The Story of the Mormons, from the Date of Their Origin to the Year 1901 Part 53

voted to proceed." *

* A "bond," which each a.s.sisted emigrant was required to sign in Liverpool, contained the following stipulations: "We do severally and jointly promise and bind ourselves to continue with and obey the instructions of the agent appointed to superintend our pa.s.sage thither to [Utah]. And that, on our arrival in Utah, we will hold ourselves, our time, and our labor, subject to the appropriation of the Perpetual Emigration Fund Company until the full cost of our emigration is paid, with interest if required."

As the teams provided could not haul enough flour to last the company to Utah, a sack weighing ninety-eight pounds was added to the load of each cart. One pound of flour a day was now allowed to each adult, and occasionally fresh beef. Soon after leaving Florence trouble began with the carts. The sand of the dry prairie got into the wooden hubs and ground the axles so that they broke, and constant delays were caused by the necessity of making repairs., No axle grease had been provided, and some of the company were compelled to use their precious allowance of bacon to grease the wheels. At Wood River, where the plains were alive with buffaloes, a stampede of the cattle occurred one night, and thirty of them were never recovered. The one yoke of oxen that was left to each wagon could not pull the load; an attempt to use the milch cows and heifers as draught animals failed, and the tired cart pullers had to load up again with flour.

While pursuing their journey in this manner, their camp was visited one evening by Apostle F. D. Richards and some other elders, on their way to Utah from mission work abroad. Richards severely rebuked Savage for advising that the trip be given up at Florence, and prophesied that the Lord would keep open a way before them. The missionaries, who were provided with carriages drawn by four horses each, drove on, without waiting to see this prediction confirmed.

On arriving at Fort Laramie, about the first of September, another evidence of the culpable neglect of the church authorities manifested itself. The supply of provisions that was to have awaited them there was wanting. They calculated the amount that they had on hand, and estimated that it would last only until they were within 350 miles of Salt Lake City; but, perhaps making the best of the situation, they voted to reduce the daily ration and to try to make the supply last by travelling faster. When they reached the neighborhood of Independence Rock, a letter sent back by Richards informed them that supplies would meet them at South Pa.s.s; but another calculation showed that what remained would not last them to the Pa.s.s, and again the ration was reduced, working men now receiving twelve ounces a day, other adults nine, and children from four to eight. Another source of discomfort now manifested itself. In order to accommodate matters to the capacity of the carts, the elders in charge had made it one of the rules that each outfit should be limited to seventeen pounds of clothing and bedding. As they advanced up the Sweet.w.a.ter it became cold. The mountains appeared snow-covered, and the lack of extra wraps and bedding caused first discomfort, and then intense suffering, to the half-fed travellers. The necessity of frequently wading the Sweet.w.a.ter chilled the stronger men who were bearing the brunt of the labor, and when morning dawned the occupants of the tents found themselves numb with the cold, and quite unfitted to endure the hards.h.i.+ps of the coming day. Chislett draws this picture of the situation at that time:--

"Our old and infirm people began to droop, and they no sooner lost spirit and courage than death's stamp could be traced upon their features. Life went out as smoothly as a lamp ceases to burn when the oil is gone. At first the deaths occurred slowly and irregularly, but in a few days at more frequent intervals, until we soon thought it unusual to leave a camp ground without burying one or more persons. Death was not long confined in its ravages to the old and infirm, but the young and naturally strong were among its victims. Weakness and debility were accompanied by dysentery. This we could not stop or even alleviate, no proper medicines being in the camp; and in almost every instance it carried off the parties attacked. It was surprising to an unmarried man to witness the devotion of men to their families and to their faith under these trying circ.u.mstances. Many a father pulled his cart, with his little children on it, until the day preceding his death. These people died with the calm faith and fort.i.tude of martyrs."

An Oregonian returning East, who met two of the more fortunate of these handcart parties, gave this description to the Huron (Ohio) Reflector in 1857:--

"It was certainly the most novel and interesting sight I have seen for many a day. We met two trains, one of thirty and the other of fifty carts, averaging about six to the cart. The carts were generally drawn by one man and three women each, though some carts were drawn by women alone. There were about three women to one man, and two-thirds of the women single. It was the most motley crew I ever beheld. Most of them were Danes, with a sprinkling of Welsh, Swedes, and English, and were generally from the lower cla.s.ses of their countries. Most could not understand what we said to them. The road was lined for a mile behind the train with the lame, halt, sick, and needy. Many were quite aged, and would be going slowly along, supported by a son or daughter. Some were on crutches; now and then a mother with a child in her arms and two or three hanging hold of her, with a forlorn appearance, would pa.s.s slowly along; others, whose condition ent.i.tled them to a seat in a carriage, were wending their way through the sand. A few seemed in good spirits."

The belated company did not meet anyone to carry word of their condition to the valley, but among Richard's party who visited the camp at Wood River was Brigham Young's son, Joseph A. He realized the plight of the travellers, and when his father heard his report he too recognized the fact that aid must be sent at once. The son was directed to get together all the supplies he could obtain in the city or pick up on the way, and to start toward the East immediately. Driving on himself in a light wagon, he reached the advanced line, as they were toiling ahead through their first snowstorm. The provisions travelled slower, and could not reach them in less than one or two days longer. There was encouragement, of course, even in the prospect of release, but encouragement could not save those whose vitality was already exhausted. Camp was pitched that night among a grove of willows, where good fires were possible, but in the morning they awoke to find the snow a foot deep, and that five of their companions had been added to the death list during the night.

To add to the desperate character of the situation came the announcement that the provisions were practically exhausted, the last of the flour having been given out, and all that remained being a few dried apples, a little rice and sugar, and about twenty-five pounds of hardtack. Two of the cattle were killed, and the camp were informed that they would have to subsist on the supplies in sight until aid reached them. The best thing to do in these circ.u.mstances, indeed, the only thing, was to remain where they were and send messengers to advise the succoring party of the desperateness of their case. Their captain, Mr. Willie, and one companion acted as their messengers. They were gone three days, and in their absence Mr. Chislett had the painful duty of doling out what little food there was in camp. He speaks of his task as one that unmanned him. More cattle were killed, but beef without other food did not satisfy the hungry, and the epidemic of dysentery grew worse. The commissary officer was surrounded by a crowd of men and women imploring him for a little food, and it required all his power of reasoning to make them see that what little was left must be saved for the sick.

The party with aid from the valley had also encountered the snowstorm, and, not appreciating the desperate condition of the hand-cart immigrants, had halted to wait for better weather. As soon as Captain Willie took them the news, they hastened eastward, and were seen by the starving party at sunset, the third day after their captain's departure.

"Shouts of joy rent the air," says Chislett. "Strong men wept till tears ran freely down their furrowed and sunburnt cheeks, and little children partook of the joy which some of them hardly understood, and fairly danced around with gladness. Restraint was set aside in the general rejoicing, and, as the brethren entered our camp, the sisters fell upon them and deluged them with kisses."

The timely relief saved many lives, but the end of the suffering had not been reached. A good many of the foot party were so exhausted by what they had gone through, that even their near approach to their Zion and their prophet did not stimulate them to make the effort to complete the journey. Some trudged along, unable even to pull a cart, and those who were still weaker were given places in the wagons. It grew colder, too, and frozen hands and feet became a common experience. Thus each day lessened by a few who were buried the number that remained.

Then came another snowstorm. What this meant to a weakened party like this dragging their few possessions in carts can easily be imagined.

One family after another would find that they could not make further progress, and when a hill was reached the human teams would have to be doubled up. In this way, by travelling backward and forward, some progress was made. That day's march was marked by constant additions to the stragglers who kept dropping by the way. When the main body had made their camp for the night, some of the best teams were sent back for those who had dropped behind, and it was early morning before all of these were brought in.

The next morning Captain Willie was a.s.signed to take count of the dead.

An examination of the camp showed thirteen corpses, all stiffly frozen.

They were buried in a large square hole, three or four abreast and three deep. "When they did not fit in," says Chislett, "we put one or two crosswise at the head or feet of the others. We covered them with willows and then with the earth." Two other victims were buried before nightfall. Parties pa.s.sing eastward by this place the following summer found that the wolves had speedily uncovered the corpses, and that their bones were scattered all over the neighborhood.

Further deaths continued every day until they arrived at South Pa.s.s.

There more a.s.sistance from the valley met them, the weather became warmer, and the health of the party improved, so that when they arrived at Salt Lake City they were in better condition and spirits. The date of their arrival there was November 9. The company which set out from Iowa City numbered about 500, of whom 400 set out from Florence across the plains. Of these 400, 67 died on the way, and there were a few deaths after they reached the end of their journey.

Another company of these hand-cart travellers left Florence still later than the ones whose sufferings have been described. They were in charge of an elder named Martin. Like their predecessors, they were warned against setting out so late as the middle of August, and many of them tried to give up the trip, but permission to do so was refused. Their sufferings began soon after they crossed the Platte, near Fort Laramie, and snow was encountered sixty miles east of Devil's Gate. When they reached that landmark, they decided that they could make no further progress with their hand-carts. They accordingly took possession of half a dozen dilapidated log houses, the contents of the wagons were placed in some of these, the hand-carts were left behind, and as many people as the teams could drag were placed in the wagons and started forward. One of the survivors of this party has written: "The track of the emigrants was marked by graves, and many of the living suffered almost worse than death. Men may be seen to-day in Salt Lake City, who were boys then, hobbling around on their club-feet, all their toes having been frozen off in that fearful march." * Twenty men who were left at Devil's Gate had a terrible experience, being compelled, before a.s.sistance reached them, to eat even the pieces of hide wrapped round their cart-wheels, and a piece of buffalo skin that had been used as a door-mat. Strange to say, all of these men reached the valley alive.

* "Rocky Mountain Saints," p. 337.

We have seen that Brigham Young was the inventor of this hand-cart immigration scheme. Alarmed by the result of the experiment, as soon as the wretched remnant of the last two parties arrived in Salt Lake City, he took steps to place the responsibility for the disaster on other shoulders. The idea which he carried out was to s.h.i.+ft the blame to F. D.

Richards on the ground that he allowed the immigrants to start too late. In an address in the Tabernacle, while Captain Willie's party was approaching the city, he told the returned missionaries from England that they needed to be careful about eulogizing Richards and Spencer, lest they should have "the big head." When these men were in Salt Lake City he cursed them with the curse of the church. E. W. Tullidge, who was an editor of the Millennial Star in Liverpool under Richards when the hand-cart emigrants were collected, proposed, when in later years he was editing the Utah Magazine, to tell the facts about that matter; but when Young learned this, he ordered G.o.dbe, the controlling owner of the magazine, to destroy that issue, after one side of the sheets had been printed, and he was obeyed.* Fortunately Young was not able to destroy the files of the Millennial Star.

* "Rocky Mountain Saints," p. 342.

There is much that is thoroughly typical of Mormonism in the history of these expeditions. No converts were ever instilled with a more confident belief in the divine character of the ridiculous pretender, Joseph Smith. To no persons were more flagrant misrepresentations ever made by the heads of the church, and over none was the dictatorial authority of the church exercised more remorselessly. Not only was Utah held out to them as "a land where honest labor and industry meet with a suitable reward, and where the higher walks of life are open to the humblest and poorest," * but they were informed that, if they had not faith enough to undertake the trip to Utah, they had not "faith sufficient to endure, with the Saints in Zion, the celestial law which leads to exaltation and eternal life." Young wrote to Richards privately in October, 1855, "Adhere strictly to our former suggestion of walking them through across the plains with hand-carts";** and Richards in an editorial in the Star thereupon warned the Saints: "The destroying angel is abroad. Pestilence and gaunt famine will soon increase the terrors of the scene to an extent as yet without a parallel in the records of the human race. If the antic.i.p.ated toils of the journey shake your faith in the promises of the Lord, it is high time that you were digging about the foundation of it, and seeing if it be founded on the root of the Holy Priesthood,"

etc.

* Thirteenth General Epistle, Millennial Star, Vol. XVIII, p. 49.

** Millennial Star, Vol. XVIII, p, 61.

The direct effect of such teaching is shown in two letters printed in the Millennial Star of June 14, 1856. In the first of these, a sister, writing to her brother in Liverpool from Williamsburg, New York, confesses her surprise on learning that the journey was to be made with hand-carts, says that their mother cannot survive such a trip, and that she does not think the girls can, points out that the limitation regarding baggage would compel them to sell nearly all their clothes, and proposes that they wait in New York or St. Louis until they could procure a wagon. In his reply the brother scorns this advice, says that he would not stop in New York if he were offered 10,000 pounds besides his expenses, and adds "Brothers, sisters, fathers or mothers, when they put a stumbling block in the way of my salvation, are nothing more to me than Gentiles. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord, and when we start we will go right up to Zion, if we go ragged and barefoot."

Young found himself hard put to meet the church obligations in 1856, notwithstanding the economy of the hand-cart system; and the Millennial Star of December 27 announced that no a.s.sisted emigrants would be sent out during the following year. Saints proposing to go through at their own expense were informed, however, that the church bureau would supply them with teams. Those proposing to use hand-carts were told of the "indispensable necessity" of having their whole outfit ready on their arrival at Iowa City, and the bureau offered to supply this at an estimated cost of 3 pounds per head, any deficit to be made up on their arrival there.*

* "The agency of the Mormon emigration at that time was a very profitable appointment. By arrangement with s.h.i.+p brokers at Liverpool, a commission of half a guinea per head was allowed the agent for every adult emigrant that he sent across the Atlantic, and the railroad companies in New York allowed a percentage on every emigrant ticket. But a still larger revenue was derived from the outfitting on the frontiers.

The agents purchased all the cattle, wagons, tents, wagon-covers, flour, cooking utensils, stoves, and the staple articles for a three months' journey across the Plains, and from them the Saints supplied themselves."--"Rocky Mountain Saints," p. 340.

CHAPTER V. -- EARLY POLITICAL HISTORY

We have seen that Joseph Smith's desire was, when he suggested a possible removal of the church to the Far West, that they should have, not only an undisturbed place of residence, but a government of their own. This idea of political independence Young never lost sight of. Had Utah remained a distant province of the Mexican government, the Mormons might have been allowed to dwell there a long time, practically without governmental control. But when that region pa.s.sed under the government of the United States by the proclamation of the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, on July 4, 1848, Brigham Young had to face anew situation. He then decided that what he wanted was an independent state government, not territorial rule under the federal authorities, and he planned accordingly. Every device was employed to increase the number of the Saints in Utah, to bring the population up to the figure required for admission as a state, and he encouraged outlying settlements at every attractive point. In this way, by 1851, Ogden and Provo had become large enough to form Stakes, and in a few years the country around Salt Lake City was dotted with settlements, many of them on lands to which the "Lamanites," who held so deep a place in Joseph Smith's heart, a.s.serted in vain their ancestral t.i.tles.

The first General Epistle sent out from Great Salt Lake City, in 1849, thus explained the first government set up there, "In consequence of Indian depredations on our horses, cattle, and other property, and the wicked conduct of a few base fellows who came among the Saints, the inhabitants of this valley, as is common in new countries generally, have organized a temporary government to exist during its necessity, or until we can obtain a charter for a territorial government, a pet.i.tion for which is already in progress."

On March 4, 1849, a convention, to which were invited all the inhabitants of upper California east of the Sierra Nevadas, was held in Great Salt Lake City to frame a system of government. The outcome was the adoption of a const.i.tution for a state to be called the State of Deseret, and the election of a full set of state officers. The boundaries of this state were liberal. Starting at a point in what is now New Mexico, the line was to run down to the Mexican border, then west along the border of lower California to the Pacific, up the coast to 118 degrees 30 minutes west longitude, north to the dividing ridge of the Sierra Nevadas, and along their summit to the divide between the Columbia River and the Salt Lake Basin, and thence south to the place of beginning, "by the dividing range of mountains that separate the waters flowing into the Gulf of Mexico from the waters flowing into the Gulf of California." The const.i.tution adopted followed the general form of such instruments in the United States. In regard to religion it declared, "All men have a natural and inalienable right to wors.h.i.+p G.o.d according to the dictates of their own consciences; and the General a.s.sembly shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or disturb any person in his religious wors.h.i.+p or sentiments." *

*For text of this const.i.tution and the memorial to Congress, see Millennial Star, January 15, 1850.

An epistle of the Twelve to Orson Pratt in England, explaining this subject, said, "We have pet.i.tioned the Congress of the United States for the organization of a territorial government here. Until this pet.i.tion is granted, we are under the necessity of organizing a local government for the time being."* The territorial government referred to was that of the State of Deseret. The local government mentioned was organized on March 12, by the election of Brigham Young as governor, H. C. Kimball as chief justice, John Taylor and N. K. Whitney as a.s.sociate justices, and the Bishops of the wards as city magistrates, with minor positions filled. Six hundred and seventy-four votes were polled for this ticket.

* Millennial Star, Vol. XI, p. 244.

The General a.s.sembly, chosen later, met on July 2, and adopted a memorial to Congress setting forth the failure of that body to provide any form of government for the territory ceded by Mexico,* declaring that "the revolver and the bowie knife have been the highest law of the land," and asking for the admission of the State of Deseret into the Union. That same year the Californians framed a government for themselves, and a plan was discussed to consolidate California and Deseret until 1851, when a separation should take place. The governor of California condemned this scheme, and the legislature gave it no countenance.

* "When Congress adjourned on March 4, 1849, all that had been done toward establis.h.i.+ng some form of government for the immense domain acquired by the treaty with Mexico was to extend over it the revenue laws and make San Francisco a port of entry."--Bancroft's "Utah," p.

446.

The Mormons had a confused idea about the government that they had set up. In the const.i.tution adopted they called their domain the State of Deseret, but they allowed their legislature to elect their representative in Congress, sending A. W. Babbitt as their delegate to Was.h.i.+ngton, with their memorial asking for the admission of Deseret, or that they be given "such other form of civil government as your wisdom and magnanimity may award to the people of Deseret." The Mormons'

old political friend in Illinois, Stephen A. Douglas, presented this memorial in the Senate on December 27, 1849, with a statement that it was an application for admission as a state, but with the alternative of admission as a territory if Congress should so direct. The memorial was referred to the Committee on Territories.

On the 31st of December, a counter memorial against the admission of the Mormon state was presented by Mr. Underwood of Kentucky, a Whig. This was signed by William Smith, the prophet's brother, and Isaac Sheen (who called themselves the "legitimate presidents" of the Mormon church), and by twelve other members. This memorial alleged that fifteen hundred of the emigrants from Nauvoo to Salt Lake City, before their departure for Illinois, took the following oath:--