| 670 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 Daviess, were driven into Far West, with but few exceptions.
"This only increased their distress, for many thousands who were driven there had no habitations or houses to shelter them, and were huddled together, some in tents and others under blankets, while others had no shelter from the inclemency of the weather. Nearly two months the people had been in this awful state of consternation; many of them had been killed, whilst others had been whipped until they had to swathe up their bowels to prevent them from falling out.
"About this time General Parks came out from Richmond, Ray County, who was one of the commissioned officers who was sent out to Diahman, and I myself, and my brother, Joseph Smith, Sr., went out at the same time. On the evening that General Parks arrived at Diahman, my brother's, the late Don Carlos Smith's wife, came in to Colonel Wight's about eleven o'clock at night, bringing her two children along with her, one about two years and a half old, the other a babe in her arms. She came in on foot, a distance of three miles, and waded Grand River, and the water was then about waist deep, and the snow about three inches deep. She stated that a party of the mob, a gang of ruffians, had turned her out of doors, had taken her household goods and had burnt up her house, and she had escaped by the skin of her teeth. Her husband at that time was in Virginia, 1 and she was living alone.
"This cruel transaction excited the feelings of the people in Diahman, especially Colonel Wight, and he asked General Parks in my hearing how long we had got to suffer such base violence. General Parks said he did not know how long. Colonel Wight then asked him what should be done. General Parks told him 'he should take a company of men, well armed, and go and disperse the mob wherever
1 This is probably an error. Others say he was in Tennessee.
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