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Not all the newspaper correspondents were professional letter to his wife-on October?..!, 1857, Captain Cove divulged, "Now I am about to comiYiunicate to you a secret by permission of (.apt iVI|l!i1 c:y]. He is a conespondent ot the N. Y. Herald and is a very pungent writer. Me has read signature I do not know, but I will ascertain before I send Wh.it Cove did not say was that he too wrote for the \',<k> y.nl- I In-all and signed his dispatches, "Argus." Gove, Utah Expedition, pp. 84-85. Others engaged in this journalistic enterprise included Albert G, Browne who was a correspondent for the Nr,c York Tribune and also wrote for The Atlanta Monthly. There was also a Mr. Wallace, special correspondent for the Weekly Alia Cuhjornid, and other writers whose pseudonym' were "Achilles" and "Utah." Who these writers were has been a matter of speculation among historians. Supposition-that "Achilles" was Edwin F. Bean, previously a United States ma.bhal m California, arc countered by Harold Schin-dler, who, in the second printing of His biography of Porter Rockwell, repoited ,i stoiy in vvliiili Achilles is identified as Samuel D. Sirrine. Harold Schindler, Orrin Porter Rockwell- Man oi Coil, Son of Thumier (Salt Lake City University of Utali Press, 1971), p. 11. I'o Utah u-'-ik liif Division.. Di. langley edited tlie wiitings o{ tins eoi respondent s.nd appropriately devoted the final chapter of his book to the detective work or' .UU-rtipting to identify "Utah." By elimination, he finally narrowed down the possible men to two enlisted men-Henry VV. Fischer and Francis C. Clinton. Langley feels Fischer is the more likely of the two. These and other writers reflected in their dispatches .1 However, throughout the governor's western cxpetiente there were discolored reports on both sides of the political halls of justice & public assemblies. Like most other men, they soon become partisans, & blacken one set of men & be-praise another set, perhaps with equal injustice. They generally bring letters of introduction to all the notabilities of the expedition, & are strange to say rather apt to praise those most, who pay them most attention. Added to the professional letter writers are nearly three thousand men here-more than half of whom are writing letters "from camp" to distant friends-& many of the "friends" are correspondents of or editors of newspapers-so that "news" is not unheard oP. If there is no news, it must be manufactured-& the governor & his family are generally considered pretty good subjects for news. Then too, we live in cloth houses. The fronts of which are wide open all the day long-mine is never closed, except in a very high wind, till bedtime. All winter so-& never have I been cold. As every officer in camp, civil & military, called, almost without exception, both on Christmas & New Year's, they all knew of my very little entertainment-& for lack of other news at that mid-winter time, that was told about to correspondents-I suppose. We do not court the letter writers-indeed, 1 never knew till very lately that certain young gentlemen, who had called now & then, were some of these very "professionals." It is nine-o-clk P.M. My custards are boiling by my side. I have been making cake (copying dispatches, duplicated, for Washington) am now making custards, have two more letters to write, and a box to unpack & invitations for tomorrow to write -all before I go to bed. So, good night, dear Anne. Every body 56 |
