Oregon History
The Terrible Trail
Weary Oregon Trail emigrants,
eager to ease travel or gain
mileage, often attempted cutoffs
and shortcuts. While many of these
alternate routes proved successful,
others did not—they became roads
to ruin for some and the end of the
trail for others.
In 1845, frontiersman Stephen Meek persuaded over 1,000
people to leave the trail at present-day Vale and trek
across the desert toward the upper Wilamette Valley.
Blazing a wagon road up the Malheur River they entered
Harney Valley, near this site. Hunger, thirst, illness and
death stalked the wagon train as it wandered west and
ultimately north toward the Columbia River. Bitterness
against Meek gecame so intense that he was compelled to
travel beyon rifle range. Meek eventually foraged ahead
to The Dalles, where a rescue party was organized, but
relief arrived too late for more than twenty emigrants
who were buried in lonely graves along the way.
In 1853, Elijah Elliott, a Willamette Valley settler,
convinced over 1,000 people to attempt a shortcut over
the Cascade Range. Following Meek's route to Harney
Valley, Elliott's party diverged around the south shores
of Harney and Malheur Lakes. Continuing westward,
the party became disoriented. As the emigrants became
increasingly desperate, scouts searched ahead for water
and a route over the mountains. Eventually, scouts
located a crude road over the Willamette Pass. One
year later, William Macy led 121 wagons along a
similar route without serious difficulty.
