Transcript
Transcript for Wright, Angus Taylor, Autobiography [ca. 1923], 3-4
Finally after outfitting and loading the stove, tinware, feather-bed and other practical things suitable for a new country, and things which mother had insisted upon bringing along, and making us quite heavily laden, we pulled out with James S. Brown as our Captain. Daddy was chaplain over our small division. I remember but little about the journey across the plains. I remember walking once with mother and crossing a small stream while holding to her hand. Again when near Fort Bridger I fell out of the wagon. I was put in the front of the wagon on the feather-bed and the motion of the wagon gradually worked me forward and I finally fell on to the tongue of the wagon and then down to the ground. Fortunately the wheels passed on either side of me or I should not have been here to tell the story. A couple of soldiers came along and I remember them picking me up. It is reported that they said: “Here is one of those damn Mormons, now you cant kill then with a ten ton wagon.”
When we finally neared Salt Lake City, we camped long enough to clean and dress up. Mother put on me my new velvet suit and I am reported to have remarked: “My! Brigham wont know me, will he mother?”. We arrived in Salt Lake City on August 18, 1859 tired and dusty but very happy after a long but successfull trip under good guidance and the Priesthood. We were met there by William Strong and his sons, relatives of Daddy’s, who packed us into his white top spring wagon and with a good span of horses cantered away while his sons drove our cattle. The change was an inspiration; the spring wagon, the horses, the clean road, the shade and the ride after the long walk was a little taste of heaven.