Thrilling War News Impels Many Utahns to Enlist
Forty-nine Volunteers in Salt Lake Alone—Other Towns Present Good Lists,
Richfield Leading with Thirty-two—Remote Towns Anxious to Add Recruits—Much Spirit Being Displayed—Provo Academy Students Sad Because they Can’t Go to War
Mounted Rifleman—Royal G. Pratt….
Nearly six hundred men had last evening volunteered for service in Utah’s quota. One hundred and sixty-three names were added yesterday. Of the number forty-nine came from this city. Reports from various places indicated that another hundred or more will be added today. So that the recruiting officers will have a list approximating 700 from which to select the men needed for the different branches of the service to be filled from the State.
The thrilling war news from the Philippines was the power that stimulated the enlistments. The war fever had not before begun to leap through the veins of many. Commodore Dewey’s magnificent achievement was the awakening fact.
[Salt Lake Tribune, May 3, 1898]
[transcribed and proofread by David Grow, Aug. 2006]
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Utah’s Rough Riders
Fort Russell, May 25—Captain Cannon has appointed the following non-commissioned officers: Sergeants—F.C. Goodwin, Logan; G.R. Sproat, Salt Lake; J.A. Harris, Monroe; J.A. Young, Salt Lake; E.C. Morris, Salt Lake; E.H. Clark, Gunnison;
Corporals—L.B. Tenney, Logan; Royal G. Pratt, Salt Lake; Leonard Robinson, Ogden; A.G. Mackinzie, Carl B. Hard, John B. Beck, F.R. Plalater and J.C. Smelser, Salt Lake;
Farriers—D.E. Scales, Brigham City; A.W. Cummings, Mareux.
[WW, May 27, 1898]
[transcribed and proofread by David Grow, Aug. 2006]
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Col. Cannon Returns
Arrived Last Evening From Jacksonville
Service Was Disappointing
Inactivity of the Command Took the Spirit Out of the Boys, Who were a Dashing and Invincible Force When They Left Fort Russell—Camp was Originally a Good One, but it was Occupied too Long—Wash Young Seeking a Chance to Go to Cuba—Burt Coming Home.
Liet. Col. John Q. Cannon returned home last evening from the camp of the rough riders at Jacksonville. Col. Cannon is in good health, having fully recovered from the effects of the malarial illness with which he was afflicted for three weeks. He is once more in civil life, having been mustered out with his regiment. The inactive state in which the command was kept was a grievous disappointment to it, for if it had had the opportunity it would have made an unexcelled record for gallantry. This feeling Col. Cannon deeply shared. Had it been his fortune to have seen active service, all know that he would have acquitted himself in a manner that would have justified the pride of his State.
In speaking last evening of his experience in the army, Col. Cannon said that the position of the regiment had been a most trying one. It had not participated in the conflict, but it had seen some of the bitterness and suffering and sorrow of war. The spirit had been taken out of the men by illness and inactivity, until the body of troops that left Fort Russell a dashing and invincible command, was spiritless and wasted at the close.
The camp ground at Jacksonville, he said, was a good one, better than that at Tampa, and perhaps better than any other in the South. It was high and dry and sandy. But it was occupied too long, said Col. Cannon, and so was bound to become foul and unhealthy with 1000 men and 1500 horses there, and other troops all around.
Nearly all the members of troop I had departed from the camp when Col. Cannon left. Capt. Young and Lieut. Hooper were still there, however. Young was trying to devise a way of ridding himself of the responsibility of caring for the property which was in his charge when he was at Pablo beach. He was also endeavoring, it was reported, to secure a position in the quartermaster’s department that would enable him to go to Cuba, and it was understood that he was planning to go to the island in a business capacity, if he did not secure a commission. Lieut. Burt will arrive here in a few days. He was in Chicago when Col. Cannon left that city. Col. Torrey came as far as Cincinnati with Col. Cannon and left for Cheyenne by way of St. Louis.
The two sick men of the troop, Royal Pratt of Salt Lake and Jesse Bean of Richfield, are making good progress toward recovery. Pratt was nearly ready to come home the day Col. Cannon started.
[Salt Lake Tribune, Oct. 31, 1898]
[transcribed and proofread by David Grow, Aug. 2006]