Background
Alfred Cumming was born on September 4, 1802 in Augusta, Georgia, the son of Thomas and Ann (Clay) Cumming. The family was socially and politically prominent.
Alfred Cumming was born on September 4, 1802 in Augusta, Georgia, the son of Thomas and Ann (Clay) Cumming. The family was socially and politically prominent.
Cumming’s sole title to fame is based upon his connection with the so-called “Mormon War” of 1857-58.
He had been mayor of Augusta in 1839 and had acted with commendable courage and efficiency in the severe yellow-fever epidemic of that year; in the Mexican War he had been a sutler with Scott’s army, and in the early fifties had served acceptably as an Indian agent on the upper Missouri.
He became a national figure when President Buchanan, alarmed at the growing evidences of revolt in Utah, appointed him (May 1857) governor of the territory in place of Brigham Young and dispatched an army to escort him to Salt Lake City.
Accompanied by the other territorial officials appointed at the same time, he arrived with the main body of Col. Albert Sidney Johnston’s army at Fort Bridger (renamed Camp Scott) about November 20.
On the 216t he issued a proclamation declaring Utah in a state of insurrection, calling upon its militia to disband, and promising, in case the laws were obeyed, a friendly administration. The army, however, paralyzed by lack of supplies and transport, caused by the depredations of Mormon guerrillas, could make for the time no further move, and for nearly five months matters remained at a standstill.
On March 12, 1858, Thomas L. Kane of Philadelphia, a friend of the Mormons, who had journeyed to Utah by way of Panama and California and had conferred with Young, arrived incognito in camp and opened negotiations with Cumming. Ignoring Johnston, and incidentally bringing on a bitter feud between the governor and the commander, he soon persuaded Cumming that in spite of the bombastic declaration of war issued by Young on September 15, 1857, the prophet desired peace.
On April 5 Kane and Cumming set out for Salt Lake City, and on their arrival on the 12th Young gave up the executive seal of the territory. Cumming thereupon notified Johnston that as peace had been restored the army was no longer necessary. Johnston, however, under his original orders from the War Department to establish military posts in Utah, moved forward in June with replenished transport and supplies. The Mormons, to the number of probably 30, 000, in spite of the counsel of Cumming and two special peace commissioners from the President who had arrived on June 7 with a full pardon for Young and his followers, evacuated the city.
On the 26th Johnston marched his army through its deserted streets and then proceeded to Cedar Valley, forty miles to the southwest, where he established Camp Floyd.
On July 5 the Mormons started to return, and a regime of peace seemed assured. New complications soon arose, however, from the demand on the part of the territorial judges at Provo for military protection—a demand complied with by Johnston, whose action was denounced by Cumming as an infringement of his own powers.
Sustained by a decision of Attorney-General Black on May 17, 1859, the governor was thereafter left in supreme authority. In the following March Johnston left the territory; a few months later most of the troops were sent to Arizona and New Mexico; and in July 1861, the remainder were ordered east. Cumming, on the inauguration of Lincoln, did not wait to be removed, but left for his home near Augusta, where for his remaining days he lived in retirement.
Gov. Cumming died at his home.
He was simple-minded and credulous, assertive and somewhat pompous in manner and jealous of his personal authority at a time when cooperation with the military arm was essential.