A Forty-niner in Utah with the Stansbury Exploration of Great Salt Lake: Letters and Jounral of John Hudson, 1848-50

Forty-niner in Utah, page 174

Exploring Great Salt Lake bush, but with this exception, no sign of vegetation or life of any kind upon this desert. The men taking charge of the skiff had been instructed to row so far as the lake extended south or hellward as the Cap very appropriately termed it, & there make an encamp- ment for the convenience of the chain party;lo7 sufficient wood had been brought to boil coffee & this apparently indispensable stimu- lant was in good demand at supper. The excessive thirst we all experience while travelling over these sandy plains is worthy of note. Seven of us started this morning carrying abt 2% Gal water in canteens & India rubber bottles but this quantity was insuffi- cient & during the afternoon a man was dispatched to camp & the canteens were again filled. The tents were pitched upon a spot of dry ground which was surrounded by shoal water on the W. & the lake on the E. near us were the carcuses of 6 antelopes who had strayed too far from fresh water & thus perished of thirst,"' one of the party also saw during the day tracks of oxen probably lost by some party jour- neying to California which would in all likelihood share the same f te a . Saty June 8. I had now finished drawing the profiles of the mountains east of us, & it was thought best for me to return to the main camp. Mr. C. anticipated finishing the remainder of the chain line in good season & joining the Capt in the Eveng. I steered the skiff to an isolated rock south of Pelican called Strongs nob, this name was first given to it in sport by the boys & not after- wards changed. *09 A sand bar ran N & S. about the centre of the lake leaving a pretty deep channel nearer each shore, to cross this we had to wade dragging the boat. South of Strongs nob & in the 107 The chaining party set up a temporary camp on the sand flat for the night while Stansbury went farther south to Strong's Knob to establish the main camp, No. 19. Stans- bury, Report, p. 199. lo8 Antelope and buffalo had grazed on Antelope Island prior to the coming of the Mormon pioneers, but the buffalo were gone by 1847 and the antelope also soon dis- appeared. As Hudson noted, there were still antelope on the plains southwest of the lake. David E. Miller, Great Salt Lake: Past and Present (Salt Lake City: Privately published, 1949), p. 23. vol. lo9 W. Strong 3, 2 April. was one of the eight men hired on April 2, 1850. Gunnison, Journal, 174