Utah Territory After the civil war in Kansas came the march to, and occupation of, Utah in 1857 and 1858, with significant attendant hardships and privations. We'll share a little of Lt. Col. Cooke's comments to explain: "In September (1857) we were suddenly recalled to Fort Leavenworth, in order to march and overtake and reinforce the command of infantry enroute to operate against the Mormons in Utah. As a souvenir of that period, I append my report of our extraordinary march. Headquarters Second Regiment of Dragoons, Camp on Black Fork, U.T., November 21, 1857 I marched then, on the 17th. My preparations, though hurried, were as complete as was possible. ...On the 21st, after a hard rain, I marched six miles, which, on slippery roads, was as much as such a train might well accomplish; and only that night nearly half of one of the companies which we had met returning from Fort Leavenworth, from a march of 600 miles, reached my camp. Half allowance, or six pounds a-day of corn for horses and mules, was the largest item of transportation. Three or four laundresses with their children were with each company. October 3.--There was so severe a northeast storm I lay in camp. I knew there would be no fuel at the next, on the Platte river. October 4.--I marched in the rain, and on the 5th arrived at Fort Kearny at 10 A.M., my rate of marching after September 21 having averaged 21 miles a day. On the 7th I marched in the rain, which had continued since the 2d of the month. ...Up to the 12th - eleven days - the rainy weather continued, clearing up with thick ice; but the marches averaged 21 miles. The grass was very scarce and poor... ...After this, the repeated hard frosts, with the previous consumption by the troops, trains, and sixty thousand emigrant cattle, almost left us without this all-important support -- I mean of a sort or condition fit for the support of our animals. October 15.--I crossed the South Platte with a very cold northwest wind. Descended Ash Hollow and marched a mile or two along the North Platte in the vain search for any grass. These twenty two miles, with the two serious obstacles overcome, were accomplished by the whole train in good time. This must be attributed to the excellent management of that most efficient officer, First Lieutenant John Buford, Regimental Quartermaster. After this, the horses began to die and necessarily be left on the road. ...A northeaster, with sleet, was distressingly cold that evening in camp on Smith's fork. Next day there was a snow storm, falling three or four inches, which the teams were scarcely forced to face; and twenty three mules, all three year olds, were relieved form the harness exhausted. On the 22d, my camp was four miles below Fort Laramie, with scarcely any appearance of grass, and there was none other for miles. ...[John Buford] was directed to ... report upon all the mules, and a board of the older officers ordered to ... report upon the horses. Fifty three were reported, on the 24th, ineffective for active service, and two hundred and seventy-eight fit to prosecute the march. I had received your communication of October 5, giving discretionary authority to winter in the vicinity of Fort Laramie; but that evening I determined to continue on. I ordered the laundresses to be left. Those too sick to ride were ordered left. Of the men dismounted, one married man to a company, and such others as were deemed by the company commanders "ineffective afoot", were authorized to be left. ...The horses were all blanketed from that time, and on the march led and mounted alternate hours, besides dismounting on difficult ground. ...The marches were then twenty miles a day till October 30, when, finding on the river very unusually good grass...after eight miles... camp was made. November 3.--Twenty miles were accomplished, against an excessively cold head wind, to a camp on Sago Creek. The horses were mostly led. The fatigue of walking up and over the high hills, in the face of the wind, was very great. November 6.--We found the ground once more white and the snow falling. I marched as usual. ... The air seem turned to a frozen fog; nothing could be seen. We were struggling in a freezing cloud. ... Finally, [the guide] led us behind a great granite rock, but all too small for the promised shelter. Only part of the regiment could huddle there in the deep snow, while the long night through the storm and in fearful eddies from above, before, behind, drove the falling and drifting snow. ... There the famished mules, crying piteously, did not seek to eat, but desperately gathered in a mass;... Thus morning light had nothing cheering to reveal; the air still filled with driven snow. ... But for six hours the frost or frozen fog fell thickly, and again we marched on as in a cloud. Marching ten miles only, I got a better camp, and herded the horses on the hills. It was a different road, where a few days before, the bodies of three frozen men were found. November 8.--The mercury that morning marked forty four degrees below the freezing point. The march was commenced before eight o'clock, and soon a high northwest wind arose, which with the drift, gave great suffering. ... but of necessity, eighteen miles were marched to Bitter Creek. The next day, nineteen miles were to be marched ... Seven hours thus, the Sweetwater valley was regained ... The animals were driven ... to herd on the high hills... but in the night a very great wind arose and drove them back from the scant bunch grass there, freezing to death fifteen. November 10.--The northeast wind continued fiercely, enveloping us in a cloud, which froze and fell all day. ... Nine trooper horses were left freezing and dying on the road that day, and a number soldiers and teamsters had been frost bitten. ... A bottle of sherry wine froze in a trunk. ... having lost about fifty mules in thirty-six hours, the morning of the 11th, on the report of the Quartermaster, I felt bound to leave a wagon in the bushes, filled with seventy-four extra saddles and bridles and some sabres. ... The Sharp's carbines were then issued to mounted as well as dismounted men. November 11.--Pleasant in the forenoon to men well wrapped and walking in the sun; we nearly surmounted the pass, marching seventeen miles, encamped on Dry Sandy. ... There remained one day's corn after that night. It proved intensely cold ... The mules for once were ordered tied to the wagons. ... Nine died. [By the 12th] ... Fifty horses had been lost since leaving Laramie. The regiment had retained through it's sufferings an excellent spirit. The 15th I reached and crossed the Green river; there was very little grass, near or far; ... The sick report had rapidly run up from four or five to forty two, thirty six soldiers and teamsters having been frosted. November 16.--We had to face a very severe wind, and to march, too, eighteen miles before a camp-ground could be got, on Ham's Fork. ... Twenty horses were abandoned in that twenty four hours. November 19.--Marched, leading through the mud and snow, as yesterday, fourteen miles, passing the camp of the Tenth Infantry. I encamped several miles above them, on Black Fork, and about three miles below Fort Bridger. From there I reported in person yesterday, and one of my companies joined the army headquarters, Camp Scott. I have one hundred and forty four horses, and have lost one hundred and thirty four. It has been of starvation. The earth has a no more lifeless, treeless, grassless desert; it contains scarcely a wolf to glut itself on the hundreds of dead and frozen animals which for thirty miles nearly block the road with abandoned and shattered property; they mark, perhaps beyond example in history, the steps of an advancing army with the horrors of a disastrous retreat. ... With high respect, your obedient servant, P. St. George Cooke, Lieutenant-Colonel Second Dragoons The occupation of Utah territory remained unexciting, with regard to relations with the Mormons. The regiment was assigned to herd and guard the Army's horses, mules, oxen, and cattle with almost no assistance from the near 30,000 man army entrenched at Fort Bridger over the winter. Colonel St. George Cooke returned to Utah after an absent assignment to become head of the Department of Utah in August 1860. He renamed Camp Floyd Fort Crittenden. During the last year before war again erupted the Second Dragoons were particularly active on the plains. The regiment, in "3 or 4 detachments", marched a cumulative "7,650 miles over the territories of Utah, New Mexico, Oregon, California, Kansas, and Nebraska". In an extreme example, Lt. William Sanders (H) and a sergeant left Ft. Crittenden UT on March 30, 1861 in pursuit of deserters. They caught the fugitives in Los Angeles, turned them over to the nearest post for trial, and returned to Ft. Crittenden on May 31 after traveling 1,600 miles in 59 days.