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to the Rockies. While about 2000 of the Saints left for
the Rockies in 1847 they still started building a picket
fence on three sides of the city, hemming it to the
Missouri River. Apparently, there were some block houses
 built along the picket fence, which was about six feet
tall. Later settlers, after the Mormons left, said there
also was a moat outside the picket fence.

The picket fence was just one in a series of measures
 undertaken to keep the peace between the Saints and some
 bold and curious members of the Omaha and the Oto-Missouri
Indian Tribes. The Indians had different ideas about
property rights and about stray livestock than the Saints.
The picket fence solved much of the problem. arising out
of those different concepts of ownership.