Mound Fort

First Settlement of Mound Fort, 1848

Mound Fort

The first settlement of that part of Ogden City, known as Mound Fort, was made by Ezra Chase and Charles Hubbard and their families in the Fall of 1848.  They located about half a mile west of the present Woolen factory.  The winter of 1848-49 was cold and severe on their stock.  There were quite a number of Indians camped on the Weber River, of the Shoshones and Ute bands. The Indians were peaceable and did not molest the two white families.

In the spring following there was an addition to this small beginning of a settlement, by Ambrose and William Shaw, they united with Chase and Hubbard in building and opening up farms. That summer they had excellent crops.  Mr. Chase raising over one-hundred bushels of potatoes from the seed of half a bushel.  They also had good yield of wheat and corn.  They had to get all of their milling done at Neuff‘s Mill, seven miles south of Salt Lake City.

In the fall of 1849, this settlement was again increased by the arrival of David Moore, George and Fredrick Barker, Francillo Durfey and Robert Porter with their families, making some twenty-three persons in all.  They located for the winter in some old log cabins near the junction of the Weber and Ogden rivers.  These cabins were built by a man by the name of Crow, his sons and sons-in-law, and in the Spring they moved to Fort Hall leaving their houses empty. 

The winter of l849 and 50 was long and severe, with deep snow.  Several head of cattle and sheep died during the winter.

Some eighty-five Shoshones with their families were camped at the big bend of Weber River, and from fifty to sixty families of Utes were camped on South side of Heber River, just below the junction of Ogden River with the Weber.  They were all very quiet during the winter.  In the spring, the Shoshones moved away to their hunting grounds. The Utes remained and several of them died in the spring with the measles.

Some time in February of this year a Military company was organized by Lorin Farr., C.C. Canfield, Captain. F; Durfey, Lieutenant and some thirty-five men.  This included all the male members of Heber County.  Ten or twelve of that number were emigrants on their way to California.  The spring was late, with a big snowstorm on the 16th of April, which remained on the ground for three or four days.  Our crops were late planted.  About the first of June the crickets came down from the mountains in great numbers and got very near our crops when the gulls attacked them and used them up in a short time.  By this kind Providence our grain was saved.

Sometime during the spring, Lorin Farr was sent up from Salt Lake City to preside over the Saints settled here and in Ogden City. He located in Mound Fort near the –

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- time and got them out of the corn twice, the third time Stewart found him in the corn twice, then shot him.  Terrikee's son, having witnessed the deed went forthwith to the Utah Camp and about daylight they were at Stewart's house in force, he however had fled.  They killed his cow, burned his hay and destroyed his household furniture.  There were from thirty to thirty-five of the Utahs with their chief, Little Soldier.  George and William Barker went out to see them and talk with them.  The Indians came in with them and David Moore took them to President Lorin Farr's house where they made an agreement with President Farr and David Moore that they would wait until about ten o'clock the next day before they would commence hostilities.

David Moore was sent to Salt Lake City for help. After he was gone, President Farr sent out several men to gather in the stock from the range.  By this time a party of the old Chiefs band came in and met them, the brethren retreated to their homes and escaped, but a man by the name of Campbell, an emigrant on his way to California, was overtaken and killed.  Daniel Burch was then sent with another dispatch to Salt Lake City.  By the time he arrived, orders were out for one hundred and fifty men, and the information from him hastened the gathering of companies.  The companies were on the march for Ogden by ten o'clock p.m., and marched to Kay's Creek before they made a halt where the companies took breakfast a little before daylight.

David Moore, Daniel Burch and G.W. Hill continued on their journey, arriving at Ogden about nine o'clock a.m.  The Indians had got to know by some means that a company of men was near at hand and were on the march for Weber Canyon as David Moore was cropping the bottomland where Ogden City now stands.

The companies got to Ogden about ten o'clock a.m., and sent some men after the Indians and got them to return when they agreed to be quiet and not molest the settlers.  Some four days afterwards the companies returned to their homes.

The incoming emigration were mostly sent to Ogden and Mound Fort.  A fort was built so as to take Lorin Farr's and the Shaws line of buildings on the south bank of Mill Creek, about one third of a mile below the woolen factory.

Peace being established, President Farr proceeded to build his mill and got it completed in January 1851.  Captain Brown gave up his sawmill late in the fall of 1850.  In the fall of 1850 Weber County was organized into a Stake with Lorin Farr President, Charles R. Dana and D.B. Dille Counselors. Isaac Clark and Erastus Bingham Bishops. The names of the High Council I have not at hand.  Bishop Bingham was bishop over Mound Fort.

After Farr's fort was completed, the mi1itary was farther organized by selecting Francillo Durfey captain of Infantry, and David Moore captain of Cavalry.  The Indians continued quiet until about the third of July 1851, when some of them came in from the mountains and stole seven head of horses.

D. Moore and F. Durfey, with sixteen men, were sent after them but did not get the horses.  They found where they had been but the Indians had left their camp very early in the morning before the company arrived.  They followed the trail and came up to them about four o'clock p.m., but the horses were sent off in some other direction.  They endeavored to induce the Indians who were at the camp to go with them to help them find the horses, but he only made game of them and said he would not go.  They then tried to take him along with them.  This he resisted, drawing his knife, pitched into the men right and left, when one of the men stopped his mad career with a musket ball.

Finding it useless to hunt farther for the horses in a strange country, the company returned home again and in four days after their return David Moore was sent out again with forty-one men to hunt after the Indians. They traveled five days but found no Indians.