Tom de Beau Soleil (a French Canadian name later anglicized to “Sun”) came to Wyoming after the Civil War. He worked as a trapper and as a military scout with William “Buffalo Bill” Cody. He also cut railroad ties under a contract with the Union Pacific Railroad. The 1872 cabin was used as headquarters for a successful ranching and hunting guide business. It later became the “Hub and Spoke Ranch,” with operations extending well into the Great Divide Basin. The Sun Ranch is a Registered National Historic Landmark.

Portions of the Sun Ranch were acquired by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1997. The visitor center, constructed mostly by volunteer labor, opened its doors in the spring of 1997 as part of the celebration of the 150th anniversary of the 1847 Mormon Pioneer wagon train.

A Tribute to Hardship
Thousands of pioneers journeyed over 1,000 miles to reach this point. Illness and death were common. Everywhere along the trail people died and were buried.

It is estimated that one out of ten emigrants who started on the trail died before completing the trip. Roughly 90 percent of the deaths were caused by disease, the rest were from childbirth, accidents, and violence. In the late 1840s and early 1850s, cholera was reaching epidemic proportions on the trails. Cholera is caught by drinking tainted water. Symptoms include high fever, vomiting, and dehydration. In a few instances, almost entire wagon companies were wiped out by cholera’s incredibly painful and rapid death.
Buried on this ridge, safe from trampling feet and iron-wheeled wagons, are over 20 known American Indian and emigrant graves.

The Emigrant Road
The Oregon Trail passed over the ridge to the east of Devil’s Gate, Good grass, water and the shelter of the hills made this a popular campsite.

Explorer Brevet-Captain John C. Fremont, 1842:
“In about three miles, we reached the entrance of a kanyon where where the Sweet Water issues upon the more open valley we had passed over. The usual road passes to the right of this place…Wilderness and disorder were the character of the scenery…”

Oregon emigrant James Mathers stopped here July, 1846, and wrote:
“…encamped above the pass of the river, between high rocks. This is the most interesting sight we have met with on our journey.”

Later, the Mormon Pioneer Trail and the California and Pony Express Trails came over this same ridge. Some 500,000 emigrants followed the Trail west. Many travellers called it the Emigrant Road.

Following the River
From here to Split Rock, a day’s trail journey west, the Oregon Trail followed two routes: one close to the Sweetwater River, the other a little further from it but more direct.

Capt. Howard Stansbury commented August 1, 1852:
“…Frost during the night; morning clear, calm and very beautiful. The road passing occasionally through deep, heavy sand continued up the right bank of the Sweetwater, …The valley is here nearly two miles wide, with rolling hills between the two mountain ranges, which… form its limits.”

Stansbury was a federal topographical engineer who was mapping both emigrant routes and a possible right-of-way for the railroad.

Granville Stuart in his book Forty Years on the Frontier, wrote this about the Sweetwater River in 1852:
“…its beautiful clear cold waters having a sweetish taste, caused by alkali held in solution…not enough , however, to cause any apparent injurious effects…”

Devil’s Gate Mail Station
The U.S. Post Office Department contracted monthly mail delivery that passed here going between Independence, Missouri and Salt Lake City, Utah. This service normally used light-draft wagons in summer and pack mules in winter and remained the only mail delivery through here until late 1858. The Devil’s Gate mail station was located one half mile south of the Gate.

Trails to Opportunity
The Oregon Trail was America’s main street west. Building upon American Indian foot paths, emigrants bound for the Pacific Northwest used the trail. They were soon followed by Mormons fleeing persecution, gold seekers rushing to California and the thundering hooves of the Pony Express.

The Way West
Following Indian paths, fur trapping mountain men traveled west. Astor’s Pacific Fur Company opened the trail through the Rockies at South Pass in 1812. Mountain men guided the first wagon train over it in 1841. Until the Transcontinental Railroad was completed in 1869 the Oregon Trail was the way west. As many as 500,000 men, women and children journeyed this way over some 2,000 miles of deserts, plains and moutains.

Yellow Metal
With the discovery of gold in California in 1848, the rush was on! By 1850, nearly 75,000 “49’ers” traveled through this valley. Numerous Trail cutoffs were developed that saved time or made for easier going. Some were pioneered by California emigrants and are known today as the California Trail.

Seeking Zion
Church leader Brigham Young led the first Mormon wagon train west along the trail in 1846-47. He followed the Oregon Trail to Fort Bridger, taking the Hastings Cutoff into the Salt Lake Valley. At this time, the Valley was part of Mexico, a situation that was changed by the Mexican-American War (1846-48).

Days of Fleeting Glory
Starting in 1860, the California Overland Mail and Pikes Peak Express galloped into history and the legend of the Pony Express was born. For 18 months, “wiry young men” on fast horses carried the mail, covering the 1600 miles from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, California in 10 days.

Why Wyoming?
There was no other route across the west that provided the three essential things needed for travel; good water every day; a dependable supply of grass; and, a passable grade to and through the Rocky Mountains which can be found only at South Pass.

The Cleft in the Rock
Devil’s Gate is a 370-foot high, 1,500-foot long fissure carved over the centuries by the Sweetwater River. It was a major landmark on the Oregon Trail…a pleasant change for weary travelers on the four day trek across the rough, dry country from the North Platte River.

Fr. Pierre-Jean DeSmet, S.J., 1841
“…Travelers have named this spot the Devil’s Entrance [Devil’s Gate]. In my opinion they should have rather called it Heaven’s Avenue.”

Goldrush 49’er, J.G.Bruff, wrote:
“…some of the boys clambered up the rocks on the north side of the Gate…where they fired pistols and threw down rocks, pleased with the reverberation, which was great. I made a careful sketch of this remarkable gorge.”

Martin’s Cove
Two miles to the northwest, nestled at the foot of the Sweetwater Rocks, is Martin’s Cove. Here Captain Edward Martin’s exhausted company of Mormon handcart emigrants sought shelter from an early winter storm in November of 1856. Of 576 men, women and children, 145 had died before rescue parties from Salt Lake City reached them.

“A condition of distress here meet my eyes that I never saw before or since. The (Mormon) train was strung out for two or three miles. There were old men pulling and tugging their carts, sometimes loaded with a sick wife or children, women pulling along sick husbands, little children six to eight years old struggling through the mud and snow. As night came on the mud would freeze on their clothes and feet. We gathered on to some of the most helpless with our riatas tied to the carts, and helped as many as we could into camp…Such assistance as we could give was rendered to all until they finally arrived at Devil’s Gate fort, about the first of November. There were some 1,200 in all, about one half with handcarts and the other half with teams.

The winter storms had now set in in all their severity. The provisions we took amounted to almost nothing among so many people, many of them now on very short rations, some almost starving. Many were dying daily from exposure and want of food.”
—Daniel W. Jones, 1856

Devil’s Gate
Devil’s Gate, the 370-foot high, 1500-foot long cleft, carved over the centuries by the Sweetwater River, was a major landmark on the Oregon Trail. A pleasant change for weary travelers coming across the rough, dry country from the North Platte River, a four day trek. Goldrush 49’er, J. G. Bruff, wrote of Devil’s Gate: “…some of the boys clambered up the rocks on the north side of the Gate…where they fired pistols and threw down rocks, pleased with the reverberation, which was great. I made a careful sketch of this remarkable gorge.”

Sweetwater River
From here to Split Rock, a day’s trail journey west, the Oregon Trail followd two routes: one close to the Sweetwater River, the other further from it but more direct. Capt. Howard Stansbury comments August 1, 1852:
“…the road passing occasionally through deep, heavy sand continued up the right bank of the Sweetwater…the valley is here nearly two miles wide, with rolling hills between the two mountain ranges, which…form its limits. About a dozen burnt wagons and nineteen dead oxen passed today along the road; but the destruction has been by no means as great as upon the North Fork of the Platte and the crossing over to the Sweetwater.”

The Pony Express and Overland Stage coaches followed these routes; the Pony Express changing horses at Plant’s Station a few miles from here.

Legend of Devil’s Gate
Shoshone and Arapahoe legend is one explanation of how Devil’s Gate was formed. A powerful evil spirit in the form of a tremendous beast with enormous tusks ravaged the Sweetwater Valley, preventing the Indians from hunting and camping. A prophet informed the tribes that the Great Spirit required them to destroy the beast. They launched an attack from the mountain passes and ravines, and shot countless arrows into the evil mass. The enraged beast, with a mighty upward thrust of its tusks, ripped a gap in the mountain and disappeared through the gap, never to be seen again.

Robert L. Munkres, “Independence Rock and Devil’s Gate” in Annals of Wyoming, April 1968.