We were in the mountains with no food.They were weak,exhausted and almost dead. Two scouts went out looking for someone to help them and they were found by a herdsman . News spread quickly in the valley, and a massive rescue effort was underway immediately . People back in the mountains were also at the point of starvation. Catherine (Kime) Rickard told her grandaughter that she could have eaten her own flesh if she had known how to do it. The scouts who had started over the mountains heading for the three sisters were still not heard from, so a search was made, and their plight was even more pitiful. This area was so rugged that the Indians had always crossed the cascades by other routes. The young men came across the lava flows to the headwaters of the Mckenzie. They werenear death from exhaustion and starvation, having eaten their horses when they gave out. The stronger ones had gone ahead until they could not continue. When someone eventually found them, one man had to be cared for for three days before he was able to travel. Even with all of the help by the rescuers, the way down the Middle Fork of the Willamette River was rough and dangerous. In two days of travel, the river had to be crossed twenty times.Water was high, swift, and cold.One woman lost her life when her wagon was overturned. The arrived in the vicinity of Eugene in 1853, and passed through the town without knowing it. At this time Eugene consisted of one store and a blacksmith shop. Bran was substituted for flour. At this time apples could be secured for any price, a nd a flour sack of potatoes were .25.**** The Rickards wintered north of Skinner"s Butte spring and made (fence) rails of fir to get them through the winter. In spring they went on down the valley looking for homesteads. Uncle Sib Barclay saw the smoke of their campfire and helped them find homesteads.******The three Rickard brothers and George Shultz took up contiguos land claims between the emigrant road (now Highway 99 west) and the Williamette River, north of the present town of Monroe. -- Linda Rogers, more to come