Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party
The Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party (from English party = travel group) was a group of settlers who succeeded as the first to cross the mountains of the Sierra Nevada in the direction of California with covered wagons . The crossing took place in 1844, two years before that of the Donner Party , which is much better known due to the occurrence of cannibalism .
The group consisted of members of ten families who came from Iowa and hoped for a better future in California. The tour group was named after Elisha Stephens , a Mountain Man who led the group, John Townsend , who would later become California's first licensed doctor, and Martin Murphy, whose sons John and Daniel founded Murphys in what is now Calaveras County in 1848 .
The successful crossing of the Sierra Nevada by the Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party marks the beginning of later journeys by settlers on the California Trail .
history
The Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party consisted of 23 men, 8 women and around 15 children. The largest group among the settlers was the family of Martin Murphy, an Irish immigrant who emigrated to Canada in 1820 and then settled in western Missouri in 1840 . Another group consisted of the doctor John Townsend, his wife and their brother Moses Schallenberger. These two groups were joined by five Irish, three French and a number of trappers . The trappers included Isaac Hitchcock, Caleb Greenwood, and Elisha Stephens, the latter being chosen to lead the tour group.
The starting point of the trip was Council Bluffs in the Iowa Territory . Probably on May 8, 1844, the settlers crossed the Missouri River and continued their journey along the Platte River , a tributary of the Missouri. After a short stay at Fort Laramie , they continued to Fort Hall , which the group reached around August 10th. Instead of moving west on the Oregon Trail , the settlers took a south-westerly direction, taking their ox-drawn covered wagons through today's state of Nevada to the Truckee River .
At today's Donner Lake , six of the owners of covered wagons decided to leave them behind so that they could more easily conquer the mountains of the Sierra Nevada on horseback. The remaining five covered wagons were pulled up the slopes to today's Donner Pass , applying all their strength . The pass was probably crossed on November 25, 1844. Eighteen-year-old Moses Schallenberger was assigned to guard the six covered wagons that were left behind. It survived the winter by trapping and during this time it mainly fed on foxes.
Before their onward journey to Sutter's Fort , the settlers left the remaining five covered wagons with provisions as well as the women and children in the mountains under the guard of two men. On December 6th, a group of seventeen men set out for Sutter's Fort, which they reached a week later. There they met the six members of the tour group who had left the trek at Donner Lake and were the first white people to pass what is now Lake Tahoe on their journey to Sutter's Fort .
Instead of immediately returning to the women and children who had been left behind, the settlers who had arrived at the fort were obliged by Johann August Sutter to take part in his campaign against the Mexican governor of California Manuel Micheltorena . At what is now Monterey on the Pacific coast, Elisha Stephens was able to convince Sutter that he and his men were not needed, and returned with them to Sutter's Fort. From there they reached the members of the tour group who had been left behind in the mountains in February 1845 and brought them to the fort under favorable weather conditions.
Later years
Elisha Stephens settled in the San José area , where Stevens Creek [sic] is named after him. He later became the first white settler to settle in Bakersfield in what is now Kern County , where he died in 1887. Martin Murphy Sen. bought Rancho Ojo del Agua de la Coche in what is now Santa Clara County . His son Martin Murphy Jun. Founded the town of Sunnyvale . Two of his other sons made money selling goods to the gold prospectors of the California gold rush and founded Murphys , a town at the foot of the Sierra . His youngest daughter, Helen, married Charles Maria Weber, founder of the city of Stockton in what is now San Joaquin County . The Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party settler Dennis Martin was successful in the search for gold and used his fortune to buy land that now includes parts of Stanford University .
literature
- George R. Stewart: The California Trail: An Epic with Many Heroes , New York [u. a.] 1962, Chapter 4 “'44”, pp. 53–82.
Web links
- Gordon Richards: The Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party on the Truckee-Donner Historical Society website