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Show Utah State Historical Society ( 801) 533- 3500 FAX ( 801) 333- 3503 Elizabeth Randall Cumming and the Feminine West hu ~ m 1800s PROFESSIONU m E Rm R Sta gged behind military expeditions and sent back reports of their progress to eastern newspapers. Their letters were often colorful while showing little concern for journalistic accuracy. Among the camp followers were also civilians whose letters to family and friends were occasionally published in hometown papers. Some of these private correspondents were women, including Elizabeth Randall Cumming. A great- granddaughter of Samuel Adams, Elizabeth married into a prominent Georgian family. Alfred Cumming had earned a reputation as a compassionate Augusta mayor, honest Army sutler, and fair Indian agent before he was appointed the first non- Mormon governor of Utah Temtory . President James Buchanan had been told the Mormons were in rebellion against the government, so the U. S. Army's Fiftieth and Tenth Infantries, Second Dragoons, and Fourth Artillery were assigned to escort Cumming and other federal appointees to Utah. So it was that Elhbeth, 46 and childless, joined the Utah Expedition of 1857- 58. Fifteen of her eighteen surviving letters tell of crossing the Great Plains by carriage, pony and wagon, and then spending the winter in tents in southwestern Wyoming. She called it the happiest and healthiest time of her life. Her letters give insight into the conspiracy by some members of the expedition to defeat her husband's peace efforts. But they have another interesting facet. The taming of the West is portrayed in history and art as a masculine endeavor. In Elizabeth's letters we not only get a rare feminine view of the frontier but glimpse some of the women she encountered during her journey. For instance, she wrote to her sister- in- law: ' There are two [ other] ladies in the camp- one from the Fifty Infy . . . one in the Tenth Infy . . . as ladies, of course, we do not care to walk about in camp, unattended.. .[ so] we see each other very little but send frequent & polite messages- books, some treasure of a couple of turnips & such like." Elizabeth would prove tolerant of Mormon peculiarities, but her perceptions of Indian women reveal there were limits to her cultural understanding: ' We passed a tolerable night, & in the morning were surrounded by the most disagreeable looking Indian I have ever seen.. .. Two or three squaws were with the party, who looked idiotic, yet fierce & miserable.. .." While crossing the Weber River her party met another Indian group that she described with slightly greater appreciation: " An Indian squaw was nursing her child on the bank- the only pretty Indian baby I have seen- the only one which smiled." While the anti- Mormon literature of the time claimed the transcontinental road east was ( more) crowded with disenchanted Mormons, factual references to female dissenters are rare. Elizabeth mentioned some: " I have had many callers today & have been obliged to see several Mormon women on business ( there are some hundreds here now since Alfred declared peace)." This is a welcome backup to historian Orson Whitney's statement that 52 women responded to Governor Cumming's offer of a military escort out of Utah. Elizabeth's Utah letters show a rare ability to separate personal antipathy to Mormon customs from her official role. ' The side [ of Utah culture] that touches y~," she wrote, was that the cities were clean, quiet, with few oaths heard and little public intoxication. Private Mormon practices, she commented, were " their own business, mine," even though she felt such practices resulted from ignorance and superstition. Perhaps most interesting is her recounting of conversations with pluml wives. Once her husband was judged to be fair, Elizabeth was invited into Mormon homes. She visited with Mary Ann Angell, Brigham Young's first living wife, two or three times a week, even being honored with a tea party attended by other wives. She was very impressed by the women's faith: ' The Mormon ladies talk a great deal about their religion. They live it. They feel it.. . . They talk much of their happiness in having the only true gospel-- of their past sufferings in Nauvoo, & during their exodus.. . ." Even the numerous poor women, she said, preferred to suffer privation in Zion than plenty elsewhere. Her fmal letter describes a memorable conversation with " a first wife who praised polygamy." Elizabeth asked, " If a woman loves her husband, how can she help suffering when me] takes another wife?" The Mormon lady answered that jealousy and confusion belonged ' only to mhlv love-& had better be quite laid aside, as useless & childish." Continued the lady, a first wife ' does suffer but her suffering is only for world.. . . We.. . gain another & a better by our self abnigation. " Her observant, intelligent, and objective reports ensure Elizabeth Cumming an enduring place among the most literate men and women of her time. Source: Ray R. Canning and Beverly Beeton, eds., The Genteel Gentile: Letters of Elizabeth Cumrning, 1857- 1858 ( Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1977). THE HISTORBLYA ZERi s produced by the Utah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For more infoxmation about the Historical Society telephone 533- 3500. 951214 ( BB) |
