On the morning of October 3, 1842, Whitman, saying good-by to his wife and home, climbed into his saddle and with General Lovejoy, their half-breed guide, and three pack-mules set out on the ride that was to win us an empire. The little group of American missionaries and settlers whom he left behind gave him a rousing cheer as he rode off and then stood in silence with choking throats and misted eyes until the heroic doctor and his companions were swallowed by the forest.
With horses fresh, they reached Fort Hall in eleven days, where the English factor, Captain Grant—the same man who, six years before, had attempted to prevent Whitman from taking his wagon into Oregon—doubtless guessing at their mission, did his best to detain them. Learning at Fort Hall that the northern tribes were on the war-path, Whitman and his companions struck southward in the direction of Great Salt Lake, planning to work from there eastward, via Fort Uintah and Fort Uncompahgre, to Santa Fé, and thence by the Santa Fé trail to St. Louis, which was on the borders of civilization. The journey from Fort Hall to Fort Uintah was one long nightmare, the temperature falling at times to forty degrees below zero and the snow being so deep in places that the horses could scarcely struggle through. While crossing the mountains on their way to Taos they were caught in a blinding snow-storm, in which, with badly frozen limbs, they wandered aimlessly for hours. Finally, upon the guide admitting that he was lost and could go no farther, they sought refuge in a deep ravine. Whitman dismounted and, kneeling in the snow, prayed for guidance. Can’t you picture the scene: the lonely, rock-walled gorge; the shivering animals standing dejectedly, heads to the ground and reins trailing; the general, muffled to the eyes in furs; the impassive, blanketed half-breed; in the centre, upon his knees, the indomitable missionary, praying to the God of storms; and the snowflakes falling swiftly, silently, upon everything? As though in answer to the doctor’s prayers—and who shall say that it was not—the lead-mule, which had been left to himself, suddenly started plunging through the snowdrifts as though on an urgent errand. Whereupon the guide called out: “This old mule’ll find the way back to camp if he kin live long ’nough to git there.” And he did.
The next morning the guide said flatly that he would go no farther.
“I know this country,” he declared, “an’ I know when things is possible an’ when they ain’t. It ain’t possible to git through, an’ it’s plumb throwin’ your lives away to try it. I’m finished.”
This was a solar-plexus blow for Whitman, for he was already ten days behind his schedule. But, though staggered, he was far from being beaten. Telling Lovejoy to remain in camp and recuperate the animals—which he did by feeding them on brush and the inner bark of willows, for there was no other fodder—Whitman turned back to Fort Uncompahgre, where he succeeded in obtaining a stouter-hearted guide. In a week he had rejoined Lovejoy. The storm had ceased, and with rested animals they made good progress over the mountains to the pyramid pueblo of Taos, the home of Kit Carson. Tarrying there but a few hours, worn and weary though they were, they pressed on to the banks of the Red River, a stream which is dangerous even in summer, only to find a fringe of solid ice upon each shore, with a rushing torrent, two hundred feet wide, between. For some minutes the guide studied it in silence. “It is too dangerous to cross,” he said at last decisively.
“Dangerous or not, we must cross it, and at once,” answered Whitman. Cutting a stout willow pole, eight feet or so in length, he put it on his shoulder and remounted.
“Now, boys,” he ordered, “shove me off.” Following the doctor’s directions, Lovejoy and the guide urged the trembling beast onto the slippery ice and then gave him a sudden shove which sent him, much against his will, into the freezing water. Both horse and rider remained for a moment out of sight, then rose to the surface well toward the middle of the stream, the horse swimming desperately. As they reached the opposite bank the doctor’s ingenuity in providing himself with the pole quickly became apparent, for with it he broke the fringe of ice and thus enabled his exhausted horse to gain a footing and scramble ashore. Wood was plentiful, and he soon had a roaring fire. In a wild country, when the lead-animal has gone ahead the others will always follow, so the general and the guide had no great difficulty in inducing their horses and pack-mules to make the passage of the river, rejoining Whitman upon the opposite bank.
Despite the fact that they found plenty of wood along the route that they had taken, which was fully a thousand miles longer than the northern course would have been, all the party were severely frozen, Whitman suffering excruciating pain from his frozen ears, hands, and feet. The many delays had not only caused the loss of precious time, but they had completely exhausted their provisions. A dog had accompanied the party, and they ate him. A mule came next, and that kept them until they reached Santa Fé, where there was plenty. Santa Fé—that oldest city of European occupation on the continent—welcomed and fed them. From there over the famous Santa Fé trail to Bent’s Fort, a fortified settlement on the Arkansas, was a long journey but, compared with what they had already gone through, an easy one. A long day’s ride northeastward from this lonely outpost of American civilization, and they found across their path a tributary of the Arkansas. On the opposite shore was wood in plenty. On their side there was none, and the river was frozen over with smooth, clear ice, scarce strong enough to hold a man. They must have wood or they would perish from the cold; so Whitman, taking the axe, lay flat upon the ice and snaked himself across, cut a sufficient supply of fuel and returned the way he went, pushing it before him. While he was cutting it, however, an unfortunate incident occurred: the axe-helve was splintered. This made no particular difference at the moment, for the doctor wound the break in the handle with a thong of buckskin. But as they were in camp that night a famished wolf, attracted by the smell of the fresh buckskin, carried off axe and all, and they could find no trace of it. Had it happened a few hundred miles back it would have meant the failure of the expedition, if not the death of Whitman and his companions. On such apparently insignificant trifles do the fate of nations sometimes hang.
Crossing the plains of what are now the States of Oklahoma and Kansas, great packs of gaunt, gray timber-wolves surrounded their tent each night and were kept at bay only at the price of unceasing vigilance, one member of the party always remaining on guard with a loaded rifle. The moment a wolf was shot its famished companions would pounce upon it and tear it to pieces. From Bent’s Fort to St. Louis was, strangely enough, one of the most dangerous portions of the journey, for, while heretofore the chief dangers had come from cold, starvation, and savage beasts, here they were in hourly danger from still more savage men, for in those days the Santa Fé trail was frequented by bandits, horse-thieves, renegade Indians, fugitives from justice, and the other desperate characters who haunted the outskirts of civilization and preyed upon the unprotected traveller. Notwithstanding these dangers, of which he had been repeatedly warned at Santa Fé and Bent’s Fort, the doctor, leaving Lovejoy and the guide to follow him with the pack-animals, pushed on through this perilous region alone, but lost his way and spent two precious days in finding it again—a punishment, he said for having travelled on the Sabbath.
The only occasion throughout all his astounding journey when this man of iron threatened to collapse was when, upon reaching St. Louis, in February, 1843, he learned, in answer to his eager inquiries, that the Ashburton treaty had been signed on August 9, long before he left Oregon, and that it had been ratified by the Senate on November 10, while he was floundering in the mountain snows near Fort Uncompahgre. For a moment the missionary’s mahogany-tanned face went white and his legs threatened to give way beneath him. Could it be that this was the end of his dream of national expansion? Was it possible that his heroic ride had been made for naught? But summoning up his courage he managed to ask: “Is the question of the Oregon boundary still open?” When he learned that the treaty had only settled the question of a few square miles in Maine, and that the matter of the northwest boundary was still pending, the revulsion was so great that he reeled and nearly fell. God be praised! There was still time for him to get to Washington! The river was frozen and he had to depend upon the stage, and an overland journey from St. Louis to Washington in midwinter was no light matter. But to Whitman with muscles like steel springs, a thousand miles by stage-coach over atrocious roads was not an obstacle worthy of discussion.