A Single Herd of 10,000 Buffalo Provides Abundant Meat for the Pioneer Camp on the Platte (1847)

The Pioneer Camp of Mormon Emigrants, after leaving Grand Island, had an abundant supply of buffalo beef from a single herd estimated to number over 10,000, which greatly strengthened those whose health was suffering. One writer calculated the herd contained eight to ten million pounds of meat, described as 'a large supply to be sent by quails in the desert.'

Fuller account of this event (as retold in The Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star, Vol. 9, No. 21, 1 November 1847, p. 326):

After leaving Grand Island, however, they had an abundant supply of buffalo beef, which greatly nerved the strength of those whose health was suffering by forced abstinence. A single herd, with which they fell in, was estimated to number over 10,000, or according to the calculation of one letter writer, must have contained from eight to ten millions pounds of meat, “a large supply (he says) to be sent by quails in the desert.”