This post is a more in depth look at one aspect of the first Robbins-connected family’s trip to Oregon, as recounted last week, about the Herren family’s trek across eastern Oregon on the Meek Cutoff in 1845.

There have been a number of books written about the Cutoff.  The Terrible Trail: The Meek Cutoff, 1845 by Keith Clark and Lowell Tiller (1966)  and The Brazen Overlanders of 1845 by Donna Wojcik Montgomery (1976), look at the entirety of the 1845 emigration from Missouri to Oregon, and provide listings of every family they have identified as being on the Oregon Trail that year.  Two more recent books take a slightly different approach.  Wood, Water & Grass: Meek Cutoff of 1845 (2014) by James H. and Theona Hambleton takes a very pro-Stephen Meek position, claiming that the mountain man, by virtue of his frequent fur trapping travels across Oregon, was never lost and knew exactly where he was at all times.  This is a view not held by other researchers, including the group of researchers that came together to study and travel the Cutoff and who’s work is the basis for The Meek Cutoff: Tracing the Oregon Trail’s Lost Wagon Train of 1845 (2013) by Brooks Geer Ragen.  Anyone interested in the Cutoff is encouraged to find these books for the various perspectives they provide.

 

John Herren, the husband of Dosha Robbins, apparently kept a journal of the family’s trip west.  The only part that has survived is a portion beginning at Fort Boise on the Snake River on August 23^rd and ending on September 8^th and the Ragen book quotes the entirety of this journal, and uses it to help track the emigrants route and identifies the Herren family’s nightly camp sites.  This diary excerpt was first published in the Albany (Oregon) Daily Democrat in January of 1891.  In the introduction to that reprint was the following information:

“The following is an extract from a diary kept by Mr Herron, father of W J Herron, of Salem, and of J R Herron, a former Sheriff of Linn county.  The diary was obtained by Jason Wheeler, of this city, from J R Herron and copied.  Mr Herron afterwards lost the original.”  And at the end of the published extract was this note:  “Here the diary was torn and mutilated so that I could not proceed with it any further.”  An additional story is that the original of the journal was lost in a family house fire in 1918.

On August 23^rd, 1845, John Herren wrote:

“This morning our company was called together, for the purpose of hiring a pilot to conduct us across the bed Boise River and over the Blue Mountains, down to the Dalles on the Columbia River.  This route will cut off the bend of the road that leads down Burnt River, and is said to be one hundred and fifty (150) miles nearer than the old route.  Price agreed on with Mr. Meek to take us through the new route was fifty dollars, so we got up our oxen and started about 9 o’clock, and travelled a northwest course to a beautiful stream of water called Malheur, about twelve miles from where we crossed the river; found plenty of grass and small willows to build a fire to get supper with, so there was no grumbling.”

In the days following Herren noted the rough road (“the worst road that they [oxen, cattle and horses] had traveled over yet, for it was uncommonly rocky and hilly” and “We had to remove some ten thousand stones before we could pass near the head of this ravine”), the presence of Indians (“the [Indians] stole one horse last night within thirty yards of our encampment”), the lack of food and water for stock (“found no water, only a small spring that did not afford water enough to drink, so our poor oxen, cattle and horses had to suffer for water another night”), and growing disenchantment with their guide and the emigrants decision to leave the main Oregon Trail (“I hope that no other emigrants will ever be gulled as we have been”).

After ten days of traveling west, north, and south through the arid lands of southeastern Oregon John Herren notes some tension in the wagon train.

“There is nothing here to cheer our drooping spirits.  We are making slow headway, the country here is so broken and rocky that we cannot get along fast, and we are rather doubtful that our pilot is lost for he has been seven days longer getting to the waters of Jay’s river than he told us he would be.  Some talk of stoning and others say hang him.  I can not tell how the affair will terminate yet, but I will inform you in its proper place…”

The following day Herren mentioned seeing a mountain which he thought was the Oregon Cascades and that they were on Jay’s River – now called the John Day River – when in fact they were far south on the Silvies River which flows south into the landlocked Malheur Lake.  The emigrants had a long way still to travel, even if they knew the direction to take.

“September 4th. – We started about 8 o’clock and traveled a south course about 4 miles, then turned southwest about 2 miles and passed down a very rocky hill or mountain into the valley of Jay’s river, here we turned a west course about 8 miles to a beautiful little rivulet of water but no wood except small willows.  Grass is very good.  This valley is on the river that we have been looking for the last seven days.  I hope the grumbling will cease now as our course appears to be west and the peak at the mouth of Jay’s river near the Columbia, is visible, and our pilot says it is about one hundred miles distance.  To-day 14 miles.”

The last journal entry finds the Herrens near the Glass Buttes not far off today’s highway 20 in desolate country:

“September 8th. – We started at 8 o’clock and traveled west about 10 miles over some of the best road that we have had since we passed the Rocky Mountains, but in the evening we had some rocky road for a few miles; here we turned about 2 degrees north of west for about 4 miles and found no grass and had to encamp in a patch of wild sage, where it was as high as our wagons.  About one mile south of where we are we found a little water, enough to cook supper with.  The stream of water that we stayed on last night runs out of the side of a mountain through a hole six feet in diameter; there is water enough within six feet of where it runs out to a drown a horse.  Passed some plains to-day that were covered.”

The party turned north, then west, and then more northerly again as they sought the Deschutes River, finally locating it near present-day Cline Falls.  Once on the Deschutes the emigrants were “found” and could follow that river down to The Dalles on the Columbia.  They were lucky to have not lost any family members during their misadventure, it is estimated that about 25 emigrants died on the route or after arrival in The Dalles.

There is another aspect of this story – while lost in central Oregon the Herren family found what later became known as the Lost Blue Bucket Gold Mine – but that tale will be told next week.

(Jacob Robbins-William Robbins-Theodoshia (Robbins) Herren & John Herren)

The first of the Robbins-connected families to emigrate to Oregon was that of John and Theodoshia (“Dosha”) (Robbins) Herren, who crossed the plains in 1845.  They had already left Decatur County about 1838/39 when they moved to Platte County, Missouri, situated at the jumping off point of the great wagon trains leaving St. Joseph, Missouri.  John Herrens’ brother-in-law, the Rev. Enoch Garrison (married to Margaret Herren), had emigrated to Oregon in 1842 and probably sent letters back to the Herrens telling of the trip and the availability of free land in Oregon.

The youngest child of William and Bethiah Robbins, Dosha was married to John Daniel Herren on 13 June 1822 in Henry County, Kentucky.  Soon after they moved to Decatur County where John filed for 80 acres south of Gaynorsville, joining Robbins and Herren siblings.

In the spring of 1845, John and Dosha Herren and their large family of twelve children, one son-in-law, William Wallace, one grandchild, and John’s 20-year-old nephew Daniel Herren, gathered near St. Joseph, Missouri, to form part of the “St. Joseph Division” of one of the largest wagon trains.  John and Dosha held great hope for their new life in Oregon as demonstrated by the naming of their youngest daughter Elizabeth Columbia Herren.  While the majority of the trip passed without major incident, the Herrens were one of the families swayed by the mountain man Stephen Meek into crossing central Oregon over what is now called the Meeks Cutoff.  Anyone who has driven over this arid, hot, mostly treeless desert between the cities of Burns and Bend, can’t help but cringe at the thought of being there in a wagon slowly pulled by thirsty, plodding oxen. More details of Meeks Cutoff will be in next week’s post.

When their wagon train finally straggled into The Dalles, they were in poor shape.  Dosha’s 10-year-old son Levi Herren, always remembered his first meal there which included fresh bread, fruit, and kegs of syrup.  The Herrens then rafted down the Columbia, taking on provisions at the Hudson Bay Company’s Fort Vancouver on the north side of the river.  They were transported across the Columbia on a Hudson Bay ferry and then followed the “Germantown” road to the Tualatin valley.

For the first winter the Herrens stayed at Whiteson in Yamhill County with the Rev.  Garrison, and then in March of 1846 John Herren and his family located about four miles east of Salem on land that already had a cabin on it.  They remained there for two and a half years.  The lure of gold was strong though, and in the fall of 1848 John, some of his children and son-in-law William Wallace, went to California where they had some success in the gold fields on the Feather River.  Spending about five months there (until the spring of 1849), John returned to Oregon by boat with $2,000 in gold dust.

That the Herrens continued to be in contact with the family in Indiana during this time, and likely in contact with brother Nathaniel Robbins and cousin Jacob Robbins is evidenced by the mention of a letter William Herren wrote to his uncle William Robbins:  “…I received a letter from John Herrens son William which told us that they was all well, the letter was dated May the 3rd. [1852]”  It is interesting that William Jackson Herren, writing letters to his uncle, had last seen William Robbins about 12 or 13 years before when the younger Herren was only 15 or 16 years old.  Obviously strong family ties remained even though the families were separated by a wide continent.

After returning from California John Herren took up a new donation land claim of 635 acres six miles southeast of Salem in the fertile farmland near Mill Creek.  The claim was settled on 2 July 1849 and there John and Dosha remained until their deaths in 1864 and 1881 respectively, and were buried in the Herren family cemetery.

Their land claim, or part of it, was later sold to the state of Oregon and became the location of the Oregon State Penitentiary.  The Herren family cemetery is located on the penitentiary grounds – not in the highest security area, but rather on the “farm annex” – though the property still requires a prison guard escort to visit.  The cemetery, however, is one of the best maintained small family cemeteries I’ve ever seen, with the gravestones sparkling white and the grass kept mowed.

At her death in 1881 Dosha (Robbins) Herren left many descendants.  As reported in the Portland Oregonian at the time:

“Mrs. Herren was the honored and beloved mother of 13 children.  7 sons and 6 daughters, all of whom lived to man and womanhood and 10 of whom together with 104 grandchildren and great-grandchildren now live to mourn her loss and venerate her memory.”

It might be noted that Dosha’s passing was also reported back in Decatur County, Indiana, where her obituary appeared in the Greensburg Saturday Review in January of 1882.

(Jacob Robbins-William Robbins-Theodoshia (Robbins) Herren)