SALT LAKE CITY — The trek west for many Mormon pioneers began on the water, said a BYU professor speaking at the Immigration Family History Expo 2010 held March 18 at the Historic Masonic Temple. Calling his lecture "The Sail Before the Trail or Have We Missed the Boat?" Fred E. Woods discussed the costs, the trials and realities that faced the thousands of converts to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as they boarded various vessels to cross the seas to America."Why do we have a cultural myopia toward the pioneers of the water?" he asked, noting that in the newly released Mormon Immigration Index CD, Parts 1 and 2, there are a total of 2,543 voyages recorded between 1840 and 1932.Boats generally left European shores — most from Liverpool, England and headed to New York or to New Orleans and the Mississippi.Families sold all they had to pay the fare and depended on church agents like Elder Amos Fielding to arrange their passage. Otherwise they were at the mercy of robbers and thieves.The Saints were urged to travel in groups, which they did, organized in branches.They had the best safety record of any people crossing the oceans and were usually preferred as passengers by captains who liked their hygiene, safety practices and orderly ways. Their voyages were filled with prayer, song and dancing.__IMAGE__There were many baptisms at sea, so many that church leaders decided the boats must reach shore before crew members could join the church to ensure their sincerity.During the three decades of emigration between 1847-1877, only one boat was lost at sea. There are numerous accounts of Saints rebuking the waves and the winds.Nevertheless, the sailing Mormons faced great hardships including sea sickness, storms, poor living conditions, disease, lack of adequate food and personal dangers. Guards were assigned to protect the women. Hostile sailors set one boat afire. Others tried to run ships aground."This was a religious migration. But it doesn't matter what religion you are, this is a look at American history," Woods said.The Saints felt a strong obligation to gather in one place as they understood it was dictated in Doctrine and Covenants 29:7-8. The Nauvoo Temple was a magnet, Woods said.A typical voyage took 38 days if the ship stopped in New York, 54 days if it landed in New Orleans. Once in America, the Saints still had to travel many more miles to reach the general body of the church. The extermination order was still in effect in Missouri so Saints traveling through that state were often mocked and threatened.Records of those who tried to get to Zion by sea include U.S. Customs lists, early newspaper accounts and personal journals. All of the current information is available at: www.lib.byu.edu/mormonmigration, Woods said. "We're very pleased with this Web launch," he said. "It all comes alive. It's like Christmas Day everyday."Woods said if an ancestor's name does not show up on any of the lists it's probable that the person was a stowaway and not on the ship's manifest, his or her name is misspelled or the person was a crew member which is a different list.
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