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John Bidwell was born in Chautauqua County on 5th August, 1819. Educated at schools in Ashtabula he became a school teacher in Westport, Missouri. He also purchased a small farm in the area.
In 1840 Bidwell took a holiday in St. Louis. When he returned home he discovered that a local gunman had stolen his farm. The man's reputation for violence was so bad that the authorities of Platte County were unwilling to enforce Bidwell's land rights. Disillusioned by these events, Bidwell decided to leave Westport. After reading a book by Antoine Robidoux he began to consider the prospect of emigrating to California. As Bidwell explained at the time: "his description of the country made it seem like paradise".
Bidwell now established the Western Emigration Society and published news that he intended to take a large wagon train to California. The idea was very popular and soon the society had the names of 500 people who wanted to take part in this momentous event. Missouri shopkeepers, fearing a rapid decline in customers, decided to mount a campaign against the idea. Local newspapers published stories about the dangers of travelling overland to California. Also, a great deal of publicity was given to Thomas Farnham's Travels in the Great Western Prairies. In the book Farnham described in detail the hardships people would face on the journey.
As a result of this campaign only about a hundred people turned up to leave Sapling Grove on 9th May, 1841. This was to be the first ever wagon train taking people from the Missouri River to California. The Bidwell expedition included only five women. It also included several talented individuals and four of the party, Bidwell, Robert Thomas, Josiah Belden and Charles Weber, all eventually became millionaires.
Bidwell later admitted that the party included no one who had ever been to California: "Our ignorance of the route was complete. We knew that California lay west, and that was the extent of our knowledge." So when Bidwell heard a group of missionaries, led by Pierre-Jean De Smet, and guided by the experienced Tom Fitzpatrick, were also intending to travel to Fort Hall, it was decided to wait until they arrived at Sapling Grove.
Fitzpatrick agreed to take Bidwell's party to Fort Hall. Bidwell later claimed that was a most important factor in the the party's survival: "it was well we did (wait for Fitzpatrick), for other wise probably not one of us would ever have reached California, because of our inexperience".
Even with Fitzpatrick's leadership the wagon train suffered considerable problems on the journey. The ran short of food while crossing the Rocky Mountains and eventually all the wagons had to be abandoned. On 22nd October Bidwell's party killed the last of their oxen. Of the 69 people in Bidwell's party who set out from Sapling Grove, only 32 people reached California on 4th November. However, the party became the first emigrants to travel overland from Missouri to the Pacific coast.
Once in California Bidwell went to work with Johann Suter. Bidwell discovered gold on the banks of the Feather River during the Californian Gold Rush in 1848. The following year he purchased the 22,000 acre Rancho Chico north of Sacramento. This was a great success and Bidwell became the best-known agriculturist in California.
Bidwell became involved in politics and was initially a member of the Democratic Party. However, he was fully committed to the temperance movement. He joined the Prohibition Party and in 1892 was its presidential candidate but won only 264,133.
An advocate of the transcontintinental railroad and a supporter of Native American rights, Bidwell published his autobiography, Echoes of the Past, in 1900.
John Bidwell died on 4th April, 1900.
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(1) John Bidwell, Echoes of the Past (1900)
He (Pierre-Jean De Smet) was genial, of fine presence, and one of the saintliest men I have ever known, and I cannot wonder that the Indians were made to believe him divinely protected. He was a man of great kindness and great affability under all circumstances; nothing seemed to disturb his temper... Sometimes a cart would go over, breaking everything in it to pieces; and at such times Father de Smet would be just the same - beaming with good humor.
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