Historedia
Episode 1 of 1

Arrival in the Sierra Nevada

When
February 18, 1847
Where
Frémont Pass (now Donner Pass), Sierra Nevada
Part of
First Relief sets out for the Donner Party

The first relief party reached the Sierra Nevada in mid-February 1847, almost four months after the Donner Party became trapped.

Rescuers from California attempted to reach the migrants, but the first relief party did not arrive until the middle of February 1847, almost four months after the wagon train became trapped. On February 18, the seven-man rescue party scaled Frémont Pass, now Donner Pass, and as they neared where Eddy told them the cabins would be, they began to shout. They were dismayed to find the first cache station broken into by animals, leaving them without food for four days.

Sources

  1. Donner Party Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-05

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.