Thomas Wasden
- Born: 29 Jun 1821, Laughton, Yorkshire, England
- Died: 18 Apr 1891, Gunnison, Sanpete, Utah
- came to America in 1853 in the ship the William Stetson
- Arrived in Valley: 17 Sep 1859, Edward Stevenson Co.
Thomas Wasden
Sons of the Utah Pioneers – Conquerors of the West p. 2663,
2664
Born: 29 Jun 1821, Laughton, Yorkshire, England
Parents: William and Mary Ann Penniston Wasden
Died: 18 Apr 1891, Gunnison, Sanpete, Utah
Arrived in Valley: 17 Sep 1859, Edward Stevenson Co.
Married: Mary Coucom -6 Dec 1841, Rotherham, Yorkshire
England
Thomas and Mary operated a small store in Aston, England,
after their marriage. Family legend says
Thomas worked in the cutlery business near Sheffield. Their first three children entered school
briefly, b Tut had to help out by working in a book bindery. The family was in comfortable circumstances
with all of them working.
About 1847, the family joined the LDS Church. In 1855, with seven children, Thomas and Mary
sold many of their possessions so they could travel to America. They got to Cincinnati,
Ohio, before they had to stop to work to earn more money to go the rest of the
way west. During this time, two children
died, Orson Spencer paid for the burial of the children as they had no
money. In 1859 they had saved enough continue
to Florence Nebraska where they joined the Edward Stevenson company.
The children walked most of the way. Brigham Young had told the people if the
children would walk barefoot and save their shoes, their feet would harden so
it wouldn’t bother them. They went o to Provo
where they spent the winter with Dan Jones.
In the spring, they went ton to Ephraim where a son died the
next spring they went ton to Gunnison where they stayed until 1867-8, them
moving on to Scipio.
They lived in a dug out until they could build a log
house. Thomas was a high priest, ward
teacher, hoe missionary and he assisted in bringing immigrants to Utah. He was involved in the Black Hawk Indian
war. After a few years, they returned to
Gunnison in 188 where they stayed.
Thomas Wasden's Record from Aston, Yorkshire,
England to Salt Lake City, Utah
This
typewritten copy was sent to Dave Carlsen by Dalene Butts on 5 February 1999
Came by railroad from
Woodhouse Junction to Liverpool and sailed on the 26th of April 1855, on the
ship Wm. Stetson and a prosperous journey.
And three deaths, children. Landed on the 8th of May 1855 in N. Y.
And came by rails and
river up to Cincinnati, Ohio, U. S. on the 5th of June, 1855 and had a great
deal of sickness with the death of Willard and Sarah Ann Wasden. W. 3. &
S.A. 1 and left Cincinnati on the 19th of April on the [ ? ] train and arrived
at St. Louis on the 26th of April 1859. And left St. Louis on the 28th and
arrived in Florence on the 9th of May by the boat Carrier and to our surprise
we found the houses deserted. Where we found a comfortable house and brought a
fine yoke of cattle and paid $80.00 dollars, also bought another yoke and wagon
and paid $125.00 dollars. The wagon been in use before, and left for the plains
on the 19th of June.
Before moving on I shot
a fine deer and gave a piece to each in the camp. Arrived Ganoe on the 4th of
July without any accidents and left on the 5th of July and arrived at Woods
River on the tenth of July, each being 140 miles apart, 11th of July camped
three miles from the bridge.
We are in the buffalo
country and are hunting today. 12th of July, pleasant day traveled 8 miles. In
the evening we had a thunder and lightning storm which tore up the tents and we
were almost drowned while getting into the wagon at 2 A.M.
13 of July traveled
about 20 Miles, pleasant day and plenty of buffalo. (Ft. Kearney is across the
river.) [Original copy is so faded this may not be correct.]
14th of July was very
hot and no breeze. 2 buffalo killed, one by Capt. Stevensen and one by Brother
Roggers. Old man Roggers has been lost since morning on the hunt. Camped at Elm
Creek, Brother Lee's axle broke. Traveled between 10 and 15 miles and very busy
this evening cutting up the buffalo.
15th of July camped at
Elm Creek. Very pleasant day. Death of a child of Brother Lee, four days old.
About 20 minutes before 10 o'clock this evening as I was getting in bed I heard
the calling and yelling as of a herd of buffalos or Indians on the cattle herd,
but to my surprise it was the welcome cheers of our lost brother Roggers.
[Pages lost] and a few
drops of rain, all well. Camped at Skunk Creek a train of [ ? -- could not make
out the name] came up late this evening with 10 wagons.
20th of July traveled 10
miles and camped at Little Mud Creek and a very Pleasant day and all sand
hills. We passed a tribe of Sioux Indians camped at the Panney Springs, quite
friendly.
21st of July was a very
pleasant day. We traveled 14 miles, camped on the Muddy Creek.
22nd was a pleasant day
with a great deal of sand hills, traveled about 15 miles. A little rain in the
evening. Nesflins Train is ten miles ahead. We have many lame cattle in the
camp now.
23rd a wet morning. It
rained while at dinner, started at 12 A.M. Traveled 9 miles. Brother Hastings
cow left behind.
24th was a beautiful
morning with the death of two oxen, one of Brother Teners and one of Brother
Chamberlains. A young girl died, daughter of Brother Allen---Elizabeth Allen,
aged 15 years. She and her mother and brother came to this country on the
Ganoe, the same train and ship as we did, and are still camped this evening by
the Platt, three miles west of the Bluff Creek.
25th of July a wet day,
traveled 10 miles with very bad roads through sand hills. There are plenty of
flies and mosquitoes.
26th of July traveled 10
miles. Beautiful day and in the evening Brothers Eldridge, Young and Coward
came in the camp with three wagons. Brother Stainpour's ox dead.
27th traveled 12 miles,
very pleasant day. There are a great many lame cattle.
29th A very heavey sand
hill 1/2 mile long. We had to double teams, it took til dinner time. Traveled
about 7 miles. Was a thunder storm in the evening. There are a great many
Indians about warring with the Panners.
29th. Pleasant day with
the death of Sister Hoppley, wife of Brother Hoppley, died of cold, been
exposed to hardships which she could not endure and buried at Castle Creek. A
train of some 10 or a dozen wagons returning from Utah and Ogden City; traveled
about 12 miles. Sister Gumbar Con left on mistake. Brother Silver is strained a
little in the arms and breast, in going through a san bar the cattle turned
around and stood on him, very nearly upsetting the wagon. Camped about nine
o'clock in the evening. Many Indians around. Camped by the Platt.
30th Pleasant day. One
ox died of Sister Gumbar. Traveled about miles.
1st of August traveled
11 miles. A great deal of sand. Pleasant day.
2nd. Fixed up the wagons
till dinner time. Pleasant day and in sight of Chimney Rock twenty miles ahead.
Traveled 10 miles with a little rain in the evening with the death of Brother
Griffith's child, five months old, died of diarreah.
3rd. Pleasant day.
Traveled 18 miles with a very heavy thunder storm in the evening we passed a
train of wagons from Salt Lake-------- and camped five miles the other side of
Chimney Rock.
4th. Pleasant day. 18
miles and we have camped.
[Remaining pages in
journal are lost.]
Thomas & Mary Coucom Wasden
By Laura McCurdy Clarke
In Yorkshire, England, on June 29, 1821, at Laughton, Thomas
Wasden was born and likewise Mary Coucom came into being August 25, 1816, at
Thryberg, being 5 years the senior of the kindly, gentle, soft-spoken Thomas,
whom she married when he was 19 years and she was 26.
Their courtship took place in the Sherwood Forest of Merry
England in the famed section of Tobin Hood’s escapades. Ellen was born July 15th, the 4th
child and 8 years after the union. When
she was seven years old the family of four or five small children made the
momentous decision to leave country and kin for religion’s sake and come to the
new land, for it was a new and untried country.
The war of 1812 with England was over and had faded into memory. The Indian troubles were fresh in the story
of Zion beyond the Mississippi river and the new call for undaunted courage,
health and vigor was at the finger tips beckoning to such souls as Thomas and
Mary to come forth to the new church of Joseph smith and help build Zion in the
tops of the mountains, thus responding to the challenge of 1847. After 4 years
in Cincinnati they packed and headed for St. Louis. During the time in Cincinnati Thomas quite
learned and fine mannered was postmaster and school teacher. During this time they endured much sickness
and death and burial of two of their children.
Mary was a good English cook knowing how to dress and cure
meats and to make Yorkshire pudding, a dough into which dripped the meat juices
and fats; pasties of marvelous look and taste; mincemeat, sweet bread and jams
so renowned in the old country. The
woods offered game and berries and nuts,
At cattle, also 125.00 for another yoke and used wagon. They were frugal. Who drove the one yoke is a
question perhaps Alice who was 13, or john then 11 knowing the resourcefulness
of john in all his lifetime it could be that he was the driver. This you may figure out.
Days passed, with buffalo and deer affording fresh
meats. Days passed with 8, 10, 12 and 14
miles of dust covered trail spaced off over the sun burnt plains.
August came and the journey was about at the close for the Wasden
family, as they entered the Promised Land coming down big mountain and little mountain
where one of the Thomas Wasden family reunions was held some years ago. They camped on 8th ward square where
the city and county building now stands. New saints greeted them and when the shades of
night closed they knelt in prayer and sang the songs that inspired their devotion
and determination to make the desert blossom as a rose
Ellen
Wasden Biography:Mormon Overland Travel trail exerpts
(Ellen was Thomas and Mary's daughter, she recorded her thoughts on the travels west)
Our
companies were organized into tens with a captain over each division. My father
[Thomas Wasden] was head of the first company and we were the first to set out
upon the trail. We aimed to make fifteen miles a day, but often covered from
eleven to twenty miles from one water hole to the next. Once we traveled all
day and found no water, and tired and parched we had to bunk down until day
light.
The
pilot was a man chosen to go ahead and select camping places and mostly always
he was a person who was familiar with the route and acquainted with the good
bedding grounds; but at times even the ingenuity of the pathfinder could not
guide us to water holes and grass for the oxen. Often the downpour of rain sank
our wheels to slow moving and the accidents of flood and field caused a great
many oxen to become lame and to expire on the roadside. There was pluck and
perserverence and a faith in the good God above that pricked up jaded spirits
and revived the failing strength, so that days came and went in good season and
each day brought us nearer to the mountain tops.
There
were nights when the memory of merry England came back and contrasted
desperately with the awful lonesomeness of the barren unbroken plains; the
terrible despair of the howling wolves; and the terror of the snakes skurring
[scurrying] around us as we shifted our feet into the baked sand dunes. I was
often so weary and footsore when I lay down on a quilt thrown upon the ground
that I could not sleep. The food was so poor that it left a nightmare memories
of the bacon and flour masquerading in ghostly forms over the sandy mirage.
There
were dried apples for the sick women and some ought to have fallen to my lot,
but I never let them know how I coveted the precious morsels. There were relief
depots along the way where flour was stored for those who needed it when the
supply in the wagon gave out.
I
remember when the supply of flour gave out and we were one days journey from
Fort Bridger. We decided to make a collection of trinkets and jewelry to
purchase flour when we reached the commissary of the plains.
At
Ft. Bridger we met the mountaineer and the trader and exchanged our jewelry for
the staff of life. Then we pushed across Green River and Weber River through
Big and Little Mountains down Emigration Canyon to Salt Lake City, where we
arrived August 26th after two months and three weeks of travel.
The
journey has many and varied memories. The rivers, sometimes swollen, had to be
forded by pitiable diligence, and at times, the women found water above their
waists as they trudged thru the streams. We had to recross the Platte River, at
least three times.
When
we came to Weber River, we camped long enough to "do out" a washing
and I used a bar of soap I brought from England. The process of washing at the
Creek is painfully laborious. We first selected a rocky place, then culled out
a rock lined basin and pushed the clothes thru and thru the clean loose rocks
as we rubbed them vigorously. Even then the color of the garments as they hung
upon the bushes to dry in the sun would not make a neighbor envious.
There
are many old by-gones which come to my mind. Things which came into our
experience as we ploughed along thru the waste, for instance we met the Pony
Express as he galloped away toward the horizon; then occasionally we came upon
the Overland Express; but more often, we met tribes of Indians or droves of
buffalo. Both of these tenants of the plains gave us some anxiety for we never
knew when the spirit of the untamable wild might take possession of them,
impelling them to sweep down upon us in fury. A stampeding band of buffaloes
strikes as much terror as the war whoop of the Red man and was equally to be
feared.
Once
a handsome buffalo broke into our circle of wagons and brought about a reign of
terror, but the beast evidently was as much panic stricken as we were for he
dashed headlong from one side of our baracade of wagons to the other until he
found an outlet, then he scampered off to the plains.
At
another time a band of Pawnees swooped down upon us. They had been the victims
of a ruthless trader who had given them "fire-water" and it took
unusual tact and courage to prevent a massacre, but we succeeded in buying our
safety.
Usually
the Indians were friendly and followed us to beg "mormon" bread and
trinkets, sometimes offering dried fruit to us in exchange, but they were
crafty buyers, holding their stuff at many times its worth.
Cooking
a meal upon the plains, simple as it usually was, demanded much pains. There
was no timber nor brush for firewood and part of a day's toil was to gather
"buffalo chips" along the road side for fire use. Often the fire
making called for a great deal of manipulation and care. Then the flour was mixed
with saleratus and baked in thick cakes in the "bake skillet" or
Dutch oven. A hole was dug in the ground then lined with hot "chips"
and the "skillet" placed within, the whole affair heaped over with
blazing "chips" and left to bake the cakes to a "turn". We
possessed only a frying pan as our outfit of cooking utensils and found my
young and green experience quite unequalled to producing a meal out of nothing
but flour and with a frying pan. So many times we went hungry and thought of
the times in England when we had had plenty.
But
in spite of all the hardships we sang as we journeyed and many are the songs we
fashioned to cheer our spirits. I do not remember the tune but this is the
chorus: "Some must push and some must pull, As we go marching up the
hills; So merrily on our way we go, Until we reach the valley, oh!" . . .
We
traveled all day and sang at night. Our prayers were said every night and we
held services on Sunday and special days.
When
we came into Salt Lake City, it was a small "city" then, we camped on
8th Ward Square, where the City and County Building now is. We drew our wagons
into a circle and the Saints hailed our coming by the band playing, "Home,
Sweet Home."
I
shall never forget how my tired and weary body and soul responded to that song.
We had reached our goal, worn and hungry, with nothing but the strength of a
mighty purpose to support us. There were no comrades we had known before and
the solemn primal curse, "Earn thy bread by the sweat of thy brow",
was upon us.
 |
| a young Thomas Wasden |
