Mexico weekly ledger., 1901-02-28

soldiers on open ground. When the
battle was over the Indians fed to the
mountains, they left more than four
hundred dead on the bloody field and
the soldiers lost little more than
half that number.
A railroad now passes through the
Bear river valley and l am told that
there is prosperous city near Soda
Springs. We reached the Soda Springs
late in the afternoon next day and
camped near them. There were quite
a number of the springs scattered
along the road, and the first one that
we came to was quite curiosity. A
cone of porous rock about the shape
and size of one Of the round hay stacks
seen in the meadows here, stood near
the road and on the top of 1t was a
stone about the size and shape Of a
milestone. A hole about all inch and
half in diameter, went straight
down through the center Of this stone
and the soda water came bubbling up
through it and flowed over the sides.
The whole thing had been built up
from the ground by the water of the
little spring. The carbonic gas rising
from some of the springs was so strong
that it caused the water to bubble and
boil lust like kettle of water over
hot fire. An emigrant lost his life at
one Of those springs few days before
we reached them. He had lain down
on the ground to get drink and the
gas was so strong that it took his
breath away and he died with his face
in the water. Bear river heads south
of Salt Lake on the east side OF the
Wasatch mountains and runs nearly
due north to Soda Springs, where 1t
makes a horseshoe bend and then runs
nearly due south to Salt Lake, empty
ing into the lake between Ogden and
Corrinne, 100 miles south Of the
springs. A mile or two west Of the
springs we came to where the road
forked, one going northwest to Oregon
by Fort Hall and the other due west
through Soublette's cutoff, and this
is the one we followed. Our trip
through this cutoff was an uneventful
one. We found good water and an
abundance Of grass all the way, and at
one place we passed a spring that
gushed out Of the side of a steep noun
tain and ran water enough to make
quite creek, and you could hear the
roar of it mile away as Invent tumb-
ling from rock to rock clear down to
the bottom Of the canyon. In this
cutoff we came to the steepest place
that ever saw wagon go down and
the night before we reached it we had
to camp at a place where the feed was
so scarce that our goats wandered so
far away from camp that the wolves
cut them off and we lost them. The
next morning the road led up "a very
high and steep hill, and when we
reached the top l thought that we
had come to the jumping-off place.
1t fairly made the hair bristle on
my head when l looked down and saw
the way the wagons had to go, and all
down l thought my wagon would turn
over endways and kill the cattle. 1t
was late in the afternoon when we
passed through deep canyon and
camped at "City Rocks" These rocks
stand on an open plain and at a dis
tance might be easily mistaken for a
town or city, as the rocks stand in
rows, with smooth streets between,
and many of them are the size and
heighth Of one-story cottage building.
Northa Of these rocks, in the canyon,
there is a cone-shaped rock that rises
to heighth Of six or seven hundred
feet and reminds one OF tall church
steeple. A short distance from City
Rocks we struck the Salt Lake road
and soon reached the Goose creek
mountains, and from there to Californa
| have already given the readers of the
LEDGER a description Of the route as l
travelled it on "Wade and Walkers
Line
l have been reading Judge Kendalls
"Overland trip to California and /
find that he is not a very close
observer or else he is badly off in his
memory. He could no more see Pixies
Peak from the route he Travelled than
he could stand in his yard in Vandalia
and see the Goddess of liberty on the
domb of the capitol in Washington.
The hot and cold springs he locates on
the Humboldt river are in Thousand
springs valley, and the Mountain mead
ow massacre occurred several hundred
miles south of where he says 1t did. In
Sacramento l heard the man preach,
who was the cause OF the horrible
butchery at Mountain meadows in 1857.
His name was Pratt and he was one Of
the big guns of the Mormon Church.
In 1855 this Pratt went on proselyt-
ing trip to Arkansas, and whilst there
he stole the beautiful wife of a promi-
nent citizen and started with her to
Salt Lake. He was overtaken on the
plains by the man he had wronged and
shot down like dog, as he richly des-
erved to be, and the misguided woman
was taken back home by her husband
In 1857 large train of emigrants from
Arkansas passed through Salt Lake
City on their way to California. They
were short of provisions and expected
to get them at Salt Lake, but the
Mormons would not sell them a mouth
| full of anything, and by Brigham
Young's order they were followed ano
all massacred at Mountain meadow
1.-The Carson deserts 40 miles wide ant
not 10 as the Judge makes it and HI