The lecture will be held at the historic Echo Church located at 60 Temple Lane in Echo, a stopover along the Mormon trail. Later, Echo served as a junction between the first transcontinental railroad and spur line to serve Park City’s silver mines.
On Saturday, local historians Steve Leatham and David Nicholas will discuss the logistics of moving federal troops between Camp Floyd near Utah Lake in Utah County to Fort Bridger in Wyoming.
In 1857 and 1858, 10 years before silver was discovered in Park City’s mountains, the Utah War, also known as the Mormon Rebellion, happened. This was an armed confrontation between Mormon settlers in the then Utah territory and the armed forces of the U.S. government.
Having faced persecution in other places, historian Sandra Morrison says the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were fearful that the military was coming after them. In response to the well-armed military, the Mormons manufactured and repaired their firearms and turned their scythes into bayonets.
“That's when [President] Buchanan sent federal troops to basically occupy Utah, in concern of Utah had become a theocracy with Brigham Young acting both as president of the Mormon church and governor of the territory. And because they were practicing polygamy, the government was becoming quite concerned about whether they might secede from the nation. And of course, the Civil War was on the horizon. So, he basically sent the entire Federal Army cross country to Utah.
Troops marched through Salt Lake City and then south to Utah Lake and set up Camp Floyd where some 4,000 federal troops were stationed. Because Utah was difficult to get to in the 1850s, the Mormons tried to block the army's entrance into the Salt Lake Valley and weakened them by hindering them from receiving provisions.
“In fact, the troops were planning to spend the winter of 1857 at Fort Bridger and Brigham Young, who was waging basically a guerrilla warfare had burned it to the ground,” she said. “So, their winter in Wyoming was not very pleasant. They were out there exposed with very little supplies. And that became a big problem, you know, for the troops was just how do you supply the 4000 troops, because people have been living in the valley, you know, less than 10 years, so, they didn't have a lot to spare.”
Captain James Simpson was brought in to support the military forces and as part of that, Morrison says he built a new wagon route through Heber what was to later become the old highway 40 and interstate 80.
The free lecture is Saturday from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Find directions to thechurch here.
