Some interested readers may think the Donner Party was an independent group of pioneers who pushed their way west more or less alone until they were stopped by snow near what is today, Truckee.

The fact is that the party followed the wagon tracks of many other pioneer wagons except for two-three weeks in August 1846. Then the Donner group chose to take a shortcut, and it ended up hacking its own way, by itself, through the Wasatch Mountains east of the Great Salt Lake.

2,700 Pioneers
Indeed, some 2,700 people left Independence, Missouri to travel the Oregon/California Trail in the summer of 1846. Many went to Oregon; around 500 of them chose California and made it safely to Sutter's Fort in present-day Sacramento.

Of the 500, a sizeable number (60 wagons full) actually traveled through the Hastings "shortcut." The Donner Party took the shortcut about a week after Hastings had already left Fort Bridger WY with the 60 wagons. Then the Donner group had to detour in the shortcut, which cost the pioneers many extra days of time. This added to the fact that they were already lagging behind the emigration that year.


The map above shows the situation in late September 1846. The dark line represents the wagon tracks of the pioneers as they completed the west end of the California Trail from northeastern Nevada to Sutter's Fort.

On the left, at #1, are the leading wagons of the 1846 emigration to California. The people in these wagons have already crossed the Sierra at what will become Donner Summit, and they are almost to Sutter's Fort.

At #2 the Edwin Bryant group, which had left Fort Bridger with Hastings using pack animals (for speed) rather than wagons, is approaching Donner Lake. (See Week #13 in Donner Party series by McLaughlin.) This group will make it to Sutter's Fort.

The main Hastings group, in wagons, is at #3, which is present-day Reno. This group will make it to Sutter's Fort.

Slowly crossing the Humboldt Sink (40-mile desert) at #4 are the people who were with or near the Donner Party when it left the main Oregon/California Trail (in WY) and tried the Hastings Cutoff. The people at #4 stayed on the traditional trail to the west, rather than trying the touted shortcut. They will make it to Sutter's Fort.

Last on the trail, at #5, is the fragmented Donner Party, the last pioneers on the trail west that year. They were about a month behind the leaders (#1), and the Donner group had yet to cross the last desert (at #4) and climb the Sierra wall looming in the west as winter approached. #5 is very near present-day Elko, Nevada.

The Oregon/California Trail
For perspective on the history of the Oregon/California Trail, three years before the Donner saga, approximately 120 wagons (1,000 people and 5,000 livestock) used the trail to go from Missouri to Oregon. Three years after the Donner saga, in 1849, 6,000 wagons came west to California over the Oregon/California Trail with 40,000 people. The gold (and California) rush was on.

This story is part of the Tahoetopia series on the Donner Party, a vital part of the saga of the West.