"jumping off place": henceforth the Mormons were going into an unknown, unpeopled, trackless wilderness, the domain of wild animals and Pottawattamie Indians. Bidding farewell to Iowa's western frontier line of settlements, they journeyed northwestward and entered Decatur County, then but recently surveyed and established. In this newlyopened region stretching to the Missouri River it became necessary to appoint a small party of "pioneers" to go in advance of the main body, to explore the route, blaze the trail, seek suitable camping sites, and make fords and bridges,15 for progress became exasperatingly slow. On the 24th of April one of the elders jotted down the following entry in his diary:

Yesterday we traveled about eight miles, to-day, six miles. We came to a place which we named Garden Grove. At this point we determined to form a small settlement, and open farms for the benefit of the poor, and such as were unable, at present, to pursue their journey further and also for the benefit of the poor who were yet behind.

Thus, after a toilsome journey through prolonged rains and deep mud, the Mormons established Garden Grove. On the 27th of April, "at the sound of the horn", the emigrants gathered to organize for labor. One hundred men were chosen to fell trees, split them into rails, and set up zig-zag fences; forty-eight were set to cutting logs for loghouses; several were detailed to build a bridge; others dug wells; some made wood for plows; a few watched the flocks of sheep and herds of cattle; while a small party was despatched on an expedition into Missouri to exchange property for cows, provisions, and other necessities. The remaining members of the party were directed to plant and sow the crops that later comers should reap.1

16

15 Annals of Iowa, Vol. IX, p. 578; and Americana, Vol. VII, p. 184.

16 Journal of History, Vol. II, pp. 110, 188; Lee's Confessions in Lewis's The Mormon Menace, pp. 229, 230; and Americana, Vol. VII, p. 187.

On the 11th of May the pioneers once more set their long wagon trains moving and proceeded northwestward. Game became very scarce, "thinned out by a tribe of Indians, called Pottawattamies, whose trails and old campinggrounds were to be seen in every direction." Near the middle fork of Grand River, in what is to-day Union County, they concluded, on May 18th, to establish another settlement. They all fell to building, ploughing, planting, and fencing, and completed a vast amount of work in a few days' time. On account of the hilly nature of the spot they named the place Mt. Pisgah.17

Towards the end of May "most of the Twelve, with large companies, proceeded in a westerly direction." In order to get a level road and to avoid the crossing of numerous small streams, they were compelled to bear northward to about the center of Adair County, "passing by what was known, in early days, as Sargent's Grove, in Adair County, and Campbell's Grove, in Cass County." Their course lay through the southern part of what is to-day Cass County, past an Indian village on the East Nishnabotna River, and thence through the southern part of the present county of Pottawattamie, reaching Indian Creek on the 14th of June. Here, within the present limits of Council Bluffs the travelworn exiles rested for a while, but soon ferried themselves and their animals and wagons across the Missouri: Winter Quarters, on the site of Florence, Nebraska, became their main encampment.18

17 Journal of History, Vol. II, pp. 189, 190.

The Pottawattamie Indians were not removed from western Iowa until after June, 1846. Although fearing their hostility, the Mormons encountered nothing but good will.

18 Annals of Iowa, Vol. IX, p. 579. The trail as laid down by Negus from Mt. Pisgah westward accords with the trail as described in detail by Edgar R. Harlan, Curator of the Historical Department, who traced the old route over township roads and farmers' fields with the aid of the original surveys of the western counties. The Mormon trail "came to be noted by the first surveyors in the

Such, then, in a general way, was the route of the first or pioneer band of Mormons - it was the trail of the pathbreakers. As the slow-moving horse and mule teams and heavy-gaited oxen had drawn their exiled owners across the Territory of Iowa, log-cabin villages sprang up for the accommodation of later Mormon emigrants. To quote from the church historian: "Thus the 'Camp of Israel' had become a veritable marching, industrial column; founding settlements as it marched; planting for others to harvest, and leaving behind them within easy reach bases of supplies that insured their own safety in case of emergency."19 The life and experiences of the emigrants for five months on that three-hundred-mile stretch of sparsely settled or wholly uninhabited country would supply materials for a separate volume: the description of a journey begun in mid-winter, over snow-covered roads and frozen ground, "with arctic weather and all the inconveniences of ice, rain, and mud until May," must be left to the imagination of the reader.20

During all these months of the year 1846 the roads of eastern Iowa were alive with Mormon emigrants. It was soon discovered that the pioneer or "Camp of Israel" route was unnecessarily circuitous, and so another trail invited same way that they noted streams or other visible land marks." See an interesting report in the Twelfth Annual Conference of the Iowa Daughters of the American Revolution, pp. 29–36. The members of this organization have taken up the commendable work of marking the trails which became important factors as avenues of emigration to the West.

19 Americana, Vol. VII, p. 186.

20 See Linn's The Story of the Mormons, p. 364.

Thomas L. Kane, who lectured before the Pennsylvania Historical Society in 1850, presented a lucid picture of the burials along the road. He tells how coffins were made of bark stripped from trees, and adds: “The name of the beloved person, his age, the date of his death, and these marks were all registered with care. Such graves mark all the line of the first year of the Mormon travel dispiriting milestones to failing stragglers in the rear."Journal of History, Vol. II, pp. 108, 109.

more travel than the first. Later Nauvoo emigrants left the old trail at the crossing of the Fox River in Davis County and bore across the northeastern corner of Appanoose County, following the highlands along the Chariton River through Monroe and into Lucas County. Here, at a point about one and a half miles south of Chariton, they fixed a camp, and then continued westward to a place about six miles south of the present town of Osceola, Clarke County, where they struck and followed the original trail to Winter Quarters.21

Even this new trail north of the Chariton River was not exclusively used, for in that event the Mormon settlement at Garden Grove would have served no purpose whatever. Accordingly a third route became established in the northern townships of Wayne County: the main road there to-day is known as "Mormon Trail"22 Modern roads similarly designated in other counties are best regarded as auxiliary routes which perhaps received the name because a small

21 Charles Negus, who probably traveled upon this later trail, roughly indicated what Mr. Harlan has presented in detail. Compare their accounts in Annals of Iowa, Vol. IX, p. 578; and the proceedings of the Twelfth Annual Conference of the Iowa Daughters of the American Revolution, pp. 33, 34. Negus, however, gives one the impression that the pioneer Mormon band of two or three thousand persons divided near the western border of Appanoose County, followed the highlands on each side of the Chariton River, and re-united in Clarke County, when the fact is they proceeded together as has been indicated: later companies of Mormons selected the northern route.

In the proceedings of the Twelfth Annual Conference of the Iowa Daughters of the American Revolution, pp. 34, 35, Mr. Harlan lays down a route which traverses the eastern settled counties of Iowa and which joins the Mormon Trail referred to in the land surveys of Monroe County and beyond. He does not, however, ascribe to this road the name of Mormon Trail, but believes it was most frequented by emigrants to the Far West. Mr. Harlan's location of the trail north of the Chariton River is supported by the 1904 maps of Lucas and Clarke counties: in one the modern highway is known as 'Mormon Trace Road" and in the other as "Mormon Trail".

22 See map of Wayne County in the Atlas of Iowa (1904), compiled by the Iowa Publishing Company.

Mr. Heman C. Smith corroborates this information concerning the northern route.

body of Mormon proselytes happened to pass that way.23 Indeed, many such went through Des Moines.

In July of the year 1846 fifteen thousand Mormons were said to be encamped or toiling along the Iowa trails westward, with 3,000 wagons, 30,000 head of cattle, horses, and mules, and a vast number of sheep.24 Indeed, at one time no less than two thousand covered wagons could be counted. On the 17th of September the last Mormons evacuated Nauvoo, terror-stricken by the military preparations and threats of their bellicose neighbors. They comprised a miserable remnant of about seven hundred people, physically unfit and poorly equipped, and they lay huddled at a camp north of Montrose until wagons arrived for them from Garden Grove and Mt. Pisgah in October.25

23 Such as the "Mormon Ridge" in Marshall County. Local traditions have been responsible for much of the confusion incident to a study of the Mormon exodus through Iowa.

24 Bancroft's History of Utah, p. 221; Ford's History of Illinois, p. 412, where the number of persons who had crossed the Mississippi in May is placed at 16,000; and Linn's The Story of the Mormons, p. 365. On p. 345, there is a record "that the ferries at Nauvoo and at Fort Madison were each taking across an average of 35 teams in twenty-four hours. For the week ending May 22 he reported the departure of 539 teams and 1617 persons; and for the week ending May 29, the departure of 269 teams and 800 persons, and he said he counted the day before 617 wagons in Nauvoo ready to start.''

The Nauvoo Eagle, July 10, 1846, printed an interview with a person who had left the Mormons on June 26th. The advance company including the Twelve, with a train of 1000 wagons, was then encamped on the east bank of the Missouri, the men busily building boats. The second company, 3000 strong, were at Mt. Pisgah, recruiting their cattle for a new start. The third company had halted at Garden Grove. Between this place and the Mississippi the Eagle's informant counted more than 1000 wagons. He estimated the total number of teams engaged in this movement at about 3700, and the number of persons on the road at 12,000. It seems that from 2000 to 3000 Mormons had left Nauvoo for other regions, some joining the Strangites at Voree, Wisconsin.— Linn's The Story of the Mormons, p. 369. See also The Bloomington Herald, May 8, 1846; and Niles's National Register, May 30, 1846, Vol. LXX, p. 208.

25 Linn's The Story of the Mormons, p. 350; Lee's Confessions in Lewis's The Mormon Menace, p. 230; and History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Vol. III, pp. 172, 173, 177, containing an extract from a lecture delivered by Colonel Kane before the Pennsylvania Historical Society.