The TREK - Saturday Day 6

Oct 26



Travel:


Deaths: Samuel Witt, age 65; Mary Roberts, age 44

 Almost imperceptibly the Saints crossed South Pass.


Paul Lyman Commentary


Crossing South Pass was a gradual affair. They went up a slight incline and then, almost imperceptibly, they started a decline. Pacific Creek was really only a spring that flowed a short distance to the west and then dried up. The Saints camped on the creek before it dried up.



Oct 27

 For the first time since October 14, no one died on this day.



Robert T Burton


“No deaths in camp tonight”


Paul Lyman Commentary


Finally, the company had a day without deaths. Eliza Chapman Gadd, age 40, had gone snow blind on the 23rd in the blizzard over Rocky Ridge. Her daughter, Mary Ann, age 7, was her trusted guide, until her sight returned. At last Eliza could see again. She and her husband, along with their eight living children, had started for Zion together. On October 4th, their two-year-old twin son, Daniel, had died. Five days later, on October 9th, her husband, Samuel, age 42, had died. Finally, her 10-year-old son, Samuel, had died and was buried at Rock Creek with the dozen others. Amazingly, she was not even a member of the Mormon Church. However, these experiences stirred her soul so much that after arriving in Salt Lake City and before the end of 1856, she was baptized a member of the Church.


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After the Martin Company was rescued at Martin’s Cove, it was decided that all the cattle, handcarts and belongings would be left at Devils Gate and the Saints would be carried back to Salt Lake City in the wagons. Dan Jones and a small group of rescuers were assigned to stay at Devils Gate and guard the freight until spring when wagons could be sent to retrieve it. Over the harsh winter they were often low on food. The cattle were starving and the heard had been decimated by wolves. The rescuers butchered and ate the rest but by early March Dan Jones and his men were out of food. This time they had consumed every scrap of cowhide, every moccasin, all the rawhide ties off the handcarts and the wagon tongues and even an old doormat made of buffalo hide. “They took inventory and found nothing edible in the whole place, except a set of harness and a rawhide pack saddle.” Just as the men were soaking the pack saddle to cook, the Lord intervened again. An express mail team arrived and the mules were carrying buffalo meat. The saddle was removed from the pot and replaced with the meat. The express men were a long time getting over the dinner they saw on the fire that night/ For years they called Dan Jones the man that ate the pack saddle.


Dan Jones gives us this recipe for boiled cow hide: Scratch and scrape the hair off; this had a tendency to kill and purify the bad taste that scalding gave it. After scraping, boil one hour in plenty of water, throwing the water away which had extracted all the glue, then wash and scrape the hide thoroughly…in cold water, then boil to a jelly and let it get cold, and then eat with a little sugar sprinkled on it.



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