"THE M O U N T A I N B O U N D VALLIES' T w o Letters By a Traveler of 1859 INTRODUCTION
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OBSERVATIONS by travelers have always been a valuable source of information about a country, its people, and their manners and customs. The travel literature describing Utah and the Mormons is especially extensive. The circumstances under which the Mormons migrated to Utah aroused wide interest, and the civilization they began to build after their settlement in the mountains kept the interest alive. The Saints regarded themselves as "a peculiar people"; defining the phrase somewhat differently, outside observers agreed.
The majority of the visitors to Utah during the pioneer period looked at the Mormon scene with a jaundiced eye; very few were capable of entire objectivity. The letters of John G. Hoagland, written in the winter of 1859-60, are outstanding in this respect. Without rancor or bitterness, and also without fawning adulation, Hoagland looked on the Mormon scene dispassionately. H e spoke kindly of those things which were pleasing to him and temperately of those things he did not like or did not understand. Hoagland's comments on the country, the people, their customs, and their institutions are all revealing. The letters were written shortly after "the Utah W a r , " and are remarkable also for the wealth of detail they contain about a typical "speculation" of the period. Johnston's army was accompanied to Utah in 1858 by riffraff and camp followers who hoped to get rich at the expense of the soldiers and people, and this has given rise in Utah history to a stereotype of the speculator. There were objectionable characters enough—in the W e s t there always have been—but Hoagland reflects a solid part of the American tradition—he is the decent, law-abiding citizen seizing upon a possible opportunity to get ahead in life. The type is with us still.