History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

468 UTAH AS A TERRITORY.
passes and canons of the Wasatch Range and South
Pass. The party included Lieutenant E. G. Beckwith,
R. H. Kern as topographer and artist, Sheppard
Homans astronomer, Dr James Schiel surgeon and
geologist, F. Creutzfeldt botanist, J. A. Snyder assistant
topographer, a number of employes, and an
escort of mounted riflemen in charge of Captain R.
M. Morris. On the 24th of October the party was
encamped on the Sevier River, fifteen or eighteen
miles from the point where it discharges into the lake
of that name, and on the following day Gunnison
started out to explore the lake, accompanied by Kern,
Creutzfeldt, the guide, and a corporal with six men of
the escort, the remainder of the party, under Captain
Morris, proceeding up the river in a north-easterly
direction. The following day several man of Morris'
detachment were sent to ascertain whether a route
were practicable northward from that point to Great
Salt Lake. While the men were yet within a hundred
yards of camp, the corporal came running toward them,
breathless and exhausted, and sinking- to the ground,
gasped out a few broken sentences, the purport of
which was that Gunnison and his party had been massacred
by Indians, and that, as far as he knew, he was
the only survivor. Morris at once ordered his men
to arm and mount, and within half an hour was on his
way to the scene of the disaster; meanwhile a second
member of Gunnison's escort reached camp on horseback,
and two other survivors came in later.
Gunnison had encamped, with no thought of danger,
in a sheltered nook under the river bank, where
wood and pasture were abundant. He was aware that
a large band of Pah Utes was in the neighborhood,
and their camp-fires had been seen daily since entering
the valley of the Sevier. A recent quarrel with
an emigrant band had resulted in the killing of one of
the natives and the wounding of two others, but they
had made no raids on the Mormon settlements, and
peace had recently been confirmed at a parley held