Devil's Gate

by David Roberts

  According to a reporter: Peoria Register and Northwestern Gazette, April 17, 1840, quoted in Hirshson, 38–39.

  And only months after choosing: Hirshson, 35.

  Brigham Young, one of the Twelve: Ibid., 35–36, 190.

  In their penury: Ardis Parshall, personal communication, December 11, 2006.

  Young had left Illinois: Hirshson, 35–36.

  George A. Smith, Joseph’s cousin: Times and Seasons, November 15, 1840, quoted in Brodie, 264.

  During the single year: Hirshson, 36.

  The newspaper made honeyed promises: Millennial Star, February 1, 1842.

  The first British converts: Brodie, 265.

  By 1844, Nauvoo’s population: Ibid., 362–63.

  On a windy, rainy night: Schindler, Orrin Porter Rockwell, 67–69.

  Rockwell’s appearance was enough: Hirshson, 64.

  The dates of Rockwell’s temporary absence: Brodie, 266, 314, 323–24.

  That denial failed to satisfy: Ibid., 324–25.

  Disheartened by exile, Rockwell: Schindler, 88–94.

  When he finally returned: Brodie, 332.

  Experts, including Rockwell’s sympathetic biographer: Schindler, 72–73; Brodie, 330–31.

  For his part, Smith soon wearied: Brodie, 327–29.

  The final unraveling began: Ibid., 367–72.

  Rather than leave Nauvoo: Ibid., 372–75.

  The retaliation Smith wreaked: Ibid., 377.

  At a signal from the prophet: Schindler, 116.

  This violent episode: Ibid., 117–18.

  The Warsaw Signal editorialized: Brodie, 378.

  Governor Ford, whose role: Ibid., 382–83.

  In any event, we know: B. H. Roberts, ed., History of the Church, vol. 6, 548.

  Smith was in tears: Brodie, 383–84.

  The retrospective account: B. H. Roberts, ed., History of the Church, vol. 6, 551.

  I am going like a lamb: Ibid., 555. Italics in original.

  The journey was uneventful: Ibid., 559.

  According to Krakauer: Krakauer, 131–33.

  The men who had murdered: Stegner, 35.

  Brigham Young’s biographer: Hirshson, 50.

  Fawn Brodie ponders this question: Brodie, 380–81.

  Brigham Young, who had risen: Hirshson, 48.

  “The death of the modern Mahomet”: New York Herald, July 8, 1844, quoted in Brodie, 397.

  One of the most cherished: Hirshson, 51.

  One historian calls Young’s oration: Ibid., 53.

  Well, he spoke, and his words: Hyde, in Journal of Discourses, vol. 13, 181.

  (Indeed, a bishop who listened): Hirshson, 53.

  Desperate to be anointed: Ibid., 52.

  Young, who did in fact speak last: Werner, 191.

  Not once did Young: Ibid., 191–92.

  Like Stalin deposing Trotsky: Hirshson, 53–54; Werner, 194.

  Rigdon indeed decamped for Pittsburgh: Werner, 194–95.

  As late as 1871: Hirshson, 308–9.

  Besides the challenge briefly posed: Ibid., 56–58.

  In the aftermath of the Prophet’s murder: Werner, 195.

  John D. Lee, in his late: Lee, 161.

  The feud between William and Young: Hirshson, 59.

  Finally, in 1860: Werner, 195.

  They were brought to the flash point: Hirshson, 64.

  though Harold Schindler, Rockwell’s biographer: Schindler, 138–40.

  In response, Gentiles attacked: Werner, 200.

  “Every Saint, mongrel or whole-blood”: Madison Express, [n.d.], quoted in Werner, 200.

  The temple, which Mormons claimed: Werner, 201–2.

  During the last weeks: Ibid., 202.

  Among them was Brigham Young: Hirshson, 65.

  “It was the first time”: Journal of Discourses, vol. 3, 266.

  No doubt there were dutiful aspects: Hirshson, 65–66.

  Yet if Young initially obeyed: See, e.g., Hirshson’s chapter “The Seventy Wives of Brigham Young,” 184–223.

  Early in February 1846: Werner, 202.

  On the other hand: Ibid., 204–5.

  We know that Young: Hirshson, 80.

  In fact, as it headed west: Slaughter and Landon, Trail of Hope, 50.

  Much speculation has gone: Bagley, Pioneer Camp, 45.

  As early as October 1845: Slaughter and Landon, 23.

  It did not take long: Ibid., 24.

  Adding to the pilgrims’ difficulties: Ibid., 28–38.

  As it was, even an elite cadre: Stegner, 73.

  Garden Grove and Mount Pisgah: Berrett et al., 72–75, 87–88.

  Yet the Prophet still keenly hoped: Stegner, 84.

  In later years, Young would rail: Journal of Discourses, vol. 5, 231–32.

  The army pay: Stegner, 78, 83.

  Some orthodox histories: Ibid., 78.

  In the fall of 1846: Berrett et al., 121–24, 207–8, 212–15.

  A year-end census: Stegner, 106.

  There were 538 wooden houses: Berrett et al., 214.

  No accurate death count: http://www.lds.org/placestovisit.

  Winter found me bed-ridden: Margaret Phelps, quoted in Slaughter and Landon, 46–47.

  That number resonated: Slaughter and Landon, 50–51.

  “the most extensively reported”: Stegner, 111.

  South Pass in western Wyoming: Berrett and Anderson, 116.

  In 1843 alone: Unruh, Plains Across, 5.

  In 1813 the Missouri Gazette: Ibid., 28–29.

  The first Anglo women: David Roberts, Newer World, 31.

  The few encounters with Indians: Slaughter and Landon, 61.

  In fact, that spring and summer: Unruh, The Plains Across, 252.

  The trail was so crowded: Slaughter and Landon, 53.

  the Mormon pioneer trek is well documented: http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  It comes as no surprise: Stegner, 132–34; Clayton, Emigration Guide, 10.

  Sandy Bluffs, west foot: Clayton, 54.

  The cavalcade on the Mormon Trail: Stegner, 119.

  To bring order: Ibid., 119–20.

  On May 29, Young blew his stack: Slaughter and Landon, 61.

  When I wake up in the morning: unnamed source, quoted in Stegner, 137.

  By June 12, the trekkers: Stegner, 127, 147–48; Slaughter and Landon, 67.

  Ascending the Sweetwater: Stegner, 148–50.

  “men, women and children”: Wilford Woodruff, quoted in Stegner, 150.

  The Mormon caravan: Stegner, 153.

  Two decades before, leading: Berrett and Anderson, 157–58.

  Another Mormon legend hovers: E.g., John Steele, quoted in Slaughter and Landon, 68.

  “there was but one thing”: Woodruff, Woodruff’s Journal, 220.

  On June 30, as the Saints lingered: Stegner, 157–58.

  Another Mormon legend: Ibid., 158.

  Br Brannan fell in: Norton Jacob, June 30, 1847, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Once across the Green River: Clayton, 74.

  But in that home stretch: Stegner, 164.

  It was characterized: Ibid., 157.

  “The sagebrush through which”: Terry Del Bene, interview, February 11, 2007.

  No one was stricken more seriously: Stegner, 162–63.

  On July 21, Pratt’s team: Ibid., 167.

  Alas, Young never uttered: Ibid., 168.

  Wilford Woodruff’s journal: Woodruff, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  CHAPTER 3: THE DIVINE HANDCART PLAN

  On June 9, 1856, a party: http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Though still in poor health: Bigler, Forgotten Kingdom, 40–41.

  In March 1849, Brigham Young: Morgan, Deseret, 125.

  The grandiosity of Mormon ambitions: Unruh, 303; Bigler, Kingdom, 46.

  In an uneasy 1850 compromise: Bigler, 48–49.

  Young tried at first to divert: Unruh, 303, 307–8.

  The official U.S. census for 1851: Ibid., 303.


  In a typical 1855 pronouncement: Journal of Discourses, vol. 2, 317, quoted in Bigler, Kingdom, 43.

  The government surveyor and explorer: Gunnison, Mormons, 26, 67–71.

  Yet because of the revelations: See, e.g., Fielding, Unsolicited Chronicler.

  Those dark suspicions: Hirshson, 144–45.

  As part of his statehood effort: Bigler, Kingdom, 102.

  John Unruh, whose The Plains Across: Unruh, 408–9.

  By the mid-1850s, a wagon: Olsen, 29.

  To solve this problem: Slaughter and Landon, 106–9.

  What those backers failed to mention: Bagley, “Two-Wheeled Torture Devices,” 4–6.

  In sheer practical terms: Ibid., 5–6.

  “Many men have traveled the long”: Millennial Star, December 22, 1855, 811.

  Adding urgency to Zion’s looming: Olsen, 21–22.

  In 1848, a similar infestation: Werner, 240–41.

  On October 29, 1855: Hafen and Hafen, 34–35.

  A month before that, the Prophet had written: Millennial Star, December 22, 1855, 809–815.

  “I have been thinking how we should”: Ibid., 813–14.

  Unlike Joseph Smith: Hirshson, 81.

  “The plan is the device of inspiration”: Millennial Star, December 22, 1855, 809.

  Oh, our faith goes with the hand-carts: “Hand-cart Song,” quoted in Hafen and Hafen, 275.

  In his December 22 editorial: Millennial Star, December 22, 1855, 809–12.

  LDS scholar Andrew D. Olsen: Olsen, 29.

  At once he dispatched: Ibid., 53.

  More mythologizing: http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  In this case, the source: Deseret News, October 8, 1856, 243.

  Most of the British Saints: Hafen and Hafen, 43–44, 56.

  Daniel Spencer had arrived: Spencer journal, LDS Archives, quoted in Olsen, 55.

  Thus Archer Walters, a skilled carpenter: Archer Walters diary, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  It is a testimony either to the converts’ loyal obedience: Ibid.

  His team earned the nickname: Ibid.

  On July 1, Archer Walters: Ibid.

  Archer Walters, whose duty it was: Ibid.

  In a memoir written: Daniel McArthur, Reminiscences, ibid.

  “June 9th, 1856. At 5 P.M.”: Edmund Ellsworth Emigrating Company journal, ibid.

  As John Oakley, a sub-captain: John Oakley journal, ibid.

  That pressure from peers and leaders: Patrick Twiss Bermingham journal, ibid.

  Combing genealogical records: Hafen and Hafen, 199n.

  In a letter to the New York newspaper: J. H. Latey, “Correspondence,” http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  John Oakley, Ellsworth’s sub-captain: Oakley journal, ibid.

  Thus on June 20, in Oakley’s diary: Ibid.

  Heartless though it seems: Ibid.

  The main daily staple for adults: Edmund Ellsworth Company narrative, ibid.

  Archer Walters’s clipped diary entries: Walters diary, ibid.

  John Oakley dutifully recorded: Oakley journal, ibid.

  Apparently the pilfering continued: Walters diary, ibid.

  In an iconoclastic study: Bagley, “Two-Wheeled Torture Devices,” 5.

  Archer Walters thought: Walters diary, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  The punitive John Oakley: Oakley journal, ibid.

  Nineteen-year-old Mary Ann Jones: Mary Ann Jones Ellsworth diary, ibid.

  “On the arrival of the company”: Bermingham journal, ibid.

  While in Florence: Oakley journal, ibid.

  (As a Swiss girl of six): Hafen and Hafen, 12.

  In the McArthur Company: Thordur Didriksson, “A brief story,” http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  They are glancingly referred to: Ellsworth Company narrative, ibid.

  e.g., an emigrant recorded as “Peter Stalle”: Ellsworth Company list of individuals, ibid.

  Their addition to the party: Ellsworth Company journal, ibid.

  The cold-eyed John Oakley: Oakley journal, ibid.

  It would remain for a single informant: Margaret Stalle Barker, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  Yet even the loyal sub-captain John Oakley: Oakley journal, ibid.

  The toil was terrible: Bermingham diary, ibid.

  Wrote Archer Walters: Walters diary, ibid.

  On August 16, the McArthur party: Bermingham diary, ibid.

  “Before half an hour,” Bermingham averred: Ibid.

  In his account of the journey: McArthur, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  Another member of the party: Mary B. Crandal, “Autobiography,” ibid.

  As the word was given: McArthur, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  Retrospect may have added a rosy glow: Crandal, “Autobiography,” ibid.

  On August 31, near Deer Creek: Oakley journal, ibid.

  He was buried at Deer Creek: Ellsworth company, list of individuals, ibid.

  A few months later, McArthur would remember: McArthur, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  Thus, farther west along the trail: Ibid.

  now a mere 228 miles short: Clayton, 72.

  On September 11, having pushed hard: Ellsworth Company narrative, ibid.

  With laconic resignation: Ellsworth Company journal, ibid.

  But that it was a dramatically orchestrated coup: Phyllis Hardie Ferguson, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  McArthur’s own report has his company: McArthur, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  Archer Walters, the Ellsworth Company coffin-maker: Walters diary, ibid.

  Writing later for the Millennial Star: Thomas Bullock, “Letter,” ibid.

  On September 17, another English Saint: Ellsworth Company journal, ibid.

  “one man of the Italian brethren”: Oakley journal, ibid.

  John Oakley, who had pitilessly attributed: Ibid.

  With the scent of Zion in his nostrils: Ellsworth Company journal, ibid.

  Just how dangerous a passage this was: William Butler, “Autobiography,” ibid.

  Charles Treseder, a young man living: Charles Treseder, “Correspondence,” ibid.

  Mary Powell Sabin, a twelve-year-old: Sabin, “Autobiography,” ibid.

  William Aitken, a thirty-six-year-old dentist: William Aitken, “Adventures,” ibid.

  The official Ellsworth journal lists: Ellsworth Company journal, ibid.

  McArthur acknowledged “only the loss”: McArthur, “Reminiscences,” ibid.

  Hafen and Hafen fix the number: Hafen and Hafen, 193.

  Without citing sources, the company narratives: Ellsworth Company narrative, McArthur Company narrative, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  The Deseret News baldly asserted: Deseret News, October 1, 1856.

  In an emotional speech: Deseret News, October 8, 1856.

  At the same meeting: Ibid.

  If anything, at that bowery meeting: Ibid.

  In a speech given two weeks after: Deseret News, November 26, 1856.

  Mary McCleve, a sixteen-year-old: Mary Meeks, “Reminiscences,” http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  But William Butler, who had staggered: Butler, “Autobiography,” ibid.

  Twiss Bermingham, the scrupulous diarist: Twiss Bermingham, “To Utah,” ibid.

  William Aitken, that much angrier apostate: Aitken, “Adventures,” ibid.

  As for Archer Walters, the loyal carpenter: Archer Walters, “The Journal,” ibid.

  In New York City, President John Taylor: Hafen and Hafen, 91.

  On June 11, from Iowa City, William Woodward: William Woodward to Heber C. Kimball, 11 June 1856, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Normally the arrival dates of such documents: Ardis Parshall, personal communication, May 30, 2007.

  CHAPTER 4: SAVAGE ADVICE

  “Dont you think I had a pleasant”: Priscilla Evans, Autobiography, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Edward Bunker, thirty-four years old: Hafen and Hafen, 81.

  In mid-June of 1
856, a church official: William Woodward, “Iowa Correspondence,” http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Bunker himself wrote almost nothing: Edward Bunker, Autobiography, ibid.

  Priscilla Evans claimed many years later: Evans, Autobiography, ibid.

  Yet David Grant, a sub-captain: Millennial Star, November 29, 1856, 767.

  A delay of three weeks ensued: Evans, Autobiography, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  It contains this cryptic avowal: Elizabeth Lane Hyde, “Autobiagraphy of Elizabeth L. Hyde,” ibid.

  Priscilla Evans paints a woeful picture: Evans, Autobiography, ibid.

  Thomas Evans had lost his leg: Ibid.

  Elizabeth Lane elaborates: “He soon gave out”: Hyde, “Autobiagraphy,” ibid.

  A slightly different version: Kate B. Carter, Heart Throbs of the West, vol. 6, 355, quoted in Hafen and Hafen, 85.

  Elizabeth Lane wrote that after rheumatism: Hyde, “Autobiagraphy,” http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Several sources report: John Parry, Reminiscences and diary, ibid. Also Robert David Roberts, Reminiscences, ibid.

  Even this, reported John Parry: Parry, Reminiscences and diary, ibid.

  Only Parry’s account even mentions: Ibid.

  “Indians met us some times”: Ibid.

  Priscilla relates how it backfired: Evans, Autobiography, ibid.

  one diary mentions a six-inch snowfall: Roberts, Reminiscences, ibid.

  One emigrant, Samuel Orton: Samuel Taylor Orton, Record book, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Twenty-three-year-old Eleanor Roberts: Carter, Heart Throbs of the West, vol. 6, 357, quoted in Hafen and Hafen, 87–88.

  By his own account, Robert Roberts’s boots: Roberts, Reminiscences, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  (The actual distance from Independence Rock): Clayton, 70.

  As late as August 30: Millennial Star, November 29, 1856, 767.

  The loner Elizabeth Lane later recalled: Hyde, “Autobiagraphy,” http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Thomas Giles, one of the blind men: Carter, Heart Throbs of the West, vol. 10, 325–26, quoted in Hafen and Hafen, 86–87.

  After the daily ration had been reduced: Orton, Record book, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  Without citing their sources: Hafen and Hafen, 193.

  One of the emigrants, Robert Roberts: Roberts, Autobiographical sketch, http://www.lds.org/churchhistory.

  By early 1856: David L. Bigler, Kingdom, 121.

  He was known to the faithful as “the sledgehammer”: Ibid., 122.

  Historian David L. Bigler describes: Ibid.

  A New York Times reporter: New York Times, September 21, 1857, quoted in Hirshson, 155.