The purpose of the authorities was to impede the progress of the army and so delay it that the government might have an opportunity to make an investigation into the real condition of affairs in Utah, and after learning them, withdraw the army which was then approaching Salt Lake City. A body of men under the command of Daniel H. Wells and Lot Smith had been sent to the front to stop the progress of the army. This they did by stampeding the cattle and horses. They were enjoined by President Young to avoid the shedding of blood except in self-defense. Those who had thus volunteered to act in the defense of their homes and their liberties were without sufficient equipments and provisions to sustain them in their defensive warfare. They had no well-equipped commissary like that with which an army is provided. The teams and wagons were a part of the equipment which belonged to the farm. They were needed at home. Very naturally in such an emergency they suffered great privations and were anxious that the difficulties and dangers might end as speedily as possible. Before Captain Van Vliet had left, he promised to hasten to Washington and speak in our favor. President Young told him that the Lord would bless him in so doing, for he felt that He had sent him to Utah. On his return, the Captain endeavored to persuade the army to remain at Ham's Fork for the winter, but the Tenth regiment swore it would come on at all hazards. The Captain then informed them that if they did, they would get a different reception from anything they had ever encountered before. Just at this time, when the advance of the army was the all-absorbing {388} topic and the dangers of its approach weighed heavily upon the leaders, John D. Lee added to their distress the news of the Mountain Meadow massacre. He had reached Salt Lake City from his home in Harmony on the 29th of September, 1857. At this place in his record and at this time, Apostle Woodruff gives the account of the Mountain Meadow massacre which John D. Lee gave to President Young: "A company of California emigrants of about 150 men, women, and children, many of them belonging to the mobbers of Illinois and Missouri, had been massacred. They had many cattle and horses with them. As they traveled along south, they went damning Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball and the heads of the Church, saying that Joseph Smith ought to have been shot long before he was. They wanted to do all the evil they could, so they poisoned beef and gave it to the Indians and some of them died. They poisoned the springs of water and some of the Saints died. The Indians became enraged at their conduct and surrounded them on a prairie. The emigrants formed a bulwark of their wagons, but the Indians fought them five days until they killed all their men--about 60 in number. They then rushed into the corral and cut the throats of their women and children, except some eight or ten children which they brought with them and sold to the whites.