The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic FateHoughton, Eliza Poor Donner
History
The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate
Houghton, Eliza Poor Donner
Donner Party; Overland journeys to the Pacific
"Yes, I am going with Eliza," was the prompt answer, which had no
sooner left her lips, than grandma resorted to her last expedient: she
ordered us both to our room, and forbade us to leave it until she
should hear from grandpa.
What message she sent him by the milker we never learned. Georgia,
being already dressed for the journey, and her trunk containing most of
her possessions being at Mrs. Bergwald's, had nothing to do but await
results.
I quickly changed my working suit for a better one, which had been
given me by a German friend from San Francisco. Then I laid out my
treasured keepsakes. In my nervous energy, nothing was forgotten. I
took pains that my clothes against the wall should hang in straight
rows, that the folded ones should lie in neat piles in my pretty
Chinese trunk, and that the bunch of artificial flowers which I had
always kept for a top centre mark, should be exactly in the middle;
finally, that the gray gauze veil used as a fancy covering of the whole
should be smoothly tucked in around the clothing. This done, I gave a
parting glance at the dainty effect, dropped the cover, snapped the
queer little brass padlock in place, put the key on the table, and
covered the trunk so that its embossed figures of birds and flowers
should be protected from harm.
We had not remembered to tell Elitha about the hundred dollars which
Jakie had willed us, so decided to let grandma keep it to cover some
of the expense we had been to her, also not to ask for our little
trinkets stored in her closet.
With the bundle containing my keepsakes, I now sat down by Georgia and
listened with bated breath to the sound of grandma's approaching
footsteps. She entered and hastily began,
"Grandpa says, if you want to go, and your people are here to take you,
we have no right to keep you; but that I am not to part with you bad
friends. So I came to shake hands and say good-bye. But I don't forgive
you for going away, and I never want to see you or hear from you
again!"
She did not ask to see what we were taking away, nor did her good-bye
seem like parting.
The fear that something might yet arise to prevent our reaching brother
and sister impelled us to run the greater part of the distance to the
hotel, and in less than an hour thereafter, we were in the carriage
with them on the way to Mrs. Bergwald's, prior to taking the road to
Sacramento.
Off at last, without a soul in the town knowing it!
Georgia, who had neither said nor done anything to anger grandma, was
easier in mind and more comfortable in body, than I, who, fasting, had
borne the trials of the morning. I could conceal the cause, but not the
faint and ill feeling which oppressed me during the morning drive and
continued until I had had something to eat at the wayside inn, and a
rest, while the horses were enjoying their nooning.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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