Latest / Story of the Pony Express / 01 - Story of the Pony Express by Glenn D. Bradley

Transcript

01 - Story of the Pony Express by Glenn D. Bradley · Story of the Pony Express

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Preface and Chapter one of the Story of the Pony
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Express by Glen D. Bradley. This is a LibriVox recording.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: by Roger Moline. The Story of the Pony Express by
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Glen D. Bradley. Preface and Chapter one The Story of
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: the Pony Express, an account of the most remarkable mail
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: service ever in existence and its place in history. Preface.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: This little volume has but one purpose to give an authentic, useful,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and readable account of the Pony Express. This wonderful enterprise
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: played an important part in history and demonstrated what American
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: spirit can accomplish. It showed that the heroes of sixty
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: one were not all south of Mason and Dixon's line,
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: fighting each other, and strange to say, little of a
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: formal nature has been written concerning it. I have sought
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: to bring to light and make accessible to all readers
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: the more important facts of the Pony Express, its inception,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: organization and development, its importance to history, its historical background,
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: and some of the anecdotes incidental to its operation. The
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: subject leads one into a wide range of fascinating material,
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: all interesting, though much of it is irrelevant in itself.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: This material is fragmentary and incoherent. It would be quite
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: easy to fill many pages with Western adventure, having no
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: special bearing upon the central topic. While I have diverged
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: occasionally from the thread of the narrative, my purpose has
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: been merely to give, where possible, more background to the story,
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: that the account as a whole might be more understandable
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: in its relation to the general facts of history. Special
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: acknowledgment is due Frank A. Root of Topeka, Kansas, joint
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: author with William E. Connolly of the Overland Stage to California,
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: an excellent compendium of data on many phases of the subject.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: In preparing this work, various Senate documents have been of
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: great value. Some interesting material is found in Inman and
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Cody's Salt Lake Trail, the files of the Century Magazine,
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Old newspaper Files, Bancroft's Colossal History of the West, and
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: the works of Samuel L. Clemens have also been of
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: value in compiling the present book. G dB Chapter one
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: At a Nation's Crisis. The Pony Express was the first
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: rapid transit and the first fast mail line across the
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: continent from the Missouri River to the Pacific Coast. It
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: was a system by means of which messages were carried
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: swiftly on horseback across the plains and deserts and over
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: the mountains of the far West. It brought the Atlantic
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: Coast and the Pacific Slope ten days nearer to each other.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: It had a brief existence of only sixteen months, and
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: was supplanted by the Transcontinental Telegraph. Yet it was of
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: the greatest importance in binding the East and West together
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: at a time when overland travel was slow and cumbersome,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: and when a great national crisis made the rapid communication
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: of news between these sections and imperative necessity. The Pony
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Express marked the highest development in overland travel prior to
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: the coming of the Pacific Railroad, which it preceded nine years.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: It in fact, proved the feasibility of a transcontinental road
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: and demonstrated that such a line could be built and
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: operated continuously the year around, a feat that had always
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: been regarded as impossible. The operation of the Pony Express
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: was a supreme achievement of physical endurance on the part
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: of man and his ever faithful companion the horse. The
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: history of this organization should be a lasting monument to
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: the physical sacrifice of man and beast in an effort
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: to accomplish something worthwhile. Its history should be an enduring
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: tribute to American courage and American organizing genius. The fall
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: of Fort Sumter in April eighteen sixty one did not
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: produce the Civil War crisis. For many months, the gigantic struggle,
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: then imminent had been painfully discernible to far seeing men.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: In eighteen fifty eight, Lincoln had forewarned the country in
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: his House Divided speech. As early as the beginning of
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: the year eighteen teen sixty the Union had been plainly
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: in jeopardy. Early in February of that momentous year, Jefferson Davis,
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: on behalf of the South, had introduced his famous Resolutions
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: in the Senate of the United States. This document was
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: the ultimatum of the dissatisfied slave holding Commonwealth. It demanded
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: that Congress should protect slavery throughout the domain of the
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: United States. The territories, it declared, were the common property
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: of the states of the Union, and hence open to
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: the citizens of all states with all their personal possessions.
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: The Northern states, Furthermore, were no longer to interfere with
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: the working of the Fugitive Slave Act, They must repeal
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: their personal liberty laws and respect the dread Scott decision
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: of the Federal Supreme Court. Neither in their own legislatures
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: nor in Congress should they trespass upon the right of
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: the South to regulate slavery as it best saw fit.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: These resolutions, demanding in effect that slavery be thus safeguarded,
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: almost to the extent of introducing it into the Free States,
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: really foreshadowed the Democratic platform of eighteen sixty, which led
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: to the great split in that party, the victory of
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: the Republicans under Lincoln, the subsequent secession of the more
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: radical Southern states, and finally the Civil War. For it
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: was inevitable that the North, when once aroused, would bitterly
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: resent such pro slavery demands. And this great crisis was
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: only the bursting into flame of many smaller fires that
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: had long been smoldering for generations. The two sections had
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: been drifting apart since the middle of the seventeenth century.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: Mason and Dixon's line had been a line of real
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: divisions separating two inherently distinct portions of the country by
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: eighteen sixty, then war was inevitable. Naturally, the conflict would
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: at once present intricate military problems, and among them, the
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: retention of the Pacific coast was of the deepest concern
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: to the Union. Situated at a distance of nearly two
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: thousand miles from the Missouri River, which was then the
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: nation's western frontier, this intervening space comprised trackless plains, almost
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: impenetrable ranges of snow capped mountains, and parched alkali deserts.
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: And besides these barriers of nature which lay between the
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: west coast and the settled eastern half of the country,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: there were many fierce tribes of savages who were usually
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: on the alert to oppose the movements of the White
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: race through their dominions. California, even then, was the jewel
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: of the Pacific, having a considerable population, great natural wealth,
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: and and unsurpassed climate and fertility, she was jealously desired
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: by both the North and the South. To the south,
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: the acquisition of California meant enhanced prestige, involving, as it would,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: the occupation of a large area whose soils and climate
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: might encourage the perpetuation of slavery. It meant a rich
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: possession which would afford her a strategic base for waging
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: war against her northern foe. It meant a romantic field
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: in which opportunity might be given to organize an allied
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: Republic of the Pacific, a power which would perchance forcibly
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: absorb the entire Southwest and a large section of northern Mexico.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: By thus creating counter forces, the South would effectively block
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: the Federal government on the western half of the continent.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: The North also desired the prestige that would come from
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: holding California, as well as the material strength and heringa
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: in the state's valuable resources. Moreover, to hold this region
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: would give the North a base of operations to check
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: her opponent in any campaign of aggression in the far West,
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: should the self presume such an attempt, and the possession
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: of California would also offer to the North the very
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: best means of protecting the Western frontier, one of the
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: Union's most vulnerable points of attack. It was with such
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: vital conditions that the Pony Express was identified. It was
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: in retaining California for the Union and in helping incidentally
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: to preserve the union that the Express became an important
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: factor in American history, not to mention the romance, the
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: unsurpassed courage, the unflinching endurance, and the wonderful exploits which
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: the routine operations of the Pony Express involved. Its identity
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: with problems of nationwide and worldwide importance make its story
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: seem worth telling, and with its romantic existence and its
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: place in history. The succeeding pages of this book will
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: briefly deal end of preface and Chapter one recording by
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: Roger Moline,