Brother Brigham sent down for a company of men to go out on the road for the army on our borders and that he was not going to let them come in. [p.53] He put the Territory under Marshal Law. This put the Gentiles in a sweat; they did not know what to do, and one Sunday just after dinner there was news came to me that old Doc Hurt was going to ship his quarters and take up his abode in the mountains with the soldiers. I went out and I called all the men in Spanish Fork together and told Col. John S. Fullmer to take command of them and go and take the Doctor. I knew it would take all the men we could raise for there was about two hundred Indians with him, James came to me and told me that he did not know anything about it. John S. Fullmer took command of his company and went down to the bridge and crossed over and went down on the bench on the other side. By this time the news had fled to Springville and Payson and there was a company came out of each place. There was about two hundred and fifty men in the three companies.

The Doctor had fled and the Indians all but about twelve were left to cover his retreat. The Mormons pursued him, and they were riding backwards and forwards and whooping and yelling and telling us to come on and fight them. I knew that it was of no use to fight them for that would not bring the Doctor back. So we held a council about what we should do, some wanted to follow him and fight their way through, but the Doctor was on a horse as good a one as was in the Territory. And then he was well armed and had an escort of twelve Indians, the best warriors there was in the whole tribe, and another advantage which he had of us was about ten or twelve miles the start, and our men were on foot without anything to eat, and the men were not united either to follow the,. for some wanted to go and others did not, and I thought that if a guard was placed at the mouth of the Canyon and on the mountains and we might yet have a chance to catch him. I found out afterwards that the two Bishops, one of Payson and Springville, knew that the Doctor was about to leave before I received the news; and they had started their men. Well, we had to give the chase up.

We returned home and nothing done. I placed a guard at the mouth of the Canyon and all became peace and quietness around as if nothing had happened to disturb us. The next morning the guard came down and reported themselves.

There was news came to me that the Doctor had fled over the west mountain and that a man by the name of William Maxfield had followed him with a half a dozen men into a small Canyon, but the Indians were too many for them. But they sent a runner to Payson for more men, and he stayed till dark watching them and no men came to his assistance; and the darkness was so great that he could no longer see them. They went home and the Doctor and his escort came across the valley and went up the Spanish Fork Canyon and passed the guard somehow or other without their knowing anything about it. I have since heard a report that I had something to do in the escape of Hurt, that I knew of his intended flight and that I was a friend of his. Now, I can truly say before God and man and God shall be my witness that I knew nothing, neither had I any conversation with him on the subject at all. No I am innocent of the report that has been spread [p.54] about me, and the ones, whoever they may be, I know that I have enemies, and the very ones that should have been my greatest friends, but the sin will fall upon their own shoulders. God knows that I am not guilty, neither would I be guilty of such a thing while I am in the Church of God and God gives me His Holy Spirit to enable me to do what is right. Well, I am free from any such report and I feel thankful to God my Heavenly Father that I am.

I gathered up men and sent them out on the road into Echo Canyon. I also sent three men up Spanish Fork Canyon to explore a little and to see if anything could be seen up there. One of the men was Taylor, my son. They went up there but they saw nothing of a suspicious nature; there were several thousand of the boys out in the mountains and Lot Smith was Captain over the mountain rangers and was scouting about over the mountains, sometimes here and sometimes there; sometimes right in sight of the soldiers and then right away from them.

General Daniel H. Wells was out among the boys giving them orders what to do. He had them to build batteries on the top of the mountain and pile rocks so that if the enemy came they could roll down rocks upon them and they would be dashed to pieces, and the Canyon was narrow for three or four miles down and there was no chance to get in but by this road, that the army would not come in but they camped upon Hams Fork.

Lot Smith went out upon the road to the Big Sandy and burned up seventy-five wagons for Miller and Russel freighting provisions for Uncle Sam; and he went up to the wagon master and told him to coral his team. He wanted to know by what authority he had to tell him to coral his wagons. Lot told him by the authority of this revolver; and he pointed it to his head. He told the men to coral their wagons. They corralled and Lot told the men that if they had anything in the wagons of their own that they could get it out, and he told them to be sharp about it. He then told his boys to set fire to the wagons and drive the cattle off up in the mountains. They did so, and the wagons all burned up, and the mark of the fire remained to this day and will do so for years to come.

The boys brought the cattle in to Salt Lake City and Brigham had them turned upon the good range where they would live all the winter. The soldiers kept on Hams fork and went to and from up and down and would not venture in any farther for they thought that the mountains were full of Mormons.

They camped at last and the winter set in upon them and they could not stir about as they had done. Their cattle that remained huddled together and starved to death.

In the summer afterwards there was several places where the cattle got together some two or three hundred head in a gang and all died and their bones lay bleached in the sun and they covered acres of ground just as thick as they could lay. Their cattle all died off and their salt give out, and there they were poor ignorant souls didn't know that they had come to fight the Lord's anointed and fight against God himself. They little knew the power they were fighting against.

Well, Brother Brigham heard of their condition of their being without salt, so he got up a load and sent it to them but they would not accept it, so the man that took it out spilt it on the road side for he would not haul it back again. Echo Canyon was will fortified and if they had attempted to come down they would certainly have been all destroyed. The boys out in the mountains got pretty short of clothing and we had to make a collection for them, such as socks, shoes, pants, shirts, mittens and sent them out to them to make them comfortable.

The mountain rangers done the most damage for they would go right into the solders camp and take revolvers and guns from under their heads and would not be seen. Now, when they had been out there all winter, their wrath was cooled down and they did not feel so much like fighting Mormons; they wanted to make treaty and they sent Gov. Cummings in to Salt Lake City; and as he was coming down Echo Canyon he came along there in the night; he would come to a camp fire of Mormons. The boys built fires all the way down the Canyon, and they all got to the top fire, and when the old Governor got to the fire the boys give three cheers for Brigham Young. The Governor stopped and spoke a few words to them. He then went on and the boys all started for the next fire and got there before the Governor and were ready to meet him. The governor stopped and spoke a few words to them again thinking that he was talking to another lot of men. He started again and again the boys started to the next fire and got there before him, and so they kept on doing all the way down the Canyon, and the Governor was never more surprised in his life. He began to be frightened for he really thought that the mountains was swarming with Mormons, an he said that he never was more surprised in his life. He said that he did not think that there was one sixteenth part as many Mormons as he saw in the Canyon. The boys had built up about twenty-five fires, and there was about five hundred of them; that would make it appear twelve thousand five hundred men, when the Old Governor had only seen five hundred in all.

Well, he came into Brother Brigham and Brigham treated him with respect and when the old Governor saw the things as they were he said that the Mormons had been foully misrepresented, and that he would stand for the rights of the people, and said that he never was in a place before where so much order and obedience was carried on. He sent word to Gen. Johnston that he had found the people of Utah good citizens of the United States and that they meant to uphold the laws of the United States and that the United States, or the leaders of the United States had done very wrong to send an army out here to make the people of the Territory of Utah come to obedience to the laws of the United States when they were the only people in the United States that observed the laws strictly. And said he, "They are good people and industrious and minded their own business." Well, he took his place as Governor still and whatever he said it was law and Gospel.

He [Brother Brigham] ordered the people in the North and in the County of Great Salt Lake to move South and take all their families and all their stock and as [p.56] much provisions as they could take along with them and told them that if the soldiers were determined to come in and kill them that they were to set fire to their homes and leave them a ruined city. And the folks did move south and Brother Brigham moved his family south as far as Provo.

There was but one woman left north of the point of the mountains and she was doing writing for the Church. The [Salt Lake] City did look a desolate place for the folks were all gone south, except a few men left to guard the city and teams were scattered from the City to Sanpete. It was like one train. The folks put straw and shavings in their houses ready to burn them when the word came from Brigham, but they did not have the job to burn them up for the soldiers came to terms, and they were to come in and go on to the west side of the river Jordan, but they were to march right through and not molest anything at all.

Well, they came in and went and camped at the crossing of the river and then went about seven miles above up into the cedars, and Brother Brigham gave orders for the folks to move back again if they wanted to, and a great many moved back and a great many stayed; there was a great many came to Spanish Fork City and they covered the bottom and made dugouts under the side of the benches, and the cattle ranged on the benches and they ate all the feed off so that our own cattle fared very slim that fall. The folks came to me to give them places to build; and I had so much to do that I did not know hardly which to begin first. I did not have time to eat meals I was so busy.

I had partly put up a saw mill and Archy Gardner came down here and moved his family here and put a house up for them. He then came to me and told me that he would take a share on the sawmill if I was willing, but he said that it was not in a good place and would have to be built up higher, so we had it moved and finished it. He then said that he thought that it was a good place to put up a grist mill, and that he thought that he would get a grant for to put up one. He did so, and when the saw mill run, he went to work and put up one of the best grist mills in the Territory. He made the race larger and put the grist mill just below the sawmill on the City main water sect, and it was a good thing for Spanish Fork for they had to go to Springville mill to get their grinding done, and they had to go to Pondtown to get their sawing done, so it was a great benefit to the ward.

Brother John Murry came down here in the move south and had put up mills for Archy Gardner down North and Archy got them to put up his grist mill, him and Brother Reed. They both of them bought land here and calculated to make their home here.

The soldiers went over into Cedar Valley and camped there and named the camp Floyd, and they built their barracks and took up their quarters there. There was a great many apostates went out there to live and there was a great many went to trade there. It made many stir around very brisk for a while. They hired men to make adobes for them and give them one dollar for per hundred and there was lots of men that would make six and eight hundred per [p.57] day, so that they made a good deal of money. They also hired men to chop cord wood in the mountains and gave three dollars per cord, cedar wood.