. . . It was most dark then; we got to Falmouth about 8 o'clock at night and stayed with a family that night called Williams who were in the Church. The next morning Brother John Tripp, who was expecting me came and took me to Penohyn to his house. I stayed with them that night. The next day I went out to my Aunt Mary and visited with them and Aunt Betsey and stayed with them about a week. The rest of the time I stayed at Brother Tripp's and worked with him and his son for which he paid me well. The day we left my mother came from Plymouth to see me. We left Falmouth for Liverpool on the 4th of March on board the "Lady Elgin," a steamship. My companion was young John Tripp. He was going like myself by the Emigration Fund; he was about one year older than I. We had a pretty good trip to Liverpool although we were seasick. Got to Liverpool on the morning of the 6th of March.. I left Tripp to watch our luggage, which was not very much, while I hunted for the office, No. 42 Islington. After a good deal of hunting I found it, and close by I see John Dunn, a soldier that had been baptized at Devonport, and as he wished me to find work for him in Cornwall, I did, as he wished to leave the Army, and I wrote him where to get work, and I was astonished to find him in Liverpool. He begged me to try to get him with us, so he went into the office with me and I reported Tripp and myself as ready to start. Brother S. W. Richards was there and told us we could not start until the 12th. I told him that we had very little money, not enough to keep us there so long. I also spoke to him of Dunn, he said he would do what he could for him so Dunn went back with me to Tripp. Dunn told me that he had a beautiful place of us to stop at and it was cheap too, I asked him if it was a Irish house, I thought it would be, as he was an Irishman, and I was prejudiced to the Irish as I thought that all the Irish were lousy. He told me tit would be cheap and clean and it was the best place for us to go. I knew that we must have a cheap place so I thought we would try it, so we went with Dunn, we found it better than we expected. He bought what we wanted to eat and paid them for sleeping room. When bed time came we went upstairs into a large room with five or six beds in it. The three of us all go into one bed and pretty soon a lot of Irishmen came up and stripped themselves naked and jumped into their beds. Although I was tired and sleepy, it was hours before I could go to sleep. I thought the whole place was lousy, and vowed to myself that I would leave the place the next day. In the morning I hunted my clothes and found nothing, so I found it was my imagination and that Irish people could be as clean as any other people. I found these people very kind to us, while we stayed there, we spent our time looking around the docks and talking to the masons and viewing the places of interest.

We went on board the sailing ship John M. Wood, Captain Hartley. There was nearly 800 persons on board, about one half of them were our people, and Brother Robert L. Campbell was appointed our president. We left Liverpool about on the 12th of March 1854. I was then 18 years four months and 12 days old. We had a pleasant voyage of seven weeks on the water. Nothing of importance with the exception of two deaths, one a woman, the other a small child. When we were in the Gulf of Mexico we were becalmed for several days, the sea was as smooth as glass and it was very hot during this time. About noon there was a cry of fire and there was great excitement for a short time. Some thought we would all be drowned or burned. It did not last long and the excitement was soon over. After we had been in the Gulf for sometime and getting nearer land, although we could not see it, we saw a log floating on the water and a nice looking wood. We secured some of it and it was a great curiosity to us. I forgot to say anything about trying to wash my shirt. I had seen mother washing and I commenced and thought I could do the same. I rubbed until I rubbed the skin off my knuckled and then I tied my shirt with a rope and threw it overboard and that was all the washing that [p.9] I done. We also seen the little flying fish and some of them fell on our deck, they were about five inches long and cannot fly far.

The nearer we got to the mouth of the Mississippi the more wood and weeds were seen floating on the water, and we talked to each other about Columbus and his sailors seeing something of the same kind when they come near to the land, so we knew we were getting near to our destination. The next that we met was the pilot boat and the pilot came on board. We began to see a difference in the color of the water, the sailor said it was the Mississippi water. We seen some curious looking steamers, they looked as if they were two or three stories high; different from anything that I had seen before. We got over the bar alright and soon after our ship was fastened to a strong steam tug with a ship on the other side of it loaded with slaves. This tug took us up to New Orleans. I think it was early in the morning on the 2nd day of May there. I think we were in New Orleans two or three days waiting for the steam boat to take us to St. Louis. We spent our time in looking over the city. I went to the slave market and saw the slaves that were to be sold that day. It was revolting to my feelings to see the men, women and children that we saw there going to be sold like cattle or horses, and although they had a black skin they were human beings. I also went to where they were building a large granite building. I do not remember what it was to be used for, but was a public building of some kind. I could have had worked there but did not want it. I have often thought of the time that I bought sugar there. I went for Mrs. Hughes, and asked the man at the store for a dollar's worth of sugar. He asked me if I had a sack to put it in. I said that I had and gave it to him. He laughed and said that it was not half large enough so he got a larger one and commenced to throw it in with a shovel. I thought perhaps he misunderstood me and I said again I wished just one dollar's worth, he said that he understood alright, and I went off with all the sugar I wanted to carry. The most of the city or the greater part of it is built on ground that is below the level of the river and being soft and spongy buildings of large size must have a foundation of piles before they can commence to build.

We left New Orleans on the steamboat "Laura" with about 700 people aboard. I with about fifteen other young fellows, had to sleep on a platform between the engine; with the hot weather, and the heat of the engine it was like being in an oven, and we would perspire from every pore, but with all this, I used to think it was a beautiful country; it was a new world to me, the trees and foliage, and all the scenery was so different from anything that I had seen before, that I was delighted with it. There were some fine residences along the river where the owners of the fine plantations lived and their slave quarters would be a little ways apart from them, and everything looked so nice and clean I often used to say to John Tripp, it was a pity for people to die in such a beautiful country. When we would stop, as we often did for wood, I often went ashore and used to talk to the Negroes. One day our boat had to stop for several hours for some repairs that was necessary, and it was near a large plantation, so I went and thought that I would have a good chat with the Negroes at their quarters. I had not been there long before the owner of the place came and spoke to me, he was a tall fine looking man with a long black beard. I thought he looked so clean with his white clothes and straw hat so different from my clothes, which was for a colder climate.

He wanted to know where I came from and where I was going. I told him of the custom of the people where I came from; what the wages of laboring men were and gave him what information that I could which [p.10] interested him. Their dinner bell rang about this time and I started to go back to the boat, but he would not listen but insisted that I must have dinner with him. I made all manner of excuses for I felt ashamed to 90 into such fine company as I expected to find there and I did not want to go with him, but he would have me so I thought I would make the best of it and went with him. The dining room was large and well furnished and the dinner was different from anything I had seen before; it was all so nice that I could not feel at home enough to eat much. The lady done all she could to make me feel comfortable. At last the dinner was over and I was glad of it. Then we commenced to talk of Mormonism and the Mormons then I felt more at home and was able to talk quite freely. They listened to me very attentively until I had to leave. I think they were excellent people. Before I left the gentleman said that if I would stay there he would do well by me
. I thanked him for his kindness and went to the boat that was nearly ready to start. In a few days after this the cholera broke out among us and we buried some of our number almost every day from here to St. Louis.

We were nearly three weeks going from New Orleans to St. Louis, when about five miles below St. Louis our boat stopped and as we had more passengers than the law allowed, there were over one hundred of the men got off and was told to walk to St. Louis. I was going to get off with the rest, but the President told me that he wished me to stay as the people would have to be held in quarantine on a small island about four miles below St. Louis in the Mississippi river, and that he had picked me with eleven others to wait on the sick and to bury them when they were dead. It was a great disappointment to me as I wanted to go on to St. Louis, but I remembered the counsel that father gave me before I left home, and that was to do whatever was wanted of me by those appointed to take charge, then I said that I would stay and do whatever was wanted of me, so we continued on with the boat until we came to the quarantine island. There was an old hulk of a steamboat called the "Hannibal," moved to the island which gave us all the shelter we had. The second day we were there the cholera broke out worse than ever. It was the Asiatic cholera. They would be taken first with the cramps in the stomach and vomiting, then they would begin to look a dark black color in the face then their limbs would cramp up and in a short time they would be dead. I have seen people eating breakfast apparently quite healthy, and we would have them buried before night. Our duties were, when they commenced to get sick to give them medicine that was sent from St. Louis, and to rub their limbs well; this was about all that we did for them. I can remember well that we got quite used to it and thought but little of the people dying, in fact we got so used to it we thought nothing of it, and we buried nearly one third of the people in the month that we were kept there. It was a little strange but with the exception of one of the twelve that was picked out to attend the sick, were all healthy and well, but when we were told to get ready to move further up the river, he was taken sick and we had to leave him there, which made us feel very badly, and the poor fellow was buried there after we left. The soil on that island was very sandy and was a great advantage to us in digging so many graves.

We left that island with glad hearts and stayed in St. Louis about six hours. I went around to all the large building where stone cutters were working. The first place that I found was a stone yard and the men were out on a strike. They had been getting two dollars a day and had struck for two dollars and fifty cents. The next place was the Court House; they were building it of limestone; quite a number of men were there. I commenced to talk with some of them, they did not seem to me to be very good work men. I commenced to work a little and showed them how we done it where I [p.11] come from. The foreman notice me and called me one side and told me that if I would come to work next morning he would give me $2.50 per day although he was giving the men there only two dollars. My first excuse was that I had no tools, he told me to come in the morning and he would furnish me with all the tools that I needed, so I left there and thought I would go a little farther. As I left I was followed by a man, he said that he was a mason, and as I was a stone cutter that we could go in together and take a small railroad bridge by contract that he had a chance to take. He represented that it would be a splendid chance for me, wanted me to go out with him as it was only two miles out, so to get rid of him I said that I had paid my passage to go farther up the river and that the boat was going to start in a short time, so I started to go down to the river and he followed me. As we passed by some stores that he lived upstairs, and pressed me to go upstairs, see his family and have dinner, but I would not go but kept on to the river and left him. I have thought he was a sharper, but I would not have stayed in St. Louis on no account as my father had particularly warned me against St. Louis. We got aboard the steamship "Ben Simon," and left for Kansas City in the afternoon.

Nothing of importance occurred and we had a very pleasant time going up the Missouri, landing alright, at what is called Kansas City. At that time there was only a few straggling houses by the river, one or two stores and a small ferry boat, a stern wheel that went by horse power that crossed the river a few times a day. Our camp was about a mile in from the river. The land was owned by a family named MacGhie. This was our fitting out place. There was a good many Indians in the neighborhood that was called the Kansas Indian, and the woods seemed to me to be full of pigs. I used to kill many of the young ones which was splendid eating. There was also a good deal of sickness in our camp and many died here.

I remember well one morning that it had been raining during the night and we had a meeting, and a brother of Dan Jones was taking to us. I was leaning against a large tree and all at once I felt very tired and wanted to sit down, but the ground was wet and I felt very curious and my teeth chattered in my head. I did not know what was the matter with me and I asked Brother Hughes, if he knew, he looked at me and said, why you have got the ague. I said well if I have run it out of me, and I ran through the woods until I could run no longer and when I got my breath I found I was just as bad as ever. It lasted on me for several weeks; the chills would come on as regular as clock work every day, the rest of the day I would feel pretty well. I was that way until one of the women that lived in the neighborhood gave me some medicine and I was soon alright. We left that camp about the last of June with about fifty wagons and ten persons in a wagon, although there was eleven persons in our wagon. Doctor Darwin Richardson was our captain, a ver good man, he was returning to his home in the 14th Ward from a mission. . . . [p.12]

. . . We arrived in Salt Lake City on the thirteenth day of September and camped on Union Square, were the University building now stands. . . . [p.14]

BIB: Moyle, James. Reminiscence, (Ms 4349), pp. 9-12, 14; Acc. #30526. (CHL)
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