Page "John C. Frémont" Paragraph 30

Had Frémont continued up the Arkansas, he might have succeeded.

On November 25 at what is now Florence, Colorado, he turned sharply south.

By the time his party crossed the Sangre de Cristo Range via Mosca Pass, they had already experienced days of bitter cold, blinding snow and difficult travel.

Some of the party, including the guide Wootton, had already turned back, concluding that further travel would be impossible.

Although the passes through the Sangre de Cristo had proven too steep for a railroad, Frémont pressed on.

From this point the party might still have succeeded had they gone up the Rio Grande to its source, or gone by a more northerly route, but the route they took brought them to the very top of Mesa Mountain.

By December 12, on Boot Mountain, it took ninety minutes to progress three hundred yards.

Mules began dying and by December 20, only 59 animals remained alive.

It was not until December 22 that Frémont acknowledged that the party needed to regroup and be resupplied.

They began to make their way to Taos, New Mexico.

By the time the last surviving member of the expedition made it to Taos on February 12, 1849, 10 of the party had died.

Except for the efforts of member Alexis Godey, another 15 would have been lost.

After recuperating in Taos, Frémont and only a few of the men left for California via an established southern trade route.