Joseph Smith Digs a Shallow Well — Water Miraculously Provided for Zion's Camp (June 1834)

In June 1834, during the march of Zion's Camp across a vast, treeless prairie, the camp of roughly 200 men, their teams, horses, and mules had marched all day in intense heat with no water available. After making camp on the open prairie—where some teams were near giving out, wood was scarce, and a strong guard had to be placed to keep the animals—men were quietly complaining about the lack of water.

According to accounts recorded by Oliver B. Huntington, the Prophet Joseph Smith sat at his tent door watching and listening. He quietly called for a spade, selected what he judged to be the most convenient spot for the camp, and began to dig a shallow well only a few feet deep. Zera Smith Cole later recalled (in an account Huntington recorded in 1890 while Cole was working in the Logan Temple with Huntington) that there was "no noise, no bustle, no show of greatness or power" about the act. William F. Cahoon likewise remembered that Joseph looked about, selected a spot, dug a shallow well, and that "immediately the water came bubbling up into it and filled it, so that the horses and mules could stand and drink from it." Another account describes the water continuing to rise in the well until it supplied the camp.

Witnesses and recollectors associated with this incident include Zera Cole and William F. Cahoon, with their accounts preserved and recorded by Oliver B. Huntington; Harvey Stanley is also named in one preserved recounting. The contemporaneous effect reported in these recollections was that water quickly appeared in the shallow excavation and provided drinking water for animals and members of Zion's Camp.

Fuller account of this event (as retold in Oliver B. Huntington, 'An Incident in Zion's Camp,' Juvenile Instructor 37, no. 1 (January 1, 1902): 20–21):

While traveling across the vast prairie, treeless and waterless, they camped at night after a long and wearisome day's march. They had been without water since early morning, and men and animals suffered greatly from thirst, for it had been one of the hottest days of June. Joseph sat at his tent looking out upon the scene. All at once he called for a spade. When it was brought, he looked about him and selected a spot, the most convenient in the Camp for men and teams to get water. Then he dug a shallow well, and immediately the water came bubbling up into it and filled it, so that the horses and mules could stand and drink from it. While the camp stayed there, the well remained full, despite the fact that about two hundred men and scores of horses and mules were supplied from it.