ITGenWeb Project

Trails & Roads

Contributed by Sharon McAllister

Before the Railroads, there were wagon roads. Before the wagon roads, there were trails that could be traveled only on foot or horseback, something hard to visualize in our modern world of interstate highways and travel by air travel. In conjunction with the waterways, however, they linked far-flung places and thus enabled trade and communication. These early trails and roads are important to understading migration patterns.

On this site, Historic Trails & Roads have been grouped by category with links to other relevant sites

Game Trails | Native Trails | Explorer Paths | Forts | Military Roads | Wagon Roads | Cattle Trails

Game Trails

How did the Natives establish their trails? Game trails were an important first step.

Native Trails

This section describes a few of the trails known to have been in use before arrival of European settlers. Most locations are very general.

• Ancient Way: A network of Indian Trade Routes in New Mexico, in use even before the arrival of the Spanish.
• Cumberland Gap: A natural gap in the Appalachian Mountains, though which passed one of the early Indian Trails.
• Nemacolin's Path: A trail between the Potomac and Monongahela rivers that later became Braddock's road.
• Osage War Trail: So named by Washington Irving, because it was used by raiding parties.
• Santa Fe Trail: Most accounts describe the road from near what is now Independence, MO through Kansas and the Oklahoma Panhandle to Santa Fe, NM as the expansion of earlier Indian Trails, but I haven't yet found details about any of those trails. For information about the wagon road itself, see NPS Historic Santa Fe Trail and Oregon-California Trails Association.
• Zuni-Cibola Trail: Part of the Ancient Way, linking the Acoma and Zuni Pueblos.

Explorer's Paths

The early explorers often took advantage of existing native trails, so their paths provide clues regarding the older ones and sometimes the basis for later roads.

• Dragoon Expedition (1834): Started from Fort Gibson (now Oklahoma), established Camp Holmes on the Canadian River, then proceeded southward to Fort Washita. They then turn west, stopping at a Comanche village and a Toyash village on the North Fork of the Red River before returning to Fort Gibson.
• Don Juan de Onate Trail: he path taken by the explorer who claimed what is now New Mexico for Spain. Starts roughly where Texas, Mexico & New Mexico meet and follows the east bank of the Rio Grande to the junction of the Rio Grande and the Rio Chama, north of Espanola. Later became part of El Camino Real.
• Gregg's Route: Josiah Gregg was a Santa Fe trader who sought a southern alternative to the existing Santa Fe Trail. His route linked Van Buren, AR with Santa Fe, generally following the Canadian River across what is now Oklahoma.
• Washington Irving's Expedition (1832)/span>: Came to Fort Gibson (now Oklahoma) from Kansas and then looped through central Oklahoma's Arkansas, Cimarron, and North Canadian Valleys often using earlier Indian Trails.

Forts

Many of the earliest roads led to frontier forts, which meant that they often became significant wagon roads used in the westward expansion. I have encountered many references to "the Old Military Road" where the context defines only the general area, but if the Forts in that area can be located it is possible to narrow the field of candidates, or even determine an approximate path in many cases. See North American Forts for an extensive list of many forts and descriptions, including some dates and specific locations.

Military Roads

• Braddock's Road: A 1755 expansion of Nemacolin's Path which the British General Edward Braddock used to transport troops from Fort Cumberland [Maryland] across the Allegheny Mountains to the French Fort Duquesne near Pittsburg.
• Camp Supply Road : Old military Road through what is now western Oklahoma, from the junction of the north and south forks of the Red River, swinging westward almost to the Texas line, then back to the northeast to Camp Supply and northward into Kansas.
• Camp Supply to Ft. Sill: Secondary military Road linking the two stations.
• Camp Supply to Ft. Reno: Secondary military Road linking the two stations.
• Forbes Road: Built north of Braddock's Road during the French and Indian Wars, under the direction of the British General John Forbes, also to Fort Duquesne. After the war it was extended eastward to Philadelphia.
• Ft. Bascom to Ft. Dodge: Old military road that crossed the Oklahoma panhandle through the southeast corner of present-day Texas County and northeastward through Beaver County into Kansas.
• Ft. Gibson to Ft. Smith: Secondary military Road linking the two stations.
• Ft. Sill to Ft. Towson: An old military road linking Ft. Sill, Ft. Arbuckle, Ft. McCulloch, and Ft. Towson to Little Rock, AR.
• Ft. Sill to Ft. Smith: An old military road from Ft. Sill through Camp Arbuckle and Ft. Coffee to Ft. Sill.
• Ft. Smith to Ft. Towson: Military Road from Ft. Smith through Ft. Towson to the Texas border.

Wagon Roads

In many cases, existing Indian Trails were widened to accommodate wagons, resulting in roads that became significant in the westward expansion.

• Bozeman Trail: A relatively short-lived trail from Colorado to Montana.
• Butterfield Trail: An historic overland mail route that passed from near St. Louis through Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California before the Civil War. In Oklahoma, it passed from Ft. Smith through Brazil Station, Holloway's, Riddle's, Pulsey's, Buffalo Station, Blackburn's, Waddell's, Geary's, Atoka, Boggy Depot, and Ft. Washita to Colbert's Ferry. Also known as the Southern Overland Trail.
• California Road: One of the many trails to California, this one from Ft. Smith through the old Choctaw and Chickasaw Nation into Texas. It loosely followed Gregg's Route.
• California Trail: Not really a single trail, but a network of trails that led west during the Gold Rush.
• Catskill Road: An early [before 1810] overland route from leading westward from Boston into central New York.
• Central Overland Trail: Link between the Oregon Trail [from the junction of the North & South Platte Rivers] to the Mormon Trail [east of Salt Lake City].
• Cherokee Trail: Followed the Arkansas River from Tahlequah through Kansas, Colorado, and into Wyoming, where it met the California Trail at Ft. Jim Bridger. Used in the Gold Rush Days.
• Chihuahua Trail: Possibly another name for El Camino Real, as it supposedly linked Chihuahua with northern New Mexico.
• Cimarron Cutoff: Also known as the Cimarron Route or Cimarron Trail, this was the portion of the Santa Fe trail that cut through the Oklahoma Panhandle. It was shorter than the Mountain Route route through Colorado by about 100 miles, but had.
• El Camino Real: Sometimes called just Camino Real, this was the main trail from Mexico to Santa Fe, and followed the Rio Grande Valley.
• Gila Trail: An oft-used term for the early southern route to California, but actually a network of trails. The story behind this particular legend is included on a site that covers the long history of the quest for a southern overland route.
• Great Genesse Road: An early [before 1810] overland route west from central Massachusetts through Albany, to Buffalo, NY.
• Great Valley Road: An early [before 1810] road from Hagerstown, MD, to west central Virginia.
• Honeymoon Trail: From Pipe Spring AZ, to St. George, UT. Mormon newlyweds from NM & AZ used this road to travel to the Temple to seal their marriages.
• Janos Trail: A trade route established by the Spaniards, extending from the copper mines near Santa Rita, New Mexico into Chihuahua and Sonora in northern Mexico. Tradition has it that this trail used part of the Ancient Way.
• Jonesboro Road: Early [before 1810] road from the coast of North Carolina across the Appalachians to eastern Tennessee.
• Jornado del Muerto: Translation: "Journey of Death". Stories of how it got its name are contradictory, but all go back to the fate of many early travelers along El Camino Real. Maps of southern New Mexico now show this as the name of the desert area between Las Cruces & Socorro, between the Rio Grande and the San Andres and Oscura mountain ranges. It lies in southwestern New Mexico, its southern end between Dona Ana and Radium Springs, its northern one near Socorro. Traversable during the rainy season by those who knew the way and were accustomed to dealing with the hazards of the land, but fatal to many. Conflicting accounts of this route persist. Some say the true El Camino Real did not stray very far from the Rio Grande Valley, even during the stretch between Las Cruces and Socorro where travelers encountered rugged country. Others describe it as 90-mile short-cut across the desert -- closer to a straight line that the widely curving river valley. Old-timers, however, tell of parties that turned east too soon and found themselves in the land-locked basin instead of crossing the open desert -- attributing many of the deaths to that area rather than to the trail itself. As I haven't yet found any map, online or otherwise, that shows a Trail by this name, I tend to believe that the name is legitimately applied to an area rather than a specific route. Photos of the Organ Mountains clearly show the relatively lush area that lured some travelers down the wrong path.
• Mormon Trail: The route that the Mormons followed from IL to Utah. It paralleled the Oregon Trail in parts, but traversed the Rockies by the South Pass.
• Mountain Route: The portion of the Santa Fe Trail that followed mountain passes through Colorado. This was more rugged than the Cimarron Cutoff, but offered reliable sources of water.
• Nashville Road: An early [before 1810] overland route through Tennessee that linked the Natchez Trace with the Richmond Road.
• Natchez Trace: Originally an Indian Trail linking what is now Natchez, MS with Nashville, TN. In the early days, Americans used it to return north after floating goods down the Mississippi by flatboat. By the War of 1812, it had become a military road and extended all the way to New Orleans.
• National Road: The extension of Braddock's Road from Cumberland Maryland to Wheeling [now West Virginia] with a surface of crushed stone has been described as the most ambitious road building project in the nation's history. In 1825, it was extended to Vandalia, IL and eventually reached St. Louis.
• Old Spanish Trail: From Santa Fe northwestward into Colorado to California, a route for pack mules because it was too rough to be traveled by wagons.
• Old Traders Trail: In northern New Mexico.
• Oregon Trail: Originally a network of Indian Trails, this system carried much of the traffic of the Westward Expansion.
• Ox Trains: Interesting account of the use of oxen to haul freight, though not about a specific trail.
• Pony Express Trail: Connected St Louis MO, with Sacramento CA through a series of relay stations. Some portions paralleled the Oregon Trail and others the Central Overland Trail.
• Richmond Road: An early [before 1810] overland route from Richmond, VA to the Cumberland Gap where it met became the Wilderness Road to the northwest and the Nashville Road to the southwest.
• Santa Fe Road: There was a feeder route to the Santa Fe trail from near Fort Gibson in what is now eastern Oklahoma, which extended north of the Arkansas River to meet the Santa Fe Trail between Council Grove and Fort Larned. Locally, it was apparently known as the "Santa Fe Road".
• Santa Fe Trail: Usually described as running from Independence, MO through Kansas and the Oklahoma Panhandle to Santa Fe, NM, but some maps include the leg from Franklin to Independence, where the Santa Fe, Oregon, and California Trails diverged. From near Fort Union, NM to a point west of Fort Larned, KS, travelers could choose from the Mountain Route or the Cimarron Cutoff. The Santa Fe Trail became very important after Mexico attained its independence in 1821 and trade restrictions were eased.
• Shawnee Wagon Road: A freight road, which appears to have shared at least a part of the path followed by the West Shawnee Trail used for cattle drives.
• Texas Road: The first major cattle trail from Texas to Kansas, later called the East Shawnee Trail. It crossed the Red River at Colbert's Ferry and passed near Fort Wichita and Fort Gibson, and crossed into Kansas near the Missouri border.
• Trail of Tears: Not a single trail, but rather the term used for various routes of removal of Native Americans from their homelands to Indian (and, later, Oklahoma) Territory. See the worksheet for an overview and individual ITGenWeb sites for more detailed information about specific Nations/Tribes.
• Wilderness Road: Opened after 1775 by Daniel Boone, linking Fort Chiswell in the Shenandoah Valley through the Cumberland Gap to the Ohio Valley. In 1792, it was widened into a wagon road.
• Zane's Trace: An early [before 1810] overland route through the Ohio Valley.

Cattle Trails

These were among the first included in our old "Trails Linking the West" page and although they were a relatively short-lived phenomenon, they were important to feeding America.

• Beefsteak Trail: The nickname of the country's last regularly-used cattle trail, the Magdalena Livestock Driveway. Herds from eastern Arizona and western New Mexico were driven along this trail to Magdalena, where they could be shipped to market.
• Chisholm Trail: The main Trail crossed the Red River near Ringold TX and went almost due north to Kansas. There was a branch that followed the north side of the North Candian River to Dodge City, KS.
• Chisum Trail: From near Paris, TX, through the southern part of the Texas Panhandle, curving southwest to meet the Pecos River south of Carlsbad, then north through Roswell to Ft. Sumner. The Goodnight-Loving Trail followed the same path through the Pecos Valley. Another trail led west from the Chisum Ranch at Roswell, southwest through the Hondo Valley, across the Tularosa Basin, over the Organ Gap and on into Arizona.
• East Shawnee Trail: The more recent name for the first major cattle trail from Texas to Kansas, which was sometimes called the Texas Road. It crossed the Red River at Colbert's Ferry and passed near Fort Wichita and Fort Gibson, and crossed into Kansas near the Missouri border. There was a branch that led northward from Fort Gibson (on the west side of the Grand River), which met the original trail at the Kansas border, and one that led northwest (north of the Arkansas River) to meet the West Shawnee Trail in southern Kansas.
• Goodnight-Loving Trail: From Ft. Worth, southwest to meet the Pecos River south of Carlsbad, then north through Roswell to Ft. Sumner. The Chisum Trail followed the same path through the Pecos Valley.
• Great Western Cattle Trail: Cattle trail through western Oklahoma, linking Bandera TX with Dodge City, KS.
• Magdalena Trail: The country's last regularly-used cattle trail, formally known as the Magdalena Livestock Driveway. Herds from eastern Arizona and western New Mexico were driven along this trail to Magdalena, where they could be shipped to market.
• Oklahoma Cattle Trails
• Old Doan Trail: Another name for the Great Western Trail.
• Old Dodge City Trail: Another name for the Great Western Trail.
• Old Texas Trail: Another name for the Great Western Trail.
• West Shawnee Trail : The second major cattle trail from Texas to Kansas, which followed the Texas Road from the Red River to Boggy Depot then struck northward through the central part of the state.