The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-07-16


Surviving Members.
81 have come among you instructed
by Colonel S. F. Kenney of the United
States army, now commanding the
army of the west, to visit the Mormon
camps and to accept the service for
twelve months of four or five COM
panies of Mormon men who may be
willing to serve their country for that
period in our present war with Mex
leo, this force to unite with the army
of the west at Santa Fe and be
they will be discharged"
The above was the first paragraph
of a circular issued and signed by j.
Allen, captain First Dragons, and
was dated at Camp of the Mormons,
at Mount Pisguh, one hundred aSi
thirty weight miles east of Council
Bluffs, June &c, 1885,
1t was copied by the writer from
Daniel Tyler's excellent History of the
Mormon Battalion, and acknowledge
ment is hereby made of aid received
from that work in compiling the brief
account of the noted organization.
On July 16 four companies of men
and part of another company were
finally raised, the fifth being filed out
later
The companies were mustered in at
Council Bluffs President Brigham
Young, Heber c. Kimball, Willard
Richards and other influential men
took an active interest in the forma-
ton of the battalion, and at Council
Bluffs President y oung spoke a fare
we'll address, in which he predicted
that not one of them would fall by the
hands of the nations foe; that their
only fighting would be with wild beasts
and that not as many bullets would
whistle around their ears as did around
DR. Willard Richards in Carthage
Jail A few families went with the
battalion and a few boys too young to
enlist went as servants to officers; but
in the main the recruits left their
families and friends to come on di-
rectly west across the plains, while
they went southwest to Texas and
Mexico, thence to California. The bat
talon was in command of Colonel j.
Allen, company A.
The feelings of the recruits may we'll
be imagined from a passage from the
diary of one of them, Sergeant Will
lam Hyde:
1.-The thoughts of leaving my family
at this critical time are indescribable
They were far from the land of their
nativity, situated upon lonely prairie,
with no dwelling but a wagon, the
scorching sun beating upon them with
the prospect of the cold winds of De-
cember finding them in the same bleak,
dreary place."
The line of march was taken up just
four days after enlistment, each recruit
sending what he could spare from his
advance wages to be sent back to the
families. The fifth company. which
was the last mustered, started little
late and did not overtake the main
body at Mosquito creek until a day or
two after the start.
After being ont three days the first
death occurred, that of Samuel Boley,
of company b.
1t was not until August 3 after
reaching Leavenworth that the battal-
lion was sufficiently equipped with
arms
After leaving Fort Leavenworth the
battalion was commanded by the
senior captain, Jefferson Hunt, as
Colonel Allen was too i'll to proceed
and ordered the advance. He died of
this illness. Lieutenant Smith soon ar
rived and relieved Hunt from the COM
mand. Colonel P. ST. George Cook
took command at Santa Fe by virtue
of appointment from the general COM
handing the army of the west.
From Santa F'e number of the sick
went to Pueblo under command of
James Brown to spend the winter
there while, the rothers pressed on. In
the subsequent march through Wilder
ness and desert almost every form Of
privation and hardship was suffered.
Thirst, hunger. cold, heat, sickness,
dangers from flood and storm, from
beasts and savages, all were en-
countered but the battalion moved on,
being gradually transformed into a
perfectly disciplined body of men
known and respected by army men
throughout tn service as loyal, Cod
fearing soldiers.
OF actual fighting the battalion had
none. They were On hand and in the
hostile country, but it so happened that
they were not ordered into the thick of
battle. Nearly the entire battalion
went on across the continent serving
in California for time where the bat
whence most of the men made their
way to Utah where their families had
located. Most of them
spent the remainder of their lives in
Utah, many occupying high civil, mill
tary and ecclesiastical positions.
OF the Weber county survivors there
are today-the fiftieth anniversary of
their enlistment-just twelve living.
They are: Alex Brown, Ogden; Jesse
s. Brown, Ogden; Ralph Douglass, Og-
den; Clint Bronson, Ogden; Lorin
Clark, Ogden; Charles Hancock, Slater
vile; John Byhee, Uintah; John Ritter,
Eden Joseph Taylor, Harrisville;
James Owens, Harrisville; James
North Ogden; James Taylor,