Hannah Smuin

Hanna Smuin Harvey was born in England and she migrated to the United States via boat. She then joined the pioneers who walked all the way to Zion in Salt Lake City, Utah. She had two little children with her. She had never been around animals (in the wild). The only animals she saw were in the Zoo. When the Pioneers crossed the plains, she walked all the way. She had two small children to take care of. One boy (James Harvey) and one girl. The pioneers would make a camp each night by bringing all the covered wagons into a large circle. They would take the tongue of one covered wagon and rest it on the axil of the next covered wagon. They would then put all the animals in the center of the circle and the pioneers would sleep in their covered wagons. Hanna was really afraid of the animalsand so she stayed quite a distance from any animal. One night when Great Grandpa was on watch for the night, Hanna took her two small children and put them to bed inside the covered wagon. She went to bed next to them. The night was exceptionally hot and so she decided to move the children and herself outside the covered wagon. She found that if they went to bed Under the covered Wagon, it would be much cooler. This she did, however, there was a problem to have those live animals around them. (The pioneers) to protect herself and her two small children, she found a club and after putting the children to bed, she climbed in bed too........with a club in her hand. She had just dozed off to slumberland when all of a sudden she felt a wet nose on her face. She picked up her club and hit is as hard as she could. The poor cow let out the most horrible and scary noise grandma had ever heard! By now the cow had turned around and was darting into the darkness. Of course, when she came to the first tongue resting on the axil of the covered wagon in front of it, she bellered and tried to jump it. This didn't work very well, because she was just a big fat cow. She got tangled up in the tongue and by the time she broke away from it, the tongue of the covered wagon in front of her wagon fell to the ground and scared all of the animals and somehow a mass exodus occurred. By now almost everyone in camp was awake. You can imagine what was happening. All of the men in camp (To defend and protect their families) jumped out of bed and standing on one leg, shoved their other leg in their coveralls and immediately proceeded to rush to where the noise was coming from. Of course, by now ALL of the children and mothers had jumped out of bed and they were all trying to find out what trouble was going on! The circle of wagons had been broken and horses and covered wagons immediately disappeared into the dark of night. There was no organization to it at all. The cattle just moved every which way. The Pioneers spent that night trying to locate where their animals had gone. I can assure you that animals and pioneers were going in all directions. It was daylight when the pioneers were just beginning to assemble in a group. That next day was spent looking for all the animals, and trying to find some of the fathers who had got lost in the dark looking for their families and/or animals. The pioneers did not cover many miles toward Zion that day. At supper time, all the men could do was try to figure out who or what had started all the trouble. Since the children were sleeping, and were not aware that grandma had hit a cow with her club, no one but grandma knew what caused all the trouble. It was just a few years before she passed away that she shared this story with her granddaughter. She never did let anyone know she was the cause of all the trouble.