While the initial exodus of Latter-day Saints from Nauvoo in 1846 is fairly well known, the story of the main migration of the Church from Nauvoo is largely untold, William G. Hartley said at the Sons of Utah Pioneers Symposium Nov. 11.

Brother Hartley, a historian with the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Church History at BYU, was the dinner speaker at the symposium. He spoke on "The Trials of Crossing Iowa."The entire city of Nauvoo was "a wagon-making workshop" during the winter of 1845-46, Brother Hartley said, as the Saints had been told to get ready for the exodus. The previous October, at general conference, those attending were told that Nauvoo would be evacuated in the spring "when the grass grows and the water runs."

The vanguard party, what came to be known as "the Camp of Israel" began to cross the Mississippi River in February 1846. Many wagons ferried across the river until it froze late in the month. Then many were able to cross on the ice. Finally, on March 1, Brigham Young and the Quorum of the Twelve led off the Camp of Israel.

"Our best estimates are that 3,000 people" were in the advance group, Brother Hartley noted. What is not very well known by many Church members is that another 7,000 left in the spring "when the roads were good, when `the grass grows and the water runs' as was the original plan," he said.

The Camp of Israel could not continue the trek immediately because too many people showed up with too little supplies. "It was a terrible dragshoot on the advance company: too many people and not enough food," Brother Hartley said.

That necessitated setting up temporary settlements where the people could prepare themselves for the completion of the trek the following year. In Iowa, the three main settlements were Garden Grove, Mt. Pisgah and Miller's Hollow (later called Kanesville.)

But they were not the only ones. Brother Hartley said historians have identified about 70 other tiny settlements in an eight-square-mile area. "We guessed at a lot of them, because we just don't know for sure where they were, but we know about them from diary and life-story accounts."

He said most of the Nauvoo Church members did not come west in 1847. They came between 1848 and 1852. "Using Kanesville as an outfitting point, they organized a lot of wagon trains. Finally in 1852, Brigham Young said

in effectT, `You people are getting too comfortable out there on those nice Iowa farms; you get out here.' So the word went out to close down Kanesville and close down the Mormon settlements."

The story of the Saints' crossing of Iowa is better known to local residents who live near the Mormon Trail there than it is to most members of the Church, Brother Hartley noted. Having mapped the trail, he is acquainted with some of the local residents and their intense interest in what they consider a part of their own historical heritage.

Though most are not members of the Church, they are keenly aware of events that happened in their area in 1846. For example, Paul Gunzenhauser, who owns the land where the Garden Grove settlement was located, has identified where he thinks many of the Mormons' cabins were located.

Brother Hartley said an eighth-grade class from a school in Murray, Iowa, led by their teacher, Bill Carper, obtained a state grant to produce a videotape and pamphlet about the Mormon Trail between Garden Grove and Mt. Pisgah.

An organization has been formed called the Iowa Mormon Trails Association, and their activities are an offical part of the Iowa State Sesquicentennial next year, he said.

He told of visiting the Wayne County Museum in Corydon, Iowa, where there is an exhibit honoring William Clayton and the hymn he wrote, "Come, Come, Ye Saints," as the "hymn heard 'round the world."