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arriving there were signing on - some who reached this rendezvous point had changes of mind and then turned back.

The next day the company was ready to move and prepared for the ferry crossing. A jostling mass of wagons with drivers cracking whips and shouting at their teams broke the silence of the morning hour. The mothers screaming at the little ones and the frantic crying of the lost children was audible above other noises as horses whinnied, cattle bawled, chickens squawked, dogs yelped or barked as wagons moved forward with a crescendo of mad sounds.

But at last the train was on its way. It had taken the better part of two days to get across the river and this was about the middle of June 1847.

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*    JAMES N. HARTY'S LETTERS       *
*     TO HIS IOWA HOME FOLKS        * 
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James N. Harty was one of the westward travelers at about this time and it is believed he was aboard the same wagon train as our Davis family. On June 29, 1847 and Then on July 9, 1847, he wrote to the family in Iowa describing the progress of the journey.

His letters read as follows: (sic...)

" to David F. Harty & Jeremia Beauford
Augusta P.O.
Desmoines, Co
Iowa
From Oregon

Platt River June 29th 1847

Dear Father: brother and sister - I embrace the, present oppertunity to inform you of our progress and prospects thus far on the road to Oregon. Since we left St. Joseph our health has been reasonably good. After passing the Mo River we passed on to Musquitoe creek a distance of 15 Ms and tarried there until our number had so increased that we considered it safe to pass on and being reinforced by those who overtook us and those we overtook our number of waggons has at length increased to 47 with about 75 men We passed smoothly along for several days nothing worthy of notice taking place except the organization of our Co. which terminated in the election of D.D.Davis Capt. of Green Bay: Lee Co. Iowa. After passing on as far as Little Blue we with others in the Co. met with a small accident. two loose horses came galloping by our teems which gave fright to them and they commenced running with such rapidity it seemed almost impossible to stop them which we did not succeed in doing until three of the cattle had fallen down and each had a horn tore off among which was Dennis' The other E. Hughes After leaving Little Blue we passed over the Platt river, after passing up it several days we were obliged to lay by one day to wait on Mrs. Balch when she gave birth to an infant son We traveled on the next day and have heard no complaint from her since: but the day after we were obliged to lay by again to bury a child, daughter of a Mr. Kimball we dug her grave deep and then sunk a vault and lay her in it with the winding sheet around her having nother to make a coffin of but covered it with pieces of short board and thought her as cemented in a vault. We placed her inscription a little way from the leveled off grave to deceive the prowling Pawnees. We have already passed eight new made graves amog, which was one J.H.Fisher, supposed to be from Salem Henry Co. he had been dug down to by the indians but not taken out we covered him up Let this not discourage you for this road has been traveled by thousands within a month We have not seen any of the thievish Pawnee yet they have visited us by night and in spite of the guards they have succeeded in stealing one of our horses One of our Co. has lost two fine filleys by ones following the" (cont.) -->

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