Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1858-05-07
INTERESTING STATEMENT FROM UTAH.

INTERESTING STATEMENT FROM UTAH.
The New York Times has letter ,
from Leavenworth, which furnishes some
reports in regard to Utah affairs of an
entirely different kind from those we
usually receive. The informant of the
writer is Mr.. Frederick Loba, an ex-
High Priest Of the Mormons, who es-
capped from Salt Lake with his family,
and is now at Leavenworth. The wri-
ter of the letter says:
"NIr. Loba bases his positive opinion
that the Mormons will make no attempt
at organised resistance, upon his personal
knowledge of the fact that they have no
means of resistance. They have very
little ammunition, no gunpowper factory,
no material from which to make the pow
der, none of the appliances essential to
that purpose, nor any single man who
knows how to make an ounce of explo-I
sive material, even if his life depended
upon it. Nor have they any artillery,
with the exception of single piece of
cannon, a two FOUNDER, one of pair
given them long since by the United
States-the ether one having burst while
Mr.. Loba was in the valley.
They have no iron from which to cast
cannon-and if they had the material,
they have no foundry, nor any machine
ry, for boring them, nor any mechanic
competent to do the work. True, there
is an abundance of iron ore over 800
miles or more south of Salt Lake City,
but it is highly magnetic, and up to the
time when Mr.. Loba left, although large
sums had been expended in experiment
ing, all efforts to melt it down and render
it fit for use had failed. Neither are the
Mormons any better off in the matter of
manufacturing small arms. They have
some few gun-tinkers among them; but,
as an evidence of their utter incompetent
. cy, he mentions the fact that no one of
them was able to make screw for him.
to replace one which he had lost from a
= revolver of peculiar construction.
Is Mr.. Loba estimates the total pJpula-
{ ton of the Valley at $4,000 souls. O
:, these, counting every male from fifteer
u to sixty years of age, he estimates tina
u there are not to exceed 1900 capable o
D" bearing arms, while not more than $500
of the whole number, in his opinion
70 would make even passable soldiers, unde
=" drilling by skillful men. Not one in tel
of the entire male population have fire
: arms of any description; and larg
10 proportion of those they have are worth
~ less. He has no confidence in the state
u" ment that the Mormons have fortife
= Echo Canon. except it may be by dis
ging bitches, and posing rocks to be rol
y ed down from the overhanging cliffs
, Their boasts of mines under the Toa
- and all that sort of thing, he scouts {
idle nonsense. In short, he considers Il
cut
= Mormons destitute of any effective po'
N err of resistance to even the small for
no already under command of Gen. job
20 ston, and maintains that Brigham Young
entire reliance has been based upon /
ne hope of being able to deter the Unit
'h- States from attempting to deal with hi
-ui' by lying boasts of his ability to wage ST
cessful resistance"
Jus MIR. Loba reports tale of horror
regard to the celebrated handcart trair
He says that of the twenty five hundr
iiu' persons who started from the fronti
'hu only about two hundred frost-bitten, ST
INK wing and emaciated beings lived to
up the tale of their suferings-the rema
ich ing twenty-three hundred persisted on
leo way, of hunger, cold and fatigue! \
ma Lola says that the route is strewn W
skeletons, while among the Indian tri
, he of Utah white children are now livi
Der; who were picked up from the snow
ntly the savages, and thus rescued from
first death which their parents had failed
rm- escape.
lght Mr. Loba is said to be very int
had gent man, and those who converse W
the him are satisfied that he speaks what
Der, believes to be the truth.-Bostoa 10
n all nal.
and
ord, Eg The store of Alanson Bliss of
annS o,,EoroJ -,