After struggling along till nightfall, the
regiments camped wherever they could find shelter under bluffs or among
willows. That night more than five hundred animals perished from
hunger and cold, and the next morning the camp was encircled by their
carcasses, coated with a film of ice. It was a scene which could be
paralleled only in the retreat of the French from Moscow. Had there been
any doubt before concerning the practicability of an immediate advance
beyond Fort Bridger, none existed any longer. It was the 16th of
November when the vanguard reached that post, which the Mormons had
abandoned the week before. Nearly a fortnight had been consumed in
accomplishing less than thirty miles.
It is time to return to the States and record what had been transpiring
there, in connection with the expedition, while the army was staggering
towards its permanent winter-camp. The only one of the newly-appointed
civil officials who was present with the troops was Judge Eckels,
who had left his home in Indiana immediately after receiving his
appointment, and started across the Plains with his own conveyance.
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