In late spring of 1858 Utah Territory’s population escalated by 2500 when the soldiers of Johnston’s Army (as they were later called) marched through Salt Lake City and took up residence in Cedar Valley. Sent by President Buchanan to put down a reported rebellion, the ranks included not only recruits from various parts of the United States but also Ireland, Germany, Poland and Great Britain.
Among this last group was Charles Wright, a bugler for the Sixth Infantry. Charles was born in 1838 in London, England. He took a circuitous route to Utah with stops in New England where his widowed mother had sent him to be educated. But Charles tired of his studies, and looking for adventure, signed up as a recruit for the army. Soon after his arrival with the troops at Fort Bridger in 1857, snow caused the army to winter there. One can imagine him entertaining his fellow soldiers with his trumpet and also the piccolo, fife and flute. Hurt in a skirmish among the ranks he spent some time in the infirmary, and then a Mormon woman took him into her home to recover. While doing so he investigated her religion and made up his mind to stay in the west after his discharge. We next find him in the home of E.T. Benson, President of the Cache Stake. The Benson’s had a large library which Charles took advantage of in this spare time. By the standards of the time, this short schooling qualified him to teach school and he began his career in Smithfield and later Providence. He married Nancy Adeline Dees and their first child was born in Providence. During this period of time his stature as a teacher grew. He earned $360 for the school year which was twice what a common laborer would earn during that period. He next taught for a short time in Willard and finally settled down in Huntsville. He believed in corporal punishment of misbehavers and applied a willow while the misbehaving child bent over touching a nail on the floor. Still the children respected him, as did the people of Huntsville. He defended a critic of the Utah educational system with a treatise published in the Ogden Herald in 1884. Specifically, the critic objected to the practice of opening and closing prayers in classrooms each day. Charles stated that statistics showed Utah’s schools were "ahead of many" of the Eastern and older Western states and territories, and challenged anyone to prove otherwise. A toast given at the close of the 1884 July 24th activities show the high regard in which he was held. "To Charlie Wright, superintendent of the Sunday School, the ‘Wright’ man in the ‘Wright’ place. By 1900, after his retirement, the hand bell he used to call children to school was rung by the school bus driver at each stop to let children know he had arrived. Charles Wright’s story is only one of numerous reasons people settled in Utah. Charles’s grave can be found in the Huntsville Cemetery alongside his wife and posterity. He died in 1910 after a rich, well-traveled life.
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