Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1892-05-12
ACROSS DEATH VALLEY
Terrible Trip of an Emigrant Rand wbosa
Bravest Member Was a Wnnaan

The most fatally famous part of the
Great American Desert is Death VALLEY
in California There is on all the olohe
no other spot more forbidding, more
desolate, more deadly. 1t is a concentra-
ton of the horrors of that whole hideous
area, and 1t has bitter history.
One of the most interesting and graphic
stories ever listened to was that related
to me, several years ago, by one of the
survivors of the famous Death Valley
Party of 1S49 Rev. J. W. Briar an aged
Methodist clergyman now living in Cali.
fornia. A party of 500 emigrauts started
on the last day of September, 1849, from
the southern end of Utah to closs tue
Jesert to the then new mines of California.
There were los canvas.topped wagons,
drawn by sturdy oxen, beside which
tTudged the shaggy men, rifles in hand.
While under the canvas awnings rode the
women and children. In a short time
there was division of opinion as to the
proper route across that painless waste
In front, and next day five wagons ana
their people went east to reach Santa Fe
whence there were dim Mexican trails TO
Los AngeIes), and the rest plunged bold
~ into the desert. The party which went
by way of Santa Fe reached California in
December, after vast sufferings. The
larger company travelled in comfort for a
few days until they reached about where
Phoebe is now. Then they entered the
Land OF Thirst, and for more than three
months wandered lost in that realm of
horror. 1t was almost impossible to get
wagons through country furrOwed with
canyons; so they soon abandoned their
vehicles, packing what they could upon
the backs Of the oxen. They struggled on
to giittering lakes, only to find them
deadly poison or but mirage OF barren
sands. Now aud then a wee spring in
the mountains gave them new life. One
by one the oxen dropped; day by day the
| scanty -four ran lower. Nine young men
who separated from the rest, being stall
wart and unencumbered with families,
reached Death Valley ahead of the others,
and were lost Their bones were found
many years later b. Gov. Blaisdpl and his
| surveyors, who gave Death Valley It's
name.
The valley lies in Inyo county and is
about one hundred and fifty miles long.
In width it tarers from. three miles at its
southern end to thirty at the northern.
1t is over two hundred feet below the
level of the sea. The main party crossed
| 1T at about the middle, where it is but a
few miles wide, but suffered frightfuIly
there. Day by day some of their mum
Der sank upon the burning sands never to
rise. The survivors were to weak to help
the fallen
The strongest of the whole party was
nervous little Mrs. Brier, who had come
to Colorado an invalid, and who shared
with her boys of four, seven and nine
years of age the indescribable tramp of
900 miles. For the last three weeks she
had to lift her athletic husband from the
ground every morning and steady him
few moments before he could stand. Sac
gave help to wasted giants, any one of
whom q few months before could have
lifted her with one hand.
At last the few survivors crossed the
| range which shuts of that most dreadful
Of deserts from the garden of the world,
and wore tenderly nursed to health at the
hacienda or ranch house of courtly
Spaniard. Mr.. Brier had lost 100 pounds
| in weight and the others were thin in
proportion. When saw him last he was
hale old man of seventy-fve, cheerful
and active, but with strange furl ows In
his face to tell of those bygone sutferings.
| His heroic little wife was still living, and
the boys, who had such bitter expert
| ence as perh ps no other boys ever sur
vived, are now stalwart men.-C. +. Lum.
mis- In the Century.