THOMAS felt keenly his responsibility, in being left at the age of twenty-one without earthly father and mother to appeal to for counsel, in being the only male member of his parents' kindred upon whom the duty rested of redeeming the dead, and in being so far separated from the body of the Saints, with a wife and sister to care for, without home of his own, and living in a city where death was stalking abroad and smiting his victims by the thousand. The prospect, though gloomy, only filled him with a determination to be faithful. In October, 1853, Thomas and his wife and her parents left St. Louis to locate at Baraboo, in Wisconsin, where, they had been informed, land and stock were abundant, and could be had on easy terms. They expected to go up the river by steamboat to Galena, but on reaching Keokuk, Iowa, the water was found to be too shallow to float the boat, and the freight was transferred to flat boats, and hauled up to Montrose, opposite Nauvoo. But the boat, thus lightened, was three days getting over the rapids, and the passengers were without shelter and suffered from cold. On reaching Galena they hired teams to convey them to Baraboo, and when they arrived at that place they found they had been deceived in regard to it, as there was neither land nor stock to be had; the soil was very poor and the residents couldn't sell what little they did raise. Thomas had spent his savings in getting there, and saw no chance of earning more. Having an acquaintance living at Hebron, one hundred miles south of Baraboo, he proceeded thither by stage, and, finding he could secure work there at splitting rails, he hired a man and team to go with him to Baraboo and bring his folks back. They arrived at Hebron just before Christmas, bought forty acres of land on time, and started in to earn a livelihood. He had not only his wife and sister to provide for, but his wife's parents and their family of six members relied upon him for protection and guidance at least if not for actual support. The weather was much of the time unfavorable for work, and the work--chopping and splitting large timber, and clearing land--new and strange to him, so that he not only felt it severely, but the family had little to subsist upon, and found it necessary to eke out an existence by using bran and shorts for food, catching fish, or killing an occasional squirrel. The hardships and privations they endured during the first year or two of their life in Wisconsin were such as to try their very souls, and Brother Briggs pays a grateful tribute to his wife by recording the fact that she never once murmured. He was young and strong and full of endurance, and able to work almost night and day, and cared nothing for himself, his only concern being for those dependent upon him.