They are nearly all loose, and I am afraid we will
have to stop sooner, if there can be found wood suitable to heat the
tires. There is no wood here, and our women and children are out now
gathering "buffalo chips" to burn, in order to do the cooking. These
chips burn well.
MRS. GEORGE DONNER.
On the eighteenth of June, Captain Russell, who had been stricken with
bilious fever, resigned his office of leader. My father and other
subordinate officers also resigned their positions. The assembly
tendered the retiring officials a vote of thanks for faithful service;
and by common consent, ex-Governor Boggs moved at the head of the train
and gave it his name.
[Illustration: FORT LARAMIE AS IT APPEARED WHEN VISITED BY THE DONNER
PARTY]
[Illustration: CHIMNEY ROCK]
We had expected to push on to Fort Laramie without stopping elsewhere,
but when we reached Fort Bernard, a small fur-trading post ten miles
east of Fort Laramie, we learned that the Sioux Indians were gathering
on Laramie Plain, preparing for war with the Crows, and their allies,
the Snakes; also that the emigrants already encamped there found
pasturage very short. Consequently, our train halted at this more
advantageous point, where our cattle could be sent in charge of herders
to browse along the Platte River, and where the necessary materials
could be obtained to repair the great damage which had been done to our
wagon wheels by the intense heat of the preceding weeks.
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