History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

BUILDING OF A STOCKADE. 265
tily constructed for the purpose by the battalion
brethren.
During the next three weeks all were busily at
work, tilling the soil, cutting and hauling timber,
making adobes, and building, ambitious to accomplish
as much as possible before the main body of
the pioneer band should start on its return journey to
report to the brethren and to promote further emigration.
The battalion brethren moved their wagons
and formed a corral between the forks of City Creek.
Brigham exhorted the brethren to be rebaptized, him-
self setting the example, and reconfirming the elders.
On the 8th of August three hundred were immersed,
the services commencing at six o'clock in the morning.
During the month twenty-nine log houses had been
built, either with roofs or ready for the usual substi-
tute, a covering of poles and dirt. These huts were so
arranged as to carry out their plan of forming a rectangular
stockade, 32 the president and Heber C. Kimball
being the first to take possession of their dwellings.
On the 17th of August twenty-four pioneers and
forty-six of the battalion set out on their return to
Winter Quarters. 33
On the afternoon of the 2 2d a conference was held,
at which it was resolved that the place should be
called the City of the Great Salt Lake. The term
'Great' was retained for several years, until changed
by legislative enactment. It was so named in contradistinction
to Little Salt Lake, a term applied
Englishman with him, named Wells, who had been living in New Mexico for
some years.' Hist. B. Young, MS., 1847, 109. On the 21st A. Carrington, J.
Brown, W. W. Bust, G. Wilson, and A. Calkins made the ascent of the Twin
Beaks, 15 miles south-east of the stockade, and the highest mountain in the
Wasatch Bange, its elevation being, as they reported, 11,219 feet. These
were probably the first white men who ascended this mountain.
32 They were 8 or 9 feet high, and 16 or 17 feet long, by 14 wide. Hist. B.
Younrj, MS., 1S47, 110. 'We were the first to move into the fort; our house
had a door and a wooden window, which through the day was taken out for
light, and nailed in at night. . .There was also a port-hole at the east end of
the fort, which could be opened and closed at pleasure. . .We had adobe chimneys
and a fire-place in the corner, with a clay hearth.' Youwfs Pioneer
Women, MS., 6.
33 'With 34 wagons, 92 yoke of oxen, IS horses, and 14 mules, in charge of
Shadrach Roundy and. Tunis Rappelye. Lt Wesley Willis was in charge of
the battalion men.' Richards' Narr., MS., 13-14.