Bound for Montana: Diaries from the Bozeman Trail

On May 14, 1866, Perry Burgess summed up the expectations and hopes of countless westering Americans when he wrote in his diary: "packed up and started on our journey toward the land of gold." Here are stories of the prospectors, freighters, wives, and merchants who, like Burgess, traveled the Bozeman Trails in search of fortune, adventure, or a new life.

A shortcut from the Platte River Road to the Montana goldfields, the Bozeman Trail was relatively short in length—less than five hun…