Church members made journey every year from 1847 to 1869...
Continues his history of the Mormons in Leek and North Staffordshire in the nineteenth century...
BRIGHAM Young organised a vanguard company to break the trail west to the Rocky Mountains, with the expectation that later pioneers would maintain and improve it. It was hoped that the group could, wherever possible, establish fords and ferries and plant crops for later harvest. A new route on the north side of the Platte River was chosen to avoid major interaction with travellers using the established Oregon Trail on the river’s south side. Given the needs of the large volume of Saints who would travel west, Church leaders decided to avoid potential conflicts over grazing rights, water access and campsites.
After the initial waggon train, converts the United States, and Europe, followed to join the main body in Salt Lake City. Church members made the journey every year from 1847 to 1869. Those who later came by railroad are not generally considered to be “Mormon pioneers.”
Between 1849 and 1855, it is estimated that 16,000 sailed from England to the United States and reached Utah by ox waggon. Most paid their own expenses but as some could not, the Church established a Perpetual Emigration Fund to provide financial assistance for the poor, with the loan to be repaid as they were able.
Each year, people continued to be organised into “companies”, each company bearing the name of its leader; the company being further divided into groups of ten and fifty with authority and responsibility delegated downward. Financial resources of the Church members varied, with many families suffering from the loss of land and personal possessions in Missouri and Illinois. This impacted the resources and supplies each family could draw upon as they covered the more than 1,000 miles to the Great Basin. Church funds were also limited at this time, but church leaders provided what funding and other material assistance they could to families undersupplied. In October 1845, the Nauvoo Neighbor printed an extensive list of suggested provisions for each family wagon; they included 2 or 3 yoke of oxen, 2 milk cows, other livestock, arms and ammunition, 15 pounds of iron, pulleys and ropes, fishing gear, farming and mechanical equipment, cooking equipment and at least 1,000 pounds of flour plus assorted other foodstuffs. Some pioneers overestimated the amount of goods they could haul on the long journey. As the oxen weakened under the strain, wagons were lightened by discarding prized possessions. In 1847, just east of the Rocky Mountains, the Kimball family dug a large hole, wrapped their piano in buffalo skins and carefully buried it. An ox team retrieved the instrument the following spring and transported it to the Salt Lake Valley!
Not all emigrants had the funds to purchase waggons and oxen. In 1856, poorer emigrants started to use handcarts to transport their belongings. They walked to the Salt Lake Valley. The handcards continued in use for the next four years and nearly 3,000 Mormon pioneers made that journey to Utah. In all, there were ten handcart companies and as John Chislett, a survivor, wrote, “Many a father pulled his cart,
with his little children on it, until the day preceding his death.” Overall, the handcart companies made up less than 10 percent of the total emigrants, but they have become an important symbol in the culture of the Church.
The use of handcarts reduced the cost of the journey by one-third and the response in Britain was overwhelming. In that first year the Fund supported the travel of 2,012 emigrants f3’rom Liverpool to New York or Boston. There followed a rail journey to Iowa City where the emigrants were outfitted with handcarts and supplies. The handcarts had 2 wheels, four and a half feet in diameter, and a single axle four and a half feet wide. It weighed 60 pounds empty. It had two seven-foot shafts ending with a three-feet crossbar at the front. The cargo box was about 3’ x 4’. The handcart, capable of carrying 500 pounds of supplies and luggage, was made entirely of wood, although, later, a stronger design was introduced with metal parts fitted.
The general rule was that 5 people were allocated to every handcart and each individual was allocated 17 pounds of clothing and bedding. Each tent held 20 occupants and was supervised by a Tent Captain. Each group of 5 tents was supervised by a Sub-captain. Provisions, so much per hundred emigrants, was carried in an ox wagon and was distributed by the Tent Captains.
The first two ships left England in March and April 1856 and unloaded at Boston. It was then train to Iowa City to collect handcarts and the trek of 1,300 miles began.
The 815 emigrants from the first two ships were organised into three handcart companies. There were continual problems with the handcarts for they had been construct with “green timber.” “Tick hoop iron skeins” were fitted which enabled the axles to turn easily and resisted breakage but they needed frequent greasing to keep them lubricated. The trips were largely uneventful although 27 died during the journey.
The membership continued to increase., In 1850, the Church had 30,747 members in England; and only 26,911 in America. By1853 nearly 3,000 emigrants had arrived in the valley.
On 29th March 1853, the 21-year-old Staffordshire convert William Burton married Elizabeth Peat on board the ship Falcon. The ceremony was conducted by a Mormon Elder. Both births and deaths occurred during that eight weeks voyage, including the death of John Mason, a five year old from Burslem. This party sailed to New Orleans and then steamed up the Mississippi. George Wood of West Bromwich insisted on burying their dead on land. Most dead bodies were tossed overboard without ceremony! The captain conceded and the bodies were buried on a small island; but he changed his mind and sailed off leaving Wood and the burial party behind. Faced with the passengers threatening take control of the ship, he changed his mind.
By 1854, the Church had 50,000 members in
England. 1855 saw the main thrust of emigration when 2,686 emigrated from Britain to America.
In 1856, disaster struck one handcart trek
- the Willie Company, consisting of 404 emigrants. They suffered an immediate setback, losing 30 cattle when a herd of buffalo caused them to stampede. This necessitated an extra 100 pounds of flour being added to each handcart. In Wyoming, many handcarts collapsed and only ineffectual repairs could be carried out. When the party arrived at Fort Laramie, they found that no preparations had been made for them. In order to expedite the journey food rationing was introduced and a mass discarding of luggage, clothing and blankets. A message got through to Salt Lake City and in October 1856 wagonloads of food and other supplies left under the leadership of Brigham Young. Meanwhile the Martin Company had set off on their trek. Both companies came to an end of their rations and faced freezing conditions with a lack of clothing and blankets. By 23rd October 1856, thirteen from the Willie Company had died of exposure and exhaustion. The Martin Company, 110 miles east, was also suffering. With help, the Willie Company arrived in Salt Lake City on 9th November 1856. They had lost 68 emigrants. The Martin Company arrived on 30th November 1856. They fared even worse; they lost 145.
On arrival in the Valley, many Staffordshire emigrants pursued the same occupation as
they had “back home.” Miners from the Potteries, Wolverhampton and West Bromwich took up mining for there was a need for skilled men to extract coal and mineral ores. Similarly, converts from North Staffordshire employed in the pottery industry, brought their highly skilled techniques to bear in that trade. Alfred Cordon was appointed the Pottery Superintendent.
In time, the change from sailing ships to steam ships; and from oxen wagons to rail travel, meant that emigrant traffic continued to increase and the journey from Liverpool to Salt Lake City was cut dramatically; from five months to three weeks!
Tensions soon escalated between the newcomers and other settlers over both the practice of polygamy and the theocratic rule of Young. This erupted into the two year “Utah Mormon War” which led to a relatively peaceful “invasion” of Utah by the United States Army. Young agreed to step down from power and was replaced by a non-mormon
Ye Saints that dwell on Europe’s shores, Prepare yourselves with many more To leave behind your native land
For sure God’s Judgments are at hand. Prepare to cross the stormy main
Before you do the valley gain
And with the faithful make a start
To cross the plains with your hand cart. Some must push and some must pull As we go marching up the hill, As merrily on the way we go
Until we reach the valley O
The third President of the Church, John Taylor, was an English convert, born in 1808, in Milnthorpe, Westmorland. He died in1887 and remains the only President of the Church to be born outside the USA
In 1878, the US Supreme Court, in the case of Reynolds -v- United States, decreed that the claim that it was a “religious duty” to engage in plural marriages was not a valid defence to prosecutions for polygamy. As a result, conflicts between the Church members and the U. S. Government escalated
In 1890, Congress dis-incorporated the Church and seized most of its assets. The Church President, Wilford Woodruff, issued a manifesto which suspended polygamy and dissolved existing plural marriages but with a proviso that existing families were not to be split. In effect, there was to be no more polygamous marriages. After this, relations with the US Government improved.
In 1896 Utah Territory was finally admitted into the United States and became the State of Utah.
By 1900, there had been more than 90,000 converts in Europe - over 55,000 in Britain. Between 1837 and 1900, there had 228 Mormon voyages leaving Britain for America. From the British Isles no less than 42% of the church membership had emigrated.
In 1904, the Church President, Joseph F. Smith, again disavowed polygamy before Congress and issued a “Second Manifesto” calling for all plural marriages to cease. The Church adopted the policy of excommunicating those members still practising polygamy.
The Church continues to play a prominent role in politics, exercising a policy of political neutrality.