That winter Brother Brigham wanted me to return to Emmett's Company and take charge of it, and bring it back and not let them go any further. I could not return in the winter season for we had to go through two hundred miles of wilderness and the snow was very deep and it was Indian country. I returned with Brother James Cummings and arrived about April. I found the camp in a poor condition. My wife had been very sick; indeed, they did not think that she would live for six months. My family had been living on a half pint of corn per day and the sufferings that they had to pass through were very bitter indeed.

There was an old squaw that lived there. She asked my mother if she had no mother. She told her, no, that her mother was dead. She said that she would be a mother to me. So my wife told her she was willing to do it, it being the tradition of the tribe; the children always called her grandmother after that.

One day, Brother Short and Brother Hall were going across the river and my wife asked them if she could go across and gather some roots for her children. They said yes, but they did not want to be bothered with a lot of women. The old squaw said that she would go and help her for she always gave her something to eat when she came to her fire. So they went over and were left over there for four days and nights and nothing in the world to eat but roots. They made a fire and gathered up some leaves and made a bed as well as they could. It was the first of April and not very warm. They called to the folks on the other side of the river; they heard them, but none came to bring them back, and there were the children left by them, several small children. John was then a baby.

My wife laid down on the fourth day, for she was very weak and feeble, and she dreamed that I had come back and that I was standing on the other side of the river. As she dreamed she awoke and said that your father's come, see him, and she looked and sure enough I was standing on the bank of the river with Charity and Phebe in my hands. Now, both had seen me in the distance and had put out of the fort and down to the river through the brush and gotten into the canoe and gone across to my wife to bring her across and when she got there she said, "Is not Mr. Butler come?" He said "No, he was not," and she said that she could see me standing on the bank on the other side of the river. He said that her eyes were better than his if she could see that far. "Why," said he, "it is a mile and a half wide and you can't see that far." Well, we got into the canoe, and they started back. My wife kept her eyes upon me and I went away and my wife said to halt, they were all gone from the bank. He said, "Don't look at them, but look at the water here; it is very dangerous and it can tip over; we all shall be drowned." My wife said that she guessed that there was no more danger there than where they had crossed. He said there was for it boiled up tremendous. The river had risen the day after they had gotten over there and the timber came down so that it was dangerous to cross at that time.

Well, they got to the shore and I was there to receive them. There were both my women, Caroline and Charity; they were both sealed to me before we left Nauvoo. I did not know hardly how to keep my hands off of Hall; I felt like I could tear him to pieces. Brother James Cummings said that they ought to have their throats cut for serving a lot of women like that, and my wife asked Hall what he had told her that lie for, that Mr. Butler had not come. He said that he thought that she would get so excited that they would be tipped over and all be drowned. My wife asked him if he thought that she had no sense.

When my wife was sick, Henri went down with his horse and small cart to get some provisions. He got two hundred of flour, fifthweight of coffee and some sugar and tea and when he came back he came and got one of my little girls and took her away, and Sister Packet came and asked what he was going to do with the child. My wife rose up in her bed and asked what he was going to do with her child and told Sister Packet to watch and see. He took her to his house and after a while she came out with a pan of flour on her head and a pint of sugar and some tea and told her to give it to her mother for she needed it to make her well. So Sister Packet ran and helped and the child brought it in for it was about as much as she could carry. My wife was truly thankful for it, for she could not eat the corn, and if she did it seemed to throw her back again.

Now, whenever I killed any game I always divided it with Emmett. It had been voted that the whole camp should throw their stuff together and fare alike, when they first started, but they did not all fare alike, for my wife was often without means and Emmett's folks had killed four fat deer, but the first might never come to the share of my family. Now, this was while I was gone. When I went away they all voted for me to go and they would see that my family did not suffer for want if there was any in camp. Now, Emmett was mad and did not want me to go at all, and said after that he did not vote to help to take care of my family.

The Indians had made the company a present of forty bales of dried buffalo meat and none of that came to the share of my family. Now, after I was gone, they counseled building houses for the winter and there were none to build one for my folks, so some of the brethren spoke to Emmett about it and he said that he was not going to build houses for them, that those that voted for him to go were the ones to build him a house. One of the brethren asked my wife one day if she had not gotten some meat from Emmett. It was Brother Potter. He seemed surprised. She told him that she had received not the first mite. He then asked her if he had not given her some buffalo meat. She told him that she had not gotten any meat at all. "Why," said he, "damn such a man."

On that night there was a meeting and everyone was to speak their feelings and Brother Potter got up and spoke his feelings and said that Sister Butler was suffering for the want of some meat and that she had not had any and Emmett said, "How do you know that she has had no meat?" "Why," said he, "she is here." And he said to her, "Have you any meat, Sister Butler?" She answered "No, she had not seen or tasted of any." "Well," said Emmett, "let them that voted for John L. Butler to leave his family go to work and take care of them." "Well," said he, "if that is the case, we will do it and she shall have some meat, if I have to go and kill the fattest ox in the company, which I will do." But Emmett said that he would give her some buffalo meat. So the next morning he gave her some meat. No one can tell the trials and hardships the women had to pass through.

While I was in Nauvoo that winter, I took two more wives and they were sealed to me in the temple. My third wife was Sarah Lancaster. She was sealed to me on the 28th of February, 1846, by Brigham Young. She was the daughter of Wright and Sarah Lancaster. Her mother's maiden name was Briant. She was a daughter of Auther and Elizabeth Briant. Her maiden name was Peelle before she married Briant. Sarah's grandfather's name was William Lancaster. He married Sarah Sanders. Her brothers and sisters are as follows: Her oldest brother Briants, he died an infant, Rex, Lawrence, Ocky were next, all boys; Elizabeth, her oldest sister, William Sanders, Sarah, and Wright Rex married Farabe Hemby; they had six children. Ocky married Mariah Wever; they had nine children. Elizabeth was married to Thomas Widup; they had eight children. William Sanders married Lucinda Meek; the last account they had seven children. Wright married Mary Davidson; they had nine children and are in the Church. My fourth wife was sealed to me in March; she was the mother of my wife, Sarah; her name was the same, Sarah Lancaster. My third wife, Sarah came with me to Council Bluffs. I then left her there. Her mother, my fourth wife, was old and she thought that she was too old and feeble to go on such a journey as it was to Salt Lake, so she went back to Indiana from Nauvoo. Sarah, my third wife, was born in Wayne County, North Carolina on the 23rd of March, 1806. My fourth wife, Sarah was born in the same place on the 28th of June, 1771.

Well, as I said, I left Sarah at the Bluffs. Myself and Brother Cummings went on to Emmett's camp and when we got there we found that Emmett had traded for a squaw and had gone to St. Peters on the Mississippi, so I told the brethren and sisters and told them what Brigham [Young] had said, and that we had to start to Great Salt Lake. It took about three days to get ready and to get our cattle altogether. Sister Emmett was alone and I asked her if she wanted to go with us. She said, "Yes, and be as quick as you can, for if Emmett was here I am sure that he would not let me go." Well, I told her that I would take her with me if she wanted to go whether he was willing or not. "Well," she said, "let us go before he comes. I expect him home in two or three days." So we all packed up our things to go down to the river. We started on our journey when Emmett came to us. He was mad as he well could be for he said that he had bought a squaw and he intended to end his days at the Vermillion Fort; so he had to lose his squaw; he traded a horse for it but he could not bring her away from her tribe. We crossed the Missouri River and went up to the Pawnee village there the Indians and whites had been fighting with one another and we had to stop there two weeks, which made it so late that we could not go, but Brother Miller said, "O yes, we can get through well enough." But there had been no company gone yet; there had only been the Pioneers through, so we all started across to the Missouri River again and camped there for the winter on a river called the Running Water. We went to work and built a fort.

There was about one hundred and fifty families, there was three fifty's. Brother Brigham got up fifty families and Bro. Miller fifty and Emmett's company, about fifty families, and Brother Brigham put Brother Miller in Captain of the hundred and fifty. Now the other companies looked down upon us in Emmett's company and threw out hints and slang such as, "Oh, they are not strong Mormons. They belong to Emmett's companies."

It was that winter that a disease came into our midst and they called it the black leg and many died with it and it mostly fell on the other two companies; they were well to do and had plenty and lived on the best, and I don't know whether it was the high living and the hot weather that had been that summer; it had been fearful hot that summer for there were two dogs and five sheep died. It was so hot, however, the disease came and there was only one in our company that had it, while the folks in the other company were lying nigh unto death by the dozens, and one of the sisters asked my wife one day who she thought was the best one to get to lay hands on her, and my wife told her that her husband she thought was the best. "Why," said she,"he is not a strong Mormon." My wife said that we were as strong as any in the camp, and besides he went off with Emmetts Company and they drove off cattle and horses that did not belong to them. Why he should never lay hands upon me."

Now there was a woman there that had the disease very bad and she had heard that Emmett's company did not have it, only one woman. She did not know how it was they were clear from it, and they all had it, and the people that they had scorned and despised were free from it, and one day she saw me go into the house and she sent for me, so I went across to see what she wanted me for. She asked me if it was true that we did not have the disease in our company. I told her that there was only one that had it. She drew a deep breath and sighed. "Well," she said, "it was very strange; she could not see what was the reason." I told her that I thought it was the high living they had now, said I, "We have had no meat or bread this winter, only a little corn and fish when we could get them and this is the third winter that we have been in the same fix. We had seen hard times, but I thought that I would rather see hard times than to be taken down with disease. "Yes," she said, "I have despised your company and would not give the sick and hungry one morsel of anything to help them in their trouble. Now, I am sick myself and there is no one to comfort me, Oh what shall I do? Do you think I shall die?" said she. "Perhaps I shall die and go to hell for my wickedness. Do you think that I shall go to hell?" I said that I did not know; the man that refused Lazarus the crumbs from his table was a rich man and he went to hell." She asked me to lay hands upon her and she said that she felt better afterwards.

On February the fifth, eighteen hundred and forty seven, my first wife was confined with a son. I had no children with my other wives. We named and blessed him and called him James, I was over to Sister Brunson's again and she said that she had heard that my wife was put to bed and asked me if we had any flour. I told her we had not, so she told her little girl to fill a pan with flour and get some sugar and a little tea and she said to me, take that to my wife; she would give her that much. Any how she said that she always felt better when I was with her, for when I was [p.37] away all seemed dark to her and she could see the devil at times. I tried to comfort her. She asked me if I thought that she would die. I told her that I had seen lots sicker folks live. I took the flour, sugar and tea home to my wife, and it was a blessing to her for it was a rarity out there for us to have flour bread. Well, thus things went on.

There is another incident that I must mention. There was a great many folks had kegs of powder. The Indians set fire to the long grass, it is very high and the folk roofs was made of this grass and so they took their powder kegs down by the river side to keep them from the fire and from exploding, and a man by the name of Hyrum Clark was helping to carry the things down to the river. Well, he had got about half way to the river he dropped the things that he had and cried out, why I've left my wife sick in bed and left her there; she might be burnt up before now. So away he ran to the house and wrapped his wife up in a blanket and run down the fort and sat her down on a door step and went to get something for her to set on, and as it happened there was no one in the house, and when he came back instead of coming down the street that he took his wife, he went down the other street and could not find her, he began to shout that he had lost his wife, and there he was running about like a crazy man, not knowing what to do . "Ah," he cried. "My wife, I've lost and she will be burnt up. And the folks all gathered round to help find her. They thought that she was in bed and that she got out herself. At last my wife and some more went into the fort gate and there she sat, and she spoke to her husband and said, "Don't you know where you sat me down." He had been so excited that he could not tell where he was going.

The next day the folks went to get their powder and Brother Drapers keg was nowhere to be found, so they went to searching the houses. Now, John Ray had a keg and the man that was working for him by the name Smith said that he had put it away in the chest, so John thought no more about it. However, they found Drapers keg in John's house and John looked for his keg and it could not be found high or low, so they began to suspicion John, and they asked him if he had not put it there himself. He said that he had not touched the kegs at all for his man had got the keg and put it in the chest himself. So they asked the man if he knew anything of Ray's keg. He said that he did not know anything at all about it. Well, they did not know what to think about it at all, but everybody believed that John had taken the keg or given his man instructions to take and put it in the chest, but John still denied it and they told him that he might as well own up to it first as last for it would be found out some day, or rather now. It was very strange where John's keg had gone to; no one could tell where in the world it could be and they began to look down upon John and talked to him about it pretty strong. John told them that he would never own up to a thing that he had never done, and they told him that he was sinning before God and man and that he would have to answer for his sins. He said [p.38] that he had nothing to answer for and that he did not want to hear anymore about it, for he had not been guilty of what he had been accused.

Well, they talked about disfellowshipping him, and Smith came up and said that he put the keg there himself and that he thought it was John's that he had taken Drapers keg and filled up John's and threw Drapers keg in the river, but it turned out to be Johns that he threw into the river. Draper examined the keg and said that there had been about three pounds and a half of powder put into the keg so he took it out and give it to John. This made quite a different feeling for John. The folks were all against him for not owning up to it like a man. Now, they thought a great deal more of him for not owning to what he had not done, but John had lost powder and Smith was the man to for it. They said he looked very sheepish about it, he was hired to John and he could stop it out of his wages; whether he did or not is more that I can say.