Hearts West Read Free Page A

foolish.”
    According to the historical publication The Californians, if Eleanor Berry had gotten her wish, she would have expired a month earlier, on July 27, 1873. She reasoned that if her life had ended on her wedding day, she might have escaped the degradation and heartbreak that was to come. But alas, God had not struck her dead and now the deed was left to her.
    Eleanor’s life began in the spring of 1851 in Gilroy, California. Her parents died when she was an infant and so she was raised by her neighbors, the Eigleberrys. She grew to be an attractive young lady, and chose to teach school as her profession. Still single at the age of twenty-two and fearing she always would be, Eleanor responded to an advertisement posted in a Bay Area literary journal. Louis Dreibelbis, the author of the advertisement, was searching for a wife and was thrilled to receive Eleanor’s letter in response to his ad. In the advertisement, Louis described himself as a wealthy, average-looking man eager to settle down.
    Letters between the two went back and forth from Eleanor’s home in Gilroy to Louis’s in Grass Valley. The pair corresponded for three months. She was quite taken with his candor and his praise of her desire to work with children. “Such a woman will make a fine mother,” he wrote. Louis found Eleanor’s letters to be “intelligent and sincere in tone.”
    It did not take long for the mutual attraction to evolve into affection. Louis’s letter of proposal was met with enthusiastic acceptance, and the couple decided on a wedding date of July 27, 1873. After resigning her position as Gilroy’s schoolmistress, Eleanor packed her trunk and boarded an east-bound train to meet Louis for the first time and marry him.
    Eleanor fanned herself with a newspaper as she took her seat on the train. The temperature inside the Central Pacific passenger car was oppressive, hotter even than the ninety-five degrees outside the train. She was accompanied by several passengers making their way to the mining camps near Grass Valley in Nevada County. Once the train reached Colfax, the bride-to-be and her belongings were transferred to a six-horse stagecoach. Of the thirteen passengers on board, Eleanor was the only woman.
    The stage driver promised Eleanor and the other passengers a safe trip and tried to assure them that they would not be overtaken by highwaymen, men who robbed travelers on public roads. Given the cargo, the driver no doubt needed to reassure himself of that notion as well. Nestled between the trunks and suitcases was a safe containing $7,000 in gold that was to be deposited into a Grass Valley bank.
    The trip was relatively uneventful for the first leg of the journey. According to one newspaper account, the passengers passed the time on the eight-hour journey swapping stories about the places they had lived or visited. Eleanor contributed to the conversation as well, trading brilliant remarks and witty banter with other passengers. The men admired her “vivacity and charm.”
    During lulls in the conversation, Eleanor daydreamed about her upcoming nuptials and life thereafter. She removed a few of Louis’s letters from her handbag and reread them. She smiled to herself, imagining she and her betrothed standing at the altar, looking into one another’s eyes, and seeing all the possibilities to come. The coach’s abrupt stop brought her back to the present, tossing her on the floor in the stagecoach.
    A gruff voice outside the buggy demanded the passengers step out with their hands in the air. She exchanged anxious glances with her wide-eyed travel companions, as they reluctantly did as they were told.
    Four armed men wearing gunnysack masks over their heads shouted at the passengers. The bandits eyed their victims carefully. For a moment no one made a move. Then the driver lowered his arms a bit and a highwayman with a six-shooter pulled the hammer back on his gun. The