Transcript

At Laramie, Wyoming, which was as far as the railroad went at that time, we were taken in covered wagons drawn by ox teams. Captain Warren S. Snow was the captain of the immigrants crossing the plains. Mother [Emma Cotter Tucker] was so very sick and suffered greatly with a gathered breast and her father [Adam Cotter] and my two sisters [Fanny Amelia and Isabel Martin Tucker] walked in advance of the wagon to pick up all the stones or any large stick that might jar the wagon and cause her any unnecessary pain. They would throw them to the side of the road. I was also still very sick, and they worried about me and thought sure they would have to bury me on the plains. Father [Samuel Starkey Tucker] had been a carpenter and joiner in England, having been bound out as an apprentice at the age of nine and working seven years to learn the trade. He also was a coachmaker and stairbuilder and when anyone died crossing the plains, it was his job to make the coffins to bury them in. He said he was so sure that I was going to die that he even waded back through a river with water clear up to his waist to get to a town and buy a board with which to make my coffin. He put the board under the wagon to keep it until he needed it and it was still there when they reached Salt Lake City, on November 2nd.

My sisters told me they remembered there was snow when they reached Salt Lake City and father had to shovel it away before he could pitch our tent.