edge to become a full-time missionary (Burns and Ives).
             Prior to Marcus' trip to the Oregon Country, Narcissa volunteered her services to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. This was a group that commissioned Protestant missionaries to different Native American tribes. It was this group that was going to send Marcus westward. The Board didn't allow unmarried women, which Narcissa was, to become missionaries. Seeing as that Marcus was unmarried, the Board thought of arranging Narcissa and Marcus to be married. He visited the Prentiss family for a weekend to have the family's consent in the two being married. The family and the couple agreed to be married and did so in the year of 1836. It was then that the Board offered the two positions as being missionaries (Burns and Ives).
             In the same year that they were married, Narcissa and Marcus made their way westward. The couple did not go alone though. An upcoming missionary by the name of William H. Gray joined the two and Narcissa convinced another missionary couple, Henry and Eliza Spalding, to come along with them. Their starting off point was St. Louis, Missouri and Oregon was their final stop (Burns and Ives).
             The group of five was led by a group of fur traders for most of the way. They had taken their wagons farther West than any other American Expedition (Burns and Ives). On the way to the West, Narcissa Whitman and Eliza Spalding became the first white women to cross the continental divide, the Rocky Mountains (Morris). The missionary group reached the Walla Walla River on September 1, 1836 (Burns and Ives). This is where the group went their separate ways. The Spaldings went to go settle with a Nez Perce tribe and establish a mission at Lapwai, near what is today Lewiston, Idaho. The Whitmans, along with William Gray went into the Walla Walla Valley and decided to build a mission to the Cayuse Indians at Waiilatpu (Morris)...