Summary:
Sketch begins with childhood reminiscences about his father, John Yates, and the family's experiences as Latter-day Saints in Coleshill, Warwickshire, England; immigration in 1850 on ship Argo; difficulties experienced at Council Bluffs, Iowa; and travel to Utah in the John Tidwell company, 1852.
Sketch describes settlement in Farmington and Call's Fort, Utah; Yates's experiences as a teamster with a Church wagon train company in 1862 and as teamster for William H. Hooper; and activities as a missionary to England, 1883-1885. There is also account of emigrant Susannah Carter Jolley's death in 1862. Yates also records the conversion of English clergyman Joseph Whiteley, who later became a University of Utah professor.
Also includes transcript of Yates's funeral service in the Brigham City Third Ward. Speakers were Honeyville Ward bishop Thomas Wheatley, Harper Ward BishopThaddeus Wight, Brigham City Second Ward bishop Thomas H. Blackburn, and Beaver Ward bishop R. A. Johnson.