If you find yourself traveling Highway 28, this route places you among several National Historic Trails and expansion era roads. These isolated tracks were the arteries of commerce, communications, and emigration for destination states like Utah, Nevada, Idaho, California, Washington, and Oregon.
Except for ranches, energy projects, and a few small communities, such as South Pass City and Farson, the route is somewhat isolated. Yet, for decades the famous and the forgotten figures of the history of the West passed through this part of Wyoming.
Roughly twelve miles west of Farson is a turnout at a stone monument and interpretive signs commemorating and educating visitors about one of the opening events of the “Utah War” of 1857. The monument was moved from the actual location of the historic events to a place on the opposite side of hollow. That is because the expansion of Highway 28 destroyed the actual location.
There is a curious deviation in the road crossing the hollow that raises speculation as to whether the route was altered with the purpose of obliterating the historic site. The answer to such a supposition is lost in time.
War in Utah Territory?
In 1857 the United States Government and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormon Church) were brought to the brink of war. The reasons for this unusual situation are complex, coming down to the two chief executives being set at odds for political reasons and a history of distrust between the parties.
President James Buchanan was in a fix. The divisions between free and slave states, which in the final days of his term split the nation, were coming to a head. The sectional violence of “bleeding Kansas” was a precursor to the coming civil war. When a federal judge fled Utah spouting a confabulation that the Mormons were in “rebellion,” Buchanan saw a chance for a distraction.
The northern and southern states seemed to agree that the polygamous Mormon religion was contrary to their cultural norms. President Buchanan ordered roughly one-third of the U.S. Army (2,500 men) to Utah, ostensibly to maintain order while a new territorial governor was installed, and a new fort built in Utah to protect the flow of emigration. The administration hoped that the Utah expedition could divert the states from sectional differences and quell growing talk of secession.
If the number of hats worn is any indication of importance, Brigham Young was the most influential man in Utah Territory. In the Mormon Church he held the first presidency, the position of eldest of the quorum of twelve, and prophet. He was the territorial governor (acting in that role in 1857), superintendent of Indian affairs, and commander in chief of the Utah territorial militia (a.k.a. the Nauvoo Legion).
First President Young was aware that the U.S. Government wanted to replace him from the influential and lucrative offices of territorial governor and superintendent of Indian affairs. More concerning than these matters, Young’s leadership was being called into question.
He responded to the internal issues by declaring a reformation. In the highly charged atmosphere created by this act, the threat of potential invasion served to quell dissent.
The U.S. Government openly advertised contracts for outfitting and transporting a military expedition to Utah. Was a war coming?
Brigham Young encouraged belief that the army was coming to slaughter the people of Utah. The militia of 4,000 men prepared for hostilities. Guns and ammunition were stockpiled. The people of Utah would soon find themselves under martial law, declared by its own territorial government.
The U.S. military took months to prepare its expedition. Units were scraped up from several posts. The expedition’s first leader, General William Harney refused the assignment. Albert Sidney Johnston accepted the promotion to command of the army but did not leave to join the expedition until long after it marched. Though President Buchanan latched upon the fantasy of a rebellion in Utah, Johnston’s orders lacked explicit measures to crush or imprison the rebels.
The long columns of soldiers and supply trains headed west at a leisurely pace. Soon the various elements of the expedition were spread over a length of a hundred miles of wagon roads. Many supply trains had no military escort while, on occasion, soldiers protected Mormon emigrant companies bound for the Great Salt Lake Valley. A military expedition expecting trouble would have been managed differently.
After the advanced elements moved through the continental divide in early autumn. General Johnston had yet to catch up with the advanced units of his army. The acting commander, Colonel Alexander, received a stunning proclamation from Acting Territorial Governor Young forbidding the army to enter Utah and declaring martial law. The incredulous Alexander sent a terse reply that the army took its orders from the president of the United States and the troops proceeded onward.
The army sought to be safely in Great Salt Lake City before the onset of a brutal winter.
Militiamen shadowed the army for some time before it entered Utah. Brigham Young’s preferred strategy was to repeat the scorched-earth resistance the Russians had offered to Napoleon.
Fortifications were placed in the mountain passes leading to the Great Salt Lake Valley. Plans were made to burn the grasses on the lands through which the army must pass. Should the army make it through to Great Salt Lake City, the stratagem would include burning the city to the ground and moving the city’s population elsewhere.
In early October the first shots of what became the “Utah War” were fired as Mormon militia raided a camp of the U.S. Cavalry in the vicinity of the South Pass of the Rockies. Shots were exchanged with no one hit. A trooper fell dead of an apparent heart attack, the first casualty of the conflict.
The South Pass raid opened the eyes of the military to their danger. All supply wagon trains were ordered to halt in place and wait for military escorts before proceeding further. This reaction set the stage for Simpson’s Hollow to earn its name.
Enter Lot Smith
On October third, Major Lot Smith’s battalion of roughly forty men was sent east by General Wells with simple instructions, “turn back the trains that were on the road or burn them.” The orders also warned against injuring anyone except in self-defense. The militiamen took few rations with them and were ordered to draw sustenance from the supply trains they encountered.
October 4, 1857- First Success
After a long night in the saddle, on the morning of the fourth the first ox train was spotted. Smith left half of his men to breakfast and took the remainder to the wagons. At the wagon camp Smith encountered a “large, fine-looking man” named Rankin.
The captain of the train assaulted Smith with a stream of curses but soon his wagons headed east. When out of sight the wagons turned west again but were halted by Mormon militia who took all the livestock, leaving the train stranded.
October 4, 1857- More Successes
Major Smith then led half his command to intercept other supply trains. A large cloud of dust on the Old Mormon Road led his scouts to discover a train of twenty-six freight wagons. The militia took supper and waited until dark before approaching the second wagon train. After a long ride they found the train. To their surprise the bullwhackers were boisterous in their cups.
The militiamen approached the drunken teamsters with caution and discovered there were two trains camped near one another. The militia appeared out of the dark and Major Smith told wagon master Dawson to get the teamsters and their possessions away from the wagons as there were orders to “put a little fire into them.”
Smith then arranged for the teamsters to stack their weapons away from the wagons. Dawson was thoroughly terrified at the sudden turn of events and pled for his life. Smith had Dawson search for overcoats and gunpowder.
The first wagon train subdued, Smith took the captive wagon master Dawson and approached the second train. The second wagon master, remembered in Smith’s report only as “Billy” was taken prisoner as easily as the first. Billy’s company was rounded up and moved away from the wagons.
As torches were prepared for the bonfire to come, an Indian entered the scene asking for presents. He requested and received soap, flour, and two wagon covers, the latter for building his lodge. With this unexpected interruption resolved, the burning began.
Smith had a large Irishman, known a “Big James” torch the wagons as he was not afraid of the wagons with saltpeter and sulphur blowing up. James set about the task with a will shouting, “By St. Patrick, ain’t it beautiful! I never saw anything go better in my life.”
Before all the wagons were fired the militia managed to draw provisions. As the flames from the burning supply train illuminated the scene, the militia withdrew and faded into the darkness. The militia headed to the bluffs of the Green River to spend the night.
October 6, 1857 – Captain Simpson’s Bad Morning
With the coming of first light on October sixth, the hunt for additional ox trains continued. There was no alarm raised as the militia encountered teamsters associated with another train, that of Captain Simpson. Disarming the bullwhackers was the first order of business.
Major Smith asked to find the captain and was informed he was away tending to livestock. The Mormon leader met up with wagon master Simpson roughly one-half mile away from the wagons. Lot demanded Simpson’s pistols. The wagon master at first refused. Upon returning to the train, Simpson saw that the militia had disarmed all the teamsters.
The two leaders were not finished with their verbal duel and Major Smith offered to return the arms to the teamsters if they really wished to try their prowess against the militiamen. The teamsters are said to have replied, “Not by a damn sight! We came here to whack bulls, not to fight.” Simpson indicated if he had been present at the camp at the when the Mormons arrived and the teamsters refused to fight, he would have killed all the cowardly bullwhackers.
Simpson’s pluck made a favorable impression on Lot Smith. The major would write that Simpson was the bravest man he encountered. Lot intended to allow the teamsters a wagon, loaded with provisions but Simpson demanded, and received, two.
Try as he might Simpson could not dissuade Major Smith from his purpose. After replenishing their own provisions, the militia burned the remaining wagons. The teamsters then headed east. Simpson’s Hollow had earned its name in history.
Smith’s command beat a hasty retreat as there was a camp of U.S. Cavalry at a distance but within sight of the burning wagons. The militia halted two miles from the burning wagons. Lot fired the only shots of the day thus far from his pistols to recall his pickets. He used the rest pause to reload the pistols.
As the pickets returned, one of Smith’s guns discharged accidentally. The errant bullet hit Orson P. Arnold in the thigh breaking the bone. The bullet continued through the shattered leg and whacked Philo Dibble on the side of the head. It then proceeded to puncture Samuel Bateman’s hat, pulling his hair. This single shot was remarkable for how many people it hit.
Rumors of Battle
Lot Smith’s account of the events of his burning of Captain Simpson’s ox train and others makes it clear that the military action was almost without violence, save for the accidental shot that hit three men. Smith followed his orders well and managed to destroy a large quantity of supplies that Johnston’s army relied upon. By agents unknown the events at Simpson’s Hollow morphed from a successful raid to a battle.
Famed adventurer Sir Richard Francis Burton, not the movie star, was on his way to Great Salt Lake City in 1860 to study the polygamous Mormons. His City of the Saints book is a classic and is filled with detailed description of traveling to Utah. In doing so he observed the Pony Express in action and passed through Simpson’s Hollow. The site of the burning was still visible as two crescents of blacked soil.
Burton wrote, “Here, in 1857, the Mormons fell upon a corralled train of twenty-three wagons, laden with provisions and other necessities for the federal troops… The wagoners, suddenly attacked and as usual unarmed- their weapons being fastened inside their awnings- could offer not resistance, and the whole convoy was set on fire except two conveyances, which were left to carry back supplies for the drivers till they could reach their homes… As at Fort Sumter, no blood was spilled.”
And he added, “So far the Mormons behaved with temper and prudence… They still boast loudly of the achievement, and on the marked spot where it was performed the juvenile emigrants of the creed erect dwarf graves and nameless ‘wooden’ tomb ‘stones’ in derision of their enemies.”
Within three years of the event, the story of how Simpson’s Hollow earned its fame was embellished. The talk of the bloody skirmish there was still in circulation well into the 20th Century. The site had taken on an aura much like the “shot heard around the world” at Lexington Green is to U.S. Citizens. Perhaps a peaceful act of defiance did not satisfy and was supplanted by a more exciting version.
In any case if you find yourself near Farson, a visit to this place linked to pasts both real and imagined is well worth the stop.
Terry A. Del Bene can be reached at terrydelbene@me.com
