Marc Entze
6-3-2004

From Walla Walla to the Gold Fields: Pack Trains and the Mullan Road

In articles about the Mullan Road there is frequent mention of pack trains but virtually no mention of how the pack trains worked. Although the Mullan Road was built as a wagon road, in reality very few wagons operated over the entire length. During the mining boom of the 1860s and 1870s, when the road was a vital communications link, the preferred method of freighting was the pack trains. The only historian to have touched on these questions is Alexander Campbell McGregor. However, his interest is primarily in how many pack animals traveled the Mullan Road and the value of their commodities. Who operated them? Where were they were headquartered? What equipment was used, as well as the preferred animals? Many questions about the pack trains remain to be answered.
Fortunately the life of packers is well recorded; there are, for example, first hand accounts published in old volumes of the Washington Historical Quarterly and the Pacific Northwest Quarterly which tell of the colorful and often dangerous life on the trail. James W. Watt’s account, entitled “Experiences of a Packer in Washington Territory Mining Camps During the Sixties” is the most useful source. He describes in detail the nature of packing and its many dangers and hardships.
The pack animals were a vital source of transportation. The landscape of the northern West is covered with steep rocky hillsides, in places the forests are nearly impenetrable and all the while these mountains bracket swift moving streams. Diaries written by travelers taking wagons over the Mullan Road record a daily struggle for their oxen. Frequent stops of a day or more were necessary to rest the animals. Over the most heavily traveled roads, such as between Walla Walla and the steamboat landing at Wallula, wagons did handle most of the freight. Even after steamboats became common on many of the rivers and lakes, the pack animal connected the points of navigation. In some cases the animals were taken aboard the vessels with their loads left strapped to their backs and ferried to the head of navigation where they proceeded on the trail. Not until the full-scale construction of railroads did the pack trains lose their superiority.
Without the pack trains, the Mullan Road likely would have seen little traffic. The road quickly fell into disrepair; washed out bridges, over grown brush and fallen trees made wagon travel exceedingly difficult. Government funds for maintaining the road were not available due to the costs and concerns of the Civil War. Even after the war no repairs were made to the road until the late 1870s, by which time railroad construction was well underway. As a result the land bridge connecting the Missouri and Columbia Rivers, and most all of the freight hauled between those two points, traveled overland on the strong backs of pack animals. The pack trains, the men who operated them and the remote outposts they supplied played an important role in the development of the northern West.
Pack trains operated from supply centers to the remote mining camps. Throughout the 1860s and 1870s Walla Walla was the center of transportation and trade for all of the interior country. In 1859, two years after the army constructed a new fort in the Walla Walla Valley, the nearby village of Walla Walla was appointed county seat, and town
government was established. Initially the citizens provided services primarily to the military personnel stationed at Fort Walla Walla, but with the discovery of gold in the Clearwater River Country, near Orofino in 1860, Walla Walla boomed as a supply center for miners. By the early 1860s “the budding city of Walla Walla,” wrote noted Walla Walla historian W.D. Lyman, “profited materially by the influx of gold-seekers, who made their way up the Columbia River and thence moved forward to Walla Walla, which became the great outfitting headquarters for . . . the gold country.” Lyman further describes the activity on the streets of Walla Walla by noting “Walla Walla was the scene of the greatest activity: streets were crowded; the merchants were doing a thriving business; and pack trains moved in a seemingly endless procession toward the gold fields.” So many miners poured through Walla Walla that “within a year [1862] more than one and one-half million dollars in gold dust had been shipped from the mining districts.” The Mullan Road, completed in 1862, directed much of the mining wealth through Walla Walla and the “endless procession” of pack trains outfitted in Walla Walla supplied every major mining district in the northern West. Most of the miners went through Walla Walla primarily because the recently constructed Mullan Road provided an easy and direct route of travel from the Columbia River to the mines.
Although the Mullan Road was heavily traveled by pack trains, the trains rarely traveled the entire 624 miles from Walla Walla to Fort Benton. Typically the packers would utilize a portion of the Mullan Road to a junction with another trail or road going in the direction of the camp they were packing too. James W. Watt, a packer based out of Walla Walla during the 1860s, recalled his use of the Mullan Road enroute to the Kootenai mines in northern Idaho:
[from Walla Walla] we traveled over the Mullan Road to the crossing of the Touchet River, the site of the present town of Prescott; thence to the Snake River, which we crossed sometimes at Silcott’s or Lyons Ferry and sometimes at Texas Ferry. We struck the Mullan Road again at Rock Creek and followed it to the crossing of the Spokane River, or Herrin’s Bridge, as the place was then called. From this point the Kootenay trail diverged from the Mullan Road.

This use of routing was very common among packers and as a result there are few accounts of packers relating directly to the Mullan Road. However, the accounts illustrate the nature of packing on any of the Northwest trails, when there was no alternative to overland freighting than to strap the supplies onto the back of a pack mule.
Much of the equipment and terminology used in packing was Spanish, learned from the Mexicans during the California Gold Rush in 1849. The pack animals of choice were mules. They were imported from Mexico and outfitted with a Spanish pack saddle called an aparejo. The aparejo, which cost from $35 to $60 a piece, was “made of leather and stuffed with moss, dry hay or grass – anything handy” to protect the animal’s back “from any rubbing of the load, and equalized the weight of the pack on the animals.” In Mr. Watt’s opinion, “they were far superior to the American pack saddle.” Under the pack, and on top of the “sweat blanket” was the “caronie,” a “fancy Spanish embroidered pack blanket.” Each caronie was embroidered with a distinctive design and every mule had its own caronie and pack. The packs were protected from inclement weather by a “mantos.” These 9 by 12 foot pieces of canvas could be folded over the loads on the trail or laid over the packs in camp.
During the night, while in camp on the trail, and after unloading, the mules were turned out into the hills to graze. One of the most important pieces of “equipment” in the pack train was a horse: the bell mare. The bell mare was a sort of “shepherd” that the mules trusted and followed, and a bell was placed around the animal’s neck to sound her location. Mr. Watt noted, “we usually had a white mare for bell mare, and the mules would rarely ever leave her vicinity. Sometimes a strange mule had to be watched for a few days until he got acquainted with and accustomed to the bell mare.” In the morning the packers would rise before daylight, usually three o’clock and follow an established routine:
While the other men were breaking camp and preparing breakfast, one of the packers would go into the hills and locate the bell mare. Finding her, he would ring her bell and the mules from all around would answer by bawling out, and starting towards the bell mare. The packer would then walk around to see whether all the mules were in sight and coming in; when satisfied of this he would mount the mare and ride into camp. If he started off on a trot or run, the mules would follow at a trot or run. . . . When the animals came in the bell mare was brought to the head of the packs, and the men began to holler at the mules ‘get in there,’ and the mules would herd in around the packs. Then the men quickly placed the ‘hackamores’ or headstalls on the mules, and tied them together.

With the mules all brought in and secured, the men would eat breakfast. After eating, the cook cleaned up and the men prepared to load the animals.
At camp, the packs were placed in a “hollow square or rude circle.” If the
campsite did not permit this arrangement, they were laid out in a row, two packs high with the aparejos placed on each side; the lash rope was placed under the loads. The mules, when brought in for loading, were likewise situated, if possible, in the same hollow square or circle as the packs to facilitate loading. Each mule carried 400 pound packs. The men usually worked in pairs when loading the mules, and on average it took them one and a half to two minutes to pack a mule. With good teamwork two men could pack 40 to 60 mules in approximately 45 minutes. Mr. Watt described the work in detail:
The men who worked in pairs were called the ‘near’ and the ‘off’ packer. With a big train, the pairs would work near together, and while his partner was finishing the tie the odd man would act as a ‘booster’ assisting the other two men with the loading of their pack, by helping to lift and place the heavy load. Experienced men would pack a hundred mules like clockwork. The ‘sweat’ blanket was first put on the animal’s back – carefully smoothed out so that there were no folds to rub and gall the animal’s back during the day; then the ‘caronie’ and the bed blankets were added; then the aparejo; then the load. If it was 400 pounds of flour each packer would first lift his 200 pounds of the pack up on to his side of the animal; then throw the ‘swing’ rope and ‘swing the packs;’ then the lash rope was thrown on top and lashed in the ‘diamond hitch’ and the animal was ready for the trail.

In the early days of packing, each man was in charge of fifteen mules. In the later days this was increased to 36 or 40 mules assigned to a team of two men. Clearly this was back-breaking labor that demanded team work and concentration. Mr. Watt summed up the experience in a statement as brief as it is descriptive: “it was some work, I’ll tell you.”
As soon as the animals were loaded the pack train was underway, the bell mare leading. Pack trains varied in size from small trains of 15 animals to large trains with as many as 100 mules. The mules would follow the bell mare without command from the packers, and as the mules started out the packers urged their horses into place in the train. The train was usually underway by six o’clock and proceeded along “at a fairly rapid walk to the next camping place.” Camps were usually located about 15 miles apart at locations where plenty of feed and water was available and were usually reached by noon. Upon arrival the mules would be unloaded, turned loose into the hills and the men busied themselves making camp. The following morning the process was renewed, day after day until they arrived at their destination.
Mules possessed features that made them the pack animal of choice for most packers. As one historian wrote of the mules, “they carry ponderous burdens, walk with ease upon the brink of a precipice, and can be kept in good serviceable condition on by provender that would starve a horse.” Further, as noted by Watt, they were amicable creatures, and after a few trips took to the trail as a matter of habit. On the Mullan Road, and most other trails, the pack animals were left to forage on their own. When treated with proper care, making sure they were fed and watered, and that the packs were properly and securely fastened, the mules proved themselves gentle and very capable animals. Captain John Mullan advised gentle treatment of the animals, writing “never maltreat them, but govern them as you would a woman, with kindness, affection, and caresses, and you will be repaid by their docility and easy management.” It is of course unknown how many packers followed Captain Mullan’s advice to treat their mules as women, but it is known that the mules were excellent pack animals that required a minimum amount of attention.
The pack animal was a costly investment for its owner and perhaps cost is part of the reason that some packers tried other animals in pack trains. Horses were the most frequently used animal after the mule. The Indians possessed large horse herds and many packers obtained Cayuse ponies for pack animals. Mr. Watt worked on one pack train of Cayuses and the experience did not impress him. He recalled that “mules were much easier to work with, and they would carry much heavier loads than the Indian cayuses.” Ben Burgunder, who also packed on many of the trails and roads of the Interior during the 1860s and 1870s, also preferred mules. When packing with horses, Burgunder wrote “we packed these with pack saddles but we packed the mules with aparhoes [aparejos]. The pack mules . . . averaged about 400 pounds to a load” and a “cayuse packed about 300 pounds.” There were some packers who used Cayuse horses, but most of the pack trains to the mines employed mules. When having to pay for the cost of several animals, those that were the most reliable and packed the most weight were consequently the most desirable.
The average pack mule cost about $250, with some excellent mules selling for as much as $400 per animal. By most accounts the average pack train was between thirty and fifty mules, thus a train of thirty-six mules would be worth $9,000. With other equipment accounted for, including the aparejos, caronies, ropes and various other supplies, a fully outfitted pack train likely cost over $10,000. The price of outfitting a pack train may have been one reason some packers experimented with pack trains of camels.
Camels were first used as pack animals by the United States Army in the southwest. The camel pack trains were right at home in the desert climate. They were found to be much superior to mules in the region, and were commonly used between various frontier posts. By the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, “the camel had then become a recognized and accepted means of army transportation.” Compared to the Cayuse horses and mules, camels carried enormous loads. During a test of the camels’ ability, one camel successfully rose and walked off loaded with a 1,256 pound pack – over four times the weight carried by mules. The camels regularly packed from 600 to 800 pounds and could travel up to thirty-five miles a day with those loads. These were significant gains over the mules then in use on the pack trains operating from Walla Walla to the gold fields.
Camels were first used in the Northwest in the British Columbia mining camps in 1861. These animals were imported from Manchuria by the American Camel Company and met with limited success. The first camel pack train in Montana arrived at Virginia City in 1865, and was used in packing freight out of Helena on the Mullan Road to locations such as Gold Creek and Deer Lodge. Sometime later, the camels were used on the “old Walla Walla train out of Hell Gate . . . and thereafter made regular runs to the western country.” One witness remembered the camel train in Helena:
They used to carry tremendous loads . . . they would be loaded with sacks of flour until you couldn’t see anything of the animals except their heads. They would carry all you could pile on them, and never show that the pack was any load for them at all. They would go up and over the mountains in the roughest and steepest places and never refuse to keep moving along in their slow, deliberate way.

Upon first glance the camel would seem like the ideal pack animal, however their presence caused considerable disruption.
William S. Lewis writes “but for the Civil War and the contemporary completion of the Pacific railroads the . . . camels . . . would undoubtedly have become familiar and accepted domestic animals for pack trains throughout the West.” In order for that to have happened, however, several problems would have had to be overcome, the least of which was the dislike of the camels by packers used to mules. When camels were placed into service on western trails, neither beast nor man knew each others’ mannerisms; as a result the dislike between “the camels and their new drivers was immediate and mutual.” By nature camels are mild and slow moving animals, but when aroused through harsh treatment, they “could kick and bite to surpass the most ornery army mule.” In addition, “mules and horses had an unconquerable fear of the camels and would stampede at sight or smell of them.” Pack train veterans recalled that “it was as easy to stop a blizzard or an avalanche, as to head off a pack train of mules or horses that had been frightened by the camel pack train.” As a result complaints regarding the camels were numerous.
The enormous loads could make travel difficult, on account of the roads were cleared for mule trains carrying much lighter loads. Indians were intensely curious about the camels, and the owners of the camels had to remain on guard at all times to keep the Indians from shooting them. No record is mentioned of Indians shooting camels, but at least one animal was accidentally shot by a white man. One day the camels were grazing along the Mullan Road between Helena and Deer Lodge when a hunter from Kentucky, James McNear, spotted the animals and took aim:
He got sight of the camels and mistook them for moose. He crept slowly and carefully over the brow of the hill, fearful that the moose would scent danger and run away. He took careful aim at the nearest one, blazed away and brought down his prey. The camel died without a struggle. McNear was just drawing a bead on another camel when the irate owner came running up, yelling and letting out a string of oaths.

McNear finally realized that the animals were not moose. The infuriated owner demanded recompense. In exchange for the camel, McNear was forced to turn over his gun, ammunition, watch, and all the money he carried, along with the deed to a claim he owned in Ophir Gulch. In addition, McNear had to “dig a grave and give the camel a decent burial.” Thereafter he was known as “Camel McNear.”
Although the camels were clearly proven to be capable of carrying incredible loads over distance far greater than pack mules, a multitude of problems kept them from being used on a large scale. That the pack train of seven camels, six after McNear’s accidental shooting of one, was regularly used on the Mullan Road between Helena and Deer Lodge and later from Hell Gate to the “western country,” provides a unique chapter in the transportation history of the region and of the Mullan Road. Throughout the pack train era in the Northwest – from the late 1850s to the early 1880s – the mule remained the dominant pack animal.

Bibliography

Lewis, William S., “The Camel Pack Trains in the Mining Camps of the West,” Washington Historical Quarterly, Vol.19, No.4 (October 1928), 271-284.

The camel pack trains were short-lived in the northern West. However they were an important aspect of pre-railroad overland transportation, and represented a search for more efficient pack animals. They could carry twice the weight of a pack mule, and required less forage and water, yet they faced numerous problems including intense dislike from the packers who were used to mules. In addition, horses and mules were frightened of them, and stampeded on sight or smell of the camel pack trains.

Lyman, W. D., An Illustrated History of Walla Walla County, State of Washington, W.H. Lever, 1901.

Lyman is noted for his two volume history of Walla Walla. The volumes are useful for their in depth referencing of primary sources, and figures. Volume 1 provides a detailed overview of the economic, political and social history of Walla Walla. In Volume 2, Lyman wrote extensive biographies of early Walla Walla citizens.

McGregor, Alexander Campbell, The Economic Impact of the Mullan Road on Walla Walla, 1860-1883, Honors Thesis, Whitman College, 1971.

McGregor’s thesis is the most complete single source I have found on the Mullan Road. The focus is on the economic development and impact of the road on the Walla Walla Country; however, the final two chapters detail later uses of the road, which include “The Mullan Road and Livestock Drives: 1862-1883” and “The Mullan Road Becomes an Eastern Washington Thoroughfare: 1872-1883.” The bibliography to this thesis is extremely useful for further research.

Mullan, Captain John, U.S.A., Report on the Construction of a Military Road from Fort Walla-Walla to Fort Benton, Fairfield, Washington: Ye Galleon Press, 1998.

This is the report issued by Captain Mullan upon his return to Washington D.C. from building the road. While the report of the road construction is packed with information, many of the appended documents provide a wealth of additional detail regarding numerous observations of the region the Mullan Road passes through. Of particular use to this paper are the sections entitled “Itinerary of Route” in which Mullan lists suggested camp spots, etc. Also useful is his “Recommendations for Travelers.” In this section Mullan provides recommendations on equipment for traveling over the Road, including hand tools and pack animals

Burgunder, Ben, “The Recollections of Ben Burgunder,” Oliphant, J. Orin, ed., Washington Historical Quarterly, Vol.17, No.3 (July 1926), 190-210.

Burgunder was a packer who, like Watt, spent considerable time packing to the mines and accumulated a vast knowledge of pack trains. Burgunder’s account is useful for his recollection of freight charges from supply centers to the mines.

Watt, James W. “Experiences of a Packer in Washington Territory Mining Camps During the Sixties,” William S. Lewis ed., Washington Historical Quarterly, Vol.19, No.3 (July 1928), 206-293. Continued in Vol.20, No.1 (January 1929), 36-53.

Watt’s lengthy account, published in three volumes of the Washington Historical Quarterly, is an invaluable look at the operations and men who worked on the pack trains. He provides details of what it was like to spend a day on the trail, the gear used in packing and the dangers faced from weather and “road agents.” Mr. Watt packed to nearly every mining camp in the 1860s and provides a good comparison of the many roads and trails.

Winther, Oscar Osburn, “Pack Animals for Transportation in the Pacific Northwest,” Pacific Northwest Quarterly Vol. 34, No.2 (April 1943), 131-146.

This article provides an overview of pack trains and the role they played in developing the Interior. He discusses the gear and animals used in pack trains. Of interest is his following the progression of pack animals and methods from the mines of the California 49ers. The animals, gear, terminology and many of the packers were of Spanish origin.