The Tale of The Oregon Trail

Hi, my name is Elizabeth and this is the story of my journey on the Oregon Trail. My family left Virginia in 1847 to travel to Oregon.

We started our journey in Independence, Missouri and six months later our family arrived at the Willamette Valley in Oregon. Our whole family made the trip West including my two brothers, all three of my sisters, Mom, Dad, and my grandparents.

We traveled in two covered wagons that held everything we needed for our trip and our new lives in Oregon. These wagons were pulled by our oxen and we had to walk next to them most of the time. Mom, Grandma, and my baby sisters rode inside the wagon for most of the trip.

While we were traveling, we encountered a lot of dangers. Our wagon wheels got stuck three different times because of the rain! My older sister, Lucy, got sick when we were crossing Kansas. She had cholera, a disease that you catch from contaminated water, but luckily she recovered soon after. Thankfully, we were not attacked by any Indians on our way over. We even traded some of our steel with them for food!

At the end of our long journey, we finally arrived in Oregon. It was so pretty! Our family built a house and farm on the land we had bought and we were very prosperous.