Pillar of Light

by Gerald N. Lund

  For a moment, Nathan considered protesting, but then he knew their situation was too desperate for such posturing. “Thank you, Carl,” he said quietly, deeply moved.

  Carl merely nodded.

  Joshua came in now, accepting what he already knew would be the answer. “The bigger question is finding the supplies you need. I think your wagon is all right. We’ll have to watch for warped boards and such, but it’ll be okay. But the other? Flour especially.” He paused. “I have a proposal.”

  “What?” Nathan asked.

  “Why don’t you and I and maybe Derek go down to Quincy tomorrow with the two wagons I have left. We’ll try and buy enough food to resupply what you lost.”

  “But we don’t have any money,” Matthew replied, “and nothing to trade.”

  “I’ll talk to my banker there,” Joshua answered evenly, “have him give me credit enough for what we need.”

  Now several started talking at once. “Will he do that?” Derek asked in surprise.

  “No, Joshua,” Lydia said. “You can’t do that.”

  “But I thought no one would give you credit,” Jessica blurted out.

  “He’ll give me credit,” Joshua growled menacingly.

  Nathan considered that. “I don’t think they’ll sell to Mormons.”

  “I’ll tell you what, Nathan,” Joshua answered, grim now. “I’ve had about all the anti-Mormon sentiment I can handle. If they refuse to sell us what we need, maybe I’ll burn their houses down.”

  That brought a smile all around. Finally Nathan nodded. “I suppose we don’t have a lot of choice. All right, we’ll try it.”

  Caroline lifted her hand. Nathan turned to her. “Yes?”

  “Joshua and I have another proposal.”

  “What?”

  “Joshua is going with you.” And then at Nathan’s blank look, she hurried on. “I’m not talking about Quincy. He’ll go west with you.”

  “What?” several of them cried at once.

  “Yes,” Joshua said. “Caroline and I have talked about it all afternoon. I’ll go and help take care of Mama. I know Matthew plans to do that, but he has his own family to worry about.”

  “And you’d stay here, Caroline?” Lydia asked, eyes wide. “Is that safe?”

  “We’ll have Carl and Melissa,” Caroline answered, her voice level. “And with Joshua gone, they’re not going to bother us.”

  Carl saw the inevitability of it immediately. “Yes,” he said. “That’s best. We’ll take care of Caroline and the children.” He turned to Joshua. “What about the lumber you’ve got coming this spring?”

  Joshua grinned. “You said things at the brickyards were slow. How would you like to become a lumber merchant?”

  Carl rocked back, stunned. “You’d trust me to do that?”

  Joshua just nodded. Then he swung back. “You don’t have to think about this, Nathan. You know it’s right. You need another man. Mama needs someone to look after her.”

  Nathan’s thoughts were a wild tumble, the possibilities racing in his mind. But finally, he just inclined his head in Joshua’s direction. “Yes, we do.” And then his voice suddenly caught and his eyes were glistening. “If Papa were here, you know what he’d say right now, don’t you?”

  Joshua’s head dropped and he didn’t look up.

  “He wouldn’t say anything,” Lydia whispered, looking at Joshua. “He’d just throw his arms around you and hold you tight.”

  Chapter 34

  Saturday, February 14, 1846

  Today is the day called by many St. Valentine’s Day. It is a day when love between men and women is honored and remembered. It is a day when I sit in my tiny cabin and shed tears as I write, for never has Will had less reason to love me than on this day.

  We have been at sea now for ten days. We had hoped and prayed that the weather would be kind until those of us who have spent our entire lives on land grew accustomed to the constant rolling and pitching and pitching and rolling of the floor beneath our feet. Alas, it was not to be. Hardly had five days passed when a great storm descended upon us. This was not just any storm. Even Will said it was a bad one. The sky at midday was as black as midnight. The winds howled with a fury I have never before known. For four days and nights we were tossed about helplessly on the monstrous waves. For a time it looked as though our brave little company was to come to a premature end and that I would die without my parents ever knowing what had happened to me.

  Life on the “passenger deck,” as they call our quarters, became not only unbearable, but unbelievably horrible. Remember that the remodeling of our ship from a merchantman to a packet ship left the ceilings—the sailors call them the bulkheads—no more than four feet high. In the best of circumstances we crawl around like monkeys in order not to crack our heads. But with the storm, it became a nightmare. Everywhere people were sick—violently, violently sick. Children screamed or lay in their beds moaning piteously. Pots and pans, dishes, luggage of every description, even whole eating tables were thrown out of their places and hurled about frightfully. One could scarce move about without risking life and limb.

  This is when I learned that I had married a total stranger. I have heard people say that being seasick makes you wish you were dead. Such mild, unremarkable language does not begin to describe my feelings. I not only wished I were dead, I longed for it like a baby longs for its mother’s breast. I cried out for it like a young kid bleating for its nanny goat. And in the midst of this indescribable suffering of body and spirit, a stranger named Will Steed stood by me, smiling down at me with ruddy cheeks and sparkling eyes. He would go up top, stand on the deck, feet braced, gripping the rigging while the rain lashed his face, and he would laugh into the teeth of the storm. At night, while I lay groaning like a dying woman, he would come tripping down the stairs, his face as rosy as a baby’s after its bath. He would be chomping on an apple, or carrying some gigantic slab of bread smeared with butter. Smacking his lips, he would then have the effrontery to suggest that if I would but partake with him, I would be instantly and forever cured.

  What terrible accident of fate created such a disparity as this between a woman and her husband? The irony of St. Valentine’s Day now rests upon me and my soul cries out, “Why oh why couldn’t I have married a man who knew not the sea?” Fortunately, Will has not cast me off for being the whimpering lass that I am. He even claims that he loves me all the more—a likely story!!

  Though I clearly let my pen run away with itself, in a more serious note, it was indeed a most terrible storm. Our vessel, completely helpless before the lashing gale, was driven closer and ever closer to the Cape Verde Islands, where many a ship has met its watery doom. Elder Brannan became a man possessed. He exhorted us to prayer. He would come down and call upon us to sing a hymn of praise to God, convinced that we could turn the elements through the song of faith.

  I digress for a moment. I said Elder B. comes “down.” Let me explain. Elder B. assigned himself one of the stateroom cabins in the officer’s quarters. In fact, he cabins beside Captain Richardson, captain of our vessel. At first he vowed that he would take mess with us, but that lasted no more than a few days. The smell of bilgewater and the howling babies who were by then already sick were too much for him. Now he eats at the captain’s table and comes down among us only occasionally. I make no further comments. Some are murmuring, but Will reminds me that it is not Christian to harshly judge another.

  Now back to the singing. Elder B. would come down in the passenger’s deck, amid the crying and the moaning, amid the terrible clatter of things flying about. “Let us sing!” he would bellow. “Let us all sing!” And we would sing. Amid the retching stomachs, amid the shrieking children, amid the howling of the wind, we would sing. We would sing at the top of our lungs such songs as “The Spirit of God,” or “We Are Going to California.” (I confess I found greater solace in the first than in the latter.)

  On the last night, Captain Richardson, with his hair flying and salt
water dripping from his beard, came down to speak to us. Even he was in despair. And though I make light of it now (only in order to stop from weeping), it was a most awful circumstance. By then we had some dead, mostly the old, their bodies no longer able to bear up under the never-ending misery in which we found ourselves. “Prepare for the worst,” the captain cried. “We shall be dashed upon the rocks before the night is over.”

  But to his surprise, in spite of the terrible, terrible situation in which we found ourselves, Elder Brannan’s call to sing had kept our faith up. Not only was the captain astonished that we were not in despair, but he was chagrined to find us more composed and hopeful than he. It was after he left that I came to know why I had chosen to marry this stranger with whom I share my bunk. Will stood before us and told us of that day when another shipload of Saints came across the great Atlantic to America. He told how in the midst of another great storm, President Young and the Twelve gathered in a circle and petitioned the Lord to calm the elements.

  I need not tell the reader of this journal what happened next. As one, we bowed our heads—as we had done many times before—and prayed for a cessation of the storm. Only this time we prayed with even greater faith. Nor is the end of my story a surprise either. Within a very short time, the wind shifted, blowing us away from the islands and the reefs that awaited. Then they died down to no more than a stiff sailing breeze. The seas that were like mountains around us calmed. The sun appeared again. Our first thoughts were to those who had died. We saw them buried in their watery grave, then gathered together on deck and knelt in a prayer of thanksgiving.

  So as I close this Valentine’s Day entry, I do express my love for the man that I have married. I also thank my God for watching over us and answering our prayers.

  Brigham Young’s original plan was to take his family across the river with the first wagons on February fourth, leading the exodus out of Nauvoo as an example for all to follow. However, on the third, when he could not disperse the crowds at the temple, he postponed his departure and stayed for nearly two more weeks. He spent that time almost day and night in the temple, overseeing the work there so that as many Saints as possible could have their temple ordinances.

  It is often the case that those in leadership positions seem unable to escape criticism from one hand or the other. So it was that when Brigham was supposedly leaving on the fourth, some—those who were not ready to leave with him—murmured because he was abandoning the city in the face of danger. Then when he decided to stay, those who had already crossed the river stopped their forward movement and complained that they had no leader to guide them. Of greater concern, Brigham learned that many in the city were postponing their departures as well, using him as the justification for doing so. Obviously, they reasoned, there was no immediate danger, because Brigham was still here. When Brigham went, they would go.

  So finally, during the evening of Sunday, February fifteenth, 1846, Brigham Young crossed the river and took his family to join the company to which he had been assigned. This company was camped at Sugar Creek, nine miles into Iowa Territory. There were fifty people in the Young party, including his wives, children, foster children, and a few others who were actually taken along because they had no other way to go. He had five separate and well-provisioned wagons to carry them west.

  Heber C. Kimball stayed behind to secure some of the Church property and supplies that were needed on the trail. Then on Tuesday morning, February seventeenth, Elder Kimball walked out of the beautiful two-story brick home that he and Vilate had completed just four months previously. He locked the door, left the key with the committee assigned to try and sell the remaining property, and walked away.

  When Heber arrived at the Sugar Creek camp shortly before noon of that same day, he became the seventh Apostle in the camp. With a majority of the Quorum now present, Brigham called for a council meeting. There were serious problems to discuss. The first stemmed from the numbers of people who had completely ignored the counsel of the brethren not to leave until they were sufficiently prepared. Panicked at the thought that they might be trapped—which was only heightened by the departure of Brigham and the Twelve—they left Nauvoo with whatever they had. Charged to be ready for as much as a year in the wilderness, they came barely able to last a fortnight. Some tents had not been completed and were open on both ends. A few families hadn’t even brought that much and tried to shelter themselves from the wintry weather by rigging up bedclothes between trees.

  The second concern, which was even more serious than the first, was the fact that now, two weeks after the exodus had started, there were still only a few hundred Saints out of Nauvoo. And these were camped a scant nine miles from their former homes—hardly a protective buffer against the marauding armies of federal soldiers that were expected. Part of the reason for that was that there simply were not enough boats to get the people across the river, even though the ferries and flatboats were working around the clock. Part of it seemed to be that once the Twelve started west, the carefully constructed organization of companies and captains started to break down. The leaderless minions in Nauvoo were milling around like sheep in a rainstorm. It was decided that Brigham, Heber, and John Taylor would return to Nauvoo the following day to expedite the exodus and get things in hand once again.

  The first two weeks of February had seen relatively mild weather, with days in the low fifties or high forties and the nights not falling far below freezing. Occasional rain or snow left the ground muddy and difficult for travel, but the temperate weather was a great blessing to people traveling out in the open or sleeping in tents and wagons.

  The day after Brigham returned to Nauvoo, the respite ended with a vengeance. A massive winter storm swept out of Canada, lashing the Great Plains with bitter cold, howling winds, and blinding blizzards. In Nauvoo, the citizens retreated to their houses. They stood around their stoves and fireplaces, listening in awe as the winds shrieked around them and the snow began to pile up in drifts. But in the Sugar Creek camp, the fledgling pioneers were about to learn that Mother Nature is not forgiving of the unprepared. Blowing straight out of the northwest, untrammeled by hundreds of miles of open prairie, the gale-force winds toppled trees, snatched the makeshift tents away like twigs of straw, and toppled even those tents which were sturdily made and properly pitched. Many a family spent the night huddled together with nothing but coats or blankets to shield them from the storm.

  When the storm finally blew itself out, there were seven or eight inches of snow on the ground and temperatures plummeted like a stone. Where before the highs had been in the forties and fifties, now they were in the teens or low twenties. Where the nights had seen frost, but little more, now the thermometer dropped close to zero. In less than thirty-six hours, the smaller channels on the river were frozen over with a thin skiff of ice. In the main channel, the river was running heavily with slush and the large chunks of ice from upstream, making the crossing to Iowa in anything but the largest flatboats a dangerous matter.

  Then on the evening of February twenty-third, the skies cleared and the temperature plunged even further. What had been unseasonably cold before became frigid beyond anything ever seen for this late in February. When the sun came up on the morning of the twenty-fourth, the temperature was still below zero. By seven p.m. that night, Brigham Young recorded in his journal that the temperature stood at twelve degrees below zero on the Fahrenheit scale.

  Derek Ingalls walked swiftly, swinging his arms vigorously back and forth to keep warm. His breath came in big explosions of mist, turned golden by the rays of the rising sun. Beneath his boots, the snow not only crunched, it squeaked. That was something he had never experienced in England, and only two or three times since coming to America. That alone told him how cold it was. He raised his gloved hands and covered his nose and mouth. He blew into them softly, letting the warmth of his breath temporarily ease the tingling in his cheeks.

  He turned off Parley Street, north onto Granger, letting the
jubilation move him forward with great strides. As he reached Steed Row, he went through the gate of Nathan and Lydia’s home, not even pausing at the front porch. He strode around the back of the house and headed for the barn. He reached the small side door, threw it open, and stepped inside.

  There were three wagons down the center portion of the barn, and several people, all dressed heavily in winter coats, hats, gloves, and scarves, swarmed around them. At the sound of the door, they all stopped and turned toward Derek.

  “Well?” Nathan said, when Derek just stood there grinning.

  “Solid as stone.”

  Joshua was loading a bag of flour into the nearest wagon. He dropped it into place, gave it one last shove, then straightened. “Did you go out on it?”

  “Didn’t have to,” Derek answered exultantly. “The wagons are already going across.”

  Matthew and young Joshua came forward, followed by Carl Rogers and his three sons. Matthew smiled broadly. “Wagons? Not just people?”

  “Yes! Wagons! There must have been thirty or forty spread out across the river. I’m telling you, that ice is as solid as if the river had turned to stone.”

  Nathan stood there for a moment, letting the significance of that sink in; then he turned to his son. “Joshua, go tell Mama and the others. We’ll finish loading here, then hitch up the teams. We’ll leave in about an hour.”

  “Yes, Papa.”

  Carl turned to his sons. “You go with Joshua and help him spread the word. Tell Mama.”

  “Tell them to meet at our house by ten o’clock,” Nathan called as they started away. “Oh, and fetch Solomon. He’s at the blacksmith shop.”

  As the boys left, Joshua jumped down from the wagon and came to stand with Matthew, Derek, Nathan, and Carl. “What a blessing!” Derek said. “We’ll be able to get hundreds of wagons across the river now. No more waiting days or weeks for a turn on the ferry.”

  “I’m not sure that leaving your homes when the temperature is no more than zero at high noon is a blessing,” Carl said quietly. “Especially for Mother Steed.”