I delivered the money to President Young and Council, with the list of subscribers, and of the persons for whom it was sent, and again prepared for my departure. Obtaining a light buggy, I harnessed my horse before it, and started for Chicago, Illinois, by land—distance five hundred and fifty miles. I performed this journey in safety in eleven days, averaging fifty miles per day. Arriving in Chicago towards evening, I immediately sold my horse and buggy, and then took steamer the same evening across Lake Michigan, thence by railroad to Boston; thence to New York, where I arrived a day or two sooner than the day agreed upon. I was hindered a little, being at a loss for funds to pay my passage; but one Elder Badlam kindly assisted me, and I soon embarked in the cabin of a splendid ship, and set sail for Liverpool. On this same ship was Franklin D. and Samuel Richards, and M. Martin, on a mission to the same country.
We had a long passage, and arrived in Liverpool October 14, in good health and spirits.
We found Elders Hyde and Taylor there all well, and were kindly received and entertained by the Saints.
A General Conference was convened in Manchester October 17; an account of which will be found in the Star, No. 7, Vol 8.
In this Conference it was agreed that President Hyde should edit the Star, and attend to all business in the publishing office at Liverpool, while President Taylor and myself should visit the different conferences in the British Isles. We, therefore, published our appointments beforehand in the Star, and so commenced our winter's mission. I will not detain the reader with a detail of our journeyings, visits and meetings in pursuance of this arrangement; but, suffice it to say, we travelled from conference to conference by railway, coaches, steamers, etc., visiting nearly all the principal towns in England and Scotland. We were everywhere received and treated with the utmost hospitality, and with demonstrations of joy and gladness not soon to be forgotten. The Saints and others convened from far and near at the sessions of our several conferences, and vast crowds of strangers, as well as Saints, listened to us. Public feasts, tea parties, public dinners and all kinds of demonstrations of joy and welcome greeted us as we visited from place to place. So that our sojourn was more like a triumphal procession than like a dreary pilgrimage. We preached the gospel, set in order the churches, directed the labors of the elders, comforted the Saints, and reproved and corrected the abuses introduced by President Hedlock and others in relation to the joint stock companies, etc.
Hedlock fled at our approach, leaving many debts unpaid and finally lived incog. in London with a vile woman—he being severed from the Church.
It was during my travels in England on this mission that I wrote the following letter in blank verse to my family, whom I had left at Council Bluffs, on the Missouri River. It was published in England at the time, on a beautiful sheet with a handsome border, and designed to be put in a frame as a household ornament; and is frequently seen to this day (1856) as a memorial in the parlors of the Saints on both sides of the Atlantic.
May it be handed down to posterity as a monument of suffering and self-denial of women and children for the gospel's sake.
CHAPTER XLIV.
AN APOSTLE OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST,