On the 17th of August I started for Salt Lake with twenty-two wagons and teams, but only ten teamsters; and we traveled one hundred miles before I got additional help. On Elm Creek, while on the move, we were charged by a stampeded herd of buffalo, estimated at three thousand head. It was with great difficulty that we turned them aside, and kept the train from being run over and trampled to pieces.
During the combat, one of my night guard was dismounted, and his mule, a fine animal, ran off with the buffalo. As soon as the train was safe, a young man by the name of Stewart, and I, followed the herd, stampeded them again, and riding into the heaving, rolling mass, secured the mule, and also succeeded in cutting out three oxen and a cow that we found running with them. Two of the oxen were large, fine fellows, and were very helpful in my team. Upon reaching Salt Lake City, I gave them to Bishop Hunter, as a donation to the Perpetual Emigration fund, and they were used for years on the Temple Block, to move the blocks of granite that were placed in the Temple walls.
Near Fort Laramie we overtook Captain William H. Dame's train of fifty wagons. As he was prostrate with mountain fever, we blended the trains, and I took charge of them until we reached Fort Bridger.
When I reached Salt Lake City, President Young gave me a beautiful Canadian mare, which the Church had furnished me to use on the plains; and he gave me, moreover, his blessing as a reward for my services.
At Provo, I found my wife Lydia with a sweet babe—Lydia Roseana—in her arms. I gave Mother Knight a cooking stove for her kindness to me and mine. Jesse, my wife Lydia's brother, wished to go to the Clara; so I employed him to drive my ox team, for which service I gave him a French pony, valued at seventy-five dollars. He was a noble boy, and I always loved him. It was late in the fall when I returned to the Clara with the machinery I started for. In six months' time I had traveled twenty-eight hundred miles with my four yoke of oxen.
I found Albina and babe well, but still living—and without a murmur—in a tent.
In 1863, I was called by Bishop Edward Bunker of the Clara Ward, to go to the states and help gather the poor. I had charge of ten teams from that ward. I drove my own team of four yoke of oxen. On the trip eastward we made part of Daniel D. McArthur's train. At Florence I was appointed captain of an independent Danish company of forty-four wagons. On the return trip we had several stampedes, in one of which two women and one man were killed. With that exception we were greatly prospered. I became very much attached to the Danish people. My brother, Lorenzo S., was with me, and was of great help to me. Jeremiah Stringham and family joined the company, and I learned to love him for his courage and fidelity.
Upon my return to the Clara, I found my two wives living in a one-room adobe house that my brother-in-law, Samuel Knight, had built for them. In the fore part of the winter, William R. Terry (my father-in-law) and I were requested by President Erastus Snow, to move to St. George. I promptly set about the work; putting up a small hewn-log house, then going to Pine Valley to make the shingles. While finishing the roof I received a letter from President Young, calling me on a second mission to the Sandwich Islands.
On March 20, 1864, I started to Salt Lake City to fill this mission. I had been notified that I would need to raise four hundred fifty dollars. I therefore sold my ox teams, and otherwise raised all the money I could before starting. Albina and children went with me to Draper, where I left her with her father. The weather was unusually stormy, and the roads were bad. On March 31st we camped on Pioneer creek, near Fillmore. For the first time in my life my children cried for bread, when I had none to give them.
Early in the morning, however, Sister McFate, a widow, came along and sold me five pounds of flour. At Round Valley brethren were owing me twenty-five bushels of wheat; but I could not get a bushel, nor a dollar in cash. Bishop Jesse Martin came to my rescue and generously helped me out of his own pocket.