The
Graves family, the Breens, the Donners, the Murphys, the Reeds, all
walked beside the wagons until overpowered with fatigue. The men became
exhausted much sooner, as a rule, than the women. Only the sick, the
little children, and the utterly exhausted, were ever allowed to ride.
Eddy and his wife had lost all their cattle, and each carried one of
their children and such personal effects as they were able. Many in the
train were without shoes, and had to travel barefooted over the weary
sands, and flinty, sharp-edged stones.
On the ninth of October a death had resulted from this necessity of
having to walk. It was a case of desertion, which, under other
circumstances, would have been unpardonably heartless. An old man named
Hardcoop was traveling with Keseberg. He was a cutler by trade, and had
a son and daughter in the city of Antwerp, in Belgium. It is said he
owned a farm near Cincinnati, Ohio, and intended, after visiting
California to dispose of this farm, and with the proceeds return to
Antwerp, for the purpose of spending his declining years with his
children. He was a man of nearly three-score years, and the hardships of
the journey had weakened his trembling limbs and broken down his health.
Sick, feeble, helpless as he was, this old man was compelled to walk
with the others.
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