Cholera outbreaks and pandemics
That year, cholera was transmitted along the California, Mormon and Oregon Trails as 6,000 to 12,000 are believed to have died on their way to the California Gold Rush, Utah and Oregon in the cholera years of 1849–1855. It is believed more than 150,000 Americans died during the two pandemics between 1832 and 1849.
Oregon Trail
Other routes involved taking a ship to Colón, Panama (then called Aspinwall) and a strenuous, disease ridden, five- to seven-day trip by canoe and mule over the Isthmus of Panama before catching a ship from Panama City, Panama to Oregon or California. This trip could be done from the east coast theoretically in less than two months if all ship connections were made without waits and typically cost about $450/person. Catching a fatal disease was a distinct possibility as Ulysses S. Grant in 1852 learned when his unit of about 600 soldiers and some of their dependents traversed the Isthmus and lost about 120 men, women, and children. This passage was considerably sped up and made safer in 1855 when the Panama Railroad was completed at terrible cost in money and life across the Isthmus. The once treacherous trip could be done in less than a day. The time and the cost for transit dropped as regular paddle wheel steamships and sailing ships went from ports on the east coast and New Orleans, Louisiana, to Colón, Panama ($80–$100), across the Isthmus of Panama by railroad ($25) and by paddle wheel steamships and sailing ships to ports in California and Oregon ($100–$150).