Dying on the Oregon Trail

by Rachel Dworkin, archivist

As a kid, I loved playing Oregon Trail. The educational computer game was first released in 1971 and our teachers had us play it in school whenever they were feeling too burned out to teach. For those of you who never experienced the joy, the game went something like this. You and your team were part of a party of settlers heading west from Independence, Missouri to Williamette Valley, Oregon in 1848. You had to purchase supplies, hunt for food, and overcome various obstacles on your journey west. Along the way, you learned about history, geography, and budgeting. The game was wildly popular nationwide with five editions, and over 65 million copies sold. We ended up dying of dysentery half the time, but boy was it fun! 

Graphics from 1985 edition of Oregon Trail

In 1847, Jacob Hoffman of Elmira decided to try his luck on the real Oregon trail. Born in 1814, he was the second son of William and Sally Hoffman. At age 20 in 1800, the elder Hoffman had decided to strike out on his own in what was then the wild frontier of Elmira. At age 32, Jacob was struck by a similar bout of wanderlust and decided to hitch-hike to Iowa. He returned home with a sample of the yellow dent corn found there and planted it on his father’s farm. The natural cross it produced with the local strain was known as Hoffman Dent Corn and the family grew it for years.

Now that he’d had a taste of adventure, Jacob found it hard to stick around at home. In the spring of 1847, he walked to Olean, New York, and then took a series of boats to Independence, Missouri. From there, he joined a wagon train containing 18 wagons, 30 men, 25 women, and 40 children. Along the way, they encountered a number of things familiar to players of the game. At the Kansas River crossing, they were waylaid by Caws who demanded a tole for crossing their land. They lost 40 cattle who spooked at the sight of buffalo, but had a grand old time hunting the buffalo for meat a few days later. Although they didn’t lose anyone from Jacob’s party, the journey was a deadly one. In a letter home, he wrote “there has been more graves made this season than there has been before. I kept an account until I got 100, then I stopped.”

The group had been fairly late leaving Independence, and winter was closing in fast. In early October, they reached Dr. Whitman’s mission in Waiilatpu, just outside Walla Walla, Washington, near the border with Oregon. Jacob decided to stay and help bring in the harvest for $18 a month and then move on come spring. In retrospect, he should have kept going.

Jacob Hoffman's letter home, October 17, 1847

Dr. Marcus Whitman had established his mission near Walla Walla in 1835 in the hopes of converting the local Cayuse tribe to Christianity, but was having a tough time of it. The natives found Whitman and his wife condescending and rude, and the problem was made worse by Whitman’s refusal to pay the tribe for the use of their land, which he insisted had been gifted to him. Despite some initial interest in attending his services, relations between Whitman and the tribe grew increasingly strained. In the early 1840s, Several Cayuse fell ill eating melons and meat which had been deliberately poisoned by the missionaries to trap pests. By that time, the mission had become an important layover and re-supply stop on the Oregon Trail. In 1847, an outbreak of measles brought by passing settlers left the tribe feeling like Whitman had come to kill them. Jacob Hoffman had signed up to work in a powder keg.   

On November 30, 1847, a group of Cayuse attacked the mission. Jacob Hoffman was in the barn dressing beef along with two other men. He was attacked and wounded, but managed to fight his way clear of the barn before being struck down from behind. Rev. Henry Spaulding, a missionary whose 10-year-old daughter was present for the massacre, wrote to the Hoffman family on April 1, 1848 to tell them what had happened to their son. All told, thirteen people were killed including Jacob and Dr. and Mrs. Whitman. 54 people staying at the mission were taken captive and held until they were ransomed by the Hudson’s Bay Company on December 29th. 

Period lithograph of the Whitman massacre. Not remotely accurate according to eye-witness accounts

The attacked kicked off a larger  conflict known as the Cayuse War which lasted until 1855.  In an attempt to end the conflict, the tribe handed over the ringleaders of the massacre for trial. They were hanged on June 3, 1850, but the war continued. When it ended, the Cayuse were decimated, and the remaining natives were pushed onto reservations, opening the way for more settlers and statehood. Jacob Hoffman and the other victims were buried in a mass grave at the mission which is now a United States National Historic Site. He went west looking for an adventure and ended up playing a tragic, if pivotal, role in the history of the Pacific Northwest. 

Memorial at the Whitman Mission National Historic Site

Wells Spicer: A Local Connection to the Wild West

by Erin Doane, Curator

While doing research for our new rotating exhibit that will highlight the towns and villages in Chemung County (the Horseheads exhibit is coming in July!) I came across Wells Spicer.  Wells Spicer was the Justice of the Peace in Tombstone, Arizona when the gunfight at the OK Corral took place.  He presided over the preliminary hearing that would determine if the Earp brothers and Doc Holiday would be held for trail.  Well, that’s interesting and all, you may be thinking, but why is he relevant to Chemung County history? Wells Spicer was born here in Chemung in 1831.  He is a native son of the county and, while he left here at the age of nine, his story is worth sharing.

 

Wells Spicer, 1875

As a young man, Spicer worked as a clerk in a law firm. He was admitted to the Iowa bar in 1853.  He worked as an attorney and was elected county judge in 1856.  He was also a journalist and publisher and tried his hand at prospecting several times.  In 1869 he moved to the Utah territory where he set up shop as an attorney specializing in mining suits and claims.  In 1875, Spicer was retained as attorney for John D. Lee who was on trial for his role in the Mountain Meadow massacre.  The Mountain Meadow massacre was a series of attacks that culminated in the killing of about 120 men, women and children in southern Utah on September 11, 1857.  John D. Lee led a militia of Mormon settlers who slaughtered nearly everyone in the wagon train of emigrants passing through Utah on the way to California.  Lee went to trial twice for his crimes and both times was defended by Spicer.  The first trial ended in a hung jury and the second with a conviction.  On March 22, 1877, Lee was executed by firing squad.  For his part in the trial, Spicer was lambasted in the press and ostracized by both Mormons and non-Mormons alike.

Execution of John D. Lee, March 22, 1877

Several years after the trial, Spicer relocated to Tombstone, Arizona.  On October 26, 1881 at around 3:00 pm, a gunfight broke out at the OK Corral.  The very brief altercation was between the outlaw Cowboys Billy Claiborne, Ike and Billy Clanton, and Tom and Frank McLaury on one side and town Marshal Virgil Earp, assistant town Marshal Morgan Earp, their brother Wyatt Earp and John Henry “Doc” Holiday on the other.  Billy Clanton and both McLaury brothers were killed in the fight.  As Justice of the Peace, it fell upon Wells Spicer to decide if the Earp Brothers and Doc Holiday would have to face trial for murder.  Spicer ultimately decided that the Earps and Holiday were fully justified in their actions as they were done in the discharge of official duty.  While the hearing appeared to be even-handed, several of Spicer’s decisions during the process seemed to favor the defense.  Because of this, Spicer was the target of criticism and several death threats. 

OK Corral, Tombstone, Arizona, 1882

Spicer’s actual death is a thing of mystery.  In 1887 he wandered off into the desert and disappeared.  Before disappearing, he stopped at the home of Bill Haynes.  There he made two attempts at suicide before striking off on his own into the wilderness where he, presumably, died of exposure.  It is thought, however, that maybe Spicer faked suicide to get away from creditors.  His body was never found and there were rumors that he was seen in Mexico after his supposed death.