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Hardship marks the life of pioneers coming to the Utah territory.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH of Lucinda Haws Holdaway
I was born October 20, 1828, near Fairfield, Wayne Co., Illinois, third daughter of Gilbert and Hannah Whitcomb Haws. In 1842 my parents were baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by Jefferson Hunt, who organized a branch of the Church there. Until they heard Mormonism they believed in no religion. The following year, in the month of February, I was baptized, being then fifteen years of age. It was very cold weather, the ice on the ditch was one and one-half feet thick. I had to walk a block and a half to my home in my frozen clothes, but did not suffer any sickness from it. I had very little opportunity to get an education. We had a large family and our spare time was employed in knitting, sewing, and spinning our own cotton to make cloth. From the age of seven to fourteen, I spent nine months in school, attending from one to two months at a time, never longer than two months.
In 1845, Elders came to tell us that the Saints were being mobbed and driven from their homes,
and that we had better prepare to go west with the company. We remained in Wayne County
until May, 1847, when my father and family prepared to go west. We went as far as Iowa and
stopped at a little place called Mt. Pisga for the winter. We remained here until the spring of
1848, then started for Winter Quarters so that we might be ready to go west with the first
company. in May we crossed the Missouri River in Lorenzo Snow's company on our way to the
Rocky Mountains. All went as well on the journey as could be expected. Of course, we had
many difficulties to encounter, _ we had to wash our clothes in cold water and make fires of
"buffalo chips" as there was no wood to be found. Very often the great herds of buffalo would
come down from the mountains to drink at the rivers, sometimes within a quarter of a mile of us;
they didn't seem much afraid. In the evening, we would all assemble in the center of the corrals
which was formed by a circle of wagons, and sing and pray. Every one seemed thankful and a
good time was had by all.
On September 23, 1848, we arrived in Salt Lake Valley. My father then bought one of the little adobe houses in the Old Fort which was built by the pioneers who came the year before. This house consisted of one room twelve feet square, containing one door, a fire-place and two port-holes about ten inches square, one on each side of the chimney. The house was made of adobe with a roof of willows, rushes and dirt and a dirt floor. The Old Fort was formed by a great many of these little houses being built together in the shape of a square, a space being left for a gate on the east and one on the west. No windows were put into the houses for fear of Indians who were numerous and often made attacks upon the settlers. When the door was closed there was no light except that from the port-holds through which the country could be seen for miles around and through them the people watched for the attacks of Indians.
After we were settled, we had a very hard time to get food to eat. A little corn had been raised the year before by the settlers, some of which we bought. This had been roasted and the bread we made of it was almost black. The people had sacks of dried buffalo meat which they used making a kind of soup and thickening it with a little flour. Once in a while a cow was killed and a little piece of meat portioned out to each family. So they lived on in this condition until the next summer.
President Brigham young told the people one Sunday, as he stood under the bowery in the Old Fort, not to be discouraged for before this time next year flour could be bought here as cheap as it could in the East. This looked impossible to the people; but nevertheless, this prediction was true. In the following summer, 1849, the gold seekers on their way to California passed through Salt Lake Valley and sold their wagons, clothing, provisions_everything, except what they had to have, to the people. These things helped the people out for some time.
On December 24, 1848, I was married, at the age of 21 years, to Shadrack Holdaway, age 26. He was one of the 500 Mormon Battalion who volunteered to fight in the Mexican War. At the close of the war he went with part of the company to California. Here he was discharged from service in the army. He was also among the first to find gold in California. Soon after he came to Salt Lake Valley.
The following March, 1849, my father and family, together with thirty other families, were called
to go south to Utah Valley to settle up that part of the country. I did not go as I intended going
back to the States with my husband in May to get some machinery for making woolen goods.
We left Salt Lake City in company with thirteen others, among them Brother Lorenzo D. Young
and wife and Doctor Bernhisel who was going to Washington, D.C., on business. Ten men of the
company intended to stay at the upper crossing of the Platte River to run a ferry to help the
emigrants across the river. Brother Young and wife went with us. One day our little company
stopped for noon at a place called Independence Rock east of Fort Bridger. After we left this
place we found that one of the men had left a lasso at our camping place. Two of the men went
back for the lasso and were followed by seven Indians in full chase. When the Indians saw our
company they fell back behind a ridge, coming up one by one. They rode along with us for
awhile and seeing some buffalos feeding some distance away tried to make the men understand
that they wanted them to chase the buffalo. They did so and succeeded in killing one. The
Indians camped with us over night. During the night our horses stampeded and in the morning
all of them were gone. Sister Young and myself had to remain in camp with those Indians while
the men went in search of the horses. But the Indians did not molest us except to try to scare us.
One of the old men came up to me and caught hold of me as if he would pull me out of the
wagon. I picked up a hatchet and shook it at him and would have hit him if he had not gone
away. Soon the men came back and we were very glad to be safe again. When the Indians left us
they pushed one of the men off his horse and stole it, saddle and all.
We journeyed on to Green River. Previous to leaving Salt Lake City we had prepared a watertight wagon box. We ferried ourselves across the Green River with oars in this wagon box. It served a very good purpose. We reached Platte River which we had to cross on a raft. Here ten men of the company stopped to help ferry Saints across the river. Brother Young and wife, Doctor Bernbisel, my husband and myself went on to Fort Laramie which was then an old government station. The second day after we left the company we began to meet train after train of gold seekers going to California.
We traveled along alright, until my husband and I took sick with cholera. I came very nearly dying; but he was able to drive. We didn't dare stop for a day on account of Indians. When we arrived at Fort Laramie Brother Young made arrangements to take a wounded man down to the Missouri River. One evening after the man had got able to walk, he got out of the wagon and walked awhile. He came upon a camp of gold seekers who no doubt asked him all about the gold mines. He knew my husband had been to the mines and when we reached the camp they halted us but we drove on. One of the men called after us, "That fellow has got his load and is going back to spend it."
We went on and camped about a mile from the camp we had just passed. After supper, when we had put our camp fire out, which was always did for fear of Indians finding us, there came a man from the gold seekers' camp and asked my husband if he would take a lot of letters for their camp over the river. My husband said he would take them if he would get them ready before he left in the morning. The man started back to his camp. Suddenly he came back all excited and said that there were Indians all along the road and that he was frightened to go back to camp and wanted to know if he couldn't stay all night. My husband asked what kind of Indians he had seen. He said they were Crow Indians. We knew that there were no Crow Indians in that part as it was the section in which the Siox Indians lived. He then told him that he had no place for him to stay and no bedding except a buffalo robe; but the man still insisted on staying all night. He took the buffalo robe and laid down under the wagon. There was a storm coming on and we told him that he had better go on to the next camp, which was about a half a mile ahead, and he could get in a tent. Finally he consented, when he found what a terrible storm had come on. My husband, fearing that this man had planned to rob us, took his gun and sat down in the front of the wagon. I wanted him to let me take the sacks of gold out of the wagon and drop them a little way from the wagon. It was so dark that no one could have seen them; in the morning I would have got them again. He would not consent to this, so he and Mr. Young sat up all night and waited for an attack which did not come. Doubtless the storm had helped to protect us from being robbed. By morning the storm had passed, and all was quiet. We resumed our journey again. I was now over my sickness and felt much better. At the Missouri River, Brother and Sister Young left us. We went to Kanesville and remained about one month to rest up.
About the first of September we started for St. Louis. Near Richmond, at a little town named
Linden, we saw a man who had been in Salt Lake City before we left and had traveled all the way
ahead of us. He knew how much gold we had for he had tried to borrow it before we left Salt
Lake City. He was a bad man and we feared that he would try to get our gold. We reached
Richmond in safety late in the evening. As we passed through the city some one halooed at us,
"Where are you from?" Receiving no answer, he turned to a man and said, "That fellow has got
his load and is going back to spent it." We drove on and just on the edge of some woods, we
came to a small river. Here we met a man on horseback who asked us where we were from and
where we were going. He said he was from Linden, the little town we passed before reaching
Richmond. He looked at our wagon and horses curiously. He tried to get us to stay in the river
bottoms all night and told us there was not a house within six or eight miles from there except a
little log cabin off the road. But we drove on anyway. I was suspicious of him and went to the
back of the wagon and watched him through a hole in the cover. The man turned around and
watched us as far as I could see him. About four miles on, we came to the little log house. Here
we stopped; we ate supper and then prepared for the night.
We were near enough to the house to hear the people talking. They had been cooking around a camp fire in the yard. When it grew dark they all went in the house and everything was still for some time. My husband went to sleep; but I could not. I laid down with my clothes on for I felt sure that we were not safe. About eleven o'clock, I heard horses coming; it sounded as if there were three, at least. I woke my husband and we were very still for fear that they would know that we were listening. They passed very close to our wagon. The men then let down some very heavy bars without a bit of noise, took their horses and went into the yard of the farmer. Thinking we would have to defend ourselves, we took our gun, pistol and hatchet, got out of the wagon and sat on the ground, waiting for the attack. Soon the doors began creaking on their wooden hinges as the people passed from room to room. There was not a sign of a light and not a loud word spoken until one of the children said, "Come on or I'll leave you." They evidently were preparing to go somewhere, but where, we never knew. Anyway we were not molested and we were thankful for it. As soon as we could see in the morning, we hitched up our team and left that place. We traveled a short distance and then took the projecting boards off of our wagon, so that it would not be so easily known to others that might have heard of us. We did not stop for breakfast until we had gone twelve miles.
We went on to St. Louis and then to Lebanon, St. Claire County, Illinois, where my husband's
folks lived. My health was not very good and about a month after my arrival at this place, I was
taken sick with a congestive fever. Three weeks later, September 26, 1849, my first baby, a boy,
was born. We named him George Bradford. I was sick for three months, during which time I had
a gathered breast. To make my trials and troubles worse, my little baby died when I was asleep.
Oh, how I felt when I awoke and found my little babe, dead, in my arms. It had lived but four
months. I was very lonely there among strangers. My husband was away much of the time,
buying up oxen preparatory to starting back to Salt Lake Valley.
On March 3rd, 1850, we left Lebanon to go to Kanesville, Iowa, where we would receive a
shipment of woolen mills machinery which we were to take to Salt Lake Valley, this being the
first machinery of its kind to enter that Valley. We reached Kanesville about the fifteenth of
May. I took sick with chills and fever; but after we crossed the Missouri River I got better.
In the early part of June we left Kanesville in William Pace's company. It was divided in two sections, with fifty in a section. Richard Sessions was at the head of our division. Everything went well until the cholera broke out. We could not get a bit of good water anywhere. The water in the Platte River was thick with mud and very warm. Many of the company died. We had no boxes to bury them in, so they were wrapped in a white sheet and laid in the cold ground _not even a slab to mark their graves. Sometimes a large rock or tree marked their burial place.
After the cholera died out, we got along real well without an accident for several hundred miles.
We had all the buffalo and antelope meat we wanted and some deer meat, which we got in the
Black Hills. The company died a lot of it and it came in very well, for we needed it when we got
out of the buffalo country. One day we saw a large herd of buffalo. They were crossing our path
just ahead of our train. The men rushed upon them and had a lively chase. One man's horse was
hooked from under him but fortunately he was not hurt. Many times I have seen great herds of
buffalo feeding at the river edge. In the evening they came out of the hills and went down to the
Platte River to drink. At first they were so tame that they would come up in our herd of cows and
sheep and smell around. One night a buffalo ran past the camp. Some of the men shot and
wounded it but it didn't stop. My husband and a Mr. Reynolds chased the animal and killed it.
They lost their way in the dark and didn't reach camp until the next morning. I sat up all night
looking for them for I was afraid that the wolves would kill them. The camp had to wait three
days for a young man who went on foot after the buffalo and was lost. We were all glad when all
of the company were safe again.
My husband was on guard at night and during the day he walked ahead and drove the stock. He
shod the horses and was looked to as a kind of overseer of the company. I had to cook for four
men and drive our team besides. One day I got in some serious trouble. My team was the last
one. We had to cross a stream with a very steep bank. My team plunged into the stream and the
wagon nearly stood on end. My horses balked and I could neither get out of the wagon nor make
them pull the wagon out. Fortunately, there was a man walking behind me who helped me get
the team through the stream.
We were now getting into the mountains on this side of the Sweetwater River. Our wagons were loaded with machinery and our teams were just about given out. Our bread stuff was all used up except some whole corn, which I made hominy of and we live on this until we reached Salt Lake Valley in September, 1850. Here and there, in the little city were patches of grain and vegetables. We lived in our wagon until my husband managed to get the walls of a small adobe house up. We put a portion of our things in the little house and stretched a domestic wagon cover over the place where the bed stood which would shelter us for awhile until my husband had time to put a roof on it. He had to get the wagons unloaded and haul hay and wood for the winter. We were living on the Big Cottonwood Creek at this time. There was not floor, no roof and no door in the house. It had been raining for three days_ was still raining_ and in the midst of this, on November. 4, 1850, my second baby was born. Everything in the house was wet through and streams of water poured through the wagon cover onto my bed. We set pans to catch the water. The baby, which we name Timothy, lived but a few minutes and I came nearly dying also.
On the 28th of December we left for Provo. I drove in an open wagon all the way. It was just about the coldest weather I ever experienced. We camped out two nights and reached the Fort on the last day of December, 1850. We could not get a house to live in, except an old log cabin with just the walls and a dirt floor. It wasn't very good for winter use but we fixed a roof on it and stayed there until March, 1851. We then built us a log cabin on the other side of Provo River. It was neither chinked nor plastered, but it was a paradise compared with the ones we had lived in before. Next, my husband built a machine shop and set up the first carding machinery brought into this country. Bishop David Evans helped to put it up and in October it was ready to begin work. Brother Evans first took charge of running it and then my husband. Soon after, he built a blacksmith shop.
In December, 1851, my third child, William Shadrack, was born. About the middle of
November, 1852, my husband married my sister, Eliza Haws. January, 1853, was the date of
birth of my fourth child. Amon David. The following summer we had to move into town
because the Indians were getting so hostile, and it was not safe for the people to live in a
scattered condition. By winter, we had built a little house almost on the same spot where we live
now. The following April, John Madison, our fifth child, was born. About the same time, we
had completed the machine shop and the men were working in it. I helped prepare the warp for
the looms and did everything I could to keep the machines running.
In March 1854, my sister, who had given birth to two children, died, leaving me her second child,
Marion, only five days old, to raise. I took him and nursed him along with my own baby. My
sister's first child, Eliza, had died when a baby. With her baby, I then had four children under
four years of age to care for. It was very hard for me and often I became very discouraged. My
husband went on putting up machinery and building machine shops until the Provo Woolen Mills
started. He then sold out and went onto a ranch about seven miles out of town. My sixth child,
Mary Elizabeth, was born September, 1856. This was at the time of the Johnston Army trouble.
I nursed her through a spell of hard sickness that lasted over three months, in which I did not
have my clothes off to go to bed once.
Those were trying times for us all. The people didn't know what to expect from the army; but were ready at the instant to fight if the call came. All of the men were on guard around town watching for the Indians because they were very annoying and treacherous and no one knew what to expect from them. At the same time, men from the northern part of the state were keeping guard for Johnston's Army at Echo Canyon. They had to be fed and clothed by the people at home. Some of the men gave all the clothes they had for the summer, except a cotton shirt and trousers, and this was in the coldest of winter.
The following spring, in April, 1858, my seventh child, Levi Stewart, was born. I had known
nothing but trouble for years, and we, as a people, were very destitute. We had to make
everything with our hands. In August, 1859, my eighth child was born, Logan Gilbert. My
husband built a sawmill in Provo Canyon and the next spring, I went up there and stayed until
August. I then came down to town. We were nearly naked for clothes and I had to get cloth
made to clothe the family for winter. I made with a hand loom and colored about forty yards of
lindsy, twenty-five yards of skirting and twenty yards of what was called gray jeans for pants.
My little boys, between the ages six and nine, had to herd the cows from town, down to the river
mouth, about three miles. The Indians were very hostile at this time and I was very frightened,
not knowing what might happen to my boys while they were away. I lived in torture for months
at a time and never had a comfortable nights's rest for fear of the Indians doing some harm. But
no harm came to them and I feel that the Lord protected us all.
My ninth child, Cynthia Mahal, was born October 1, 1860, and only lived about one year. She died of cholera infantum. August 16, 1863, Nancy Emmaline was born. This was my tenth child. She died at two years and a half old of malignant scarlet fever. Andrew Nathan was born December 2, 1864. Louisa Diantha was my next child. She was born November 12, 1866, and lived to be a little over a year old, dying of diphtheria. For eight days and nights, before she died, I didn't lay down to sleep.
It was about this time that my husband met with a severe accident. He went to Salt Creek
Canyon, near Nephi, for a load of coal. He was helping a man lift his wagon wheel so that he
could go on, and just as the horses started, his foot slipped and he fell under the wheels and the
wagon, which contained seventy bushels of wheat, went over him, breaking every other two pair
of ribs open and his collar bone. I went and nursed him until he was able to be brought home and
in about a month he was able to walk seven miles.
After Louisa was buried, I became sick and was obliged to stay in bed for about one month and was not well again until after my next child was born. I was still sick in bed when my thirteenth child was born, Warren Haws, March 17, 1868. I had a hard time to raise him, until he was six years old. After that he gained in health and I got along without any serious trouble. I, myself, was also feeling much better. January 17, 1870, my last child was born, Amanda Lucinda. She was my fourteenth child. I still had to make cloth for my family. In those days we had no machines, no knitting factories, no woolen mills, so were compelled to make our own clothes. There were also no railroads to bring goods here. I was kept very busy all the time. When my youngest child was four years old, I went on the ranch to take care of the stock_ almost seventy head. My husband and the older children were in the canyon running a saw-mill. The four youngest were with me. We had to feed and milk eight or ten cows and care for them. We stayed at the ranch until it was too cold for my husband to work in the timber; then we came to town and the children started to school. When Amanda was five years old, my husband was accidentally shot while at work in the timber. He had set a gun to shoot a bear; the next morning he went to see if the bear had been shot and happened to step on the string, which was arranged to discharge the gun. The gun went off and he received the bullet in his leg, which passed clear through his thigh; but no bone were broken. After three weeks of unsuccessful doctoring, I was obliged to care for him myself. He had a hard time to keep his leg; but it finally became well.
For about fifteen years, off and on, we lived at the ranch. My health then began to give way and I
returned to town to live. I had lived in town but a short time when I feel from my window,
breaking one of the bones of my wrist and dislocating it. Soon after this, my husband met with
another accident. He was working in a saw-mill near Schofield. One day while hauling timber,
he was suddenly pitched forward between the horses. They became frightened and dragged him
for nearly a mile over rocks. The result was that he had his jaw bone broken in two places, his
skull fractured and his throat cut badly. He was sent home and after having his jaw set and the
fractured skull bound by a physician, I was his nurse and doctor. It seemed that luck was against
us, for soon after, I was hurt again. As I was coming from the ranch, I fell from the wagon. The
wheel ran over my right arm and left ankle, crushing my arm and breaking my ankle.
These accidents all happened in less than three months. I got the use of my limbs again, though,
nearly as good as they ever were.
About one year later, 1891, I was taken very sick with stomach and heart trouble. I was sick for
about five months and as soon as I was able, I went to the Manti Temple and was baptized for my
health. The next day I was able to walk up into the tower of the Temple. I remained there about
a week, doing work for my mother's family and also my own. I returned home and remained well
for about twelve years. Then I had a spell of nervous prostration and was confined to my bed for
about five months. During this time, I had all of my teeth taken out. As soon as I was able, I
again went to the Manti Temple and was baptized and washed and anointed for my health. I
became well and enjoyed good health for a number of years.
About this time, my two youngest children were married. Shortly after, my daughter's husband
was sent on a mission to Australia and she stayed with us while he was away. In just twenty-one
years I had given birth to fourteen children, and in just twenty-one years and six months from the
birth of my last child, the last two were married. Then I was just in the same situation as when I
was married twenty-one years before, without a child to make home cheerful. It seemed as
though I could not live any longer_ my trials seemed too much for me to bear. My father and
mother were dead, my children gone from me and myself and husband left alone again. In
March, 1899, the husband of my daughter, Amanda, died at Ogden. She came home to live with
us on the ranch and has been with me every since. In April, 1899, my son Amos died from the
result of an injury which he received by being crushed between rock while at work at a quarry.
The following October, I went again to the Manti Temple. My sister Mary went with me. We stayed about two weeks and finished the baptisms for my mother's family as many as were recorded. In the spring of 1901, I had to undergo an operation to remove a tumor from my right breast which had been growing for three and a half years. I was then seventy years old and I dreaded the operation very much. Still I knew that there was a God in heaven who would save me from the power of death if I had faith enough in Him. I prayed earnestly for faith and that the Lord would take away the fear I felt. My prayers were answered; for the great fear I had left me and I felt my life would be spared. The day of the operation, members of my family fasted and prayed for me and I layed down upon the operating table as if nothing was going to happen. I had the Elders administer to me before the operation, and after it was over they anointed me and prayed for me again, and I never suffered pain nor had any fever. I was sick only four days and on the ninth day when the stitches were taken out the wound was healed and I never suffered any pain from that day to this. I leave this as my testimony, that there is a God who answers prayers and who sanctifies the anointing of his servants.
About two years later, my husband leased his ranch and came home to live the rest of his life.
Soon after, he took sick with pleuropneumonia and on December 24, 1902, after a short illness,
he died. This same day was my wedding day; we had been married fifty-four years.
I am now seventy-nine years old and have been a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints since 1843.
When the Relief Society of the Provo Third Ward was organized with Sister Mary Jane Tanner as President, I was appointed as a teacher and I worked in that position for twenty years.
I have written this brief history from memory and on that account have omitted many incidents
that might have been of interest, if I could have remembered them.