November 1846: The Donner Party

摘要

The 1840s saw a surge in the westward expansion that took place across the United States in the decades following the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. By 1840, according to one estimate, some seven million Americans-40% of the country's population at the time-lived in the area between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River. In the years that followed, nearly half a million emigrants traveled westward in search of economic prosperity, religious freedom, or simply a better life. Their journeys fulfilled the "Manifest Destiny" described by journalist John O'Sullivan in 1845, but only at the risk of great peril. Chief among the dangers the emigrants encountered were the harsh weather conditions that prevail across mountainous regions of the western United States during winter.Such was the case for the group of emigrants made up primarily of the families of George Donner, his brother Jacob Donner, and James Reed. Settingout from their home in Springfield, Illinois, in the spring of 1846, the party joined a larger wagon train of westward-bound pioneers in Independence, Missouri-the starting point of the California, Oregon, and Santa Fe Trails-to embark on a journey of more than 2,000 miles across a vast region of unorganized territory toward present-day California.