History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

764
COMMERCE AND COMMUNICATION.
for his poultry or butter, gravel or adobes, which he
delivered in return for wood, hauled the wood to the
store, and thus, at length, wife and child were clad.
For the tuition of his children he would pay, perhaps,
so many dozens of eggs per quarter; for admission to
for the services of a
the theatre, a score of cabbages ;
laborer or mechanic, a certain number of watermelons
per day ; and his tithes were usually, but not always,
paid in kind.
In this primitive fashion, until the advent of the
railroad, trade was for the most part conducted in
Utah; and notwithstanding the wisdom and economic
system of their rulers, there were times, as will be rein
embered, when the settlers were really needy. The
country was relieved only by a train of fortunate, or
as the settlers believed providential, circumstances.
These were, first, the presence of the army of Utah,
which after disbursing large sums among the community
sold them its substance at nominal rates;
second, the arrival of a second army under Colonel
Connor, with the interchange of traffic and demand
for labor thereby occasioned; third, the needs of the
overland mail and telegraph lines.
In part through such adventitious aid, the merchants
of Utah, putting forth their might, built up a
commerce as wonderful in its growth and development
as that of any of the states on the Atlantic or
Pacific seaboard. As early as 1864 there were several
houses in Salt Lake City that purchased in New
York, St Louis, or Chicago goods to the value of
$250,000 or more at a time, among them being William
Jennings, 33 Godbe & Mitchell, the Walker Broth-
33 Isaac, the father of William Jennings, a wealthy butcher of Yardley,
Worcester, England, was better known to fame as one of the claimants in the
Jenninirs chaucery suit, in which millions of pounds were at stake; but though
he proved himself a lawful claimant, his efforts won for him no substantial
result. .In 1S47 William Jennings, then some 1-4 years of age, took ship for
New York, where, during the ensuing winter, he was employed by a porkpacker
at a wage of S6 a week. After some adventures, being at one time
robbed of his all and glad to find work as a journeyman butcher, and on
another occasion attacked with cholera, which left him with a shattered constitution
and 8200 in debt, he chanced to make the acquaintance of a catholic