Welsh Journals

Council Bluffs, a contingent of eighty-four followed their intrepid leader, Captain Dan Jones, on the long trek 'through mud and mire' to Salt Lake City. They did not reach their 'land of promise' without some dissension. A dispute arose over an alleged discrimination against the Welsh. Captain Dan Jones proposed that the Welsh contingent settle as an independent nation with Elizabeth Lewis as their queen. Almost to a man the Welsh approved of this plan, but a conciliatory speech by the American leader George A. Smith persuaded the Welsh to continue their journey. Two weeks after reaching Utah, Elizabeth Lewis married Dan Jones, despite the fact that she was already married to David Lewis, who had stayed in Wales, and had borne him six children. The story of this difficult journey is well told by Professor Dennis in the first eighty pages of a 243-page book. The remaining part of the book consists of details about the emigrants, photographs and biographical sketches of some of the more prominent 'Saints' and translations from Welsh of relevant letters and documents. Professor Dennis translated these documents himself and is to be commended on learning Welsh for this purpose. As a Mormon himself, the author may lack a genuinely critical eye. He might for example have culled from other sources the views of contemporaries who saw the Mormons in a different light. Included in the Appendix are translations of letters by Elizabeth Lewis, the 'Welsh Queen', to John Davis, dated 1850-51. She is fullsome in her praise of her new home and contrasts it with her fellow-nation in Wales where poor grounds, hard taxes, plagues, choleras, thefts and murders ravaged mankind. At about the same time, a man called John visited Salt Lake City and wrote to his brother in Aberdare. This letter was published in Seren Gomer (1851, pp. 427-28) and it would have been revealing if a translation of it had been included by way of contrast. The following paragraphs seem relevant: I went on my journey past the valley of the Salt Lake among the Latter Day Saints and was surprised that anyone from Wales was blinkered enough to allow themselves to be led to destruction by a swarm of unprincipled and graceless rascals, wearing the cloak of religion to deceive the ignorant. Those who have been bewitched to go over are no better than slaves, as they have been deprived ofall society and commerce and among them is a fairly responsible woman from Carmarthenshire-she left her husband and went with Captian Daniel Jones and is at present to him. Their president has 25 in his house and they say they are his spiritual wives. This is but an example of the villainy that I have been an eyewitness to. Although the Welsh Mormons continued to keep some Welsh traditions alive, the only obvious vestige of that first group of Welsh emigrants is the famous Mormon Tabernacle Choir, whose origins lie with a choir formed by John Parry of Clwyd. He was among those Welshmen who responded to 'the call of Zion' a hundred and fifty years ago. GWYN JENKINS National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth