All is well! All is well!
William Clayton stood silently for a moment, then looked around, smiling faintly. He slowly sank down to sit on the ground. No one moved. No one spoke. Above them the stars were like a great glittering cape across the sky. Around them the night seemed impenetrable but safe. Finally, Brigham cleared his throat. “William, I want you to make copies of that song. I want it passed around the camp.” He stopped, deeply moved. “I want every Latter-day Saint to learn those words and start singing them to each other. Thank you, William, for bringing us a gift from above.”
Chapter Notes
Once the weather turned warmer and drier, two new challenges began to plague the Saints—rattlesnakes and prairie fires. References to both begin to crop up in the journals at this time. Brigham makes mention of a fire on the sixteenth of April about noon. He says that it “burned over doing no damage.” (MHBY, p. 134.) Several journals also mention a fire on the seventeenth. This was in the evening and was fought “with whips [probably wet blankets and sacks] and water” (“Diary of Lorenzo Dow Young,” Utah Historical Quarterly 14 [1946]: 136). For purposes of the novel, only one fire is described and it is placed on the sixteenth.
In his journal, under date of Wednesday, 15 April 1846, William Clayton wrote the following while camped at Locust Creek in Iowa Territory: “This morning I composed a new song—‘All is well.’ ” Thus was born a hymn that became the most beloved of songs sung along the trail and an anthem that came to symbolize the spirit of the Latter-day Saints throughout the world. The details of its coming forth and of William Clayton come from contemporary sources. (See CN, 6 April 1996, pp. 6, 12; Paul E. Dahl, “ ‘All Is Well . . .’: The Story of ‘the Hymn That Went Around the World,’ ” BYU Studies 21 [Fall 1981]: 515–27.)
Chapter 14
Somewhere on the plains of Iowa—April 18, 1846 (Saturday)
My name is Rachel Steed Griffith Garrett. I was born on the 24th day of January in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and thirty-two. I am now fourteen years of age. My mother is Jessica Roundy Steed Griffith Garrett, and my father (actually my stepfather, but he is as good as any real father could be) is Solomon Garrett. Perhaps later I can write more of my life story and tell you why my mother and I have all those names, but for now I want to begin with the present.
Two days ago we had a terrible fire on the prairie. We were out where there was lots of grass, and the wind was blowing hard. The fire was large and moved very fast. I was very scared and wondered if someone would be killed or if some of our wagons would be burned. But Heavenly Father blessed us. We started another fire, then drove our wagons into the burned area. The other fire just went around us and we were safe. But that night, after we were in camp, my cousin Emily Steed and me (Emily is not only my cousin, she is also my very best friend) talked about what would happen if we had died in the fire or maybe if we are killed by Indians as we go west. We have not had a chance to get married and have children, so there would be no one who would know that we lived. We decided to keep journals and write about ourselves so that if we die, someone will know about us. Mama gave me her journal and said I could write in the back of it. I promised I won’t read hers, and she promised she won’t read mine.
I may not get to write every day. There is no way to write in the daytime when we are traveling. Even if I rode in the wagon, which I don’t, it would be too bumpy to write anything. And when we make camp, there is so much to do—getting the tent up, starting the fire, cooking supper, helping Mama churn butter or get little Miriam and Sol to bed. (Miriam is my baby sister. She’s two, almost three. Sol is Solomon. He’s named after my father. He’s just a year old.) By the time we’re done, it’s usually dark. Lamp oil and candles are scarce. So unless Mama or Papa keep a light on, I have to wait. I wanted to start yesterday, but couldn’t because there was so much to do when we reached camp. Maybe on a rest day—like a Sunday—I can write more about my early life and catch up on what has happened since we left Nauvoo, but for now I’ll try and write something every day.
Yesterday, two children in camp died of the measles. I didn’t know them, but the whole camp was sad. Lots of children have the measles right now. And mumps. (Miriam has the mumps and rode in the wagon all day yesterday.) They buried the children outside of camp, then drove the wagon back and forth over the graves so the wolves can’t tell where they’re buried. I will ask Heavenly Father in my prayers tonight to take the children home to him.
Pleasant Point—April 19, 1846 (Sunday)
Pres. Young named our camp here Pleasant Point. This is another beautiful day—the fourth in a row now. Everyone is happy. Mama says spring is here for sure. It is so nice to walk around camp without sinking in mud. We had sacrament meeting today and almost everyone in camp came. Papa said there were about 600 of us. It was a good meeting. Brother John Kay and William Pitt from the band sang a song about the exodus. Then we all sang Brother Clayton’s new song, “All Is Well!” Everyone sang loudly and I felt little goose bumps on my arms when they sang. Mama says that happens sometimes when you feel the Spirit. Uncle Nathan talked to Pres. Y. afterwards and he said he had never felt a sweeter spirit since we started. I’d like to ask the Pres. if he got goose bumps too, but I wouldn’t dare. Emily says she will for me. I forbade her to do it.
This afternoon, some messengers arrived from Nauvoo. They had a whole bag of letters that were passed out. Grandma Steed got a letter from Aunt Melissa and we all gathered round to hear it. Melissa and Carl are doing fine. They say many people are getting ready to leave the city now that the weather’s getting better. One thing was not good news. M. says they got a letter from Kirtland saying that Carl’s mother had died. That’s sad. Their baby Mary never got to go to Kirtland, so she will never see her Grandmother Rogers.
After we finished the letter, we started talking about the rest of our family who aren’t with us. We all pray for Will and Alice, who are at sea somewhere. We also pray for Peter and Kathryn. They should have left Springfield by now, so we hope we’ll meet them soon on the trail.
I knew the good weather was too good to be true. It has started to rain again and I shall have to stop now.
Hog Creek—April 21, 1846 (Tuesday)
We stayed in camp all day yesterday, but I was too busy to write. We washed clothes and cleaned out the tents. Miriam is still quite sick with the mumps. She looks like a chipmunk, but Mama says she thinks she is past the worst. We left camp this morning. It has rained off and on all day. Not hard, but the mud is back. After we got here to camp, someone accidentally lit some gunpowder. It exploded and started a grass fire, but it was wet enough that it was put out quickly. After the fire of the other day, though, a lot of people got quite excited.
Uncle Matthew and other men built a simple bridge over the creek and we camped on this side (west). Tonight some of the hunters found two wild hogs and killed them. So we’re calling this the Hog Creek Camp.
Garden Grove—April 25, 1846 (Saturday)
It has been four days since I’ve gotten a chance to write. There has been too much to do or I was too tired by the time chores were done. I will try and remember what has happened. On Wednesday, we reached a very pretty spot and the leaders named it Pleasant Grove. Pres. Y’s horse was bitten by a rattlesnake that day. He caught the snake and killed it. Then he did something very strange. He cut the snake into pieces and put the raw meat on the wound. The snake meat drew out the poison and the horse was fine. I asked Uncle Joshua if he had ever heard of something like that. He said he’d heard of the Indians doing such a thing, but had always wondered if it was true.
Except for a move of only one mile in the evening, we stayed in camp on Thursday while Pres. Y and others rode ahead to reach the Weldon River where the settlement will be. Some others caught up with us. It rained hard during the night and it is cold and muddy again. The hunters are finding quite a bit of game—a deer, some prairie chickens, and a wild turkey. One of them shot what they call a prairie
dog. Ugh! Papa says they’re just a ground squirrel and probably taste like a squirrel. I said I didn’t want to eat anything that was called a dog, even if it was a squirrel. Emily says she would rather waste away and die first. But there is hardly any flour in camp anymore so the meat the hunters find is important.
I thought I would write about what it is like out here so that my grandchildren will know what I went through. Actually this is Josh’s idea. (Josh is Emily’s older brother.) Emily told him that we’re writing journals now and he said that our children and grandchildren are going to want to know more about us than whether or not it rained on this day or that. I think that’s a good idea so here goes. I shall pick a good day to describe for my future readers.
The bugle blows at 5:30 each morning. I don’t know who blows it. One of William Pitt’s band members I guess. Then we have to be up by six o’clock. First thing is always prayer. We do this as a family in our tents. Then while the men get a fire started—if we’re lucky and it didn’t rain, there will still be a few coals from the night before—the girls and the women start breakfast. The younger boys and girls get the little children dressed. Mothers with little babies have to feed them, so they help when they can.
Breakfast on the trail is usually simple. Most often its just mush with a little milk or sugar. Sometimes we have just bread and milk topped with a touch of sugar if there is any. If there is meat, the men like fried bacon or ham, or thin steaks. When there is no meat, we eat a lot of lumpy dick. When I tell you how we make it, you won’t wonder any more why it’s called that. For lumpy dick, you fill a kettle with milk and put it over the hot coals. You have to watch it real close so the milk doesn’t scorch. The minute the milk starts to boil, you start to put in flour, just a little bit at a time. You don’t stir it in. You have to kind of poke and mix it. You don’t want it to become slick and smooth. You want it to be lumpy. (See, I told you it would make sense.) You do that for about fifteen minutes until it’s quite thick, like cereal. Eat it with sugar or thick cream while it’s still hot and it’s very good, though I get tired of it quickly.
When we noon, or stop at midday, we usually eat a cold meal—bread, cheeses, dried fruits, beef or venison jerky, and hardtack. Hardtack is like a biscuit, only harder. We eat a lot of it for two reasons. First, it never spoils. If you keep it dry, it will last for months. It doesn’t have any yeast in it. Second, it is easy to make. You just get flour, salt, and then add just enough water to make the flour stick together and make dough. Then you roll it out flat, cut it into squares, bake it on both sides, then eat it. It’s called hardtack because it’s like chewing on the bark of a tree, only tastier.
Supper is the biggest meal. Unless it’s raining hard, we always build a fire and cook supper. Things we eat a lot are rice and baked beans and stew. Stew is especially good if the hunters have shot a rabbit or a squirrel. Especially good is when they get a prairie hen or a wild turkey. With the stew we eat corn bread or johnnycake. (Those are about the same thing only corn bread has yeast and is baked, johnnycake is cornmeal mixed with water or milk and cooked on a griddle.) For dessert, we may have sugar cookies or gingerbread. Sometimes we have pilot pudding. Pilot pudding is easy to make. You take some bread and break it into a bowl, then pour boiling water over it. Then you drain off the extra water, put sugar and cream on it, and eat it while it’s hot. It is very good. If the cow has just been milked and there is fresh cream, one of my favorite desserts is to skim the cream off the top of the milk where it is the thickest, then spread it on a piece of white bread or corn bread like it was butter and sprinkle a little sugar or cinnamon on it. Mmm. I’m hungry just thinking about it.
Once breakfast is over, we clean up the camp while the men get the stock and hitch them to the wagons. The older boys take the tents down and fold them up. Usually we start out between eight or nine o’clock. Though traveling is the hardest part of being out here, it is also my favorite part. I love to walk alongside the wagons or up beside the oxen. Papa is teaching me how to drive them by calling out to them. Papa never whips the oxen. He says it only frightens them the more. Usually I have chores to do, such as to grease the axles if they start to creak, or to watch the smaller children. That’s very important now that the rattlesnakes have started to come out everywhere.
I love the prairie. Now that spring is coming, it is so beautiful. We walk for miles and miles and see nothing but grass and flowers waving gently in the wind. It is like being on an ocean, with the hills rolling gently like waves, and the breeze rippling through the grass. When we reach a high spot, you can look forward and back and see wagons and oxen and horses and sheep and dogs and pigs and children and women all strung out along the trail. It is a grand sight and never fails to make me stop and look. At the creeks and rivers, we pile up like sheep trying to get through the narrow gate to the sheepfold. And as we cross, it is all pandemonium. Men holler, the oxen bellow, the wagons rattle and splash, the children squeal as they have water fights, the women hike up their skirts and wade across if it isn’t too deep.
I won’t say any more about the mud and the rain, I have talked a lot about that already. It is part of our trip, but now that spring is here, it won’t be a problem nearly as much anymore.
Well, back to the news. That same afternoon—Thursday—Pres Y. and the others returned to camp. They found the place on the Weldon River where we shall build a settlement for those who are still coming. They are going to call it Garden Grove. We all came here yesterday. Everyone is excited. This will mean we can stop for a while. We will build fences and cabins and plant grain for those who are still to come. Also there is a mill on the river. Pres. Y. says the local settlers are willing to hire some of the men and they will pay us in flour and seed grain. Oh, a piece of warm bread with butter and honey sounds more heavenly than I can express in words.
Uncle Matthew is back with us again, at least for now.
Garden Grove Camp—April 29, 1846 (Wednesday)
What a beautiful place. It is like a garden here on the Weldon River. I’m glad they’re calling it Garden Grove. It has rained a lot since we arrived on Friday. The camp is a great bog, just like so many times before, but work goes on anyway. Rain or not, everyone seems happier. More people are coming every day now. Papa, and all my uncles—Joshua, Derek, Matthew, and Nathan—and my cousin Josh (Emily’s older brother) have been working for local people or splitting rails to fence in land for plowing. But we haven’t gotten any grain yet. The river has risen so much with the rain that the gristmill can’t work. So we will have to wait a little longer for bread. One sad thing. Pres. Y. told the men that they have decided to try and sell the Kirtland Temple and the Nauvoo Temple so they can get enough money to help the rest of the Saints come west. Everyone knows it had to happen, but it still made everyone gloomy. Mama says it is like they are selling a piece of us. I wanted to cry but didn’t because I didn’t want the little ones to think something was wrong.
Speaking of the little ones. Miriam is better now. She was sitting up and laughing this afternoon. Thank you, Heavenly Father, for answering our prayers.
Melissa Rogers was in the back room of the Steed Family Dry Goods and General Store, taking inventory of the bags and boxes and barrels. It didn’t take long. There wasn’t much that was left. For that matter, the shelves out front had a lot of empty space as well. The store was just a shadow of what it had been a year ago when it had been one of the hubs of Nauvoo, drawing many people in to visit and talk as well as to shop.
She closed the ledger book and sat down on a stool. Was it her? Was it the fact that she and Carl were known to have turned their backs on the Church? Did people resent the fact that they had kept the Steed family name on the store even though there were no more Steeds in Nauvoo?
Immediately she shook her head. No, it wasn’t that. At least it wasn’t a major factor. People were still friendly and kind. People still greeted her pleasantly on the street and treated Carl with respect. It was just the times. The population of
Nauvoo was emptying quickly now. Since the weather had turned more pleasant, the ferries across the river were running full almost every trip. And the demand for supplies had been so heavy for the last six months that they simply could not keep up with it. That had started a vicious downward spiral. Much of what Lydia and Caroline had done prior to their leaving had been to buy and sell by bartering. Cash was a rare commodity nowadays. Unfortunately, the things most commonly taken in trade were things which those leaving for the West did not need. To turn around and sell or trade them off again in a city whose whole focus was going west was not a highly profitable way to run a store. And without profit, without cash in hand, there were very few suppliers who were extending credit to businesses in Nauvoo. So the supplies dwindled and the customers with them.
It made her sad. Not for the money. Lydia and Caroline had given them the store on the promise that someday she and Carl would pay them something for it. In a way, they were out nothing so far. Rather, it was that she had found a strange fulfillment in the store. She wasn’t sure exactly why. Maybe it was being able to account for each thing and to have a place for it until it was sold. Maybe it was being out of the house and meeting people for part of each day. Maybe it was pure nostalgia, a way to keep in touch with the family that were now gone. There had been many happy hours spent in this store on the corner of Knight and Main Streets.
“Mama?”
The door pushed open and her oldest son was there. Carl had just turned fourteen yesterday. Like his mother, he loved the store and had become her mainstay in running it. With all the schools closed—Melissa was teaching all of her children at home now—there was nothing else to take his time. Except the brickyard. To his father’s great disappointment, young Carl did not care for the brick business at all. David and Caleb were there almost every day. Carl would go only if his father specifically asked him to. But he reveled in the dry goods business and was meticulous in helping his mother make it work.
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