Third Week at Great Salt Lake City.--Excursions.
Governor Cumming had asked me to accompany Madam and himself to the
shores of the lake, with an ulterior view to bathing and picnicking.
One fine morning, at 10 A.M., duly provided with the _nécessaire_
and a thermometer--which duly snapped in two before immersion--we
set out down the west road, crossed the rickety two-laned bridge
that spans the holy stream, and debouched upon a mirage-haunted and
singularly ugly plain. Wherever below the line of debordement of the
lake’s spring freshet, it is a mere desert; where raised, however,
the land is cultivable, from the Wasach Mountains to Spring Point, at
the north of the Oquirrh, giving about eighty square miles of fertile
land. The soil, as near the lake generally, is a thin layer of saline
humus, overspreading gravel and pebbles. The vegetation is scattered
artemisia, rose-bushes, the _Euphorbia tuberosa_ and other varieties of
milk-weed, the greasewood, salicornias, and several salsolaceæ. There
are numerous salt deposits, all wet and miry in the rainy season; and
the animals that meet the sight are the coyote, the badger, and the
hideous Phrynosoma. A few blue cranes and sage-chickens, which are
eatable till October, were seen; and during winter the wild-fowl are
found in large flocks, and the sweet-water streams are stocked with
diminutive fish. In contrast with the bald and shaven aspect of the
plain, rose behind us the massive forms of the Wasach Mountains, robed
in forests, mist-crowned, and showing a single streak of white, which
entitles them to the poetical boast of eternal snow--snow apparently
never being respectable without eternity.
After fifteen miles of good road we came to the Point o’ the
Mountain--the head of the Oquirrh, also called West Mountain--where
pyramidal buttes bound the southern extremity of the lake. Their
horizontal lines are cleanly cut by the action of water, and fall in
steps toward the plain. Any appearance of regularity in the works of
Nature is always pleasing--firstly, because it contrasts with her
infinite diversity; and, secondly, because it displays her grandeur
by suggesting comparison with the minor works of mankind. Ranches
and corrals, grass and cattle, now began to appear, and the entrance
of a large cave was pointed out to me in the base of the buttes. We
drove on, and presently emerged upon the shores of this “dead and
desert”--this “still and solitary” sea. It has not antiquity enough
to have become the scene of fabulous history; the early Canadian
_voyageurs_, however, did their best to ennoble it, and recounted to
wondering strangers its fearful submarine noises, its dark and sudden
storms, and the terrible maelstrom in its centre, which, funnel-like,
descended into the bowels of the earth. I believe that age is its
only want; with _quasi_-lifeless waters, a balance of evaporation and
supply--ever a mystery to the ignorant--and a horned frog, the Dead Sea
of the New World has claims to preternaturalism at least equal to those
of its sister feature, the volcano of depression, in the Old Hemisphere.
[MARE MORTUUM.]
The first aspect of Mare Mortuum was by no means unprepossessing. As we
stood upon the ledge, at whose foot lies the selvage of sand and salt
that bounds the wave, we seemed to look upon the sea of the Cyclades.
The sky was light and clear, the water of a deep lapis-lazuli blue,
flecked here and there with the smallest of white horses--tiny billows,
urged by the warm soft wind; and the feeble tumble of the surf upon
the miniature sands reminded me, with the first surveyor, “of scenes
far, far away, where mightier billows pay their ceaseless tribute
to the strand.” In front of us, and bounding the extreme northwest,
lay Antelope or Church Island, rising in a bold central ridge. This
rock forms the western horizon to those looking from the city, and
its delicate pink--the effect of a ruddy carpet woven with myriads of
small flowers--blushing in the light of the setting sun, is ever an
interesting and beautiful object. Nearer, it has a brown garb, almost
without a tinge of green, except in rare, scattered spots; its benches,
broken by gashes and gullies, rocks and ravines, are counterparts to
those on the main land; and its form and tintage, softened by the
damp overhanging air, and contrasting with the light blue sky and
the dark ultramarine streak of sea at its base, add greatly to the
picturesqueness of the view. The foreground is a strip of sand, yellow
where it can be seen, incrusted with flakes of salt like the icing of a
plum-cake, and bearing marks of submergence in the season of the spring
freshets. At the water’s edge is a broken black line of a peculiar
drift, which stands boldly out from the snowy whiteness around. Where
my sketch was taken I looked as through a doorway, whose staples were
two detached masses of stone. On the right rose an irregular heap of
conglomerate and sandstone, attached to the ledge behind, and leaning
forward as if about to fall. On the left, the “Black Rock,” which can
be seen as a dot from the city, a heap of flint conglomerate, imbedded
in slaty, burnt, and altered clay, formed the terminating bluff to a
neck of light sand and dark stone.
Before proceeding to our picnic, I will briefly resume the history and
geography of this Mare Mortuum. The Baron de la Hontan, the French
governor of Placentia, in Newfoundland, about 1690, heard from Indians
of a Great Salt Water, which he caused to disembogue through a huge
river into the South Sea or Pacific Ocean. Like the Lake Tanganyika,
in Central Africa, it was arrayed in the garb of fable, 300 leagues of
length, 30 of breadth, with “100 towns about it,” like Mr. Cooley’s
highly imaginative “Zanganica,” and navigated in large boats by the
savage Mozeemleks, who much remind one of the old semi-mythical
“Mono-moezi.” Doubtless many a trapper and obscure trader has since
that time visited it; a name or two has been found upon the adjacent
rocks, but those were braves who, to speak metaphorically, lived before
the age of Agamemnon. In 1845, Colonel Frémont, then engaged with his
second expedition, made a partial flying survey, which, in 1849-50, was
scientifically completed by Captain Howard Stansbury.
In geologic ages the lake occupied the space between the Sierra Madre
on the east, and the ranges of Goose Creek and Humboldt River on the
west. The length is roughly computed at 500 miles from north to south,
the breadth from 350 to 500, and the area at 175,000 square miles. The
waters have declined into the lowest part of the basin by the gradual
upheaval of the land, in places showing thirteen successive steps or
benches. A freshet of a few yards would submerge many miles of flat
shore, and a rise of 650 feet would in these days convert all but the
highest peaks of the surrounding eminences into islands and islets,
the kanyons into straits, creeks, and sea-arms, and the bluffs into
slightly elevated shores. Popular opinion asserts that the process of
desiccation is going on at the rate of about half a mile in ten years.
But the limits of beach and drift line laid down by Captain Stansbury
are still well defined, and the shrinking of the volume may be ranked
with its “sinking”--like the sink of the Humboldt and other rivers--an
empirical explanation, by which the mountaineer removes the difficulty
of believing that evaporation can drain off the supplies of so many
rivers.
[THE GREAT SALT LAKE.]
The lake, which is about the size of the African Chad, occupies the
northeastern corner of Utah Territory, and lies to the northwest of
the Great Salt Lake Valley, which is forty miles long by about twelve
in breadth. The major axis of the irregular parallelogram is sixty to
seventy miles in length from north to south, by thirty to thirty-five
from east to west. Its altitude has been laid down at 4200 feet above,
while the Dead Sea of Palestine is 1300 feet below sea level. The
principal influents, beginning from the north, are the Bear River, the
Weber River, and the Jordan. They supply the balance of evaporation,
which from water is greater, and from high lands is usually less, than
the rain. The western side is a perfect desert--a salt and arid waste
of clay and sand, with the consistence of mortar when wet, which can
not boast of a single stream; even the springs are sometimes separated
by “jornadas” of seventy miles. When the rivers are in flood, the
lake, it is said, rises to a maximum of four feet, overflowing large
tracts of level saline plain, winding between the broken walls of
rock which surround it on all sides. Near its shores the atmosphere
is reeking, bluish, and hazy, from the effects of active evaporation,
and forms a decided change from the purity and transparency of the air
elsewhere. Surveyors have observed that it is a labor to use telescopes
for geoditic purposes, and that astronomical observations are very
imperfect. The quantity of vapor is less, and evaporation has less
tension and density from the surface of salt than of fresh water; here,
however, the operation is assisted by sunheat sufficient to produce
an aeriform state, and by a wind brisk enough to prevent the vapor
accumulating over the surface.
The water of this remarkable feature, which so curiously reproduces
the marvels of Judea, contains nearly one quarter of solid matter, or
about six times and a half more than the average solid constituents of
sea-water, which may be laid down roughly at three and a half per cent.
of its weight, or about half an ounce to the pound.[179] The Dead Sea
is its sole known superior. The specific gravity is 1·170, distilled
water being 1·000; the North Atlantic, between latitude 25° N. and
longitude 52° W. (G.), 1·020; and the Dead Sea, at 60° Fahrenheit, from
1·22742 to 1·130. The vulgar estimate of its saltness is exaggerated.
I have heard at Salt Lake City of one bucket of saline matter being
produced by the evaporation of three; and that meat can be salted,
and corned beef converted into junk, after twelve or fourteen hours
in the natural unevaporated brine. It is used without preparation
by the citizens, who have not adopted the precautions recommended
by Dr. Gale.[180] It is collected by boys, shoveled into carts at
the points of the beach where the winds dash up the waves--forming a
regular wind-tide--and is sold in retail at half a cent per pound, or
two shillings per hundred pounds. The original basin of geological
ages was, doubtless, as the shells have proved, fresh water. The
saline substances are brought down by rain, which washes the soil and
percolates through the rocky ledges, and by the rivers, which are
generally estimated to contain from ten to one hundred grains of salt
per gallon,[181] and here probably more, owing to the abundance of
soda. The evaporation is, of course, nearly pure, containing but very
minute traces of salts.
[179] “One hundred parts by weight were,” says Dr. Gale, “evaporated
to dryness in a water-bath below the boiling-point, and then heated
to about 300° of the thermometer, and retained at that heat till the
mass ceased to lose any weight. It gave solid contents 22·422 (?),
and consisted of
Chloride of sodium }In the {Chloride of sodium 97·80
(common salt) 20·196 }Abbé { „ „ calcium 0·61
Sulphate of soda 1·834 }Domenech’s { „ „ magnesium 0·24
Chloride of }work the {Sulphate of soda 0·23
magnesium 0·252 }analysis is{ „ „ lime 1·12
Chloride of }taken from { ------
calcium a trace }Col. { Total 100·00
------ }Frémont: {
Total 22·282(?)”}thus-- {
The waters of the Dead Sea give solid contents 24·580, and consist of
Chloride of sodium 10·360
„ „ calcium 3·920
„ „ magnesium 10·246
Sulphate of soda ·054
------
Total 24·580
The strongest natural brine in the United States, according to
Professor Beck, is that of the Syracuse Saline, New York, which
contains 17·35 per cent. of chloride of sodium.
[180] “The salt water” (it is elsewhere called “one of the purest and
most concentrated brines known in the world”) “yields about 20 per
cent. of pure common salt, and about 2 per cent. of foreign salts;
most of the objectionable parts of which are the chloride of lime and
the chloride of magnesia, both of which, being very deliquescent,
attract moisture from the damp atmosphere, which has the effect to
moisten and partially dissolve the common salt, and then, when the
mass is exposed to dry air or heat, or both, a hard crust is formed.
I believe I have found a remedy for the caking, which is cheap and
easily used. It consists in sprinkling over the salt obtained by the
evaporation of the water, and heaped up in a bin or box containing
a porous bottom of blankets or other like material, a cold solution
of the salt as it is concentrated from the lake till crystals begin
to be deposited. This concentrated brine, while it will dissolve
none of the common salt, will dissolve all the chlorides of calcium
and magnesium, and carry them down through the porous bottom, and
thus leave the salt purer and better than any now found in our
markets. For persons who are obliged to prepare temporarily the salt,
as travelers passing through the country, the water of the lake,
without concentration, may be used for washing out the deliquescent
chlorides, sprinkling the heap of salt by a watering-pot at intervals
of two or three hours during a single day, and allowing it to drain
and dry at night, and be spread to the sun an hour or two the
following morning.”
[181] “The Physical Geography of the Sea” (by Captain Maury), chap.
ix., § 502, quoted from “Youmans’ Chemistry.”
It has been generally stated that the water is fatal to organic life.
The fish brought down the rivers perish at once in the concentrated
brine; but, according to the people, there is a univalve, like a
periwinkle, found at certain seasons within the influence of its saline
waves; and I observed, floating near the margin, delicate moss-like
algæ. Governor Cumming mentioned his having seen a leaf, of a few
inches in length, lined with a web, which shelters a vermicular animal,
of reddish color, and about the length of the last joint of the little
finger. Near the shore, also, mucilaginous matter, white, pink, and
rusty, like macerated moss, adheres to the rocky bed, and lies in
coagulated spots upon the sand. We may fairly doubt the travelers’
assertion that this Dead Sea contains no living thing; whereas neither
animalculæ nor vestige of animal matter were, according to Lieutenant
Lynch, detected by a powerful microscope in the waters of the
Asphaltite Lake.
[ISLANDS IN GREAT SALT LAKE.]
The Great Salt Lake is studded with an archipelago of islands, which
would greatly add to its charms were their size commensurate with its
diminutive limits. These, beginning from the north, are,
1. Dolphin Island, so called from its shape, a knoll of rock and shoal
near the northwestern end, surrounded by about three feet of water.
2. Gunnison’s Island, a large rock and small outlier, southeast of the
former, and surrounded with water from nine to twelve feet deep.
3. Hat Island, southeast of Gunnison’s, the smallest of the isles, with
a reef sunk about seven feet: it was probably part of the following,
and is separated from it by a narrow channel nowhere more than six feet
in depth.
4. Carrington Island, so named from the Mormon surveyor, a circular
mass with a central peak: the water is from three to six feet deep on
every side except the western and southwestern, which are shoals and
shallows. It contains no springs, but is rich in plants and flowers, as
the sego, also spelled sigo, seacoe, and segose (_Calochortus luteus_,
an onion-like bulb or tuber about the size of a walnut, more nutritious
than palatable, much eaten as a table vegetable by the early Mormons
and the root-digging Indians, and even now by white men when half
starved), a _cleome_, a _malvastrum_, a new species of _malacothrix_,
and several others.
5. Stansbury Island, the second largest in the lake, an ovate mass,
with a high central ridge, dome-shaped above, and rising 3000 feet,
twenty-seven miles in circumference, and about twelve in length. During
the dry season it is formed into a peninsula by a sand-bank connecting
it with the lake’s western shore. Thus antelopes, deer, and coyotes
pass over to browse upon the plants and to attack the young of the
ducks, geese, plover, gulls, and pelicans, that make their homes upon
the cliffs: it is also used for grazing purposes. The principal plants
are a _comandra_, and sundry new species of _heuchera_, _perityle_, and
_stenactis_. Fossils and shells are found in scatters.
6. Antelope, also called Church Island, because the stock of the
Saints is generally kept there. Lying to the east and northeast of
the preceding, and in shape an irregular and protracted conoid, it
is the largest of the islands, sixteen miles long by six of extreme
width, with a western ridge and an eastern line of broken peaks, which
attain a maximum of 3000 feet above the lake and 7200 above sea level.
It lies twenty miles to the northwest of the city, and the narrow
passage between it and the opposite plain is fordable. This island is
surrounded on the north by a tufa bed twelve feet deep; eastward by six
feet of water; southeast and south by shoals; and westward by a deposit
of black mud: the deepest sounding in the lake, thirty-five feet, is
found between it and Stansbury Island. Off the northwestern coast is
a rock, called, after its principal peculiarity, Egg Island: in the
eastern cliff there is said to be a cave, described to resemble the
Blue Grotto at Capri, which has been partially explored. Formerly there
was a small pinnace on the “Big Shallow;” it has either been wrecked or
broken up for fuel.[182] Antelope Island contains arid ravines and a
few green valleys, besides a spring of pure water, and, being safe from
Indians, it is much esteemed as a grazing-place.
[182] In the “Revue des Deux-Mondes” (April, 1861) we are told that,
“Pendant l’été un petit bateau à vapeur fait un service régulier
sur le Lac Salé.” Fresh proof, if it be required, how difficult, or
rather how impossible, it is for any amount of talent or ingenuity in
a reviewer to supply the want of actual eye-seeing information. The
“Lac Salé” is not yet come.
7. Frémont Island, so named by Captain Stansbury from the first
explorer, who called it, after the rude dissipation of a dream of
“tangled wilderness of trees and shrubbery, teeming with game of every
description that the neighboring region afforded,” “Disappointment
Island.” The Mormons have preferred “Castle Island,” suggested by its
mural and turreted peak, that rises above the higher levels. It lies
north and northeast from Antelope Island, parallel with the mouth of
the Weber River, and south of Promontory Point, the bluff termination
of a rocky tongue which separates Bear-River Bay from the body of
the lake. Its shape is a semilune, fifteen miles in circumference,
abounding in plants, especially the Indian onion, but destitute of wood
and water. Here, on the summit, Captain Frémont lost the “brass cover
to the object-end of his spy-glass”--disdain not, gentle reader, these
little reminiscences!--and Captain Stansbury failed to find the relic.
I was surprised by the want of freshness and atmospheric elasticity
in the neighborhood of the lake: the lips were salted as by sea air,
but there the similarity ended. We prepared for bathing by unhitching
the mules upon the usual picnicking place, a patch of soft white
sand between the raised shore of the lake and the water brink. The
bank supplies a plentiful stream of water, potable, though somewhat
brackish, bitter, and sulphurous: it shows its effects, however,
in a clump of plants, wild roses, and the euphorbia of many names,
silk-plant, _vache à lait_, _capote de sacarte_, and milk-plant.
The familiar magpie prevented the solitude of the scene being too
impressive. Here was also a vestige of humanity, a kind of “lean-to” of
dry stone wall, with the bank for a back-bone: you might have ridden
over it without knowing that it belonged to Mrs. Smith of Vermont, now
departed, unless warned off by the sudden appearance of what your
superior sagacity would have discovered to be a chimney.
[THE BATH IN THE GREAT SALT LAKE.]
The bathing-place is behind the Black Rock. The approach is first over
the fine soft white sand, like that of the sea-shore, but shell-less,
soppy where it receives the spring-water, and almost a quicksand near
the lake. The foot crunches through caked and crusty salt-flakes,
here white, there dark green, there dun-colored like _bois de vache_,
and every where the reverse of aromatic, and sinks deep into the
everlastingly wet sand below. This leads to the neck of broken, riven
stone pavement, whose head is the Black Rock. As the lake is neared,
the basalt-like surface becomes red and rusty, the points are diamonded
by sparkling spiculæ, and in the hollows and crevices where the waters
have dried to salt it gathers in the form of icy lumps. A dreadful
shock then awaits the olfactory nerves. The black mud of peculiar
drift before alluded to proves to be an aceldama of insects: banks a
full foot high, composed of the _larvæ_, _exuviæ_, and mortal coils of
myriads of worms, musquetoes, gnats, and gallinippers, cast up by the
waves, and lining the little bay, as they ferment and fester in the
burning sun, or pickle and preserve in the thick brine.[183] Escaping
from this mass of fetor, I reached the farther end of the promontory
where the Black Rock stood decorously between the bathing-place and the
picnic ground, and in a pleasant frame of curiosity descended into the
new Dead Sea.
[183] According to Mr. T. R. Peale (quoted by Captain Stansbury,
Appendix C), “More than ⁹⁄₁₀ths of the mass is composed of the larvæ
and exuviæ of the _Chironomus_, or some species of musqueto, probably
undescribed.”
I had heard strange accounts of its buoyancy. It was said to support a
bather as if he were sitting in an arm-chair, and to float him like an
unfresh egg. My experience differs in this point from that of others.
There was no difficulty in swimming, nor indeed in sinking. After
sundry immersions of the head, in order to feel if it really stang and
removed the skin, like a mustard plaster--as described--emboldened by
the detection of so much hyperbole, I proceeded to duck under with
open eyes, and smarted “for my pains.” The sensation did not come on
suddenly; at first there was a sneaking twinge, then a bold succession
of twinges, and lastly a steady, honest burning like what follows a
pinch of snuff in the eyes. There was no fresh water at hand; so,
scrambling upon the rock, I sat there for half an hour, presenting
to Nature the ludicrous spectacle of a man weeping flowing tears. A
second experiment upon its taste was equally satisfactory; I can easily
believe, with Captain Stansbury, that a man overboard has little chance
against asphyxiation; _vox faucibus hœsit_ was the least that could be
said concerning its effects upon my masticators. Those who try such
experiments may be warned that a jug filled at the fresh spring is
necessary in more ways than one. The hair on emersion is powdered like
the plastered locks of the knights of flamingo-plush and bell-hanging
shoulder-knots, and there is a clammy stickiness, which is exceedingly
unpleasant. Salt, moreover, may be scraped from the skin--imaginative
bathers have compared themselves to Lot’s wife--and the Ethiop,
now prosaically termed “nigger,” comes out after a bath bleached,
whitewashed, and with changed epidermis.
Notwithstanding the _fumet_ from the kitchen of that _genius loci_
whom I daurna name, we dined with excellent appetite. While the mules
were being hitched to, I found an opportunity of another survey from
below the Black Rock: this look-out station is sometimes ascended by
those gifted with less than the normal modicum of common sense. The
lands immediately about the lake are flat, rising almost imperceptibly
to the base of abrupt hills, which are broken in places by soft and
sandy barriers, irreclaimable for agriculture, but here and there fit
for grazing; where springs exist, they burst out at too low a level
for irrigation. The meridional range of the Oquirrh, at whose northern
point we were standing, divides the Great Salt Lake Valley from its
western neighbor Tooele or Tuilla, which in sound curiously resembles
the Arabic Tawíleh--the Long Valley. It runs like most of these
formations from north to south: it is divided by a transverse ridge
declining westward, and not unaptly called Traverse Mountain, from Rush
Valley, which again is similarly separated from Cedar Valley. From the
point where we stood, the only way to Tooele settlement is round the
north point of West Mountain, a bold headland, rugged with rocks and
trees. Westward of Tooele Valley, and separated by a sister range to
the Oquirrh, lies Spring Valley, so called because it boasts a sweet
fountain, and south of this “Skull Valley”--an ominous name, but the
evil omen was to the bison.
Bidding a long farewell to that inland briny sea, which apparently
has no business there, we turned our faces eastward as the sun was
declining. The view had memorable beauties. From the blue and purple
clouds, gorgeously edged with celestial fire, shot up a fan of penciled
and colored light, extending half way to the zenith, while in the south
and southeast lightnings played among the darker mist-masses, which
backed the golden and emerald bench-lands of the farther valley. The
splendid sunset gave a reflex of its loveliness to the alkaline and
artemisia barrens before us. Opposite, the Wasach, vast and voluminous,
the store-house of storms, and of the hundred streams that cool the
thirsty earth, rose in stern and gloomy grandeur, which even the last
smile of day failed to soften, over the subject plain. Northward, to
a considerable distance, the lake-lands lay uninterrupted save by an
occasional bench and a distant swell, resembling the upper convexity
of a thunder-cloud. As we advanced, the city became dimly discernible
beyond Jordan, built on ground gently rising away from the lake, and
strongly nestling under its protecting mountains. A little to its
northeast, a thin white vapor, like the spray of a spouting whale,
showed the direction of the Hot Springs: as time wore on it rolled
away, condensed by the cooling air, like the smoke of a locomotive
before the evening breeze. Then the prominent features of the city came
into view, the buildings separated themselves from their neighbors
by patches and shades of several green, the streets opened out their
regular rows and formal lines; once more we rolled over Jordan’s
rickety bridge, and found ourselves again in the Holy City of the Far
West.
[TRIP TO CAMP FLOYD.]
The ultimate destination of the Judiciary whom I had accompanied was
Carson Valley, in the Sierra Nevada, a distance of some hundreds of
miles through a wild country where “lifting of hair” is by no means
uncommon. The judge, though not a sucking diplomat, had greenly relied
upon _bona verba_ at Washington for transportation, escort, and other
necessaries which would be easily procurable at Camp Floyd. It was
soon found advisable to apply to the military authorities at the
cantonment. The coach, as I have said, had ceased to run beyond Great
Salt Lake City. In May, 1858, a contract had been made with Major
George Chorpenning to transport mails and passengers--the fare being
$120--from Utah to California, he receiving $130,000. This lasted till
September, 1859, when the drivers, complaining that the road-agents
charged with paying them for eighteen months had expended the “rocks”
in the hells of San Francisco, notably evinced their race’s power
of self-government by seizing and selling off by auction wagons and
similar movable property. On the 20th of March, 1860, it came into
the hands of the proprietors of the Eastern line, Messrs. Russell and
Co., who ran a mail-wagon first to California, then to Camp Floyd, and
lastly, on the 1st of June, finding their expenditure excessive, packed
the mails on mules.[184] Single travelers were sometimes thus pushed
through, starting on the Wednesdays, once a fortnight; for a party like
ours such a proceeding would have been impossible. Consequently, the
judge and I set out for Camp Floyd to see what could be done by “Uncle
Sam” and his “eagles.”
[184] They carry 50 to 60 lbs.; and the schedule time to Placerville
is sixteen days.
Mr. Gilbert--of the firm of Gilbert, Gerrish, and Co., general
(Gentile) merchants--offered us seats in his trotting wagon, drawn by a
fine tall pair of iron-gray mules, that cost $500 the twain, and were
christened Julia and Sally, after, I believe, the fair daughters of
the officer who had lately commanded the district. With a fine clear
day and a breeze which veiled us with dust-hangings--the highway must
be a sea of mud in wet weather--we set out along the county road,
leading from the southeastern angle of the Holy City. Our route lay
over the strip of alluvium that separates the Wasach Mountains from
the waters of Jordan: it is cut by a multitude of streamlets rising
from the kanyons; the principal are Mill Creek, Big Cotton-wood,
Little Cotton-wood, Dry Cotton-wood, and Willow Creek. The names are
translated from the Indians, and we saw from the road traces of the
aborigines, who were sweeping crickets and grass-seed into their large
conical baskets--among these ragged gleaners we looked in vain for
a Ruth. Near Big Cotton-wood, where there is a settlement distant
seven miles from the city, an English woman came across the fields
and complained that she had been frightened by four Indian braves
who had been riding by to bring in a stolen horse. The waters of the
kanyons are exceedingly cool, sweet, and clear, and suggested frequent
reference to a superior kind of tap which had been stored away within
the trap. In proportion as we left the city, the sterility of the River
Valley increased; cultivation was unseen except upon the margins of the
streams, and the look of the land was “real mean.” In front of us lay
the denticulated bench bounding the southern end of the valley.
After twenty miles from the city we reached a ranch on rising ground,
near the water-gate of the Jordan. It was built at an expense of
$17,000, and was called the Utah Brewery. Despite, however, the plenty
of hop and barley, the speculation proved a failure, and the house had
become a kind of mail-station. Between it and the river were a number
of little rush-girt “eyes”--round pools, some hot, others cold--and
said to be unfathomable; that is to say, from twenty to thirty fathoms
deep. They related that a dragoon, slipping with his charger into
one of them, found a watery grave, where a drier death might have
been expected. At the ranch we rested for an hour, but called in vain
for food. From the Utah Brewery, which is about half way, drivers
reckon twenty-two miles to Camp Floyd, making a total of forty-two
to forty-three miles between the head-quarters of the saint and the
sinner, and we therefore looked forward to a “banian day.”
About noon we hitched to and proceeded to ascend Traverse Mountain,
a ridge-like spur of the Wasach, running east and west. It separates
the Valley of the Northern or Great Salt Lake from the basin of the
Utah, or Sweetwater Lake, to the southward, and is broken through by
the waters of Jordan. The young river--called Piya Ogwap, or the Big
Water, by the Shoshonees--here rushes in a foaming shallow stream, that
can barely float a dug-out, over a rocky, pebbly bed, in the sole of
a deep but short kanyon, which winds its way through the cross range.
The descent is about 100 feet in two miles, after which the course
serpentines, the banks fall, and the current becomes gentle.
As we toiled up the Dug-way, the graded incline that runs along the
shoulder of the mountain, we saw a fine back view of the Happy Valley
through an atmosphere clear as that of the English littoral before
rain. Advancing higher, we met, face to face, an ambulance full of
uniform _en route_ to the Holy City, drawn by four neat mules, and
accompanied by strikers--military servants. We drew up, the judge was
readily recognized, and I was introduced to Captains Heth, Clarke, and
Gibson, and to Lieutenant Robinson. They began with an act of charity,
supplying ham sandwiches to half-starved men, and I afterward spent
pleasant evenings with them at Great Salt Lake City, and became Captain
Heth’s guest at Camp Floyd. Their kindness and hospitality lasted to
the end of my stay. After the usual “liquoring up,” they pointed to
Ash Hollow, the depths below, where the Mormons had intended to make a
new Thermopylæ. Promising to meet them again, we then shook hands and
resumed our road.
The steep descent on the counterslope of Traverse Mountain disclosed to
us the first sight of Utah Lake, which is to its sister what Carmel is
to Lebanon. It was a soft and sunny, a placid and beautiful landscape,
highly refreshing after the arid lands on the other side. A panorama
of lake, plain, and river lay before us. On the east, south, and west
were rugged walls and peaks of mountain and hill; and northward a broad
grassy slope rose to the divide between the valleys of the Fresh and of
the Salt Lake. From afar the binding of plain round the basin appeared
so narrow that the mountains seemed to dip their feet into the quiet
reservoir; and beyond the southern point the lone peak of lofty Nebo
stood, to adopt the Koranic comparison, like one of the pins which
fasten down the plains of earth. A nearer approach discovers a broad
belt of meadow, rich alluvial soil, in parts marshy, and in others
arable, wheat and root-crop flourishing in the bottom, and bunch-grass
upon the acclivities. The breadth is greater to the west and south of
the lake than in other parts. It is cut by many a poplar-fringed stream
that issues from the tremendous gorges around--the American Fork, the
Timpanogos[185] or Provo River, and the Spanish Fork. On the near side,
beyond the winding Jordan, lay little Lehi, whose houses were half hid
by black trees; and eastward of the Utah Water, dimly visible, was
Provo City, on a plain watered by four creeks. Such were the environs
of the Sea of Tiberias.
[185] From _Timpa_, a rock, and _ogwabe_, contracted to _oge_, a
river, in the Yuta dialect. In English maps published as late as
seven years ago, “Timpanogos” is applied to the Great Salt Lake!
_Provo_ or _Provaux_ is the name of a Canadian trapper and trader,
who in past times defeated with eighty men a thousand Indians, and
was killed at the moment of victory. The Mormons call the City
_Provo_, and Gentiles prefer as a “rile” _Timpanogos_.
[UTAH LAKE.]
The Utah Lake, another Judean analogue, derives its supplies from the
western versant of the Wasach. It is in shape an irregular triangle,
the southern arm forming a very acute angle. The extreme length
is thirty miles, and the greatest breadth is fifteen. It owes its
sweetness, which, however, is by no means remarkable, to its northern
drainage, the Piya Ogwap, _alias_ Utah Outlet, _alias_ Jordan River.
Near the shores the water soon deepens to fifteen feet; the bottom is
said to be smooth, uniform, and very profound in places; but probably
it has never been sounded. The bed, where it shows, is pebbly; a
white, chalky incrustation covers the shallower bottom; shells,
especially the fresh-water clam, are numerous upon the watery margin;
the flaggy “Deserét weed” in the tulares is ten feet high,[186] and
thicket is dense in places where rock does not occupy the soil. The
western side is arid for want of influents; there is a “lone tree,”
a solitary cotton-wood, conspicuous amid the grazing-ground of
bunch-grass, sage, and greasewood, and the only inhabitants, excepting
a single ranch--Evan’s--are, apparently, the Phrynosoma and the lizard,
the raven and the jackass-rabbit. The Utah Lake freezes in December,
January, and February. At these months the Jordan rolls down floes of
ice, but it is seldom to be traversed on foot. In the flood season it
rises two, and the wind tide extends to about three feet. It is still
full of fish, which in former times were carried off in barrels. The
white trout weigh thirty pounds. There are many kinds of mountain trout
averaging three pounds, while salmon trout, suckers, and mudfish are
uncommonly large and plentiful; water-snakes and “horsehair fish” are
also found.
[186] Tulare is a marsh of bulrush (_Scirpus lacustris_), which
is found extending over immense tracts of river valley in Western
America. “Tooly” water, as it is pronounced, is that which is
flavored or tainted by it.
After descending the steep incline we forded the Jordan, at that point
100 feet broad, and deep to the wagon-hubs. The current was not too
swift to prevent the growth of weeds. The water was of sulphury color,
the effect of chalk, and the taste was brackish, but not unpleasant;
cattle are said to like it. The fording was followed by a long ascent,
the divide between Utah Valley and its western neighbor Cedar Valley.
About half way between the Brewery and the Camp is a station, held by
a Shropshire Mormon, whose only name, as far as I could discover, was
Joe Dug-out, so called, like the Watertons de Waterton, from the style
of his habitation. He had married a young woman, who deterred him from
giving her a sister--every Oriental language has a word to express
what in English, which lacks the thing, is rudely translated “a rival
wife”--by threatening to have his ears cut off by the “horfficers.”
Joe, however, seemed quite resigned to the pains and penalties of
monogamy, and, what was more to our purpose, had a good brew of porter
and Lager-bier.
Having passed on the way a road that branches off to the old camp,
which was deserted for want of water, we sighted from afar the new
cantonment. It lies in a circular basin, surrounded by irregular hills
of various height, still wooded with black cedar, where not easily
felled, and clustering upon the banks of Cedar Creek, a rivulet which
presently sinks in a black puddly mud. For a more thoroughly detestable
spot one must repair to Gharra, or some similar purgatorial place
in Lower Sindh. The winter is long and rigorous, the summer hot and
uncomfortable, the alkaline water curdles soap, and the dust-storms
remind one of the Punjaub. I lost no time in suggesting to my
_compagnon de voyage_, Lieutenant Dana, as a return for his kindness
in supplying me with a “Bayonet Exercise,” and other papers, our old
campaigning habit of hanging wet canvas before every adit, and received
the well-merited thanks of Madam. The hardest part of these hardships
is that they are wholly purposeless. Every adobe brick in the place
has been estimated to have cost a cent, as at Aden each cut stone was
counted a rupee; and the purchase of lumber has enriched the enemy. In
1858 the Peace Commissioners sent by the supreme government conceded
to the Mormons a point which saved the Saints. The army was not to be
“located” within forty miles of Great Salt Lake City; thus the pretty
sites about Utah Lake were banned to them, and the Mormons, it is said,
“jockeyed” them out of the rich and fertile Cache Valley, eighty miles
north of the head-quarters.
[CAMP FLOYD.]
A broken wall surrounds this horrid hole. Julia and Sally carried us in
with unflagging vigor. We passed through Fairfield, less euphoniously
termed Frogtown, the bazar of the cantonment on the other side of the
creek. During the days when Camp Floyd contained its full complement
of camp followers--5000 souls--now reduced to 100 or 200 men, it must
have been a delectable spot, teeming with gamblers and blacklegs,
grog-house-keepers and prostitutes: the revolver and the bowie-knife
had nightly work to do there, and the moral Saints were fond of
likening Frogtown to certain Cities of the Plains. Of late years it has
become more respectable, and now it contains some good stores.
We removed from the wagon the mail-bags containing letters for the
camp, and made ourselves at home with the hospitable Gilbert. On the
next day, after “morning glory” and breakfast, we called upon the
officer commanding the department, Colonel P. St. G. Cooke, of the
2d Dragoons, and upon the commandant of the cantonment, Lieutenant
Colonel C. F. Smith. They introduced us to the greater part of the
officers, and, though living in camp fashion, did not fail to take
in the strangers after the ancient, not the modern, acceptation of
the term. It is a sensible pleasure, which every military man has
remarked, to exchange the common run of civilian for soldier society in
the United States. The reveillé in the morning speaks of discipline;
the guard-mounting has a wholesome military sound; there is a habit
of ’tention and of saluting which suggests some subordination; the
orderlies say “Sir,” not Sirree nor Sirree-bob. The stiffness and
ungeniality of professionals, who are all running a race for wealth
or fame, give way in a service of seniority, and where men become
brothers, to the frankness which belongs to the trade of arms. The
Kshatriya, or fighting caste, in the States is distinctly marked.
The officers, both of the navy and the army, are, for the most part,
Southerners, and are separated by their position from general society.
The civilian, as was the case in England twenty years ago, dislikes
the uniform. His principal boasts are, that he pays his fighting
servants well, and that he--a militia-man--is far superior to the
regular. A company of Cadets, called the Chicago Zouaves, during the
summer of 1860, made a sensation throughout the land. The newspaper
writers spoke of them in terms far higher than have been lavished upon
the flower of the French army; even the military professionals were
obliged to join in the cry. As a republican, the citizen looks upon a
soldier as a drone. “I hate those cormorants,” said to me an American
diplomat, who, _par parenthèse_, had made a fortune by the law, as he
entered a Viennese café. _L’arte della guerra presto s’ impara_ is his
motto, and he evinces his love of the civilian element by giving away
a considerable percentage of commissions in the army to those whose
political influence enables them to dispense with the preparation of
West Point.
[UNITED STATES MILITIA.]
I am here tempted to a few words concerning the cheap defense and
the chief pride of the United States, viz., her irregular army. The
opposite table shows the forces of the militia to be three millions,
while the regular army does not number 19,000. The institution is,
therefore, a kind of public, a writing, speaking, voting body, which
makes itself heard and felt, while the existence of the regulars is
almost ignored. To hint aught against the militia in the United States
is sure seriously to “rile up” your civil audience, and Elijah Pogram
will perhaps let you know that you can not know what you are talking
about. The outspoken Britisher, despite his title and his rank as
a general officer, had a “squeak” for his commission when, in the
beginning of the volunteer mania, he spoke of the new levies as a
useless body of men: it is on the same principle in the United States.
Thus also the liberal candidate declares to his electors his “firm
belief that, with all our enormous expenditure, the country had not
felt itself secure, and straightway a noble arm of defense, springing
unbought from the patriotism of the people, had crept into existence,
forming a better shield for our national liberties than all that we had
been able to buy with our mounds of gold.” (Cheers.) The civilian in
the United States boasts of his military institutions, his West Point
and his regular army, and never fails to inform a stranger that it is
better paid than any force in Europe. On the other hand, he prides
himself upon, as he is probably identified with, the militia.
MILITIA FORCE OF THE UNITED STATES.
_General Abstract of the Militia Force of the United States, according
to the latest Returns received at the Office of the Adjutant General._
+-----------------------+----+---------+---------+---------+---------+
| | | | | | |
| | | | | | |
| | For| | General | Field | |
| | the| General | Staff |Officers,| Company |
|States and Territories.|Year|Officers.|Officers.| etc. |Officers.|
+-----------------------+----+---------+---------+---------+---------+
|Maine |1856| 13 | 52 | 36 | 230 |
|New Hampshire |1854| 11 | 202 | 119 | 895 |
|Massachusetts |1859| 10 | 47 | 111 | 353 |
|Vermont |1843| 12 | 51 | 224 | 801 |
|Rhode Island |1858| 2 | 22 | 106 | 26 |
|Connecticut |1858| 3 | 9 | 82 | 199 |
|New York |1856| 93 | 299 | 1,531 | 5,495 |
|New Jersey |1852| | | | |
|Pennsylvania |1858| | | | |
|Delaware |1827| 4 | 8 | 71 | 364 |
|Maryland |1838| 22 | 68 | 544 | 1,763 |
|Virginia |1858| | | | |
|North Carolina |1845| 28 | 133 | 657 | 3,449 |
|South Carolina |1856| 20 | 135 | 535 | 1,909 |
|Georgia |1850| 39 | 91 | 624 | 4,296 |
|Florida |1845| 3 | 14 | 95 | 508 |
|Alabama |1851| 32 | 142 | 775 | 1,883 |
|Louisiana |1859| 16 | 129 | 542 | 2,105 |
|Mississippi |1838| 15 | 70 | 856 | 348 |
|Tennessee |1840| 25 | 79 | 392 | 2,644 |
|Kentucky |1852| 43 | 145 | 1,165 | 3,517 |
|Ohio |1858| | | | |
|Michigan |1854| 30 | 123 | 147 | 2,358 |
|Indiana |1832| 31 | 110 | 566 | 2,154 |
|Illinois |1855| | | | |
|Wisconsin |1855| 15 | 8 | 215 | 904 |
|Iowa | | | | | |
|Missouri |1853| | 17 | 4 | 67 |
|Arkansas |1859| 10 | 39 | 179 | 911 |
|Texas |1847| 15 | 45 | 248 | 940 |
|California |1857| 18 | 126 | 11 | 175 |
|Minnesota |1859| | | | |
|Oregon | | | | | |
|Washington Territory | | | | | |
|Nebraska Territory | | | | | |
|Kansas Territory | | | | | |
|Territory of Utah |1853| 2 | | 48 | 235 |
|Territory of N. Mexico | | | | | |
|District of Columbia |1852| 3 | 10 | 28 | 185 |
| +----+---------+---------+---------+---------+
| Grand aggregate | | 515 | 2,374 | 9,884 | 38,687 |
+-----------------------+----+---------+---------+---------+---------+
+-----------------------+------------+----------------+----------+
| | |Non-commissioned| |
| | | Officers, | |
| | Total | Musicians, | |
| |commissioned|Artificers, and | |
|States and Territories.| Officers. | Privates. |Aggregate.|
+-----------------------+------------+----------------+----------+
|Maine | 340 | 73,248 | 73,552|
|New Hampshire | 1,227 | 32,311 | 33,538|
|Massachusetts | 521 | 157,347 | 157,868|
|Vermont | 1,088 | 22,827 | 23,915|
|Rhode Island | 156 | 16,555 | 16,711|
|Connecticut | 293 | 51,312 | 51,605|
|New York | 7,388 | 329,847 | 337,235|
|New Jersey | | | 81,984|
|Pennsylvania | | | 350,000|
|Delaware | 447 | 8,782 | 9,229|
|Maryland | 2,397 | 44,467 | 46,864|
|Virginia | | | 150,000|
|North Carolina | 4,267 | 75,181 | 79,448|
|South Carolina | 2,599 | 33,473 | 36,072|
|Georgia | 5,050 | 73,649 | 78,699|
|Florida | 620 | 11,502 | 12,122|
|Alabama | 2,832 | 73,830 | 76,662|
|Louisiana | 2,792 | 88,532 | 91,324|
|Mississippi | 825 | 35,259 | 36,084|
|Tennessee | 3,607 | 67,645 | 71,252|
|Kentucky | 4,870 | 84,109 | 88,979|
|Ohio | | | 279,809|
|Michigan | 2,858 | 94,236 | 97,094|
|Indiana | 2,861 | 51,052 | 53,913|
|Illinois | | | 257,420|
|Wisconsin | 1,142 | 50,179 | 51,321|
|Iowa | | | |
|Missouri | 88 | 117,959 | 118,047|
|Arkansas | 1,139 | 46,611 | 47,750|
|Texas | 1,248 | 18,518 | 19,766|
|California | 330 | 207,400 | 207,730|
|Minnesota | | | 23,972|
|Oregon | | | |
|Washington Territory | | | |
|Nebraska Territory | | | |
|Kansas Territory | | | |
|Territory of Utah | 285 | 2,536 | 2,821|
|Territory of N. Mexico | | | |
|District of Columbia | 226 | 7,975 | 8,201|
| +------------+----------------+----------+
| Grand aggregate | 51,460 | 1,876,342 | 3,070,987|
+-----------------------+------------+----------------+----------+
That writing, speaking, and voting have borne fruit in favor of the
militia, may be read in the history of the Americo-Mexican War. The
fame of the irregulars penetrated to Calcutta and China: it was
stopped only by the Orient sun. But who ever heard of the regulars?
The “newspaper heroes” were almost all militiamen, rangers, and other
guerrillas: “keeping an editor in pay” is now a standing sarcasm. The
sages of the Revolution initiated a yeomanry second to none in the
world: they had, however, among them crowds of frontiersmen accustomed
to deal with the bear and the Indian, not with the antelope and the
deer. The Texan Rangers in later times were a first-rate body of
men for irregular purposes, not to be confounded with the militia,
yet always put forward as a proof how superior to the “sweepings
of cities,” as the regular army was once called in the Senate, are
the irregulars, who “never fire a random shot, never draw trigger
till their aim is sure,” and are “here to-night and to-morrow are
fifty miles off.” But the true modern militia is pronounced by the
best authorities--indeed, by all who hold it no economy to be ill
served, for any but purely defensive purposes, a humbug, which costs
in campaigns more blood and gold--neglect of business is perhaps the
chief item of the expenditure--than a standing army would. As a “Garde
Nationale” it is quite efficient. When called out for distant service,
as in the Mexican War, every _pekin_ fault becomes apparent. Personally
the men suffer severely from unaccustomed hardship and exposure; in
dangerous climates they die like sheep; half are in hospital, and the
other half must nurse them: Nature soon becomes stronger than martial
law; under the fatigue of the march they will throw away their rations
and military necessaries rather than take the trouble to carry them:
improvident and wasteful, their convoys are timid and unmanageable.
Mentally they are in many cases men ignoring the common restraints of
society, profoundly impressed with insubordination, which displays
equality, which has to learn all the wholesome duty of obedience, and
which begins with as much respect for discipline as for the campaigns
of Frederick the Great. If inclined to retire, they can stay at
home and obtain double or treble the wages: not a few are driven to
service by that enthusiasm which, as Sir Charles Napier well remarked,
readily makes men run away. Their various defects make organization
painfully slow. In camp they amuse themselves with drawing rations,
target practice, asking silly questions, electing officers, holding
meetings, issuing orders, disobeying orders, “’cussing and discussing:”
the sentinels will sit down to a quiet _euchre_ after planting their
bayonets in the ground, and to all attempts at dislodging them the
reply will be, “You go to ----, Cap.! I’m as good a man as you.” In the
field, like all raw levies, they are apt to be alarmed by any thing
unaccustomed, as the sound of musketry from the rear, or a threatened
flank attack: they can not reserve their fire; they aim wildly, to
the peril of friend and foe, and they have been accused of unmilitary
cruelties, such as scalping and flaying men, shooting and killing
squaws and children. And they never fail, after the fashion of such
men, to claim that they have done all the fighting.[187]
[187] These remarks were penned in 1860; I see no reason to alter
them in 1861.
Such is, I believe, the United States militia at the beginning of a
campaign. After a reasonable time, say a year, which kills off the weak
and sickly, and rubs out the brawler and the mutineer; when men have
learned to distinguish the difference between the often Dutch courage
of a bowie-knife squabble and the moral fortitude that stands firm
in presence of famine or a night attack, then they become regulars.
The American--by which I understand a man whose father is born in the
United States--is a first-rate soldier, distinguished by his superior
intelligence from his compeers in other lands; but he rarely takes to
soldiering. There are not more than five of these men per company, the
rest being all Germans and Irishmen. The percentage in the navy is
greater, yet it is still inconsiderable. The Mexican War, as History
writes it, is the triumph of the militia, whom old “Rough and Ready”
led to conquest as to a “manifest destiny.”[188] On the other hand,
the old and distinguished officer who succeeded General Taylor has
occasionally, it is said, given utterance to opinions concerning the
irregulars which contrast strongly with those generally attributed to
him.
[188] And it will be remembered, the Mexicans were not Austrians or
Russians.
[HATRED AND MURDER.--SERGEANT PIKE.--MR. HENNEFER.]
At Camp Floyd I found feeling running high against the Mormons. “They
hate us, and we hate them,” said an intelligent officer; consequently,
every statement here, as in the city, must be received with many
grains of salt. At Camp Floyd one hears the worst version of every
fact, which, as usual hereabouts, has its many distinct facets. These
anti-Mormons declare that ten murders per annum during the last twelve
years have been committed without punishment in New Zion, whereas New
York averages 18-33. They attribute the phenomenon to the impossibility
of obtaining testimony, and the undue whitewashing action of juries,
which the Mormons declare to be “punctual and hard-working in
sustaining the dignity of the law,” and praise for their “unparalleled
habits of industry and sobriety, order, and respect to just rights.”
Whatever objection I made was always answered by the deception of
appearances, and the assertion that whenever a stranger enters Great
Salt Lake City, one or two plausible Mormons are told off to amuse
and hoodwink him. Similarly the Mormons charge the Christians with
violent injustice. On a late occasion, the mayor of Springville, Mr.
H. F. Macdonald, and the bishop were seized simply because they were
Church dignitaries, on the occasion of a murder, and the former, after
durance vile of months at Camp Floyd, made his escape and walks about
a free man, swearing that he will not again be taken alive. In 1853,
Captain J. W. Gunnison and seven of his party were murdered near
Nicollet on Sevier River, twenty-five miles south of Nephi City. The
anti-Mormons declare that the deed was done under high counsel, by
“white Indians,” to prevent the exploration of a route to California,
and the disclosures which were likely to be made. The Mormons point
to their kind treatment of the previous expedition upon which the
lamented officer was engaged, to the friendliness of his book, to the
circumstance that an Indian war was then raging, and that during the
attack an equal number of Yuta Indians were killed. M. Remy distinctly
refers the murder to the Pahvant Indians, some of whom had been
recently shot by emigrants to California.[189] The horrible “Mountain
Meadow Massacre”[190] was, according to the anti-Mormons, committed
by the Saints to revenge the death of an esteemed apostle--Parley P.
Pratt--who, in the spring of 1857, when traveling through Arkansas,
was knived by one Hector M‘Lean, whose wife he had converted and
taken unto himself. The Mormons deny that the massacre was committed
by their number, and ask the Gentiles why, if such be the case, the
murderers are not brought to justice? They look upon Mr. P. P. Pratt’s
proceeding--even in El Islam, the women of the infidels are, like
their property, _halal_, or lawful to those who win them--as perfectly
justifiable.[191] In February, 1859, occurred sundry disturbances
between the soldiers and citizens at Rush Valley, thirty-five miles
west of Great Salt Lake City, in which Mr. Howard Spencer, nephew to
Mr. Daniel Spencer, a squatter, while being removed from a government
reservation by First Sergeant Ralph Pike of the 10th Infantry, raised
a pitchfork, and received in return a broken head. Shortly afterward
the sergeant, having been summoned to Great Salt Lake City, was met
in Main Street and shot down before all present. The anti-Mormons, of
course, declare the deed to have been done by Mr. Spencer, and hold it,
under the circumstances--execution of duty and summons of justice--an
unpardonable outrage; and the officers assert that they could hardly
prevent their men arming and personally revenging the foul murder of a
comrade, who was loved as an excellent soldier and an honest man.[192]
The Mormons assert that the “shooting” was done by an unknown hand;
that the sergeant had used unnecessary violence against a youth, who,
single-handed and surrounded by soldiers, had raised a pitchfork to
defend his head, and that the provocation thus received converted the
case from murder to one of justifiable homicide. In the month of June
before my arrival, a Lieutenant Saunders and Assistant Surgeon Covey
had tied to a cart’s tail and severely flogged Mr. Hennefer, a Mormon.
The opposition party assert that they recognized in him the man who
two years before had acted as a spy upon them when sitting in Messrs.
Livingston’s store, and, when ordered to “make tracks,” had returned
with half a dozen others, and had shot Dr. Covey in the breast. The
Mormons represent Mr. Hennefer to be a peaceful citizen, and quiet,
unoffending man, thus brutally outraged by tyrannical servants of
government, and, moreover, prove for him an _alibi_ from the original
cause of quarrel. I have given but a few instances: all are equally
contradictory, and _tantas componere lites quis audet_?
[189] See Translation, vol. i., p. 463.
[190] The following is the account of that affair, officially given,
of course, by anti-Mormons: On the 4th or 5th of September, 1857,
a large emigrant train from Arkansas, proceeding to California
with horses, mules, and ox-wagons, conveying stores of clothing
and valuables, was suddenly attacked near a spring at the west end
of Mountain Meadow Valley. The Indians, directed by white men, cut
off from water the travelers, who had fortified themselves behind
the vehicles, which they filled with earth, and killed and wounded
several. When the attacked party, distressed by thirst and a galling
fire, showed symptoms of surrender, several Mormons, among whom the
leaders, John D. Lee and Elder Isaac C. Haight, are particularly
mentioned, approached them with a white flag, and by soft words
persuaded them that if they would give up their weapons they should
be safely forwarded to Panther Creek and Cedar City. The emigrants
unwisely disarmed themselves, and flocked toward the spring. The
work of murder and robbery began near a patch of scrub-oak brush,
about one mile and a half from water. Between 115 and 120 adults
were slain. Three emerged from the valley; of these, two were soon
overtaken and killed, and the third was slaughtered at Muddy Creek,
distant about fifty miles. One of the Mormons--the name has been
variously given--is accused of a truly detestable deed; a girl,
sixteen years old, knelt to him, imploring mercy; he led her away
into the thicket--and then cut her throat. Seventeen children, aged
from two months to seven years, were taken from the Indians by the
whites, and were distributed among the several Mormon families in
Cedar City, Fort Harmony, Santa Clara, etc. Of these, sixteen were
recovered, and the seventeenth was found in the April of 1858. Mr.
Jacob Forney, the late Superintendent of Indian Affairs, conducted
the investigation on the part of the federal government; he reported
that white men joined in the murder and the robbery. The Mormons
of course deny, _in toto_, complicity with the Indians, and remark
that many trains--for instance, to quote no others, the emigrants at
Sublette’s Cut-off, Oregon, in August, 1858--have similarly suffered,
and that they can not be responsible for the misfortunes which men
who insult and ill-treat the natives bring upon themselves.
[191] The following is an extract from the “Millennial Star,” July
25th, 1857. The article is headed “More of the Assassination:”
“We publish the following extract from a letter written by two
gentlemen to the editor of a New York paper. The letter was dated
Flint-Cherokee Nation, Arkansas, May 17th, 1857, and says that after
Elder Pratt was arrested in the Indian country, he was ‘placed
under a strong guard, and by a military escort conveyed in chains
to the Supreme Court, Van Buren, Arkansas. The case being promptly
investigated, and there being no evidence upon which a bill of
indictment could be found, he was liberated on the 13th instant.
Brother Pratt, being without arms, and without friends to protect
him, and knowing that M‘Lean was thirsting for his blood, and that
he had the aid of a mass of the corrupt, money-bought citizens of
Van Buren, endeavored to make his escape on horseback, unmolested;
but every road and passway being under strict watch, he did not
succeed in getting far till his path was discovered. M‘Lean and half
a dozen other armed fiends pursued him; and Brother Pratt being
totally unarmed, they succeeded in killing him without being hurt.
Two of the party in advance intercepted his road, and brought him
to a halt, while M‘Lean and the others came up in the rear. M‘Lean
discharged a six-shooter at him, but the balls took no effect: some
passed through his clothes, others lodged in his saddle. The parties
now being in immediate contact, M‘Lean stabbed him (both being on
horseback) with a heavy bowie-knife twice under the left arm. Brother
Pratt dropped from his horse, and M‘Lean dismounted, and probed the
fatal wounds still deeper; he then got a Derringer from one of his
aids, and, as Brother Pratt lay dying upon his back, shot him in the
upper part of the breast, dropping the pistol by the side of the
victim. The assassin then mounted his horse and fled. This occurred
within a few steps of the residence of a farmer by the name of Wire.
Two gentlemen, being at the house at the time, saw the whole affair,
and have made oath to what they witnessed before a coroner’s jury.
Brother Pratt survived the work of this assassin two hours and a
half, and was enabled to tell those who came to his assistance who
he was, that he had been murdered by a fiend for doing his duty,
and gave full instructions as to what course should be pursued in
interring his body, and the disposition of the means and property
connected with his person. His instructions were fully attended to
by Elder Higginson and Mrs. M‘Lean, who reached the place of his
assassination the same evening. Those who saw his last moments state
that Brother Pratt died without a murmur or a groan, and apparently
without a pain, perfectly resigned to the will of Heaven. Brother
Pratt told Elder Higginson, the morning after his arrest, that his
enemies would kill him, and requested Elder Higginson to go through
with this spring’s emigration to Utah, and carry the news of his
death to the Church and his family. This Elder Higginson will do,
the Lord helping. After perpetrating this heaven-daring deed, M‘Lean
returned to Van Buren and made it known. After remaining in town
several hours, and walking the streets with impunity, he was escorted
by a number of citizens of Van Buren to the boat, and took his leave
of the place. Verily we had long thought that the bloodthirsty
mobocrats of Missouri and Illinois were without a parallel in the
world, but we now yield the palm to the Church-going citizens of
Van Buren, for they have proven to the world that they are a den of
murderers and assassins.
GEORGE HIGGINSON.
GEORGE CROUCH.’”
[192] On this occasion, Cedar Fort, a neighboring settlement, with
cultivation, and a few huts, near Camp Floyd, was attacked at night
by camp-followers (soldiers); a single calf was killed (the whole
place was burned to the ground), and the damages speedily rose from a
dozen to $10,000, claimed from Congress (which did not half repay the
injury done).
Strongly disclaiming the idea that the officers who discussed with me
the subject at Camp Floyd had any tendency to exaggeration or to set
down aught in malice, and quite conscious, as they never failed to
remark, that a stranger is allowed to see only the _beau côté_ of the
New Faith, I can not but think that their views are greatly warped by
causes external to it. This is to be expected. Who, after the massacre
of Cawnpore, would have admitted into his mind a shadow of excuse for
Nana Sahib? Among so many, however blinded and fanatic, and however
fond of polygamy--this is ever the first reproach--there must be some
good men. Yet from the “chief impostor” to the last “acolyte,” all
are represented to be a gang of miscreants. The Mormons are far more
tolerant; they have praise for those Gentiles, even federal officers,
who have abstained from injuring them. They speak well of Lieutenant
Colonel E. J. Steptoe, 9th Regiment of Infantry, and the officers of
his force;[193] of General Wilson, afterward the Navy Agent at San
Francisco; and of the present commandant, Colonel Cooke. They have
nothing to say against Judge Reed, or Mr. John J. Kinney, the Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court; and when Judge Leonidas Shaver died
in 1855, they put the papers in mourning, and buried the Gentile in
their cemetery. They do not abuse even their merchant rivals. Mr. J.
B. Kimball, to mention no other, is generally praised and trusted.
But when they find it necessary or advisable to take away a man’s
character, they can do it, “and no mistake.” At the same time, their
tolerance and discipline are, to say the least, remarkable. Judge
Brocchus,[194] to quote but one, would run the risk of being torn to
pieces in almost any fanatical meeting in Europe.
[193] Mr. Hyde (chap. vi.) gives the official document in which these
officers petitioned President Pierce to reappoint Mr. Brigham Young
as Governor and Superintendent of Indian Affairs in Utah Territory,
and it speaks volumes in praise of the much-abused Saints.
[194] Chap. vi.
[“BOSTON.”]
At Camp Floyd I was introduced to Colonel G. H. Crossman, Department
Quarter-master General, and Major Montgomery of the same department; to
Dr. Porter, who was uncommonly and unnecessarily shy upon the subject
of a “sick certificate;” and to Lieutenant N. A. M. Dudley, when we
passed many a merry time over “simpkin.” It is hardly necessary to say
that the judge, having no authority to demand, did not obtain either
escort or carriage. Colonel Cooke frankly told him that he had neither
men nor conveyance at liberty, and even if they were that he could not
exceed orders. The Secretary of War is ready to “be down” upon such
offenses, and in the United States Army probably more officers throw
up the service from distress for leave than in the English army. It was
clear that we must travel without the dignities, so we inspected an
ambulance and a four-mule team, for which the Hungarian refugee, its
owner, asked $1000--but little beyond its worth. After an exceedingly
satisfactory day in a private sense, I passed the evening at Captain
Gove’s, and watched with astonishment the game of Boston. Invented by
the French prisoners in the islands of the American Liverpool, and
abounding in “grand misery,” “little misery,” and other appropriate
terms, it combines all the difficulties of whist, écarté, piquet, brag,
and cribbage, and seems to possess the same attractions which beam
upon the mind of the advanced algebraic scholar. Fortunately there was
an abundance of good commissariat whisky and excellent tobacco, whose
attractions were greater than that of Boston. On the morrow, a gloomy
morning, with cold blasts and spatters of rain from the southwest, and
the tameness of the snow-birds--which here represent
“Cock Robin and Jenny Wren,
God Almighty’s cock and hen”--
warned us that the fine season was breaking up, and that we had no time
to lose. So, inspanning Julia and Sally, we set out, and after six
hours reached once more the City of the Saints.