The remains of an old cart road which followed the east bank, high up opposite the sand bench, coming out into the upper valley about half a mile above the present Union Pacific garage, may still be traced. This route was used for some years, but was far from satisfactory. Other settlers from the towns below began to cultivate tracts in the upper valley and the timber resources of the canyon made a better road imperative. During the winter of 1864-65, a wagon road[60] was built up the river bed, crossing the stream many times. This is the road which, with minor improvements, served as the main highway into Zion until the National Park Service built the road that first made it fully accessible to the public. This road in turn served until 1930, when the present well-graded highway was constructed midway between the river and the older road that it replaced. It was while constructing this first wagon road on January 9, 1865, that George Ayers was killed. A short dugway was being graded on the slope above the river. With no blasting powder, the men were excavating a large boulder, and George Ayers and Orson Taylor had stopped to rest in the shade of the huge stone, rolling cigarettes. Suddenly it began to move. A shout of warning came from Samuel Wittwer and Heber Ayers. Taylor was able to scramble out of the way but Ayers was squarely in its path and it fell directly upon him, crushing and killing him instantly—the first victim of Zion Canyon. Indian troubles, treated in a later chapter, broke out in the spring of 1866. Martial law was declared and instructions were issued from the military headquarters for the settlers to concentrate in towns of at least 150 families. It was at first decided to gather all the settlers of the Upper Virgin River at Rockville and Toquerville, and later, at Virgin. James Jepson[61] recalls that his father had just moved his cabin from Virgin to Rockville when the revised decision reached him and he moved back to Virgin again. This was the fifth time the cabin had been moved and his father dryly remarked that it was so used to the process now that all he had to do was throw the logs into the yard and they would fit themselves together. This concentration order meant the abandonment of all smaller places: Duncan, Grafton, Northrop, Shunesburg, Springdale and Zion. Those who could not buy or rent a house simply dumped their belongings in the shade and set up housekeeping under the trees. Some moved their log houses with them, others made dugouts and still others built new log houses.