ture- of personal suffering, cruelty, and outrage to men, women, and children, and the wanton destruction of property. The world has grown older since then, and, after a lapse of nearly forty years, it seems scarcely possible that such scenes could have been enacted during the present century, and in an American State.
A few of the Saints were shot, some tied up and cruelly whipped, over two hundred of their houses were burned, fences were torn down, cattle and horses stolen, and household effects, goods, and chattels destroyed or taken from them. Men, women, and children fled terrified before their enemies in every direction seeking protection. A party of about one hundred and fifty children are said to have wandered out on to the prairie, and remained there for several days without shelter, and with only the aid of half a dozen men who went with them to provide as well as they could for the helpless little ones, while their fathers and mothers were being hunted down like wild beasts.
Some of the exiles sought refuge in Van Buren (now Cass) county, but were not permitted to settle either there or in La Fayette. Most of them ultimately settled in Clay county, where they were received with some degree of kindness.
