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During the summer of 1854 the grass-hoppers did considerable damage to crops in Utah. As in the case of the crickets, another famine followed, though not immediately, this destructive visitation.
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CHAPTER XXVI. 1854-1856.
BRIGHAM YOUNG'S RECORD AS GOVERNOR --. AN ADMINISTRATION ACCEPTABLE TO BOTH MORMONS AND GENTILES-THEY UNITEDLY PETITION FOR HIS REAPPOINTMENT-COLONEL STEPTOE- THE GUNNISON MASSACRE INVESTIGATED AND THE MURDERERS BROUGHT TO JUSTICE- DEATH OF THE UTE CHIEF WALKER-THE TRIUMPH OF BRIGHAM YOUNG'S INDIAN POLICY -WHY THE SAVAGES DREW A DISTINCTION BETWEEN "AMERICANS " AND " MORMONS "- DEATH OF CHIEF JUSTICE REED-JUDGE KINNEY SUCCEEDS HIM-MORGAN COUNTY SETTLED -THE ELK MOUNTAIN AND SALMON RIVER MISSIONS-THE CARSON COLONY-GEORGE Q. CANNON AND THE "WESTERN STANDARD" -DEATH OF ASSOCIATE-JUSTICE SHAVER-THE MORMON PEOPLE HONOR THE MEMORY OF THEIR DEPARTED FRIEND-JUDGE DRUMMOND SUCCEEDS JUDGE SHAVER-THE UTAH LEGISLATURE CONVENES AT FILLMORE-ANOTHER MOVEMENT FOR STATEHOOD-CACHE, BOX ELDER AND OTHER COUNTIES SETTLED.
8 RIGHAM YOUNG'S first term of office as Governor of Utah was now drawing to a close. The Mormon leader was a natural governor. Consequently he had made a good one. Too firm, too masterful perhaps, for some, who prefer a loose to a taut rein over the steeds of state; a weak rather than a strong hand at the helm of government. By many a vigorous administration of authority is almost invariably deemed despotic, particularly if it comes in contact with their personal interests and desires. At times, of course, it may merit the opprobious opinion; at other times the reproach may be utterly undeserved.
Every Cæsar has his Cassius; every great, or good, or gifted man his envious detractors, who, like their "lean and hungry" prototype -though envy is not always characterized by leanness-"are never at heart's ease whilst they behold a greater than themselves." Cæsar was slain for this,-for being greater than all his countrymen; and his assassins, who to justify themselves in "the deep damnation of his taking off" prated of Rome's freedom and Cæsar's tyranny,
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had first thought-Brutus perhaps excepted-of their victim's great- ness and their own comparative littleness. Cæsar may have been tyrannical,-most powerful men are, or at times seem to be,-but it was envy of his glory, more than hatred of his tyranny, that whetted the daggers which pierced him.
"Patriotism," said bluff old Dr. Johnson, "is the last refuge of a scoundrel." Those Roman Senators who, steeped in corruption, leagued with the pirates of the Mediterranean against their own country, could still protest patriotism and slay Cæsar for his "tyranny" in exposing and putting a stop to their crimes, were mostly patriots of that class. Still, Cæsar had his faults; but so had Cassius, so Casca, so Cicero the silver-tongued, and even the cynical Cato. Yes, and so had Brutus, "the noblest Roman of them all." If it was right to slay Cæsar "because he was ambitious," it would have been right to murder all the rest because they fell short of perfection.
It is not the author's design to draw a parallel between Julius Cæsar and Brigham Young. Such an attempt would necessarily prove futile. For though both were great men, they were too unlike, their characters and careers too dissimilar, to furnish a perfect comparison. This much, however, may be said: Brigham Young could no more help being the greatest and strongest man in Utah than Julius Cæsar could help being so in Rome. God and nature, not man, were responsible in both cases. Brigham Young in his time was perhaps hated as bitterly as Cæsar, and like Cæsar would have been slain if some who hated him could have had their way. But Brigham, though brave, was more cautious than Cæsar. He shunned his "ides of March," listening betimes, not only to friendly counsel, but to the warning whisperings of his own prophetic soul. Hence he lived long, and died a peaceful death. Had Joseph Smith been more like Brigham, and less like Cæsar in this respect, he might have lived and died like Brigham, instead of being assassinated as was Cæsar.
That all who hated Brigham Young and Joseph Smith were
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rogues and hypocrites, we do not believe; no more than we believe that Joseph and Brigham were perfect men, without fault, and not liable, like all mortals, to make mistakes. We believe that many who hated them were sincere in their hatred, and honestly supposed that they had ample cause for it. But we also know that some of their opponents were merely rogues, who opposed them, not on principle, but for personal profit, as others bent to them and said "Rabbi," not from a friendly motive, but from an impulse of sordid calculation, "crooking the pregnant hinges of the knee that thrift might follow fawning."
Brigham Young, we say, made a good Governor, and it was largely due to the fact that he was a strong one. He could not have been otherwise, and doubtless it was well for the time in which he lived that such was the case. After all, it's your weak man in power who is most dangerous; the man who is easily swayed by others ; who, even if he have convictions, has not the courage to maintain them; the man who, being under oath to faithfully fulfill the obliga- tions of an office, surrenders his judgment and conscience to other men who have taken no such oath, and who probably would not keep it if they had. Of such beware. Trust rather the strong man, the man of independent thought and action ; the man of iron rather than the man of lead or tin.
The author remembers reading some years since, in the columns of the Salt Lake Tribune, an editorial article on Bismarck, the great chancellor of Germany. The editor commented upon a rumor that Bismarck, then in power, bewailed the fact that he did not possess to the degree that he desired the love of the German people. The writer went on to give a reason for this absence of affection, attributing it to the fact that Bismarck was a man of iron, and as such could not expect to be beloved, in the same way at least, as a gentler spirit would have been; the very sternness of his nature precluding it. But, said the editor in substance, let Bismarck be consoled by the reflection that had he not been a man of iron, stern and strong, he could not have done the work he did; could never
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have moulded out of the chaotic, or disunited fragments of the Fatherland the solidified and mighty German empire, the fame of which achievement would be to Bismarck an enduring monument long after that empire itself should have crumbled and passed away. We have taken some liberty with the editor's language; perhaps also with his thought; but such was the substance and such the moral conveyed, as it lingers in this writer's memory.
In the light of a truth so well and wisely uttered, let us survey, not only Bismarck and his work, but other men and theirs. Had Brigham Young been otherwise than as God and nature made him, could he have done so well the work assigned him by destiny? Do weak men conduct exoduses and conquer deserts? Do they hold in check the merciless savage, build cities and temples and enthrone civilization in the midst of solitude and sterility ? Utah's great pioneer was a man of iron. He had to be, in order that his work might not be poorly or but partly done. And yet he possessed- what no tyrant ever did-the love of his people, to a marvelous degree. No despot was ever loved like Brigham Young. No leader, at his death was ever more sincerely mourned by his followers. It was not "a trembling submission" that was paid to him in life; it was not an affected sorrow that was manifested at his death. They regarded him as a Prophet, it is true; but they also knew him to be a superior man, and loved and trusted him accordingly. But the Gentiles did not love him; at least not all, nor even most of them. There were many reasons for this; both from his standpoint and theirs. No man can draw all men unto him. It is the work of a greater than man to do that. And even He did not succeed, con- sidering merely his own generation.
But Brigham Young's rule as Governor of Utah had evidently been acceptable, not only to the Mormons, but to most of the Gentiles as well. The best proof of this is in the fact that at the expiration of his official term, the leading Gentiles of the Territory, business men and officials, united to a man with the Mormons in petitioning the President of the United States for his reappointment.
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One of the signers of this petition was Lieutenant-Colonel E. J. Steptoe, of the United States Army, who, on the 31st of August, 1854, arrived at Salt Lake City at the head of a detachment of troops on his way to California. Efforts had previously been made to secure the reappointment of Governor Young, but the President- Franklin Pierce-influenced no doubt by the adverse reports on Utah sent out by Secretary Ferris and others, had declined to reappoint him, and had named Colonel Steptoe as Governor in his stead. The Colonel, however, having surveyed the situation, seems to have felt much the same as did Captain Stansbury over Governor Young's appointment in the first place. Said Stansbury at that time:
Upon the action of the Executive in the appointment of the officers within the newly-created Territory, it does not become me to offer other than a very diffident opinion. Yet the opportunities of information, to which allusion has already been made, may perhaps justify me in presenting the result of my own observations upon this subject. With all due deference, then, I feel constrained to say, that in my opinion the appointment of the president of the Mormon church, and head of the Mormon community, in preference to any other person, to the high office of Governor of the Ter- ritory, independent of its political bearings, with which I have nothing to do, was a measure dictated alike by justice and by sound policy. Intimately connected with them from their exodus from Illinois, this man has been indeed their Moses, leading them through the wilderness to a remote and unknown land, where tliey have since set up their tabernacle, and where they are now building their temple. Resolute in danger, firm and sagacious in council, prompt and energetic in emergency, and enthusiastically devoted to the honor and interests of his people, he had won their unlimited confidence, esteem, and veneration, and held an unrivalled place in their hearts. Upon the establishment of the provisional government, he had been unanimously chosen as their highest civil magistrate, and even before his appointment by the President, he combined in his own person the triple character of confidential adviser, temporal ruler, and prophet of God. Intimately acquainted with their character, capacities, wants, and weaknesses; identified now with their prosperity, as he had formerly shared to the full in their adversity and sorrows ; honored, trusted, the whole wealth of the community placed in his hands, for the advancement both of the spiritual and temporal interests of the infant settlement, he was, surely, of all others, the man hest fitted to preside, under the auspices of the General Government, over a colony of which he may justly be said to have been the founder. No other man could have so entirely secured the confidence of the people ; and this selection by the Executive of the man of their choice, besides being highly gratifying to them, is recognized as an assurance that they shall hereafter receive at the hands of the General Government that justice and consideration to which they are entitled. ' Their
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confident hope now is that, no longer fugitives and outlaws, but dwelling beneath the broad shadow of the national ægis, they will be subject no more to the violence and outrage which drove them to seek a secure habitation in this far distant wilderness.
As to the imputations that have been made against the personal character of the governor, I feel confident they are without foundation. Whatever opinion may be entertained of his pretentions to the character of an inspired prophet, or of his views and practice on the subject of polygamy, his personal reputation I believe to be above reproach. Certain it is that the most entire confidence is felt in ,his integrity, personal, official, and pecuniary, on the part of those to whom a long and intimate association, and in the most trying emergencies, have afforded every possible opportunity of forming a just and accurate judgment of his true character.
From all I saw and heard, I am firmly of opinion that the appointment of any other man to the office of governor would have been regarded by the whole people, not only as a sanction, but as in some sort a renewal, on the part of the General Government, of that series of persecutions to which they had already been subjected, and would have operated to create distrust and suspicion in minds prepared to hail with joy the admission of the new Territory to the protection of the supreme government.
As said, a similar feeling to that expressed by Captain Stansbury seems to have animated Colonel Steptoe, when, toward the close of 1854, he signed with many others the following memorial, having first respectfully declined his own appointment as Governor of Utah :
To His Excellency, Franklin Pierce, President of the United States.
Your petitioners would respectfully represent that, whereas Governor Brigham Young possesses the entire confidence of the people of this Territory, without distinction of party or sect ; and from personal acquaintance and social intercourse we find him to be a firm supporter of the constitution and laws of the United States, and a tried pillar of Republican institutions ; and having repeatedly listened to his remarks, in private as well as in public assemblies, do know he is the warm friend and able supporter of constitutional liberty, the rumors published in the States notwithstanding ; and having canvassed to our satisfaction his doings as Governor and Superintendent of Indian affairs, and also the disposition of the appropriation for public buildings for the Territory ; we do most cordially and cheerfully represent that the same has been expended to the best interest of the nation ; and whereas his re-appointment would subserve the Territorial interest better than the appointment of any other man, and would meet with the gratitude of the entire inhabitants of the Terri- tory, and his removal would cause the deepest feelings of sorrow and regret ; and it being our unqualified opinion, based upon the personal acquaintance which we have formed with Governor Young, and from our observation of the results of his influence and administra- tion in this Territory, that he possesses in an eminent degree every qualification necessary for the discharge of his official duties, and unquestioned integrity and ability, and he is decidedly the most suitable person that can be selected for that office.
35-VOL. 1.
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We therefore take pleasure in recommending him to your favorable consideration, and do earnestly request his re-appointment as Governor, and Superintendent of Indian affairs for this Territory.
The first signer of this memorial was Judge John F. Kinney, who had succeeded, on August 24th, Judge Lazarus H. Reed as Chief Justice of Utah. Colonel Steptoe signed next, and then followed all the Federal officials, United States Army officers, and leading Gentile business men in the Territory. The memorial was sent to Washing- ton in December, and resulted in the re-appointment of Brigham Young as Governor of Utah.
On New Year's, 1855, a grand ball was given by the Utah Legis- lature in honor of Chief Justice Kinney and other newly-appointed Federal officials; also to Colonel Steptoe and the officers of his command, who had decided to spend the winter in Salt Lake City. Besides the Colonel, the principal officers were: Major Reynolds, Captain Ingalls, Lieutenants Tyler, Mowry, Livingston, Chandler and Allston. The soldiers numbered one hundred and seventy-five, comprising two companies of artillery and one of infantry, and there was an almost equal number of employes, in charge of the vehicles and animals. Most of the officers and men were gentlemen, and their relations with the citizens were of a pleasant character. Some of the soldiers, however, became intoxicated on New Year's day, and a fracas occurred between them and a party of civilians. Firearms were used, and several persons wounded. Fortunately there were no fatalities, and the affair, which was much regretted on both sides, though creating considerable excitement, was amicably settled .*
A few of the officers became enamored of and married Mormon girls. One of them-Sergeant John Tobin-joined the Mormon Church and remained at Salt Lake City, where he taught a class in sword exercise.
During Colonel Steptoe's sojourn in Utah an investigation of the Gunnison massacre took place, and a number of Indians were
* Colonel Steptoe's officers helped to quell the riot, striking with their sabres their own men until they desisted from the brawl.
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arrested and put upon trial for the crime. One of these was the Pauvant chief, Kanosh, who was acquitted. Some of that tribe, however, were convicted and sentenced to imprisonment in the penitentiary.
In January, 1855, Walker, the Utah chief, who had so long been a terror to the whites, died at Meadow Creek, in Millard County, and was succeeded by his brother Arapeen. Walker, prior to his death, became convinced that the Mormons were his friends, and among his final words was an injunction to his tribe to live at peace with the settlers and not molest them .*
Here triumphed Brigham Young's Indian policy. Never did he permit his people to make war upon the red men, save in self-defense, and he always showed mercy and magnanimity toward them when they sued for peace. The money appropriated by Congress for the Indian tribes of Utah was not stolen, as in other places, but duly applied by Superintendent Young to the purpose for which it was intended. True, his enemies-some of the Indian sub-Agents- stated to the contrary, but Brigham Young's character, acts, and especially the admirable results flowing from his manipulation of Indian affairs in the Territory, is a sufficient answer to such charges.
On the other hand, the Indians were shot down, often in a spirit of pure wantonness, by passing travelers and emigrants, who thus precipitated war after war upon the settlers, until the natives, ignoring their former traditions, learned to discriminate between those who murdered them, killed them for mere sport, and those who were indeed their friends, feeding them when hungry, and only fighting them when their own lives and property were imperilled by the savages. Is it strange that in the minds of the untutored sons of the wilderness there should grow up a distinction between the Mormon settlers and the other white people who came among them?
* According to the cruel custom then in vogue among the savages, an Indian boy and girl and thirteen horses were buried alive with Walker, being secured near the corpse of the chief at the bottom of a deep pit or walled enclosure, and left to suffer until death brought relief.
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One class they called "Mericats"-Americans-and the other class Mormons. The latter were found fault with by some of the local Federal officials because of the distinction thus made by the Indians. But it would have been far more reasonable to have censured those who were mainly responsible in the premises-the " Mericats," who wantonly murdered the red men, and were really more account- able than the ignorant natives themselves for such lamentable and soul-harrowing tragedies as the Gunnison massacre.
In February, 1855, Dr. Garland Hurt, who had recently been appointed Indian Agent for Utah, arrived in the Territory. He appears to have been one of those who criticized the Saints for the distinction drawn by the savages, virtually blaming the Mormons for not being disliked by the Indians as much as were white people generally.
Judge Lazarus H. Reed, who, as stated, had been succeeded in office by Chief Justice Kinney, died in March of this year, at his home in Bath, New York. He had not spent more than half his time in Utah since his appointment as Chief Justice. In fact it does not seem to have been the custom for our Federal officials to do more in those days. Their salaries being so small, they were compelled to engage in other than their official pursuits, here or elsewhere, in order to gain a livelihood. Most of the Mormon officials, including the Legislators, served without pay. Judge Reed had won the respect and esteem of the citizens of Utah, and they sincerely deplored his death. Judge Kinney succeeded not only to the office of Chief Justice Reed but to the good-will felt for him by the people of the Territory.
The work of colonization still went on. In the spring of 1855 Morgan County was settled by Jedediah M. Grant,* Thomas Thurston and others; and about the same time a colony led by A. N. Billings left Sanpete County for the Elk Mountains, where they began, in June, a settlement on the left bank of Grand River. In May two
* The county was named for its pioneer settler, J. M. Grant, whose middle name was Morgan.
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more colonies set out, one under Thomas S. Smith and Francillo Durfee, for Salmon River, now in Idaho, where they founded Fort Limhi; and the other, under Orson Hyde, going to Carson Valley, on the main overland route to California. Each of these companies arrived at its destination about the middle of June .*
Orson Hyde was accompanied to Carson by United States Marshal Heywood and Judge George P. Stiles, the latter having succeeded Associate Justice Snow, whose term of office expired in 1854. Messrs. Hyde, Heywood and Stiles were empowered by the Utah Legislature to meet with a similar commission from California, and establish in the Carson Valley region the boundary line between that State and this Territory. Having done this, they organized Carson County. Orson Hyde became its Probate Judge and Hon. Enoch Reese its representative to the Legislature. Colonel John Reese, brother and business partner of Enoch, had settled at Genoa, in Carson Valley, in 1850 or 1851. He is credited with building the first house at Genoa, then known as Reese's Station. Others say that H. S. Beatie erected the first house at Genoa, and that Colonel Reese bought him out. Several companies from central and northern Utah went to Carson Valley in the "fifties," and a number of small settle- ments were there formed. Among those who accompanied Orson Hyde were Christopher Merkley, Chester Loveland, George Hancock, Seth Dustin, William Hutchings, and Reuben and Jesse Perkins. Some of those who followed, next season, were William Jennings, Christopher Layton, William Nixon, Peregrine Sessions, Albert P. Dewey, William Kay and George Nebeker. At the time of the Buchanan war -1857-most of the settlements in Carson Valley were broken up, the Mormons returning to the region of the Great Salt Lake. Carson
* It is the ultimate object of the Mormons, by means of stations, wherever the nature of the country will admit of their settling in numbers sufficient for self-defense, to establish a line of communication with the Pacific, so as to afford aid to their brethren coming from abroad, while on their pilgrimage to the land of promise. These stations will gradually become connected by farms and smaller settlements, wherever practicable, until the greater part of the way will exhibit one long line of cultivated fields from the Mormon capital to San Diego .- Stansbury's Expedition, page 142.
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County, however, and nearly the whole State of Nevada belonged to Utah when the great Comstock mine was discovered in 1857-9.
On May 10th, 1855, Charles C. Rich, George Q. Cannon, Joseph Bull, and M. F. Wilkie, left Salt Lake City for San Francisco. Elder Cannon there established a weekly journal called the Western Standard, representing the views, doctrines, and general progress of the people of Utah. The first number of this paper, edited by him, was issued at San Francisco on the 23rd of February, 1856. About the same time Elder Cannon published his Hawaiian translation of the Book of Mormon.
On June 29th, 1855, at his residence in Salt Lake City, died Hon. Leonidas Shaver, Associate Justice of Utah. The circumstances attending his death were these: Judge Shaver, who had held office in Utah for about three years, had long been troubled with a disease in the head, which gave him so much pain that he was in the habit of using opiates and stimulants to obtain relief from suffering. He was also troubled with an old wound in the hip. Finally his system succumbed, and he died on the date given. Precisely at what hour he passed away is unknown, as he was found dead in his bed, by those who attended him, about one o'clock in the afternoon. He had retired, according to his custom, about midnight. His death being sudden, an inquest was held over the remains, Mayor J. M. Grant presiding and the following named citizens acting as jurors : William Bell, a Gentile merchant, William C. Staines, Daniel Carn, C. C. Branham, Andrew Cunningham and Bryant Stringam. Among the witnesses examined were Dr. Garland Hurt, Judge Shaver's medical attendant ; Dr. France, Edward Barr and a Mrs. Dotson, landlady of the house where the deceased had dwelt. The evidence showed that Judge Shaver for some time had been unwell, that he had com- plained of a violent pain in his ear, which had become worse through a cold, the night before his decease. The physicians testi- fied that an abscess had formed and broken inside his head, the effects of which had penetrated to the brain, causing death. The verdict of the jurors was in accordance with these facts.
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