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Mt. Pisgah Mormon Cemetery

By Richards L. Evans

RECENT "DISCOVERY" SHOWS MOUNT PISGAH MORMON CEMETERY, UNION COUNTRY, IOWA, TO BE CHURCH PROPERTY.

HISTORICAL DOCUMENT CREDITS MORMONS WITH HAVING BEEN INSTRUMENTAL IN OBTAINING STATEHOOD FOR IOWA IN 1846.

AS A RESULT of the tenth Historic Pilgrimage conducted by Vida Fox Clawson to Winter Quarters and other points of Church interest has come the "discovery" that the Mount Pisgah Mormon Cemetery in Union Country, Iowa, is the property of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints-a fact which apparently was heretofore not a matter of record either in the Church Historian's Office or in the Presiding Bishop's Office, because its acquisition in 1886 had apparently been forgotten. Being a cemetery, no tax notice has ever been issued to the Church for this property.

The fact of the Church ownership of this historic site came to light through the interest and inquiry of Mr. Ralph Budd, President of the Chicago, Burlington, & Quincy Railroad. Mr. Budd, who attended the dedication of the Winter Quarters Monument at Florence, Nebraska, personally conducted the Historic Pilgrimage group that was present on that occasion to Mount Pisgah Mormon Cemetery in Union Country, Iowa, some 115 miles southeast of Winter Quarters, and spent the day with them there. Mr. Budd, observing that the nature of the grass indicated virgin ground and that the plot was fenced in, unimproved, uncared for, and undisturbed, inquired as to possible Church ownership.

CLOSE UP OF FRONT FACE OF MOUNT PISGAH MONUMENT.

TENTH HISTORIC PILGRIMAGE GROUP AT MT. PISGAH.

Since no member of the party was able to inform him on this point, Mr. Budd undertook a private investigation and a week later there came the following letter:

Mrs. Vida Fox Clawson

29 South State St.

Salt Lake City

Dear Mrs. Clawson:

I enclose a short article prepared by Mrs. Mertle R. Brunson, dealing with the Mormon trek across Iowa and their temporary settlement at Mt. Pisgah. Her husband conducts the Brunson Studio at Creston, Iowa, and has made a number of photographs of the monument located in the burial lot, which are also enclosed.

The article is an absorbing narrative and I thought you would be interested in also reading it, as well as having the photographs.

Yours very truly,

(Signed) Ralph Budd.

P. S. I also enclose copies of two deeds found of record at Creston, Iowa, concerning the burial ground, and two maps locating the parcel of land, transferred by A. C. White to John Taylor, Mormon Trustee, on June 12, 1886.

R. B.

The two deeds referred to, one of which is reproduced herewith, were dated May 3, 1886, and June 12, 1886. The first one was made out in error to O. B. Huntington as Trustee-in-Trust of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and the second one, executed to correct the error of the first, was made to President John Taylor, Trustee-in-Trust. The consideration was thirty dollars paid to Albert C. and Ellen White, husband and wife, for one acre of land. A reasonable conclusion is that O. B. Huntington negotiated for the property in behalf of the Church and was erroneously described as Trustee-in-Trust in the first deed.