MORMON PIONEERING JOURNEYS: A SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHICAL
GUIDE TO THE NINETEENTH-CENTURY EXPERIENCE

I. The Mormon Trail: Bibliographies, Atlases, and Guides to Ocean and Overland Travel

Allen, James B. and Glen M. Leonard. The Story of the Latter-day Saints 2nd ed. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1992).
 
Brown, S. Kent, Donald Q. Cannon and Richard H. Jackson, eds. Historical Atlas of Mormonism (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1994).
Contains a variety of maps relating to Mormon migration; especially valuable is Map #37: "Mormon Settlements in the Middle Missouri River Valley" prepared from research by Gail G. Holmes.

 

Hill, William E. The Mormon Trail, Yesterday and Today (Logan: Utah State University Press, 1996).
 
Kimball, Stanley B. Mormon Battalion on the Santa Fe Trail in 1846: An Analysis of Mormon Battalion Trail Accounts (Santa Fe, NM: U.S. National Park Service, 1996).
 
________. "Mormon Emigration Trails," in Mormon Americana, A Guide to Source and Collections in the United States ed. David J. Whittaker (Provo: Brigham Young University Studies Monograph Series, 1995), pp. 407-436.
Best single guide to the sources, publications and trail organizations.

________. Discovering Mormon Trails (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1979).
 
________. Historic Sites and Markers along the Mormon and Other Great Western Trails (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1988).
 
________. Historic Resource Study: Mormon Pioneer National Historical Trail (Denver, CO: National Park Service, 1991).
 
Ludlow, Daniel H. Editor-in-Chief, The Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 4 volumes (New York: Macmillan, 1992).
Includes a number of entries with maps and statistical information on all aspects of Mormon migration.

 

Roberts, Brigham H. A Comprehensive History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, Century I 6 Volumes (Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1930), 3:1-381.
 
Sonne, Conway B. Saints on the Seas: A Maritime History of Mormon Migration, 1830 90 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1983).
 
________. Ships, Saints, and Mariners: A Maritime Encyclopedia of Mormon Migration, 1830-1890 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1987).
 
 

II. The Context: The American Westward Movement

Billington, Ray Allen, and Martin Ridge. Westward Expansion, A History of the American Frontier 5th ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1982).
 
DeVoto, Bernard. The Year of Decision, 1846 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1943).
 
Goetzmann, William H. Army Exploration in the American West: 1803-1863 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1979).
 
________. Exploration and Empire, The Explorer and the Scientist in the Winning of the American West (New York: Knopf, 1966).
 
Hafen, LeRoy R., W. Eugene Hollon and Carl Coke Rister, Western America, The Exploration, Settlement, and Development of the Region beyond the Mississippi 3rd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1970).
 
Jackson, W. Turrentine. Wagon Roads West: A Study of Federal Surveys and Construction in the Trans-Mississippi West, 1846-1869 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1979).
 
Lass, William E. From the Missouri to the Great Salt Lake: An Account of Overland Freighting (Lincoln: Nebraska State Historical Society, 1972).
 
Mattes, Merrill J. The Great Platte River Road: The Covered Wagon Mainline via Fort Kearney to Fort Laramie (1969; Reprint, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1987).
 
Myers, Sandra . Westering Women and the Frontier Experience, 1800-1915 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1982).
 
Milner II, Clyde A., Carol A. O'Connor and Martha A. Sandweiss, eds. The Oxford History of the American West (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994).
 
Paden, Irene D. The Wake of the Prairie Schooner (New York: MacMillan, 1944).
 
Paul, Rodman W. Mining Frontiers of the Far West, 1848-1880 (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1963).
 
Reid, John Phillip. Law for the Elephant, Property and Social Behavior on the Overland Trail (San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, 1980).
 
Unruh, Jr., John D. The Plains Across: The Overland Emigrants and the Trans Mississippi West, 1840-60 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1979).
Very useful study.
 
West, Elliott. Growing Up with the Country, Childhood on the Far Western Frontier (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1989).
 
White, Richard. "It's Your Misfortune and None of My Own": A New History of the American West (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991).
 
Winther, Oscar Osburn. The Transportation Frontier: Trans-Mississippi West, 1865-1890 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1974).


III. Histories of Mormon Migration

 

A. Causes and Consequences
Christian, Lewis Clark. "A Study of Mormon Knowledge of the American Far West prior to the Exodus (1820-February, 1846)," (Master's thesis, BYU, 1972).
 
________. "A Study of the Mormon Westward Migration between February 1846 and July 1847: With Emphasis on and Evaluation of the Factors that Led to the Mormons' Choice of Salt Lake Valley as the Site of Their Initial Colony," (Ph.D. diss., BYU, 1976).
 
________. "Mormon Foreknowledge of the West," BYU Studies 21 (Fall 1981):403-415.
 
Esplin, Ronald K. "'A Place Prepared': Joseph, Brigham and the Quest for a Refuge in the West," Journal of Mormon History 9 (1982):85-111.
See also Esplin, "A 'Place Prepared' in the Rockies," Ensign 18 (July 1988):6-13.
 
________. "The Significance of Nauvoo for Latter-day Saints," Journal of Mormon History 16 (1990):71-86.
 
Hartley, William G. "Coming to Zion: Saga of the Gathering," Ensign 5 (July 1975):14-18.
 
Kimball, Stanley B. "Nauvoo West: The Mormons of the Iowa Shore," BYU Studies 18 (Winter 1978):132-42.
 
Lyon, T. Edgar. "Some Uncommon Aspects of the Mormon Migration," Improvement Era 71 (September 1969):33-40.
 
Mulder, William. "Mormonism's 'Gathering': An American Doctrine with a Difference," Church History 23 (September 1954):248-64.

 

 


B. Nauvoo to Winter Quarters


C. Mormon Battalion


D. Winter Quarters to the Salt Lake Valley

E. Later Migrations

 

IV. Diaries and Autobiographies

 

A. Bibliographies and Guides


B. Selected Published Journals/Diaries


V. Miscellaneous References



A. Contemporary Works


B. Visual/Photographic Accounts


C. Miscellaneous Topics