Morgan Pioneer History Binds t/s Together Horace Strong Rawson Horace Strong lime Nothing very particular transpired in my childhood only what is common until the war of 1812 with Great Britain. In 1813 the British came over Niagara River and burned Buffalo City and several other towns and drove the inhabitants off the frontiers, my father and his family with the rest, but they again returned. In 1819 my father and his family moved by water down the Allegheny River to Pittsburgh, thence down the Ohio River to the Falls, just below Cincinnati. We came very near being lost in a gale, but the Lord in His mercy preserved us. My father and mother were goodly folk, reserved in all their ways. My father was a Baptist preacher and lived up to the best light they had until their death. My father died September 17, 1824, in Washington County, Indiana in the fifty-fourth year of his age, leaving my mother with six children, and I, feeling in some degree, the obligation I was under to a kind and tender mother, done the best I could to relieve their wants. My mother died May 16, 1825, in the thirty-fifth year of her life, in the same place, leaving their children on my hands to provide for. I married and my wife kindly assisted me in providing for my brothers and sisters until they could take care of themselves. We labored hard and was prospered much. We then moved to Randolph County, Indiana, bought a quarter section of land, soon had a nice farm with suitable buildings and settled down to life as happy as we could be with the light we had then, steadily pursuing our labors, endeavoring to the best of our abilities to keep the first commandment to multiply and replenish the earth. In 1831 we were baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints by Levi W. Hancock and confirmed by Zebede Coultrin, receiving the Holy Spirit the Lord verifying His promise. I then testified to a large congregation the truth of the Latter-Day work. We soon partook of the gathering spirit, being fully convinced that the Lord had set His hand the seventh time to gather His people in this the seventh dispensation. We learned the place of gathering and in 1832 With several other families, moved to Jackson County, Missouri, the Land of Zion. Then I was ordained a teacher under the hand of Wheeler Baldwin, president of the branch. We enjoyed ourselves for a short time, filled us with love toward each other, granting us the gifts. We improved them to a great extent, then the devil got mad. You better believe we were a law-abiding people. He saw he couldn't harm us by the law. He therefore called out the mob, that being his only remedy and fully commissioned them with his power, then he went to Kirtland to the Prophet Joseph Smith and the mob carried out his orders there. They then commenced their depredation by whipping some, tarring and feathering others and unroofing and tearing down houses in the night, driving women and children into the woods, destroying property, until we could stand it no longer, Therefore we came out in self defence, some skirmishes then took place, some killed and some wounded on both sides, but we kept the ground until they gathered their forces, three to one of us and they were well armed and we were not. We met them on the Temple Lot and compromised, just on their terms, to give up our arms and to forthwith leave the country. I saw Limon Witte, who was our captain, deliver his sword to Colonel Boggs, exclaiming, "Take my sword or my head, I do not care a damn which," and we were ordered to set our guns down on the Temple Lot against the fence where the great Temple is to be built and dedicated unto the Lord in this generation and a cloud is to rest upon it by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night for upon all the glory shall be defence. According to the edict of old Boggs, the Saints had to leave Jackson County. Several families moved to LaFayette County, Easton, our friend. While there we saw the stars fall, a great sight indeed. Here we found friends, God bless them forever. In the spring of 1834 Bishop Partridge and Council who lived in Clay County requested the scattered Saints to gather there prior to the coming of the Prophet Joseph Smith with a portion of strength of the Lord's House to redeem Zion. We were obedient to the call. In the spring of 1834, we left our friend Ezra Barnet, a friend indeed. We moved across the Missouri River into Clay County. The people here for a while seemed very calm until Joseph and his little band arrived which magnified in their eyes to the degree that two hundred swelled to two thousand,