Transcript

Transcript for Spencer, Hiram Theron, "Sketch of Life and Experiences of Patriarch and Mrs. H. T. Spencer, Who Pioneered Magna and Vicinity," [1925?], 3

The next spring when the people could get cattle and horses enough to pull their wagons they started westward.

A great many could not come because they did not have the means to buy cattle, so they had to lay over at Winter Quarters that season.

My uncle and his family and also our family were able to start west.

President Brigham Young and some of the saints had gone on ahead of the rest of us.

Some other boys and myself had to drive loose cattle, walking most of the time behind the train of wagons.

When we got up on the Platte River about fifty miles from Winter Quarters the buffalo were so thick that it was necessary to drive the teams, three and four abreast between the river and the bluffs where it was wide enough, so the train would not be scattered out so far that the buffalo could run through or stampede the horses and cattle.

We taveled westward all of that summer and arrived here in the Salt Lake valley, about September 20, 1847.

Daniel Spencer was captain of the hundred and Horace [Ira] Eldredge was captain of the fifty in the company we were traveling with.

There was between seventy-five and one hundred families altogether.

When we reached the valley the men set to work building more houses in the fort.