"I botanize, and read some, but cook "heaps" more. There are four
hundred and twenty wagons, as far as we have heard, on the road
between here and Oregon and California.

"Give our love to all inquiring friends. God bless them.

"Yours truly,
Mrs. George Donner."

By the Fourth of July the Donner Party had reached Fort Laramie.
They pushed on west over the old trail up the Sweetwater River
and across the South Pass, the easiest of all the mountain passes
known to the early travelers. Without much adventure they reached
Fort Bridger, then only a trading-post. Here occurred the fatal
mistake of the Donner Party.

Some one at the fort strongly advised them to take a new route, a
cut-off said to shorten the distance by about three hundred
miles. This cut-off passed along the south shore of Great Salt
Lake and caught up the old California Trail from Fort Hall--then
well established and well known-along the Humboldt River. The
great Donner caravan delayed for some days at Fort Bridger,
hesitating over the decision of which route to follow. The party
divided. All those who took the old road north of Salt Lake by
way of Fort Hall reached California in complete safety. Of the
original Donner Party there remained eighty-seven persons. All of
these took the cut-off, being eager to save time in their travel.
They reached Salt Lake after unspeakable difficulties. Farther
west, in the deserts of Nevada, they lost many of their cattle.