The pioneer handcarts of 150 years ago were "motored by muscle" and "fueled by blood, sweat and tears," said Elder Robert E. Wells, an emeritus General Authority, at a gathering Sept. 10 of some 1,100 descendants of Edward Bunker, captain of the third handcart company of 1856.
Elder Wells, himself a direct descendant, conducted the program in the Assembly Hall on Temple Square, at which Elder Earl C. Tingey of the Presidency of the Seventy, an adopted Bunker descendant by marriage, presided.
In remarks near the conclusion of the program, Elder Tingey compared the journeys of the 19th century pioneers to the challenges and dangers that are faced by Latter-day Saints today. As severe as their trials were, he said, "our trek is probably far more dangerous than their trek was, because our trek exposes us to the spiritual death and destruction of the family, whereas their trek was primarily one of physical death and deprivation."
Noting that each person in a handcart company was restricted to only 17 pounds of baggage, Elder Tingey reflected that today's Church members must prioritize what their symbolic "17 pounds" will include. "Will it include family home evening? Will it include reading the scriptures? Paying tithes and offerings? Partaking of the sacrament? Those are part of the 17 pounds we ought to carry in our wagons today, and if we do so, we won't have the loss of the family."
Like the pioneers on the trail, "we get up every morning and symbolically face west and walk another 20 miles on the path and pattern the prophets have counseled us to do," he said. He expressed the hope that "we as (Bunker) descendants will prioritize our lives in such a way that we take only what we must and we not leave any by the side of road that are precious and we wake up every morning and move another 20 miles in the right direction."
William G. Hartley, BYU history professor and an author and frequent speaker about the Mormon Trail, gave what he called "a closer look" at Captain Bunker and the handcart company he led, the third of five to depart from Iowa City, Iowa, in that first year.
"Brigham Young felt that Zion was so important that people would give up their possessions if necessary to reach it and walk with pack sacks if need be," Brother Hartley explained. "Handcarts, he said, would be cheaper and faster, so the option was offered to Europeans for the year 1856. Not everyone went by handcart in the handcart years. The option was there, but others went by wagon train. The plan was to put capable people in charge of the handcart operation, and Edward Bunker, although he didn't know about his handcart assignment until about three days before they left, was one of those capable leaders."
Elder Bunker was among missionaries returning from England who, because of their experience in traveling the trail, were assigned to pick and set up an encampment in Iowa City and oversee the construction of the handcarts and the outfitting of the companies. (Edward had made four trips over the Mormon Trail, including as a member of the Mormon Battalion.) Eventually, he was put in charge of a Welsh company of 320 souls that left Iowa City on June 23, 1856.
Brother Hartley quoted from Edward Bunker's autobiography this reminiscence about the company he was assigned to lead: "The Welsh people had no experience and very few of them could speak English. This made my burden very heavy. I had the mule team to drive and had to instruct the teamsters about yoking the oxen."
A Bunker descendant himself, Brother Hartley shared journal entries and accounts from the company, including this from Priscilla Evans: "My husband had lost a leg in early childhood and walked on a wooden stump, which caused him a great deal of pain and discomfort, and his knee, which rested on a pad became very sore. My husband was not able to walk any farther, and I could not pull him in the little cart, being so sick myself. One late afternoon, he felt he could not go on, so he stopped to rest beside some tall sagebrush. I pleaded with him to try to walk farther, that if he stayed there he would die, and I could not go on without him. The company did not miss us until they rested for the night. When the names were checked, we were not among the company, and a rider on a horse came back looking for us. When they saw the pitiful condition of my husband's knee, he was assigned to the commissary wagon and helped dispense food for the rest of the journey."
Also speaking at the program was descendant Gaylen Bunker, who gave a sketch of the life of Edward Bunker, who converted to Mormonism after meeting Book of Mormon witness Martin Harris in Kirtland, Ohio, in 1844. Joining the exodus west, he served in the Mormon Battalion, and later was a bishop in Ogden and Santa Clara, Utah, and in the settlement he founded, Bunkerville, Nev. He died and was buried in the Mormon colony of Colonia Morelos in Mexico.
Descendant Vilate Bunker Van Leeuen spoke of the Elder Bunker's travel by sailing ship from England, and Elder Wells told of his efforts to find the burial site of Edward Bunker in Mexico and place a marker there.
Former Miss America Sharlene Wells Hawkes, a daughter of Elder Wells, sang "I Know that My Redeemer Lives."
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