52
HISTORY OF MILLARD COUNTY
their shoes scrambling over the rocks." Then, with a partial commentary on the morale of some workmen, he observed, "some of the joiners would be glad to return to your city if they could get there." 5: Not only was progress on the construction of the State House slow in 1852, but John Bernhisel, the territorial delegate to the United States Congress, encountered a series of obstacles in his efforts to obtain additional funding for the building. Disgruntled federal officials assigned to share governing responsibility with some of the ranking Utah M o r m o n s , together with the 1852 public announcem e n t by Apostle Orson Pratt admitting the practice of polygamy among some church members, inflamed anti-Mormon rhetoric and greatly influenced congressional opinion. The House of Representatives requested that President Fillmore provide information about the actual situation in the territory so that it could "ascertain whether the due execution of the laws of the United States has been resisted or obstructed." Congress also wanted to know if there had been "any misapplication of the public funds; and whether the personal rights of our citizens have been interfered with in any manner."53 Amid such conditions, delegate Bernhisel fought doggedly for funding for the State House in Fillmore for the next five years. W h e n Brigham Young was in Fillmore in May 1852, he sent a small party led by Apostle Albert Carrington to the western portion of the broad Pahvant Valley to search for lead deposits. Carrington h a d assisted Lieutenant John W. G u n n i s o n and Captain Howard Stansbury with their earlier surveys. Later some of Carrington's family settled in Millard County. Carrington noted the lack of mountains or plateaus between Fillmore and the Sevier River, a distance of about forty miles. Brigham Young later noted to his friend Thomas L. Kane the importance of the Sevier River to future agricultural developments in the valley: "The river can be brought around to supply any deficiency of water in the Pauvan Valley."54 Ten years later, the first of many canals became a reality, carrying irrigation water to the new farming areas of western Millard C o u n t y and eventually even to some of the lower lands in the eastern side of the county. Carrington followed the river's "devious windings" southwest to the Sevier Lake, located between the Cricket Mountains on the east and the House Range on the west. The Paiutes called the lake Uhvuh'
