| 247 people to rescue them, in order that they might make that a pretext of an accusation for the breach of the law and that they might the better excite the prejudice of the populace and thereby get aid and assistance to carry out their hellish purposes of extermination. Immediately on the authentication of these facts, messengers were despatched from Far West to Austin A. King, Judge of the fifth judicial district of the State of Missouri, and also to Major General Atchison, Commander-in-chief of that division, and Brigadier General Doniphan, giving them information of the existing facts, and demanding immediate assistance. Gen. Atchison returned with the messengers and went immediately to Diahman and from thence to Millport, and he found the facts were true as reported to him;-that the citizens of that county were assembled together in a hostile attitude to the amount of two or three hundred men, threatening the utter extermination of the Mormons, he immediately returned to Clay county and ordered out a sufficient military force to quell the mob. Immediately after they were dispersed and the army returned; the mob commenced collecting again soon after: we again applied for military aid, when General Doniphan came out with a force of sixty armed men to Far West; but they were in such a state of insubordination that he said he could not control them, and it was thought advisable by Col. Hinkle, Mr. Rigdon and others that they should return home; General Doniphan ordered Col. Hinkle to call out the militia of Caldwell and defend the town against the mob, for said he, you have great reason to be alarmed, for he said Neil Gillum from the Platte country had come down with 200 armed men and had taken up their station at Hunter's mill, a place distant about 17 or 18 miles north west of the town of Far West, and also that an armed force had collected again at Millport, in Davies county, consisting of several hundred men, and that another armed force had collected at DeWitt, in Carroll county, about 50 miles south east of Far West, where about 70 families of the Mormon people had settled upon the bank of the Missouri river at a little town called DeWitt. Immediately a messenger, whilst he was yet talking, came in from DeWitt, stating that three or four hundred men had assembled together at that place armed cap-a-pie, and that they threatened the utter extinction of the citizens of that place if they did not leave the place immediately, and that they had also surrounded the town and cut off all supplies of food, so that many of them were suffering with hunger. Gen. Doniphan seemed to be very much alarmed, and appeared to be willing to do all he could to assist, and to relieve the sufferings of the Mormon people; he advised that a petition be immediately got up and sent to the Governor. A petition was accordingly prepared and a messenger despatched immediately to the Governor, and another petition was sent to Judge King. The Mormon people throughout the country were in a great state of alarm, and also in great distress; they saw themselves completely surrounded with armed forces on the north and on the north west and on the south, and also Bogard, who was a Methodist preacher, and who was then a captain over a militia company of 50 soldiers, but who had added to his number out of the surrounding counties about a hundred more, which made his force about 150 strong, was stationed at Crooked Creek, sending out his scouting parties, taking men, women and children prisoners, driving off cattle, hogs and horses, entering into every house on Log and Long Creeks, rifling their houses of their most precious article, such as money, bedding, and clothing, taking all their old muskets and their rifles or military implements, threatening the people with instant death if they did not deliver up all their precious things, and enter into a covenant to leave the state or go into the city of Far West by the next morning, saying that "they calculated to drive the people into Far West, and then drive them to hell." Gillum also was doing the same on the north west side of Far West; and Sashall Woods, a Presbyterian minister, was the leader of the mob in Davies county; and a very noted man of the same society was the leader of the mob in Carroll county; and they were also sending out their scouting parties, robbing and pillaging houses, driving away hogs, horses and cattle, taking men, women and children and carrying them off, threatening their lives and subjecting them to all manner of abuses that they could invent or think of.
Under this state of alarm, excitement and distress, the messengers returned from the Governor and from the other authorities, bringing the fatal news, that the Mormons could have no assistance. They stated that the Governor said that "the Mormons had got into a difficulty with the citizens, and they might fight it out for all what he cared. He could not render them any assistance."
The people of DeWitt were obliged to leave their homes and go into Far West; but did not until after many of them had starved to death for want of proper sustenance, and several died on the road there, and were buried by the way side, without a coffin or a funeral ceremony, and the distress, sufferings, and privations of the people cannot be expressed. All the scattered families of the Mormon people, in all the counties except Davies, were driven into Far West, with but few exceptions.
(page 247) |
