Lot Smith's Cavalry Company (Mormons)...

5fish

Captain
Joined
Aug 26, 2007
Location
Central Florida
You know President Lincoln ask for help from the Mormons in 1862... To help protect the Overland trail and telegraph lines which had just connect the east and west coast ...

The Overland Trail—which carried people, mail, and telegraph lines—stretched from Atchison, Kansas, to Salt Lake City, Utah. General James H. Craig, brigadier general of volunteers, received orders on April 16, 1862, making him responsible for protecting the Overland Trail.[7] The trail had been plagued for months by Indian attacks that disrupted travel and communication.[8] Soldiers were now required to protect the Overland Trail.

The request...


Washington, April 28, 1862

Mr. Brigham Young,

Salt Lake City, Utah:


By express direction of the President of the United States you are hereby authorized to raise, arm, and equip one company of cavalry for ninety days’ service. This company will be organized as follows:

One captain, 1 first lieutenant, 1 second lieutenant, 1 first sergeant, 1 quartermaster-sergeant, 4 sergeants, 8 corporals, 2 musicians, 2 farriers, 1 saddler, 1 wagoner, and from 56 to 72 privates. The company will be employed to protect the property of the telegraph and overland mail companies in or about Independence Rock, where depredations have been committed, and will be continued in service only till the U.S. troops can reach the point where they are so much needed. It may therefore be disbanded previous to the expiration of the ninety days. It will not be employed for any offensive operations other than may grow out of the duty hereinbefore assigned to it. The officers of the company will be mustered into the U.S. service by any civil officer of the United States Government at Salt Lake City competent to administer the oath. The men will then be enlisted by the company officers. The men employed in the service above named will be entitled to receive no other than the allowances authorized by law to soldiers in the service of the United States. Until the proper staff officer for subsisting these men arrive you will please furnish subsistence for them yourself, keeping an accurate account thereof for future settlement with the United States Government.

By order of the Secretary of War:

L. Thomas, Adjutant-General.[14]


The hero comes...

Lot Smith was something of a folk hero in the Utah Territory. Described as a “red head [with] a red face, a straight form, a military bearing . . . and a gleam in the eyes that bespoke a high temper and an absolute absence of fear,”[19] Lot Smith looked the part of a soldier. According to one member of the Lot Smith Company, “He was gentle as a woman and as brave as a lion . . . a citizen . . . a soldier, and also . . . a missionary of the Church.”[20] With prior service in Indian wars, in the Utah War, and as an active member of the Nauvoo Legion, Major Smith was well respected and admired within the territory

Ending...

The Civil War continued for another three years and cost the nation dearly. The service of the Lot Smith Company did not influence the outcome of the war, but Utah’s only official military contribution during the Civil War provided an opportunity to demonstrate the loyalty of the Latter-day Saints collectively and the members of the Lot Smith Company individually as they faithfully served their country.

Here is a link to the whole Lot Smith Cavalry story ... they did have a rough time getting around...

https://rsc.byu.edu/archived/civil-war-saints/lot-smith-cavalry-company-utah-goes-war
 
Lot Smith is famous he has a bio book!...OMG

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https://www.amazon.com/dp/1589586921/?tag=civilwartalkc-20

Lot Smith: Mormon Pioneer and American Frontiersman is the comprehensive biography of Utah’s 1857 war hero and one of Arizona’s early settlement leaders. With over fifty years of combined research, mother and daughter co-authors Carmen R. Smith and Talana S. Hooper take on many of the myths and legends surrounding this lesser-known but significant historical figure within Mormonism.

Lot Smith recounts the Mormon frontiersman’s adventures in the Mormon Battalion, the hazardous rescue of the Willie and Martin handcart companies, the Utah War, and the Mormon colonization of the Arizona Territory. True stories of tense relations with the Navajo and Hopi tribes, Mormon flight into Mexico during the US government's anti-polygamy crusades, narrow escapes from bandits and law enforcers, and even Western-style shoot-outs place Lot Smith: Mormon Pioneer and American Frontiersman into both Western Americana literature and Mormon biographical history.
 
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