The Mojave Desert appears as the punishing country that lay ahead of emigrants traveling the Old Spanish Trail toward California. In the account of the Fancher party, its scorching wastes begin beyond the Mountain Meadows, making that green valley an important last place to rest and graze before the difficult crossing.

Setting on the Route

The trail dropped sharply from the Mountain Meadows into the Mojave Desert. The meadow lay at the edge of the Great Basin, 5,800 feet above sea level, in a shallow valley carpeted with green sedges and bunchgrass. Beyond it stretched hundreds of miles of hot, hard country. The contrast between the high oasis and the desert wastes gives the route a clear threshold: a place of water and pasture before an arduous passage.

The Fancher Party and the Crossing Ahead

By the time the Fancher party reached southern Utah, it included about 130 emigrants, mostly from Arkansas, and a thousand cattle and two hundred horses. Apostate Mormons who had left the territory joined along the way, bringing the company to approximately 140. After the party met Mormons traveling north, Jacob Hamblin recommended the Mountain Meadows as a place to rest and graze its large herd before setting out across the Mojave Desert. The emigrants later stopped beside an artesian spring; the cattle and horses could graze in the valley while the travelers prepared for the country ahead.