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Show Bancroft Library In collecting and compiling this history of In-dian depredations in Utah, it has been my purpose to obtain my information first handed, as far as pos-sible. I was personally acquainted with conditions in Sanpete and Sevier Valleys during the years 1863 to 1872. It fell to my lot to be herd- boy in Thistle Valley, which was then a favorite haunt of the In-dians, and they often told us that we were trespassers on their domain. In 1865, when the Black Hawk war broke out, I had left Sanpete to locate in Sevier Val-ley, which was then most exposed to Indian raids be-cause of having been settled but one year when the war broke out and that valley afforded the handiest and most convenient outlets into the Indian strong* hold in the mountains and country lying to the east, which was then unsettled by white people and but little known to them. I have also made it a point to obtain informatioii from reliable histories and individual diaries and records, and by interviewing persons who were ac-tually in the places and took part in the affairs as recorded. And finally I obtained much information from newspaper files and documents in the Church Historian's Office. It is half a century and more since the raids and assaults recorded in this book took place, most of the persons who took active parts in the same have re-sponded to the last earthly call, and what information we get first handed must of necessity be obtained now or never. I have often querried; why should those |
