Glenn D. Bradley

“ Nor was Kelley the only pony rider who took narrow chances from the guns of excited immigrants. Traveling rapidly and unencumbered, the rider, sunburned and blackened by exposure, must have borne on first glance no little resemblance to an Indian; and especially would the mistake be natural to excited wagon-men who were always in fear of dashing attacks from mounted Indians--attacks in which a single rider would often be deployed to ride past the white men at utmost speed in order to draw their fire. ”

“ Some scream themselves hoarse; others are strangely silent; and some--strong men--are moved to tears.
The noise of the cheering multitude grows faint as the Kansas shore draws near. The engines are reversed; a swish of water, and the craft grates against the dock. Scarcely has the gang plank been lowered than horse and rider dash over it and are off at a furious gallop. ”

“ Yet one thing is certain: in loyalty and blind devotion to duty, no group of employees will ever surpass the men who conducted the Pony Express. During the sixteen months of its existence, the riders of this wonderful enterprise, nobly assisted by the faithful station-keepers, travelled six hundred and fifty thousand miles, contending against the most desperate odds that a lonely wilderness and savage nature could offer, with the loss of only a single mail. And that mail happened to be of relatively small importance. Only one rider was ever killed outright while on duty. ”

“ It was the moral duty of the people to remain loyal. It truthfully asserted that California's influence in the Federal Union should be an example for other states to follow. If the idea of a Pacific Republic were repudiated by their own citizens, such action would discourage secession elsewhere and be a great moral handicap to that movement. And the press further pointed out with convincing clearness, that should the Union be dissolved, the project for a Pacific Railroad [19] with which the future of the Commonwealth was inevitably committed, would likely fail. ”

“ The above are random extracts from frontier newspapers, printed while the Pony Express was running. The Express could never have existed on its high plane of efficiency, without an abundance of coolheaded, hardened men; men who knew not fear and who were expert--though sometimes in vain--in all the wonderful arts of self-preservation practiced on the old frontier. That these employees could have performed even the simplest of their duties, without stirring and almost incredible adventures, it is needless to assert. ”

“ Yet it was of the greatest importance in binding the East and West together at a time when overland travel was slow and cumbersome, and when a great national crisis made the rapid communication of news between these sections an imperative necessity.
The Pony Express marked the highest development in overland travel prior to the coming of the Pacific railroad, which it preceded nine years. It, in fact, proved the feasibility of a transcontinental road and demonstrated that such a line could be built and operated continuously the year around--a feat that had always been regarded as impossible. ”

“ Today, after a lapse of over fifty years, nearly all of the heroes who achieved them have gone out on that last long journey from which no man returns. While history can pay the tribute of preserving some anecdotes of them and their collective achievements, it must be forever silent as to many of their personal acts of heroism.
While lasting praise is due the faithful station men who, in their isolation, so often bore the murderous attacks of Indians and bandits, it is, perhaps, to the riders that the seeker of romance is most likely to turn. ”

“ Another class of men to be feared was a small but powerful group representing much wealth, a financial class which proverbially shuns war because of the expense which war involves; a class that always insists upon peace, even at the cost of compromised honor. These men, with the influence which their money commanded, would inevitably espouse the side that seemed the most likely of speedy success; and in view of the early successes of the Confederate armies and the zealous proselytizing of rebel sympathizers in their midst they were a potential risk to loyal California. ”

“ The danger of secession was wholly potential. Yet potential dangers are none the less real. Had it not been for the determined energies of a few loyalists in California, led by General E. A. Sumner and cooperating with the Federal Government by means of the swiftest communication then possible--the Pony Express--history today, might read differently.
Now to turn once more to the potential dangers [18] that made the California crisis a reality. About three-eighths of the population were of southern descent and solidly united in sympathy for the Confederate states. ”

“ Throughout this crisis, news was received twice a week by the Pony Express, and, be it remembered, in less than half the time required by the old stage coach. Of its services then, no better words can be used than those of Hubert Howe Bancroft.
It was the pony to which every one looked for deliverance; men prayed for the safety of the little beast, and trembled lest the service should be discontinued. Telegraphic dispatches from Washington and New York were sent to St. Louis and thence to Fort Kearney, whence the pony brought them to Sacramento where they were telegraphed to San Francisco. ”

“ While a majority of the people of California were loyal to the Union, there was a vigorous minority intensely in sympathy with the southern cause and ready to conspire for, or bring about by force of arms if necessary, the secession of their state. As the Civil War became more and more imminent, it became obvious to Union men in both East and West that the existing lines of communication were untrustworthy. Just as soon as trouble should start, the Confederacy could, and most certainly would, gain control of the southern mail routes. ”

“ They are in California, leaping over its golden sands, treading its busy streets. The courser has unrolled to us the great American panorama, allowed us to glance at the homes of one million people, and has put a girdle around the earth in forty minutes. ”

“ The worst part of the journey lay between Salt Lake City and Sacramento, where for several hundred miles the route ran through a desert, much of it a bed of alkali dust where no living creature could long survive. It was not merely these dangers of dire exposure and privation that threatened, for wherever the country permitted of human life, Indians abounded. From the Platte River valley westward, the old route sped over by the Pony Express is today substantially that of the Union Pacific and Southern Pacific Railroads. ”

“ Nearby, closely inspecting the animal's equipment is a wiry little man scarcely twenty years old.
Time to go! Everybody back! A pause of seconds, and a cannon booms in the distance--the starting signal. The rider leaps to his saddle and starts. In less than a minute he is at the post office where the letter pouch, square in shape with four padlocked pockets, is awaiting him. Dismounting only long enough for this pouch to be thrown over his saddle, he again springs to his place and is gone. A short sprint and he has reached the Missouri River wharf. ”

“ On his return trip he had to pass once more through the aspen thicket where his predecessor had received his death wound. This was one of the most dangerous points on the entire trail, for the road zigzagged through a jungle, following a passage-way that was only large enough to admit a horse and rider; for two miles a man could not see more than thirty or forty feet ahead. Kelley was expecting trouble, and went through like a whirlwind, at the same time holding a repeating rifle in readiness should trouble occur. ”

“ Yet with the one exception, they stuck grimly to the saddle or trudged manfully ahead without a horse until the next station was reached. With these men, keeping the schedule came to be a sort of religion, a performance that must be accomplished--even though it forced them to play a desperate game the stakes of which were life and death. Many station men and numbers of riders while off duty were murdered by Indians. They were martyrs to the cause of patriotism and a newer and better civilization. ”

“ Every neck is stretched further and every eye strained wider away across the endless dead level of the prairie, a black speck appears against the sky, and it is plain that it moves. Well I should think so! ”

“ That only one rider was ever taken by the savages was due to the fact that the pony men rode magnificent horses which invariably outclassed the Indian ponies in speed and endurance. The lone man captured while on duty was completely surrounded by a large number of savages on the Platte River in Nebraska. He was shot dead and though his body was not found for several days, his pony, bridled and saddled, escaped safely with the mail which was duly forwarded to its destination. ”

“ In California, the region most benefited by the express, the opening of the line was likewise awaited with the keenest anticipation. Of course there had been at the outset a few dissenting opinions, the gist of the opposing sentiment being that the Indians would make the operation of the route impossible. One newspaper went so far as to say that it was "Simply inviting slaughter upon all the foolhardy young men who had been engaged as riders". But the California spirit would not down. A vast majority of the people favored the enterprise and clamored for it ”

“ Situated at a distance of nearly two thousand miles from the Missouri river which was then the nation's western frontier, this intervening space comprised trackless plains, almost impenetrable ranges of snow-capped mountains, and parched alkali deserts. And besides these barriers of nature which lay between the West coast and the settled eastern half of the country, there were many fierce tribes of savages who were usually on the alert to oppose the movements of the white race through their dominions. ”

“ Private corporations and Congress had not been wholly insensible to the needs of the West. Subsidized stage routes had for some years been in operation, and by the close of 1858 several lines were well-equipped and doing much business over the so-called Southern and Central routes. Perhaps the most common route for sending mail from the East to the Pacific Coast was by steamship from New York to Panama where it was unloaded, hurried across the Isthmus, and again shipped by water to San Francisco. ”

“ The rider's approach was watched for with keen anxiety. By daylight he could generally be seen in a cloud of dust, if in the desert or prairie regions. If in the mountains, the clear air made it possible for the station men to detect his approach a long way off, provided there were no obstructions to hide the view. At night the rider would make his presence known by a few lusty whoops. Dashing up to the station, no time was wasted. The courier would already have loosed his mochila, which he tossed ahead for the keeper to adjust on the fresh horse, before dismounting. ”

“ On one occasion they raised a purse of three hundred dollars for the star rider when a pouch containing a number of Chicago papers full of information from the South arrived at Sacramento a day ahead of schedule.
That these splendid achievements could never have been attained without a wonderful degree of enthusiasm and loyalty on the part of the men, scarcely needs asserting. The pony riders were highly respected by the stage and freight employees--in fact by all respectable men throughout the West. ”

“ The boom went on and the census of 1860 revealed a population of 380,000 in the new commonwealth. And when to these figures were added those of Oregon and Washington Territory, an aggregate of 444,000 citizens of the United States were found to be living on the Pacific Slope. Crossing the Sierras eastward and into the Great Basin, 47,000 more were located in the Territories of Nevada and Utah,--thus making a grand total of nearly a half million people beyond the Rocky Mountains in 1860. And these figures did not include Indians nor Chinese. ”

“ Johnnie Frey who has already been mentioned as the first rider out of St. Joseph, was little more than a boy when he entered the pony service. He was a native Missourian, weighing less than one hundred and twenty-five pounds. Though small in stature, he was every inch a man. Frey's division ran from St. Joseph to Seneca, Kansas, eighty miles, which he covered at an average of twelve and one half miles an hour, including all stops. When the war started, Frey enlisted in the Union army under General Blunt. ”

“ Probably no firm has ever surpassed in integrity that of Russell, Majors, and Waddell, famous throughout the West in the freighting and mail business before the advent of railroads in that section of the men, the verbal promise of one of their number was a binding guarantee and as sacredly respected as a bonded obligation. ”

“ An average speed of ten miles an hour including stops had to be maintained on the summer schedule. In the winter the run was sustained at eight miles an hour; deep snows made the latter performance the more difficult of the two.
The best record made by the Pony Express was in getting President Lincoln's inaugural speech across the continent in March, 1861. This address, outlining as it did the attitude of the new Chief Executive toward the pending conflict, was anticipated with the deepest anxiety by the people on the Pacific Coast. ”

“ Of the eighty riders usually in the service, half were always riding in either direction, East and West. The average "run" was seventy-five miles, the men going and coming over their respective divisions on each succeeding day. Yet there were many exceptions to this rule, as will be shown later. At the outset, although facilities for shorter relays had been provided, it was planned to run each horse twenty-five miles with an average of three horses to the rider; but it was soon found that a horse could rarely continue at a maximum speed for so great a distance. ”

“ To assist a rider in any way was deemed a high honor; to do aught to retard him was the limit of wrong-doing, a woeful offense. On the first trip west-bound, the rider between Folsom and Sacramento was thrown, receiving a broken leg. Shortly after the accident, a Wells Fargo stage happened along, and a special agent of that Company, who chanced to be a passenger, seeing the predicament, volunteered to finish the run. ”