# Wife No. 19/Chapter 20
### CHAPTER XX.
#### BRIGHAM BUILDS WAGONS BY "INSPIRATION." — THE CHURCH SETS UP A WHISKEY-STORE.

* Saying "Yes" under Difficulties.
* A Woman who Meant to have her Way.
* Two Company: Three None.
* Building Wagons by Inspiration.
* My Father despatched to Chicago.
* He gets rid of his New Wives.
* My Brother sent to the Sandwich Islands.
* My Mother tells her own Story.
* She Returns to Salt Lake City to see my Father.
* Wifely Considerations.
* She finds two other Ladies at her Husband's Bedside.
* He likes a good deal of Wives about Him!
* A Heart dead to Love.
* Brigham "asks no odds of Uncle Sam or the Devil."
* He proclaims Martial Law.
* Fiery Speeches in the Tabernacle.
* Preparing for War.
* Government Troops Arrive.
* The Saints quit Salt Lake City.
* The Church Distillery.
* Brigham shamelessly Robs my Father.
* He fills his own Pockets.
* My Father, being without Funds, takes his Sixth Wife.
Mormons Burning a Government Train.OME time before our family bereavement by the loss of Louise, my mother and I went to Skull Valley, about seventy miles from Salt Lake City, where my brothers were keeping a herd-ground.
We had intended to go by ourselves; but one of the young wives, who was very much attached to my mother, begged to be allowed to go. She appealed first to my father, and he, in turn, referred her to my mother.
​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/350 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/351 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/352 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/353 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/354 ​my impatience, I was more really happy than I had been for years. I felt more like myself than I had since that fatal day in Nauvoo, when, after long and prayerful consultation, we decided that duty and right demanded that we should enter polygamy, and made the choice of the first plural wife. I was coming to my own again, and my life was positively glorified by the thought. His illness, rather than distressing, gladdened me. I should have, of course, the exclusive care of him, and he should miss nothing of the old love and tenderness in my regard for him. For the time, at least, we should be all in all to each other.
"We arrived at last, and I hurried to the sick-room of my husband, with my heart full of tenderness for him, my eyes brimming over with loving tears. But, in my dreamings, I had forgotten, or had ignored the fact, that others had the same right to minister to him, to care for him, to remain with and watch over him, that I had; and when I entered the room, the tenderness was driven from my heart, the tears from my eyes, and I stood there a polygamic wife, in presence of three of my husband's other wives, who had the ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/356 ​which every Salt Lake City resident will remember — many of them to their sorrow.
In 1857 there was a prospect of United States troops being sent to the Territory, and Brigham determined to resist them. In a public speech on the 24th of July, the day celebrated by the Mormon Church as the anniversary of their first entrance into the Valley, he said, "God is with us, and I ask no odds of Uncle Sam or the devil."
When it was ascertained beyond a doubt that the United States troops were on the way, he counselled every warlike preparation to be be made. Business was suspended; an adobe wall was built back of the city for protection against Remains of Adobe Defences. Johnson's army; the elders on missions were ordered home at once, and all the people turned their attention to the task of repelling the invasion. "For," said Brigham, "they shall not enter the Valley." He issued a proclamation, forbidding all armed forces from entering the Territory, and martial law was also proclaimed.
The latter part of the winter the Mormons received a visit from Colonel Thomas S. Kane, of Philadelphia. He had before this proved his friendship for the Saints, and was respected and listened to accordingly. It is supposed the colonel convinced Brigham that he was not yet strong enough to conquer the United States, and advised a change of tactics. ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/358 ​that we were there, one of the younger wives, while on a visit, increased our already somewhat numerous family by giving birth to a daughter, and, in addition to her school duties, my mother performed the several offices of cook, housekeeper, and nurse, until she was able to return home.
In the mean time, affairs in Salt Lake City had assumed their usual quiet. The troops were camped about forty miles from Salt Lake, in Cedar Valley. They called the station Camp Floyd. While they remained in the Territory, some of the Saints, wishing to dispose of their produce, sold a large quantity to the troops, and were well paid for Mormons selling Provisions to United States Troops. it. Brigham heard of it, and the very next Sunday forbade their selling any more, and cursed all those who had had dealings with our enemies, as he called those men who had respected the honor of their government and spared the people who had so injured them.
It was not long before it was whispered that Brigham had agents in Camp Floyd selling tithing flour and lumber; taking large contracts, and obtaining large prices. But in the meanwhile he did not relax his severity towards his people. The bishops were ordered to withdraw the hand of fellowship from every person in their wards who traded at Camp Floyd. It was a sure sign of apostasy to be ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/360 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/361 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/362 ​Those who were so fortunate as to see one of those carriages in its entirety, say that no one could form any idea of them without seeing them, and that the only way to get an adequate idea of the size would be to take the dimensions of a "Prairie Schooner," and multiply them by five.
The wagons proved a success, as they were loaded with freight for Salt Lake merchants, for which they paid twenty-five cents a pound; and those wagons that came through with my father brought no less than five thousand two hundred and fifty dollars' worth of freight for the Prophet. Brigham's Folly. — "The Prairie Schooner." It is a poor plan that does not enrich him; he seems, in some way or other, to make money out of his very failures.
After my father's recovery from his illness he presented his accounts for the Prophet's inspection, and expected an immediate settlement, and his promised pay; instead of which, he was quietly informed that his services were to be a gratuity to the church, and at the same time he was presented by the Prophet with a bill from the express company for bringing his trunk of clothing through.
While in Chicago, he had sent two hundred and fifty pounds of freight home for the family's use, and they would not let my mother have it until she had paid the full ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/364