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Dox: Susan Shelby Magoffin (30 July 1827 – 26 October 1855) was the wife of a trader from the United States who traveled on the Santa Fe Trail in the late 1840s. The diary in which she recorded her experiences has been used extensively as a source for histories of the time. ==Biography== Susan Shelby was born into a wealthy family on 30 July 1827 on their plantation near Danville, Kentucky. Her grandfather was Isaac Shelby, a hero of the American Revolutionary War and the first governor of Kentucky. On 25 November 1845, when aged eighteen, she married Samuel Magoffin. Samuel was the son of an Irish immigrant who had prospered in Kentucky. Samuel and his brother James Wiley Magoffin had been active in the Santa Fe trade since the 1820s, travelling widely in the United States and Mexico and gaining considerable wealth. James became U.S. consul at Saltillo in 1828 and married the daughter of a prominent Chihuahua merchant in 1830. Samuel Magoffin took his bride with him, travelling in as much comfort as possible, on the next trading journey, leaving Independence, Missouri on 10 June 1846. According to Susan Magoffin, their outfit included "fourteen big wagons with six yoke each, one baggage wagon with two yoke, one dearborn with two mules (this concern carries my maid) our own carriage with two more mules, and two men on mules driving the loose stock." They brought a maid, a cook and a coop of live chickens with them. Susan thought she was the first "American lady" to have made the trip. On 31 July 1846 Susan Magoffin suffered a miscarriage at Bent's Fort, just after her nineteenth birthday. The Magoffins reached Santa Fe, New Mexico on 31 August 1846. From there, they headed south to El Paso del Norte, Chihuahua and Saltillo. Susan's health began to suffer from the hardships of the journey. While sick with yellow fever in Matamoros, Chihuahua, Susan Magoffin gave birth to a son, who did not survive. The Magoffins returned to Kentucky in 1848, where a daughter was born in 1851. In 1852 they moved to Barrett's Station, near to Kirkwood, Missouri, where Samuel bought a large estate. Susan's health had been irreparably damaged by the hardships of the Santa Fe expedition. A second daughter was born in 1855. Susan died soon after, on 26 October 1855, and was buried in St. Louis, Missouri. Susan Magoffin shared the common Anglo-American prejudices of the time about Indians and Mexicans, at first assuming they were primitive and brutish, but was quick to adapt her views as she came to know them better. Thus she was astonished that an Indian woman who gave birth to a healthy child then went to the river half an hour later to bathe herself and her baby, and repeated this practice each day. She said "No doubt many ladies in civilized life are ruined by too careful treatments during childbirth, for this custom of the hethen is not known to be disadvantageous, but it is a 'hethenish custom. She said, "I did think the Mexicans were as void of refinement, judgement etc. as the dumb animals till I heard one of them say 'bonita muchachita' (little girl )! And now I have reason and certainly a good one for changing my opinion; they are certainly a very quick and intelligent people." When she reached El Paso del Norte, Susan was greatly impressed with the civilized manners and learning of her Mexican hosts. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Susan Shelby Magoffin」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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