Item Detail
-
13493
-
2
-
0
-
English
-
Home to Iowa : Letters from the Western Trails
-
Iowa Heritage Illustrated
-
Spring 2003
-
84
-
30-47
-
Wikert transcribed excerpts from a treasure-trove of letters she inherited from her mother. They are letters written from the children of Christopher and Mary Stageman to their parents. The Stageman family arrived in America from England in 1840. They settled in Maryland. Their eldest daughter, Sarah, joined the Mormon Church and the family joined her in 1851 to travel to Council Bluffs, Iowa. The parents were 'disillusioned' with Mormon practices and decided to stay in Iowa on Mosquito Creek, three miles east of Kanesville. Harriet, a younger daughter, married Francis Stine and moved to Pleasant Valley, a Mormon settlement south of Kanesville. She unexpectedly died in 1852. Their daughter, Sarah, traveled to Salt Lake with a Mormon company. After arriving in Utah, she married Charles H. Bassett, the third wife in a polygamous marriage. Their son, John, visited his sister, Sarah, in Salt Lake in March-April 1854. In letters to his parents, he did not inform them that Sarah was a plural wife. He describes the high cost of food and clothing, conflicts with Indians, and his plans to go to California to hunt for gold. In her letters, Sarah urges her parents to visit her because she misses them greatly. She attests to her belief in Mormonism. In 1855, her husband went on a mission and she gave birth to a son, Charles Henry Bassett, Jr. In her husband's absence, she taught school to support herself. She is convinced that only those dwelling in Zion will be safe and urges her parents to join her in Utah. In a letter (28 Feb. 1859), she attests that Zion 'is the only place of safety.' She observes that following the arrival of Johnston's Army, there 'is plenty of stir here since the soldiers came, everything is bringing a good price & money has been very plentiful.' In 1859, Sarah divorced Charles, but remained firm in her religious beliefs. The letters of her brothers, James and John, are written from such locales as California, Maryland, Nevada,