Bob Simson. Jim Bridger and I had just gone into camp
when they rode up. After they had shaken hands with us Jim Beckwith
said, "Boys, you are just the parties we are looking for."

Bridger asked Beckwith what he had been doing and where he had been
since we parted at Bent's Fort last spring. Beckwith replied that he
had been with a train of emigrants just now who were on the way to
California, and they had camped over on Black's Fort. The cholera had
broken out among them soon after they crossed the Platte River, and from
then up to yesterday they had buried more or less every day. There had
been no new cases since yesterday, and they were laying over to let
the people rest and get their strength, and they expected to start out
tomorrow morning, and turning to me Beckwith said, "Will, I want you to
go with us for there is another train of emigrants over on the Salt Lake
route."

At this time there were two routes between the Green river and the
Humboldt; one by the way of Salt Lake and the other by Lander's Cut off.
Beckwith said, "Those emigrants going by the Salt Lake route have no
guide, and I am afraid when they strike the Humboldt they will all be
massacred, for they will be right in the heart of the Pi-Ute country,
and you know this tribe is on the war path, and I want you to go on and
overtake them and see them safely through, or else stay with this train
and I will go myself and take care of them. We want the two trains to
meet at the mouth of Lone Canyon, and then we will go up Long Canyon to
Honey lake and then cross the Sierra Nevada."

I turned to Jim Bridger and said, "Jim, what do you think of this
proposition?"

Jim said he thought it a good thing for me to do; the responsibility
would give me more confidence in myself. "You know, Will, you have
always depended on Carson or me at all times, and this trip will teach
you to depend on yourself."

I saddled my horse and went with Beckwith back to the emigrants' camp.
It was arranged that I was to take charge of the scouts and Simson to
take charge of the other train, and Beckwith would go on and overtake
the other train, and the train that reached the mouth of Long Canyon
where it empties into Truckey river first must wait for the other train.

At this point the two trails divided, one going up the Truckey by the
Donna lake route and the other up Long Canyon by Honey lake, the latter
being considered the best route.

The next morning we pulled out. I