This is a newsletter my Uncle Alan wrote back in 1998 with some family history in it. 

March 7, 1998

Dear Family,

I wanted to begin some regular family history feature in these newsletters.  In the future, there will be two items in each family newsletter relating to family history:

1.     Information you ought to include in your own genealogical records

2.     Information about one of our ancestors

Instead of including information regarding the first item, I am going to make a request.  Put down on your calendars a job you will do by May 1, 1998.  By then, you will have sent me a family group sheet with complete information on your family.  Teresa called me a few weeks ago and wanted information on baptismal dates, marriage dates, endowment dates, etc. for each family member; I know some of us did this a year ago, but much of that information was partial or incomplete.  I was surprised how little of the information Teresa had recorded or I had recorded.  So I want to gather all that information and disseminate it.  None of the information on your children is registered on the International Genealogical Index (IGI); I know because I have looked for it.  So even if you have done your four generation work, the information about your own families isn’t up-to-date.  Upon getting that information, I will send in a disk to update the IGI to include the latest information.  So next time the newsletter goes out, I expect that I will have updated information from each family to send to all other family members. 

When we were at the family reunion in July, I was a little surprised that some of the stories about our ancestors were new to you.  So let me follow up on two items: the bad reputation of the Campbells and information on Lyman Curtis. 

When I was in Scotland, I had to be careful whom I would tell that I was Scottish.  The follow-up question was always, “What clan do you come from?”  When I told them “Campbell,” that would often cool the questioner’s desire for information of any sort.  You see, there is still bad blood between Campbells and McDonalds. 

The Campbells and McDonalds had been at war with each other for years.  They got together under a truce flag to work out a peace deal.  The Campbells violated that truce by sneaking up on a group of MacDonalds (actually a tribe of McIans within the McDonald clan) in the middle of the night and slitting their throats while the McIans were asleep.  Since then the Campbells have had a reputation for skullduggery and deceit.  Perhaps now you are glad I didn’t get to finish the story when we were in Kuna and you wished I hadn’t done so here. 

Since the family reunion I have conceived the idea of writing a biography of Lyman Curtis.  I have started collecting information on his life.  This task is complicated by the fact that he didn’t keep his own journal during his life.  But we do have other sources: toward the end of his life he dictated an autobiography (which I haven’t come into possession of yet), the newspapers wrote about the lives of 1847 pioneers  at the jubilee celebration (Lyman Curtis was one of the few still alive at the Jubilee in 1897), during the 1847 crossing each pioneer was paired up and Lyman’s partner (Levi Jackman) did keep a journal.  So from these sources, I can share a number of stories I am confident none of you has heard about his life.  As a brief overview, I ought to note that Lyman shared in many of the important events of the Restoration.  He helped build both the Nauvoo and Kirtland temples.  He was involved in Zion’s Camp (most of the members of Zion’s Camp set out from Kirtland to go to Missouri to redeem the illegally-taken lands, but a small contingent from Michigan was organized by Hyrum Smith and Lyman was in that Michigan group).  When Joseph and Hyrum were murdered, Lyman and his brother Moses were assigned the task of guarding the bodies on the return trip from Carthage and later while the bodies laid in state in Nauvoo (a bounty had been placed on Joseph Smith’s head and the saints were afraid someone would come to decapitate the bodies).  Lyman was also one of the small group of nine pioneers who came into the Salt Lake Valley on the 22 of July, 1847.  Lyman was a skilled surveyor and Brigham Young needed a host of surveyors to lay out the new city.  So Lyman was recruited.  When the Latter-day Saints were driven out of northern Missouri during that cold winter of 1838-39, the mobs rounded up all the Saints’ guns.  Lyman initially put his gun in the pile, but felt so bad about it later in the day that he took the risk of sneaking back and recapturing his rifle.  It was this gun that he took with him on the 1847 trek (my sources claim you can go into the Deseret Museum in Salt Lake and see that very gun on display).  He was one of three men on that trek assigned the task of hunting; he was proud of his marksmanship. 

Like most of the pioneers in that 1847 crossing, Lyman wanted to return to Winter Quarters to be with his family before winter arrived.  Most stayed in the Valley only about six weeks.  He returned with four other men.  They had one horse between them; they walked and the horse carried their bedding and provisions.  One night on the Platte River their horse was stolen.  They followed its trail through the snow to a Sioux village.  The approached the Sioux chief and asked for his help.  The chief called the Indians together and assigned some women to repair the visitors’ shoes (which were returned fully soled and cleaned), some he assigned to bring food, and some returned their horse.  Lyman Curtis always attributed this peaceful meeting to Brigham Young’s wisdom in making pacts with the Sioux and all other Indian tribes.  Brigham Young always viewed it as cheaper to give gifts to Indians than to kill them.  The U.S. government had a very different policy. 

Sincerely,

Alan