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Polygamy

Brigham Young's handcart scheme: the cost of gathering to Zion

August 16, 2026 at 9:07 PM MT · via YouTube / Kirsten & Megan · Summarized by Mormon News from original reporting

Kirsten & Megan's reading of "Wife No. 19" reaches Chapter 11, which examines Brigham Young's handcart plan. Ann Eliza Webb Young describes how Brigham promoted a cheaper way to bring converts to Utah: sending emigrants west with handcarts rather than wagons.

The chapter details how Young presented the handcart scheme as divinely inspired while it primarily solved the church's financial problems. European converts, promised help reaching Zion, were instead required to pull their belongings across 1,300 miles of wilderness. The scheme led to multiple disasters, including the 1856 handcart companies in which over 200 emigrants died. The video has drawn 174 views in 27 hours.

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