It was said by an eminent friend of our people that, "The history of the Latter- day Saints will never be written."
He was acquainted with their career. He knew that to write their history would be to eclipse the writings of Moses, in describing the doctrines and journeyings of ancient Israel. And it becomes patent to any one who undertakes to chronicle the events of even an epoch of our history, that there is an under-current of heroism, faith, devotion, governing and directing the energies of our people, which requires the subtle power of inspiration to appreciate and the gifted pen of one, who sees with "the eye of faith" to depict. To be such a one would gratify the ambition and pride of the writer; but he sees so much yet to attain, ere reaching that honored distinction, that he fain would content himself with an humbler lot, and therefore purposes in the present paper to merely touch upon certain interesting incidents, relating to that martial period of our people's history, when the army of the United States came up against us in 1857, and our men were enlisted in "the army of defence" to take part in what we called, "The Echo Canon War."