handle, wrench, screwdriver and two good pocket knives--one being to lose on the way. So far, a gun is of little use except to fire off, clean out and load up again every three or four days. A family should be supplied with such medicines as they know how to use, especially for such diseases as proceed from a neglected and dirty condition of the skin and overcharging of the bowels with Platte water sand, and colds taken by swimming the Platte for cattle and fuel, and the best of remedies for murrain, alkali, overflowing of the galls, hobnail and other ails of cattle and horses. There is an abundance of a purer and honester article of saleratus in this country than can be got at factories, and a man may get more or less as he pleases at Kanesville. Salt for cattle is unnecessary after striking the Platte--from that point, for some reason, they will not eat it. There are about ten ferries on the road--the aggregate cost on each wagon is about $25 to $30--by all but two of which--the Mississippi and Missouri--we swam our cattle without difficulty. The loss of cattle on the road is just according to the care they have. The loss of sheep, some 15,000 to 20,000 of which are on the way, I am informed by the most judicious drivers to be not much less than 20 percent, or one-fifth. If anyone wishes to take hens, they can manage a half dozen or so with little trouble. There are some in our company, and they ride well, being let out at evening, and have laid nearly all the way. There is no trouble in taking a dog, unless a bad traveler, by seeing to it that he has water supplied to him on the "dry stretches." It is not well to take cows that will "come in" on the road; I have seen many such, and many young calves traveling, but there are great objections, to wit: Good butter cannot be made on the road, and such as we have is little cared for. A can holding 6 to 20 qts. keeps our sour milk and cream, and makes our butter by the motion of our wagon. Everything should be carried in tin cans and bags. Pickles, and, I presume, pork, can be kept in cans while air tight. The flesh of poultry, "cooked down," is found an excellent article of food. The dried eggs were a failure with us. Tinware should be substituted for earthen, and sheet for cast iron. Russia is the only sheet iron that, in a stove, will last through. An excellent substitute for a stove when no baking is to be done is a sheet of iron like a stove top, to be put over a fire hole in the ground, a common means of cooking, and one which the traveler soon learns to make and use. It is just as good as a stove for every purpose but baking. Everyone needs flannel underclothing here. In regard to supplies of clothing for the future, everyone is convinced that anything not needed for the road costs a great deal more than it comes to. Take nothing for use after getting through--excepting money, of course, though I can assure you, you will have much less of that than you expected when you get there. No water should be used for drinking or cooking, nor allowed to cattle, unless in a running stream or containing insects; otherwise it is probably alkaline. Everyone ought to have too much sense to use water from the stinking holes dug by some foolish persons in the margins of "sloughs" and alkaline marshes. No poison water is found east of here that I am aware of, except as the alkaline is called poison. We have seen one alkaline spring, on the upper Platte, but the alkali is too apparent to the taste to be dangerous. To this point it is safe to use all running water, or that which contains the young of mosquitoes and frogs. The guidebooks are full and reliable in their information on this subject. A man wants a guide, of course, and the latest to be got. The "Mormon Guide" is the best as far as it goes. This, as everything else the emigrant wants, is to be got at Kanesville.
    I shall probably have no more opportunities to forward letters until I reach [Table] Rock City, two months hence at least, and I may not have one to send this--though I hope for it, for we expect to be, until we leave the Humboldt, on a trail taken by some of the return travel from California and Southern Oregon. If I have time, I will fill up. There are many things I wish to write, but must defer till I get through. I expect, if I live, to hail from [Table] Rock City, Oregon.
Watertown Chronicle, Watertown, Wisconsin, November 2, 1853, page 1


    About 1500 immigrants with 250 wagons and a large number of loose cattle took the new route over the Cascade Mountains into the head of Willamette Valley. They were expected to arrive at the end of September, but not arriving, a party of the citizens of Lane County started to look for them. They discovered that the immigrants had mistaken the direction, gone too far to the south and suffered severely. We clip the following from the Statesman.
    When found they were suffering of hunger, living on the beef of their poor cattle, as they had been out of bread for several weeks. They had been all lost on the plains, having traveled south of the route in the deserts toward the Klamath Lake and nearly perished for water; they crossed one desert 75 miles in extent, on which journey many cattle gave out and families suffered exceedingly for water.
    It will pass to the credit of the people of this county that they were nearly all informed of their situation by daylight on Monday morning, had supplies on the way to meet them, and in twenty-four hours more than 20,000 pounds of flour was on its way up the middle fork of the Willamette, and all a free gift for the destitute, and yet provisions of all kinds are still passing up.
    He passed one man after leaving the wagons who had lain down to die for want of something to eat, but it is hoped that he got relief from those who are going out.
    Many companies of men, from four to ten, had left the wagons four and six weeks ago to make their way into the valley, some of them on foot and without provisions, none of whom have since been heard from.
    They left three of their company seven days back in the mountains, who had lain down protesting that they could come no farther and must die; they had subsisted on horse flesh till it gave out, after which they had nothing but snails and other insects to sustain life, being unable to take any game.
    One man who wandered away from the trains perished from hunger and want in the deserts.
    A Mrs. Petty crossing the river in a wagon which upset was drowned.
    The relief sent by the citizens of Lane and Linn counties was prompt and liberal. Between the 16th and 24th Oct., there passed into the Canyon, laden with relief 94 packed animals, 23 wagons and 290 head of work and beef cattle.
    It is believed that all the emigrants are now in a situation where there need be no loss of life or suffering in reaching the valley.
    The road to the summit of the mountain is described as being excellent. On the western slope and along the river the road has been not more than half opened, being filled with fallen timber, and not cut of sufficient width. The road crosses the Willamette about 20 times; these frequent crossings are very unpleasant and fatiguing. Nearly all can be avoided by a little labor.
    The fact is sufficiently clear that there is on this route the best ground for the best road over the Cascade Range at present known.
Daily Alta California, San Francisco, November 21, 1853, page 3


    Mr. Editor--We arrived here in the Rogue River Valley Oct. 26th, just five, instead of four, months out from Kanesville, in company with a train of 87 persons, 23 wagons, 334 head of cattle, 1700 sheep and 29 horses and mules--all right save the "ordinary wear and tear" of wagons and teams, and some wear and tear of heart, especially for going hungry now and then, and eating poor dry beef for a fortnight on the road. We were so foolish as to join company with this great multitude at Green River, 60 miles this side of the South Pass, and to come through with them, and dearly we paid for our folly. Our teams were broken down, and we were delayed three weeks and over beyond the time we might have made. There was a great deal of suffering in the train in consequence of the delay--suffering providentially arrested by relief of flour from the valley, meeting us ten days out, near the Sierra Nevadas. We cannot express our obligations to this people for their generosity. It is the noblest community I ever saw. Many had consumed their whole summer in a most sanguinary war of defense with the bloodiest horde of Indians on the continent; all the grain that could be destroyed by fire had been consumed, and many of the dwellings of the settlers burned down; business of all kinds was totally prostrated, and the famine of the past year threatened a continuance for a year to come, but as news reached the valley that emigrants were suffering on the road, a force of fifty rangers immediately volunteered for their defense against the Indians, and under their protection a train of mules with three tons of flour, $1,000 worth--was sent to their relief. The whole road to the Sierra Nevadas, and indeed for a hundred miles beyond, was thus effectually occupied and aid supplied as far as any necessity could be anticipated. Wherever the presence of Indians was suspected, there an efficient detachment of troops was posted and the closest watchfulness maintained; whenever property was plundered from emigrants, the most vigorous efforts were made to recover it--and when families were found destitute of bread, they were supplied at the lowest rates to those having money, and free to those having none. And twice after the first, during the emigrating season, provision trains under escort were sent out that there might be no possible failure of the abundance of their liberality. On account of the great disproportion of prices of labor and food, emigrants experience very great difficulty in getting through the first eight months of their residence here, and no one can realize the intense interest felt in their condition by the citizens of the valley. Every facility within reach of the people is afforded them to obtain food and to find employment. There is a great deal of industry in the valley, and the strangest mixture of economy and liberality I ever saw. With the evidences of friendliness, frankness and generosity a man everywhere meets, he can hardly believe the community to be composed of people from every part of the Union, a year ago all strangers to one another. Land here is good--but not as good as that of Wisconsin generally. It is too gravelly. Much of it, especially that most affected by drought, is quite naked. Generally it is about half covered with a short, thick growth of very rich bunchgrass that seems to spread some by grazing and may in places eventually form a close turf. A very little of the land on the streams has grass that may be mown--but the best of it is not what your farmers would call tolerable wild meadow. On the southern slopes of the mountains grass, much of it clover, takes the place of timber, while the northern slopes are covered with pine (mainly pitch pine), fir and yellow cedar--the latter differing a little from your white cedar, and approaching the famous redwood, palo colorado, of Oregon and California. Much of the southern slopes is grown up to a short, stunted wild sage--Fremont's artemisia--a form of which covers "the plains" from Scott's Bluffs, below Laramie, to the Sierra Nevadas--fit for neither fuel nor food for man or beast. There is soil everywhere. The rock is very seldom exposed. Now and then you see a wall of sandstone or hornblende running along the mountainside, but you see too that time is fast employed whittling them to earth.
    The periodical drought produces a necessity for irrigation on almost all soils, for the coarser products. Wheat, oats and barley--all cereal grains--do well. They mature before they suffer. Flax is indigenous on all good soils from the Bear River to the Pacific. There is no three months of dog days to make corn. The summer nights are too cool for it and the drought a little too early. The early kinds are grown, but with no great success. With wheat we can beat the world--and perhaps with oats. With coarse vegetables the country does well. In fat cattle, it can't be beat. Now, at midwinter, there are hundreds of cattle, as fat as your best stall-fed, on the commons--propagating, growing, fatting, with as little human care as the deer on the mountains. The animal grows through all the seasons, and at one year old is as heavy as in your country at two. An ox here is expected to weigh eight to eleven hundred, of course, and you see one yoke performing a labor that two of ours can hardly do. The wheat crop for the next harvest is yet, Dec. 17, but little of it in. They sow till March. The plowing of the season is now from a third to a half done. It commences with the rains late in Nov. and continues to the middle of Feb. or first of March. It requires four or five yoke of oxen to break with a plow cutting 14 inches. We have had now four freezing nights, all in succession. It is called remarkably cold. Men complain of the cold as they do in your country when the mercury is 20 degrees below zero. Their houses are very open--about open enough for comfortable summer houses--and they expect to keep warm in them. The commerce of the country is carried on upon pack mules, and so mild are the winters that the "packers" expect to sleep and live in the open air in all seasons, even without tents. The highest point to which the mercury rose last summer was 112°--but the heat was not oppressive as it is in Wisconsin. The air is balmy from the effect of the sea, and one feels free about the chest in the highest heat of summer. In winter the temperature ranges in the neighborhood of zero to 14° below--seldom, perhaps never, freezing in the daytime, and only now and then nights. Nobody thinks of such a thing as feeding cattle in the winter. You sometimes see a little stack of hay designed for a working team in time of emergency--but this is not common. It is expected that teams will go right along through the winter, plowing and keeping fat on the new growth of grass which is now green and fine. The old Spanish trail and the present inland commercial route is through this valley, from California to Oregon. Thousands of mules are employed on it. Trains are constantly passing. And this multitude, winter and summer, subsist solely on grass. Potatoes and other coarse products are secured when ripe without regard to seasons. The potatoes are not yet all dug--though they ought to be. These things are secured against frost by putting them into houses about as close as a good log house. The mildness of the winter is a very great advantage to this country. The rains and fogs render it an unpleasant season, but far less than you in that country suppose. The rains came on this year about the middle of November. It rained more than half the time for ten or twelve days; since that, for eighteen days, we have had two storms, and enough to keep the ground very wet--that is all. This is the busy time of the year. Last summer and fall they had rains out of their season, and many suppose they may be looked for henceforth--but I apprehend there is no good ground for such a hope. We met these rains on the road and they were called unprecedented. The wet weather is from the south westward brought by a tropical sea wind; I take it to be a diverted western monsoon, ranging along the region of mountains forming the whole western coast country of the continent, and it comes warm almost like a summer shower. We have no cold rain storms.
    Hogs do but indifferently. If I were coming out here again, I would bring two or three full-blood grass breed pigs. On the clover they would do as well as the bears and cattle--but those that subsist on roots and mast have a poor time of it. I should think the hogs of the valley were of Spanish stock--but mean and miserable as they are, a pig is worth an ounce of gold. With such as they are the country will soon be supplied and a better breed be called for. The breed of cattle cannot be improved. Everything of the kind becomes Durham in a year after it gets here. The Umpqua Valley, between here and the Willamette (pronounced Wil-lam-et) is said to be best for hogs. Hens may be obtained here for about $2.00 a pair. A family in our train took out a pair, with little trouble. I have seen no geese nor turkeys, and presume there are none in the valley. Surrounded by mountains as this valley is, it cannot, of course, be otherwise than well watered.
    I can only say of the Rogue River what I have heard, that it is so large as to require ferries. On either side, down valleys three or four miles wide, flow little creeks--Bear, Butte, Evans, Antelope &c--from the mountains to the river. There are many little brooks that reach the creeks, and there you see everywhere small spring runs that in a little way lose themselves in the soil--and by all of these is afforded an abundant means for irrigation. A few, very few, trout are in the creeks, and some salmon live to get up here from the sea, but so bruised and beaten about by the drift in the swift streams that they are unfit to eat. Of game--on the wooden slopes the deer are really "too numerous to mention." Back a few miles in the mountains, the black, brown and grizzly bears are abundant. The grizzly is one of the noblest animals in the world--more powerful and more fearless than the tiger. There is a species of the American lion, and what is said to be a very fair representative of the hyena, in the mountains--though I doubt whether the latter is vouched for by any very good authority. Myriads of wild geese and sandhill cranes--but their place of resort, so far as we know anything about it, is several lakes in the interior, some of which we pass in coming over from the Humboldt, and of which I may write more fully at another time. The grizzly is an animal of incredible strength. I have seen a cub, five months old, break up a bullock's leg in the joint, stripping away the muscles from the bone with his claws. But they can neither climb a tree nor run along a steep hillside, and so they are not very dangerous. The fiercer animals have never been known to descend into the valley. Small game is scarce. Wild fruit, except the apple, is rather abundant. Of that, no form is found save the tree--a fine crab tree, but bearing only a very few small berries, half as large, perhaps, as a currant, and half as good. The grapes of this valley are abundant and superior. The domestic apple does remarkably well. The native plum grows on a dwarf bush, perhaps 10 to 18 inches high, and has the flavor of the peach. Apple trees for sitting are packed over from the Willamette and sold here for $1.00 each.
    This valley is about 75 miles long and perhaps 8 wide, beside the valleys of the creeks. The lower part of the valley, half of it, or thereabouts, is reserved for the present for the Indians. They attempted last summer to drive out the whites, and after a war of three months, during which about 40 whites and 100 Indians were killed, peace was concluded by the surrender of the best half of the valley to the whites. These Indians are a wild, fierce tribe, of kin to the Diggers on the Humboldt, and about the lakes this side of there, and the Snakes of Snake River. They are degraded and cruel beyond measure. It is said that they murder for pastime. They will any of them shoot a man to get his hat. We saw the body of an emigrant that had been dragged from its grave, to be stripped, and left to the ravens. The whole country from the head of the Humboldt to this place, and indeed to the ocean, except the "desert," sixty miles, is infested by them to such an extent that no place is safe. I wrote you what we heard of the Humboldt Indians--the Diggers--of their extinction by the smallpox. We found it partially so--and no one comes over the plains without wishing it were so of all these tribes. At the western junction of the Bear River and Salt Lake roads, we heard of the war of the Utahs and Mormons, the particulars of which you probably had long ago. The opinion of the most intelligent men I saw who came that way was that the war was got up by the Mormons as a pretext for consolidating their military establishment and fortifying the passes to the city. Bad as the Utahs are, all who came that way agree that the Mormons are worse--that they are more adept at theft and more reckless at robbery. Much trouble is yet to be experienced with that community. The cattle trains that came by Salt Lake sustained more loss within striking distance of that city than those by the Bear River road on the whole trip.  The closest vigilance was insufficient to prevent the theft of cattle. The property of emigrants is probably no safer there than in the country of the Pawnee. I thought our road over the mountains by the Bear River was the worst possible, but I would advise those having any more than a small number of cattle to come that way rather than run the hazards by Salt Lake. But I am digressing here. More of this anon.
    The wood of the valley is mainly pitch pine, fir, cedar and bur oak. This pine cannot be split at all, and is too heavy for convenience--heavier than water. It however makes our lumber, while a mammoth pine of the mountain summits, called the sugar pine, makes our shingles and the shakes with which frame houses are generally covered. Our rail timber is the cedar and fir. The oak is a short, tough, gnarled tree like your bur oak, used only for fuel. The poplar and poorer species of the elm flourish along the streams, and in many places everything is covered with the grape vine. The yew tree grows here and there on the mountains--and so does the laurel. The alder grows to a tree 18 inches in diameter--but it is useless. There is a tree representing the butternut, but it has no fruit save a seed like that of the maple, and one called the manzanita, a more splendid tree than you ever saw; the "mistletoe bough" too, rendering the oak classic with its associations. The maple, linn and hickory are unknown here--though the hazel, a brittle thing in your country, by its singular toughness supplies the place of the latter for some purposes. The chaparral, the crookedest, ugliest and most obstinate bush you ever saw, forms the upland undergrowth.
    The best-informed men put the population of the valley at three to four thousand--three to four hundred being in the village of Jacksonville--and among them our old friend, Dr. E. H. Cleaveland, of Watertown. He is the only old acquaintance I have seen except Mr. Warren, of Hartland, whom I met on the plains and who called on you at your place. The Doctor is doing well--first rate--and sends his respects to all who remember him. He has actually driven out all competition and is now doing all the business of the valley in the line of his profession. The Dr. is now enjoying as much of wealth and the confidence of the people as any man in the valley. There are few--perhaps ten or twelve--families in the village. The first time I was here I saw but one woman, and she kept a bowling saloon and drunkery. Since that we have found a good society of families. The mass of the men "keep batch"--the merchants in their stores, and mechanics in their shops--even the Justice of the Peace, with several miners, cooks, eats and sleeps in "the office," a circular mosque-like building, made of "shakes," I believe without a board or pane of glass about it. The houses, except one, the Robinson House, are all made of these things, and are generally lighted by the crevices or windows of cotton cloth. The first successful schools in the valley are just started by persons of our company, are in Jacksonville to be the basis of an academy and one in the country. The first religious societies--three Methodist--are now being organized, with five clergymen, of the same denomination, all of our company, in the field. The most flourishing branches of business are those of the bowling saloon, the gambling den and the drunkery--and yet there is less of gambling and drinking in the place than you would expect to see. Merchants and mechanics are doing well. There is no cooper, gunsmith, carriage maker nor shoemaker doing business in the place--though by another year, they might all save the latter succeed well. We have but one sawmill in the valley--though three more, at least, are commenced, and a grist mill is to be ready for the next harvest.
    We find it very difficult to become familiarized to the enormous prices in this country. Flour, this winter, ranges from 20¢ to 25¢ a pound, beef is 20¢ and 25¢, bacon, mess 37¢, prime 45¢, potatoes 6¢, squashes &c. 4¢ a pound. Salt is 25¢ a pound, candles 75¢-100¢, coffee 37¢, sugar 33¢, butter $1.25, milk 100¢ a gallon. While domestic staple products, it will be seen, bear from five to ten prices, labor bears but two to four--as, per day, $2.00-$3.00; per month, $50.00-$75.00. This renders it extremely difficult for emigrants to subsist the first few months. Some of our folks say they never before found "existence so much a problem." Some of them, men heretofore well to do in the world, have dug potatoes for every 30th bushel; some have worked for $2.00 a day, with board, and paid $4.80 a bushel for potatoes--the price when we came. I sold a good log chain for five squashes. A neighbor sold a good wagon for 100 hills of potatoes, and got the worth of the wagon, $80.00, and I sold one for 100 lbs. of flour and 750 lbs. or 12½ bushels potatoes. Oxen are worth, by the yoke, but $100 to $160 and cows from $75 to $100 each. The difficulty of obtaining food is increased 100 percent by the voracious wolfish appetites of all newcomers. People eat till they are themselves astonished, and oftener thus than till they are satisfied. I presume four-fifths of those who have been here but three months experience great trouble in getting enough to eat. It is a hard thing to say of the country, but it is true, and tell your readers if they do not wish to realize it, to stay at home. When a man gets to raising and selling agricultural products, or becomes established in any other business the profits of which are three or four times the profits of labor, he can prosper--but not till then. That is too true. And you can tell them that if people were not made over, or rather half unmade, by the dehumanizing processes through which they go from Kanesville here, they would never submit to the conditions of this country. They would never submit to living in such houses, with such an absence of the conveniences and comforts of eastern life, and such a destitution of intellectual and moral opportunities, if they had not already learned on the plains to submit to anything. You can tell them that too, and tell them they can never, in living here, get paid for coming over the plains. I am not homesick; I am not prejudiced; I only tell you facts. And it is in fulfillment of a pledge to many of your readers, to tell them facts, that I tell them much more than half of those, in this country of mild winters, of a fruitful soil and mines of gleaming gold, are dissatisfied and regret having come here. Of those who have come without their friends, I have heard not one express an intention to bring them here. The general expression of such is, "I am glad my family are not here," while the mass of those who stay, stay for other reasons than because they like the country. We are all told that by another year or so we shall prefer it to the East. I know not how that may be, but I know that a large portion of those who have been here eighteen months, the time of the settlement, intend to leave.
    Mining is being perhaps fairly paid now. Some are making fortunes and some making nothing, or less. There is room for many thousand miners in this valley. The gold, in some quantity, is exhaustless. And the farther explorations are carried in every direction from us, the more extensive the gold-bearing country is found. New diggings are discovered somewhere every day. There is gold enough--more than can be washed out. And yet mining is a very precarious business. I would advise no one to come here to mine, because he is very likely to expend years of labor without profits and very sure to get less gold than will repay him for what he undergoes in coming and living a miner's life. It is worth something to "see the elephant," and well enough, perhaps, at least for a young man, to waste two years in learning the lesson of a trip to and a residence in this country, and it is "well enough" for them only, as young men are bound to fool away about so much time, and there is no school in which they can learn as fast, or by the discipline of which truths will be so indelibly impressed on their memories. I will write again soon.
Watertown Chronicle, Watertown, Wisconsin, March 29, 1854, page 1


    Dear Sir--I write to advise you of the occurrence of a new and probably a serious difficulty with the Indians. On the 13th inst. a force of about 30 whites, near the Cottonwood, about 40 miles from here, on the road south to California, in the Shasta Valley, went out in pursuit of Indians who had for some weeks been engaged in the theft of cattle. They had traced them into the mountains to a cave, when they were attacked by about 100 Indians from an ambush, and dispersed with the loss of their rations and ammunition--having four men killed and four seriously wounded. The attack was well sustained by the whites, in a fight continuing in one form or another, all day. The loss of the enemy is unknown.
    The Indians are of the Shasta and Rogue River tribes--a portion from a band located but about nine miles from here. It is generally treated as a prelude to certain war. A Capt. Wright, a famous Indian hunter, of this valley, has gone to the scene of the affair, and at Yreka and Cottonwood is raising a volunteer company to pursue them. It was intended to have 200 regular troops stationed in this valley before this time--but they are not here, and no one knows when they may be. But regulars or no regulars, should these tribes renew hostilities, the citizens will make short work with them. I will advise you of the progress of the affair.
Watertown Chronicle, Watertown, Wisconsin, April 5, 1854, page 2