California Trail (Bidwell-Bartleson) 1841
"First Wagons to California"
Contributed by Steve F. Russell
The Bidwell-Bartleson Party of 1841 was the first to attempt to travel by wagon train from Missouri to California (then owned by Mexico). Their general route was over what we now call the California Trail. This “route” is actually a trail system of routes that evolved during the gold rush and emigration years of the 1840s through the 1860s.
Often called the “First Wagons to California,” Bidwell-Bartleson failed to get their wagons all the way. They had to abandon them is the eastern deserts of Nevada because of severe stress to their livestock.
The Expedition
The Bidwell-Bartleson story begins in the spring of 1839 with Bidwell’s travel from Cincinnati, Ohio, down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, to Burlington, Iowa. After his luck failed him homesteading in Iowa, he headed cross-country to the Missouri River, near Keytesville, Missouri, and then up the north side of the Missouri River to Platte County, Missouri, north of Kansas City. After school teaching and another failure at homesteading in Platte County (probably at Liberty, Missouri), Bidwell decided to head to California and, in late 1840, started an effort to organize an expedition for that purpose.
On May 15, 1841, the expedition was ready and departed Westport Landing at Kansas City headed northwest for the Platte River in Nebraska. They followed the Platte River and the North Platte River past Chimney Rock, Scotts Bluff, Fort Laramie, Casper, reaching Pathfinder Reservoir in central Wyoming.
West of the reservoir, they followed the Sweetwater River to South Pass on the Continental Divide in Wyoming. This entire route followed closely—but not exactly—the route that would later become famous as the emigrant trail to Oregon and California.
West of South Pass, their route was a combination of other routes taken earlier and their own route choices. To navigate western Wyoming, they followed the Little Sandy River, the Big Sandy River, the Green River (Spanish River), and Blacks Fork and Hams Fork of the Green River. They crossed the rugged mountains on the western border of Wyoming and exited into the valley of the Bear River near Randolph, Utah.
They went down the Bear River northward to Soda Springs, Idaho, on the route of what would become the Oregon Trail. They marveled at the carbon-dioxide-powered springs and soda impregnated water of Soda Springs. This route was taken by virtually all emigrants on the Oregon Trail.
At Alexander, Idaho, west of Soda Springs, the party split up into two groups—one to Oregon and one to California. The Oregon group decided to go to Fort Hall and on to Oregon. John Bidwell, John Bartleson, and the others continued to California.
From Alexander, they turned southwest to follow the Bear River to the Great Salt Lake. Their route took them past the lake and then, they turned west to find the Humboldt River.
Most of the route between Donner Spring and Mary’s River (Humboldt River) would later be used by the Hastings Cutoff.
Its highest elevation, at Disaster Pass, California, is 7416 feet (a meager 5 feet higher than South Pass!). The length of the trail from Westport Landing, Missouri to Dr. John Marsh’s cabin in California is 2151.5 topographic miles.
Later Expeditions
As far as we know, the Bidwell-Bartleson Party were the first to attempt to take wagons over the Oregon-California Trail to northern California. They followed the generally established Oregon Trail to west of Soda Springs, Idaho, and then went southwest toward California and arrived at the cabin of Dr. John Marsh, about 30 miles east of Oakland, California. They crossed the Sierra Nevada Mountains south of Ebbetts Pass and north of Senora Pass.
They had to abandon their wagons at Big Springs, Nevada (in Goshute Valley, on the east face of the Pequop Mountains). This was about 470 miles short of the pass they crossed to go into Paradise, California.
Joseph Walker tried to take wagons to California in 1843, but he also failed to cross the Sierra Nevada Mountains. He abandoned the wagons in the Owens Valley of central California.
The first wagons into California were with the Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party that crossed Donner Pass in 1844 eventually arriving at Sutter’s Fort. It seems they used the Oregon Trail route to Fort Hall, Idaho and then followed the same general route as Joseph Walker in 1843—along the Raft and Humboldt Rivers to the Truckee River—where they followed the trail over Donner Pass and on to Sutter’s Fort.