Id., 181-2.
herd of wild bulls. Thence, without further adventure
worthy of note, they continued their march, and reach-
ing the Pacific coast on the 29th of January, 1847,
found the stars and stripes floating peacefully over the
town of San Diego. ^^
A more detailed account of the career of the Mor- mon battalion will be found in my History of Cali- fornia. It remains only to add here that about one hundred of the men reached Salt Lake City in the winter of 1847, while some remained on the Pacific coast. ^
The alacrity displayed by the Mormon president in raising this battalion has been ascribed to various causes ; to the fear of further persecution should the levy be refused, and to a desire of showing that, not- withstanding their maltreatment, the saints were still
^' In A Concise History of the Mormon Battalion in the Mexican War, 1846 -1847, by Sergeant Daniel Tlyer, (Salt Lake City,) 1881, 8vo, 376 pp., we have a most valuable book, ami one that forms the leading authority on this subject. Though written, of course, from a Mormon standpoint, and marked by the credulity of his sect, the execution of the work is all that its titls-page promises. Li the introduction, occupying 109 pages, we have President John Taylor's account of the martyrdom of Joseph Smith, Colonel Kane's discourse on the Mormons, and a poem by Eliza R. Snow, entitled The Mormon Battalion, and First Wagon Load over the Great American Desert. The remainder of the volume consists of original matter. Tyler was a mem- ber of company C in the battalion, and no doubt speaks the truth when he says in his preface that ' neither labor, pains, nor expense has been spared in the effort to make this a just and authentic history.' Among other authori- ties may be mentioned Home's Migr. and Settlem't, L. D. Saints, MS., 32-3; Xehfktr's Early Justice, MS., 3; Woodruff's Rem., MS., 76; Henry W. Big- ler's Diary of a Mormon in California, MS., in which last we have a faithful and interesting record of the Mormon battalion and Mr Bigler's account of the discovery of gold in California. The Conquest of New Mexico and Califor- nia: an Historical and Personal Narrative, by P. St. George Cooke, Brigadier and Brevet Major-general U.S. A., N. Y., 1878, 12mo, gives some additional matter, as do the jounial and report of that officer in U. S. Sen. Doc. No. 2, 30th Cong., Special Sess., diini.'ya. House Ex. Doc, 30th Cong., IstSess., no. 41, pp. c40-63. Cooke, it will be remembered, was in command of the battalion. Items have also been gathered from U. S. House Ex. Doc, 31st Cong., 1st Sess., no. 24, p. 22; Apostle Wilford Woodruff's Speech, in Utah Pioneers, 33d ann., 19-22; Smith's Rise, Progre-is, and Travels, 8-11; Tullidge's Life of Brigham Young, 41-76; OlshajiMn, Gesch. de Mor., 142-4; and Kane's The Mormons, 27-9. Biographical notices of some of the members, and the names of the women who accompanied the battalion, are given in Tullidge's Women, 427, 432, 443-4.
-'^In the Frontier Guardian, March 7, 1849, is a notice copied from the St Joseph Gazette, stating that the members of the battalion can at once receive their extra pay at Fort Leavenworth. The notice is signed by Paymaster Thos
