Don Ashael Crandall

Paul married Barbara Allen on 6 Jun 1924 in Gilbert, Maricopa, Arizona. Barbara (daughter of John Seymour Allen and Barbara Ann Phelps) was born on 5 Oct 1903 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona; died on 12 Feb 2003 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona; was buried in Mesa City Cemetery, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Notwithstanding the error on the birth certificate of her son Wilford Myron Crandall, she was not "Barbara Brown Allen", but simply "Barbara Allen."

Barbara Allen Crandall, in her own words, written 1995:

I was born in the two-room house on the 20 acre farm at the southwest corner of Stapley and Broadway in Mesa, the fourth child of Barbara and John Seymour. I was three when we moved to the Lamb Ranch.

My first five years of school were in Mesa, then in 1915 we moved to the ranch south of Gilbert and I started school there. Dad had a large dairy, 40 to 60 cows, so when I was in the eighth grade, I was milking ten cows every night and morning and riding my little mare to school with neither saddle nor bridle.

My eighth and ninth grade years I went to Chandler. I started at Tempe Normal in 1921 and in 1923 graduated and began teaching in Ocotillo. I married Paul Crandall in 1924. Paul rented an 80-acre farm from George Lewis for two years, but the farm depression was severe and he went broke both years. Paul held down various jobs during the depression--drove an ice truck, Mesa city street sprinkler, fuel and feed sales, bought a service station, delivered Union Oil, supervised county highways and then went back to farming, his true love, with his brother Lee.

I held church positions from 12 years of age when I was secretary of the Primary. I taught various classes then was called to the Primary Stake Board before I was married, where I served for 20 years, ending as Stake President. I had one daughter and five sons during those years.

In 1943 I went back to teaching to help out for a year or so during World War II. I retired 27 years later. During this time I was MIA president six years, Junior Gleaner teacher six years, and Genealogy director for five years. I then directed travel tours for nine years. Paul served in the bishopric of Mesa First Ward for 13 years. In 1952 our fourth son, Charles, died of Hodgkins' Disease, and in 1971 Don was killed in an auto accident in California.

We had served as ordained Temple workers for five years then we were called to the Tulsa, Oklahoma Mission in December 1979. Paul developed high blood pressure, so we were released after one year. He developed prostate cancer five years later and died August 26, 1987.

We have 19 grandchildren and 24 great-grandchildren. I am 92 years old, and have been a Relief Society visiting teacher since I retired from school teaching. My four living children come to my home for lunch every Tuesday, a great delight to all of us.

Obituary, The Arizona Republic, 16 Feb 2003:

Barbara Allen Crandall, 99 year old Mesa native, died on Wednesday, February 12, 2003, at her Mesa home.

Born October 5, 1903, she was preceded in death by her husband, Paul L. Crandall, two sons, Don Ashael and Charles Lee.

Barbara rode a horse bareback to Mesa and Gilbert elementary schools and graduated from high school and got her teaching certificate in 1923 from Tempe Normal School, now ASU in Tempe. While there she was on the varsity softball and volleyball teams.

Her first teaching job was in Ocotillo, and on June 6, 1924, she married Paul L. Crandall. They made their home and reared six children in Mesa. In 1937 she was contacted by Joe Jarvis, newly named Mesa recreation director, who asked her to organize a recreation program to keep the kids busy during the summer. This was the beginning of the Mesa Parks and Recreation program. She recruited a small group of volunteers workers and they taught games, dancing and songs, played sports and went swimming on Wednesdays. Each season wound up with staging of a production involving all of the children in costume. In all, Barbara directed the program for seven years.

Barbara worked for a while in Maricopa County politics, was an attache in the State Legislature, a precinct committeeman and was vice chairman of the Maricopa County Democratic organization for a year.

With World War II manpower shortages, Barbara went back to school, teaching fifth grade in Lehi. Besides classroom subjects, she went onto the playground and taught the boys football, baseball and basketball. The girls were instructed in volleyball, dodgeball, Jump rope and softball. Her teaching philosophy was that every child participated and had a costume in any activity. She wound up her 27 year teaching career at Lowell school in Mesa.

Barbara held many ward and stake leadership and teaching positions in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She was active in the Primary for 20 years and later in the Mutual Improvement Association (MIA), the youth organization of the Church. She was presented a Golden Gleaner recognition award for service. In 1979-80 she filled a mission with her husband for the Church in the Tulsa Oklahoma Mission. They were also ordinance workers for several years in the Arizona Temple in Mesa. She was a charter member of Phi Chapter, Delta Kappa Gamma, teachers' sorority.

In 1978 she was named Mesa Merit Mother and was runner-up for Arizona Mother of the Year. She was a charter member and first secretary of the Mesa Historical Society. After her retirement from teaching, Barbara organized the Arizona Ramblers Travel Club and conducted bus tours, primarily for senior citizens, throughout the United States and Canada.

She is survived by her daughter, Barbara Nielsen, three sons, Paul L. Jr., Wilford M. (Wil). and Dr. John A., all of Mesa, one sister, Mary Hardison, Vallejo, Ca, one brother, Russell H. Allen of Mesa. She has 19 grandchildren and 35 great-grandchildren.

Viewing will be held at Meldrum Mortuary, 52 N. Macdonald, on Monday, 6-8:00 P.M., (also one hour prior to services at the Church). Funeral services will be held Tuesday February 18, at 10:00 A.M. at Centennial Ward, 422 E. University.

Interment will be at Mesa Cemetery 1212 N Center.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Mesa Historical Society.

Notes:

Known as "Cellus." Worked as a teamster; owned his own horse and wagon.

Myron married Clara Mabel Packer on 22 Dec 1896 in Safford, Graham, Arizona. Clara (daughter of Alonzo Hamilton Packer and Lydia Ann Parker) was born on 26 Jun 1878 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah; died on 30 Dec 1929 in Gilbert, Maricopa, Arizona; was buried on 1 Jan 1930 in Mesa City Cemetery, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Died of injuries sustained in a car accident.

Author unknown -- the Relief Society president referred to is Clara Mabel Packer, and the "Lee Crandall" mentioned is her son Lee Alonzo Crandall:

"Grandma Nichols was on the way to the temple for the wedding of her son Lee in the Mesa Temple, when the accident occurred at the corner of Main and Gilbert Road, which was way out in the desert. She was serving as a counselor in the ward Relief Society at the time and she and the Relief Society President were on the way to the temple for the wedding. The RS President was driving the car then they were hit and killed. The wedding had to be postponed until after the funeral. One of the older gentlemen in our ward who became a great friend of mine because he was always studying the gospel and knew the latest discoveries about the Book of Mormon, etc. His name was Lee Crandall, and he was always giving firesides etc. He was awesome. We shared books back and forth and one day we were talking family history and I related mine and he about fell out of his chair -- his mother was the Relief Society President that was driving the car when she and Grandma were hit and killed. Small world isn't it."

According to an account of the life of Clara Packer written by her daughter Zelma (b. 1904), in papers of Paul Leslie Crandall now held by P & T Nielsen Hayden, the accident happened on 10 Oct 1929, and while Viola Nichols died in the hospital three hours after the accident, Clara "was seriously injured and never fully recovered, but was able to come to [the Gilbert Relief Society] meeting on Nov. 5, and did not miss a meeting until the end of the year. She presided for the last time on December 17, 1929."

According to the same account, on 17 Jan 1928 Clara Packer succeeded Barbara Allen as president of the Gilbert Relief Society. Barbara Allen had herself been elected on 13 Jul 1927, but moved to Mesa in January 1928. We believe this Barbara Allen to be, in fact, Clara Packer's daughter-in-law, TNH's grandmother.

Notes:

"John Seymour spent his first eleven years in Cove before his family moved to Mesa, Arizona. He has been extremely active in missionary work and colonization. He has made his livelihood by farming and canal building. His first mission was in the Southern States; the second in the Eastern States; and the third in the Southwest Indian Mission among the Pimas. He and his wife have financed twenty-one years of missionary work and have contributed funds for temple work. No request from the church was refused whether great or small. He has been a faithful ward teacher for fifty years without missing one month. While supporting one missionary he prospered greatly and was so encouraged that he supported two more after the first had returned. His financial status reversed and he became almost bankrupt, barely able to keep the missionaries out. Later he was asked why he had not become discouraged in the Gospel because of this situation and he replied, 'Whether I get rich or go broke while I keep a missionary out doesn't change the fact that the Gospel is true.'

"His wife, Barbara Phelps, came to Mesa from Montpelier, Idaho when she was a year old. They suffered the rigors of pioneer life including a smallpox epidemic. She recalls having her shoes blacked with soot and grease before she could go to Sunday School and Primary. She was energetic and capable with a nice singing voice. Their marriage has been humble and devout. Ten of their twelve children grew to maturity and are active in the Church. She milked cows to support herself and family and to supply her husband while he was on two missions. She joined her husband on his third mission and they did a splendid job among the Indians at Santon, Arizona. She has worked in all the auxilaries and at present, at the age of seventy-five, she is still teaching Primary." [Ancestors and Descendants of Andrew Lee and Clarinda Knapp Allen]

"Allen was proud of his large family of 12 children, which included [his] seven sons. While living in Gilbert, in 1934, he organized and coached the Allen family basketball team and challenged any family in the church to a game." [Images of America: Latter-Day Saints in Mesa by D. L. Turner and Catherine H. Ellis. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2009.]

John married Barbara Ann Phelps on 2 Oct 1895 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. Barbara (daughter of Hyrum Smith Phelps and Mary Elizabeth Bingham) was born on 26 Aug 1877 in Montpelier, Bear Lake, Idaho; died on 31 Jan 1957 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona; was buried in Mesa City Cemetery, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

"Barbara Phelps (later Allen) arrived in Mesa in 1879 and a 16-month-old infant. At age 12, she received an accordion for Christmas. She then earned money by playing with her father, Hyrum Phelps, for dances in Lehi, especially at Christmas. In later life, she organized the Granny Band, which performed at events around town." [Images of America: Latter-Day Saints in Mesa by D. L. Turner and Catherine H. Ellis. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2009.]

A memoir by Barbara Ann Phelps Allen:

My parents were Hyrum Smith Phelps and Mary Elizabeth Bingham Phelps. I was born August 26, 1877 at Montpelier, Bear Lake County, Idaho. I was just sixteen months old when the family reached Mesa. The first house Father built was on the east side of Hibbert Street between 1st and 2nd Avenues.

Among my first recollections of this place was the first Sunday School I attended, It was held in the school house, a one-room adobe. Hannah Peterson (Miller) was the teacher. We recited the alphabet from cards. We were seated on a low bench in front of the room. I attended my first Primary with my sister Lucy. We were very devoted to each other. One never went without the other. Each week we listened anxiously while the secretary read the program for the following week, but we were never on it.

When I was nine years old, the school put on a program and every child in the room was given a part but me, I felt disgraced, and I never even told my mother. I always remembered the feeling I had and in the sixteen years I presided over the Primary I always favored the backward child and never slighted anyone to my knowledge.

Father built a long room on the back of the house to accommodate the growing family. Grandma Bingham lived with us awhile before moving into a house on Broadway just east of Mesa Drive. We children were staying with her after Father was taken to Yuma to the penitentiary. The officers came there one night looking for Mother; they had a warrant, and Grandma wouldn't take it, so they threw it on the floor. I thought she wasn't very polite.

When I was twelve years old, Mother gave me an accordion for Christmas. I soon learned to play it. A few years later, she and Lucy gave me a larger one which I kept until after I was married.

One time Father went to Tempe and bought a bolt of cloth called Zephyr gingham; it was a beautiful plaid. As I remember, five of us girls had dresses alike. Lucy and I always dressed alike. Most people thought we were twins. The first M.I.A. I attended had only one class for everyone. Pres. Charles I. Robson told the story of Joseph Smith's first prayer. That was the first time I had heard it, and I have never forgotten how it impressed me.

Soon after this Lucy and I were asked to sing at one of the meetings. We sang, "Write Me a Letter from Home.' After that I think we were asked to sing at every public entertainment held in Mesa until after I was married. Lucy and Grandma Phelps bought us an organ which I learned to play by ear. Father and I played for the dances at Lehi a few times. I earned $2.50 over the Christmas holidays playing out there. I left my organ there during that time so I wouldn't have to carry it back and forth. Lucy and I joined the choir when I was sixteen, and I sang with them for twenty years. I memorized 200 hymns besides the anthems we sang.

I well remember the first dress I made; it was a real pretty blue and I wore a blue ribbon around my waist. Mother's sister, Anner LeSueur sent me the ribbon because they told her I looked so much like her. In the summer of about 1891 there was a conference held at Pinetop, and Mother and Aunt Clarinda in company with quite a large group of saints, attended. Brother William took them. It took six weeks to make the round trip. Amy was about four years old. While they were gone, I made Amy a dress. I made it a plain tight waist with a full skirt that came nearly to her ankles, and it was so tight I could hardly fasten it. She had it on when mother came and when mother saw her she began to cry, and she said Amy looked like we had starved her. One night at a dance, John S. Allen, known as Seymour, came into our lives. He rushed across the floor, came up to me and said, "Come on , Caddie, let's dance." Then he saw his mistake, and after an apology, asked me to dance. From then on he never failed to dance with Lucy and me. Later on he began making regular visits to our home, but we did not know which of us he was most interested in. We had a lot of good times together. One night he asked if he could take me home. Up to this time he had never taken us any place. He had a lady friend and we were just side issues, but after this night we knew which was his favorite.

John S. and I kept company for about nine months and were married on Oct. 2, 1895. We had a quiet wedding at our home on the corner of Hibbert and East First Avenue. Only close relatives were invited. The ceremony was performed by Bishop James Malen Home. We stood at the head of the table, and the guests were seated around it, ready to partake as soon as the ceremony ended. Mother and Lucy had cooked a very fine dinner. When we went through the kitchen to be married, Mother and Lucy were standing by the stove. Mother was crying and Lucy looked sad, but I couldn't see anything to feel sad about. One week after we were married, we started in company with Eli and Medora Openshaw for the St. George Temple. It took six weeks to make the round trip.

When we returned home we started housekeeping in a two-rooms of the house built for Warner and Fannie Allen. It was here our first child, Charles Ashael, was born July 31, 1896. At this time the monthly fast meeting was held on the first Thursday of the month, and he was blessed by Grandpa [Charles H.] Allen.

We moved into a 2-room lumber house with a lean-to on the back that Father had built on 20 acres Grandpa Allen had given Seymour at the corner of Broadway and Stapley. On Feb. 15, 1898, Blanche was born. When she was four months old, J. S. was called on a mission to the Southern States. He left in June and I milked eight to ten cows while he was gone. Esther stayed with me and cared for the babies all the time. Mother was very good to me. I used to wonder how I could get along without her. I did all the sewing for the six girls, Lucy, Hattie, Amy, Esther, Clara, and Gertrude. At this time Lucy was working in Johnson's store and did a lot to help the family.

I was blessed while J. S. was gone. We all enjoyed good health. When it was time for him to be released, I went to Utah in company with my parents, Father Allen and his wife, Annie. Uncle Perry Bingham met us at Price, Utah and took us to Vernal where I stayed until I heard from John S., then I went on to meet him in Cove, Utah. After we returned home, Seymour and Warner went into partners and bought eighty acres on Baseline. Hyrum Loren was born Oct. 7, 1901 and Barbara Oct. 5, 1903.

John R. was born Oct. 29, 1905 and was just a few months old when Seymour sold the 20 acres and bought 60 acres two miles east of Mesa on the Apache Trail from Mr. Lamb. This was where Gove Liahona was born July 26, 1907. Then John Seymour was called on another mission, this time to the Eastern States. President Ben Rich was his mission president both times. I was left this time with more work and more responsibilities. Ashael was a big help to me. One of my sisters stayed with me most of the time and helped.

J. S. came off his mission June 1909, and Mary was born Sept. 1,1910. On March 27, 1912, Eldred Phelps was born, but lived only six weeks. This was the first real sorrow to come to us. July 8, 1914 Russell Hoopes was born. In the Summer of 1915, we moved to a 320 acre ranch four miles south of Gilbert.

Seymour had gone into partners with his older brother Warner and acquired a 320-acre farm four miles south of Gilbert. This was entirely alfalfa at the time but was later planted to cotton.

December 2, 1915 Ashael left for a mission to the Southern States and June 5, 1916 Ben Rich Allen was born, and November 5, 1917, Joseph Seymour was born. Two babies were born while Ashael was away.

When Joe was about eight months old, I took a little motherless baby, Robert Southers, four months old, to raise. I kept him nine months, then his aunt, Mrs. Ellingbow, wanted him so badly that J. S. told me I shouldn't be selfish and keep him, so I let her have him.

After several years the depression came on and we decided J. S.'s brother, Benjamin, should live with us for a couple of years. J. S. sent him on a mission. Chancy, Seymour's older brother, lived with us a lot. October 11, 1920, Della, our twelfth and last child was born three days after Loren had left for a mission. He labored in Louisiana.

We struggled along for several years. The depression came on and we decided to rent. The boys wanted to finish school. As J. S. couldn't run the ranch alone, he decided to rent it out. We bought us a home in Mesa at 48 West Second Street and lived there for a year or more.

J. S. and his brother Jim took a job building a fence along the railroad. It was at this time that the next great sorrow came when Della died of mastoid infection Nov. 21, 1925.

We sent Gove on a mission to the Eastern States and in February 1935 we sent Russell to the Samoan Island to fill his mission. Before he returned home, we sent Ben in March 1938 to Argentina. All our family have very fine companions. We are very proud to have them to associate with. In all our family gatherings, they are with us one hundred percent. We are very proud of our family and their families, and always pray for their success in righteousness.

October 29, 1945, we held our Golden Wedding Anniversary, the first time all the family had been together for a long time. For the reception, Ashael came from the Spanish American Mission, Ida from Los Angeles, Russell from Kirtland, New Mexico, and Mary from Vallejo, California. We had a dinner at the ranch home. All ten of the family and twenty-seven of the grandchildren were present. We all had a lovely time. After this gathering Ida was called to labor with Ashael in the mission, taking George with them.

My mother was very strict about us attending our duties and being punctual. Because of this, the Sunday School Superintendent called me to be a substitute teacher when I was quite young. When I was seventeen I attended Conference and they reorganized the Stake Y.L.M.I.A. and I was surprised when they sustained me as secretary. I served in that capacity for twelve years underfive presidents, Ann Eliza Leavitt, Jannett Johnson, Lulu Macdonald, Fannie Dana and Mary Hibbert. Soon after I was released, I was chosen stake secretary for the Relief Society. I held that position for about six years. I was released to be president of the Mesa First Ward Relief Society. I served about a year and we moved to Gilbert. There was no Gilbert Ward then, and we were in the Chandler Ward. After this I served about sixteen years as president of the Primary for Chandler, Gilbert, and Mesa Wards. I was superintendent of Religion Class in Gilbert the same time I was President of the Primary. At this time John R. was attending high school in Gilbert and he assisted me with religion class.

We rented our ranch and bought us a home in Mesa, but stayed only a year or so. At this time I was president of the Primary in Gilbert and Bishop Haymore asked me to preside there until Barbara came home from vacation, and before she came I was made president of the Mesa First Ward Primary. I presided over both of them for about six weeks. I have been president of the Gilbert Relief Society two different times, second counselor to Grace Nielson and then president in the Mesa First Ward Relief Society, second counselor to Adelaide Peterson in the Stake Primary, and I held several other positions. Now at the age of seventy-four, I am a Relief Society district teacher and a Guide teacher of four boys in the Primary of the Mesa Ninth Ward. I am very thankful for the many opportunities I have had to serve.

March 1942 was the Centennial celebration of the Relief Society, and the General Board requested that pioneer stories be brought before the public as much as possible. I was president of the Gilbert Relief Society at that time. I read several good stories and decided to put them into a pageant. I had fine cooperation, and it turned out to be a success. We played it in six different wards. I also wrote two other pageants which were very successful, an Easter pageant and one on the restoration of the Aaronic Priesthood. In doing this work I received some of the greatest joy of my life. Another thing that I enjoyed a lot was putting on entertainments with the Primary children. I found a lot of work doing these things, but when it was all over, there was unspeakable joy that came to us seeing the happiness that came to the children.

The Lord has been good to me for which I am grateful. We have been relieved of pain through prayer and being administered to many times. My first relief came when I was first married. I had an ulcerated tooth which was so severe I didn't think I could stand it any longer. John S. administered to me and relief came instantly. Another time when I was alone on the ranch with the little children, I became very sick. My head pained so badly at times I wasn't conscious. John was nine years old. He went off by himself and prayed for me. All at once a quivering feeling went through my body and with it went the pain. I couldn't account for it until he told me he had prayed for me. John had been instantly relieved twice when his father administered to him when he had gathered ears.

One time when we had been helping the Chandler Ward top maize to pay off on their piano, we came home after dark and found Loren crying with pain. As he drove the cows around the haystack, they loosened the derrick fork and it swung around before he knew it, striking him on the leg and puncturing the bone. The pain was so severe he couldn't stand to have us walk across the floor. He immediately called for his father to administer to him, which he did, and the pain left as he took his hands off, and it never returned. For these and many more blessings too numerous to mention, I am grateful.

Notes:

HYRUM OSCAR CRANDALL
Compiled from The Life Story of Hyrum Oscar Crandall book

Hyrum Oscar Crandall was born April 26, 1844 at LaHarpe, Hancock County, Illinois, the son of Myron Nathan Crandall and Tryphena Bisbee. He was their second child. His parents were a close and faithful family. His father heard the gospel from missionaries in Villanova, New York and was fifteen years old when he joined the church. The Crandall family moved to Kirtland, Ohio, then followed the church migration from Ohio to Missouri, then to Quincy, Illinois and later to LaHarpe, Illinois not far from Nauvoo. Tryphena's family had joined the church in 1837 and were residents of Nauvoo at the time.

Persecution was so strong against the church that the members were driven from Illinois. In 1847 Myron and his family and many of his siblings left Illinois for Kanesville, Iowa. Myron built the first dugout in Kanesville. As a young boy Hyrum lived there with his family in Kanesville on a six acre farm for three years. While living here they acquired a span of horses, two yoke of oxen, two cows and a two year supply of provisions. Consequently, when they left to join the saints in Utah they did not suffer as much deprivation as some other pioneers. While they lived in Kanesville, Hyrum sister Julia Ann suffered an accidental hip injury which left her crippled the rest of her life. This injury kept the family from traveling as soon as they had hoped.

In 1850 that Crandalls left Kanesville with the Aaron Johnson Company. Hyrum was six years old when they left for Utah. The company arrived in the Salt Lake Valley 02 September 1850, in much better condition than most of the trains that had struggled across the plains. They camped at Emigration Square for a few days to let their animals rest, wash their clothes and mingle with the Saints. One morning Brigham Young came into the square and with a wave of his cane, cut out the first eight wagons and told them to prepare to leave at once for their new home about 50 miles south of Salt Lake. The Crandall's were among the eight wagons cut out. Some of the men had scouted the country on horseback and came back with glowing tales of the beauty of the Utah Valley with belly-high grass and a spring of cool mountain water with the lake shimmering nearby.

Captained again by Aaron Johnson, the lead wagon was driven by Martin Pardon Crandall and they traveled three days, arriving at Hobble Creek about 3:00 p.m. on 18 September 1850. The Crandall's were among these and on 18 September 1850 they arrived at what they first called Hobble Creek, because they could hobble the horses and turn them out to graze along the creek. Later they named their camp Springville in honor of the mountain spring which gave them water and afforded power for the gristmill. The next morning the men hung up their grindstone, sharpened their scythes and began to make hay from the wild grasses which grew in abundance. They also sharpened axes and sent groups of men into the canyons for logs to build a fort.

Aaron Johnson's history records, "The following day the men went to the hills for logs from which to build their homes. In the meantime, the women and children picked wild ground cherries, choke cherries and service berries… The first days were full of promise and hope."

The men began to build a fort the second day after they arrived because there were bands of Indians in the area. The village grew rapidly as the wagons arrived. Chief Walker and his parties were troublesome, more from their habit of walking into homes unannounced and uninvited, and their thievery, than threatening life. One day word came that the Indians were on the warpath and all the women and children were gathered into the meeting house to stay while the men joined in repelling the Indians. The day was hot and their supply of water is gone. No one dared go to the creek until Grandmother Guymon took the bucket and ran quickly to the stream, filled the bucket and ran back. It was extremely warm but they had been told to keep the doors and windows closed.

At this juncture 1851, Utah was a young land. American history was still in the making here. An early day log fort arose in "Hobble Creek" almost immediately to afford the first settlers protection from the Indians and from the approaching winter. The area had a bounty of mountains, badlands, canyons, valleys and desert. In short, the area was a geologic showcase. This was the wide open west the Mormons did so much to shape. The experiences of the settlers in Springville were peculiar to the pioneer way of life. Their experiences were accounts of travel in covered wagons, accounts of Indian battles and otherwise the eking out of an existence that at times was barely of subsistence level.

Hyrum received his schooling in Springville schools and grew up in a community that placed great importance on socials, dances and parties. Bishop Johnson, when he built his permanent home, built a large room in which the young people could socialize and dance. They had only to provide the fuel and the candles. When the meeting house was built, socials were held there.

Hyrum married Margaret Elizabeth (Betsy) Guymon who was also a lifelong resident of Springville. They had known each other even across the plains coming to Utah when Betsy was seventeen they married on 06 March 1864. They were later sealed and received their endowments in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City on 14 January 1869.

The Black Hawk War broke out in 1866, lasting two years. Hyrum, 22 was assigned guard duty. Whenever trouble came, the old bell on the church was rung three times, then after a few seconds lapse, three more times. In case of extreme emergency, a drum roll was added to the end of the alarm.

Early in May a courier came dashing into town reporting that some people had been shot near the forks of the canyon. Immediately that bell rang out, "come, come, come – quick, quick, quick," followed by a long drum roll. In half an hour a posse had formed and twenty men left for the crime scene, among them was Hyrum. When the posse arrived, however, no dead were found but the men divided up into pairs and searched all afternoon for signs of Indians. At sundown they met at the Curtis ranch where ten more men joined their ranks. The group held a council of war and decided that the Indians had holed up for the day and would try to escape through a familiar canyon after dark. Ten of young men volunteered to try to head them off. When they arrived at their destination, one of their numbers was missing and they waited fearfully for the confrontation. They descended the trail to return to the ranch for breakfast where they found the missing boy who had become lost during the night. They were relieved that he was alive, as they had feared and dead.

All that summer the men worked in parties of 30 to 40 men when they went for wood, staying close together and keeping armed. A company of minute men was formed and for six months they camped in the tithing yard. Each day a squad was detailed to herd the cattle to feed on the bench and bring them home safely in the evening. During that summer they encountered the Indians several times but the Battle of Diamond Fork in which Hyrum Oscar was involved is worthy of mention.

A band of Indians came down Maple Canyon in June of 1866 and drove off 50 head of cattle and horses. This was the start of the Battle Diamond Fork. The bell rang, the drums rolled and a posse was formed. Only about ten were in the initial group as the other men were working in the fields and it took awhile for them to gather. Another posse from Spanish Fork was scheduled to meet them, hoping to surround the Indians on two sides. The Spanish Fork group met the Indians and engaged them in battle before the Springville group arrived. The skirmish lasted about an hour and a half and two young men were killed. The Indians finally fled, so they picked up their two dead comrades, strapped them to horses and sadly went home. They were met by Bishop Johnson who told them to get a few hours of sleep because one boy hadn't returned. Shortly the bell rang and they were on their way again.

The Diamond Fork Battle was one of the most successful of the Black Hawk War as the Indians lost all of their camp equipment and much of their ammunition and guns. Most of the cattle were found and returned and after 48 hours of continual fighting with little food and water, the Springville men, including Hyrum Oscar, dragged themselves home.

Hyrum and Betsy had been married five years when it was decided that Hyrum would take a second wife, so he chose Betsy's sister, Harriet who was eighteen. They were married 25 October 1869 at the Endowment House in Salt Lake. Betsy worked diligently spinning wool and weaving cloth to make Hyrum a suit to wear for this marriage. Betsy had just had a baby, Franklin Edgar, born 01 September 1869 and could not make the journey, so her mother went with them. Betsy worked all day to prepare a fine supper the night that Hyrum and Harriet got home. When everyone was eating, Betsy slipped out and a friend found her sitting on the chopping block sobbing. Polygamy was probably the hardest principle the pioneers had to live.

In 1879 the two families moved to Huntington, Emery County, Utah in what is known as Castle Valley. The party included Betsy and six children, Harriet and four children. Harriet's fifth child, Adelaide Lucinda was born, en route to Huntington.

The history of Huntington, Utah reveals that Hyrum Oscar arrived with a large group of settlers in late summer 1879. Castle Valley had been settled as early as 1850 but it was not until 25 years later that settlers moved there in any great number. A colony of Mormons had arrived in 1877, building dugouts along the north side of the creek. As they built homes, other settlers moved in and occupied the dugouts. Hyrum arrived with Noah Thomas Guymon, his father-in-law and they helped survey the town of Huntington. As was the custom, lots were numbered and the numbers placed in a hat, then each man drew for lots. Those with plural wives drew a lot for each wife. Noah Thomas and Albert Guymon both drew lots at this time. Hyrum and William Howard were business partners in a saw mill and built identical homes. The old Crandall home burned down later, but the Howard house still stands.

Hyrum was a counselor to the Elias Cox, first Bishop of Huntington, when the ward was organized 07 October 1879 by Canute Peterson, Stake President and shortly afterward the auxiliary organizations were formed, a cemetery designated and an "Old Folks committee" was appointed. Hyrum also filed on 160 acres of homestead land which he improved a great deal. Hyrum and William O. Howard's steam sawmill used the timber that was one of them valuable cash crops in Huntington. Their mill was a shingle and lath mill located in Crandall Canyon found in Huntington Canyon. Another sawmill was located in Rilda Canyon but it later moved to the Forks, also in Huntington Canyon. For the first year there was no drinking water, so the pioneers hauled water from the creek.

While they lived in Huntington, three children were born to Betsy and three sons were born to Harriet. Noah Thomas Guymon, grandfather to all these children, owned the first store, the first grain binder, the first "surrey with the fringe on top." This surrey was used as a hearse in the community for many years.

The year after their arrival in Castle Dale Valley, a big 24th of July celebration was held under a large bowery erected for the occasion. The same bowery was also used as a church until a log cabin, forty by sixty feet, was erected. This log cabin church had a dirt floor, but a wooden floor was added shortly, but the building had a thatch roof and mud filled the chinks between the logs. Doors and windows from Sanpete County were added and when it was finished, of big New Year's Dance was held in it. A new wing was added later, forming a T. A stage at one end of the addition made it possible to hold plays and programs and eventually a coat of plaster and whitewash improved it aesthetically and a new floor over the original improved it functionally. It served the community until it was destroyed by fire in 1918.

The first Thanksgiving celebration was held in this building in 1881. A program of songs, recitations and stump speeches started the day, then a midnight supper and dancing until morning completed the festivities. Dancing was one of the favorite pastimes of the Saints. More men than women were usually in attendance, so the men were given numbers and weren't suppose to dance until their number was called. If they didn't wait, that was called "ringing in," a practice that cause more than one fist fight outside.

Just what prompted Hyrum to pull up stakes and move his two families to Vernal, Utah it is not known for sure. In 1887 Hyrum sold his hundred 160 acres and moved his family to Vernal, Utah where he purchased 80 acres of land and worked as a contractor, building homes. Here Betsy had another daughter and Harriet had her last child. In Vernal, Hyrum purchased a large lot, building one house on one end of the lot and one on the other. Each had two rooms on the ground floor and two rooms upstairs. There was no stairway, but a ladder provided access. The children ran back and forth between the two houses and everyone was congenial with one another.

The family prospered in Vernal but persecution of polygamous families intensified. And it was at about this time that the laws of the land began to focus against those Latter-day Saints who had entered into polygamous marriage relationships. Because of the attacks against the church over this issue the Mormon Church issued its Manifesto suspending the practice of polygamy in the church. This occurred on 06 October 1890. The church had conformed to the laws of the land but the families that had been constituted through plural marriage found themselves in an adverse situation. Hyrum Oscar was already having to evade local and Federal agents bent upon putting him in jail.

Because he was not openly able to be with his two families the way his heart and conscience dictated, Hyrum Oscar Crandall held council with his two families over the untenable situation and both families agreed they should load both families into the wagons and move to Mexico where they can live unmolested.

President Wilford Woodruff, an Apostle and himself a polygamist, became very ill while he was fleeing the Federal officers, so he came to the Crandall Home for refuge. Betsy killed a chicken and made chicken broth to sustain Elder Woodruff and he stayed at their home for several days. He stayed upstairs in the boys' bedroom and when he was better, the children were allowed to go up and visit him. He taught them a little song, "I'll be a Little Mormon."

Because of Federal persecution and after much discussion, Hyrum decided to take his two wives and seventeen children and move to Mexico, hoping to escape constant surveillance of the "Federals." They packed all their necessary furniture to head for the Mormon Colonies in Mexico. Preparations were completed, and on a cold day, 23 January 1891, they said their goodbyes when Franklin, decided to marry before they left. Julia Euzell and Hettie didn't join the family going to Mexico. They also married about this time.

At the last moment Hyrum saw that he needed an extra rope and the only place to buy one was at the hardware store but he was afraid he would run into officers, so he elected to shave off his beautiful beard and mustache. A Deputy Whitaker, who was a "spotter," passed right by Hyrum on the street and didn't recognize him. After Hyrum bought his rope, jumped on his horse and rode away, Whitaker ask the storekeeper if that wasn't Crandall!

Three wagons left Vernal 23 January 1891, one pulled by a four-horse team. In addition to this they had 48 head of loose horses and they trailed a cow. (Some family dispute arises over the existence of a cow). Just how much planning went into this move no one seems to know for sure. In any event Hyrum Oscar Crandall took enough time to sell and dispose of its property. It is recorded that the wagons were well outfitted. The older boys drove the extra stock and the wagons. When evening came they cooked and ate around a campfire. They were entertained by singing and playing the harmonica and recollections of that time were spoken of the beautiful spring flowers, the streams and lovely valleys. The days pass quickly and soon it became warm and sunny and the roads became dusty and dry. The stock kicked up clouds of dust that whirled around everyone.

Finding water was always a problem. In the arid regions when a water hole was located they more often than not found the Indians guarding the water. Hyrum Oscar had to barter a horse to the Indians on one occasion for permission to fill their water kegs and water their stock. On their trip down, many times it passed over large beds of saleratus or alkali, akin to baking soda. They filled all there empty cans with it and used it to leaven their bread. It made the bread very yellow but at least it would rise and they found it very tasty.

The days on the trail passed quickly and soon it became warmer and the road became dusty and dry. One day just before they got to Monticello, a spotter came into camp. All the polygamists' families had been taught to answer all questions from strangers about their family with "I don't know." The spotter asked all the children where their father was and what his name, but all he got was a chorus of "I don't know." He drove out of camp cursing and calling them dumb little brats but the children felt pretty smart. He was not deceived, however because shortly Marshall Whitaker showed up. His jurisdiction was in Utah but he bragged that he was going to arrest Hyrum the next day. Hyrum's friends took the Marshall's group to the saloon and treated them to as much drink as they wanted, while Hyrum and Brother Wrigley herded their horses into New Mexico out of immediate danger.

In some places quicksand made it necessary for the men to drive the horses back and forth until they could find a safe place to cross. Many places were so steep that they had to tie the wheels together with chains in order to let the wagons down slowly enough.

They were glad to cross over into New Mexico Territory to get away from the jurisdiction of the Marshalls and spotters. However, in New Mexico they traveled on Zuni Territory and those Indians were on the warpath. The boys took turns sitting watch night and day.

After five months of travel the families arrived in Deming, Luna County, New Mexico on 05 June 1891, after traveling by wagon for five months. The nearest railroad point to the Mormon Colonies. Margaret was sent to deliver when they arrived here. Hyrum rented a small house for her and the younger children and helped put up tents for the older ones. After getting everyone settled in, Hyrum left with Harriet, her children and all the older boys to look over the colonies in Mexico and see if it was where they wanted to settle. They hadn't been gone long when Margaret went into labor and they came back to help Margaret. She gave birth to their twelfth child.

A few days later the party set out again, leaving Margaret with the small children and a new infant. When Hyrum and the rest of family arrived at the Mexican border, they were told that they would have to pay $5.00 a head to the Mexican Government for all their livestock. The austere conditions of the area had already turned their heads, so the return to Deming convinced that Mexico should not be their destination. Inasmuch as they were not impressed with the country, they returned to Deming. They took a contract to dig a canal to bring water to that thirsty land and they worked all summer only to find that a Mr. Taylor, the bookkeeper had absconded with all the money, leaving Hyrum and his families completely without funds. It was a hard time for all of the family and they decided that Margaret was to return by train to Utah with all of her younger family to a place Hyrum had purchased this was 1892 purchased sight unseen several years before in this small community of Indianola, 50 miles south of Springville. Mr. Black, from whom he had purchased it for span of mules, had represented it as a sound house and everyone was looking forward to living there.

Harriet and her family proceeded on to the Gila Valley in the territory of Arizona. Harriet reportedly had already made friends with some people from Gila Valley who spoke favorable terms about the area. It was decided that Hyrum should accompany Harriet and get them settled and then return to Utah himself and live with his first family. And this is the order of events that finally developed.

Hyrum, Harriet and her family preceded by wagon to Safford, Arizona with what remained of the stock taken to New Mexico. They arrived in Safford (the Layton area) in December 1892. Harriet and her children settled in a temporary house which is now part of the Lawrence Fuller ranch. Their immediate concern of course was a livelihood. Hyrum remained with Harriet less than a year reportedly. A Tax Collector's s Office receipt reflects that on 12 April 12, 1893, one H. O. Crandall paid $24.70 to Graham County, Arizona Territory at Solomonville, Arizona the county seat. It is said that when Hyrum returned to Utah to join his first wife he took one wagon and one span of horses with them. The laws of the land, so to speak, had separated her and her children from Hyrum Oscar Crandall never seeing her husband again. They were left in a two room shack with tents for the older boys. Two wagons and teams gave 17 year old Marcellus the oldest and Mel, teenage sons, means to earn a living hauling and freighting and Harriet served as a midwife.

Hyrum met Margaret and her family in Indianola in 1893. They were thrilled to see their husband and father after nearly a year without him. In 1894, Margaret and Harriet's brother, Ed Guymon wrote about a wonderful place in Wyoming so Hyrum left his family again to file on a homestead there. This was 1894 in the big horn basin of Wyoming in the fall. In 1895 soon he wrote for Margaret and the children, to come and be with him in Wyoming. The family was destitute when they receive the letter but they packed their belongings into two wagons and started out. It was a sad meeting when they met Hyrum headed for Utah. They spent that winter in Otto, Wyoming.

The next summer Hyrum and the boys worked on the Joe Brown's Ranch between Otto and Mormon Bend. Hyrum and the boys contracted to build Cody canal nearby, 1895 – 1896 laid out the city of Burlington Wyoming. So while the rest the family set up housekeeping in Otto, they worked on the canal until the spring of 1897. It was also at that time that Hyrum and Richard Prater laid out the city of Burlington, Wyoming and the family moved there. In the spring of 1897, Hyrum got a contract to build the road through Yellowstone Park. The family lived in tents, cooked over campfires and carried their water up a steep hill to their camp.

The fall of 1897 the families moved out of the park and homesteaded some land in the Teton Valley just south of Driggs, Idaho. Hyrum Oscar and his boys built a two room log house with a dirt roof. A spring of pure water provided plenty of water. The valley was beautiful, nestled just under the Teton peaks. Choke cherries and other berries grew in profusion in the summer. Heavy winter snows cover the trees and meadows but the valley was ready to bloom come spring. Hyrum with the help of his boys farmed the land. He bought cows and chickens to stock the place. Margaret sold butter and eggs to the store. For the first time the family was really settled.

Once again Hyrum contacted from the Utah Construction Company and moved the family to Evanston, Wyoming in 1899 through 1900. That year Hyrum cleared $3,000.00 making roadway for the railroad. The following year he wanted to try "just one more time," and contrary to Betsy's wishes, they stayed in Evanston to build more roadway. The formation of the dirt changed, however and the hills which had to be blasted before the bed could be laid, and weathered and "air slaked," and when the inspecting engineer came, he would not pay them, saying that the bed was dirt instead of rock. They lost all their money.

The family returned to Teton Basin to start over. During those years Hyrum was first counselor in the bishopric under Don Carlos Driggs. The Teton stake was organized later. Bertha recalled it vivdly:

"Joseph F. Smith was the visiting authority. At that time he was an Apostle and I remember sitting by father listing to the conference. The way they had it arranged, we all sat on planks laid over cut-off logs. I remember it being an exciting conference. Thomas E. Rex of the Rexburg stake was there and I remember him reading off the names: Don Driggs, president of the Stake; George Young as first counselor and a fellow by the name of Wingren as Second Counselor. Then they began to read off the names of the high councilmen. As I sat by father, I could see the perspiration running down his neck and it wasn't too warm, at least I didn't think so and I wondered what the matter was. But he knew he was going to be made Bishop and so he was. He was Bishop for three years, until the day he died. He was a wonderful man. A thoroughly honest and good man. A man whose word was as good as gold anytime."

Hyrum had always had bad headaches during his life. He loved to have his hair brushed when his head ached. That spring he got a very severe headache so Margaret got the hairbrush and began brushing his hair. While she was thus engaged, he grew still and died in Margaret's arms. The doctor said it was a heart attack. The date was 30 April 1904. He was just 60 years old. Hyrum was buried in Driggs Cemetery which he and his counselor had laid out just a week before. He was the first grave in it.

Harriet, who never again saw her husband after he left the Gila Valley in 1893, lived in Safford near her children and died there 18 May 1942.

Hyrum married Harriet Guymon on 25 Oct 1869 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. Harriet (daughter of Noah Thomas Guymon and Margaret Johnson) was born on 11 Nov 1851 in Springville, Utah, Utah; died on 18 May 1942 in Safford, Graham, Arizona; was buried in Safford Cemetery, Graham, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Posted to findagrave.com by "Sunflower Lady", 7/11/2011:

"[The] Pioneer Band from Safford, Graham, Arizona played at many community events. It was organized in the early 1880's. Alonzo Packer, the bass drum player, who died Friday, March 23, 1917, was the first member of the band to die and his friend, James Fall Freestone, the second. Alonzo's daughter, Charlotte, married James's son, Leonard.

"Alonzo and James lived close to each other. As Alonzo's life drew to a close it was hard to make him stay in bed. When he was urged to lie down and rest he would say, 'No, if I go to bed, I will never get up. When I give up to the bed, that is the end for me'.

"Shortly before he died his old friend, James Freestone, came to see him. He had walked with the aid of his cane the distance of the 20 acre field that separated the two of them, to pay his respects to Alonzo. As he entered the room, he stood for a time looking down upon his friend in bed, then he said 'Well, Lonzo.' Alonzo replied, 'Well, James.' Two short words! That was the only exchange. That was all that needed to be said. A lifetime of meaning and emotion were packed within these few words. Ten days after Alonzo died James also died."

Alonzo married Lydia Ann Parker on 6 Jul 1869 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. Lydia (daughter of Solomon Parker and Nancy Jane Welch) was born on 19 Nov 1847 in Ekfrid, Middlesex, Ontario; died on 8 Oct 1918 in Safford, Graham, Arizona; was buried on 10 Oct 1918 in Safford Cemetery, Graham, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Arrived in Salt Lake City on 20 Sep 1856. "Her family had traveled from Canada by oxen and wagon with a group of emigrants who were new members of the Church" [John A. Freestone, The Life and Times of Alonzo Hamilton Packer] -- a phrasing that does not settle the question of whether Lydia Ann Parker's father ever actually joined the Latter-day Saints. The same source does say that Lydia herself "became a member of the Church while living in Canada."

First married, abt 1863, to Henry Levins Powell of Ekfrid, Ontario; by him, one son who died at six months and one daughter, Nancy Jane, b. 8 Apr 1866 in Deweyville, Box Elder, Utah. Henry Powell abandoned her. She was hired by Angelina (Chapman) Packer to work in the boarding house that Angelina and her husband Jonathan Taylor Packer ran in Brigham City; this led to her making the acquaintance of their son Alonzo, and ultimately marrying him. Alonzo adopted Nancy Jane as his own and she took the surname Packer.

Notes:

From the Dictionary of Mormon Biography:

"Allen, Charles Hopkins, 1830-1922 [...] Born at Burton, Cattaraugus County, New York, 1830. Father converted to Mormonism and family moved to Kirtland, Ohio, c. 1835-36. Left for Missouri but for want of means stayed in Illinois. Living in vicinity of Springfield when visited by Joseph Smith and party, c. 1843. Lived near Carthage in June, 1844. Baptized, 1844. Family moved to Nauvoo after martyrdom. Visited Carthage Jail on the way. Stopped at Camp Creek for a while. Moved to Iowa, 1846. Spent some time at Winter Quarters. Farmed at Keg Creek near Kanesville, 1847-52. Brother served in Mormon Battalion. Operated ferry across Missouri River, 1849. Operated mill another season. Traveled to Utah, 1852. Mountaineer at Ft. Bridger offered them $1,000 for first bushel of grain matured in Salt Lake Valley.

"Settled at Provo City. Operated David W. Roger's sawmill. Built fort at Blacksmith Fork. Released from that mission and returned to Provo, 1853. Ordained teacher, 1853. Journeyed to San Bernardino, 1855. Trouble with meddlesome Indians en route. Freight trip to Salt Lake City, c. 1857. Returned to California. Trip to Carson Valley via San Francisco. Spent winter there. Discovery of Comstock Lode. Returned to San Bernardino. Visit to Utah, 1862. Traveled to Florence to bring company of immigrants west, 1863. Returned to California to sell property, 1863-64.

"Settled in Cache Valley, Utah. Married Elizabeth Adelaide Hoopes, 1864. Lived in Richmond several years, then moved to ranch. Ordained elder, went to temple. Presided five years over Coveville Branch. Advised to move to warmer climate. Settled at Mesa, Arizona, 1882. President and director of Mesa Canal Company. Ordained high priest, 1882. Member of Maricopa Stake High Council. Apparently also counselor to stake president. Served in Lamanite mission fifteen years. President of high priests' quorum, 1885--. Trips to Logan Temple. Death of wife, 1889. Married Annie Eliza Jones, 1890. Allen family reunion, 1898. Second anointing, 1900."

Charles married Elizabeth Adelaide Hoopes on 15 Jun 1864 in Richmond, Cache, Utah. Elizabeth (daughter of Warner Hoopes and Priscilla Gifford) was born on 9 Sep 1847 in Council Bluffs, Pottawattamie, Iowa; died on 19 Nov 1889 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona; was buried in City of Mesa Cemetery, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

An unsigned sketch of the life of Elizabeth Adelaide Hoopes Allen, found on familysearch.org:

Adelaide, as she was lovingly called, was one of the first babies born in a covered wagon during the time her LDS parents were being expelled from Nauvoo. On the 9th of September, 1847, she came to Warner Hoopes and Priscilla when they were traveling through the state of Iowa, at Council Point, Pottawattamie County, sometime before they arrived in Council Bluffs. Her early life was filled with trials and tribulations, as experienced by many other faithful Saints at that time.

Her father was a shoemaker by trade and her mother possessed great faith and energy. When Adelaide was around three, her parents moved to St. Joseph, Missouri to find work as they did not have the means to travel any farther at that time. Brigham Young had told the Saints who could not finance themselves to go all the way to the Great Salt Lake Valley to wait until they could. Her father secured a job of burning charcoal and things looked good for a time. Her mother was in poor health and they hoped this climate would make her better. The following is based on an event recorded in Adelaide's journal that occurred while the family was living in St. Joseph:

One night we were entertaining an Elder McGraw who had stopped at our place as he was returning from his mission in England. He told my father that he felt impressed to tell him to remove his family immediately to Florence, Nebraska and there to prepare to immigrate to Utah. He repeated that same advice later that night and again the next morning. After he started away he returned and advised him to go right away and leave his family to dispose of the property. But my father was loathe to leave his prosperous situation and heeded not the counsel. About a week later a non-Mormon family's home was burned and the Mormons were accused of committing the deed. Four of the brethren were arrested but they were proven innocent and released. However, the decision of the court did not please the hellish mob which then planned to kill the men. The brethren were warned by a friend but my father didn't believe he was in any danger. The sheriff of Buchanan County came to father and offered protection and he refused as "he had no enemies". After a few days he had an uneasy feeling that he should not remain at home that night. He counseled his wife and told her if a friend came to the house to call him as he would stay out in the woods, but if it was an enemy, she should blow the dinner horn, made from a cow's horn, signifying that the more she blew the horn the deeper into the woods he should go. Sometime during the night my mother was awakened by voices outside. She listened and recognized voices of some of the mob and they were making plans to take father away. After they had stationed the guards at the windows and doors with instructions to "shoot him down" should he try to escape, mother grabbed the horn and blew three loud blasts. The leader of the mob, thinking it was a signal for him to come to her rescue, grabbed the horn and blew it repeatedly. Finally mother told him the louder and longer he blew, the further and faster father would run. The mob grew more angry but she told them that had they come like gentlemen, she would have called him and he would have returned. Furiously they took to the woods where they hunted the rest of the night but could not locate him. The next day they returned and tried to get mother to give up this terrible religion, saying that if she would she and her children would be cared for. My mother's answer was an inspiration to me; she said, "My husband and religion mean more to me than money or anything that money can buy." They cursed her and used vile language as they took their departure. We children scattered hot coals in the yard hoping that if they returned they would get burned.

In spite of protests, her father and a Brother Lincoln were put in jail and had to remain there for nine months before they were proven innocent. Adelaide remembered the night the mob took her father to jail. They broke the door to get into the house and though her mother pleaded with them not to take him, they were rude to her. It made it very hard on the family as Adelaide's mother was not too well and she had to provide for them. She disposed of most of their belongings and then resorted to making willow baskets which the children sold. Adelaide remembered visiting her father in jail. He was - pale and thin, with black eyes, and with hair and whiskers all over his face. It was frightening to look at him. After he was released from jail, they decided to cross the plains and go where the Saints were, though they had no money. The parents sold their only cow and her father took the money and left immediately for Florence, Nebraska where his brother Hyrum Hoopes was preparing to leave with a group of Saints for the Salt Lake Valley. This was in the year of 1857 when the last body of Saints left Winter Quarters. Adelaide's father borrowed enough money from his brother and sent for his family who arrived in time to leave with the company. Adelaide was then a girl of 10 and her job was to look her baby brother, Daniel. She remembered that she walked much of the way and carried her brother on her back when he got too tired to walk.

The company had cattle which they were driving through. One of the cows had a sucking calf and one of the men told Adelaide that if she would catch the calf and tie it up at night, she could have the milk from the cow in the morning. That sounded very good so unbeknown to her parents, she slipped up to the cow when the calf was getting his milk and got the rope around the calfs neck. The calf became frightened and began to run. Adelaide hung on to the rope for quite a while but when he pulled her through the bushes and a muddy place, she had to let go. She said she could have held it if her sister Melissa had helped. She never did get the milk.

Her sister Melissa, age 12, rode a horse all the way and drove the cattle to help pay back the money their father had borrowed. The group arrived in Salt Lake in 1857 . They moved to Bountiful for a short time, then moved to Richmond, Cache County, Utah. Adelaide was the one chosen to help her father with the sheep. She helped with the shearing as well as the herding. With the wool, she learned to spin, weave and sew, besides learning to cook and keep a tidy house. Adelaide had a girl friend by the name of Belinda Bear. One day she was over visiting with Adelaide when Belinda's boy friend, Charles Allen, called for her. Just for a joke, Adelaide hid Belinda's bonnet and when Belinda found out that she had hid it, she began to chase Adelaide around the house. Around they went, in and out. Apparently Charles thought they would never stop so he caught Adelaide, then about seventeen years old, and held her until she told where the bonnet was. That was the last time that Charles took Belinda out, as he began to court Adelaide. Although he was seventeen years her senior, she seemed to share his feelings and consented to be his wife. They were married in Richmond on 15 June 1864, and later went to Salt Lake and were sealed in the Endowment House. Their first five children, all boys, were born while they lived in Richmond. Five other children, four girls and a boy, were born in Cove, Utah where the family homesteaded 160 acres in a canyon.

While the family was still in Cove, Adelaide and her sister-in-law Mary decided to kill the pig. Mary was to hit it in the head to knock it down, then Adelaide was to cut its throat to make it bleed. When the water was hot enough so the pig could later be scalded, Mary climbed into the pen with the axe and hit it but not hard enough to make it fall. The pig began running and squealing around the pen so Mary called for Adelaide. They both took after it. Around and around the pen they went. When Adelaide finally caught one of the hind legs, they both pulled hard and stopped it. Mary hung on to its leg while Adelaide cut its throat. They found it a hard job to kill a pig and often laughed about their experience.

Adelaide's husband was Branch President in Cove, but the cold winters were too much for him and he contracted rheumatism and was badly crippled. They thought they had better try a warmer climate for his health, so relocated to Mesa, Maricopa County, Arizona. Adelaide and the girls rode in a white top buggy on the trip. She knitted socks for the family on the way, which they did not need so badly in a warm climate.

They moved into an adobe house with a dirt floor but it was not long a dirt floor, as Adelaide with her energy and pride soon had a nice wood one. Within the next seven years, four more children were born. Their home was always a gathering place for the young folks. They were always made to feel welcome even though they had to be bedded on the floor.

Adelaide drove a little span of mules, Jack and Molly, sitting in the white top buggy whenever she traveled without the men folk. Those little mules were deathly afraid of Indians. Whenever they saw one they would break into a dead run. There were Indians all over the valley when they first came to Mesa. One might pop up at any time so Adelaide had to be on the watch. The mules could smell them first. They would first stick up their ears, then their nose up in the air with their eyes on the lookout. That surely meant a "runaway" and Adelaide was always prepared. She grasped her lines just so, braced her feet to give her strength and pushed on the brake. Many times she had small children with her. She never had an accident.

Their house was built right on the trail where the Indians used to hunt rabbits. They objected to this and would often stop, get off their horses and peek into the windows, as well as ask for something to eat. Her children remembered how scared they were when the Indians came galloping up on their horses with their dark, bare bodies and nothing on but a "breech clout" around their loins and their long, black hair flopping up and down. One day an Indian came walking to the door and demanded something to eat. Adelaide, remembering the counsel of President Young to feed instead of fight them, turned to go get him something when she looked around just in time to see him entering the door with his eye on the gun that was hanging on the wall. Adelaide, "quick as a wink", gave him a big shove and he landed on his back out the door on a board with nails in it. The Indian was shocked. He did not move very soon. He looked around, got up slowly and started off on a trot. He left a piece of his "breech clout" on the nails. He never came back.

Adelaide loved music. She and the children sang together many of the ballads of the day, such as "Polly Van", "Joe Bowers", "Captain Jinks" and "Vacant Chair". The family often held what they called "Primary" where they met together in the evening and sang songs and told stories. It was always opened with prayer.

Adelaide died giving birth to her fourteenth child, on 13 November 1889, at age 42. It was a great sorrow to the father and family. After her death, everybody in town tried to help. The funeral was held out at the front of the home. Brother Henry Rogers was one of the speakers and he remarked that, "The old, poor and needy will miss Sister Allen most of all". She was always there to help them in their time of need. She was laid to rest in the Mesa Cemetery.

Her last request to the family was to keep them together. The request was granted for a council meeting with the father and older children, it was decided that the oldest daughter, Adelaide, would care for the home and the children. She was fifteen years old at the time and Seymour, age nineteen, took over the job of providing as best he could. The father lived a short distance away after taking a second wife.

Notes:

[From this Phelps site.]

Autobiography of Hyrum Smith Phelps

Hyrum Smith Phelps first saw the light of day in the once beautiful city of Nauvoo, Illinois, February 26, 1846. Referring to his early life he said:

My parents, Morris Phelps and Sarah Thompson Phelps, had already been expelled from their homes twice--Kirtland, Ohio and Independence, Missouri--leaving them very little of this world's goods. Some three or four thousand Saints had crossed the Mississippi River by ferry boat and on the ice headed for the valleys in the Rocky Mountains.

By the middle of the following June, my father had a yoke of oxen and cows to pull one wagon, and in company with some others he started to follow those who had gone previously, arriving at what they called "Winter Quarters" on the Missouri River in Iowa. We remained there until June 1851. Father worked at wagon making most of the time. When he had managed to raise two teams of oxen and cows, a company of sixty wagons was organized, Father was made captain, and they started for Utah.

After many trials and hardships, they arrived in Salt Lake City September 25, 1851. The first winter Mother and two children stayed with her brother, Samuel Thompson, in Mill Creek Canyon. During the winter, Father found a location in Alpine, Utah County and a house (such as it was) built on a piece of ground he had taken up. Soon after we were located, another member was added to the family, a son, Charles Wilkes Phelps, who lived four years and died with measles. During 1853 and 1854, Father, his son-in-law, James Holmes, Isaac Huston and James Preston built a saw mill near the mouth of Dry Creek Canyon about a mile and a half from Alpine. During the summers from 1853 to 1859, I herded sheep that belonged to the settlers of Alpine. All I had for my dinner was segos [lily bulbs] that I would dig out of the ground with a digger that I carried with me. (It was a pointed stick something the shape of a beaver's tail.) It was while herding sheep that I was tempted the hardest to steal It came very near getting the best of me. James Preston was down in the penstock of the saw mill repairing something, and I brought my sheep near the mill. I spied a dinner pail and taking the lid off I saw some flour biscuits. I put my hand in the pail to take a biscuit and was reminded of that commandment, "Thou shalt not steal. " Then I remembered the teachings of my mother, "Thou shalt not steal. " Finally I got courage enough to get away and I went out in the mill yard and began to pick gum. Soon I heard a voice call my name and when I went back, James Preston gave me a biscuit and a leg of chicken. Maybe you think I wasn't thankful I had resisted the temptation. We had been without wheat flour for several months and had been eating musty corn meal bread. I can now [1922] remember those days just as vividly as though they had been within the last two years. Only those that experienced the hardships of those days can realize what they were.

I went to school three or four months in the winter until I was seventeen years old. About the fifth grade was as far as I reached. When I grew large enough to put a yoke on the oxen, I quit herding sheep and worked on the farm and in the canyon. When I was sixteen, I calculated I could do as much as a common man at most anything. In the spring of 1864 I was 18 years old. Father sold out all his lands and home and decided to go up to Bear Lake Valley, Idaho. James Holmes and my half brother, Joseph Phelps, and my father fitted out ox teams and made the start April 1864. They landed in Montpelier on May 17, 1864. All three took up a farm and started once more to make homes. They built log houses with dirt floors and roofs.

In the winter of 1865 I commenced keeping company with Miss Clarinda Bingham. In the fall of 1866 frost had killed all of the grain and Calvin Bingham decided to move back to Hyrum, Cache Valley, as he had to depend on blacksmithing for a living. That meant he would take his daughter Clarinda also. She and I talked the matter over and we decided to get married. When I laid the matter before the blacksmith, he said, "Nothing doing. You are both too young!" (Which was verily true.) I talked the matter over with a friend, and he advised me to give the old folks the dodge and get married anyway. So on the evening of September 26, 1866, we invited a high priest by the name of John Turner to come over to the neighbors' and perform the ceremony for us. For a short time it looked like something interesting was going to happen around the place. I didn't have very much to say, but a good many things ran through my mind that space will not permit me to mention. Finally, things began to get normal again, and we decided if I would go down below to the town of Benningston and help get the sheep across the Bear River, we would be forgiven. This was carried out to the satisfaction of all concerned.

Now for a description of the home I took my bride to: My mother's house had but one room 18 by 17 feet, a dirt roof and floor with a straw carpet. She had her loom in there during the winter. Her bed was in one corner and I had a bunk built in another corner. It was built into two sides of the house and one log stood out in the room. A straw bed, buffalo robe and quilts comprised our bed for the winter. In the spring, the fore part of May, I found there was going to be an increase in the family, which put me to my wits' ends to know how to meet the situation. But it happened that providence had smiled down on me again by sending the Indians into the valley somewhat earlier than usual. I happened to be the sole owner of a little brown pony which I sold to an Indian for a buffalo robe and seven elk skins. The nearest dry goods store at that time was Richmond, Cache Valley, some 65 miles across a big mountain. It happened that my brother Joseph was in the same boat that I was, and he and I started out to find a market for what we had to sell. I sold my buffalo robe and three of my elk skins, (I had four elk skins left to make me a suit of clothes) and bought a few yards of flannel and a few yards of calico, a bottle of castor oil, a box of Grafenburg pills and three hundred pounds of flour, and I went home with a smile on my face that did not come off for a long time. That summer I built a house and moved in and we called it our home. Father took a contract that summer to build a bridge over Blacksmith Fork about 60 miles southwest en route to Ogden. He let James Homes, Hyrum S. Rich and myself in with him, and we received $86 each in store pay on Williams Jennings in Salt Lake City.

Now, reader, I want to tell you that was the first time in my life I had worked for money and appropriated the proceeds for myself. Previous to that it had always been for Father's family. With my store bill I bought me a scythe to cut hay, a pitchfork, a shovel, ax and kitchen furniture. And we were just as happy as young married folks can be Then for the next ten or fifteen years, every sixteen or eighteen months, an extra member was added to the family until we had an even dozen. I forgot to say that we obtained the cattail feather bed from bulrushes on the river bottoms the first winter.

My spare time was occupied trying to improve my home and surroundings. Crops were cut short by the early frosts. Sometimes entirely. But with all the drawbacks that I endured, I accumulated means and felt I had been wonderfully blessed. In the summer of 1872, Brigham Young came to the valley on one of his annual visits and he preached discourses on plural marriage. (Up to that time, polygamy had never appealed to me very strong. I had been raised in a polygamous family, and I thought I never wanted any of it in mine.) After I heard Brigham Young's sermon, there was a feeling came over me that I had better at least make the attempt to get another wife, but to eliminate the courting; just ask the consent of the girl and her parents and if either was opposed, that was to be the end of it. When I raised courage to put it to the test, everything was in the affirmative. September 8, 1873, I was married to Mary Elizabeth Bingham, sister to my first wife, in the Endowment House. Being raised in a polygamous family, I thought I knew about as much as anybody on how to guide the ship. How well I succeeded, those that have been acquainted with me can be the judge.

During the winter and spring of 1874 and 1875, Charles Mallory and I built a sawmill in Montpelier Canyon. After that I could build and finally got comfortably situated. On May 22, 1876, Father died after spending the winter in Southern Utah. He arrived home May 17 and died five days later. The early frost and cold long winters caused me to make a change to a warmer climate. With consent of Apostle Charles C. Rich, I disposed of all my belongings and put it into teams, wagons and cattle. On October 3, 1878, in company with Charles Dana and son Roswell, John Hibbert, John and William Lesueur, Charles Warrener and Robert Williams, we set out for Salt River Valley, Arizona. We arrived at Mesa on January 17, 1879. Robert Williams stopped in Salem, Utah. He had an ox team and the rest of us had horses. We arrived in Mesa with four teams, three wagons and about 25 head of cattle, mostly cows. The first settlers had only been located since October. They were living in tents and sheds mostly. The company let us join them, giving us a chance to work out water rights to get shares in the company.

It was hard to get a home and get comfortably located again. I disposed of all my surplus stock, teams, and wagons which enabled me to buy provisions until I got houses, such as they were, to live in. Everything went well with us until September 1884 when Charles I. Robson, Oscar Stewart, Alma Spillsbury, George Wilson, James Wilson and I were indicted for polygamy and unlawful cohabitations. We never tried to evade the propositions as we believed the law unconstitutional, and we had no trouble getting bondsmen. The next spring the trial court convened in April, We all went down to Phoenix, the county seat, about a week before our trial was to come off to see if we had any friends that we could depend on. We found about all the friends we had were saloon men and that kind of people. We employed lawyers and the church sent Tom Fitch of Los Angeles to take charge of the trial. Things looked darker to us every day. Our lawyers worked with the judge and did all they could to get some assurance from him to show us some leniency, but failed. Alma Spillsbury's case was brought to the jury and in less than twenty minutes a verdict was given--Guilty. Our lawyers told us there was no use for any other to stand trial, and so they informed the judge that the others would plead guilty. We were told to appear at 10 a.m. the next day. The judge said we would have to promise to obey the law. That caused me some serious reflections. I will now relate a dream I had two or three nights before. I went to bed wondering what the outcome of it all would be. I dreamed I was out in an open country all alone, close by me stood a very small bull, a cherry red in color, the most perfect and handsome animal I had ever seen. His horns looked to be transparent and came to a very sharp point. As I looked, at a great distance I saw a large object moving towards me, and when it came close enough to tell what it was, I saw that it was a monstrous bull. I discovered that he was mad, and the closer he came the more mad he became. I saw he was making for the little bull, and he looked as large to me as an elephant. He never halted till he came up within six or eight feet of the little fellow, and all the while the little fellow stood chewing his cud not seeming to pay any attention to the monster bull. When the monster stopped, I thought he put out his tongue and his eyes were like balls of fire. He made a dive at the little bull, and at the same time the little bull caught him in the neck, completely unjointing it. The monster fell and I woke up. This dream brought joy to all of us. We felt that something was going to happen that would cause a change in our favor. On the morning of April 11 at 10 a.m., we all appeared ready to take our medicine. The first name called was Hyrum S. Phelps.

The judge asked, "Mr. Phelps, you have pleaded guilty to the charge of unlawful cohabitation. Have you anything to say why the court should not pass sentence on you?"

"I have just one request, your honor," I replied. "That is that you do not insist on me obeying the law as you interpret it. I consider the law unconstitutional and made especially to punish the Mormons. I will hold myself subject to the law at all times, but I don't want to make any promises."

"Mr. Phelps, I am not here to decide on the constitutionality of the law, but punish those that violate the law as it stands, and I shall expect something from you that will convince me you will obey it the same as all law abiding citizens," he said.

"Your honor, God gave me my wives. They were virgins when I married them. I can hold my hand up and say before God and man that I never did, outside of the marriage relations, have anything to do with any man's wife or daughter." I spoke for fully five minutes on the purity of marriages and why we practiced it. At the conclusion of my talk I said, "That is all I have to say."

The first word he spoke was to those sitting near him. He said with tears in his eyes, "Gentlemen, you may think that this is a desirable position to pass sentence on these men. This is the hardest thing I ever had to do. You are some of the best citizens we have." Turning to me he added, "Mr. Phelps, I realize your family needs you at home, and I shall give you only ninety days and no fine to pay." I thanked him for being so lenient.

The next day the warden inspected us, gave us a clean haircut, a shave and a brand new suit of clothes with the stripes running horizontally. The night before I was sentenced, Mary Elizabeth gave birth to a baby girl and a month following she lost her little two-year-old boy. The warden gave us all privileges that were possible and the most comfortable cells in the prison.

We were turned loose again on July 12, 1885. I then went to living again as I had always done. The stake authorities thought I was running desperate chances as I was living with both families, and advised me to go to Mexico. In the spring of 1887, I drove down to Juarez, Mexico to see what I thought of the country. I did not like the government in that country. On Dec. 3, 1890, I received a call to serve a mission to the Southern States and to be in Salt Lake to leave for the mission Dec. 16. I told my boys I would borrow the money and start Dec. 5 to go up to Bear Lake and see my folks there before going on my mission. The third day after I received my call, I started. I arrived at Maricopa where I was to change cars on the Southern Pacific Railroad. The train stopped, I looked out of the window and who should I see but my old friend the Federal Marshall who was after me. The Spirit told me he was wanting me and for me to get off the car on the opposite side from where the others were getting off. I was to go around, and come in behind and get on the other train on the opposite side from where the others were getting on and walk lame. When I came in full view of the officer, the Spirit seemed to operate on me just like some person giving me a command. When the train started off, I looked out the window and saw that my poor old uncle Brother Sam Thompson was returning home after a short visit with my mother. I did not have time to tell him what was taking place. I waited in Yuma until the next day and Uncle was on the train, so we went on our way without any more trouble. I visited my relatives in Bear Lake and they contributed more than enough to pay my expenses from Salt Lake and back again. I arrived at my journey's end (Spartanburg Mills) on Dec. 23, 1890. I had just one dollar in my pocket, and I gave that to the family I was to stay with to buy Christmas presents as they were very poor.

David LeBaron was my first companion. I was gone 23 months, but never slept out one night, only had to pay for one night's lodging during my entire stay in the mission field. While on my mission I baptized four persons. When I returned home, I was a better man and had a testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel During my absence, President Wilford Woodruff had issued the Manifesto and my law breaking was at an end.

On the 26th of February 1889, I fitted out two teams and went to St. George, Utah, to work in the temple. I took my mother, wife Clarinda, daughter Lucretia and son Calvin. We had our three oldest children sealed to us and mother had her two oldest sealed to her and father. I also did the work for Grandfather Spencer Phelps and his wife. We were gone from home six weeks. The work done at St. George completed all the vicarious work on my ancestors that I knew of at that time. My mother made her home with me from the time we left Bear Lake, Idaho until her death January 31, 1896.

About the year 1900, I received a letter from my nephew, William R. Holmes, who was laboring as a missionary in Massachusetts at the time that The Phelps Family of America and Their English Ancestors was being published in two volumes and there might be a chance for me to get my family included in the work. I sent a list of my family, but it was too late to be inserted in the book, However, I sent an order and received the genealogy of my ancestors back for eight generations. My wife Mary Elizabeth and I have been working in the temple at Logan, Utah most of the time since April 1919 to 1925.

After returning home from my mission, my time was occupied on my farm and surroundings until about the year 1910. My sons being married and myself along in years, I was not able to do the work required. I decided to sell the 80 acres and when the buyer came along, I sold for $19,000 and bought a city lot in the town of Mesa, and built a home on it for Clarinda and a home for Mary Elizabeth on 20 acres I had left previous to my selling. On October 13, 1906 Mary Elizabeth's house burned down. We were sleeping out of doors at the time and everything was burned except the beds and clothing we had taken off our bodies when we went to bed. It was a brick house and it burned so quickly that the walls were not damaged very much. I soon rebuilt and was comfortably situated again. During the winter of 1917-18 I sold my ranch home and we moved into another home I had built in town. My plans were to spend the balance of my days working in the temple for the redemption of my ancestors who are dead and gone.

Now in conclusion of the story I have given of my life, I must say that I have been true and faithful. On the advent of another birthday, I will be 77 years old and I have every reason to believe I will live till I am 95 years old. If I should live that long, I expect to hear of more sorrow and suffering from wars, famines, earthquakes and destruction by the destroying elements than I have ever heard of in the last fifty years. I have never sought after notoriety of civil offices. I am thankful that I was counted worthy to be called into the High Council at the organization of the Maricopa Stake, which office I held and tried to honor until the 8th of December, 1912, when I was ordained a patriarch. And I say as Nephi of Old, "I was born of goodly parents" who did all they could for their children under the circumstances by which they were surrounded.

And as my ancestors before them. I am proud to know that I am of such stock, for many of them fought, bled and died in the Revolutionary War. I thank my God that I am permitted to do their work in the temple of the Lord, and I pray that my children will join with me as soon as circumstances will permit them to do so. I know the Lord expects it of us, and if we fail to do what we can for them, we will come to our condemnation. (You have ears to hear, take warning.) As for myself, I know I have made many mistakes and fallen into many habits that were not becoming to a Latter-day Saint. I have not controlled my tongue and have said many things I should not have said. But with all my failings, I have always tried to be honest with my fellow men. I have had no dollar in my life that I would be ashamed for any person to know how I came by it, not have I ever spent a dollar that I would be ashamed to tell my children— Clarinda, 12, and Mary Elizabeth, 14. Eleven of them have passed to the great beyond. Three of them died and left infant babes. A daughter, a young woman grown and a son 19 years. The others ranged in age from three months to four years. I have also two daughters that are left widows with ten and five children to take care of.

So I feel content to know that when my time comes, I will have loved ones to mingle with over there. I thank the Lord that I was permitted to be born when the Gospel of Jesus Christ was again on the earth. I know that God lives, that Jesus Christ is the Redeemer of the world and that Joseph Smith was and is Prophet of God and that the Church known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is indeed the only church that is acceptable unto Him as a church. This is my testimony and I here subscribe to it in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

P.S. When I die, I prefer to be buried by the side of my mother without any display of flowers, the same as the rest that have gone on before me. It is a satisfaction to know I will have loved ones to mingle with when my turn comes to go. Given this day the tenth of December, 1922, at Logan, Utah.

/s/ H. S. Phelps

[Hyrum Phelps died April 23, 1926 after being gored by a bull. Kenneth and Lavel Whatcott were with him when he was gored and said that his intestines were lying on the ground in the manure. He died two days later.]

Hyrum married Mary Elizabeth Bingham on 8 Sep 1873 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. Mary (daughter of Calvin Bingham and Elizabeth Lucretia Thorne) was born on 25 Dec 1853 in East Weber, Weber, Utah; died on 14 Nov 1933 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona; was buried in Mesa City Cemetery, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: 17 Nov 1933, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona

Notes:

Died of diabetes.

"Mary Elizabeth Bingham Phelps," by her daughter Barbara Ann Phelps Allen:

Mother was born on Christmas day, 1853, the daughter of Calvin Perry and Lucretia Thorne Bingham. Her early life was as useful and busy as were her later years. She worked out some, and also helped her grandfather Ashael Thorne make butter and cheese plus other work to be done on a farm.

When she was a young lady, she earned money to buy herself a nice yellow calico dress with black dots in it and thought it most beautiful. She, like Father, loved to dance and said often after they had danced until after midnight, a crowd would get into a sleigh and ride until daylight.

She had quite a number of boy friends, one in particular she liked real well, It was while she was keeping company with him that she married Father (Hyrum Smith Phelps) as a plural wife. She said she didn't know why she did it, but supposed it was meant to be that way.

At the time she married they lived in Montpelier, Idaho, but the winters were too severe so they moved to Mesa, Arizona after three daughters had been born, Laurett, Lucy and Barbara. Laurett died of diphtheria before they left Idaho.

The journey to Arizona was a long hard one, especially for mother, as she was in her last months of pregnancy. The company laid over three days at Lee's Ferry because of her condition, and on the third day, Dec. 2, 1878 her oldest son, Gove Edward, was born. They arrived in Mesa Jan. 17, 1879. Mesa was practically a desert when they arrived and they lived in tents the first three months until Father and his sons could make adobes to build a house.

The first one was a long three-room house. Mother lived in one end and Aunt Clarinda the other. The center room was used for awhile to store corn and grain, and later Grandma Bingham lived there awhile. While she lived there, he son Ashael died.

In 1881 Father built a home on the corner of First Avenue and Hibbert Street for Aunt Clarinda. This house was a T-shape with a porch on two sides, had a shingle roof and dirt floors. It still stands today [1953] but has been improved. Mother had the long house then to herself. It was here that Hattie, Orson and Yuma were born. The Federal officers had been after Father and Mother for plural marriage, and Father was arrested. He was sent to Yuma, Arizona Penitentiary for three months. Mother was taken to the home of Ed Jones in Lehi. She stayed there until just before Yuma was born, then went to her mother.

Father bought or traded and got eighty acres one mile east of town and built another home for Aunt Clarinda who had a family of boys and moved mother to the home on First Avenue and Hibbert because she had mostly girls. Here Grace, who lived only a few weeks, Amy, Esther, Clara and Gertrude were born.

After Aunt Clarinda moved to the ranch, Mother was allotted a few cows for her support. It was Gove's job to drive the cows to and from the pasture, and he often rode a cow called Puso. I remember we had a lot of grief because the cows would often get out of the corral and get into Brother Hibbert's place at night, and he would come and awake mother and say ugly things to her. We milked some of the cows that were brought from Montpelier. When Esther was a few months old, Father went on a mission to the Southern States.

Mother lived in this home until 1895 when Father sold it and built her a nice brick house on the eighty acres. Wilford, Mother's fourteenth child, was born here. He was the pride and joy of the family. Father used to call him the little prophet. He is four months younger than my oldest son, Ashael. Mother practically raised him with Wilford. They were like brothers.

While living in this home Mother's greatest sorrow came when Lucy died. At the time she was confined to her bed with a sore leg, and couldn't go see Lucy during her sickness. Lucy had developed blood poison after the birth of her fourth child and namesake, Lucy. Brother Calvin was surely good to mother during Lucy's sickness; he would come three times a day to keep her informed of Lucy's condition. Sometimes he would call at midnight. Lucy died Jan. 6, 1905. Mother took little Lucy and raised her as her own.

Because of Father's age and the boys married and gone, he found he couldn't do the work on the ranch, so he sold to a Mr. Fraser and moved onto twenty acres on Home Lane. He built mother the nicest home she had had and built two houses in town on Sirrine, one for Aunt Clarinda and one to rent. As age kept creeping, he found he had to stop work altogether, so he sold the twenty acres and moved Mother in the house he built to rent. Here they spent their last days. Father died April 23, 1926, after having been gored in the belly by a bull. Mother died 17 November, 1933 from the effects of diabetes.

Mother was a wonderful mother to her family, a typical Bingham, the most unselfish and generous person to be found. She always went without for her family. I've seen her many times skim the cream off the milk and give it to father and she would use the skim milk. She didn't go out very often, having 14 children, two babies most of the time. One May Day she sent us on ahead to a picnic. Amy was the baby. Lucy and I took her and the other children on; Mother came later. When we took Amy to her, the baby didn't recognize Mother and began to scream. It was the first time she had seen Mother in her dress-up clothes. Amy cried with hunger, so Mother had to go home and change her dress so Amy would nurse.

Mother had inflammatory rheumatism while Amy was a baby. At that time there was an epidemic of some kind of fever, and Aunt Clarinda's oldest son, Hyrum, had it. Father had to be with him until he died. Lucy and I, with Grandma Sarah Phelps had to take care of Mother and the baby. She suffered something awful. Her legs were swollen twice their size, and she couldn't bear to be moved. After Hyrum died and Father came to help take care of Mother, he and Grandma decided to get her up on an open bottom chair and steam her. They got her on the chair, but it was cruel what she suffered during the ordeal, and the sad part was that no good came from it. She finally got well.

Mother was quite spiritual. A number of times things happened and it was made known to her before hand. One time she was troubled and went into the bedroom to pray. As she came out, she said just above the door she heard the sweetest music she had ever heard, and as the music died away, a peaceful feeling came over her and she was comforted.

Very few people suffered as much as Mother. One time she and sister Annie went into the field to glean wheat, and they came in contact with poison weeds and their legs broke out with sores. Mother's was the worst. Both her legs were solid sores from her knees to the soles of her feet. It took weeks for them to heal. Every summer for several years at the same time, her legs would break out with the same kind of sores, but each year they would he more mild. This was a few weeks before Grace was born; after that her legs caused her a lot of misery. There were quite a few other things that caused a lot of suffering that I'll not take time to mention, besides giving birth to 14 children without the aid of a doctor or having something done to ease the pain.

Mother was a good Latter-day Saint. She always donated liberally, paid her tithing and fast offerings. When she began paying, she saved all her statements from the dairy so she would know how much she owed, and at the end of the year, she owed a few cents more than ten dollars. I don't know how she managed to live. She had a few hens, but they didn't lay any eggs until the price went down to ten cents a dozen. Lucy was the main stay of the family. Hattie and I worked some. When either of us earned any money, it was turned over to Mother. Not a cent did we use for ourselves without her telling us to. She would shine our heavy shoes with stove soot. We were quite large before we could afford dress shoes. We weren't the only poor people, however; most everyone was alike

We had a happy home, Mother made it so. Our home was a house of prayer. We had family prayer night and morning, and I think that had everything to do with the spirit of our home. I know I speak for all of the family when I say I am thankful for wonderful parents and what they did for us.

Notes:

His wedding to Tryphena Bisbee was performed by Hyrum Smith, brother of Joseph Smith. He and his family were among the eight families that founded what is now Springville, Utah.

Life sketch of Myron Nathan Crandall, author unknown:

Myron Nathan Crandall, the fourth child of David Crandall and Margret McBride, was born in Genessee County, western New York on 17 Aug 1818. In 1823 the family moved to Villanova, NY where they lived for about eleven years. There they heard the gospel, joined the church and moved to Kirtland, Ohio. Myron Nathan was fifteen years old. The family then followed the church migrations from Kirtland to Missourit then to Quincy, IL and later to LaHarpe, IL, not far from Nauvoo.

On Jan 26, 1841 Myron Nathan married Tryphena Bisbee who had joined the church in 1837 and was living in Nauvoo. They were married in her Uncle Noah Packard's home by Hyrum Smith, brother of the Prophet Joseph Smith.

Two children were born to them in Illinois, Julia Ann 26 Nov 1841 and Hyrum Oscar 26 Apr 1844. Persecution was so strong against the church the members were forced to leave Illinois.

In Aug 1844 Myron Nathan's mother died and in 1845 his father married Mrs. Jerusha Smith who was not interested in following the Saints when most of them left Illinois and moved to Iowa. David, his nine year old daughter, Margret Ann, and his new wife, Jerusha, stayed in LaHarpe. Margaret Ann died there at age seventeen.

Myron Nathan, his married brothers and sisters with their spouses and children, and his three unmarried brothers left Illinois about 1847 and settled in Kanesville, Iowa. Myron Nathan built the first dugout in the community. In 1848 his third child, Myron Edgar was born and during this period their first child, Julia Ann suffered a severe hip injury which left her permanetly crippled and they were unable to travel with her for some time.

Early in June 1850 the Crandalls left Kanesville to go to Utah with the Aaron Johnson Company. There were 22 in the Crandall group as follows: Eliza Crandall, her husband John Deal and 4 children; Myron N Crandall, his wife Tryphena Bisbee and 3 children; Spicer Wells, his wife Orinda Spafford; Emiline Crandall, husband Richard Bird and 2 children; Laura Crandall her husband Willis K Johnson; Martin Pardon Crandall age 20 unmarried; Lucien Delancy Crandall age 18 unmarried; Nelson David Crandall age 16 unmarried.

While in Kanesville Myron Nathan owned a six acre farm, had a span of horses, two yoke of oxen, two cows and sufficient provisions to last two years; consequently, they came across the plains with fewer hardships than many of the Saints. Myron's kindness and thoughtfulness for his wife, who was pregnant, was shown by his taking a rocking chair and a small cook stove for her comfort and a hammock for his crippled daughter which swung from the wagon bows and made her journey more bearable.

In the latter part of June tragedy struck the company. Aaron Johnson's wife, Polly Kelsey, Spicer Crandall's wife Irinda Spafford, her mother four of her brothers and sisters and Willis K Johnson, husband of Laura Crandall, all died of Cholera. They were buried near the Platte river in Nebraska.

The Aaron Johnson Company arrived in Salt Lake 12 September 1850. Brigham Young requested the first eight wagons to go to Springville and build a fort there. The teams comprised those of Aaron Johnson, Myron Nathan Crandall, Martin Pardon Crandall, William Miller, John W Deal, Richard Bird, and Amos Warren and his brother.

In November 1850 Myron Nathan and Tryphena's fourth child, Franklin Austin, was born, the first child born in the settlement.

Before the first winter set in a fort was competed and the church organization effected. The Springville fort was built on a rise and covered 1.5 acres of ground. It was located near the northwest corner of Main and Center streets. All the houses faced the enclosure with their doors and window opening into it. For safety measures there were no windows on the outside of the cabins. There were gates on the east and west sides of the fort and bastions at the corners. In times of trouble the cattle were driven inside the enclosure for protection.

Aaron Johnson was the first bishop with William Miller and Myron Nathan Crandall as his counselors. For the first two years church was held in the fort but later Aaron Johnson built a large adobe home with one large room reserved for church, social gatherings and dances.

During the winter of 1851-2 Springville was surveyed and a site chosen for a city square and a school. The rest of the lots which were 12.5 rods square were chosen by drawing a number out of a box. The lot drawn by Myron Nathan is located at what is now the northwest corner of Main street and Second north.

In 1852 the legislature approved a charter for Springville and held an election to appoint a mayor and alderman. Myron Nathan was appointed an alderman and his duties included acting as Justice of the Peace, a position he held until his death.

Myron Nathan had received his endowmnets at Nauvoo but was not sealed until it could be done in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City.

He entered into plural marriage with Susanna Wimmer 9 Dec 1854 and with Mary Hurst 11 Mar 1857. He was a hard worker and a good provider.

While sickling grain Myron Nathan became overheated, contracted pneumonia and died 4 August 1860, age 42. He was survived by his three wives and eleven children, seven by Tryphena, two by Susanna Wimmer and two by Mary Hurst.

Tryphena died in 1863 and she and Myron Nathan are buried in the old Springville cemetery with a suitable marker on their graves. His other wives married his brothers. Susanna Wimmer Crandall married Spicer Wills Crandall and gave birth to seven more children. she died in 1918. Mary Hurst Crandall married Martin Pardon Crandall and had one child. In 1875 she married Amost Maycock and had three more children.

While the life of Myron Nathan Crandall covered only 42 years it was a life filled with hardship, responsibilities and tribulations but also major accomplishments, blessings and rewards. He was a valiant pioneer and a most faithful church leader.

Myron Nathan's father, David, and his mother, Margret McBride, led the family into the church and journeyed together from Villanova to Missouri and Nauvoo. Myron Nathan, his good wife and his brothers and sisters stayed together through the tribulations from Nauvoo to Utah. The Crandall posterity now numbers in the thousands and the benefits of the struggles and hardships their ancestors endured in remaining faithful to the church.

Myron married Tryphena Bisbee on 26 Jan 1841 in Nauvoo, Hancock, Illinois. Tryphena (daughter of James Bisbee and Polly Packard) was born on 4 Apr 1819 in McDonough, Chenango, New York; died on 12 Oct 1863 in Springville, Utah, Utah. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also known as Tryphena Bisby.

Notes:

Bodyguard to Joseph Smith. Present at the meeting following Smith's death when Brigham Young "was transfigured so that he looked and sounded like the Prophet Joseph Smith."

NOAH THOMAS GUYMON

Compiled by Olive Guymon Stone, granddaughter

This history is taken from histories written from descendents of Noah Thomas Guymon, from ward records, from the diary of Noah Thomas Guymon, the Church chronology, American Fork history and Church history. It is also taken from children's biographies.

Noah Thomas Guymon was the fifth child of Thomas Guymon and Sarah Gordon Guymon. He was born 30 June 1819 at Jackson County, Tennessee. His parents were both descendants of Revolutionary War ancestors. Noah Thomas Guymon was born with the blood of a noble ancestry of courage, devotion and stamina of true Americans of which our Guymon family can be very proud.

Noah Thomas Guymon was fortunate in having a father who was a good farmer and a good schoolteacher. From his father he received a good rounded basic education. He also knew the fundamentals of farming and the raising of livestock.

In the early spring of 1826 the family moved to Edgar County, Illinois. Here they lived a rather peaceful life until James Guymon, a brother just older than Noah Thomas, came home from a trip, which changed the whole course of their lives. This happened during the winter of 1836-1837. James was very excited and told them of a new church; different from any other church they had ever known. When he had finished telling his story, their father stood upon a log and said, "Jim, this is the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is just what we have been looking for." Noah Thomas, James, their younger brother and four sisters and their parents soon joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Noah Thomas was baptized 02 March 1836 by Elder Calob Baldwin. From this time on, the family went through much of the persecutions, which had to be endured by the members of the Church.

Noah Thomas knew the Prophet Joseph Smith and acted as one of his bodyguards. He told his children of being in the Sacred Grove and hearing the Prophet Joseph Smith telling the Saints that the time would come when they would be driven to the Rocky Mountains. He bore his testimony in a conference in Orangeville, telling of a meeting conducted by Brigham Young, when Brigham Young was transfigured so that he looked and sounded like the Prophet Joseph Smith. This to him was proof that Brigham Young was chosen by God to lead the Saints after the death of the Prophet.

Noah Thomas married Mary Dickerson Dudley on 24 December 1837 in Caldwell County, Missouri. She was the daughter of James Dudley and Celia Ross Dudley both from Richmond, Virginia. Mary was born 13 August 1814 at Wolf Creek, Hardin County, Kentucky. They were married by Elder Jefferson Hunt. Their first child was born 25 October 1838 at Caldwell County, Missouri, near Far West, on the night of the Crooked River Battle when David Patton was killed. This child was a girl whom they named Mary Jane.

In the winter of 1838 Noah T. and his family with the rest of the Saints, moved to the state of Illinois, where Noah T. helped in the building of the city of Nauvoo. Here on the 10th of September 1840 Noah Thomas' second child Lucinda Harris was born. And 08 July 1842 their third child Emma Melissa was born.

Times were hard and Noah Thomas moved his family out into the country on a small farm. Therefore, they were not living in Nauvoo when the Prophet Joseph Smith was killed; in fact, Noah Thomas was sick in bed with a high fever.

On the first day of March 1845 Mary Dickerson Dudley died from complications due to childbirth. She was taken to Nauvoo for burial. This left Noah Thomas with little motherless girls who needed care and attention. Ten months later [on the] 24th of November 1845, Noah Thomas Guymon married Margaret Johnson, daughter of Edward Johnson and Sarah Brown Johnson. To this union were born four daughters and three sons.

12th February 1847 Noah Thomas married his third wife, Elizabeth Ann Jones at Winter Quarters. She was a daughter of James Nylor Jones and Sarah Ann Manerly. They were married by Brigham Young.

Noah Thomas Guymon and his three little girls from his first wife, his wife Margaret with her first two children and Elizabeth (his third wife) and her little son left Council Bluffs, Iowa in the spring of 1850 to make their long journey across the plains to Utah. They came to Utah in the Aaron Johnson Company. There were other members of his family in the same company. They were his parents and their daughter Melissa who was still single. His sister Barzilla and her husband Matthew Caldwell and their small children. There was his sister Polly and her husband Robert Lewis Johnson and their small children. There were many preparations, which had to be made for so long a journey. Wagons had to be made ready, cows and oxen had to be trained to work on the wagons and clothing had to be made for wearing on the trip. All their belongings had to be packed and those things they could not take had to be sold or given away. There was much work and planning went into the preparations for the long journey to a new home in the wilderness where they would be free to worship God as they wished. They were very happy with the thought of coming to Utah where they would no longer be persecuted by the mobs.

The most pleasant part of this journey was spent traveling along the banks of the Missouri River. The company crossed the river on flat boats and the cattle swam the river. They gathered buffalo chips to make fires on the prairie lands. The company traveled long hard hours but they always took time out at night to sing songs of praise to their God and to enjoy each other's company around the campfire before retiring for the evening.

Three days before the end of their journey, James Guymon the older brother of Noah Thomas came to meet them. James had made the journey a year before and was anxious to see his parents, brother and sisters and their families. The children were driving the cattle a short distance ahead of the wagons and when they saw their Uncle James coming to meet them, they shouted with joy. This was indeed a happy reunion.

Finally, they arrived at Salt Lake City, very tired but happy to be at the end of their journey and with their friends of the Church. One of the things that impressed the children was a red rag on a stick nailed upon a log room to show that merchandise was sold there. Another log room had a tin cup nailed over the door to show that tine ware was sold at the place.

The family had arrived in Salt Lake City 12 September 1850. They spent their first week with James who lived on the Little Cottonwood River. He had a lovely garden, which furnished good eating for these tired and hungry travelers.

Noah Thomas, Matthew Caldwell, Azamiah Adams and Henry Chipman went to American Fork. The history of American Fork says that Noah Thomas Guymon built the first house and his daughter Clarissa Ellen Guymon was the first child born in American Fork.

Noah Thomas with the assistance of his family cleared the brush and willows from a small farm and he built a house, which was built of logs, and the roof was covered with small poles on which cane was laid. When this was finished, Noah Thomas, his brother in law, Matthew Caldwell and Azamiah Adams went to Salt Lake City to work for wheat, potatoes and other supplies they would need to carry them through the winter and to plant in the spring. Brother Adams had left his family in Salt Lake City and intended to move them out on his return. Adams left his young son there with the new settlers. He and brother Chipman were the only male members left to protect their wives and children while they were away.

The day after their departure Chief Walker and a large number of his Indian braves came and pitched their tents or wickieups as they were called, near the little new homes which these new settlers had just finished. The settlers were upset by their arrival so brother Chipman went down and had a talk with the Chief. The Chief said they were friendly and that he and some of his lesser chiefs were on their way to Salt Lake City to see and talk with the Great White Chief, Brigham Young. The Chief said his Indian braves would hunt, fish, gather acorns and turn their horses on the low lands to feed. He told his braves not to molest the white people. Nevertheless, the women and children were very much afraid. Some of the Indians were very annoying. They would come into their cabins and help themselves to whatever they wanted such as milk or anything they could see that they wanted to eat. As the cows had helped pull the wagons across the plains and had given milk all summer, they were about dry now. These settlers needed the little milk they got from the cows to soak the hard bread they had left. Their provisions were getting scarce. They had hauled what they did have over a thousand miles in one wagon. When a big Indian brave would come into their cabin and pick up a pan of milk, drink what he wanted and pass it to another Indian to finish drinking, the Guymon family knew they would have to eat their bread dry. Still they were very thankful to their Heavenly Father for his protecting care over them, for they realized they could all have been killed and their belongs taken or destroyed.

Noah Thomas Guymon was away from his family three weeks. He had got the chance to work for one of his friends, William Casper thrashing out wheat, digging potatoes and hauling some lumber from the canyon. He also sold some things he had brought with him; thus, he was able to obtain enough potatoes, corn and wheat for their winter's needs and enough seeds for their spring planting. This was the last of November 1850. They stayed here that first winter. In the late fall of 1851 they moved to Springville. Here his children were able to attend school in a log house inside the fort.

In October 1852 Noah Thomas attended the General Conference of the Church in Salt Lake City. At this conference he was called to go on a mission to England. As soon as he could get the proper clothing for the journey he left for his mission. He left his home in the company of Elder Spence (? Spicer) Crandall on 09 September 1852 to go to Salt Lake to receive special instructions before starting their journey. There were one hundred elders all leaving for missions to the nations of the earth. They left Salt Lake the 15th September 1852 in five wagons and arrived at Fort Bridger on the 22nd of September. There they joined a company of 22 more wagons. Orson Pratt, one of the Twelve Apostles and Daniel Spencer were in this group.

He had a successful mission. Copies of letters he wrote state how successful they were and how the Lord took such good care of the missionaries that went. Without purse or script, they did not want for food or a place to lay their head. Noah was very grateful for the good care he had had and for the many converts made in England.

In the diary of Noah Thomas Guymon it says, "We have chartered a ship named, ‘Juvants,' and it was to sail 30 March to bring 33 converts to America." On 01 April 1855 Elder Glover, who had been appointed president of the company, called a meeting in regard to the best policy for keeping good order. They divided the passengers on board into twelve wards and Noah Thomas was appointed president of the first ward. On 06 April they held a General Conference on board this ship and sustained the general authorities of the Church. Many were sick during the journey. 06 May 1855 they reached the mouth of the Delaware River and they landed at Philadelphia at 10 o'clock that night. They reached Atchison, Kansas 27 May and 28 May they went to Mormon Grove.

31st May and 01, 02 June they organized for crossing the plains with Noah Thomas Sergeant of the Guard of the 2nd Company. 14 June 1855 they started on their journey across the plains. The 10th of August they passed Fort Kerney and 28th August they camped at Fort Bridger. They arrived in Salt Lake City with many Saints and 58 wagons on 07 September 1855. Noah Thomas reported to the Church authorities and gave a full report of his mission and then hurried home to Springville to his family. He arrived there 10 September 1855 after having been away almost three years. He was sick with Mountain Fever on his return and was ill for several weeks.

Wednesday, 20 May 1857, the 51st Quorum of Seventies was organized at Springville, Utah with Noah Thomas Guymon as the President. In September 1884 the 81st Quorum of Seventies was organized in Emery County by Seymour B. Young with Noah T. Guymon as one of the Presidents. Noah Thomas was a bishop's counselor in Fountain Green for a number of years. Robert L. Johnson, his brother in law was the bishop.

While in England, the Rowley home was always open to elders. Here Noah T. became acquainted with the Rowley family and Louisa Rowley, the oldest daughter. This Rowley family emigrated to Utah in the year 1856. 02 March 1857 Noah Thomas Guymon married Louisa Rowley. She was the daughter of William Rowley and Ann Jewell Rowley. They were married by Brigham Young in his office in Salt Lake City.

In about 1863 Noah Thomas moved his family to Fairview, Sanpete County, Utah. In 1867 he moved his family to Fountain Green, Sanpete County, Utah shortly after he became counselor to Bishop Robert L. Johnson. He held this position until 1879 when he moved his family to Castle Valley.

Noah moved Elizabeth Ann Jones Guymon and her family to Orangeville, Emery County, Utah. He moved Louisa Rowley Guymon and her family to Huntington, Emery County, Utah. He and the boys built Louisa's first home in Mountain Dale. It was clay hills close to the Huntington River. They dug a room or a cellar back in the hill with a lean-to at the opening of the cellar. The lean-to was built by standing poles upright. Willows were put across the top for a roof with leaves and mud on top of the willows for a roof. Small windows were made with heavy greased paper. An old tub was used as stove for cooking and to heat their home. This home was called a dugout. This was a temporary home where they lived while Noah Thomas and the boys hauled logs from Huntington Canyon and built a log house in the northeast part of Huntington. It was nice and comfortable home for those days. Here Louisa gave birth to one more child, Franklin Noah Guymon, born 1883. He was Louisa' twelfth child and Noah's twenty-eighth child.

Noah Thomas spent part of time in Huntington and part of his time in Orangeville with his third wife until the Manifesto. He then moved to Orangeville and made his home with his third wife.

At the time of the Manifesto, one morning a neighbor came and told Louisa that soldier from the United States Army was in town looking for the men that were practicing polygamy. The neighbor said, "You had better keep your children inside so they cannot be questioned." However, Louisa needed something from the store, so she sent her youngest daughter Laura to the store. She instructed Laura to say, "I don't know," if anyone should try to question her. Sure enough, the soldier saw and questioned the child. He asked, "Who is your Dad, little girl?" Laura answered, "I don't know." "Where do you live," he asked. "I don't know," Laura replied. "Where is your father?" he asked. "I don't know." Little girl, what is your name?" Again Laura replied, "I don't know." "Oh, you dumb little thing," the soldier said with disgust and rode away.

When Noah Thomas left his youngest family in Huntington, he left them with stock in the Huntington Co-op Store, a general store where they sold everything from yard goods to molasses, pots and pans to farm machinery. This stock declared dividends each January, which kept the children in clothes. He also left a farm, which the boys farmed.

His declining years were spent in Orangeville, Emery County, Utah. Until a few months before his death he took care of a small garden and milked a cow. He had lived an active life. He had helped organize cooperation stores in Fountain Green, Orangeville and Huntington. He was successful with mercantile business, farming and livestock.

He died 07 January 1911 at the age of 92 years in Orangeville, Emery, Utah. He was the father of twenty-eight children. He is buried in the Orangeville Cemetery.

Noah married Margaret Johnson on 24 Nov 1845 in Orangeville, Emery, Utah. Margaret (daughter of Edward Johnson and Sarah Frances Brown) was born on 28 Feb 1821 in London, Middlesex, Ontario; died on 17 Dec 1900 in Driggs, Teton, Idaho. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

From Find a Grave:

HISTORY OF MARGARET JOHNSON GUYMON

Margaret Johnson was born 28 February 1821 in Springfield, Elgin (then the London District,) Ontario, Canada, the youngest daughter of Edward Johnson and Sarah Brown, Irish immigrants. Upon hearing the doctrines of the LDS church preached to them, Edward and his family were baptized in 1836, moving to Missouri to be with the body of the Saints when Margaret was 12 years old. In Missouri, Margaret's mother and sister Elizabeth died and her father married Percy Baldwin Curtis, a widow. The family moved to Lima, Illinois and then to Nauvoo after 1841, living in the 4th Ward. Margaret Johnson and her brother, Robert Lewis Johnson made a home together prior to Robert's marriage to Polly Ann Guymon 30 April 1846 in Nauvoo.

Ten months after Noah Thomas Guymon's wife, Mary Dickersen Dudley, died following childbirth, he and Margaret Johnson were married on 25 November 1845 in Nauvoo. Their home was a on a farm outside of Nauvoo. In 1846 Noah's sister Polly Ann Guymon married Margaret's brother, Robert Lewis Johnson.

The Guymon family moved with the body of the Saints to Pottawattamie County, Iowa where Margaret's first two children were born in the town of Kanesville. These children were Margaret Elizabeth Guymon born 19 September 1846 and Martin Lewis Guymon born 24 January 1849.

12th of June 1850 Noah Thomas Guymon's family left Council Bluffs, Iowa for Utah in the Aaron Johnson Wagon Train. The Guymon family now consisted of Noah's three daughters by his first marriage, Margaret and her two children and his third wife, Elizabeth Ann Jones and her son, William Albert Guymon. They were fortunate to travel with Noah's parents and Margaret's brother, Robert. They arrived in Salt Lake City, 12 September 1850, staying with Noah's brother, James who had a home in the Little Cottonwood area of the valley. Their visit was brief however, as Brigham Young had designated eight wagons from their company to continue their journey into Utah Valley and settle there. Noah erected one of the first homes in what is now American Fork, Utah. The home was made of logs; the roof of poles on which cane was laid. In October 1851 he moved the family to a farm near Springville, Utah. His children were able to attend a school inside the fort. It was here that he was called on a mission to England for three years from 13 September 1852 to 10 September 1855.

During Noah's absence there was trouble with the Indians. Margaret moved her family into the town of Springville for protection. Margaret had to support herself and her extended family while Noah was gone. This she did by teaching school and sewing for other people. She raised food in her garden and carded, spun, dyed and wove her own wool cloth into clothes for the children. She purchased a lot and had home built and paid for through her earnings when her husband came home three years later. It was in Springville that the remainder of Margaret's children were born.

Seeking greener pastures, Noah, Margaret, Elizabeth and a 4th wife Louisa Rowley moved to Fairview, Sanpete County, Utah and again in 1867 to Fountain Green, Sanpete County, Utah. Here the family seemed to be content until 1879 when exploration of Castle Valley yielded good reports and it was decided to move there. Margaret now 60 years old, did not join the exodus there but moved back to Springville. For the next twenty years she lived in her children's homes, especially that of her daughter Julia Maycock.

On 17 December 1900 Margaret Johnson Guymon died in Driggs, Teton County, Idaho while visiting her daughter Margaret Elizabeth Crandall. Her body was shipped home to Springville where she is buried in the Springville Cemetery. An inscription on her tombstone reads: "Our mother we hope to meet you when the cares of life are through." Margaret remained faithful throughout her life to the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Notes:

Joined the LDS in 1836. [On Footings From the Past, citation details below.]

TNH's common ancestor with Boyd K. Packer:

Jonathan Taylor Packer (1817-1889) = Christina Petrina Sundby (1825-1892)
Joseph Alma Packer (1859-1941) = Sarah Adeline Wight (1861-1934)
Ira Wight Packer (1885-1958) = Emma Jensen (1888-1965)
Boyd K. Packer (1924-2015)

Jonathan married Angelina Avilda Champlin on 4 Jan 1840 in Adams County, Illinois. Angelina (daughter of William Sisson Champlin and Mary Ring) was born on 8 Jan 1820 in Hartland, Windsor, Vermont; died on 7 Jan 1893 in Colonia Juárez, Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, Mexico; was buried in New Colonia Juarez Cemetery, Colonia Juarez, Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, Mexico. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 1818, Vermont

Notes:

He was a sawmill operator. The 1880 census shows him in Deer Lodge, Montana.

Notes provided by John Ira Parker of Elko, Nevada to Laura Greene, 1999, from his family records:

Solomon Parker was born August 25, 1804 in Edwardsburg, Johnston, Ontario, Canada. He was the eighth child of Robert James Parker and Providence Miller. He married first Ann Custin of Preston, second Nancy Welch, and third Mary Catherine Green. Solomon Parker immigrated from Canada to Utah in 1856 and recorded in Journal Histories October 15, 1856 and September 20, 1856 (pages 1-8), "Solomon Parker and family came from Canada as passengers on Capt. Knud Peterson's ox train, which arrived in Great Salt Lake on September 1856. (250 Scandinavians), 14 wagon English emigrants. Left Florence, Nebraska about June 10, 1856. Joseph Parker was also a passenger. While in Canada, Solomon Parker bought on March 5, 1851 100 acres of land from George T. Goodhue in Middlesex. Paid 7 pounds (N 1/2 lot N. Con) Solomon sold on April 28, 1856 100 acres of land to Thomas Cook for 312 pounds 10 shillings. The sale of the land was immediately before his departure for Utah. Solomon Parker spent the last years of his life with a couple of his sons from his marriage to Nancy Welch in Deer Lodge, Montana, and died there May 8, 1884.

[Found on rootsweb] This note written by Lillian Millett on the back of an old family group sheet. This was written to Alfred and Orva Freestone when they were on a mission in Canada where this family originally came from:

"When Solomon Parker died he was in Montana, with a daughter who was not a member of the church. He left his genealogy on these names under his pillow and asked that they be given to Grandma (Lydia Ann Parker his daughter). He said 'Annie will know what to do with these names'. So when Grandma Packer (Lydia Ann) died they were all assembled in the front room at Grandma's house and there some miraculous way, the names fell into Aunt Clara's lap. When they examined them, they were these same names, which she and Aunt Janie then went to Salt Lake temple and did the work. I have had a hard time trying to connect them, as very little explanation was given, but we know they are close relatives, because of what Grandpa Solomon Parker said about them. You can understand my feeling about location and mission in that area.

"I have a record of a land grant to William and Margaret Welch for 400 acres of land. It was petitioned for in New Johnstown (now Cornwall) in 15 May 1797. It was granted on 17 May 1802 in Mountain Dundas. (Lots 24 and 22). This Margaret was the daughter of John Rudeback (a Loyalist). I think we have two Margarets who married Williams but it is not proven. I wonder if it ever will be?"

Solomon married Nancy Jane Welch in Dec 1826. Nancy was born on 7 Jan 1811 in Mountain, Dundas, Ontario; died on 16 Dec 1850 in Ekfrid, Middlesex, Ontario. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Given on many unsourced online trees as a daughter of William Welch and Margaret Rudeback (or Rudebach), herself a daughter of John and Catarina Rudeback.

We know her maiden name was Welch from documents such as the death records of her children.

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: New Hampshire

Notes:

There is a blurry photo of a balding gentleman in a suit and tie that is widely shown on the web as being an image of this Andrew Lee Allen, despite the fact that the gentleman's clothing is more modern than anything worn before 1870, and the photo is clearly captioned "Andrew Allen, Born Aug 17, 1832". In other words, it's Andrew Lee Allen, Jr. (1832-1918). Sometimes we wonder if people are doing genealogy in their sleep.

From "Our Family" by Charles Hopkins Allen [Ancestors and Descendants of Andrew Lee and Clarinda Knapp Allen]:

"Andrew Lee Allen was born in Limerick, York Co., Maine November 24th 1791. He was the son of Elijah Allen, who was born in 1763 at Stratham, Rockingham Co., New Hampshire, and his first wife, Mehitable Hall, who was christened March 26th, 1769 at Rochester, Strafford Co., New Hampshire.

"His mother died June 25th, 1800 in Corinth, Orange Co., Vermont and his father was remarried October 21st, 1809 to Hannah, widow of George Perry. His father died October 19th, 1839 at Limerick, York Co., Maine.

"After his mother's death Andrew Lee Allen went to live with his maternal grandfather, Rev. Avery Hall, staying until he was 14 years of age. He worked at the blacksmith trade. Not being satisfied, he left home and never went back again. He went on shipboard to help protect the American vessels during the war known as the War of 1812. He left there and went into Canada, where he got into trouble with the British by drinking a toast at a barn-raising. The toast was, 'he wished that the Eagle of America would triumph over the crown of Great Britain,' for which he was arrested by the British. Making his escape he went into the state of New York, Cattaraugus Co., where he entered one hundred and sixty acres of land, and made himself a very nice home. He planned to settle down for life and he soon owned a large grove of sugar maple trees besides his prosperous farm.

"On December 11th, 1824, he married Clarinda Knapp, daughter of Calvin and Deborah (Hopkins) Knapp. Clarinda was a refined, educated woman who was highly skilled in the arts of fine painting, sewing, tailoring, ladies' leghorn hat designing, and homemaking. Her gentle upbringing had a great influence on the lives of those about her. She was a woman of true faith and was a Bible scholar.

"They remained in Burton, Cattaraugus Co., New York until they had seven children, namely: Elijah, Lydia, Saphronia, Charles, Andrew, James, and Sidney. They had not joined any religious society but were honest and upright with all men, waiting for something to come along that would give them better satisfaction than the religions of the day. [...]"

Andrew married Clarinda Knapp on 11 Dec 1824 in Cattaraugus, New Hampshire. Clarinda (daughter of Calvin Knapp and Deborah Hopkins) was born on 10 Aug 1802 in Bethlehem, Litchfield, Connecticut; died on 7 Dec 1862 in Richmond, Cache, Utah. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: New York

Notes:

Daniels and McLean (citation details below) have him dying in "Weston, Oneida Co., Utah". This is clearly an error; there is no Oneida County in Utah, but there is one on the Utah border in southern Idaho. Weston, where Warner Hoopes died, was in Oneida county, Idaho at the time; it's now in Franklin county.

[Everything below, including the footnote, was posted to ancestry.com by "mmbrown66".]

Sketch of the Life of Warner Hoopes

Warner Hoopes, son of Jonathan Hoopes and Rebecca Watts Hoopes, was born in York County, Pennsylvania, October 29, 1817. He died at Weston, Idaho February 13, 1891. His ancestors were of the Puritan stock, of the Quaker religion. His grandfather was engaged as a provision hauler in the Revolutionary War. Warner was the third child in a family of twelve children. Not being very strong as a young man, he was taught the shoemaker trade. While he was still a boy, his parents joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. They were with the Mormons in their wanderings, and shared with the Saints the mobbings, drivings, and persecutions incident to the membership in the Church during its infancy.

For the first ten years of his life as a Mormon elder, Warner Hoopes spent most of his time in missionary work in the surrounding states, and while the Saints were fleeing through Missouri before the mobs, in the winter of 1838, leaving bloody footprints on the frozen ground, he alleviated the suffering very much by sitting near the campfire far into the night making shoes for those who had been driven from their homes before they could collect the necessary wearing apparel.

Joseph Smith Sr., father of the Prophet Joseph, and first patriarch of the Church, gave Brother Hoopes a blessing. One of the promises given was that the Lord would chastise him whenever necessary. Brother Hoopes always considered this a great blessing, and one which was literally fulfilled. Whenever he became the least bit slack in his religious duties, the Lord chastened him.

In 1840, he married Priscilla Gifford, daughter of Levi Gifford and Deborah Wing Gifford. Priscilla was born at Tiago County, Pennsylvania March 3, 1818; and died in Weston, Idaho August 2, 1876. She, too, was a descendant of Puritan ancestors. She was a woman of remarkable faith and energy. To Warner and Priscilla Hoopes were born nine children; six girls and three boys. Only four lived until maturity, the others died while children. Three died during the wanderings and persecutions of the Saints, and two were buried at Richmond, Utah. Of those who reached maturity, Rebecca married Matthew Fifield, and lived and died in Weston, Idaho; Melissa married William McCarrey and lived at Richmond, Utah; Adelaide married Charles Allen of Cove, Utah, who moved to Arizona, where Adelaide died; Daniel Lewis Hoopes, lived for a time in Weston, Idaho, then moved to Logan, Utah. (He died April 20, 1925.)

After the marriage of Warner Hoopes, he continued to travel with the Saints. He lived at Nauvoo, where his first three children were born. He was fleeing through Lee County with the Mormons during that terrible period of suffering and starvation; and witnessed the miraculous appearance of quails into camp; so tame that they could readily be caught with the hands, or shaken from the bushes where they would lie until picked up.

When the people were at Council Bluffs, Iowa in 1846, preparatory to moving toward the Rocky Mountains, President Brigham Young advised all who had not enough provisions to last one year, to go back into Missouri and get the means to come on as soon as possible. He also advised them while doing this, not to say anything as to they were with about religion. Brother Hoopes and his family moved back into Buchannon County near St. Joseph. Here, he became engaged in burning charcoal and became quite prosperous. Contrary to the counsel of President Young, the Saints in that region began holding meetings, which brought them into prominence and soon aroused the anger of the non-Mormons in that community.

About that time, a Brother McGraw stopped by at the Hoopes place over night. He was on his way to a mission in England. During the evening, he told the family that he felt impressed that they should go directly to Florence, Nebraska, and prepare to emigrate to Utah. He repeated this advice in the morning, and after he had gone some distance, he came back and advised Brother Hoopes to leave his family to dispose of what property could be sold, and for him to go immediately, and for the family to follow as soon as possible. Hoopes did not heed this counsel, and he stated that he did not know of an enemy he had in the country; that he wanted to wait until the charcoal that he had was ready for the market.

About two weeks after this, a non-Mormon family was burned in their house. The burning occurred at night. The father, mother and five children all perished in the flames. Some enemy accused the Mormons of doing this, and four of them - including Hoopes - were arrested. The court declared them innocent. Soon after that, an enemy collected a number of tar barrels and set fire to them, then gave the fire alarm in St. Joseph. This accomplished its purpose. It collected a large crowd of men. He then proceeded to read what he called the confession of a Mormon. The confession was that Mormons had set fire to the before mentioned, with the purpose of killing the inhabitants. A mob was soon collected, ready for mischief and crime. A neighbor heard the threats of the mob and warned the Mormons.

The day preceeding the incident just related, the sheriff of Buchanan County had called upon Broher Hoopes, and offered him protection as he feared some mischief was brewing; but Hoopes said he thought it was not necessary as he knew of no enemies he had. After the neighbor's warning, he felt a little uncomfortable and decided not to stay in the house that night. It was arranged with Mrs. Hoopes that if a friend or the sheriff should come by the house during the evening or night, she should come out and call Brother Hoopes; but if any danger was about, she should blow the dinner horn. All went well until long into the night. Mrs. Hoopes was awakened by voices outside stationing men to guard the windows and doors, and ordering that if Hoopes attempted to escape, to "shoot him down like a dog." She arose praying, and the answer to her prayer came in a voice which left her without a doubt what to do. "Blow." She gave the horn one strong blast. The leader of the mob demanded that the door be opened. When he entered, he asked for Mr. Hoopes. She told him that he had gone.

"Give me that horn!" he demanded. Taking the horn, he blew and blew and blew again until Sister Hoopes said, "The louder you blow, the farther he'll go."

As soon as she had said these words, she wondered at herself for saying them. She never could understand just what it was that made her say the words. She told the leader further, that if he had come like a gentleman, she would have called her husband in; but now it was impossible.

All night, the mob looked for him and Brother Lincoln.

Next morning, he started for St. Joseph, hiding from the mob by slipping behind trees. Finally, Brother Hoopes saw the sheriff who was a friend and always continued to be so, even during the long days of imprisonment. For Hoopes' protection, the sheriff put him in prison where he kept him for ten months and a day. When he was released, he was freed rather miraculously, thus:

About the time of the trial, Roe Thomas, who had been away from home, came back; and hearing from his mother of the arrest of Hoopes and Lincoln, recalled the events which resulted in the release of these two men.

On the night before the burning of the home, Roe Thomas and John Keen ran away from home. While Keen was going home for his clothes, Thomas lay down near Mrs. Luellen's house and fell asleep. When he awoke, he heard the large clock in Luellen's house strike twelve. This was the exact time that Mrs. Luellen said she had seen Hoopes, who was short; and Lincoln who was extra tall, pass. This had been the testimony on which Hoopes and Lincoln were held. When Mrs, Luellen heard what the boys said, she recalled her testimony, knowing that she had been mistaken.

A horse had been stolen, and when Mr. Luellen went away for the night, he told his wife to keep an eye on the horses, and if she heard the dog bark, to look out. She therefore saw the two boys, Keen and Thomas as they went by, and thought it to be Hoopes and Lincoln coming from a Mormon meeting.

* 1825 or 1826 was the time when Hoopes was in the St. Joseph prison for ten months and one day. During this time, all the property and money he had collected was spent to feed and clothe the family, and for lawyer's fees. The last cow was sold for steamboat fare to Florence, Nebraska. Here, Brother Hoopes joined the family and his brother, Hyrum, from whom he got means for coming across the plains. Both Hoopes and his son were sick most of the way. Mrs. Hoopes, who had a young baby, drove a team and the children helped drive the cattle.

Brother Hoopes and Dan Lewis were both sick with fever and did not get much better until they reached the Black Hills. Dan Lewis had his knee swollen with rheumatism so that he had to use crutches. Rebecca worked as a hired girl for Hyrum Hoopes. Melissa worked for Bovier, brother-in-law of Hyrum Hoopes. She drove his cattle for him, riding horseback. She stayed with the Boviers the first winter in Grantsville.

Brother Hyrum Hoopes had been in Utah once, and had trouble with his bishop, and had taken his family back to Missouri. Here, he had nothing but trouble and sickness, so he decided to return to Utah. He had teams and wagons, and equipment so that he was able to give Warner Hoopes the job of helping him out. Brother Warner Hoopes and Dan Lewis should have driven the teams but were too ill. At the time of Johnston's Army, Hyrum Hoopes drove a team for the Army. His wagon was burned by Lot Smith -- wagon and all it contained, except the personal belongings of the drivers.

Brother Bovier promised Mrs. Hoopes milk for the children if they would catch and tie up a suckling calf at night. Adelaide, who was a little girl, succeeded in getting the rope on the calf's neck; but it, being nearly a year old, was too much for her and pulled her through the slough. She complained that Melissa had not come and helped her when she called.

When Brother Hoopes was in prison, young Dan Lewis went with his mother to visit him. He was so startled at seeing his father through the bars, that he fainted.

* Special note.... this history was typed as originally written by the author... more likely it was about 1858 that he was imprisoned.

Warner married Priscilla Gifford on 29 Jul 1840 in Brown, Illinois. Priscilla (daughter of Levi Gifford and Deborah Wing) was born on 3 Mar 1818 in Covington, Tioga, Pennsylvania; died on 2 Aug 1876 in Weston, Franklin, Idaho. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Covington, Tioga, Pennsylvania is now called Sullivan.

Notes:

Transcription of a handwritten history of his family by Morris Charles Phelps, here.

Transcriptions of some entries, from August 1851, of the journal of the Morris Phelps Emigrating Company.

Transcript of a journal of daily events kept by Morris Charles Phelps in Alpine, Utah from 1856 through 1859.

Much more about Morris Charles Phelps here.

By "SMSmith" at Find a Grave:

"Morris' line goes back to William Phelps who immigrated to America in 1630. Morris' mother was the descendant of a Hessian soldier who was captured at Trenton during the American Revolution. He then joined the colonial army and fought with Washington. Morris attended school in various frontier communities as his family moved west. They settled in Ohio and he had the opportunity to attend school briefly at Mentor, Ohio. His diaries and letters show a better than average vocabulary and he was excellent penman.

"When he was about nineteen years of age, he visited his relatives in Illinois. While there he met and fell in love with Laura Clark. Laura was born in New Fairfield, Connecticut on July 28, 1807. Morris and Laura were married March 26, 1826. They lived in Illinois for five years and their two oldest daughters, Paulina Eliza and Mary Ann were born there. They became interested in the new religion of Mormonism in 1831 and after several weeks of investigation, they were baptized in the Dupage River on August 18, 1831. They left Illinois two months later and joined the Saints in Missouri. Their daughter, Harriet Wight, was born soon after their arrival. Morris and his family were driven from their homes in Jackson County and moved north into Clay County. He was called on a mission for the church in 1834 and was sent to the states of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. This left Laura alone with her three daughters. She taught school and practiced obstetrics. Charles C. Rich traveled with Morris as his companion, Morris baptized Laura's parents who moved to Missouri and help her while Morris was away.

"Morris spent the winter of 1835-36 as a carpenter on the Kirtland Temple in Ohio. He was ordained a high priest and attended the dedication of the Temple on April 6, 1836. He then returned to his family in Missouri. He returned home in time to help his family move again because of persecution.

"Morris established a home on a small farm just outside of Far West and it was here that his first son, Joseph Morris was born in 1837. Although there was intense persecution and bitterness, this was a time of happiness for the family. Morris invested in a merchandising business and did quite well. The happiness did not last for long, because new mobs formed and caused a great deal of damage and sorrow. They raided the Phelps home and threatened Morris' life, but only killed his hogs, Morris said in his diary that 'I was attacked by the mob...my property was confiscated and I was made a prisoner. (October 31, 1838.) Was put in jail where I remained until July 4, 1839, from which made my escape with Parley P. Pratt, by the assistance of Orson Pratt and my wife, Laura.'

"While Morris was incarcerated, Laura and the children went with her parents to Montrose, Iowa. They found an abandoned farmhouse and made a home. Morris and Parley Pratt were chained with wrist and ankle irons in such a manner that they could only sleep on their backs. The story of Laura's plan to free her husband is amazing and illustrates the great faith courage. She and her brother, John Wesley Clark, rode horseback from Montrose to Columbia, Missouri, a distance of 160 miles. A grandson, Will R. Holmes left the following account: 'Here was her plan to free them: She would secrete three horses in some brush a short distance from the jail. As an excuse to get the jailer to unlock the prison door, she would suggest to the jailer that he open the door and pass the coffee pot in to the prisoners through the open door. Should the jailer unlock the door, it would be the signal to get busy, pull the door wide open, grab the jailer, throw him to the floor and flee for their lives.'

"Laura was warned by her brother, John not to touch the prisoners or assist them as that would be an offense. Will Holmes' history continues: 'The scheme worked but not without difficulties. The second door was unlocked and King Follett (one of the prisoners) pulled the door open and ran out, Parley P. Pratt was to follow and grandfather Phelps, being an athlete and wrestler, was to throw the jailer down and he would follow. It proved to be an exciting event...it was the fourth of Fourth of July and hundreds were nearby celebrating.'

"The escapees made it to where Orson Pratt and John Clark were waiting with the horses. They split up and made their way to Illinois. Morris was quite ill from exposure and being confined to prison for eight months. Laura was left to the mercy of the mob in Columbia. A young man sneaked her away from the angry mob and then assisted her in returning to Illinois where she found friends.

"Morris went on another mission east in 1839. He took Laura with him and also his youngest child, Joseph. Another son, Jacob Spencer, was born in Indiana. Morris' writings reveal the next tragic event, which occurred shortly after the end of the mission to the east. 'Rested a few days, got our children together and settled in Macedonia, Illinois, 25 miles east of Nauvoo. Here we lived in peace and quiet for some time. My wife, Laura, acting in the capacity of a midwife, by over exertion and by traveling day and night, took sick 1st of February and died on the 9th of February, 1842.'

"Laura's death was a great sorrow to Morris, especially with the five small children. Persecution against the Mormons was beginning in Illinois and he worried about protecting them from the mobs. Morris met Sara Thompson, the daughter of David and Leah L. Thompson. Sara was twenty-two years old and a schoolteacher. She was born March 20, 1820 in Pompey, New York and had come to Nauvoo with her widowed mother. Morris and Sara were married March 27, 1842 and they moved into Nauvoo where Morris could work on the temple. Two daughters were born to them while living in Nauvoo, but both died in infancy. Laura's youngest child, Jacob, was accidentally scalded to death. Morris' daughters Mary Ann and Paulina married Charles C. Rich and Amasa M. Lyman respectively. Hyrum Smith Phelps, Sara's third child, was born in Nauvoo on February 26, 1846. This was the bitter cold night that many saints were being driven from their homes and across the Mississippi River.

"The Phelps family reached Winter Quarters in the fall of 1846. They remained here for five years and prepared for the journey to the mountains. Morris spent five his time building and repairing wagons and travel equipment. Morris married Martha Barker Holmes on February 26, 1848. Martha was fifty years and the mother of James Holmes, who later married Morris' daughter, Harriet. They came to Utah together in 1851 and settled in Alpine. Morris and James Holmes owned interest in a sawmill and other properties in Alpine. Morris served as an Alderman and as a counselor in the bishopric while they lived in Alpine. In June, 1864, both men pulled up stakes and followed Charles C. Rich to Bear Lake.

"Morris' first home in Montpelier was a one room log hut with a dirt floor and a dirt roof. The floor was covered with straw and the roof leaked. The door was made of wooden planks with a latch that was operated by a buckskin, which was pulled in at night for a lock. The furniture was homemade and the beds were made of small poles bored into the walls and supported with crossbeams. The mattress was made of straw. The logs were obtained from 'Joe's Gap,' a narrow gorge two miles north of Montpelier, which opened into a pine-covered canyon. It was Morris's son, Joseph, who found the narrow ravine, and ever since that time it has been called 'Joe's Gap.' The food was cooked on open fireplaces or in Dutch ovens covered with coals. Clothing was all hand made. Every family had its spinning wheel and each community had good weavers. Sarah T. Phelps was one of the most prominent weavers. Most all of the clothing was made from homespun cloth. Men wore buckskin shirts and britches and beaver vests and caps to keep them warm.

"The first year, 1864, an early frost damaged the crops. Teams went to Cache Valley for flour, but before they got back it snowed so hard that they were unable to reach the settlements without additional aid. The winter was a long and severe one, the snow was deep and blizzards made travel impossible. Communication between settlements was made on snowshoes. By spring most of the people were eating frozen potatoes or sticky bread made from frozen wheat.

"Morris later built a large, two-story home with wooden floor and shingle roof, the first in Montpelier. This became a center for community gatherings. He became postmaster of Montpelier in 1869 and was ordained a patriarch by Brigham Young in 1873. Sarah was the first President of the Relief Society in Montpelier. She also served the community as a midwife and she delivered 580 women without a loss. Morris and Sarah lost one daughter, Martha, in Montpelier, who was nineteen. Their daughters, Amanda and Olive, grew to maturity. A son, Charles Wilks, died as a child. Morris and Sarah had seven children, but raised only three. Morris Phelps died at Montpelier on May 22, 1876. After his death Sarah moved to Mesa, Arizona with her son Hyrum. She died there on January 31, 1896."

Regarding the birth date and place of Morris Charles Phelps: Memorial to the Pioneer Women of the Western Reserve ed. Mrs. Gertrude van Rensselaer Wickham (Women's Department of the Cleveland Centennial Commission, 1896), quoted at length here, says that Spencer Phelps came to the township of Leroy in the Western Reserve in 1803, that Mary "Keneep" arrived two years later, and that Spencer and Mary were married there in December 1807. If this is true (which is obviously not established), it calls into question whether Morris Charles Phelps was in fact born on 20 Dec 1805 in Northampton, Massachusetts as reported in many family histories and on his headstone in Montpelier, Idaho. It's worth noting that we have been unable to find any record of the birth of any Morris Phelps in western Massachusetts in the first decade of the 19th century. Is it possible that Morris Charles Phelps was actually born circa 1808 in Ohio? This would mean he began courting Laura Clark Baldwin on his trip to Illinois when he was actually sixteen, and married her in Laurenceville when he was about eighteen -- exactly the ages at which a young man might be tempted to add two years to his claimed age, particularly when far away from any close relatives who might contradict him.

Morris married Sarah Thompson on 27 Mar 1842 in Hancock, Illinois. Sarah (daughter of David John Thompson and Leah Lewis) was born on 20 Mar 1820 in Pomfret, Chautauqua, New York; died on 31 Jan 1896 in Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Allegedly she and her mother Leah Lewis were founding members of the Relief Society when it was organized on 17 Mar 1842, but neither of them is mentioned in Wikipedia's coverage of that first meeting.

From Sarah Thompson Phelps, a memoir by her granddaughter Barbara Ann Phelps Allen:

Grandma was born March 20, 1820. Her parents were James and Leah Lewis Thompson. When she was four years old, her father died leaving her mother with seven small children, making it necessary for her to start out early in life making her own way. In spite of poverty, she succeeded in acquiring sufficient education to be able to teach school.

When she was eleven years old, the gospel came into their home. She, together with her mother and other members of the family except one brother, joined and were baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. After they joined, their friends turned against them, and from then on their trials began. They were driven from place to place and finally forced to flee to the Rocky Mountains. She was brave and courageous as a young woman.

She taught school when she was a young woman. It was customary for teachers to board among the homes of their pupils, which she did, and in doing so she learned many of the plots and schemes of the mobs to assassinate the Saints. She kept the saints posted, and when the final plot came for the general roundup of the saints, she made a dash on horseback to give the alarm to her people. She was followed for five miles one time, but her horse being fastest, she made her escape. Another time when she was teaching, she went to a home to collect her pay, and the people refused to pay. They said their intentions were to drive all the Mormons out and take the crops that they had recently harvested. She told them what she thought of them. While she was speaking, a voice came to her telling her to leave the next morning as soon as she arose. She did, and as she was leaving, she saw the mob coming and they tried to kill her.

At the time of Haun's Mill Massacre, she lived but a few miles from the mill on the creek; some of those who were fortunate enough to get away came to her home. While the mob was going through the country, they crossed the creek where Grandma and all the women were washing clothes. She told many times how they looked, saying they had their faces painted and were disguised in every imaginable way. Some of the women were so frightened, they fainted, but grandma shouted, "Hooray for the captain!" Two of the men rode up to her and asked if she wasn't afraid of them. She said she hadn't been raised in the woods to be afraid of owls. They asked her if she didn't recognize them, and she said she did not. They told her she should, they were her old neighbors. She then asked them what they intended to do, and one replied, "Kill everyone on the creek." Grandma asked what they had done that they should be killed. Their reply was they did not know, they were only obeying orders. On two different occasions, she was chased by a mob who tried to shoot her, but their guns refused to go off.

One time when they had been driven from their home, she said they had traveled all day in the rain driving their cattle. She had on a sunbonnet that was quilted so that cardboard slats could be inserted. The rain had dissolved the slats, and the front of her bonnet flopped in her face. She was soaked to the skin, weary and tired after plodding the mud all day. As they were passing a farm house, a lady saw her and invited her into her home to dry her clothes and get warm. She was taken into the parlor by the fireplace. There were two young ladies and their boy friends sitting there, and when they saw grandma they burst out laughing. She said she was nearly in tears; she looked them in the eye and said, "You must have been born in the woods."

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 27 Sep 1827, Fowler, St. Lawrence, Jefferson, New York
• Alternate death: 29 May 1883, St. David, Cochise, Arizona

Notes:

A memoir of his daughter Mary Elizabeth Bingham, by her daughter Barbara Ann Phelps, calls him "Calvin Perry Bingham."

From The Bingham Family in the United States, citation details below:

Calvin and his family were with the earliest Mormon groups to move across America. The oldest child of Lucius Augustus, Calvin was born in NY, lived in Upper Canada as a child, and by 1840 when he was thirteen, lived with the Mormon group in Henderson, Knox Co IL. About 1848, probably in IA after the Mormons moved to Pottawattamie Co, Calvin married Elizabeth Lucretia Thorn. He, his wife and her entire family, mother and siblings lived in one household in 1850.

Between 1853 and 1867, Calvin and his family lived in several different UT settlements. They then lived for about ten years in Montpelier, Bear Lake Co ID before returning to Box Elder Co UT by 1880. After Calvin died in AZ in 1883, wife Elizabeth moved to Vernal, Uintah Co UT where she lived with grown children William and Alice in 1900.

Posted to ancestry.com by user NORDSEEKER, with the remark: "This account was written by their great grandson, Wes Martin. I don't know where he got all the information, but I found it typed on the back of a family group sheet in his genealogy book."

"Calvin Bingham was the son of Lucius and Sarah Stone Bingham. He was born Sept. 7, 1827 in Fowler, St. Lawrence County, New York. He was the oldest of eight children: four brothers--Benjamin, Augustus, Perry, and Prosper-- and three sisters: Emeline, Lucy, and MaryJane.

"His mother died about 1849. His father remarried but never came west to Utah. Calvin was baptized into the Mormon church at the age of seventeen in Bannock County, Illinois in 1844.

"Elizabeth Lucretia Thorn was the daughter of Ashael and Sarah Lester Thorn, born in Monrovia, Cayuga county, New York on March 25, 1832. She was the second child in a family of ten: three boys--William L., Richard, and Isaac, and seven girls--Maryann, Sarah, Nancy, Lydia, Abigale, Barbara Ann, and Elizabeth Lucretia. Her mother died about 1852 and her father re-married Elizabeth Lusk, a widow. They came west with his family.

"Calvin and Elizabeth were married December 18, 1848 in Pottawatamie, Iowa. Sarah and Calvin were born to them here. In 1853 they and several other members of the Thorn family moved west to Utah settleing in the West Weber area (now known as Uintah). Their third child, Mary Elizabeth, was born here. While living in Uintah, Calvin was called to serve in Col. Johnson's army. They were among the saints that made the move south--leaving their homes to be burned if necessary. On returning they settled in Farmington, Utah, where Lucy Melissa, their fourth child, was born. Later they moved to Three Mile Creek which is now known as Perry, Utah. In about 1857, the Ashael Thorn family moved here too and they built their homes near each other. Barbara Ann, their fifth child was born here. Three years later in 1860 they moved to Hyrum, Utah.

"Being among the first settlers in Hyrum, they took an active part in civic and church activities. Calvin became the first Bishop of Hyrum and was loved and remembered by people for a great many years. Two more children were born to them here, Anna Marie and Ashael.

"In 1865 they were called to settle the Bear Lake, Idaho area. They settled in Montpelier where due to very harsh winters, they lost their crops. Very discouraged, they returned to Hyrum, Utah. Their son, William Augustus, was born here in Montpelier.

"About 1868 they returned to Montpelier. Elizabeth taught the first school in town--teaching out of their small log home. Another daughter, Lydia Emeline, was born to them here. Later, they built a large home on the banks of the creek that ran through town. Their last two children were born here--Orissa Vilate and Alice. Orissa Vilate died at nine months old. Also at this residence, their daughter, Lucy Melissa Bigham Williams, died after giving birth to a baby girl. She was only eighteen years old. This two week old baby girl was raised by her grandparents, Calvin and Elizabeth.

"In 1878, the Binghams, their married son and daughters, and a large group of other people left Montpelier intending to go to Arizona and settle an area there. But upon reaching Salem, Utah, they decided to stop there for a year or so. The Perry Bingham family and the Robert H. Williams family were among those that settled in Salem for that short time. In 1880, with several other families including the Alonzo Bingham family, Calvin and Elizabeth headed for Arizona again. They stopped in St. Johns, Arizona where their daughter, Anna Marie and husband William were living. They stayed there until 1891 when they moved to St. David, Arizona. Arriving on Christmas Day, they joined others of the original group who had settled that area and started up a freighting business. This business engaged in the freight business between Benson, Tombstone and Bisbee. Although Calvin was a blacksmith by trade, he found freighting more profitable. So he bought a team of large horses to go with the team he already had, and followed this occupation for a little more than a year.

"Calvin Bingham left his home with a wagon loaded with freight for Bisbee, about 56 miles from St. David. On the following day, May 27,1883, while going down a steep grade, his freight wagon upset pinning him under the wagon and causing his death.

"His body was brought home by three men from his ward. Funeral services were held in the ward at St. David May 29, 1883. Speakers were Patriarch P.C. Merrill, President David P. Kimball, J.H. Martineau, Bishop Henry Horn, and S.B. Merrill, who all spoke highly of the integrity, faithfullness and honesty of Calvin. After the death of her husband, Elizabeth Lucretia Bingham, with her family consisting of the younger children Ashael, William, Emeline, Lucy Jane, a grand-daughter, and Alice moved to Mesa, Arizona where her three oldest children, Clarinda, Mary Elizabeth Phelps, and Calvin Perry Bingham lived. She had only been there a short time when another sorrow came into her life. Ashael, then 23 years old, had an appendicitis attack and died just four months after his father's death.

"The family spent three years in Mesa and then returned to their former home in Montpelier, Idaho. Then in 1888 they moved to Vernal, Utah where Lucretia spent the remainder of her life. She was a faithful LDS woman and worked in the Relief Society organization. While in Montpelier she had been called to work among the sick and dying. She helped make burial clothes and to dress and lay out the dead. She underwent many hardships of the early pioneers. She learned to be thrifty and to economize so she could feed and clothe her family. It is said that when she bought a piece of calico, she would tear a quilt block from it for the quilt she was making. She made very nice quilts that were the envy of her friends and neighbors. Thread was expensive, so she would ravel out cloth to sew her blocks together with. She taught her 11 children to be thrifty and industrious too. She passed away at her home in Vernal Nov. 28, 1903 as a result of a heart attack."

Calvin married Elizabeth Lucretia Thorne on 18 Dec 1848 in Big Pigeon, Pottawattamie, Iowa. Elizabeth (daughter of Ashal Enoch Thorne and Sarah Lester) was born on 25 Mar 1832 in Moravia, Cayuga, New York; died on 28 Nov 1903 in Vernal, Uintah, Utah; was buried in Vernal Memorial Park, Vernal, Uintah, Utah. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 1 Jun 1795, Caldwell, Warren, New York

Notes:

Shoemaker.

From Our Crandall and Beckstead Ancestors:

"The families of David Crandall and his in-laws, the McBrides, remained close and moved from one place to another together. David and his family heard the Gospel in the home of his mother-in-law. [...] The family moved from New York to Kirtland, Ohio, in 1835. Late in 1835, David, Margaret and Daniel Mead Crandall went to Pike County. Most of the family remained in Kirtland. It is in Pike County where their youngest child was born. Daniel returned to Kirtland that year and David and Margaret remained in Missouri. They went through the same persecutions as did the other Saints there. [...] From Missouri, David and Margaret moved to Quincy, Illinois in about 1838, and met up with the rest of the family. They stayed in Quincy for three years. In 1841, the moved to LaHarpe, Illinois, twenty three miles east of Nauvoo, where there was a thriving branch of the church. [...] David and Margaret were endowed on August 24, 1843, in Nauvoo, in the office of the President.

"David Married Mrs. Jerusha Smith sometime between the death of Margaret and when the Saints left the area in 1846. She had children from her first marriage. [...] Two reasons kept David in LaHarpe: his youngest daughter, Margaret Ann, had mental limitations and he knew that she would not be able to handle the arduous trip west; and his second wife, who was not a member of the Church, refused to go. [...] In 1853, his daughter, Margaret Ann, died."

David married Margaret Ann McBride about 1810. Margaret (daughter of Rev. Daniel McBride and Abigail Mead) was born in 1795 in Chester, Washington, New York; died in Aug 1845 in La Harpe, Hancock, Illinois. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 1 Jun 1792
• Alternate birth: 1 Jun 1794, Chester, Washington, New York

Notes:

Baptized into the LDS, along with her husband and some of their children, 16 Apr 1833 in Villanova, New York. [Our Crandall and Beckstead Ancestors]

The baptisms were performed by Amasa M. Lyman and William F. Cahoon. [David Crandall]

In 1842, her sister Martha McBride became one of the plural wives of Joseph Smith.

Notes:

James Bisbee and his wife joined the LDS church in 1837.

James Bisbee and Polly Packard were:

3rd cousins once removed, via common ancestors John Shaw and Alice Phillips

3rd cousins once removed, via common ancestors John Whitmarsh and Sarah Harding

4th cousins on two lines, via common ancestors John Whitmarsh and Sarah Harding

4th cousins once removed, via common ancestors Samuel & Elizabeth Packard

5th cousins, via common ancestors William Richards and Grace Shaw

James married Polly Packard on 28 Jan 1807 in Plainfield, Hampshire, Massachusetts. Polly (daughter of Noah Packard and Molly Hamlin) was born on 14 Jan 1787 in Plainfield, Hampshire, Massachusetts; died on 11 Aug 1862 in Pharsalia, Chenango, New York; was buried in East Pharsalia Cemetery, East Pharsalia, Chenango, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 14 Jan 1787, McDonough, Chenango, New York

Notes:

Called in some records Polly "Molly" Packard.

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 10 Mar 1787, Stokes, North Carolina

Notes:

Moved to Jackson County, Tennessee around 1815, where they lived about ten years. In Tennessee he taught school and ran a ferry over the Cumberland. Moved to Paris, Edgar, Illinois sometime in the mid-1820s. Along with much of his family (save for his sons Isaiah, John, and William, who never joined), he was baptized into the LDS church in 1835. In the same year, he was ordained a priest and appointed to lead the Edgar County branch of the church. In 1838 he was a member of the high council in Far West, Caldwell, Missouri. He had moved to Hancock county, Illinois by 1840. According to his Find a Grave entry, he went on a church mission to North Carolina in 1844. Emigrated to Deseret with the Aaron Johnson Company wagon train in 1850.

Thomas married Sarah Gordon on 23 Feb 1809 in Stokes, North Carolina. Sarah (daughter of John Gordon and Barzilla Martin) was born in 1789 in Stokes, North Carolina; died on 7 Dec 1872 in Fountain Green, Sanpete, Utah; was buried in Springville City Cemetery, Springville, Utah, Utah. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 20 Nov 1791, Stokes, North Carolina

Notes:

Also called Sallie.

From "Sarah Gordon Guymon," by Olive Guymon Stone:

Sarah was the oldest of John Gordon's and Barzilla Martin's children. She was born 20 November 1789 in Surry County, North Carolina. Being the oldest of twelve children Sarah had many responsibilities; helping her mother with the children, making beds and helping her mother in the tavern. She had a busy life and never knew an idle moment.

Sarah married Thomas Guymon in Stokes County, North Carolina the 23rd day of February 1809. He was the son of Isaiah Guymon and Elizabeth Flynn. He was an ambitious young man, who farmed in the summer months and taught school in the winter. They lived in Stokes County, North Carolina for six years. During that time three sons: Isaiah, John and William were born to them. They moved to Jackson County, Tennessee in 1815. Here they had three more sons: James, Noah Thomas and Martin and one daughter Barzilla. Ten years later they moved again, this time to Edgar County, Illinois in 1825. While living here they had four daughters: Elizabeth, Polly Ann, Sarah Jane and Melissa Jane.

Sarah and her husband were converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1836 and soon joined with the Saints and were with them in all their persecutions. Their son James came to Utah in 1849 and a year later in the spring of 1850 Thomas and Sarah Guymon with their daughter Melissa Jane, their son Noah Thomas, his wife Margaret Johnson and children, their daughter Polly Ann and her husband Robert Johnson and their children, all came to Utah with the Aaron Johnson Company. Their three eldest sons however, did not come to Utah. The family with others made many preparations for the journey to Utah. Among other things, they had to train or break cows to lead on a wagon of three yoke of oxen.

The most pleasant part of their journey was spent traveling along the banks of the Missouri River. The company crossed the river on flat boats and the cattle swam the river. They gathered buffalo chips to make fires in the prairie lands. The company traveled long hard hours but they always took time out at night to sing songs of praise and enjoyed one another's company before retiring.

Three days before the end of this journey their son James came to meet them. The children were driving the cattle ahead of the wagons and when they saw their Uncle James coming they shouted for joy. The shouts of joy soon rang through the entire company. Thomas and Sarah were indeed happy to see their son and the company was glad to see someone they knew for now they were sure that their long journey would soon be at an end. Finally they arrived at the little town of Salt Lake City on the 12 September 1850. One of the sights that impressed the children was a red flag on a stick nailed up on a log room to show that merchandise was sold there and another log room with a tin cup outside to show that tin was sold there.

They spent their first week with James, who lived on the Little Cottonwood River. He had a lovely garden, which furnished good eating for the new arrivals to the valley. The married children moved down into Utah County all except James, who moved down some time later. Thomas and Sarah spend their first winter in Salt Lake Valley.

Sarah had a very quick temper and was very determined about getting her own way when she felt she was right. The people in Salt Lake Valley were told to take their dry cows in the herd and let the herder take them to Antelope Island, which is an island in the Great Salt Lake. Sarah felt it was wrong to let her cows be sent over there for the winter. The herder came and put her cows in with the rest of the herd. She was very determined that her cows were not going so she came out with her cane for a switch and turned her cows out of the herd and took them home. The cows had to be herded all the time. She must have known what she was doing for the other cows froze to death and her cows furnished milk for her family and many more settlers.

Sarah not only loved her children very much but she was fond of her brothers and sisters. We have found many instances where she was close to the son of her sister; his name was Calvin Stone who lived in Utah. We also have evidence that she corresponded with her family back in North Carolina. Among the letters written to her youngest brother Martin was found a document giving Martin the Power of Attorney and a letter asking him to sell her land, which was left her by her father. Her father was a wealthy man at the time of his death. Her oldest brother James was the Administrator of the Estate. This letter to Martin was 28 February 1870. In this same letter she stated that her health was very poor and that she was living with her son Noah Thomas and that he was taking care of all her business affairs.

After Noah Thomas moved to Springville, Thomas and Sarah moved to Springville. Here her husband Thomas died 20 October 1855. After his death Sarah moved to Fountain Green to be near her children there. She lived in a home of her own and had a girl named Martha Jane Park lived with her to keep her company. She lived the last few years with her son Noah Thomas. Here she died on 07 December 1872, at the age of 91 years. She was taken to Springville for burial beside her husband.

Notes:

With his wife Sarah Brown, baptized into the LDS church in 1836. Baptism performed by Orson Pratt. [Findagrave.com]

Membership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1830-1848 has him born 17 Aug 1785 in Armagh, son of John Johnson; living in London, Ontario in 1813; "Baptism Date: 1836, Ordained High Priest." It also has him married to Sarah Brown (no further information about her) and comments that "Edward was listed among the Nauvoo members."

Early Members of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints says that "Edward Johnson resided at London, Ontario, Canada, in 1813. He joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1836. He was ordained a high priest and was listed among the Nauvoo members. He was baptized and confirmed a member of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints by E. C. Briggs and G. R. Outhouse." This source also agrees that he was born in Armagh and gives a birthdate of "Aug 1785".

Sources cited by Early Members of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints:

Early Reorganization Minutes, 1852-1871, Book A, pp. 85, 141, 351, 507

Saints' Herald Obituaries, 1872, p. 478

Black, Membership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: 1830-1848, 25:517-18

Nauvoo Temple Endowment Register, 1845-1846

Platt, Nauvoo: Early Mormon...Series, 1839-1846

Smith, Nauvoo Social History Project

Belvidere, Iowa, RLDS Branch Records

Note that Seventy Quorum Membership, 1835-1846 is at odds with some of this: it has him born in 1806 in Ireland (no more specific place) and dying in 1873 in Iowa (no more specific place). It does agree that he was baptized in 1836 and notes under "Post-Nauvoo data" that he was "affiliated with RLDS." It also gives "Brown, Sarah" as one of his wives.

His obituary appears on page 478 of volume 19 (1872) of the Saints' Herald, the magazine of the RLDS. "At his residence at Preparation, Harrison Co., Iowa, April 18, 1872, of old age, Br. EDWARD JOHNSON, in the 87th year of his life. He was an old-time saint, and was faithful to his conceptions of duty to the last. Peaceful be his rest."

Note that an age of 87 in 1872 is in accord with a birth year of 1785.

Note also that while the Saints' Herald obituary places the (now-vanished) town of Preparation in Harrison County, Iowa, its site actually was and is in Monona County.

From the Saints' Herald for 1 Jan 1873 (vol. 20, p. 16), by Joseph Smith III, Prophet-President:

"The notable departures from this earthly life, so far as the church has been affected thereby, are Bro. William Marks, Sr., Brn. George Bellamy, J. B. Brown, Austin Cowles, N. H. Ditterline, Duty Griffith, Edward Johnson, John Norton, and Alva Smith, all good men. The most of these brethren were old-time Saints, faithful and true. All of them were of very excellent service to the church where they lived. As the New Year comes in we wonder how many that begin it will be left at its close to battle for the right."

The fact that Edward Johnson died in Preparation naturally makes us wonder if he was one of those who were, for a time, "Baneemyites," followers of Charles B. Thompson:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_B._Thompson
http://www.iowadnr.gov/Destinations/StateParksRecAreas/IowasStateParks/ParkDetails.aspx?ParkID=610160
http://www.wellswooster.com/tommies/cbthompson.htm
http://iagenweb.org/boards/monona/biographies/index.cgi?read=150652

Edward married Sarah Frances Brown. Sarah was born on 7 Sep 1781 in Armagh, Armagh, Ireland; died on 4 Apr 1844 in Missouri. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

The Find a Grave entry for her husband asserts that she died in Canada before the family arrived in Missouri.

Notes:

Both John A. Freestone and Donna Smith Packer give Moses Packer's mother as Ann Phipps, but Packer researcher Warren Packer says: "In a paper left by Jonathan Taylor Packer, the name of the mother of Moses Packer is given as Margaret. Descendants of Jesse Packer, a brother of Moses, say that the mother of Jesse was Mary Ann Phipps. Records show that Aaron Packer, father of Moses, married Ann Phipps; but we have not been able to find out with certainty the name of Moses' mother."

*****

There's a photograph of a man in a large top hat that is in wide circulation on the internet as an image of Moses Packer. Dozens of copies of it can be found attached to Moses Packer on ancestry.com, geni.com, etc. It also appears in at least one Packer family history volume published by a relative of TNH. Do a Google image search on "Moses Packer" and you'll find it immediately.

Those who believe that this man is Moses Packer should contemplate the fact that the first photographic portraits of human beings were made in 1839. Moses Packer died in 1830.

*****

Common ancestor of TNH and Jeff Flake, former senator from Arizona and Ambassador-to-Turkey-designate, making then fifth cousins:

Moses Packer (1764-1830) = Eve Williams (d. ~1837)
William Hamilton Packer (1815-1875) = Sarah Briggs Allen (1835-1920)
William Ezra Packer (1868-1932) = Emma Elizabeth Foutz (1869-1947)
Joseph Alma Packer (1890-1954) = Blanche Standing (1892-1954)
Wilma Packer (1915-1974) = Leon Almond Hock (1913-1973)
Nerita Hock (b. 1937) = Dean Maeser Flake (b. 1931)
Jeffry Lane Flake (b. 1962)

Moses married Eve Williams about 1791 in Fayette, Pennsylvania. Eve (daughter of Abraham Williams and Sarah) died after 9 Jul 1837. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

According to a spirit-duplicated document in the papers of Paul Leslie Crandall (d. 1987), probably written by Warren Packer, Eve Williams was "said to have lived in Fayette County, Pennsylvania at the time of her marriage to Moses Packer."

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 16 Apr 1794, West Green River, Vermont
• Alternate birth: 16 Apr 1794, Shelburne, Chittenden, Vermont

Notes:

Note that no town called "West Green River" or "Green River" exists in New Hampshire. There is a river called the Green River in Vermont.

Wikipedia page about the Haun's Mill massacre here.

Posted to ancestry.com by "genealogy_man":

1836. William Sisson CHAMPLIN (Mercy SISSON, William, William, Thomas, George, Richard) was born 16 Apr 1794 in Shelburne, Vermont. He died 29 Jan 1861 in Lehi, Utah, Utah.

From Cheri Hardisty:

William Sisson Champlin and his family joined the Mormon Church in the 1830's and migrated to Missouri. He was the son of Joseph Champlin of Westerly, Rhode Island, and Mercy Sisson of Stonington, CT.

The Sissons settled in Independence, Missouri, and were driven out of that area along with the other Mormons. They subsequently located themselves in Clay County Missouri until the Mormons were driven out of there, and then located in Caldwell County, Missouri. Caldwell County was set up at that time by the government, as a county specifically for the Mormons to live in, in order to avoid further conflicts. However, there were some of the old settlers who remained in the county, and they were not happy to have the Mormons as neighbors. You see, Missouri was a slave state, and the Mormons were opposed to slavery. So the aim of the old settlers was to expel the Mormons from the state to ensure the state remained pro-slavery.

William Sisson and his family lived at a place called Haun's Mill. It was a Mormon settlement, but not a very large one. The largest Mormon settlement in Caldwell County was Far West which had about 5,000 residents. The Mormons were aware of the rising hostilities against them, and as a result, the Prophet Joseph Smith counseled those at Haun's Mill to come to Far West for safety. It was October 30th, 1838. William and his family were concerned about having food to last them through the winter at Far West, and so in preparation to go there, they were digging up carrots that day. As they did so, the mob rode in on horseback, and a massacre ensued. A couple of days after the massacre, the Governor of Missouri, Governor Boggs, issued his famous "extermination order" which resulted in the Mormons fleeing to Illinois for safety. The extermination order called for the Mormons to be driven from the state, or exterminated if necessary. (After Joseph Smith was murdered in Illinois, Brigham Young took the reins of leadership of the church, and in 1847, the Mormons began their famous pioneer trek to Salt Lake City, an area which was not desirable to others, in hopes that at last they would be able to live in peace.)

When the mob arrived at Haun's Mill, the women and children fled into the woods for safety, and the men ran into the blacksmith shop, and attempted to defend the settlement from that position. The blacksmith shop, however, was made of hewn logs, and there were cracks (the crack width being about 2") between the logs. The Mob came right up to the blacksmith shop and poked the barrels of their rifles through those cracks and opened fire on those inside. William Sisson Champlin was inside. And when the massacre was over, there were only two survivors from inside the blacksmith shop.

William was a smart man. When he saw what was happening, he laid down on the floor, and as his comrades fell to the ground, dead, he pulled their bodies over the top of his own, and pretended he was dead. When the mob rushed into the blacksmith shop after opening fire, they saw that William had new boots on his feet, and they wanted those boots. He allowed them to take the boots, all the while pretending he was dead, and as a result, he lived, and for the rest of his days, he was known as "Old Possum". His wife and children who had fled into the woods also survived.

William married Mary RING "Polly", daughter of Reuben RING and Anna, on 28 Mar 1816 in Hartland, Windsor, Vermont. They had the following children:

3724 F i
Sarah CHAMPLIN.
3725 M ii
William Jefferson CHAMPLIN was born 1820.
3726 M iii
Joseph Albert CHAMPLIN was born 1825.
3727 M iv
Alonzo CHAMPLIN was born 1827.
3728 F v
Angelina Avilda CHAMPLIN was born 8 Jan 1828 in Hartland, Vinson, Vermont.
+ 3729 F vi
Mary Jane CHAMPLIN was born 20 May 1830 and died 1 Nov 1906.
3730 F vii
Margaret Emma CHAMPLIN was born about 1833.

William married Mary Ring on 28 Mar 1816 in Hartland, Windsor, Vermont. Mary (daughter of Reuben French Ring and Nancy Reed) was born in 1794 in Old Salisbury, Essex, Massachusetts; died on 3 Apr 1871 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: 3 Apr 1871, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah

Notes:

Sometimes recorded as Mary Polly Ring, or Mary "Polly" Ring.

Deseret News, 12 April 1871:

DIED. — At Brigham City, at the residence of Bro. J. T. Packer, from the effects of canker, Mary Champlin, aged 77 years, on the 3rd instant.

Deceased was born at Old Salisbury, Essex county, Mass.; embraced the gospel with her husband at Brooklin, Susquehanna County, Penn., in 1832, while Martin Harris and his brother were preaching there. On their journey to the Far West they were stopped by a mob and survived the memorable scenes at "Haun's Mill." Of those who remained at the blacksmith shop, Bro. Champlin was the only one who escaped death, and was saved by the brethren falling on him. One of the mob, however, discovered him, and said "by h__l there is yet one man who is not killed, let us finish him;" while another said, "It is time we were off," which created a panic, and all fled. He guarded off the guns of the mob which, through the shop walls, were aimed at the little boy of Bro. Warren Smith, who was at last so brutally murdered by them. He subsequently lived in Nauvoo, Ill., was with the Saints in the general exodus from there and, with his family, reached Salt Lake Valley in 1849, and died ten years ago. Sister Champlin, the deceased, was without the sight of her eyes for the last five years of her life. The interment has just taken place to-day, at 3 p.m., and has been largely attended.

Notes:

Arrived in Canada, 1796, where he took the Loyalist oath of allegiance. [Ontario People: 1796-1803 by E. Keith Fitzgerald. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1993.]

Robert married Providence Miller. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Elijah married Mehitable Hall about 1788. Mehitable (daughter of Rev. Avery Hall and Hannah Chesley) was born on 22 Mar 1769 in New Hampshire; was christened on 26 Mar 1769 in Rochester, Strafford, New Hampshire; died on 25 Jun 1800 in Corinth, Orange, Vermont. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Bef 26 Mar 1769, Rochester, Strafford, New Hampshire

Calvin married Deborah Hopkins on 12 Nov 1800. Deborah (daughter of Elijah Hopkins and Joanna Parish) was born about 1780; died on 6 Sep 1831. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Baptized into the LDS church 16 Jan 1834 in Ohio. Later lived in Nauvoo; arrived at the Salt Lake Valley in 1850.

Jonathan married Rebecca Watts in 1812. Rebecca (daughter of Thomas Watts and Mary Cookson) was born in 1792; died in 1863 in Mendon, Cache, Utah; was buried in Mendon City Cemetery, Mendon, Cache, Utah. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 24 Oct 1792, Newberry, York, Pennsylvania
• Alternate birth: 24 Oct 1793, Newberry, York, Pennsylvania

Notes:

Baptized into the Mormon church in 1831. He baptized Eleazar Miller, who in turn baptized Brigham Young. His brother Alpheus Gifford baptized Heber C. Kimball.

He was a participant in Zion's Camp, 1834.

In 1835, he was ordained a Seventy and called to serve in the First Quorum of the Seventy, thus becoming one of the earliest General Authorities of the church.

More about him here.

Levi married Deborah Wing in 1816 in Tioga, Pennsylvania. Deborah (daughter of Prince Wing and Deborah Chase) was born on 5 Apr 1796; died on 15 Mar 1877 in Weston, Franklin, Idaho; was buried in Weston City Cemetery, Weston, Franklin, Idaho. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 20 May 1796, Greenfield, Saratoga, New York
• Alternate birth: 29 May 1796, Greenfield, Saratoga, New York

Notes:

Fought in the War of 1812.

Spencer Phelps (1782-1865) appears in most online genealogies as a son of Spencer Phelps (1753-1829) by his second wife Theodomy Allen (1755-1841). But the older Spencer's first wife Naomi Clark died in 1784. If the younger Spencer was born in 1782, his mother was Naomi Clark, not Theodomy Allen.

Evidence:

Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 shows Naomi Clark born 4 Oct 1753 in Northampton, Massachusetts, daughter of Ezra and Martha Clark.

Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988, "CLARK, NAOMI of Northampton, Intention of marriage to Spencer Phelps, published March 19, 1781."

Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 shows Spencer Phelps born 24 May 1782 in Chesterfield, Massachusetts (just outside Northampton), son of Spencer Phelps and Naomi.

This headstone at Bridge Street Cemetery, Northampton, Massachusetts, of "Mrs. Naomi Phelps Wife of Mr. Spencer Phelps who died May 25 1784 In the 31st Year of her life".

Spencer married Mary Kniep. Mary (daughter of Christian Burchard Kniep and Maribah Miller) was born on 13 Dec 1784 in near Mt. Tom, Hampden, Massachusetts; died on 22 Apr 1851 in Kirtland, Lake, Ohio. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

In some records as "John David Wesley Thompson". Claimed is various LDS family histories as being born in Pelham, Massachusetts, but the 1904 edition of Pelham vital records shows no entry for his birth.

David married Leah Lewis about 1812. Leah (daughter of Gideon Lewis and Sarah Card) was born on 7 May 1787 in New Ashford, Berkshire, Massachusetts; died on 3 Nov 1843 in Nauvoo, Hancock, Illinois. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Allegedly she and her daughter Sarah Thompson were founding members of the Relief Society when it was organized on 17 Mar 1842, but neither of them is mentioned in Wikipedia's coverage of that first meeting.

Obituary, from the Nauvoo Neighbor, 15 Nov 1843:

Died on the 3rd inst. in this city, Mrs. Leah Chiles [Childs], of cancer and rheumatism, in the 57th year of her age.

Sister Childs was a firm believer in the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as they have been revealed in the last days to man through the medium of revelation.

She shared all the persecutions heaped upon the saints -- was driven with them from the state of Missouri, and suffered much from exposure and fatigue. Never was the name of a more generous, benevolent and sympathetic woman enrolled upon the records of the Church. She was truly a "mother in Israel." She possessed great faith, which seemed, for a long time, to baffle the destroyer, death; but it was the will of her Heavenly Father to take her to himself, that her soul might be emancipated. She [was] released from the vicissitudes of this troublesome world. She had been afflicted for more that a year, and suffered the most excruciating pain, but she was perfectly resigned to the will of heaven and when the period of her desolution arrived she fell asleep, as calm as the sleep of infancy, with the unwavering hope of participating in the first resurrection, when she should awake to everlasting youth, immortality and eternal life.

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 1 Sep 1804, Vergennes, Addison, Vermont
• Alternate birth: 7 Sep 1804, Vergennes, Addison, Vermont
• Alternate birth: 27 Sep 1804, Vergennes, Addison, Vermont
• Alternate death: 11 Apr 1857, Iowa

Notes:

From The Bingham Family in the United States, citation details below:

With his brothers Reuben and Jeremiah 2nd Jr., and his mother and her second husband, Abner Whipple, Lucius Augustus and his family moved west to near Brockville, Upper Canada about 1829. None of them appeared on the NY 1830 Federal census. The group remained in Canada until the late 1830s when they decided to embrace the Mormon religion and moved to Henderson, Knox Co IL, near Nauvoo. They may have passed through Oswego Co NY where brother Aaron lived. Lucius, Reuben, and Jeremiah 2nd Jr. were all enumerated on the IL 1840 U.S. census. By 1850, part of the group had moved on to near Council Bluffs, Pottawattamie Co IA, but it is not clear what happened to Lucius Augustus. He was not named on the IA 1850 Federal census, but his oldest son was. There is also a record of a child born to him and second wife Rebecca White at Harrison Co IA in 1853. Instead of going on to Utah, Lucius Augustus remained in IA and died in 1857.

Lucius married Sarah Stone in 1826 in Fowler, St. Lawrence, Jefferson, New York. Sarah (daughter of Josiah Stone and Sarah Darby) was born in 1804 in Londonderry, Rockingham, New Hampshire; died in 1849 in Pottawattamie, Iowa. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 21 Apr 1804, Londonderry, Rockingham, New Hampshire
• Alternate birth: 21 Apr 1805, Londonderry, Rockingham, New Hampshire
• Alternate birth: 21 Apr 1806, Londonderry, Rockingham, New Hampshire
• Alternate death: 1850, Pottawattamie, Iowa

Notes:

Also called Sarah "Sally" Stone.

The database "Membership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1830-1848" states that her parents were Josiah Stone and Sarah Darby/Durby/Daby.

Lucius Augustus Bingham and Sarah Stone were great-great grandparents of TNH's third cousin twice removed, Harold Bingham Lee (1899-1973), eleventh president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, after whom the main library at BYU is named.

Notes:

Headstone says "Ashal (Asahel)".

Listed in the 1850 census at "South Fork of the American River, El Dorado, California", as Ashel Thorn, born abt 1808, New York.

Departed Six Mile Grove (near Winter Quarters, Nebraska) 9 Jun 1853; arrived Salt Lake Valley 9 Sep 1853. (Pioneer Immigrants to Utah Territory, at ancestry.com)

From "A Biography of Asahel (Ashel) Thorn," credited as "written by a great-grandson Enoch Thorne 'in the first person'", reproduced on "Crapo-Hegsted Family Tree" on ancestry.com by tree owner "Jerrirud":

"In 1800, my father, RICHARD, and mother, MARY ANNER ARMSTRONG, with their 10 children migrated west to Pennsylvania. While there I married a beautiful young girl named SARAH LESTER. All of us, but my father, joined the Mormon Church and began to gather to Nauvoo, Illinois. Before we were driven from Nauvoo, 8 of us were endowed in the Nauvoo Temple. We were fortunate to escape with our lives and, as a family, pressed on to Pottawattamie, Iowa and camped at Six Mile Grove, about six miles west of Winter Quarters. I built a house there for Sarah, and I, now also, had ten children.

"At Pottawattamie, my eldest son, WILLIAM, and I decided to go to California to participate in the gold rush. While in California, I was called home because of the serious illness of my wife, SARAH, and I left by boat home, leaving my teams, wagons and son, WILLIAM, in California. My California venture was a financial aid to me for the rest of my life.

"At Pottawattamie, Iowa we organized a company of Saints and started for the Salt Lake Valley on June 9, 1853. We were part of a company consisting of 202 souls and 70 wagons with Daniel C. Miller and John W. Cooley in charge. My uncle JOSEPH THORN was one of the Captains of 50. While on the plains of Iowa my wife passed away, and I buried her while on the move to Zion. That day I shall never forget. The Company divided soon after leaving Elkhorn, and my children and I arrived in the Salt Lake Valley September 9, 1853 in the Captain Thorn Company."

Ashal married Sarah Lester on 3 Aug 1829 in Clinton, Dutchess, New York. Sarah (daughter of John Lester and Nancy Appleby) was born on 15 Jun 1809; died on 9 Aug 1853 in Pottawattamie, Iowa. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 14 Jun 1809, Albany, Albany, New York

Notes:

Death location on (modern) memorial marker says "ON THE PLAINS, POTTAWATTAMIE, IOWA". [Find a Grave entry for Sarah Lester]