The Graveses worried too. Breen noted in his diary that Elizabeth Graves seized the Reeds' scanty remaining property as collateral against some unspecified debt, presumably Margret Reed's purchase of two cattle weeks before. The seizure probably didn't mean much, since the Reeds had virtually nothing left and were no longer occupying their half of the double cabin they had once shared with the Graveses, but it was plain evidence that collaboration had irreversibly dissolved, that the Donner Party was beset with the petty imbroglios that invariably afflict any group of people confined together amid trying circumstances. Elizabeth Graves eventually took her bickering to a ludicrous level, insisting to Breen that his predictions of warmer weather were a sort of jinx, an ironic guarantee of continued freezing. Apparently she meant this quite seriously, since the normally ungrudging Breen wrote succinctly, 'she is a case.'
Nobody could hold out much longer, as Patrick Breen clearly understood. For weeks he had been hoping for a thaw, whether to aid the arrival of the rescuers or the escape of the emigrants. Again and again he had recognized what he thought were the signs of a changing season— the chirping of birds, the caress of the sun—only to be disappointed when the blizzards returned. Now, as if in recognition of their perilous state, he seemed to lower his goal, to aim not necessarily for ultimate salvation but merely for a fleeting victory over the snow that had so long held them captive. 'We hope with the assistance of Almighty God,' he wrote, 'to be able to live to see the bare surface of the earth once more.'
Part 3
Salvation
20 Fellowbeings
In the modern world, rescue is often a relatively easy affair. Discover that some unfortunate band of adventurers is trapped in the wilds— isolated by the natural confines of mountain or island or jungle—and usually a helicopter can whirl down and disgorge medics and guides and helpers of every ilk. There are exceptions, of course. It has been said that the upper reaches of Mt. Everest might as well be the moon, for all the hope of sudden deliverance from afar. But most of the time, if sufferers can be found, assistance can be delivered with astonishing speed. Sailors are saved from turbulent seas; climbers are plucked from cliffs. Even if those in need cannot be reached, they can often be located, so that a crackly voice on the radio or the steady beep of a transponder can serve as the target for a parachuted cache of calories that preserves life until the motor-powered cavalry roars over the hill.
The nineteenth century presented more intractable dilemmas. In the case of the Donner Party, learning the precise location of the stranded party provided no guarantee of its salvation. The helpless travelers faced a mountain range all but impassable on foot or in the saddle, yet would-be rescuers shared precisely the same means of transport. And if getting in is just as hard as getting out, if you cannot reach them for precisely the same reasons they cannot reach you—then how the hell do you save their lives?
AT FIRST, EVEN THE POTENTIAL HELPERS needed help. When the seven surviving members of the Forlorn Hope struggled down out of the mountains in mid-January, the little settlement they found at Johnson's Ranch was too small to mount a rescue mission. So the first task was not to head east to aid the victims, but south and west to summon men, equipment and supplies from Sutter's Fort, forty hazardous miles away.
Winter rains had deluged Northern California. Rivers strained against their banks, floodwaters surged over fields, mud seized hooves and feet and wagon wheels and held them with an unbreakable grip. The countryside, one man remembered, was 'one vast quag mire.'
The first obstacle was the Bear River, pounding along too high and too fast to ford. Two pine logs were lashed together with strips of rawhide, and the next morning the haphazard raft was shoved out into the roaring current, an Indian messenger named Indian Dick hanging on for dear life. The little vessel remained intact long enough to ferry its passenger to the opposite bank, where he took off his shoes, rolled his pants up above the knee, and set off on his lonely slog through the floodlands. Remarkably, he reached Sutter's Fort that night and raised the alarm about the desperate, trapped emigrants.
Heading into the Sierra in the dead of winter was a life-threatening enterprise, so recruiting participants posed a problem. With a war on, John Sutter had briefly lost control of his own fort, which was now under the command of an army lieutenant named Edward Kern. Kern had no authority to pay a rescue party, but he made a vague promise that the federal government would do something for the men, then fired off a quick letter to his superiors seeking retroactive approval and guidance. Kern's amorphous promise fell short. Only three men came forward, too few to even begin the journey. Then Sutter stepped in and proved that an established local man often has more credibility than the federal government. Along with John Sinclair, whose Mexican title of
Rescuers said later that money was not their incentive, and it's hard to discount their courage. 'Finally it was concluded that we would go or die trying,' wrote Daniel Rhoads, one of two brothers who agreed to go along. 'For not to make any attempt to save them would be a disgrace to us and to California as long as time lasted.'
Whatever their motivations, a party of about a dozen men was raised, many of them fresh emigrants who had themselves crossed the plains only months before. They gathered at Johnson's Ranch to make preparations. Sutter and Sinclair built on their earlier generosity by providing provisions and horses, but still it took days to ready the supplies. Cattle were slaughtered and the meat dried. Rawhide strips were cut so they would be ready later for making snowshoes. Saddles posed such a supply problem that two local women loaned sidesaddles for the rescuers' use.
By early February, a little less than three weeks after Eddy stumbled down out of the mountains, the party was ready to leave. Sinclair arrived to take down the names of the rescuers for the official record and to bid them farewell. They were doing a noble thing, he said, and should not sacrifice their own lives in the effort. But neither should they flinch. They were 'never to turn their backs upon the Mountains until they had brought away as many of their suffering fellowbeings as possible.' A few of the horses had gone astray, and by the time they rounded up the loose animals much of the day was gone, so they delayed their departure until morning. A forbidding sly hinted at a brewing storm, and that evening the clouds loosed a downpour, 'one of the heaviest hurricanes ever experienced on the Sacramento.' In the higher elevations the rain would be snow, and as the men of the rescue party drifted off to sleep, they must have wondered if the attempt to save other lives would cost them their own.
FROM THE SAFETY OF THE LOWLANDS, Caleb Greenwood raised his eyes to the seductive white peaks and the ominous winter skies, calculating the odds. Greenwood had spent a lifetime in the mountains of the West, as trapper, guide, hunter, explorer. He was in his eighties, but his sinewy strength and vigor suggested a younger man. His worn buckskins looked as though he had not taken them off for years. A Crow Indian wife shared his household. Grown sons, universally referred to in the ugly argot of the day as 'half-breeds,' joined in his adventures.
Greenwood had stayed alive by respecting the countless agents of death that populated the wilderness: beasts and disease and enemies and, perhaps most of all, ruthless winter. He knew what awaited a handful of men, mostly rubes fresh from the East, with no real guide, trudging off into the teeth of the Sierra in the dead of winter. Greenwood proposed a hard but realistic wager: None of the rescuers would ever be seen alive again. Nobody took
