The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-07-18
DEATH VALLEY HORRORS
EXPERIENCES IN THE SCORCHED
AND BLASTED TERRITORY.
Haunted by RepuIsivc Reptiles and
Was Equal to an Emergency.

San Barnardino (Cal) Letter in ST. Louis
Gl0be-DemOcrat.
No locality in all America is so lonely,
so deadly hot and so weirdly impressive in
scenery as Death Valley. in Inyo county,
California. 1t is close to the southwestern
boundary of Nevada, and is cut off from
California proper by the Panamint and Flu
neral mountains. 1t is as nearly a bit of
hades as may be imagined on this earth,
Explorers say there is nothing so frightful
on this continent. 1t is truly valley of
desolation-150 miles long and tapering from
a width of seven miles at the southern end
to twenty-one at the northern. 1t is some
200 feet below the level of the sea, and is
walled in three sides by ghostly white
mountains, over 5000 feet high, of basalt
and granite. AS far as the eye can reach
not a living thing may be seen. Even
birds do not fly into that region, and the
absolute silence of the spectral valley
pounds in ones ear. No friendly cloud ever
obscures the sun from spring to autumn,
and all summer the temperature IS never
less than 125 degrees. Often it is $50 de-
grees. The whole valley has been scorched
and blasted through countless ages. The
borax and volcanic formation. Dead bodies
never decompose there. They are mummi-
fed in few days under the frightful solar
heat and the roasting winds that cOntinu-
ally sweep through the canyons of the val
ley.
A party of three men have just come to
this place, after having come through
Death Valley. Fortunately for them, it was
in early summer. That they live to tell
their sufferings is a marvel among the
mining prospectors and cowboys who know
something of Death Valley from excursions
into it in midwinter and along it's southern
edge in summer. John w. WesicOtt, form
erly in the employ of the State of California
a guardian of the forests in the Yo-
semitic valley. was the leader in the party.
The three men went from Los Angeles to
look at some silver and gold deposits in the
San Lorenzo mountains, In southern Ma
vada, last May, and finding prospects or
wealth in the newly-found mines, they de-
layed their departure until the LIST OF June;
Miners and others, who had traversed i
there would be no danger in travelling
through that region in June, If they could
plenty of water. The trip through Death
Valley to the Calico mining region at Dag
gett would, save the miners Journey OF
then westward over the Serras at Truckee,
and then down through the Sacramento and
San Joaquin valleys to Los Angeles.
Mr.. Westcott and his two comrades de-
cided to risk the Journey through Death
Valley. The weather had been comparative
ly cool for several weeks previous to their
start with mule wagons from southern Ne
vada, across Inyo county, for Daggett. But
the SECOND day they were out Old sol came
out in blazing glory. The party of three was
six days in crossing the valley. In that pc
riod each man lost from fifteen to twenty
two pounds of flesh, and one of the men
has been made so weak and nervous that
it will be weeks before he will be himself.
The dried meats became so hard that they
loA9n loo Cf yNAfG
toes rotted in three days; their water evap-
grated fast and was drunk only when It
was absolutely necessary. The party had
large quantity of canned fruit, and, al
though It became very hot, it was the
sole article of diet that saved their lives.
They had three dozen boiled eggs that
shriveled and spoiled in the shell, so as to
be unfit to eat. even by almost starving
men, One night they killed two rattle
snakes in a canyon leading out of the val
ley and skinned, cooked and ate the flesh
of the reptiles.
A FRIGHTFUL JOURNEY.
ct was a frightful journey" said Mr..
Westcott to a reporter in San Bernardino.
mo one knows the horrors of thirst and
what spectral fantasies come to one toiling
as we did over the horrible alkan desert
waste for days in a temperature of never
less than 125 degrees One day I know we
travelled in solar heat of over $50 degrees.
There were the most perfect mirages of
streams of water and beautiful lakes about
US every dawn and sunset and had we not
heard all our lives how these atmospheric
pictures have lured to death many an emil
grant through Death Valley we should
surely have left the trail and gone wan
dering about the valley. We had to be
watchful of one another, for one can be-
come insane in few hours in the horrible
solar heat and poisonous atmosphere of
Death Valley; We Travelled almost entirely
by night and sat beneath wagons in the
daytime. We had provided extra heavy
shoes and, had we reached the southern
end of the valley one day later, each Of
us would have been ShoeleSS.
"All that you have ever heard of the hor
rors of thirst on the alkai plains, and
under burning sun where evaporation IS
suffered only family what scores of men
have known before they staggered forward
to die In Death Valley. However, we ex-
perienced enough to have some idea of
what agony there is for one who travels a
day, or possibly twentyfour hours in
fierce hot sunshine. Our mouths became
dry and parched, unless we drank at least
once every hour. One day two OF us be-
came separated from the mules and driver,
where the kegs of water We're carried, and
we went six hours without drink My
tongue was literally as dry as herring,
my eyes burned, and my knees seemed as
if they would not carry me another yard.
Both of us knew that those were faint
symptoms of delirium from thirst, and we
resolutey kept on back to the wagon and
mules. Several days of terrible heat and
the glare of the sun upon ones eyes deaden
were in the valley we were in such pain
and so weak that none of us spoke more
than dozen words a day. Our nervous SyS-
TENS still upset.
did we see any human remains in Death
Valley? Yes, one day we rested few hun
dred yards from four human skulls and a
lot of human bones. They were white and
about the hips were yellow shreds like dried
tendons. That was all there was left of
flesh the bones. [ believe they must
have been there over twenty years. Under
other climatic conditions the bones would
have crumbled to dust long ago. The skele-
tons were close together. Twenty feet away
were bones of animals-probably mules, and
the parts Of a big wagon. The people had
evidently drawn close to one another in
boraX works are many human skeletons.
Oh the pathos of Death Valley has never
been adequately told. There's no spot like
it elsewhere"
This frghtful locality originally earned
it's name back in the days of the Argo-
train containing party of thirty emil
grants passed through the Mormon Settle
ment bound for the new FL Dorado. They
assembled the Funeral mountains, and went
down in the Valley of Death. Only two
survived to tell the tale. Twenty-eight
not the only instruments of DEATH which
Justify the title of the horrible canyon.
A TERRIBLE SCENE.
A trackless waste of sand and salt SHIN
mers by day beneath the rays of a more
than tropical sun. On entering there is no
escape. Hemmed in on all sides by titanic
rocks and majestic mountains, full of
treacherous pitfalls. false surfaces and
quivering quicksands, surrounded by ST.
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