In the 1840s, Mormon convert Howard Egan was a businessman, Nauvoo City policeman, polygamist, and bodyguard to Joseph Smith, founder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Egan became envoy for the volunteer Mormon Battalion during the 1846-48 Mexican-American War. Charged to escort Mormon pioneers on the westward trek to Utah, he was appointed "Captain of the 9th group of 10 men" in 1847. In the 1857-58 Utah War against Col. Albert Sidney Johnston's federal army, Egan conveyed ammunition and rose in rank to major.
A skilled frontiersman credited with blazing numerous Western trails, Egan was devoted to Utah Territorial Governor and LDS President Brigham Young. He knew how to handle a gun and, according to Utah civic leader and Mormon diarist Hosea Stout, was among Young's gang of "be'hoys," along with gunslinger and church member Orrin Porter Rockwell.
In 1851, Egan took the law into his own hands and got away with murder.
Born in Ireland in 1815, Egan was 8 years old when his mother died and the bereaved family moved to Canada to start anew. When their father unexpectedly passed away, a married sister took in the 13-year-old orphan, who soon found work as a sailor on Canada's great waterways.
By 1838, the independent voyager made his way to Salem, Mass. He learned the rope-making trade, opened shop, and in 1839 married his beloved 15-year-old Tamson Parshley. The couple then joined the LDS Church and moved to Nauvoo, Ill. In 1846, they participated in the mass Nauvoo exodus and wintered at Winter Quarters, a bustling Mormon settlement near present-day Omaha, Neb.
While Tamson was hearth and home to her growing family, Egan traveled extensively for the LDS Church. His assignments were many and varied: from freighting supplies along the Missouri River to heading to Santa Fe to pick up Battalion letters, packages and wages for the soldiers' families.
Reaching Salt Lake City, Egan was again on the go. According to the family foundation's literature, the intrepid guide and pathfinder transported "the printing press upon which the Church published the Deseret News," and during the gold rush days mapped a "primitive trail to southern California" presumably "to establish the Salt Lake Trading Company in the Sierra goldfields."
In 1851, Egan returned home after a year traversing the wilderness to discover his wife Tamson had given birth to another man's child. Anguished and feeling betrayed, Egan was determined to rout out the scoundrel — James Madison Monroe, a former friend and teacher of Joseph Smith's children. He found Monroe near Bear River. It appeared the men were talking peacefully until, Stout recorded, "Egan drew a pistol and shot him in the face on the right side of the nose just below the eye."
Monroe fell "dead on the spot."
Confessing he did what he did "in the name of the Lord," Egan lamented Monroe had "ruined his family, and destroyed his peace on earth forever."
Tried by a jury of his peers in Salt Lake City, religious conviction and frontier law saw eye to eye. On Oct. 18, 1851, Egan was acquitted. He raised the boy, William Monroe Egan, as his own.
Egan became a cattle rancher. Claiming he could ride a mule to California within 10 days, he did, while trailblazing the "Egan Trail." In his 40s, Egan was appointed division superintendent of the Pony Express line from Salt Lake City to Carson City. He planned home stations, including his at Deep Creek, and most likely was its oldest rider.
Egan's relationship with President Young never wavered. During the "Great Colonizer's" last illness, Egan stood in as his nurse and at his death in 1877 stood resolute as special guard at his graveside.
Between 1844 and 1849, Egan married three other plural wives, and eventually acquiesced to their petitions for divorce. In 1878, with Tamson by his side, Egan died of pneumonia at age 63 — his story, a legacy.
Eileen Hallet Stone, author of "Hidden History of Utah, a compilation of her Salt Lake Tribune columns, may be reached at a. Additional Sources: Hosea Stout's, "On the Mormon Frontier," and the Nov. 15, 1851 Deseret News.
