Transcript

I left in the Spring of 1847 and moved to what is now called Florence on the Missouri River.

Worked this summer with John D. Lee at what was called Summer Quarters about 18 miles from Florence. But this amounted to nothing and in the Fall I found myself with nothing with which to pursue my journey and on the 15th of September 1847 George Washington Woolsey Hickerson was born at 5 o’clock P.M.

And now notwithstanding my great poverty I was not altogether discouraged. I went into Missouri and labored with all the power and might that I possessed and finally succeeded in obtaining a scant outfit with which in the Spring of 1848 I started for Great Salt Lake Valley in the company of Elder Willard Richards one of the First Presidency of the Church, and it was not until the 4th or 5th of July that we got well under way from Florence. It was a very hard trip on me, my wife being in poor health and part of the time two teams to drive with the assistance of Isaac my little son who was only about eight years old. But we arrived in the Valley on the 19th of October and notwithstanding my scant means I do not think we have done altogether without bread any one whole day but we had some bread every day.