Today is yesterday's Tomorrow - Here is the story I promised you.

Below is the image of my great-great-grandfather's Donation Land Claim at the Bureau of Land Management. Click the link to search for your own ancestor's land grants.

James and his wife Mary Ann (Evans) Sherrill claimed, improved and farmed 320 acres of prime river bottom land in the Willamette Valley for the required four years to gain ownership. Click on the image to see a larger version.

 

 

This is what they walked and drove 2,000 miles for, this is what they endured dust, heat, and thunderstorms without shelter for. Unlike the 30,000 people who died, and thousands of others who quit and turned back, James and Mary Ann reached the end of the Oregon Trail, and fulfilled their dreams.

 

Starting the journey with their wedding, they made the Oregon Trail their honeymoon. With them in the wagon train were Mary Ann's parents, Richard and Nancy Evans, and also Mary Ann's older brother Edward Evans. Mary Ann's brother-in-law, William Holloway, was also driving a wagon, but his wife Eliza Jane, Mary Ann's sister, was not with them. Eliza Jane died after her baby was born, possibly of complications of childbirth. Mary Ann was taking care of Eliza's one year old baby, Mary Jane Holloway. She would grow up in their household until 1869, when she married. 

 

Tomorrow: disaster strikes just as they reach their goal.