Transcript

{Events recorded by Albert Carrington.}
A Lyman, left the camp of Winter Quarters, Omahaw Nation, with his company of pioneers, April 8th/47 about 3.P.M. just as PP Pratt, arrived from England. Traveled 7 miles & camped, {.} country very broken; all quiet and safe. In company, waggons & teams as follows; A Lyman 1 Waggon, 3 horses, 1 riding mare, A Lyman, Albert Carrington, & Starling {Sterling} Driggs, with it. Barnabas L Adams, 1 Waggon, 2 horses, with Roswell Stevens. AW Collins furnished 1 Waggon, 2 mules, John Gleason & Charles Burk with it. Joseph Matthews 1 Waggon, 2 mules, 1 Riding Mare, Gilburd Summe is with him. James M Flake furnished 1 Waggon, 2 mules, & 1 cow, with a black man, named Green {Flake}. Fielding Garr furnished 1 Waggon{.} Norman Taylor 1 horse. A{lexander} P Chesley 1 mare {to} go with said waggon. Daniel Thomas furnished 1 baggage Waggon{,} 3 mules & 1 horse. John Thomas driver. John Brown in company with 2 Waggons, 4 mules, 4 oxen, 2 cows, with Matthew Ivory. David Powel{l}, & 2 black boys named Oscar & Mark. G A Smith's team came up April 9th{,} himself after, ½ past 2.P.M.—
April 9th at 3.P.M. A Lyman & company started, traveled 12 miles, & camped at ¼ past 8.P.M. in the open prairie{.} Rodney Badger, one of our company came up with us just before we camped, O. Pratt, E T Benson, & Wilford Woodruff with their companies, camped with us. Chesley, Gleason, Adams. & Leemane stood guard; country, open broken prairie; all quiet & safe—
April 10th started at 6.A.M. & traveld steadily till 3.P.M. reached the Elk Horn & camped; distance 20miles, guard, J Matthews, Brown, Ivory, Badger, Stevens, Powel & Burke; Pratt, Benson, & Woodruff crossed with their companies; country open, broken prairies & view of the Platte river & bottom from the Elk Horn bluffs, bottom very wide & level with but little timber on the banks; all quiet & safe. 6 Waggons to go on & 13 men. 1 Baggage Waggon & driver. distance traveled 39 miles—2 Waggons{,} 5 men with Br Brown
Sunday April 11th A Lyman & company commenced the crossing the Horn, soon after breakfast about ½ 7.A.M. on a raft, & all crossed just as B Young & HC Kimball came up about 10.A.M.; all the waggons were crossed & went down the Horn ½ mile & formed a line. G. A. Smith on the Extreme highs , John Thomas rtnd with the baggage waggon
April 12th after early breakfast, A Lyman, with the 12 & some others started back to winter quarters, most of the teams started on at the same time, & 4 of A Lyman's waggons. we traveled 11 miles up the Platte, the bottom very wide & level & camped without much order, there being more appointed to form the line. afternoon came up & formed a line the same afternoon. Weather cool, cloudy, & windy; The Platt is very wide, with low sandy banks, & shallow, swift current, the bottom on each side is very wide & level, & the bluffs rise low & sloping from the edge of bottom. Col. S Markham called the men together about sun down, gave them some good counsel, about keeping the commandments, & to be careful, watchful & prayerful, & do as they were told by the 12 even to the smallest particular. It was voted to abide the counsel of Col Markham, WG Thurwood & Thos. Grover until the 12 returned. Jackson Redding, Barnabas Adams, Tarleton, Lewis & J{ame}s Case were appointed to start in the morning & hunt a ford or crossing on the Horn higher up to shorten the distance from Winter Quarters & strike the Platte higher up, & avoid some sloughs in the East the Horn & in the Platte bottom. all quiet & safe.
13th Elder Taylor returned to Winter Quarters from England. Redding, Adams, Lewis & Case started after breakfast to hunt the Ford. Driggs waded on to Van island for game, got nothing. The road committe{e} returned & reported unfavorably. Weather, light clouds, but pleasant. All quiet.
14th Cloudy, commenced showering soon after 7 A.M. quit showering about 11 A.M. cool. all quiet.
15th clear & pleasant, about 3.P.M. A Lyman, with the 12. {& RC Stevens with a cow furnished by AW. Collins,} & the 4 waggons that stayed at the Horn came up. G.A Smith & waggon came up about ½ past 5 P.M. company called together & addressed by B Young. Guard set. all quiet.
16th After breakfast the camp was called together & formed in a double ring, no of men 143, Women 3; . business opened by prayer. by B Young; remarks by G.A Smith, HC Kimball{,} Bishops Whitney & Noble. Commenced organizing by appointing Cols Markham & Rockwood{.} Captains of hundreds or of 72 & 71; Tarleton Lewis, Addison Everett, Br Case & John Pack{.} captains of 50s Charles Shumway, BL Adams, John Brown, Howard Egan, Seth Taft & the 12 who are along (8); Col Markham was appointed Captain of a standing guard & he picked out 50 men, 12 on at a time, to be returned every 2 hours stand ½ the night. The leather boat came up on the 15th and was in the ring. A Lyman, myself, Adams &c sent letters back to our families. No. of waggons 72, besides the boat. At 12 P.M. started & traveled up the Platte 4 miles & camped in line at 4; distance, 9 ms. Weather cool & cloudy. The road keeps up the bank of the Platte. Instruments brought by Taylor & Pratt, 1 artificial horizon, 2 Sextants, 2 circles of reflections, 2 barometers, 1 telescope, several thermometers. .
17th Started soon after 8 A.M. traveled up the Platte 7 miles & camped about 11. Thermometer, an hour by sun, stood at 26°, wind very high & cold, some cloudy. At 5.P.M. the camp were called together & formed in tens. Prest. B Young proposed that we organize as a military body. B Young was elected Lieut General, S Markham Col, John Pack 1st major, Shadrac{h} Roundy 2nd {major.} Prest. Young then told every man who walked to carry a gun & the teamsters to have theirs where they could put their hands on them easily; teams to travel by 10s & seperate{.} no man to go out unless sent. Thomas Tanner was appointed captain of the cannon with 8 men. Thos. Bullock clerk of the company. A Lyman with his waggon & BL Adams with his were formed into the line next to HC Kimball. In Forming into 10s ET Bensen was captain of the 2nd 10, with waggons & men as follows; Doct. Richards, Thos. Bullek {Bullock} & George Brown, with 2 waggons{.} Amasa Lyman, Albert Carrington, Sterling Driggs, Barnabas L Adams & Roswell C Stevens with 2 Waggons. ET Benson & Thos. Grover with 1 waggon (5 Waggons & 10 men) all quiet. List of the men belonging to the standing guard, drawn from A Lyman's Company. B L Adams captain of 10, M Ivory, D Powel, J Matthews, AP Chesley, G Summe, R Badger, C Burke. A Trading waggon from the Paunees {Pawnees} belonging to Benway{.} camped just below our line; they had a Spaniard, whom they had returned from the Pawnees; 5 trading waggons
18th Wind high & very cool from the South East, cloudy; towards evening wind high but milder & but little cloudy. 6 Waggons came down from Paunee with peltry. Feed, cotton wood & corn. A tree was fell on an ox, hurt some, but he walked off in a short time. Ellis Eames went back, in company with the trading teams; he got disheartened being sick. Thermometer at 5. P.M. air 53 5/10, mercury 52 9/10. Barometer 287 8/100. Captains of tens Wilford Woodruff {1st,} ET Benson {2nd,} PH Young {3d,} Johnson {4th,} SH Goddard {5th,} C Shumway {6th,} Case {7th,} S Taft 8, H Egan 9, AP Harmon 10, John Higby 11, L Jackman 12, J Brown 13, J Mathews 14, ET Benson called his 10 together, & gave instructions as follows, at ½ past 8 the bugle to sound & to attend prayers & all to be in bed & the fires put out by 9; at 5. A.M. the bugle to sound & all to rise in thier beds & attend prayers, & every one be ready to start at 7; every man who does not drive a team, to walk beside his waggon with a loaded gun lock leathered & caps ready. The sound of the bugle at other hours to be an alarm. ET Bensen resigned & Thos. Grover was elected captain of the 2nd 10. Camp to form in a ring with the off fore wheel against the righ{t} hind one of the lead waggon, tongues out. All quiet.
19th Warm & pleasant; started at ½ past 7 A.M. & traveled till 2. P.M. 12 miles, road dry & level up the Platte bottom, camp formed on the bank of the river{.} soon after we camped OP Rockwell, J Redding, JC Little & Thos. Brown came up horseback N... men ...149 144{.} after resting & bateing, traveled 8 m{ile}s. road as usual, weather quite but some cloudy; camped in a semicircle on the Platte. Platte as usual very wide, from 1 to 2½ ms & studded with Islands; tho bottom on the South side appears narrow at this point, & all our route to day & the bluffs rise bold from its edge, like those on the Missouri, along the route from the road the bluffs the bottom will average 20 ms. Received a vial of gun cotton as a present from Thos. L. Kane by the hands of Elder JC Little Saw 1 Indian at a distance on a horse or pony. Latitude 41° 27' 5". All quiet. Took a glass of brandy with the 12 & a few others, at the invitation of OP Rockwell which he received as a present from Thos. L. Kane.
20th Started ¼ to 8, traveled 2 or 3 ms. & crossed a Shell creek, 4 or 5 yds wide, rested at noon, Latitude 41° 25' 2", camped in a semicircle on the bank of the Platte with brouse plenty & handy, distance 18 ms. The fishing party who went ahead in the morning, had caught some fine buffalo & carp (213), A Lyman got a large buffalo for his mess. road dry and very level, face of the country & river as yesterday. Weather warm, a fine breeze & some cloudy. A.L. visited a village of Prairie dogs, J Mathews shot one. Found the skeleton of an elk with a very large pair of antlers.
21st Started soon after the ox teams, which all started together. (21) met a few Paunees, towards noon who were very friendly: past their village & a trading something like a mile off on our left; stopped to rest on the Loup fork, several Paunees, came up from their village; some presents were made the chief by the brethren{.} A Lyman presented a hand of Tobacco. Weather in the morning, cloudy. sprinkled a little, about 3 P.M. is commenced thundering & lightening & rained quite hard for an hour or more, the wind then became quite high, & continued so sometime. Camped on the Loup fork about 5, all safe. distance 22 miles: Thermometer 51°, Barometer 28½ ° at ½ past 5 A.M. The Loup Fork & its scenery is precisely like the Platte, only the stream is much smaller. A very strong guard was put out on acc. of our nearness to the Pawnees, A Lyman was one. the first ½ of the night. Not disturbed by Indians.
22d Traveled about 1¾ ms. & crossed Looking glass creek, about 6 yds. wide, at a good ford; at noon reached Beaver Creek {12 or 14 yds wide} & rested &c, {.} Latitude at this place, 41° 25'. 13". meridian observation by Prof O Pratt, camped on Plum Creek at the Missionary station. Feed good{,} hay put up by the Brethren last, summer & corn fodder. Weather, clear & warm, with a pleasant breeze. Distance 18 ms. This missionary station was for the Pawnees & was under the superintendance of Rev J Dunbar. It's beautifuly located, (for this prarie country) on Plum Creek about 1 mile above its entrance into the Loup, on the second bottom. The view on the North & West is bounded, at a distance of ½ to 1 mile by a low range hills, through which Plum Creek comes from the North, fringed on its banks by cotton wood, Elm, coffee nutt, burr oak, ash, & willow. To the South & East the view is open, commanding the Govt. Station, the Loup & its Islands & bottoms for some distance & the dividing ridge between it & the Platte. The Station had 2, 1 story & ½ hewed loghouses, quite well finished & 4 other log dwellings, with several out houses & yards, & some 80 acres of ground fenced & broken & cultivated with corn. The only furniture left was the castings of a premium No 5 & a rotary cooking stove. The missionaries left this station last summer or fear of the Sioux. The Government Station was situated about ½ mile below the M Station, on the oopposite side of the Creek; it apparently consisted of some 6 or 7 buildings, on 3 sides of a small square with the South side open & picketed, & a blacksmith shop about 200 yds lower down. 1 log stable, near the picketing was all the building left by the Sioux, when they burned last summer. Laying about the ruins, were some 17 plow irons, several waggon tires, Waggon boxes, bands & other irons, & some waggon wheels, with several flat & square bars of rolled iron, & some slab iron &c{.} Quite a surface of ground had been broken about the station, in different patches, & some of it cultivated with corn.
23d Started at ¼ past 12. N{oon}. & crossed the creek at a ford with quite steep banks, rolled on & crossed in about 4 ms. & stopped in the Loup, where Bishop Miller crossed last summer, distance 6 ms. Prof O Pratt, crossed with his carriage, with the aid of several men; Elder Woodruff then drove in with 2 yoke of cattle before his horses & several men with a drag rope & {c}rossed, Br. J Pack also crossed with his waggon. The prest. then ordered the rest to go up about ½ mile further & form for camping, which was done about 1 hour by sun. P.M. The Fording was very bad owing to the quicksand & consumed much time & labor, even to get over the 3 waggons. Our camp was within ½ mile of the Pawnee village, it was partialy burned last summer by the Sioux, when they burnt the Govt. Station, the Pawnees were away at the time. When they returned they rebuilt the burnt portion & built several other lodges; they were burned out again by the Sioux last winter, & only one 2 lodges is are now entire, apparently their council lodge, with a diameter of about 50 ft. in the clear, inside. The lodges were built circular, & probably averaged about 39 ft. in diameter & with their stables occupied some 10 acres of ground. Their corn was put in holes dug in the ground like this {illustration} & lined with bark, or puncheon, or matting. A horse belonging to Prest. Young died last night, cause unknown, as there were many opinions, probably choked to death by his chain halter. 
24th The site of the ruins of the Pawnee Town, has been a noted place for many years, & at the it was burned, there were above 6000 inhabitants, being one Grand band of the divisions of the Pawnee Nation, which has been from many years & is yet the terror of all the Western tribes. The Site is very beautiful, being on the North side of the Loup, where the 1st bluff rises abruptly from the waters edge, some fifty ft. & forms a second bottom, bounded on the West by Willow Creek at the distance of about 1 mile on the North at the same distance by a range of gradual rising hills, which form a ridge at the height of the general elevation of the country laying North, & running round to South East & sloping down to the first bottom at a distance of about 2 miles; facing South & looking to the East & West is commands in the foreground, & a view of the Loup & its islands for some 8 or 10 ms. {& in the distance} the low ground between the Loup & Platte; & the timber of the Platte islands; & its waters several places at apparent distance opposite of about 15 ms. The ruins occupy a space of from 15 to 20 acres the number of lodges from appearance was above 200, with only 2 entire, they all built circular, with an entrance way of from 5 to 10 ft. long, 4 or 5 ft. wide & 6 ft. high; their average diameter in the clear was about 40 ft. varying from 20 to 60 ft., height from 12 to 20 ft. with a hole in the top from 2 to 3 ft. across for the escape of the smoke, & covered with Earth to some depth. In building they threw out the earth level to the depth of about 1½ ft, they then placed firm in the ground a circle of strong forks at equal distances & laid strong poles in them, then small poles were placed around, with their tops resting on the horiz{on}tal ones, & secured in their places by raw hide ropes, for their relative position see figure {illustration} the next row of forks & poles were disposed of as the first, except they were placed more upright, & were of course longer & fewer in number{.} the 3d course of covering poles were sustained at their extreme ends, by being firmly lashed together with raw hide ropes, & converging to a center at the top to form the circular outlet for the smoke, were quite strong, the whole was then covered with grass & Earth. A circular seat of earth ran all (Except at the entrance) round the outer edge about 1½ ft. high & 2 or more wide. Interspe{r}sed, were their horse pens, built of small poles from 10 to 15 ft. set in the uprightly & close togther & bound at the of about 5 or 6 ft. by horizontal poles lashed on with raw hide; also the holes for securing their corn. they had partialy fortified their Town by a low embankment of earth & sod. As you go N from the ruins across the level plain & rise the gradualy sloping hills, you pass several graves of their braves, & some on the height of ground; they were buried in an upright position sitting posture, facing the East, the aperture opening being covered with poles & matting, & a mound of earth & sod to the height of from 4 to 6 ft. raised upon it. The view from this height, varied only from that of from the Town, only in looking & to the right & left facing S, in commanding a more extensive prospect of the Loup & Platte, & the low prairie between them, to appearance as far as the eye can extend up & down, the 2 rivers seem to run nearly paralell. As you turn & face the North, you see an open, rolling prairie, at a very uniform elevation with neither tree or shrub, except on & near the margins of the small creeks emptying into the Loup. Around the common burying ground, were laying numerous, human bones & skulls, dug up by the wolves, & beads {beasts}. 
24th Between 8 & 9 A.M. movements were made to cross the Loup, the route across the river was staked off, & the waggons commenced fording, some loaded, other ½ unloaded but the majority with their loads, all doubling teams, meantime the boat was busily used for carrying over goods from the bank opposite the camp ground. As the teams passed & repassed, keeping the same track, the ford kept improveing, by the quicksand packing, until the last waggons with full loads, passed over more easily than the first ones did empty. every was got over safe and sound by about 4 P.M. for which we all felt to thank Lord. We then rolled 4 ms. & camped on the Loup. the prairie haveing been burnt, the grass looked quite green. Weather very pleasant. The 2 rafts, that the council decided last night to build, were built this forenoon in good style & season S Driggs assisted; a man crossed on one of them & left it on a sand bar, the other was let go adrift about 3 P.M. showing that our raftsmen were correct in their judgements, which were that a raft could not be managed to advantage in crossing so strong & boiling a current.
Sunday 25th Another very pleasant day, but more wind. Bro. Chesley, Taylor, Matthews, & a black boy, started for the Pawnee ruins, for now from the horse pens to make ropes of. Brs. Driggs, Stephens & Carrington went to washing, finished about 11 A.M. rested & read awhile, & about 2 P.M. Brs. Lyman, Carrington & Driggs took good wash & swim in the Loup just below the camp. Between 4 & 5 the Brethren were called together and addressed briefly by GA Smith, Prest. Young, & several of the brethren, GA Smith advised the men not to kill game they did not need, nor shoot ducks & geese, & let them go down stream. Prest. Young said he was perfectly satisfied with the camp, & with our movements, & he had never been in company with so many men under like circumstances where there was so much union & harmony. Also remarked that wherever you find a man fond of binding up with covenants to them him, you may mark it, that {- - -} & the ones bound with them him, will sooner or later be bound to be burned, & he wanted the to learn wisdom all the time & treasure up knowledge. Br. Chesley upon his return, in crossing the river, rode into some quicksand holes, & his mare after flouncing about for some time, finaly turned over on her back & him under the water all over, when he had to let go the rifle he had, to extricate himself{.} after doing he hunted some time for the rifle but the quicksand & the deep & rapid channel just below prevented him from finding it. The rifle was worth some 10 or 12 dollars & belonged to Rodn{e}y Badger Antelope today across the Loup.
26th We were all roused to arms by the sound of the bugle just before daybreak; the alarm was caused by the guard fireing upon some Indians, who had crept upon the within 2 rods, they ran & the guard counted 6. Thier moccasin tracks were plain to be seen when day broke. No damage done. Started at ¼ to 8 A.M. Stopped to rest at ¼ to 12 N. The ruins of an old Pawnee town, could be easily seen from this at a distance of about 4 ms. NW across the Loup. Started at ½ past 1, crossed a great number of Indian trails, all converging to & divergeing from the old ruins. Passed a little on our right, the ruins of another old Indian village, located like the others, at a point where the bluffs rise bold to the second bottom; these had been 10 or more lodges, some quite large & the ground around had been cultivated to some little extent, & the old vegetation appeared very rank. Rolled on & stopped at ¼ past 4, on the steep banks of a small creek, rising in the divideing ridge and emptying into the Loup. The Camp was formed under the high bank, directly on the margin of the creek, at the distance of ½ to 1 mile from the Loup. bottom bed of this little creek is rocky, (limestone).} Buffalo grass & Artimesia (or wild sage) occured occasionly in patches to day, & near our Camp there was considerable buffalo dung. No road this day, only as we made it. If a person does not consider timber, an essential, in beautiful scenery, then the scenery to day, all of our route was very beautiful, as we passed up the second bottom of the Loup, Commanding a view of the level bottoms of the Loup & its ridges. Weather as usual very pleasant. . Distance 19 ms. J C Little's & Doct. Richard's horses strolled off to a distance back of the Camp, & after dark (by moonlight.) a good deal of search was made for them but unsuccesfuly.
27th Started at 8, at the same time Brs. Rockwell, Matthews, Thos Brown, & John Eldrege, started, to look for the 2 missing horses, rolled on & turned out to rest at 2 on some good grass, 5 or 6 inches high, started at ½ past 3 & rolled untill ½ past 5, & camped by a creek with sandy bed, about 2 yds. wide, & emptying into the Platte; time of travel 7 hours, distance 18 ms. We have made our own roads for the last 2 days, seeing no other waggon tracks. Buffalo dung & bones were quite plenty on our route. Some antelope were seen, & Bros. J. Brown & Stevens shot one, passed a village of prairie dogs, & with in one of their holes, was a rattlesnake, in another an owl. Buffalo & muskete grass quite plenty, which with other kinds of grass made the prairie look quite green. Most of the day route there has not been a tree or bush in sight, General course WSW SW by S (to strike the Platte), over a surface whose general elevation was quite level, but more or less uneven from the effect of the wind in the light sandy soil. Oweing to the great proportion of sand in the loam, & probably to dry seasons & but little dew the grass is disposed to grow in bunches. The teams suffered this day from want of water, there being none from creek to creek. Weather some cloudy but pleasant & warm, about 5 the wind blew quite strong a few minutes & it sprinkled a little. The Breth{re}n who went for the horses returned, just before dark, & reported that they found where the Indians had tied 1 horse all night, & soon struck the trail of both horses, giving back, which they followed to within a short distance of Sunday Camp ground, when all at once at a short distance off their rose up on their feet 15 Indians, & came towards , their object was to get their horses, but failing & being told to put out, they retreated towards the timber a short distance off on the Loup, & they went they fired 6 times at the Brethrn, but without effect, the Brethrn did not fire, but turned & came back. Soon after the Camp formed{,} a horse of Lewis Barney's was shot in the foreleg just below the body, & the bone broken very badly. It was done accidentally, on acc{ount} of some rifles being laid in waggon loaded & capped & one of the Brethren in pulling out his coat raised the hammer so high that the gun went off. Our hunters saw some 7 or 8 buffalo Came in view of the Platte about ½ past 4.
28th The horse that was accidentaly shot last night, was shot this morning to put him out of his misery. The 4 horses dead & missing, were all lost through carelessness. Crossed the small creek before us, ford quite mudy, Traveled 6 hours, distance 15 ms., up the Platte, as we supposed opposite Grand Isleand; over a country very level even for this level region, soil as usual, vegetation d{itt}o, no timber except on the Isleand. Weather cloudy, some cooler, & quite a breeze all day. A Lyman shot a wild goose. Camped in a circle, waggon tongues out. A few antelope were seen to day & a few deer upon the Isleand. Our horses, for a few feeds have had but 1 qt. of corn pr head at a feed; 2 a day, & seem to do hold their own. Struck an old trading trail, with now & then a waggon track to be seen.
29th Weather pleasant, cloudy & some cool in the evening. Crossed a creek about 8 yds wide at a good ford, supposed to be the Wood River of Mitchel's map, scattering of timber with cottonwood, Elm, White Ash, willow, Plum trees, &c, the latter in blossom. Time of travel 7 hrs. distance 18 ms. Feed, rushes on the Isleand, Cotton Brouse, grass & corn, A few deer, 20 or 30 Antelope & many geese seen, 2 of the latter killed. A Beautiful section of level land & with a quick soil lies between Wood River & the Platte, with plenty of timber if used carefuly. Grass not sufficient to sustain teams without they lay still.
30th Started up the Platte following the old trail. Watered at 12 in a small creek, a point on the trail where the next company should stop over night, rolled on till 5 & some teams being faint we camped, without wood, or water, except a little we dug for, distance to the Platte over 1 mile & no wood then on this bank & the ground between boggy. Driggs shot a goose, PM Young took it to dress for the feathers. Travel time 7 hrs, gait quite slow, distance 17 ms. Weather smoky, wind very high & cold from the N, Thermometer at sundown 41°. My fingers are so cold I can hardly write. Slept warm. Scenery & soil as usual, no timber, except on the Isleand.
May 1st Thermometer at sunrise 30°. Weather cloudy & very cool, with high wind. Traveltime 9 hrs. distance 18 ms. Teams traveled together, some ox teams very weak, from want of feed. Camped about 2 miles above the head of Grand Iseland, on one the ravines which make down from the bluffs, with a few trees on it, & water in the holes. The road most of the day was quite uneven, on account of occasionaly ravines makeing down from the bluffs, & the backs wallow holes of the buffalo, where they lick up the saltish deposit, that occurs very frequently & has for some 40 ms., also from the prairie dog holes, which cover a surface of 1000 acres, with the vegetation, so closely eaten by dogs, in many places that fire will not run. No timber, except on the Iselands, & creeks & ravines. & We saw Buffalo to day about 10. AM for the first time, 3 or 4 at first, then quite a herd along the face of the bluffs about 4 miles off & a little ahead, past noon we halted a little, & several of the brethren took horses, & large pistols, & started for them, we had a fine view of the chace from our line, A Lyman & John Brown, singled out & killed a very fine cow, J Matthews killed a fine calf &c{.} altogether there were killed 7 calves, 4 cows & 1 Bull, we had a fine lot of good meat for supper, better than beef.
May 2nd Sunday—Thermometer at sunrise 20°, most of the brethren busy taking care of their buffalo meat. Weather, clear & pleasant in the morning, but soon clouded up and became cool again. We started about 4 P.M. & rolled 3 ms. to get better feed, camped by a prairie run, close by Platte; no wood but small willows. Our Goose back, looking pretty blue, Young pretending he had forgot who he had got it of. Ice froze last night in the water bucket ¼ inch thick. Latitude at our Saturday night camp, by Meridian observation by Prof O. Pratt, 40° 41' 42", our camp being about 2 ms. above the Isleand & almost opposite as near as we could tell, where Fremont took an observation, at a distance across the river of about between 2 & 3 ms. makeing the observations in amount agree, counting out the N & S distance between them. The Saline Effloressence of Fremont, that occurs so frequently, as far as one can judge are the Lord's salt dishes for his cattle, & as far as we can analize them with the tongue, they contain salt, a small proportion of saltpeter, & {a small proportion} of sulpher; the 2 latter we are not positive about, they have the appearance at a little distance of scattered ashes, being a thin whiteish incrustion on the surface.
3d Weather cloudy, but little wind, & warmer. after breakfast several men went out to the bluffs, to still hunt buffalo, among them A Lyman & S Driggs. In the afternoon wind higher & quite cool. The hunters returned with 2 antelope, S Driggs shot one of them. A Small party went up the river to explore the route, they went 10 or 11 ms. & one of the party, saw some Indians, & they all returned. A party was sent out to notify the hunters of the nearness of Indians. We lay by to day to rest our teams, & let them feed, as our corn was getting scarce. The hunters of the hunters came in about dusk, & brought 2 calves, died they had killed. About 9 A.M. the cannon was fired, to let the Indians know we had one. S Driggs accidentlay lost R C Steven's pistol.
4th About 4 A.M. cannon fired again. The sun rose clear & pleasant. We crossed the little run, before us easily, at its outlet, Platte here, about 2 ms. wide, well named, Nebraska, or shallow water. Some timber at the head of the run we crossed, & a few trees occasionaly on the bank of the Platte, Timber on its island getting scarcer. Towards noon, 3 trading waggons called a halt opposite us, on the Oregon route; one of their men waded over, deepest water, knee deep, his name was Charles Beaumont; 9 men in the company, with pelting, 16 days from Fort Larimie {Laramie}. We came over for sugar & coffee, We improved the short he would wait, & handed him 54 letters for Winter Quarters, & presented him with about ½ bushel of bread & flour, an article he said he had not eaten for 2 years, he was very friendly & said he wanted no money for taking our letters. Brs. J Brown & Woolsey went over to see their leader{.} we went about 3 ms. & turned out to wait for them. Grass poor, prairie recently burned by the Indians. J Brown & Co returned & reported pretty good feed, & a good hard road, (Oregon route.{)} The Camp was called together, report heard, remarks made, & in view of all we knew, it was voted that we keep up the N side of the Platte, till we got to Larimie. Traveled 11 ms. & camped near Platte, by a clear prairie run & in pretty good feed not burnt. Camp was called together in the morning. laws read, & a volunteer 10 to aid the starving guard, A Carrington volunteered . No fresh sign of Indians in our neighborhood, except the burning of prairie grass, on our right, near & among the bluffs, opposite & ahead & back, probably burning for buffalo range.
5th Sun rose clear & warm, wind S. Buffalo feeding round in sight just outside our stock. Crossed the run before us at a good find & kept up the Platte between the old trail & the river, over fresh burnt prairie{.} wind very high from the S. severe on teams & men, some of the road softish, better to have kept the old trail, about noon took on the old trail, & rested a little, feed poor; the men horseback chased some buffalo, killed 5 calves & 1 cow, & took 1 calf alive. A Lyman killed 1 calf, J Matthews the cow. &c about 4 PM came to wall of fire reaching from the river to the bluff, we quartered, back about 1 mile & camped on the Platte, found a good patch of feed. distance 14 miles.
6th quite pleasant; started ½ past 5 A.M. in order to pass the fire, ahead, which was well damped down by the night and showers about 3 A.M. passed, the fire & a strip of old grass & turned out to feed. RC Stevens killed an antelope. The calf that taken alive, got kicked by a horse or mule, last night, & killed: just before we turned out at noon a very young calf followed Luke Johnson into the camp, they put him in a waggon. about starting time Prest. Young and a few other men, rode out to prevent our cows from mixing with the buffalo, the & a few others {-} Prest. lost his spy glass. Went to look at a poor old buffalo cow, who soon lay down while we were all looking at her. Camped in a semicircle on the bank of Platte, distance 20 ms., feed poor, teams failing. No timber on either bank of Platte, yesterday nor today, quite a breeze from the W.
7th A Carrington stood from ½ past {12} to half past 4, 6th 10 of standing guard. Wind very high from the N. waiting for an axletree to be fixed, & our teams to fill themselves; buffalo all round; fuel last night & this morning, a little wood & buffalo dung. Camp called together, to see about team for the cannon &c Br. E Snow, received quite a chastisement from the Prest. for neglecting the cows yesterday. Started at ¼ to 11 & traveled till 3, distance 8 ms. Buffalo in great abundance, & passing to & from the river, & playing, old & young. Camped in ring on the Platte, feed tolerable good. Camping inspected military fashion. OP Rockwell found B Youngs spy glass. Very cloudy & qute cool{.} towards evening sprinkled a little. 8th . A Lyman killed a pole cat.
8th Sun rose clear, no wind, weather quite warm; road over level ground, but rough, from the multitude of trails running across our track from the bluffs to the river, made by the buffalo passing to & fro, & by shallow basin like places, they make in paduring & wallowing; halted about noon to rest; the whole bottom has the appearance of an old fed out pasture, only the dung is almost as thick as is useualy {usually} is about a barnyard; the grass is so closely fed out, that the weeds are quite thick. The herds of buffalo this fornoon have been inumerb countless, almost, extending on both bottoms from the river to the bluffs in such numbers, that the ground on the opposite side appears black, & width on both sides about 4 ms. length about 8; as we passed up the river near the bank, the buffalo would beat back, & as we halted, in front of us the line of buffalo reaching from the river to the bluffs, looked like a solid dark wall, depth back unknown; feed poor, OP Rockwell killed a cow. While nooning Smoot's 2 horses went out to see the buffalo, a few 100 yds off and commenced running with them, & Grover & J Brown, had quite a race, on their horses, to head them & get them back. Rolled on & camped in a semicircle on the bank of the Platte, just below where the bluff, cuts off the bottom, for a short distance. A Lyman went ahead about 4 ms. to look out feed &c to lay by over Sunday, an found a better place than this. Distance 11 ms.
Sunday 9th rolled on 4 ms. to find better feed, passed the point of bluff by taking down the bank & keeping up the sandy beach 1 or 2 & bottom mile & came out in the bottom again very easily, but in case the water should be high, the hills are easily passed over. Camped called together at 3 PM, W Woodruff made a few remarks, felt well; O Pratt also felt well, but thought it uncertain we could return this fall . A Lyman spoke upon the principle of learning all the time to be patient in the school we are in, which would be better to us than gold or silver. Camped in a semicircle on the bank of Platte, bottom— narrower, about 1 mile wide here, soil more sandy. Some of the boys had quite a play with the horns & tail of a young bull, quite some poor. Several buffalo lay along our route on the 8th dead, probably, from starvation, generaly.
10th A board was put up on a post, with a letter in it, for the next company, writing on the board. look in this. Cool, wind NW. one side "look in this & you will find a letter," on the other "316 ms. from winter Quarters. Westward bound, Pioneers{"}. Cool, Wind N W E. Rolled on over a better soil, & sank in growth of grass not burned, crossed a clear, gravely run 6 yds wide. Rockwell & J Brown, chased a wild horse; a good many buffalo, feeding at the foot of the bluffs. Joseph Hancock killed a 3 yrs old cow, meat good. Nooned, clear & warm; better grass, Bottom widening again, from 1 to 3 ms., soil quick & good, well watered{,} {,} crossed another narrow run; a deer killed; The bluffs are low ranges of hills generaly, in many places on their sides & tops perfectly naked, & was cut up into holes & ditches, &c by the effect of wind & rain on the light soil; 2 gorges in the ridge, for the passage of the runs we crossed. Camped in a semicircle on the bank, opposite an isleand with plenty of cottonwood brouse, grass better, water & wood plenty. A Lyman shot a hare, meat tough. Some cloudy, but little wind. Distance 10 ms.
11th Sun rose clear, no wind, air cool, a few light clouds, blacksmithing going on. Horn sounded at 4 AM. Started at ¼ to 10, rolled on, with the bluffs, about ½ mile on our right, & long isleand in the river, with several small & a few large Cotton Wood trees & several small cedar on it, the bottom on the S side appears very narrow, & the bluffs according to Fremont, from 2 to 500 ft. high, elevation very sudden for sand & clay & much cut up into points & ravines at ½ 12 watered, passed over a low spur of the bluffs a short distance, bottom widened again directly to from 1 to 1½ ms., crossed a gravely run about 5 yds wide, went on ½ mile & camped in a circle about ¾ ms. from the river. Feed middleing. Distance 9 ms. Warm through the day, cloudy, breeze from the South. But few buffalo seen. 12th Latitude ½ mile W of camp, by M, observation, by Prof O Pratt, 41° 7' 44".
12th Horn, at 4. Quite cool, wind SE. Crossed a small run, mooned, A.C. & several others went back into the bluffs to hunt, several buffalo about, quite thin yet, {.} J Matthew killed a 1 yr. old buffalo heifer. A vertical section of the hill country, taken any where, within the distance we went back, (between 1 & 2 ms.) & as much farther as we could see, would present the same view as from the bottom. An isometric sketch of the hill country, would present innumerable peaks & knobs, more or less rounded, with deep circular holes, & with ragged edges in many of them, & between, basins of all sizes, from a few yds. across, to ½ a mile, & ravines shallow & deep, long & short, & all over the surface, rough & smooth, run buffalo trails, & scattered very thickly, buffalo bones & dung. Soil light colored marl, as deep as any of the ravines will show, stained in places by iron rust. Grass scanty, in many places none, from the effect of buffalo pawing & rubbing & wallowing & the force of the wind on the light soil when the grass roots are thus torn up. Distance 2 12 ms. Clear, & warm in the P.M. camped in a circle near the mouth of a small run; & about 1 mile from where some Indians, probably Sioux, had camped & left some week or 10 days ago; they had killed several buffalo; & left their old moccasins. AL kept his waggon, being unwell.{(12th AM Harmon, fixed a rodometer, by which we have since, measured)}
13th Quite cool, wind NE, & high; crossed a small run; rolled on, & cross a small clear, shallow, quicksand sand bottom stream, about 10 rods wide & camped in a semicircle on its bank, & near its outlet, supposed by G.A. Smith to be the Rawhide of the traders; it is probably of some considerable length as it makes quite a passage through the bluffs, & afford considerable water, it is the first stream we have crossed since Wood River. Distance 11 ms.
14th Cloudy & cool, wind SE, commenced lightening early & about 9 rained quite hard for some time, cloudy, cool & showery through the day; our course would round through the hills, to avoid a point in the bluffs, where they come to the water quite bold, for about ½ mile {& about 1½ mile above our camps}; came on to the edge of the bottom again & nooned. J Higbee killed an antelope. This point of bluffs is directly opposite the commencement of the high ground between the N & S Fork, it commands a good view of the head of the level ground between the 2 forks, with an occasional glimpse of the water of the S Fork, the course of the N Fork for a long distance, studded with small isleands with not a tree & hardly a bush in sight in any direction; you can also see, looking S of E, the point of junction of the 2 Forks, at a distance according to Fremont of 18½ miles, from the point of high ground between them; the averge breadth of the level land between the Forks is some 4 ms., length 18½. The average width of the N Fork so far is about ¾ mile, very shallow, with quick sand bottom. Since the junction, the bluffs on both sides, have taken a lower elevation, probably about 150 ft., smoother & more grass upon them, & opposite our resting place all them of the ranges take about the same elevation, the middle rather the lowest, & as far back as one can see to the N, NE & NW, the hills look billows on the ocean in a high storm. bluffs this day, composed mainly of sand, still grass grows on them, sufficient to sustain cattle. J Brown killed an antelope, also PH Young 1, J Higbee a badger, Luke Johnson & E Glines a bull, meat brought in next morning, OP Rockwell shot a bull & A Lyman, J Brown, Stevens &c, pursued it some distance into the bluffs, & killed it, but as it was late & they far off, only a little of the meat was brought in. Camped in the form of a letter S, owing to a mistake, about ½ mile from the river & from a low spur of the bluffs, makeing to the water. Feed good, Distance 8½ ms., road winding, to get through the hills, & sandy, in the first watch an object supposed to be an Indian creeping in the horses was fired upon by R Badger, & it made off, without saying good by.
15th Cool & cloudy, Wind. N. W. began to rain, about breakfast time, quite hard, wind pretty high, started while showery & wound through the low hills, about 1 mile very easily, with the exception of the sand, came on to a narrow and wet bottom, sandy by the edge, & grass good, stopped to feed showering all the time; P.M. a little showery, rolled on & camped in a circle about ½ mile from the Fork, OP Rockwell killed a bull. Distance 7 ms; bottom wetish, feed good.
16th Cloudy & very cool, wind N.N.W.; in the PM some warmer & not so cloudy. Camp called together, for meeting, Cols Markham & Rockwood, gave some good advice, & Elder HC Kimball, some good teaching, partly as follows, not a man of us will fall if we go straight &c{.} learn by precept also by example, that you may profit by the experience of others, do not God's servants bless,? cultivate a spirit of blessing &c I shall not kill game on the sabbath, unless it is necessary; if a man lives wrong do not follow his example, but that of the good; we shall receive more glory for faithfuly performing this mission, than for any other we have ever engaged in; have no malice; I believe angels go before us day by day, angels were seen by the brethren in going to Jackson in Zions Camp, in 1834; 9 of that camp are in this. E Glines killed a bull, & an antelope with 2 young in it. The small runs we crossed, spring some mile or 2 in the bluffs, & and are more numerous, than heretofore, bluffs not quite so sandy. The country for distance back, in the bottom & on the bluffs is so closely pastured, that there is no appearance of fire having run over it for years; a few wells dry, water tastes of iron rust. Buffalo plenty all the time.
17th very cool, some cloudy, wind W.N.W.; AM Harmon put another wheel to his roadometer, gaged for 10 ms.; rolled on & passed a low spur of the bluffs, for about 2 ms., road when it struck the bottom, was made along the edge of the bluffs; bottom for some 10 ms., will average about 3 ms. in width, quite wet, near the bluffs, crossed several small runs & some sloughy places, & a good length of wet ground, & camped in a circle, within about 1 mile of the river. We passed a point where the bluffs came to the waters edge on the other side, for the first time, & continued so, about 1 mile, then a space of very narrow bottom, then the bluffs again come down quite bold, for about 1½ ms., with small cedar trees, scattered on over the sides & in the hollows. The road to all appearance would have been better, if we had kept up on the river bank, from the hills we crossed. 3 bulls & 2 antelopes were killed & brought in. AL killed 1 of the lopes; quite warm from 10 A.M. 3 or 4 wells dry about 4 ft. deep, Distance 12¾ —
18th Cloudy & warm, wind E.S.E. Captains of 10s Called together, Prest. Young, made remarks, of which the following is the purpose as reported to me; the hunters do not start out soon enough, but lay around until the teams start & then have to go further for game & hinder the camp in going so far into the hills to haul meat; the horsemen were blamed for not takeing more care to look the best route, many for turning up their noses at fore quarters of meat, & the whole for being indolent, & they had better put their horses into the teams; route quartered for the bank, & came in it just below the Cedar bluffs opposite, 3 deer drinking & walking about in the river, water very shallow & bed good to judge by their motions, nooned crossed a run about 1 rod wide, passed onemptying just as the commencement of the cedar bluffs opposite, more old grass than usual, nooned, cloudy & report of thunder from WSW, sprinkled a little occasionaly. Camped in a circle on the W bank of a clear run about 2 or 3 yds wide, (Eagle Creek) & about ½ mile above its outlet; through the night, rained quite moderately, most of the time, Wind N.{,} feed poor, Camp called, & ordered to drive in all cattle & horses near them, when they went to gather them in not to stop in the road to water, under penalty, of traveling in the rear of the cannon the rest of the day. Distance 15¾ ms. {(18th} appearance of rock, in the cedar bluffs in the S side for the first time.)
19th Started at 5 to find better feed, crossed a small run & turned out to feed, grass tolerable, bottom, narrow & wetish, started about 8, began to rain quite steady & tolerably fast. Wind E, soon crossed another run {(Wolf Creek)}, about 1 rod wide, & began to rise the sand bluffs which come to the water for ¾ mile, road up & through quite sandy, hard pulling, passed on to the bottom across a small run & stopped at 11 on account of its still raining; the route would probably have been better over the bluffs if we had passed up the run further & wound among the hills where they are not so sandy, or keep right up the river under the bluffs; started at 3, still raining, at times quite hard, rolled in 2 ms. & camped in a semicircle on the river bank. Wind N.N.E., feed middleing; Distance 8 ms. rained till nearly dark.
20th cloudy & coolish, wind N.N.W.{,} bluffs as usual, sometimes, pretty well tumbled & sharpened up, at others smoother, at times sand predominates, then clay, now & then an appearance of rock, in the face of the bluffs on the S side; started at 8, stopped at {½ past} 11 at a point within ½ mile of the river, where a low spur of hills runs down from the bluffs, average width of bottom 2 ms., soil good, road good; the hills & bluffs have come to the water on the S side almost the whole distance, with a good many small cedar trees growing on them; 1 cedar tree on the N side, with a young indian, wrapped in a hide, with his wooden boat bowl & spoon & a small bag, found in tied in its branches; passed just before we stopped, a large patch of pigweed; horizontal strata, in the bluffs on both sides, apparently of limestone, mostly on the S side; crossed a run soon after starting; feed good; cool; several small Iselands, scattered along, but hardly any of them, support even bushes, until we get to this point, where some of them have small cedar trees; while nooning A Lyman & 3 others crossed over, in the boat to the mouth a short dry hollow opposite; & found the Oregon road to come down the hollow & take the S bank of the Fork, ash in the hollow & mountain cherry bushes; the strata of rock proved to be limestone; rolled on about 2 ms. & crossed a swift, quick sand bottom creek from 10 to 12 rods wide; passed on, bottom, grass, soil & as in the A.M. came to a point where a low range of hills, come to the river, & just at the point, a run about 4 yds. wide emptied into the river, rolled on ½ mile, between, the low hills & run, & camped at 6 in an oval, by the run & within ½ mile of river. Distance 15¾. So far since the Oregon road came over, the bottom is a mere strip, the ledgey bluffs rising just back of the bank; on this side with the exception of the 2 spurs of very low hills, the bottom is about 2 ms. wide, & good for grass; by our camp, the low hills come near the run, which is about parallell with the river, flat bottom of ½ mile & more between the 2, the hills reach back some distance to the main bluffs; opposite bluffs quite bold & ledgey;{(Castle Bluffs 8 ms. above Ash Hollow)} through the day, this side only 1 place where the strata show {& at the gorge of the creek} few buffalo seen; pigweed plenty; 1 pole cat seen & 1 prairie hen.
21st—Pleasant, cloudy, sunrise, no wind, breaking away, started at 8; stopped at ½ past 11 ; a board of distances was put up at the camp ground; hills retreated, width of bottom, from 2 to 4 ms., soil good, clayey, quite wet in places, from the rains of 19th, S side, no bottom, distance for A.M. 7¾; 3 or 4 deer seen; air pure & good; feed good; started at ¼ to 2, & kept up near the center of the bottom, road heavy from the late rain, bore to the W.N.W. & crossed a very low range of hills, which had swept round & come to the river, passed through a very rich pigweed patch, & kept on near the base of the low hills on our right, & the river 1 mile or more on our left, at ½ past 5 line stopped, in view of our front horseman just ahead among whom were 2 mounted Sioux, soon turned a little towards the river & camped in circle about 1 mile off, a few buffalo seen on the other side, P.M. distance 7¾—15½. The bluffs on the S side, keep their rocky ledge, up to a dry, hollow, of some apparent length, whose mouth is about ½ mile higher up than our camp, they then keep on at a lower elevation, & are much smoother & without rock; of any consequence, showing; a few small ash trees, in the hollow; very little bottom on the S side; hills low on the N, bottom wide, grass good & plenty between our camp & the river & up as far as one can see, there is very heavy coat of old grass, of a good kind, resembling timothy or red top. 22nd The route would have been nearer & probably much better to have struck, from our camp to the low hill we crossed. 22nd a petrified bone {27 in.} of a very large animal, picked up on the low hills we crossed, by the roadside, in a dry, gravely channel, made by the rain water of the hill country.
22nd—a little cloudy, pleasant, breeze S; started ¼ past 8, rolled on, road good, crossed a clear run 3 or 4 yds wide emptying in just above the cedar bush bank opposite; stopped to noon at ½ past 11; a few scattering pine trees, small, on the bridge opposite; an occasional narrow strip of bottom on S side, hills smoother; N side bottom averages about 1 mile, occasional appearance of rock both sides, 2 buffalo seen on S side, soil gravely, a weed called by the boys "old man" quite plenty also a weed some call rag weed, prickly pear occasiony few rather short & scattering; points in the Oregon road visible occasionaly; 7¼ ms.; started again about 2 and came 4¼ ms. then wound among & over the bluffs 3 ms. onto the bottom 1 mile & camped in a circle within about ½ mile of river. distance 15½ ms., first 4¼ miles over a dry hard bottom, & across several dry beds of runs in high water; from the ridge of bluffs the road crossed, we could see chimney rock, & view the very curious & broken ground all round us & especialy on our right & ahead, crossed the gravely bed of a run, some 8 rods wide, 3 times, in the hills, hauling through the beds of the runs very heavy. Old Man weed very plenty, smells & tastes some like wormwood, a few small cedar trees in the bluffs, a young grey eagle brought into camp, also another petrified mammoth bone, portion of the main bone of the hind leg, diameter 5 inches circum 15 {inches}. a thunder storm passed round us & dropped a few sprinkles. The bluffs, opposite our camp on the N, are named by the Prest. Bluff Ruins, they present an appearance of ruined castles, with their turets, towers, terraces & walls, much dilapillated {dilapidated}, it has been caused, probbly, by the breaking down of the horizontal strata of limestone, which is quite thin, & the washing away of the marly foundation of the strata by rain; sun & wind, constantly operating; a marly clay, appears to be the main body the hills & bluffs, many foreign specimens of rock a strewed all over the beds of the dry runs & in the tops & sides of the highest hills & bluffs in many places, such as granite of several varieties, quartz, green stone &c{,} a great amount of flint of various shapes & sizes.
Sunday 23rd Some cloudy, quite warm, Br. Fairbanks bit in the ancle {ankle} by a rattlesnake, made quite sick. About noon, camp assembled, & meeting was began by singing{,} prayer by Prest. Young, singing, a few remarks by E Snow, the Prest. then spoke for some time, & advanced the following ideas in his remarks, "the fruits of this n our works in this mission, will be tasted by us in this world & in that to come & eternaly for good or evil, according to our works;" "I feel highly pleased with this camp & its movements, all goes well &c," "no underhanded work in the gospel, all is plain, & all things belong to the upright & honorable," "no man has disobeyed my counsel that I know of" {"}I will do the scolding, no other man shall" "our mission will soon be looked upon, as among the first works of the church." {"}a place must be prepared for giving enducements & teaching revealed principles that have not been taught publickly" "we built the temple & font in spite of the opposition of wicked men. About 5 wind blew very hard, about 7 began to rain hard, continued to rain till towards 10, wind high through the night. Latitude, M observation 41° 33' 03". Barometric height of bluff above the surface of the river 235
24th {(a board with a letter plugged up {in. . .} put up)} very cloudy, wind cold, a few flakes of snow flying, wind last night & this morning N.N.W.; started 20 minutes past 8{,} stopped to rest 35 minutes past 12, road hard & good, bottom more rolling than usual; a curious shaped & live portion of bluff, nearly opposite on S side, looking like a fortified round tower with a detached Tunel {(called by the Prest. "an old court house")}; still cloudy, & very cool, 10 ms.
2 Sioux came to us while we were resting. started ¼ to 3. & Camped in a circle within ¼ ml of river, road good, feed poor, clouds breaking away, wind fell; bottom wide & not so rolling; just as we formed camp, 35 Dacotahs, men women & children, mounted{,} crossed the Fork to visit us, they were very friendly, clean, well dressed, well formed, good size & well behaved; AC went out to them to read 2 letters in French, given them as recommends, one to OWash to oha, ou le belle journier, signed PD Papin, the other to brave Bear, not signed, both good;
25th quite a frost clear mild & pleasant, The Dacotahs came down from their sleeping place, ½ ml above & remained about our camp until we started{.} behaved perfectly well, we gave them some bread last night & this morning; traveled 12 ms; road dry & generaly very level, but rough from inequalities, course nearly through the center of a wide bottom, & camped in a circle, about 4 ms. E.N.E. from Chimney Rock in the S side; by Barometric calculation by Prof O Pratt, at our last nights camp, height above ocean 3371 ft. & 686 ft above the junction, being a rise from that point, of 5 ft 6‚Öì inches to the mile. Latitude by M observation 41° 41' 46" OP Rockwell killed 2 antelopes, AL 2 hares, but little air, quite warm. Grass middleing, principle grass, {"}buffalo grass." Widest place in bottom about 6 ms. several wells dug. {illustration of Chimney Rock}
26th Some cloudy, warm, a fine breeze from the W, Started at 8, stopped at 12. 7¼ ms. started at ½ past 2. Camped at 5, in a circle, near the river, grass, pretty good; road level, bottom wide & dry. the road would be better, if it kept the bank, on account of grass, driftwood, & water at all times; 4 antelopes killed; sprinkled a little about sunset. 5 ms.—12. Our camp is nearly opposite Terrace Bluffs, of marly clay, constantly wasting, & in fair view of Chimney rock.
27th cloudy. but very pleasant, with a fine breeze, started at 8, stopped at 12, route close by the river, grass good, road fine; nearly opposite Scotts Bluffs {Bluff} on the S side. From Ash Hollow to Chimney Rock by our road 72½ ms. Width of river opposite our lasts night's camp 792 yds; 8ms. 2 lopes killed AL killed 1, started about 2, & camped in a circle about 5 near the river, & just above the most Northern point of Scotts Bluffs, 5¾—13¾, grass &c as in A.M. stopped this early on account of grass just ahead looking short. bottom still very wide, about 6 began to rain quite fast, wind high from N.N.E., a few bushes on the opposite bank. Scotts Bluffs & those above & below are of the prevailing marly clay formation. & cut up into all manner of curious & fantastic shapes by the action of the elements & fast wearing away. Rained slowly till about 9 in the evening. Since we left bluff ruins, after you leave the river bank from ½ to 1½ ms., the bottom is very dry till you reach the low range of hills, from 3 to 4 ms. then dry for about the distance to the main bluffs, so that the best grass is confined to the strip of bottom, along the river.
28th Cool & cloudy, quite misty about 7, wind E.N.E. River takes a sudden bend from Scotts Bluffs to the N.W. or almost N for a short distance; laid by till about 11 for fear of rain, started & soon came to where the bottom was narrow & quite sandy & continued so for about 3 ms. with a small clear run close on our left, then about 4 ms. of good hard road along a wide bottom again, then instead of keeping on the edge of dry bottom, the road pilot, struck across, the wetish bottom lying nearer the river & we had 4½ ms. of first wetish, then sandy, then tolerable road & camped in a circle near the river, with plenty of drift wood, but poor grass, the new being mixed up with the old. Cool & cloudy. 11½ ms. a few scattering cotton wood trees & small willows on the small Isleands & then S side bank. misted & sprinkled in the night.
29th Cool & cloudy, began to sprinkle & mist quite steady about 5; the Prest. made some remarks against so much levity, card playing, dancing &c as there was going on. Wind N.E. slackened up misting about 10, wind E. at ¼ to 12 Prest lectured the camp very sharply & very well, upon the subject of their levity, such as dancing, fiddleing, and card playing, mock trials, loud laughing & talking, contention &c showing what such a spirit would lead to, & that he did not wish to go any further, with such a spirit in the camp, &c, then called the 12 together, then the high priests (18) includeing 4 bishops, then the seventies (76), then the Elders (8) left those who did not belong to the church, 2 sick in wagons, 2 away hunting; the Prest then called upon them by quorums & they all covenanted with uplifted hand to return to the Lord with renewed purpose of heart, & leave off those practices, that tend to evil, good remarks by Eld{e}rs Kimball, Pratt & Woodruff, started ½ past 1, stopped ½ past 5, & camped in a circle near a spring run about 5 yds wide, & just above a point where the river runs from the south to N across the bottom about 2 ms. several trees on the iselands, &S bank. Road good, grass good, sand rock nested in the bluff for the first time close by the road & about 2 ms. below our camp; just b{e}low us the N Fork runs a serpentine course to & fro across the bottom for the first time. The Oregon road just below Scotts Bluffs turned behind the hills to avoid the Bluff, & comes on to the river after 2 ds. travel just the large trees on the isleands, at a point about 1 mile or more below our camp, it crosses horse creek, which empties above Scotts Bluffs on the S side. Road
28 {29}th would have been nearer & better to have continued on the dry hard bottoms. The grass on the hard bottom, is thin & short, but good where the bottom is wetish, which is the case very frequently, in patches of some length & breadth, lying near the river, & always to be commanded for camping purposes, as to grass, driftwood & water. Elder Kimball remarked that not of us or of our families would die until our return, if we would abide counsel as given. Elder Woodruff counseled motioned that all to burn up their cards, gammon boards & dice for they were useless lumber. 
30th Sunday, appointed as a day for fasting & prayer; warmer, but still cool & cloudy, wind E. About 9 the camp assembled for prayer meeting, Bishop T Lewis presiding, praying, singing & remarks, confessing &c by the brethren, all good, meeting closed ½ past 10. About 12, the brethren assembled to partake of the sacrament, Bishop Lewis presideing, at the same time, the 12 & 9 others, with their clothing repaired to a bason in the hills, & stationed OP Rockwell & A Carrington on the look out, while the rest clothed, & went through the usual signs & prayed, the Prest. being mouth, soon after they dressed it began to sprinkle, about ½ past 1 & then to rain just as we got back to camp. The low range of hills of field that has continued so long, begins just below the sand stone Bluffs to take a higher elevation, & becomes more broken, as you rise in the ridge & look N the land extends back at the same elevation broken barren & rolling for 4 or 5 miles then there is a breadth of lower ground, still rolling & barren far from 5 to 10 miles extending to the main bluffs; an immense quantity of pebble stone is scattered promiscuousely over this barren & broken region. about {4} the Prest. invited the 12 & Bro. Carrington, Shumway & Snow to take a walk, we ascended the ridge & then proceeded to the top of the a high peak about 2½ ms. from camp, we then had a fine view of the main ridge of bluffs on either side from 20 to 30 ms. apart, & of the interveneing level, rolling & tumbled up surface & the course of the river up & down for a long distance, with also the towering Black Hills, between the points WNW. & SW. & Chimney Rock to the S.E. Br. GA Smith offered up a very approp{r}iate prayer & we got back to camp about dusk, in season to have a look at a very fine specimen of lunar rainbow, which occured soon after, about 7. It has been a day of much joy and satisfaction to us, peace, quiet & harmony prevailing in the camp & stock full fed & well rested, & we all felt well & thankful for the sudden change for the better since our covenant.
31st Clear & pleasant, breeze from the W.N.W. started about 8, turned off our course a little to find grass, stopped ½ past 12, distance 9¼ ms, grass thin; course very direct, bottom varying much in breadth oweing to the winding of the river, generaly very dry; with scanty grass, ridge quite broken, many of the peaks barren from sand, others covered with gravel & pebble stones. distance across bottom & river from ridge to ridge 5 or 6 ms. is an average. Started ¼ to 3 stopped camped ½ to 7 in 2 parallell lines on the gravely bank of a swift run from 20 to 30 ft. wide, & about 1 mile above its outlet. course quite direct{,} road quite sandy, & grass thin, passed several good sized cotton trees, & stumps & trunks on the isleands & banks, accompanied by long fringes of willow & young cotton bushes; 1 deer killed by J Higby, dis 7¼. June 1st clear & pleasant Latitude by M observation, 42° 04' 44". much the most bottom on N side, quite a frost.
June 1st Clear and pleasant; started soon after breakfast, crossed the small run before & soon came on to good hard ground; bottom from 2 to 4 ms. wide, quite dry & hard with thin grade trees, green & dead, more numerous & larger, & small pine or cedar trees, or both, quite plenty in the bluffs in both sides of river, little or no bottom on S side, just before we stopped, ¼ past 12, passed 5 old sod chimnies near the S bank; grass thin, 4½ ms. after nooning, Latitude 42º 09’ 24” traveled 4½ ms, road generaly quite sandy, grass scattering, & camped in a semicircle on the river bank.  Rain & hail 3d quite a Shower 4th.  To Laramis Fork 569 ms. . . . about opposite Fort St John on {w side} Laramis Fork, 1½ ms. from our camp, channel much narrower & {108 yds wide} above Larimies Fork, & deep & current strong. Our camp fires tonight presented quite a cheerful & old fashioned appearance, wood being plenty. cloudy, sprinkled a few drops just after dark. Soon after we camped 2 of the brethren, that had come up from Pueblo 2 weeks last Sunday {(16th)} came over in our boat, they were pleased to see us & we them, they were 15 ds. coming from Pueblo, did not hurry & laid bye some, distance 250 ms. The Crows had been down just before they came to the fest & stole 25 horses from the post in daylight.
2nd The 12, A.C. & several others crossed the N Fork, walked 2 or 300 yds to the ruins of Fort Platte, (a tradeing post,) the outer & inner walls are pretty much entire, built of large sun dried brick about 15 ft. high, 2½ ft. thick & enclosing a parallellogram 144 ft. by 103 ft., with 2 large gateways 1 for stock &c the other the main entrance, opening into the hollow square around which the building are ranged against the walls, with a wall between it & the space allotted to stock, We next went to Fort St. John, & were politely received by Mr. Beaudeaux & Co 17 in all. Walls &c as Fort Platte, the enclosure 168 ft. by 116, the main building 2 stories high & forming part of the wall, with a smallish double planked door, opening through an entrance way into the hollow square, in open court, round which are ranged, mostly against the walls, & the store room, blacksmith shop, ware rooms, cook room &c, stableing &c along the east wall, with a waggon entrance & strong door, in the middle on the S side, the main entrance, folding doors high & wide, double ash plank thickly studded with spikes, over the main entrance, is raised a square tower, of light from work weather boarded, with a flag staff near up from it. Several squaws & young children in about, probly belonging to the traders. We charterd their flat boat & took a ride down the rapid current of Larimies Fork, 3 or 4 ms. in its windings, to the mouth about ½ mile below our camp, then turned up & crossed over to camp, some cloudy. Mr. Baudeaux said the first post was established here in 1833, & that it was 300 ms. from here to Bridger's Fort, on Black's Fork of Green River, & when the Oregon & California roads fork. 2 flanking projections, in squaw towers run up above the walls & roofes, 1 in the SE & 1 in the NE corner. They send their peltry from this post to Ft. Pierre 400 ms. over land, on the Missouri, where other steamboats take it. Latitude M observation by O Pratt 42° 12' 13" at Ft. St. John, width of Larimie Fork at same place 41 yds. some cloudy & quite warm.
3rd pleasant, with a strong wind from ESE, commenced ferrying over the N Fork about 5{,} kept busy at till ½ past 1, when a severe hail & rain storm began to pour on us, accompanied with heavy lightning & thunder, lasted 1 hour. A Lyman started about 11 for Pueblo to counsel the movements of men & things there, in company Stevens, Wool{s}ey & Tippetts of the Mormon Battalion. Sprinkling occasionaly. A.C. sent a letter to his wife, per A Lyman to be forwarded the first chance. Rained a good deal through the night.
4th cloudy, but pleasant, all over by 8. A.C. left a letter for wife, at this place. Paid Mr. Baudeau $15. in cash & work turned by Crow, for use of flat boat. Started at 12 on the Oregon Road, stopped {½ past 1} to let the teams pick some patches of good grass. The company that came up from Pueblo came into our line, with 3 waggons, several loose horses, a number of fine cows & calves & 3 large fine bulls. Started ½ past 3, & camped ¼ to 6 in a circle near the river, grass good but scattering, this day we began to travel in what is called the Black Hills, so called from the dark shade given them, by the large number of small pine & cedar trees growing upon them; quit hauling fuel; This river from above the forks is very crooked, with little or no bottom, except in narrow strips & small curves. road in some places quite sandy with sharp pitched, we came down one very sharp steep hill, much worse than any since we started, bottom, timber & hills about evenly divided between the N & S side. a very broken country. grass mostly Buffalo grass. quite a shower between 5 & 6 P.M. Mr. Baudeau & Eugene Montalant, told Col Rockwood, they had never seen so civil & well behaved a company travel this road. distance 8¼, Stand by our camp & look all round & you can hardly tell how we or this river get here, the most circumscribed view we have had. The comers had 5 waggons & 1 cart, 9 men, 5 women, 3 children. We now have 76 waggons, including cannon boat & cart. 96 Horses, 51 mules, 90 oxen, 43 cows, 3 bulls, 9 calves, 16 dogs, 16 chickens,.
5th quite cloudy, sprinkled a few drops. Archibald Lytle one of the new comers abused his oxen yesterday. Started late, some oxen missing awhile, halted ¼ to 12, 6½ {ms.} quite a quantity of bench grass, bluffs mostly of a very fine grit sandstone {(silecious {siliceous} sandstone)} , of a light grey, easily crumbled by exposure, in some places presenting a perpendicular face, in some butleing, & others wore away so as to resemble the terraced plats of a steep hill side garden. road crossed a bad point of rock, then kept up the dry of a spring run, the water sinking, in a dry {tin..} not far from the spring, several specimens of iron stone, the lower hills, as far as can see, an{d} composed of light colered, & redish & red clay & limestone, with an occasional show of the sandstone of the ridge, road very good for a hill country , crossed a small gravely run; stopped ½ past 12 close by a small run, grass good but scattering. wild flax found. dis 11¼, put up 7th 10 ml stake; Started at 2, passed in 2 or 3{00} yds, a fine spring close by road side, crossed 1 dry run, & another 2, & camped in a semicircle {1/2 past 5} on the bank of river a la Prele, a clear & rapid creek, from 18 inches to 2 ft. deep at this time, & from 2 to 3 rods wide, grass good on the margins; dis 8—19¼; as we camped, emigrant Co in sight ahead & our 15 waggons close upon them. Since leaveing Ft. John, the formation as far as observable, is based on a horizontal bed of hard & clay mostly light colored, overlaid with a bed of coarse sand or gravel, then in many places overlaid with another strata of clay, upon which rest, where undisturbed, the horizontal strata of Argilaceous & silecious sandstone & strata of clay, as you advance a pure grit, or side caus calcareous sandstone of fine quality, white & redish, & in connection at a lower elevation, light colored, redish, & red argilaceous limestone, & grit sandstone, in some few places, metaliferous limestone, pudding stone & conglomerate frequent, but not occupying any considerable extent, as to regularity or surface except on the N Fork, occasional specimens of soft gypsum or plaster of paris, impure, & also of hard gypsum purer. To judge from a hasty observation en route of the country from Ft. John to River a la prele by the hill road its original geological formation must have been in horizontal strata of Clay then conglomerate or corse sand, then clay (mostly light colored & hard, in places red or metaliferous, though confined) these argilaceous limestone & Iron clay & in others silecious sandstone without the super strata of clay, takeing this as a given all view of the formation for 78¾ ms. & then noticeing the divideing ridges, the hills & banks & beds of streams, one is led to the conclusion, that when these strata were disturbed the waters in seeking a level wou{l}d do so by rapid currents which would directly, wear high perpendicular banks, from the very nature of the formations, which also being easily operated upon by the feirce winds & storms of this country so far as the claying strata are concerned would give way from {time} to time & the super strata of rock would of coarse decline according & to every degree from a slight slope to a perpendicular & to every point of compass, though in the main to the channels of the streams as is the fact, leaving cones & bluffs & peaks & combs, & at a lower elevation more rounded hills, just as we see them. some traders passed W, just as we camped; PM cloudy{,} quite a cool breeze now{.} W by WSW W by S. road good with a few small exceptions, about 20 rods back of our camp on S Side of road, is a grave, with headstone cut, G Hembree, 1843.
10th a few clouds, very pleasant, with a fine breeze from W.S.W. Started at 7, crossed 2 Wet & 1 dry small runs, & {-} Bourche Fourche Boisee, a fine stream, now about 18 inches deep & from 3 to 4 rods wide, noon halt on its bank at 11. grass tolerable, road good, with the exception of a few short pitches; cotton wood & willow & ash, cherry plenty enough for camp purposes on all these runs wet or dry, so far from Laramie. the hills, over which the road passes not so broken this A.M. mostly clay, where bored, white, light cream color, & redish where not covered wit{h} gravel & pebble, the ridge on our left is smoother & probably, grit sandstone, in spots redish . Started at 2, rose the Elevation of the hill W & began to turn for the N Fork, ¼ to 3 came on to the bottom, but a small portion of low bottom, but the elevated bottom is very level & from ¾ to 1½ ms. wide, terminated by gradualy slopeing hills, which again slope towards the divide or main bluff, artemisia in abundance, crossed a small run; land on the N side much the most broken clay our route since we struck the Fork, crossed Deer Creek, a beautiful stream, , now about 18 inches deep in the swift places & from 4 to 5 rods wide, camped in a circle on its bank. {3/4 ml from river{.}} . dis 9—17¾. 9th stake put up. as you stand on the top of the East bank of Deer Creek, near its Northern limit, & look S by W & S.S.W. to the main bluff or divide the view extends to the bluff {..eter} of the creek, over its beautifuly winding course & bottom & the slopeing grassy hill that bound it , & a long line of bluff with several clumps of small thrifty pine, dotted in other places by scattering ones, altogether a sweet & lovely view, & one of the finest places for a small settlement, that we have found. A. Carrington, discovered an extensive coal bank, the first ever found to our knowledge on the Platte or any of its tributaries, it rests upon a fine grit sandstone, commonly called grindstone of excellent quality of a whiteish or light grey color, except where stained by sulphures of iron, then yellowish, as far as it shows, from the creek to cool bed is from 40 to 50 thick, than the coal bed, probably from 6 to 10 ft. . our traced nearly 1 mile, then overlaid by a brown micaceous slate, could not determine its thickness without mining, slate overlaid by an earthy limestone (brown) in layers from a few, to 18 inches thick, whole thickness not determined, for some reason as applied to the slate, the whole overlaid by a coating of the prevailing Eratic pebbles, over the face of the sandstone, are round & ragged specimens of Fremuginous Sandstone, many of them formed around a nucleus of Sulphures of Iron. Blue blos wild Flax in abundance on this creek. This spot would be is the best one for a location, all things considered, on either route from the Missouri to the S. Pass. soil calcareous clay, easily tilled. Some lopes killed.
11th Get clear & very pleasant, breeze from N.W. by N. GA Smith & A.C. visited the coal bed this morning & took specimens, we cut out with a hatchet, Started ½ past 7. kept up the river, road good, crossed a dry run, a good quantity of good sized cotton wood, in the banks of river, hills throwing low spurs to the river occasionaly, Flax plenty, noon halt 20 m to 12, on a strip of low bottom, grass tolerable, a few light clouds{,} Wind W. dis 9¼. several rattlesnakes seen this A.M. 10th stake put up this forenoon. Latitude 42° 51' 47". Started, & rolled up the river with a good road, crossed 2 small clayey runs main bluff or ridge on our left from 2 to 5 or 6 10 to 12 miles off the divideing ridge N & Laramie Forks. {.} many small pine upon its sides & summit, it looks quite smooth & green for the bluff, first hills on both sides quite smooth & low. Camped in a circle near the river, on a small meadow{,} grass tolerable. dis & 7¾—17 ms. 11th stake up. evening very mild & pleasant. 8 lopes killed.
12th clear & pleasant, with a fine breeze from the N.W. Started ¼ to 8, over rolling prairie bottoms, crossed a few ravines with steep banks, &1 clayey run; noon halt ¼ to 12. dis.7¼{.} cotton much scarcer, & more stunted. grass tolerable, road good, 12th stake up, after resting rolled on, crossed clayey run & camped in a semicircle on River, close by the common ford; road good. grass pretty good, dis 4—{11¼}, our front company had done a good business in crossing the Emigrant Co. for which they got flour at $2.50 per 100 lb. bacon & some cash, traded waggons with one of them & for a fine horse mare, 100 lb. of flour 50 ½ {ba..} of crackers & 28 lb. bacon to boot, some smithing, waggon fixing &c done for them for which our brethren also got good pay, all of which came very opportunely. quite warm, main Range of bluffs S of our camp from 14 to 2 ms 6 to 8 ms thickly covered with small pines. one of the men brought from the bluffs {1 snow ball} a small piece of dark brown mica, good brown micaceous sandstone & a piece of coal, the same kind & quality as the first discovered by A.C. on deer creek, & estimated at the same thickness, that is from 8 to 10 ft. & distance to this point 28¼ ms. indicateing, if any way continuous, an inexhaustible supply, for Whitney's railroad or any other project which requires much fuel.
Sunday 13th Some cloudy & very warm & still, horn for meeting at 9, good teaching by Elders Kimball & Young & Prof O Pratt, after meeting, operation set in motion for crossing. 1 of the tongue hounds of A Lyman's broke, in going to the bluffs for a load of pine poles.
14th pleasant{.} began to cross ½ to 5, the loading put over in the skiff & the waggons, some rafted & some hauled over with a rope, cloudy, wind E & E by S, between 3 & 4, wide high SW by W, accompanied with a severe storm of hail & rain for about ½ hour, then most violent we have had, & wind then shifted suddenly, as the storm passed by & blew high & cold from NE by E. the storm came upon us, somewhat unprepared, in the hurry of crossing, but we have heard of no particular damage by it. the waggons of Elder Woodruff's & Captain Grover's tens were put over 1 at a time, by Capt Grover {4} and BL Adams {7} without wet or any injury & our loads also came over safe. George Brown rowing, & the rest of us unloading, loading boat, loading waggons again &c, all of which the 2 first 10s got done, just before the storm, then {ink spot} waggons pulled over by rope got very wet{,} some of them rolling over & over, some bows broke, 1 reach, & otherwise some damaged, but nothing serious, J Pack's waggon turned over & spilled out 1 set of plow irons, {&} some stilo & iron, lost of course, about dark{,} river riseing fast. 24 waggons got over, a heavy mist from time to time, lay on the bluff as low as the line of snow banks, throughout the day. S Driggs, A Carrington & BL Adams, let Norman Taylor have their share of the meal & flour, which was ferryed for, & got of{f} the emigrants, & divided among the 10s. at the rate of 6 lb flour & 2 lb meal per head, makeing 18 lbs flour and 6 lb meal we let Taylor have, as he was out of bread and he drew his own ten, 6 lb flour & 2 lb meal, makeing him out 32 lb bread stuff. we were all quite tired this night, & most of us got very wet in the river or in the storm. AC got wet as a rat, holding BL Adams waggon cover in front to keep the storm out.
15th Some cloudy, wind strong from SW by W; skiff set in operation early crossing loading & the raft in crossing waggons. we all felt some the worse for the wear, but quite well & in good spirit, it seems a pity we could keep on the N side & avoid the expense & time of crossing at St. John, & the labor & time & damage here, as the N Fork above Laramie, is at all times more or less difficult to ford across. water falling. A Carrington, with aid of Col Little, made & put in a tongue hound, & mended the long hounds, by putting on the sway bar, of A Lyman's waggon. In swimming some stock, 1 horse of B R Crow's got drowned, he was started across with a long raw hide rope, a peice of chain & filler of wood, he got tangled in the ropes. quite of a number of waggons got over all safe.
16th warm & cloudy, quite a breeze from W by S & WSW. after breakfast, Adams & Driggs, started with others, to go & rough out 2 or 3 canoes, & left me AC alone with out wagons. wrote & read all day, very lame & some from hard work. P.M. wind riseing some thunder, & a few drops of rain; 21 wagons from Pike & Adams Cos. Illinois, finished crossing today, about 4 or 5 ms. below us: 2 Emigrant Cos. opposite us on the other side; bound for Oregon & California. Adams, Driggs & the others returned about dark, with roughed logs for Canoes, 23 ft. long, & 20 by 22 &19 by 20 inches. busy crossing all day, one of the emigrant cos. has lost buried 2 of thier number, 1 young man & 1 young woman, both within 150 ms. of this place, the first deaths we had heard of in any of companies. AC stood guard for Adams last ½ of night.
17th wind strong from W by S, water high, still busy crossing, Prest. Young's wagon crossed about 9; finished crossing our company & crossed several emigrant wagons & loads; finished swiming over our stock; more emgirant wagons rolling up; Adams & Driggs with others all day working at canoes, A.C. made some apple pies & sent them a large one for dinner, the first we have had on this trip. the 2 canoes finished & ready for planking, late in the afternoon, it became quite cloudy, & high cold wind from N. by E. about ½ past 6
18th Clear & pleasant, Why S wind from W by S, we have crossed 1 emigrant company of 10 wagons, & will soon have over another of 18 or 19 d{itt}o {wagons}, @ $1,50 pr wagon in flour @ $2,50 pr 100 lb & meal @ 50 lb pr bush{el}, &c, AC left a short letter for wife, to be sent first chance. Both companies of emigrants over & another began upon. our 2 canoes fastened wide enough apart to run wagons on were launched ½ past 12, & put in operation, owing to being green & 1 time larger than the other, they could not bring a wagon with its full load, if very heavy.
19th about 4 A.M. showering a little, soon ceased & cleaned up. 9 of our men left here under Br. Grover, to ferry, viz. J. Davenport, John Higby, FM Pomeroy, dJ {Luke} Johnson, W Empy, AM Harmon, BF Stewart, E Ellsworth, Ernie Glines stayed according to counsel of his own will, haveing been counseled to go on. Snow off the hills, started about 8, kept back of the {ria.} hills over a good clay road, passed over quite an elevation, from which we had an extended view on our sight of a moderately broken country, apparently very dry, & thickly covered, with, wormwood, southern wood, sage, & a great variety of plants in flower, some of them very beautiful, no timber, except a scattering cedar or pine on some far off hill; passed on our left, in our desent, to ragged ridge of redish brown argillaceous limestone overlaying in some places a bed of ferrigineous sandstone, in other places, on impure black slate, overlaid by a bluish limestone, supervened. noon halt {½ past 1 dis 11¼} brought us nearer the river, & within a short distance {¾ mile} of a spring, & in sight of red banks on the Platte, started soon, kept on back of the river hils, through a valley, road good over hard clay, just above this spring{.} the Platte comes up from the South, through high, slopeing red banks, two far off to determine their composition. rolled on till past sun down, & camped by a small spring. grass tolerable, no fuel but sage & other small bushes & a few buffalo chips, dis 10½—21½. 1 buffalo & other game killed, buffalo getting some fat. country more hilly, road good keeping the narrow, rolling valleis {valleys}, with escarpments of ferrigenous sandstone & indications of coal, with clay marl &c
June Sunday, 20th Clear & quite cool, started, without turning loose, to find better feed, rolled on 3¾ ms. & stopped by a spring run with tolerable grass, & got breakfast, started & about noon crossed a spring run with very cold clear water, & its banks fringed with shrubery, quite an oasis in this barren region of sage, directly began to ascend quite a long hill from whose sumit, we had a fine view of the jagged outline of the left ridge of the Sweet Water clearly defined against the blue sky, & of its detached & ragged spurs, thrown into some distance into the basin below us, sage in abundance, crossed 2 boggy spring runs, with their accompanying patches of grass & stopped at 3 in another, to rest again; road good; the hill near our last camp is composed 1st of clay{,} 2nd light gray conglomerate, 3d ferrigenous d{itt}o {conglomerate}, the whole overlaid, by the usual quantity & vanity of gravel, pebbles & boulders, quite clear & warm; rolled on, in 4 or 5 ms. crossed a clear quick run about 3 yds wide, & in 2 or 3 turned off ¼ to the left & camped near said run about dark, dis 7½—20. grass indifferent, Woodruff & Brown out, canon fired for them at midnight.
21st Clear, still & warm. Woodruff & G Brown still out, sage for fuel last night & this morning. started ¼ to 9{.} road alternateing with clay & gravel, kept quartering for the Sweet Water, passed some pools on our right & left, with a deposit in around some of them answering tolerably well for saleratus, passed on our right & left broken masses & ranged of rock granite with only a few scanty pines & a scanty vegetation in their crevices, benches & fissures & in a few places some scanty vegetation, noon halt, on the Sweet Water, near Rock Independence, dis 7½. a few willows on its banks, about it is about 35 yds. wide {& very winding{.}} Clouding up, thunder at 2, Woodruff & G Brown came to us{.} they staid here last night with the co just before us, which company a woman died yesterday or last night & was buried near the rock, grass indiferent. Started ¼ to 3, showered a little, soon came to Rock I, where the road passes over a narrow bottom, with the Rock close on one side & the river the other, a stake put up opposite the center of Rock marked to fort John 175¼ the face of Rock next the road from base to summit, almost full of names; this Rock {& the round like rock opposite,} is isolated, merely as to surface appearance, & are composed, as well as the neighboring ranges on both sides, of a coarsish gray granite, it is from 1/3 to ½ mile long & about 130 ft. high, & like its neighboring fellows seamed & fiorrowed {& broken} in every direction, about 1 mile or more crossed the Sweet Water, now about 2½ ft. deep, passed on & went through a narrow pass, made through the point of a granite ridge, & in riseing on either hand about 399 400 & from ½ to ¾ ml. from Devils Gate, where the Sweet Water cuts its way through the same granite point, in a short distance further, camped in a semicircle on the right bank of S.W. & just below the outlet of a quick runing, clear rivulet about 3 yds. wide, with plenty of good grass, dis 7¾—15¼. road as usual. As you pas up the bank of the S.W. the point on one hand & the main range on the other, gradualy narrow shut off the narrow bottom, until they inclose the stream, with verticle walls from 30 to 40 yds apart at the base & about 400 ft. high, for from 3 to 400 yds., the stream in this narrow gate is choked up, by masses fallen from above, in some places to appe{ar}ance, leaving only a narrow channel 3 or 4 yds. wide, whole fall through gate from 10 to 18 feet, near the foot of the gate, there is a verticle vent, about 10 yds wide, runing diagonaly across the sumit to the road, you cross 4 dikes of trap from 10 to 40 yds. across at top, runing as near as I could judge, without compass ENE & WSW, while the gate is NE & SW, crossing the road, you soon come to a bed of coarse conglomerate, & a little further, granite & another trap dike, which was as far as my time would permit.
22nd a little cloudy still & warm{.} {.} Crossed rivulet near camp & in 2 or 3 ms. another like it, low bottom very narrow & continualy crossed by the winding river, which for ms. keeps close to the left range, prairie bottom, slightly rolling, with scanty grass, but abundance of sage & absintha bushes, left range very naked, right range higher, & densly timbered in places from base to sumit with pine & cedar, & studed in many places with snow banks. 1 wide gap of about 1 mile in the left range & a narrow one, appearing practicable for wagons at this distance, & nearly opposite in right d{itt}o, road over clay, in some places sprinkled with sand & fine gravel, level, but very {...yhish} in some places from slight inequalities in the clay, noon halt, on river bank, grass good, just here absinthe predominated, 1 thunder rool {roll}. L Young's wagon axeltree broke, dis 10 ms., (the most regular fracture is vertical as indicated, at Devils Gate, & road pass, by the rest through which the river rushes, & this corresponding faces of the walls to the trap dikes) rolled on, soon passed quite a pond on our left, & began to wind among the hills, crossed a rivulet about 3 yds. wide fringed with large sage bushes, banks steep, in comeing out Jake & Lyon broke their traces, whanged them up, & went on{.} crossed another rivulet about 2 yds wide, & 2 isolated granite masses, one on our right, the other on our left & some distance apart, camped in a circle, near the river, on a strip of low bottom, & at the foot of quite a hill, {.} at 8 oclock PM. dis 10¾—20¾, road tolerably level, but very gravely, & a good many large pebbles & boulders in some places; the right hand range some lower than in AM. & angles more rounded, with quite a level & smooth outline, left range still ragged & bare, river still run close by the base of the left range, with its low bottom more elevated, & in some places the hills ran to it, prarie bottom very hilly. While nooning learned that one of the emigrant companies, just behind us, lost a young man named Columbus Tustin 18 or 19 yrs old, he was drowned in swiming a horse across the N fork, another gap in left range just opposite our camp, narrower than the one opposite noon halt, grass good, which is the first we found since noon halt, our route being mostly among the hills.
23rd slight clouds, very pleasant, cool nights & warm days, started at 7. soon passed close on our left, the head board of a grave, marked Matilda Crowley, B July 16th 1830. D July 7th 1846. in 1½ ms. came to a small pebbly rivulet 5 ft. wide, with a few good sized trees growing each side of the road, we called it Cotton Wood Creek, opposite the mouth of this creek, & for some distance in its length, the left range is entirely worn away, leaveing an extended view to the N of the dry & apparently level country beyond, extending far away, with its level outline drawn in the blue sky in the distance, leaveing rivulet, passed just on our right, a short, low, isolated wall of calcareous sandstone, whole bottom quite level, passed a low granite ridge on our right, on the left right bank, & soon passed its point & turned on the river again, right hand range as in the PM of 22nd. noon halt, just at the entrance of 2 hard ranges of granite. fast abo{...} between the road which the river pass dis 8½{.} grass good, absinthe quite thrifty, road heavy from sand & gravel, started between ¼ & ½ past 1, directly took a detour to the left & rose a slight elevation to avoid the pass, continued on over the prarie bottom, till ½ past 5 when we struck the river again, passed on a little further & camp in a circle on river bank ¼ past 6{.} dis 8½—17. grass good, wind N by E, 1 small emi{grant} co camped just ahead of us about 2½ mile, another d{itt}o {emigrant co} about 1½ ml, they are the 2 cos. that left the Platte crossing the same morning we did, sage & absinthe both plenty, & thrifty, nothing new in the river scenery except that its ranges are more broken, a fine view of the lofty peaks of the Wind river chain of the Rocky Mts. from out camp. N Taylor received 21 lb. flour for extra work ferrying out of the last amount pd by emigrants. 24th road level, but sand & gravely. teams tired.
24th Fleecy clouds. Wind SW. Started about 6. Grass good along the river from about 1½ or 2 ms. road then leaves the river again to cut off a bend, sandy & gravely, in about 3 miles, comes to a valley runing from bluff to river, grass indifferent, pools of spring water it occasionally, very bogy in a wet time, road crossed it just above a spring, ice still in places from 1 foot to 18 in below the bogy surface, water sulphery from bogire, some of the pools, broogish, from the saline deposit, the vally has a smell like a salt marsh, from our camp to this spring 6½ ms. The river ranges begin to loose their rocky characteristic, & lower down into bluffs, mounds, table sumits, & long swells, & look green. Intervening rolling & hilly, with sage & absinthe in abundance & in some places very thrifty. In 17¾ ms. reached S water again, & camped in a semicircle on its bank ¼ past 3, road sandy & gravely except in the spring vally, which was clay. Lopes plenty, some killed. From our camp, but little to be seen in any direction, but low rolling hills, covered with scanty grass & stunted sage, just sufficient to make them look green. Fuel plenty, of sage, willow & absinthe. G Summe set shoes on Leon & Jake.
25th Clear & pleasant, nights cool, days warm. Wind from S.S.W. a sage hen was killed last night, they are very like a prairie hen in size & build, darker gray. Started ½ past 6, wind high & cool, crossed the river ascended & descended a spur of the river hills, into a paivillon (little meadow) cut off just above by another spring{,} clay & marl, which also crossed, & came again into the bottom. kept up the river & crossed a small spring run & stopped for noon halt ½ past 11{.} dis 8¾, grass good; very coarse conglomerate in pudding stone in the hills on both sides of river at this point. quite large onions, dandelions & strawberries in blossom. rolled on & in about 1½ ms. began to rise a very long & high hill, near the top its sides & sumit covered with a light grey earthy limestone, in thin & broken up layers as far as showing. descending a little, quite cross red & light colored & whiteish fine grained sandstone. (commonly called, "grind stone grit") ascending again, you cross a light brown & in some places blueish compact limestone, descending a little & on riseing again, you cross bars of ferrigenous & whiteish compact sandstone, cropping out in tolerably thick strata, at an inclination or dip of about 30°, from this point in the road you have a fine view, of the snowy peaks of Wind River chain & of Table rock on the South side of the pass, here GAS & AC turned off to the right & went about ¼ mile to ‚Öî the way down the Northern slope of ridge & found quite a bank of snow, & a fine bed of red mineral clay, rtnd to road, you then descend into a basin among the hills, which again become lower & smoother, passed 3 ponds, from appearance & taste snow water, further on crossed a small bogy spring run, then passed an abundance of trap rock, cropping out here & there verticaly in thin layers, passed 1 & crossed 2 bogy spring runs, & went on & camped in semicircle, on a clear rivulet about 6 ft wide, grass in the basin & on the spring runs, & here tolerable. just below our camp, is a fine grove of Quaking Aspen, of 5 or 6 acres, & some of them 10 inches diameter at the butt. road hard & good, except in a few places where it was rocky & pebly, but hard on oxen's feet, on account of sharp gravel, the wind blew right against almost a hurricane, as we crossed the high rocky ridges, & it continued quite high all day, & very cool. we found a species of white clover here, called by the traders Esparcette, or wild, or spanish clover. snow banks near the tops of the low hills around is in 2 or 3 places. dis 11½ ms. dandelions in blossom & some seeding.
26th Thermometer at sunrise 28°. froze thin ice in the water pail. started about 8, crossed & soon crossed a spring run, with Quaking Asp around it. in about 2 ms. crossed a branch of the Sweet Water from 10 to 12 yds. wide, in 3 or 4 ms. another about 6 or 8 yds wide, next crossed the Sweet Water now so deep as to come up to the wagon boxes, into some of them & turned out for noon. grass good & plenty. dandelions & other flowers in full bloom, & some of the grasses seeding, at the same time at the edge of the narrow bottom & at the foot of the hills, there are heavy banks of snow, so that one can pick flowers with one hand & snow ball with the other. Latitude, meridian observation by Prof O Pratt 42° 32' 42". E Glines came up from the ferry. dis 11 ms.; rose the hill & kept along over level & gently rolling ground, hard, & gravely, now & then a little rocky; passed the culminating (or dividing) line between the eastern & western waters, haveing its southern termination at a point, in the southern range of hills, where there is the lowest elevation of about 1 mile in length, with a small mound near its center, descended a little into hill basin, & turned over a small rise on our right, leaveing the road for a short distance, & camped on the Sweet Water, about ½ mile from the road, dis 7¾—18¾, grass good, & plenty & abundance of red willow fringed the banks.
27th Sunday, cool, clear, & pleasant; A.C. sent a letter to his wife by some trains going men returning to the states {8 in number}. Started rather late, but soon enough to keep out of the way of the next companies & get better feed at our camp. crossed a small run running S.W. breeze from S.E. just before crossing run, hills on each side of road, have heavy beds of red mineral clay. Soon as we crossed run turned out to feed. dis 6¼. Started & rolled over a gravely road, though hard, crossed a quicksand bed, with a little water{.} dis 9 ms.—15¼ . in going through the South Pass, which is from 20 to 25 miles wide from the bluffs on the south side to the base of the Wind river Chain on the North, you would hardly suspect you were crossing a line of portion of the grass back bone of North America, far from the Sweet Water to our present Camp, with the exception of the snowy sumits peaks & 1 large mound, you see nothing but shallow valleys, wide plains & low swelling hills, the road in fact for the last 34 miles, being much more level than in most prarie countries for the same distance, sage in abundance as usual, which with absinthe or grease bush is our fuel tonight, red & redish clay, sprinkled over slightly with gravel makeing a hard good road, but several on the feet of unshod oxen.
28th Clear & pleasant, started ½ past 7, road hard & some gravely as usual, quite level, passed over a bed of limestone, came to a fork in the road{.} we took the left for Bridger, the right leads to the Bear River bend. scenery that of a gently rolling plain, with low hills occasionaly, sprinkled with gravel & covered with sage, & scanty growth of grass, main soil, clay, redish & yellowish, alternating. noon halt on Little Sandy. . now about 10 or 12 yds wide{.} dis 13½, grass scanty, scattered cumuli. ½ past 4 started & crossed Little Sandy{.} in a short distance met Mr. Bridger & 2 men with him, as the Prest. wished to converse with him, we soon turned a little to the left and camped at 6 on the creek we crossed{.} grass scanty, dis 1¾ {—15¼} cloudy. Prest. Young & the 12 had a conversation with Mr. Bridger, T Bullock, Wm. Clayton & A. Carrington took notes.
29th Mr. Bridger & men, continued on to Ft. John, clear & pleasant, view very extensive over a level plain, bounded in some dircetions by low hills & low table mounds. {& in some by the horizon{,}} in others by snow cap
ed mts., soil & veg{etation} as usual. Started, ¼ to 8, rolled on over level gravely road to Big Sandy, 6¾ mls. now about 60 yds wide, grass good, from Ford on Little Sandy to that in Big Sandy, 8½ ms. These 2 streams are said to be perfectly dry in the fall, you then get water by diging. scattering clouds. Latitude of this ford by Prof Pratt 42° 06' 42". a few scattering cotton wood on this stream. crossed Big Sandy ½ past 1, rose a slight ascent into a very extensive plain, quite warm, road level & gravely, in many places, limestone in their strata, thickly strewn over the surface, about 4 PM cloudy cooler, plain more rolling, at ½ 9 PM, camped in circle on Big Sandy{.} dis 17—23¾.
30th Clear & warm, started ½ past 8, camped ¼ to 12 on the East bank of Green River, dis 8 ms. After dinner all busy, some washing, others at work on our 2 rafts, some smithing, & others burning coal. about 4 clouded up & wind rose & blew very hard from W. by S. About 5 Br. S. Brannon {& 2 with him} came into our camp from California. Green River is now about 160 yds wide & so deep that animals have to swim in crossing, & current rapid, quite a number of tolerable sized narrow leaved cotten Woods onscattered along its banks. Our camp is about 4 3 ms. above the outlet of B Sandy; in many places on our route from S Pass to this crossing, there are strong indications of coal, iron, lead & copper. Brannan reports our battalion in California, & the brethren who went round by sea, are settled in St. Francisco, & neighboring villages, but will mostly move into the valley of San Joaquin, about 300 x 50 ms. they have already begun to farm about 30 ms. above the settlements, he brought a file of the "California Star". Both rafts finished about dark.
July 1st Fleecy clouds, very pleasant. After breakfast began to swim cattle to tow rafts Several complaining of headache, back ache and some sick at the stomach, oweing in a great measure probably, to extra fatigue & exposure to the chilly night air. Our rafts set over 5 & the other 1, when the wind got so high they had to quit. This 2nd division abandoned their raft it ran so heavy & began to build another, towards evening wind fell & 1st division put over 4 more wagons—10 in all.
2nd Clear, warm, & still; just before sunrise, swam over quite a no. of cattle & horses; both rafts crossing wagons; 1st division raft 26 x 11 ft.; 2nd d{itt}o {division} new raft 25 x 10. musquitoes quite troublesome; many still complaining, with what is called by the emigrants the camp fever; some getting better & some geting sick; nearly all the stock & all the wagons but 18, over safe & well.
3d very Cloudy & dark, cool strong wind from W & W by N. BL Adams down with the camp fever. Thundered & showered occasionaly; all over safe; Elder Woodruff & A Carrington laid hands on Br. Adams at his request, started between 3 & 4, keeping near the river over a clay sand & gravel road, quite heavy, & camped in a circle near on the river at 5, dis 3{m}s., wind low & clouds broke away. musquitoes very thick; nearly opposite, cliffs, slopeing, vertical & overhanging of indurated green clay, or marl, from 100 to 150 ft. high. grass pretty good. Adams better.
4th Sunday—clear & warm. low clouds skirting the horizon. P Young, E Glines, R Badger, A Farr, & George Woodward went back to meet our next company, & help their families & tell them about camping places. A Carrington lent R Badger his bridled martingales. 1 of Br. Crow's oxen died, some think poisoned by a week. about 3 P.M. 12 of the batalion from Pueblo came into our camp. well armed & mounted, they left their co. at the N Fork crossing, last monday, A Lyman was with them.
5th clear & pleasant, Started about 8, & camped on Ham's Black's fork at 5, dis 20 ms. . road good. grass on the route in a manner none, at this camp poor—surface of country rooling, the edges of the table mounds & the bluffs of Ham's fork, are in some places nearly vertical & about 100 ft high or more, composed of indurated green clay, gray marl & an occasional thin strata of earthy limestone. from 10 cloudy, this fork is now about {30 or 40} 50 yds wide, , water turbid—
6th Clear & pleasant—a fine fish resembling salmon trout was caught last night—the bluffs opposite our camp, at the mouth of a ravine, are composed of clay slate, micaceous sandstone, marl, indurated clay, in thin alternate horizontal strata, interspered with their layers of fibrous gypsum, (saten spar) & then whole highly stained with oxide of iron, & where exposed fastly decomposing, the crop out reached 2/3 the height, covered with gravel, pebbles & rounded stones of various sizes & kinds. Started about 8{,} kept up Black's fork about 4 ms., & then Ham's fork about 4 mls., crossed Ham's fork at a good ford, grass good here, crossed over the divide & in about 1 miles crossed Black's fork, for good; passed some isolated ridges in a very decomposing state, from 2 to 400 ft. high, composed, reckoning from base to sumit or vice versa, of thick horizontal beds of indurated green clay, & brown micaceous sandstone, alternateing & thiner beds of earthy marl; crossed Black's fork again, ford good, about 30 yds wide, & camped on its banks about ½ past 4, dis 18¼ ms. Grass very good & several kinds; scattering cotton wood—patches of willows, at our camp plenty, also currant bushes, currants good size—rose bushes—dandelion seeding—flax very thrifty & seeding—small trees, very like crab apple plenty—road as usual, except less sand & gravel & fewer stones. A fine breeze from W by S—
7th Clear & pleasant, with a pleasant breeze. Started about 8, kept up Black's fork, in about 3 ms. crossed it. ford & grass good—rolled on & crossed a creek about 8 yds wide ford good, soon came to Black's fork, & halted ¼ past 12. —road rough from gravely hills & dry ravines. grass good. cool breeze from W by S & W by N. a range of snowy mts lying off some distance to our left, trending W by N & E by S—gradualy sloping down as their eastern extremity till they loose their snowy sumits—Started at 2, road up Black's fork very stony in several places. passed where the Oregon Emi{grant}s who come this way turn off to the right about 2 ms. below Bridger—then crossed 7 mountain streams from 3 to 12 yds wide & camped in circle on bank of 1 of them ½ or ‚Öî ml. above Bridger —grass is good on & between all these streams, from the second bank to the fork about 1½ ml—the streams are very rapid & have a good many fine black speckled trout in them & are fringed with willow & have several cotton woods—scattered near by Bridger's fort consists of 2 long, rough, 1 story log cabins, built in the form of an L, with a small enclosure for stock built of upright poles—scattered around near the fort are 19 lodges, most of them said to belong to Bridger, squaws of the Snake Indian tribe—
8th clear. quite a frost—very cool—at 7 getting warmer—musquitoes thick—one of the mules John Gleason drives, got hurt last night by getting his fore righ{t} hind foot between his halter & neck—The snow peaks about 15 mls South of us are gleaming brightly in the morning sun—no fresh meat in camp—game scarce—Carrington & Driggs ground about 1 peck of feed corn of B L A{dam}'s. Latitude of Fort Bridger, M observation by Prof O Pratt 41° 19' 13" Barometrical height 6665 ft.
9th Clear & warm—Started about 8, took Hastings' new road. 6¼ ml{.} halted at a fine spring to water, a few cotton woods in it bous, grass only for a small co—cool breeze from WSW—in short distance crossed the run near a high square table mound, with thick beds of indurated green clay, plenty of Quaking Asp & a few snow banks—ascended a long stony rise to an elevated sage plain, passed over & discarded a long steep hill, & then desended gradualy to Muddy creek, 6 yds. wide, 2 ft. deep, with stony bed, fringed with willow, with a few cotton wood, crossed it & camped on its bank at ½ past 5, dis 6¾—13—grass good & plenty, especialy a rank broad leaved kind resembling wheat or rye, growing in bunches, now from 3 to 4½ ft high and full headed—road good except the stony places—soil clay—red mineral clay croping out in the bluffs of Muddy—several still sick—Latitude by roadside, at top of ascent from spring run 41° 16' 11" M observation by Prof Pratt—Grind & sythe stone {12 ft. bed stratified} close on the right of road as you cross Muddy going W.—Scrubby pines white cedar scattered over the hills in places, seldom as high as 15 ft—
10th Fleecy clouds{,} very pleasant—Started about 8—in 3½ ms came to a mineral spring with a strong copperas & alum taste, rose the a divide between muddy Bear river, descended into one of the Bear river Swalles or valleys—soon passed a similar tasting spring—.continued on {5½ ms—9} & halted at 2 where there was good grass {& 2 good springs of pure water} & a red & green powder spring opposite, across the bottom—9 ms—{(9ms to gunpowder spring) the road over Bear & Muddy dide we think would be better if made through a gap 1 mile or more S. with little labor probably, makeing ascent & descent much less, & more gradual enroute more direct.} both sides of the divide & of the valleys the road passes through, there is abundance of red mineral clay and plenty of sandston of any degree of fineness or coarseness that may be required of excelent —& plenty of excelent limestone—large beds of handsome conglomerates about the springs, calcareous tufa—near the first one travertin, with silecious nodules—started & soon began to rise the divide between Bear river, ascent long & gradual, Barometric height {blank space} by O Pratt. Descent rapid in two points very steep—on the sumit limestone in thin strata, vertical & diping—in descending strong indications of coal in several places —kept on through a narrow vally to a gage, turned left over a low hill into another valley. & in a short dis{tance} crossed a shallow rivulet 3 yds. wide, stony bed, & camped by twilight on its bank{.} Dis 9—18. cloudy & cool—west of the divide less red clay & more vertical strata—Miles Goodyear & 2 men & a Mr. Craig of Ray Euel Co & Mr Truete of Shelby Co Ill. & 2 other men, camped 1½ ms. from us on Bear river, from California, Goodyear & his men for Bridger, the other 4 for the states—this point was considered by Craig to be about ½ way from San Francisco to St. Josephs Mo. by the lower route & Bridger—on the lower route a drive of 75 ms. over a salt plain without water{.} Craig & co lost 5 horses on it—
11th Sunday. clear & pleasant—frost last night & ice in the bucket—a fine spring between camp & first rise—there are two roads here, one to the right down the creek further, the other bears more south—about 1¼ miles due south from rivulet ford, & about 200 yds to the left of where the southern road begins its 2nd rise & near a black alder bush, is a fine spring of mineral tar, it exutes from the slope of the hill among sandstone boulders, & its deposition of pitch & asphaltum cover a surface of 30 yds. length by 3 breadth, near it there is an abundan of starch root, an excelent edible root, white, & about the size of a pheasant egg—Antelope plenty in Mud{d}y & Bear rivers & plenty of trout in latter—G Brown & Driggs took Jake & Lyon & rode on the southern road to Bear river about 5 ms. gone 4 or 5 hours—very warm—about dusk, camp assembled to choose route, they chose right hand or northern—sulpher spring at point of cliff 200 yds. South of where road comes to rivulet—
12th Cloudy—warm—started about 7—from rivulet to Bear r{iver} 1¾ ms. 2 low stony hills, 2nd with steep rise & fall—Bear r about 3 yds wide & 2 ft. deep{.} rapid current & stony bed—soil yellowish, redish & white clay, supporting a ranker growth of vegetation—noon halt by need to{.} cliff dis 9¾ ms. grass good—road good—2 lopes killed—started & soon began to rise along gradual & winding ascent to quite an elevation, from which we had a fine view of mountain, hill dale & valley. without snowpeaks, generaly covered with an abundant growth of vegetation—descended a moderate slope & found a fine spring close on our left at foot of hill. good grass round—passed on ground descending by easy slopes & narrow vales—camped about 6 in a fine vale (Mathew's vale) 3 or 400 yds South of camp a fine spring—grass good & sufficient for a large camp—dis 3¾—16½ —Prest. Young and a few wagons with him stayed at noon halt. he was sick—just back of our camp a fine cliff of silecious sandstone & pudding stone, Capped of with beds of calcareous limestone Grindstone, all the beds thick & horizontal—about ‚Öî low apertures extending farther—bottom dusty—swallows nests & firebrands in it—it is a thick bed of silecious sandstone—about sunset heavy thunder & drops enough to cause a full arched rainbow——
13th Some cloudy—very pleasant—the Pres did not come up last night, a few went back this morning horseback, to see him—fuel white, cedar from cliffs—sage much less abundant—began on our last sack of flour, BL Adams, 100 lbs. he had 200 lbs.—½ past 11 Elder Kimball came up horesback, & reported the Prest. better, Col Rockwood worse—little past 12 a light shower some thunder{.} Camp called together, & by Prests. counsel 23 wagons started at 3, to fix road to kanyon of Weber river & examine Reed's cutoff, while the sick are getting better, Prof O Pratt leader—Prest & Col Rockwood still quite sick—Driggs killed a lope—bridle halter in the range.)}
14th Some cloudy, quite warm, pleasant breeze from S by W—Several sick with camp fever—Elder Woodruff returned & reported Prest. Young better, Col Rockwood very sick— cloudy & warm —
15th Some cloudy—very pleasant—about 11 quite a shower—with thunder—½ past 12 the Prest. came up{.} the sick, nearly all better—½ past 1 thunder again & showery—started about 2, in about 2 ms. came to a good spring close by the road & another opposite plenty of stock water, & good grass in abundance—camped ¼ to 4, dis 4½ ms. road good. grass good & 3 good springs—Cliffs North of Camp fast decomposing, consisting of thick beds of silecious sandstone & pudding stone & some old red sandstone, small caves & much honeycombed in places, red clay in abundance—1 lope killed —
16th only 2 or 3 of night guard on at time for a long time back—at 5 a short thunder shower—at 7 another d{itt}o {short thunder shower}—½ past 8 some cloudy, quite warm—started about 9{.} kept down some narrow vale. springs & small Quaking Asps, each side at different points—noon halt about ½ past 12{.} —road good—hills on each side of vale very high & steep with less red clay—at halt 2 fine springs, & verticle cliffs of yellow, gray & redish sandstone , copper by pudding stone, beds thick & diping, no means of ascertaining the strike or dip—grass good, & dwarf ceder plenty—OP Rockwell came to us, reported 20 ms. to fork of Reeds Cut off & kanyon road—started, down the same vale, quite narrow, road good, except crossing the spring run 6 times, banks steep—camped about 7, grass tolerable, water from run, dis 9½—16¼—
17th clear & warm—Prest. Young quite sick last night & this morning—iron axletree welded—started at 10, soon came to Bear river some 40 yds wide, average depth 1 foot, current rapid, channel winding, bed stony—quite a number of narrow headed cotton wood—road good, dis 2½ & camped in a ring ¼ to 12—grass good—about 2, the Pioneer part of 12 except Prest. Young sick, A Lyman with Brown's detachment & Elder Woodruff hunting horses & a few of the breth{er}n 10 in all repaired to the mountains, clothed, opening prayer by Elder Richards, signs &c prayer by HC Kimball, signs &c prayer by GA Smith, returned at 5, all hands rolled boulders going up & coming down, A Carrington stood guard—
18th ice in the water bucket—at 7 clear & warm—Prest quite sick, some easiar—at 10 prayer meeting—at the Prests. request through Elder Kimball, voted that we all go on, except a few wagons, that the Prest. may be more retired—adjourned till 2—met at 2—sacrament administered. Elder Kimball gave some good teachings, & remarked that the Prest. had been washed & anointed all over, & had slept well & waked & looked brighter, & would be able to go on in a day or two—both meetings good, Bishop Lewis presideing—
19th Frost near the river—at 7 clear & warm—started about 8{.} Prest. better—soon after we started the Prest. & the few wagons with him started on a short distance—kept down Weber river, soon crossed & put up guide board, marked Pratts Pass. 74¼ ms. to Bridger—came to a spring run directly, crossed it & began to ascend a portion of the mountain{.} got to top very easily & gradualy{.} 80 ms. from Bridger—struck over into head of another spring run, kept down a while, stopped to water & turned to right to avoid a long kanyon in run, rose a hill & descended a long slope, & crossed a branch of Weber about 6 yds wide clear &c & thickly fringed with willow, camped on its bank, dis 13¾{.} road stony & rough in many places, but excelent, with a little more labor, for a mountain road. grass indifferent—this branch empties into Weber between its 2 kanyons, reported to be some 5 or 6 mls apart—Walker was out all night, came in safe this morning {20th}—snow mts. in sight from ridge, about 20 ms ahead—pudding stone still prevailing in the outcrop—Red Fork—spring runs & this fork have in a manner, no bottom land, being shut in close by hills.
20th Frost, ice in the buckets—at 7 clear & warm—nights cool, days hot—burnt a small coal pit last night. some tire seting this morning—started about ½ past 10—kept up Kanyon Fork, crossed it 11 times, passing one bitter cotton wood & quaking asp grove, & going through one, & camp on same fork, a little past 5. distance 7¼ ms—very hot at noon—road work at the fords & cutting willows—path so narrow through the willows & grove that one cannot walk & drive—road stony & rough, rather the worst on wagons we have had—grass here, & in all this fork, poor, very little except the wheat grass, which the animals do not like—very dusty—3 wagons, 6 men, (2 well & 3 sick) tarried—
21stclear & warm, started about 7. crossed fork 1 & soon turned off to right to avoid kanyon—kept up a dry spring run—quaking asp, bitter cotton wood, balsam fir, & spruce pine—good spring water in 2 places—ascent very gradual—road good—at top at 11 blank space}}—had a good view of spurned & ragged mountain ranges, some with snow on, & also of fine looking valley—descent straight & smooth but pretty steep for about 500 yds, at foot of it a good spring—kept descending gradualy, through a burnt quaking asp grove—soil quick & fertile—vegetation rank—road working—Carrington worked from before start, till past 1—not so warm at noon on account of a light breeze—soon came to where the springs make a run—both a the ravines through which we ascend & descend are quite narrow, hills on each side steep—Adams & Driggs worked on road some—a few oak shrubs—a few small sugar maples—got clear of the timber & thickets & kept down run awhile, then turned to the right to avoid kanyon—rose a long, high & tolerably steep ascent to the top of northern ridge of run—Cannon team & Br. Frost's gave out here—descended same ridge—hill long & quite steep—struck another spring run & kept down it, road very rough, crossing run often—cotton wood, fir tre{e}s, a few small sugar maple, box elder, &c, service or June berries begin to ripen, very plenty—camped on this view ½ mile back of our front company, after dark, teams on wagons about 13 hours without feed, dis 14 ms.—grass indifferent, nearly all being wheat grass & drying up—limestone croping out faintly in spots both in ascent & descent of ridge between runs—puding stone plenty on this run—some small rushes—all our teams very tired—red clay in places—very dusty—cloudy towards evening—
22nd clouds thick & dark—quite warm all night—started a little before 9 down the run—¼ past 9 overtook the advance company—passed on a short distance, & found where the emigrants had got tired cutting brush & small trees, & turned to the left over a steep hill, we cut on about 150 yds & came out of narrowest part of new kanyon, rocky crags & hills on each side, high & steep—hills directly took a lower elevation, & we soon came in view of the Salt Lake from {10 to} 15 {to} {20} to 20 ms. west of us—the valley including a portion of the slopes is about 10 ms. across—as we proceed down run towards lake, timber & brush give out & a few clumps & fringes of willow & some few scattering cotton wood & box elder on the runs is all the timber or shrubbery in the valley—passed on down run & camped at 6 on its bank, here a pretty stream about 2 yds wide—dis 7¼—clouds mostly gone—musquitoes plenty till after dark, then their music ceased—soil quick & fertile—vegetation fired from drought—grass good though getting some dry & tough—GA Smith, O Pratt & a few brethren started in the morning horseback & explored down kanyon, then turned north keeping the edge of the valley, crossed 2 clear runs about the size of this, all stony beds, came to a saline portion of valley abounding in hot mineral springs, one very large one,—distance traveled & seen ahead, judged to be about 20 ms. north of camp—several pieces of whitish & very porous tufa picked up by the boys near the moths mouth of kanyon—3 quite long & high mountain ranges in the Lake—deep banks of snow on the rocky peaks a few miles SE from camp—several rattlesnakes killed—near the mouth of kanyon, quite a grove of small sugar trees, a few nearly 1 foot through—
23rd clear & warm—started about 7, kept up edge of valley 2 ms. camped on mountain run at 9 near a few small cotton woods & plenty of small willows—about the same distance from mouth of kanyon as last night; since allowed to 2 ms. further from W 2s.—camp gathered ½ past 9—prayer by O Pratt & remarks by Brs. Pratt & Richards—S Roundy{,} S Taft, S Markham, Br. Crow & A. Carrington, appointed as committee to examine & report ground for ploughing{.} committe left the meeting, & reported at ½ past 11, a piece of fine ground for potatoes, beans, buckwheat, &c & had staked off 40 x 20 rods of plough for potatoes—soil fertile, piable loam, with fine gravel from quartz, granite, standstone & hornstone trap—1st furrow turned on potatoe ground at 12—3 ploughs runing through P.M. 1 harrow most of P.M.—dam for irrigateing began at 2—grass mowing for turnip patch at 4—prairie hens here—wandering & silk poded milkweed—about 6 quite cloudy, some thunder, & slight shower —at dark, meeting, Major Pack, staid and reported the Prest. & company this side the mts. on last run, a few ms. back, all better—regulations about teams &c teams {& ploughman} to come on in turns, 4 hrs each, from 4 AM to 8 PM, 4 turns—
24th Some cloudy, quite warm—potatoes all planted—over 5 acres ploughed—A Lyman's & some other ploughs broke—towards evening a light shower—about 3 the Prest. & company came up, all better—