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N0KFQ > TODAY 19.02.15 17:00l 55 Lines 2610 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 47834_N0KFQ
Read: GUEST
Subj: Today in History - Feb 19
Path: IZ3LSV<IW8PGT<I3XTY<I0OJJ<N6RME<N0KFQ
Sent: 150219/1600Z 47834@N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA BPQ1.4.63
Feb 19, 1847:
Donner Party rescued
On this day in 1847, the first rescuers reach surviving members
of the Donner Party, a group of California-bound emigrants
stranded by snow in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
In the summer of 1846, in the midst of a Western-bound fever
sweeping the United States, 89 people--including 31 members of
the Donner and Reed families--set out in a wagon train from
Springfield, Illinois. After arriving at Fort Bridger, Wyoming,
the emigrants decided to avoid the usual route and try a new
trail recently blazed by California promoter Lansford Hastings,
the so-called "Hastings Cutoff." After electing George Donner as
their captain, the party departed Fort Bridger in mid-July. The
shortcut was nothing of the sort: It set the Donner Party back
nearly three weeks and cost them much-needed supplies. After
suffering great hardships in the Wasatch Mountains, the Great
Salt Lake Desert and along the Humboldt River, they finally
reached the Sierra Nevada Mountains in early October. Despite the
lateness of the season, the emigrants continued to press on, and
on October 28 they camped at Truckee Lake, located in the high
mountains 21 kilometers northwest of Lake Tahoe. Overnight, an
early winter storm blanketed the ground with snow, blocking the
mountain pass and trapping the Donner Party.
Most of the group stayed near the lake--now known as Donner
Lake--while the Donner family and others made camp six miles away
at Alder Creek. Building makeshift tents out of their wagons and
killing their oxen for food, they hoped for a thaw that never
came. Fifteen of the stronger emigrants, later known as the
Forlorn Hope, set out west on snowshoes for Sutter's Fort near
San Francisco on December 16. Three weeks later, after harsh
weather and lack of supplies killed several of the expedition and
forced the others to resort to cannibalism, seven survivors
reached a Native American village.
News of the stranded Donner Party traveled fast to Sutter's Fort,
and a rescue party set out on January 31. Arriving at Donner Lake
20 days later, they found the camp completely snowbound and the
surviving emigrants delirious with relief at their arrival.
Rescuers fed the starving group as well as they could and then
began evacuating them. Three more rescue parties arrived to help,
but the return to Sutter's Fort proved equally harrowing, and the
last survivors didn't reach safety until late April. Of the 89
original members of the Donner Party, only 45 reached California.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: kohiggs@gmail.com
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