This Country Of Ours by Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall (general ebook reader txt) 📖
- Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
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Besides Kansas, two more states were admitted into the Union during Buchanan’s term of office. These were Minnesota in 1858 and Oregon in 1859. They both became states while the struggle over Kansas was going on. For in them there was no trouble over the slavery question, and they were both admitted as free states. Minnesota was part of the Louisiana Purchase together with the last little corner of the North-West Territory. Oregon was part of the Oregon country. These with Kansas now made thirty-four states. So there were now thirty-four stars in the flag.
It was at this time that what is known as the Mormon War took place.
Mormonism was a new religion founded by Joseph Smith. Joseph Smith was a shiftless, idle, jovial fellow, one of a large family as shiftless and idle as himself. He was very ignorant, but he had a wonderful imagination, and he could never tell the simplest happening of his everyday life without making a great story out of it.
When he grew to be a man he began to dream dreams and see visions, and at length he declared that a messenger from heaven had shown him where to find a golden book. No one else saw this golden book, because Smith had been warned by the angel that great punishment would fall upon him if he showed it to any one. He was, however, allowed to make a “translation” of what was written in the book. This he did, publishing it as “The Book of the Mormons” or “The Golden Bible.” But it seems very likely that part of this so-called translation was really copied from a story written by a man named Spaulding which had never been published. A great deal of it was, however, copied from the Bible.
Smith, who was at this time living in the State of New York, now declared that the religion which had been revealed to him was the only true religion. He founded a Church of which he was head or “prophet” and under him were twelve apostles and other dignitaries. A few people soon joined him and gradually their numbers increased until at last they numbered several thousand.
They now became a community by themselves, they moved about from place to place, and at length settled in Illinois where they built a city called Nauvoo.
Smith had many revelations. If he wanted a horse or cart he had a revelation saying that it was to be given to him. If he wanted his followers to do anything, again he had a revelation saying it was to be done. So he ruled like an autocrat and did whatever he chose. And while at Nauvoo he had a revelation which said it was quite lawful for men to marry as many wives as they wanted.
Soon the people of Illinois began to dislike the Latter-day Saints, as they called themselves. For they stole horses and cattle and all sorts of things belonging to other settlers. And once anything was stolen by the Mormons, it was impossible to get it back. For if a stranger went to their city, and showed by his questions that he had come to look for something he had lost, he soon found himself followed by a Mormon who silently whittled a stick with a long sharp knife. Soon the man would be joined by another, also whittling a stick with a long knife. Then another and another would silently join the procession, until the stranger could stand it no longer and hastily departed homeward.
So as time went on the people grew more and more angry with the Mormons. And at length their anger burst into fury, and, in 1844, Smith and one of his brothers were lynched by the mob.
The Mormons were greatly cast down at the death of their Prophet, but they soon found a new leader in Brigham Young, one of the twelve apostles.
But this change of leader brought no peace between the Mormons and their neighbours. Complaints of theft grew more and more frequent. Both sides went about armed, murders were committed, and the settlers burned many of the Mormon farms.
At length the whole of the Mormons were expelled from Illinois, and one March day a great caravan started westward. Slowly day by day they moved onward through unknown wildernesses, making a road for themselves, and building bridges as they went, and only after long trials and hardships they reached the Great Salt Lake.
The land around was treeless and desolate, and the ground so hard that when they tried to plough it the ploughshare broke. Yet they decided to make their dwelling-place amid this desolation, and in 1847 the building of Salt Lake City was begun.
At the beginning, troubles and trials were many. But with hard work and skilful irrigation the desert disappeared, and fertile fields and fair gardens took its place.
The Mormons now laid claim to a great tract of land and called it the State of Deseret. And over this state Brigham Young ruled supreme.
In 1850, however, the United States organized it as a territory and changed the name to Utah. Utah is an Indian word meaning Mountain Home. Of this territory Brigham Young was Governor, but other non-Mormon officials were sent from Washington. Very soon there was trouble between the Mormons and these non-Mormon officials and, one after another, they returned to Washington saying that it was useless for them to remain in Utah. For with Brigham Young as governor it was impossible to enforce the laws of the United States, and that their lives even were in danger.
But when there was talk of removing Young from the post of Governor he was indignant. “I am and will be Governor,” he said, “and no power can hinder it until the Lord Almighty says, ‘Brigham, you need not be Governor any longer.’”
The Mormons were indignant at the false reports, as they considered them, of their doings which were spread abroad in the East. So they asked the President to send one or two visitors “to look about them and see what they can see, and return and report.”
But instead of sending visitors President Buchanan appointed a new Governor, and sent a body of troops to Utah.
Thus began what is called the Mormon War. But there was never a battle fought. Although at first the Mormons prepared to resist, they changed their minds. And the Government troops marched into Salt Lake City without resistance. They found the city deserted, as nearly all the inhabitants had fled away. They soon returned, however, and “peace” was restored. But the submission was only one in form, and for many a long day there was trouble between the Government and the Territory of Utah.
Besides the main body of Mormons who founded Salt Lake City there is another band, followers of Joseph Smith’s eldest son also called Joseph. They broke away from the first Mormons because they did not think it right to marry more than one wife, nor could they believe in all that “the prophet” taught his followers. Their chief city is Lamoni in Iowa where they live quiet industrious lives and are greatly respected by their neighbours.
This religion, founded so strangely, has spread very rapidly. In 1830 the church had only six members. Today there are more than three hundred thousand Mormons in the world, most of whom are in the United States.
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Meanwhile a great man was coming into power. This was Abraham Lincoln. He was the son of very poor people and his earliest days were spent in the utmost poverty and want. His home in Kentucky was a wretched little log cabin without doors or windows, and the bare earth for a floor. But in spite of his miserable and narrow surroundings Lincoln grew up to be a great, broad-minded loveable man.
He was very anxious to learn, and he taught himself nearly all he knew, for in all his life he had only two or three months of school. The few books he could lay hands on he read again and again till he almost knew them by heart.
Lincoln grew to be a great, lanky, hulking boy. He had the strongest arm and the tenderest heart in the countryside, and was so upright in all his dealings that he earned the name of Honest Abe.
Everybody loved the ungainly young giant with his sad face and lovely smile, and stock of funny stories.
He began early to earn his living, and was many things in turn. He did all sorts of farm work, he split rails and felled trees. He was a storekeeper for a time, then a postmaster, a surveyor, a soldier. But none of these contented him; he was always struggling towards something better.
While keeping shop he began to study law, and when he was not weighing out pounds of tea and sugar he had his head deep in some dry book. While trying his hand at other jobs, too, he still went on studying law, and at length he became a lawyer.
Even before this he had taken great interest in politics and had sat in the Illinois House of Representatives, and at length in 1846 he was elected to Congress. But he only served one term in the House, after which he returned to his law business and seemed for a time to lose interest in politics.
But the passing of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill aroused him again. As a boy he had been to New Orleans. There he had seen the slave market. He had seen negro parents parted from their children, and sold to different masters. He had seen them chained like criminals, beaten and treated worse than beasts of burden, and from these sights he had turned away with an aching heart. “Boys,” he said, to his companions, “let’s get away from this. If ever I get a chance to hit that thing, I’ll hit it hard.”
And he did not forget what he had seen; the memory of it was a constant torment and a misery to him. And now the chance had come, and he hit “that thing” hard.
In 1858 he challenged Douglas, the author of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, to go round the country with him and make speeches on the great subject of the day: Douglas to take one side of the question and Lincoln the other. It was a bold thing to do, for Douglas was considered the greatest speaker of the time, and Lincoln was scarcely known. But the speeches made Lincoln famous and henceforth many of the men in the North looked upon him as their leader. He wanted to have slavery done away with, but above all he loved his country. “A house divided against itself,” he said, “cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure half-slave, half-free. I do not expect the Union to be divided. I do not expect the House to fall. But I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other.”
He had no bitterness against the South, for he loved his whole country, South as well as North. It was slavery he hated, not the slave-holders. But the slave-holders hated him and his ideas. So when in November, 1860, Lincoln was chosen President the Southern States declared that they would not submit to be ruled by him.
As you know, the new President is
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