Covered Wagon Women

by Holmes, Kenneth

• ISBN13: 9780803272972
• ISBN10: 0803272979
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-04-01
• Publisher: Univ of Nebraska Pr

Summary

The overland trails in the 1860s witnessed the creation of stage stations to facilitate overland travel. These stations, placed every twenty or thirty miles, ensured that travelers would be able to obtain grain for their livestock and food for themselves. They also sped up the process of mail delivery to remote Western outposts. Tragically, the easing of overland travel coincided with renewed conflicts with the Cheyenne and other Plains Indians. The massacre of Black Kettle's people at Sand Creek instigated two years of bloody reprisals and counterreprisals. "Amid this turmoil and change, these daring women continued to build on the example set by earlier women pioneers. As Harriet Loughary wrote upon her arrival in California, "[after] two thousands of miles in an ox team, making an average of eighteen miles a day enduring privations and dangers . . . When we think of the earliest pioneers . . . we feel an untold gratitude towards them."

Author Biography

Introducing this Bison Books edition is Maria Montoya, an assistant professor of history and an assistant professor in the Program in American Culture at the University of Michigan.

Table of Contents

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION	7	(8)
A LETTER FROM LA GRANDE RONDE, 1862	15	(12)
Nancy C. Glenn
Introduction	15	(4)
The Letter	19	(8)
LETTERS FROM THE OREGON TRAIL, 1862-1863	27	(32)
Louisa Cook
Introduction	27	(3)
The Letters	30	(29)
A TRIP TO THE COLORADO MINES, 1862	59	(36)
Ellen Tootle
Introduction	59	(2)
The Diary	61	(34)
JOURNAL OF A MORMON WOMAN, 1863	95	(14)
Mary Elizabeth Lightner
Introduction	95	(3)
The Journal	98	(11)
A LETTER FROM THE OREGON TRAIL, 1863	109	(6)
Elizabeth Elliott
Introduction	109	(2)
The Letter	111	(4)
TRAVELS AND INCIDENTS, 1864	115	(48)
Harriet A. Loughary
Introduction	115	(2)
The Travels	117	(46)
A JOURNAL OF OUR TRIP, 1864	163	(36)
Lucretia Lawson Epperson
Introduction	163	(2)
The Journal	165	(34)
THE 1864 JOURNAL	199	(34)
Mary Ringo
Introduction and Note on John Ringo	199	(5)
The Journal	204	(29)
THOUGHTS BY THE WAY, 1864-1865	233
Harriet Hitchcock
Introduction	233	(2)
The Journal	235
Illustrations
TABLE OF DISTANCES BETWEEN ATCHISON, KANSAS, AND PLACERVILLE, CALIFORNIA	11-12
NANCY C. GLENN	14
THE OMNIBUS	29
LUCRETIA EPPERSON	165
GRAVE MARKER OF MARTIN RINGO	201
HARRIET ADELLE HITCHCOCK	232