William Van Orden Carbine

Mormon Pioneer:

"...I came on to the valley with strangers who used my [me] rather badly. I was then in what was Brigham's company[.] When we got about half way across the plains we laid over, Heber's company camping a mile or two from us, Brother William Emp[e]y a friend of ours, was in the tent that I was in. Seeing how I was used, he told me some of Presiding Bishop Whitney's teamsters were going back from there. He thought I could get to go with them. I have thought since he had talked with him about it, he advised me to go and see, I did so. He said he could take me to the valley but was not prepared to keep me when we got there. I told him I had a place to go to when I got through. He said he would take me if the man was willing I should leave. I went back the next morning and asked him if I could leave. He said, Yes, but the next minute he said, "No", you started to go to the valley with me and you have to go with me. I thought I had. I yoked my cattle then told brother Empy what he said. Brother Empy said "You go, if you don't you are a fool and you ought to suffer." So I started on the run for the other camp. I thought about what I should say when Bishop Whitney would ask me if the man was willing I should leave. He never asked me and I was glad of it. I thought I would say that he told me to go as he did before he changed his mind. Bishop Whitney and his family were very kind to me, Sister Emaline B. Wells was his second wife then. I was then thirteen years old.

My Uncle Hector Haight came for me the night we got in the valley. That was September 15, 1848, we arrived in the valley..."

SOURCE: Carbine, William Van Orden, Reminiscences, [2]. (Trail excerpt transcribed from "Pioneer History Collection" available at Pioneer Memorial Museum [Daughters of Utah Pioneers Museum], Salt Lake City, Utah. Some restrictions apply.) Retrieved from http://lds.org/churchhistory/library/source/1,18016,4976-18935,00.html