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Show Page 65 matter also weighed upon their minds: the question of fulfilling the commandment to assemble at the Far West temple site on April 26. The designated date was only weeks away, and it seemed more and more apparent that any attempt to fulfill the instruction would be futile and perhaps impossible. Several argued that "under our present circumstances... the Lord would not require the Twelve to fulfill his words to the letter... 35 he would take the will for the deed." Although Brigham Young has been called the great Mormon pragmatist, he nevertheless hesitated not at all to "obey the revelation in any case" - in order to say that prayer over that spot of ground in Far West, they would break once again into the enemy heartland. Orson left on April 18 with Brigham Young, John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff and George A. Smith and Alpheus Cutler, the master workman of the temple. They ferried the river at Marion, Missouri, and encamped under the Mississippi bluffs. Their presence audaciously defied an "exterminating order" issued by the chief executive of Missouri, Lilburn Boggs, ordering all Mormons out of the state by spring, so the travelers moved clandestinely toward Far West, keeping their mission as quiet as possible. The roads were full of emigrating Saints threading their way in the opposite direction, and soon Apostle John E. Page came in sight. While he struggled with a barrel of soap that had tumbled from his wagon, the brethren persuaded him to go back to Far West with them. Riding deep into Missouri, the apostles faced ever-increasing danger; they gathered corn by night and stayed close to the woods. At length they arrived at Tenney's Grove, where Apostle Heber C. Kimball lay concealed, and passed the word that the authorities would meet on the square at Far West in the early hours of the twenty-sixth. They learned that for several days the antagonists of Far West had been exultant at the prospect of |
