Handcart chapter
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CASPER, Wyo. — There's a timeless quality to the land in this region of central Wyoming. Between far-flung population centers are mile after mile of sagebrush-covered plains and rolling hills, with fences, noncongested highways and an occasional cattle herd being the only apparent evidences of civilization.
This is high country. Approaching Casper from the west, one crosses the Continental Divide several times. The wind seems to blow constantly in all seasons.
The wide and shallow North Platte River flows through Casper, a reminder that it was here the Mormon pioneers left behind this avenue of westward migration and began to travel up the Sweetwater River.
And it was near here 150 years ago Oct. 19 that the Martin handcart company of Latter-day Saints crossed the North Platte for the last time. Winter arrived suddenly, snow fell that night, and 14 members of the company perished, including the husband of Elizabeth Horrocks Jackson. As he lay next to her in the night, she found to her horror that he had died, but there was nothing she could do but wait until morning, when he was buried with the others.
In this sesquicentennial year of the handcart chapter of Church history, the 40-year-old Mormon History Association chose to have its annual conference May 24-27 in Casper, some 50 miles from the Church's Martin's Cove Historic Site.
Unaffiliated with the Church, the association draws its membership from people of diverse faiths, perspectives, cultural backgrounds and scholarly attainments, with a common interest in Mormon history; a portion of them are Church members.
Some 600 attendees — the second- or third-largest turnout, according to association president Phillip L. Barlow — gathered for presentations, tours, and other activities. Topics were wide-ranging, but much of the conference centered on the handcarts, particularly the ill-fated Martin and Willie companies.
Thus, this was the first of at least three major observances of the sesquicentennial, the other two follow in succeeding weekends along the Handcart Trail in Kearney, Neb., and Iowa City, Iowa. (See May 20 Church News for advance details on the Kearney and Iowa City celebrations. The Church News will provide on-the-scene coverage of both.)
It is a time to remember this innovative but brief experiment in overland travel, a time to recall the success of eight of the 10 handcart companies that embarked 1856-1860 but to remember also the suffering, grief and ultimate triumph of the ill-fated Willie and Martin handcart companies.
What follows is a sampler of some of the highlights from the conference.
Pre-conference tour
One of two pre-conference bus tours covered points along the Mormon Trail west of Casper, including Martin's Cove.
"We ask that you not disturb our rattlesnakes," cautioned tour guide Lee Underbrink, a Casper resident who described himself as one of the "Gentiles" in the association.
A long-time expert on the trail in Wyoming, he pointed out visible evidences of the trail that had been marked by the Oregon-California Trails Association and were denoted by swales formed in the land over time by the passage of thousands of wagon wheels. (Swales are differentiated from ruts, which are formed by the wheels passing over rock.)
At one point on the trip, antelope sprang along in front of and at the side of the bus.
Tour members viewed such handcart trail landmarks as Red Buttes, Bessemer Bend, Avenue of Rocks (mentioned in the journals of nearly every trail pioneer) and Greasewood or Horse Creek, where six wagons of the first relief company from Utah met the Martin Handcart Company at Greasewood Creek on Oct. 31, 1856. They viewed inscriptions from pioneers on Independence Rock, and some climbed a portion of it.
They had lunch at the Church's Martin's Cove Historic Site. Some made the two-mile-or-so hike up to the cove. Conversing with several conference attendees, Elder John Bagley, a missionary serving at the site, pointed out areas where handcart trekkers and rescuers are thought to have camped and to have buried their dead with only the snow to cover the bodies, the ground being too hard for digging.
Academic sessions
William G. Hartley, associate professor of Church History at BYU and a prominent Mormon trails expert, introduced an academic session by recalling an occasion when he was at the Martin's Cove visitors center soon after it opened in 1997. A guide there rankled him by saying of the handcarts, "If ever a plan was designed to fail, this was one."
"And I chastised him immediately," Brother Hartley said. "We had a chat for about 20 minutes about what the handcart plan was and what Brigham Young had in mind; what were the elements of the plan, and, if they all were in place, how well it would have worked, and, indeed, how well it did work, except for the two that left too late."
He noted that eight of the 10 companies made it OK, including one led by his own great-great-grandfather.
He said Brigham Young was America's leading promoter of organized migration, for which he should be credited, and the fact that some 70,000 people came west to Utah over 26 years is a tribute to the organized efforts of the Church to move people successfully.
Lyndia McDowell Carter, a Springville, Utah, author of two forthcoming books, one on the Willie company and the other on the Martin company, spoke about the horrific struggle for survival by members of the Martin company that began with the last crossing of the North Platte River on Oct. 19, 1856, and lasted until they reached Devil's Gate on the Sweetwater River on Nov. 2. Retelling of the saga has collapsed a 15-day battle with nature into the events at Martin's Cove, she lamented.
Musical Program
In connection with the opening reception of the conference, a new opera was presented, "1856: Long Walk Home." Created by Harriet Patherick-Bushman in anticipation of the handcart sesquicentennial, it presents the story of the Willie and Martin companies in operatic form. A grant from the Barlow Foundation at BYU and other financial sources funded the project.
The opera draws on scripture, pioneer journals and existing song texts, such as "The Handcart Song." It recounts such gripping tales as that of Camilla W. Judd, whose 6-year-old boy came missing on the trail. Her husband went back to find him, saying he would catch up with her. She gave him a red shawl to be used as the boy's burial shroud if the father found him dead but to be used as a signal flag to be waved when he returned if the boy was still alive. As it turned out, the shawl was used to signal the boy's survival.
National Historic Trails Interpretive Center
Conference attendees were invited to visit this facility at reduced rates. Opened four years ago in Casper, it highlights four major trails — Mormon, Oregon, California and Pony Express — all of which came through Casper. Dioramas combine with a recorded multi-media presentation to tell the story of the trails. Some exhibits center on the Mormon exodus from Nauvoo and the subsequent migration of converts to Utah.
In one of several interactive exhibits, visitors may have a simulated experience pulling a handcart whereby they move a treadmill which, in turn, causes the handcart to sway and twist as though going over a rough trail.
E-mail to: rscott@desnews.com
