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Albert Stephen Farnsworth

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Albert Stephen Farnsworth

1844-1904

Albert Stephen Farnsworth was born May 22, 1844 in Nauvoo, Illinois, a few short weeks before the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum Smith.  He was the third son of Stephen Martindale Farnsworth and Julia Anne Clark and the seventh generation of Farnsworth’s in the United States.

His ancestors came from Farnsworth, England and if our genealogical recrods are accurate, were descended from English kings of the Plantagenet line.  The Farnsworth’s were among the early settlers of Massachusetts.  We find record of them as early as 1638 taking an active part in the settling of Massachusetts. Matthias Farnsworth, Albert’s immediate ancestor, settled in Groton, Massachusetts.  He was a freeman and took active part in the civic and religious affairs of the community.  Men of this family fought and died bravely for freedom in both the Revolutionary and Civil Wars.  One of these received commendation from his commanding officer and was posthumously honored after he fell at Gettysburg.  The family sought after freedom of religion and high education and it became traditional for males of this line to attend Harvard.

Stephen Martindale, Albert’s father, was born October 8, 1810, in Dorset, Vermont.  He was the first of the family to join the Mormons.  He joined in the early days of the Church, moved to Nauvoo, Illinois, and endured the trials and persecutions suffered there by the Saints.  He was a carpenter and builder and helped to build the Nauvoo Temple. A short time before the martyrdom of the Prophet, he had the “Farnsworth Vision” in which he saw the exodus of Saints from Nauvoo under the leadership of Brigham Young, the blessings and abundance that would come to the Mormons in the West, and their triumphant return to Jackson County in the last days.  He went west from Nauvoo and settled first in Iowa, and later emigrated to Utah and settled in Pleasant Grove He was called from there to help settle Richfield and Joseph City, Utah.  He died September 19, 1855.

Albert’s mother, Julia Anne Clark, was the daughter of Richard and Anne Elizabeth Sheffer Clark and a descendant of William Clark who came to Pennsylvania with William Penn in 1682 and helped to establish the village of Chester and later the city of Philadelphia.  These early Clarks belonged to the Society of Friends, commonly called the Quakers.   According to family genealogical records, they were of Scotch-Irish lineage descended from the Stuart line of the kings of England.  William Clark served as judge and a member of the first governing body of Pennsylvania.  Members of the family served in both the Revolutionary and Civil Wars.

Richard and his family heard the gospel from Franklin D. Richards in 1842.  They joined the Church and moved to Nauvoo and helped in the building of the Nauvoo Temple.  In May of 1850, they crossed the plains and became the first permanent residents of a community which they called Pleasant Grove.  Julia Anne went with her husband to settle southern Utah and Arizona and after his death, moved with her sons to Mexico where she lived, until she died on October 24, 1898 in Colonia Pacheco.  She loved flowers and patiently carried seeds and potted plans as she moved from place to place.  These she planted between the rows of vegetables, and her garden was thus a place of beauty.  She took with her to Pacheco a yellow climbing rose she had carried with her on her many travels and it is said that yellow roses now grow wild all over the Pacheco Valley.

Albert Stephen Farnsworth crossed the plains with his parents and grew to manhood in Richfield, Utah.  He was a great athlete, a foot racer, and wrestler.  Brigham Pierce, boyhood acquaintance, often told about Albert Farnsworth.  He said the first time he ever saw him, he was with his older brothers and they were challenging anyone who would to race or wrestle against Albert.  He said that as far as he knew he was never beaten.  Albert also loved to sing and dance.  From his early youth he showed remarkable civic leadership.  He built the recreation hall in Richfield and served as recreation manager.  He had a way with young people and they loved and respected him.  His religion, it would seem, was the dearest thing in his life.  His loyalty in support of Church Authorities set an example to the youth of the community who loved and emulated him.  He was a man of good judgement whose counsel was often sought.

While living in Richfield he married Martha Hall.  She bore him four children before they were divorced.  Later he married Mary Ann Johnson, Eliza Bertleson, and Sarah Ann Slade.  All three of these wives went with him to Mexico and bore him large families.

In 1879 he was called to help settle St. Johns, Arizona.  There the Farnsworth’s lived on a ranch quite a distance from town and their nearest neighbors were the Nathan Tenney’s who later also went to Mexico.  During this time bands of Indians frequently came by the ranch and stopped for food.  They were never turned away.  Though the Farnsworth’s had very little for themselves, they always shared with the Indians.  I remember Grandmother telling about an Indian brave who came to her one day and asked for food.  She offered him what they had, cornbread and molasses, but he threw it down and demanded something better. Grandmother was so angered by seeing good food wasted when her own children often went hungry, that, forgetting her husband’s warnings to always treat the Indians with kindness, she picked up the broom and chased the man out of the house.  He never returned.  Grandmother’s eyes would flash with righteous indignation as she told the story to me.  The picture of her with her broomstick in hand and the Indian fleeing before her has always stayed with me.

While still at the ranch, they also had an exciting experience with the famous outlaw, Billy the Kid.  Brother Tenney had moved his family back into town and grandfather was away working at a logging camp.  One day, becoming very worried about his family, he left work and rode the 75 miles to the ranch.  He found the family safe, but decided to spend the night and return to work the next morning.  Before sunrise a band of armed men rode into the ranch and demanded breakfast and feed for their horses.  Grandpa recognized the leader as the notorious bandit, Billy the Kid.  Grandmother hurriedly fixed a fine meal while Grandfather fed and watered the horses.  After the meal, the leader asked what they owed and Grandfather named a small sum.  The leaders refused to pay and as Grandfather moved to go into the house a dozen revolvers were drawn with heavy oaths and threats to blow out his brains if he moved.  Quickly his terrified wife threw her arms around her husband’s neck, protecting his body with her own.  The outlaws searched the Tenney home taking all their rifles.  They took Albert’s new saddle, and, asking if he had guns in his house, moved toward it.  Grandmother thinking only of their desperate situation dashed for the door and barricaded it with her arms, “Stand back!” She said.  “Don’t you dare go in there.” With a cynical smile, but heeding her flashing brown eyes and her fearless attitude, the bandit turned away. With Grandfather still under guard, the outlaws rounded up a band of choice horses belonging to the people of St. Johns; but as soon as they started to ride away, he rushed into the house of his rifle determined to follow the outlaws and recover the horses.  Grandmother pleaded with him not to go, fearing for his life and those of the children. But two other horses came in sight.  Quickly Mary and Albert drove these into the corral.

“Mary, I will not see a single one of these horses taken,” Albert told her.  “Take this gun and go into the cellar.  Shoot the first man who tries to enter.  I will stand guard here.”

A commanding figure he no doubt made as he walked back and forth, his Winchester shining in the sun.  The outlaws paused to consider.  This was no man to be trifled with, and the wife handled a gun as if she too knew how to use it.  Apparently not wishing to take a chance, Billy the Kid gave orders for his men to go to the trail.  Later help came and a posse was formed to pursue the bandit, but he escaped.  For years afterword, Grandmother enjoyed a certain fame as the woman who stood off Billy the Kid.

In 1880 Stephen Albert was called from St. Johns to Fruitland, New Mexico.  There he operated a store on the banks of the San Juan River, which divided the town of Fruitland.  Because of his honesty and fairness in trading with the Indians, they became his friends and they helped him and protected him.  Because of his influence with the Indians he was chosen as one of a party to accompany Heber J. Grant, who was then a young Apostle, on a tour of Arizona.  The Indians gave Albert an Indian name, “Chis, Chily, Ixy,” which means that he was a pretty good man.

Albert was called to the colony of Mancos, Colorado, which was in need of strong leadership.  He was made Presiding Elder and later sustained as Bishop.  Arriving in Mancos he called the people together and asked them to all work together to build a church house.  They agreed and although it was summer and they were busy with farm work, they began at once cutting and hauling logs.  Actual building began on July 1, and by July 24, the building was far enough advanced to hold the traditional celebration there, and by the time winter set in it was completely finished.

Albert and the Saints prospered in Mancos. He built homes for his families, cleared land of farming, set a store, and bought a grist mill.  But persecution by U.S. Marshals caught up with them again.  Bishop Farnsworth had either to go underground or move again.  He never hesitated. Believing in “the principle,” his wives and children were dear to him and they were his responsibility. He couldn’t leave them to fend for themselves, deny them the protection they needed or the right to his name.  They decided to move to Mexico.  This time there could be no open selling of property.  Secretly he called his family together.  Taking what little they had saved and food and clothing to last them for a while, they loaded wagons and began the long journey to a new land.  This was in 1889.

They first settled in Colonia Pacheco where Albert hoped to be able to support his families by building.  He and his two brothers built many of the homes in Colonia Pacheco and Colonia Garcia.  But times were hard and money and food were scarce.  Albert bought a sawmill and his brother Alonzo operated it while Albert and his older sons began to work at railroad building for John W. Young.  When the railroad venture went broke, he not only lost his job, but the little money he had invested in it.  He and his boys turned to freighting and whenever they came home, they brought their wagons loaded with provisions which they divided with the hungry people in the town.  Albert had always been generous to a fault.  He could not see a woman or a child suffer in want, so often he gave away necessities and left home to find more work in order to help those in need.  No one wife or family was every favored above the other.  Each family took turns accompanying him while he worked for the railroad.  When he received his pay he bought things to make his families comfortable.  Aunt Bertha Romney says that she remembered at one time he bought three stoves, three bedroom sets, three organs, and several bolts of cloth.

On the rough frontier while he worked for the railroads he tried to keep his family free of bad environment and he himself lived up to the principles of the Church.  Each day there were family prayers, singing hymns and reading the Bible.  He tried to teach what was right and impressed his children with the importance of being honest and truthful.  His loyalty to the Church was tested when Moses Thatcher was dropped from the Council of the Twelve.  His son Reuben said that of this occasion, “Pa loved that man above all men and he couldn’t believe that he was in the wrong.  For many days and nights, Pa fasted and prayed about it, and then one day he picked up the Doctrine and Covenants and read a passage where the Lord promised that the President of the Church would never lead the Saints astray.  Albert knew this was an answer to his prayer. From that time on, he had no doubt. That little passage of scripture is why we are members of the Church today.”

In 1895, Albert with his wife Mary Ann and her family, moved to Sabinal where Albert took a contract with the Northwestern Railroad.  The older boys freighted from Sabinal to Villa Ahumada, always resting on Sunday.  When this railroad job was finished Mary Ann moved to Colonia Juarez where she could put her children in school.  Albert sold the sawmill in Pacheco to his brother and invested the proceeds in farmland at Colonia Dublan.  But again in 1904 he took a railroad job in the Oriente Sur Railroad and moved Mary Ann and her family to Guerrero, Chihuahua.  During the years they had moved, Mary had lost five of her fourteen children. Here at Guerrero she lost her sixth.  To relieve Mary Ann’s grieving, Albert sent her back to Dublan, where he had built her a lovely home.  The younger children also needed to attend school.  His wife Lide (Eliza) went out to stay with him and the boys.  In November Albert became desperately ill.  Mary Ann hurried to his side.  Although he was unconscious when she arrived, he roused himself, spoke to her, and calling the boys to him, he exacted a promise from them that they would continue with the work, pay any debts that he might owe, care for his wives and children, see that their sisters were taken care of, and that the younger children were given an education.  A promise the boys dutifully fulfilled.

He died on November 28, 1904 and was buried in Guerrero, Chihuahua, beside his daughter. 

He was recognized as one of the great pioneers of the Mormon Colonies in Mexico.  Of him it was said, “To know Albert Stephen Farnsworth was to love him.”  He was clean and virtuous in thought and action, honest in all his dealings with his fellowmen, kind, charitable, and generous to a fault, particularly to those in need.  Some men preach their virtues, only a few like Albert have no need for that.  Their lives and their deeds speak for them.  It can be truly said of him that he left every community in which he lived a better place than he found it.”

Albert Stephen Farnsworth:  pioneer, builder, colonizer, leader of men, husband, and father from Nauvoo, Illinois, to Guerrero, Chihuahua.  Thousands of rugged miles, years of hardships, suffering and privation to give a numerous posterity the heritage that is theirs.  A grateful generation blesses him.  My second son bears the name, in humble gratitude to the grandfather I never knew.

Floriene Farnsworth Taylor, granddaughter

Stalwart’s South of the Border, by Nelle Spilsbury Hatch page 159

Alexander Finlay Macdonald

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Alexander Finlay Macdonald older

Alexander Finlay Macdonald

(1825 – 1903)

Alexander Finlay Macdonald was born September 15, 1825 in Kintail, on an ocean inlet in Scotland.  His father, Duncan Macdonald, a tenant farmer, eked out a scant existence on land that was soured by sea spray and soaked by constant British mists.  His mother, Margaret MacRae, cooked their oatmeal porridge and potatoes over an open peat fire in their cottage and kept the sooted walls clean with whitewash.

“Sandy,” as Alexander was called, was taught to read and write English by the village dominie and read the Bible to his parents on Sunday, thereby teaching English to them in a home where only Gaelic had been spoken.    Sometime in his youth he had a year of studies at the University of Glasgow.  At the age of 17, he went to pork at Perth as a ship’s carpenter.  In this capacity he sailed with ships on many voyages.  On these trips was David Ireland, a companion worker, through whom he met the Graham family of which Elizabeth (Betsy) was the fifth of ten girls and who later became his wife.

ON his way to his home in Kintail after a seven months’ sea voyage, he passed through Perth, and was handed a pamphlet which he put in his pocket without reading.  Later in Kintail he handed the pamphlet to his father as he entered the door and hastened to greet his mother.  A moment later he was surprised by a whack across his shoulders.  “Take that and that for bringing Mormon literature into the home,” roared his father who continued beating Sandy with his walking cane until he was driven from home.  Back in Perth he took passage on a ship leaving for a three years’ voyage that took him to many parts of the world, including America.  But he kept alert to find out all he could about the Mormons.  On his last trip to America he heard of Joseph Smith’s death and the breaking up of Nauvoo.

He was 21 when he arrived back to Scotland, and legally a man on his own.  By this time he was determined to find out all he could about the Mormons.  Upon arriving at Perth he discussed religion with Betsy Graham, his sweetheart, and finding that she was also dissatisfied with her religion, they both joined the Mormon Church in 1847.  They were the first two persons baptized into the Church in the city of Perth.  Alexander advanced rapidly in his knowledge of the Gospel and was soon called o be a missionary in the Highlands of Scotland, working in Inverness.  He was called to be head of the London Conference, headquartered in Liverpool.

He and Betsy were married May 20, 1851.  When they emigrated to America in 1854, they took his reconciled father, now a widower, Betsy’s mother and sister and sailed on the steamship John Wood landing in New Orleans in Ma of that same year.  After traveling up the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers and being delayed twice because of cholera, they were ready to join with a company of Saints and outfit themselves to cross the plains.  He had to break a couple of steers to pull the ox cart, which was entirely new work for Sandy.  Before leaving they knelt as a family to thank their God for protection on the high seas, for miraculous preservation of their lives in the midst of sickness and death, and that they were finally on their way to “Zion.”

When they arrived in Salt Lake City they were met by a welcoming committee consisting on the main of the people they had entertained in the conference in Liverpool.  Alexander Finlay Macdonald, Jr., was born February 12, 1855, in Salt Lake City, the first of 11 sons (no daughters) to be born to this union.  For the next 25 years, Salt Lake City Provo, Springville and St. George, Utah, were Macdonald homes.  While in Springville, they studied the principle of plural marriage, and in spite of growing negative reactions, he married Sarah Johnson, who died in 1860, bearing him no children.  While living in Springville, he was also married to Agnes Aird and Elizabeth Atkinson in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City on October 22, 1864, and in 1870, to Fannie Van Cott.  In Springville, he built a large home for his families, was arrested for polygamy by federal officers and spent six months in jail.  He served as mayor of Springville, was Counselor to Bishop Aaron Johnson, and was one of the Seven Presidents of the 51st Quorum of Seventy.  When he finished his jail term, he was called to Provo to take charge of the tithing and help finish the meeting house.

In the early 1870s he was called to St, George to help with carpenter work on the temple, and to manage the Erastus Snow mansion, a sort of boarding hose for the out-of-town temple builders.  During the erection of the temple, some 80 men were accommodated daily at the Snow mansion.  Sandy invested in in farm land nearby Middleton, and his sons and father built homes there.

When the St. George Temple was finished he was called on a mission to Scotland.  He took two of his older sons, Alex Jr., and Aaron, with him, leaving the responsibility of the farm to his wives and younger sons.  On his return from his mission, he was in charge of 170 emigrating Saints sailing aboard the steamship Wyoming.  This tired company arrived in Salt Lake City June 11, 1879.  In the fall of the year another call came from Church Authorities to preside over the Saints in the fast growing frontier of Arizona.  In February, 1880, the Maricopa Stake was organized with Alexander F. Macdonald the first President.

By 1883, Mesa had increased in population until it warranted being made into a city, and when it was incorporated as the city of Mesa, and ecclesiastical affairs in hand, than U.S. Marshals arrived with indictments for the arrest of every man having more wives than one.  To avoid arrest and a fine, the leaders of the Church sent him to Mexico to find suitable colonization lands there as a haven for plural families.  

He made three trips in to northern Sonora, the third of these in November and December of 1884, with a group headed by Apostles Brigham Young, Jr., and Heber J. Grant.  There were 24 persons in this party, one other Stake President besides himself, and representatives from all of the frontier towns in Arizona.  They went as far south as the mouth of the Yaqui River, made friends with the Yaquis, and were invited to settle on some of their lands.  Because the Yaquis were at that time at war with the government of Mexico, the Mormons were accused by the press of collaborating with the Yaquis against Mexico.  Colonization there at that time had to be abandoned.  Copies of the Book of Mormon, however, were later sent to the Yaquis through missionaries and some Yaquis were baptized.  At a conference in St. David, Arizona, later, because of if the illness of Apostle Brigham Young, Jr., Alexander Macdonald was appointed to take his place.  There he met with Apostle Moses Thatcher who notified the Saints of the failure to find suitable lands in Sonora, and that explorations would continue in Chihuahua with Alexander F. Macdonald in charge. He promised that a place would be prepared for them.   

In compliance with this call and with the assurance he would find the needed land as Apostle Thatcher had predicted, he left St. David January 1, 1885, to begin explorations in northern Chihuahua. With him went Christopher Layton, President of the St. Joseph stake, and John Campbell, as interpreter.  W. Derby Johnson, Jr., took them by team to the nearest depot on the Southern Pacific Railroad, where they entrained for El Paso, Texas. The next day was spent with landowners and speculators in Ciudad Juarez looking at maps and locating desirable places. They left at night on the Mexican Central Railway and went as far as San Jose station, what is now probably called Gallegos. There they sought help from Dr. Samaniego, a lawyer of reviewed and practicing physician, from whom they gained valuable help. Not only did he advise them on land purchase procedures in Mexico, but told them where good land purchases might be found and gave them an insight into Mexican an Indian nature. They drove away the next morning in Samaniego’s carriage.  In it they traveled through the Santa Maria Valley, the Corralitos holdings, and decided on purchasing Señor Garcia’s claim in the Janos area. This was but six miles from La Asencion, the official port of entry and near the international boundary, a location Church leaders had specified.  When they reached La Ascension again after their four weeks’ journey, they were surprised to find a camp already set up and William C. McClellan impatiently waiting to be directed to “the place.”

They hastened on to St. David to report the result of the exploration, then Macdonald returned to the site March 1, with Apostle Moses Thatcher. The latter, after looking over the location, advised immediate purchase. Taking locksmith with him, Macdonald went to Ciudad Juarez to complete the negotiations with Señor Garcia. After three weeks of negotiating the deal could not be consummated. Undismayed, McDonald said Lot Smith back with the disappointing news and he himself went on to investigate other prospects. On the heels of this discouragement came an order for leaving the country within 15 days. Macdonald guessed the reason for leaving this: immigrants flocking into the country and making camps along the Casas Grandes River without declaring their intentions, was too much like the stampede that settled Texas earlier in the century include result again in loss of territory to Mexico. Fast, skillful thought and action by Macdonald and George Teasdale, President of the Mexico Mission, were required. Personal interviews in both Chihuahua City and Mexico City brought results, but not until the last day of the time granted for departure.

Patients and negotiating skills were finally rewarded with the purchase of 200,000 acres of land in the valleys near Casas Grandes and in the mountains to the northwest.  “Colonia Diaz” for Porfirio Diaz, “Colonia Juarez” for Benito Juarez, and “Colonia Pacheco” honoring their benefactor, the Governor of Chihuahua, were established and titles to the lands secured.

McDonald shows three lots on the main street of Colonia Juarez and after liquidating his property in Mesa, Arizona built comfortable homes on two of them for his wives Agnes and Fannie. He sold the third lot to John C. Harper with the proviso that he build a hotel on it.

He was appointed First Counselor to George Teasdale and served as President of the Mexican Agricultural and Colonization Company. When the Mission was organized into a Stake, with Anthony W. Ivins as President, Macdonald was released from leadership in ordained a Patriarch. In 1894 he sold one home in Colonia Juarez and moved Agnes into a comfortable log cabin in Colonia Garcia. He was now 71 and continued actively giving blessings as he traveled from colony to colony, sealing for time and eternity couples who are unable to make the long journey to a Mormon Temple.

In February, 1898, while he was away, a trusted Mexican worker murdered, then robbed Agnes who operated the post office and a little store. His wife Lizzie came from Arizona to take Agnes’s his place. McDonald continued to travel in his buckboard drawn by sturdy mules over rough mountain roads doing his part in the colonies until his death on March 21, 1903. He was survived by three wives, Betsy, Lizzie, and Fannie, and 13 of his 26 children. A numerous posterity it carries on the Alexander F. McDonald heritage.

Nelle Spilsbury Hatch

Stalwarts South of the Border page 445

Andrew Duthie

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Andrew Duthie

(1857-1939)

On July 23, 1857, Andrew Duthie III, was born to Andrew Duthie and Louise Brebner in the city of Aberdeen, Scotland.  He was born of a very fine family. He heard the Gospel first preach to him by John Gray who later became his brother-in-law and was a Patriarch of Randolph, Utah for 15 years.

Andrew Duthie filled two missions for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The first was in Scotland before he was married. There he heard our mother’s beautiful voice singing in the street meetings of Glasgow, Scotland, and fell in love with her.  He was introduced to Jeannie Frazer by Elder Alexander F. MacDonald.

They were a devoted couple. They crossed the Atlantic Ocean at separate times, to be married in the temple. As the temple wasn’t finished, they were married in the old Endowment House in Salt Lake City.

My father, Andrew Duthie III, came to Utah first in 1880, and lived with former President David O. McKay’s father, who was also from Aberdeen, Scotland, and knew his parents there. They were happy to have a Scotsman of father’s character and integrity in their home and Thomas McKay helped father obtained his first job in Utah. After he had saved enough to care for a wife, mother came to Salt Lake City and stayed with her mother’s sister, Isabelle Taylor. She also had another aunt, Sister Quayle.

Jeannie and Andrew had a lovers quarrel and made up under the famous Eagle Gate on State and South Temple Street in Salt Lake City.  She had a song for every occasion. She’d sing “I Cannot Give the Hand Where the Heart will Never be.” It is an old Scotch ballad and her heart always turned to her true lover, Andrew. They were married February 22, 1883, and Salt Lake City.

Andrew had learned to be a master mechanic in the large shipyards in Glasgow, Scotland. It took him eight years to finish his training, but later in Mexico he earned as much as $50 a day in the Pinos Altos Mine, making tools and machinery. He raised nine children of his own and six nieces and nephews of the Ireland family. He was always giving to the poor and helping those in need. Brother and Sister Duthie were blessed the with good things of life, whether it was in Mexico, El Paso, Randolph, Bear Lake, or Salt Lake City. There was always a welcome place for their friends to come and stay, not just overnight, but for weeks at a time. When I was a child we lived in El Paso, and Brother and Sister Wall would come to stay and buy things for their store. Brother and Sister Taylor were welcome, too, as were Brother and Sister Spilsbury, Brother and Sister Dan Skousen, and so many others who went to El Paso to shop. They never went to a hotel or café.  Colonists were welcome, or ever the Duthie’s lived. They were loved by all.

Andrew Duthie knew he would never have a happy wife until he sent to Scotland for each of her family. So one by one, he sent money for them to come to the United States. He also sent for his own sisters, Louise and Betsey.  

Jeannie, and three children, Gilbert, Agnes, and Louise stayed in Evanston, Wyoming while Andrew went to Mexico to help his brother, John Duthie, run some mines in Pinos Altos, Mexico.  The trip to Mexico, when she finally went was hard, with the children so small, and my brother John, a baby, died. She lived among the Tarahumara Indians in the mountains, where Andrew was working. Victoria was born in this mining camp.

The colonists needed people like Andrew and Jeannie. She was a midwife, and she helped to deliver many babies in the colonies. She had had enough nursing to train her to be a spotless housekeeper, and her mother taught her to cook. She loved to make fruitcakes for the Relief Society and Scotch shortcake for everyone who came to visit. Jeannie and Andrew received joy in feeding everyone who came to the home. They sang Scotch songs together, and taught all the family to sing. People loved to hear their Scotch brogue and accent. No matter where they lived, they enjoyed helping and serving others.

When they lived in Pearson, Brother Spilsbury used to carry the passengers to and from the railroad train. Being an old friend of the Duthie family, there was always supper waiting for him, a clean bed and love and friendship in the Duthie home. Week after week the Duthie and Spilsbury family spent evenings together. I looked forward to Grandpa Spilsbury letting me ride to the train with him in the big buggy. They were always helping others financially, and otherwise, and people came when they were in trouble.

In El Paso, they kept a bedroom for missionaries, and Church Authorities ate dinner in our home many times.

Since our home in Mexico was President Abram O. Woodruff’s home, Jeannie kept it furnished beautifully and it always was sparkling clean. Here in this beautiful home, she invited many Church Authorities to eat when they attended Stake Conference in Colonia Juarez, including  President Joseph F. Smith and Apostle James E. Talmage. It was he who dedicated our home in 1920. After Jeannie moved back to Mexico, Adam S. Bennion, Apostle Melvin J. Ballard, and many others honored them as visitors. She often had delicacies from El Paso sent to serve at these lovely dinners.

Andrew’s name among the gold and silver mines in Mexico became famous because of his knowledge of mining machinery. He worked for the Southern Pacific Railroad in El Paso for many years. His previous railroad experience was surveying for the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad from Salt Lake City to Castle Gate, Utah.

In 1924, Jeannie moved to Provo, to be with Isabel and me, her daughter, while we attended BYU. She passed away in 1926 after an operation in Salt Lake City. She is buried in the Provo Cemetery. Andrew was ill at the time.  In 1929, Andrew Duthie went on his second mission for the Church. He served in the California Mission around Sacramento. While he was in Salt Lake City, he met President Anthony W. Ivins, who was happy to see his old friend. Since his wife had passed away, he tried to be both mother and father to his children. Brother Ivins knew how devoted Jeannie and Andrew always were. None of their children ever heard a quarrel. President Ivins called him to go on his second mission. We were always proud of our parents because of their great love and service to mankind. Andrew was a wonderful missionary even at 73 years of age.

In Houston, he passed away June 25, 1939 at 83 years of age, and is also buried in El Paso.

Margaret Duthie Naylor, daughter

Stalwarts South of the Border Page 143

 

Martha Cragun Cox

Martha Cragun Cox

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Martha Cragun Cox

(1852 -1932)

Martha Cragun Cox was born March 3, 1852 in the Mill Creek Ward, Salt Lake County, Utah. Her father, James Cragun, was a descendent of Patrick Cragun, born in Ireland, who came to America, settling in Massachusetts.  Family tradition has it that in his early manhood he was one of the “Indians” threw the English tea overboard in Boston harbor.

Martha’s mother Elenor Lane, a granddaughter of Lambert Lane who was born in England and emigrated to America with his parents when he was about 12 years of age.

Martha’s parents joined the Mormon Church in 1843 and arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in 1849. They received the call to pioneer the Dixie, Utah country in 1862. As a girl, Martha learned to leave on her mother’s loom. She made cloth for her own dresses and earned a little money weaving for other people. Quoting from her “Reminiscences,” we learn of an experience that had a profound effect on her life:

One day I was taking from the loom of piece that I had woven for a pair of pants for Brother Jeffreys, a cultivated English gentleman.  It had been made from nappy yarn and I told him it did not reflect credit on the weaver.  “Oh, well,” he said, “twill only be for a little while we will need it.  Twill soon be worn out and then my nappy cloth and the weaver’s work will be forgotten and the weaver too. Though she becomes round shouldered over the loom in trying to serve people with good cloth, (she) will wear out and be forgotten and no one will know that she wove.”  These words fell on me solemn-like and prophetic and I pondered them deeply.  “What profit is there finally,” I said to myself, “in all this round of never ceasing labor? Weaving cloth to buy dresses to wear out. When my day is past, my warp and woof in life and labors ended and my body gone to rest in the grave, what is there to mark the ground in which I trod? Nothing!”  And the thought maybe weep.

I went to McCarty (her brother-in-law James McCarty) and told him what brother Jeffreys had said to me. What can I do that my work and myself will not be forgotten, I asked. He answered “You might plant.”  To this I replied that the day would come that our neighbor with all his fine trees, flowers, vegetables, etc., that he had given to St. George would be forgotten by the people and his fine gardens vanished. “Plant in the minds of men and the harvest will be different,” he said. “Every wholesome thought you succeed in planting in the mind of a little child will grow and bear eternal fruit that will give you such joy that you will not ask to be remembered.” His words, though they enlightened, brought to me an awful sadness of soul. I was so ignorant. I saw that I had hitherto lacked ambition for I had been content to dance, laugh, and sleep my leisure time away, never supposing that I might reach a higher plane than that which enabled me to support and clothe myself.

Opportunities for schooling in those pioneer days were very limited and books were not plentiful, but Martha read everything she could find. She kept a list of words of which she wanted to learn the meaning and pronunciation. She would quiz available people for information, including strangers passing through the country, cowboys, miners, old timers. She started teaching school in her middle teens and taught school for 60 years of her life.

Martha married Isaiah Cox December 6, 1869 and became the mother of eight children, five of whom lived to raise families of their own. Isaiah died April 11, 1896 in St. George, Utah.

Martha taught school in Bunkerville, Nevada until 1901, then she went to Mexico to be with her daughters, Rose Bunker, Geneva, and Evelyn. She traveled by way of team and wagon with some of the David F. Stout family. Arriving on the Mexican border, they made camp and stayed for some time in Naco, Sonora. Living there was a family of Indians of the Yaqui tribe. In Martha’s writing she said, “This family of Yaquis were the finest of the human race and looks. The woman who was the honored mother of a large brood had splendid features. In fact, I thought as I looked at her that she was the noblest looking woman in face and form I’ve ever seen.”

Martha had deep sympathy and love for all the Indian tribes. When just a young girl she listened many times in the town of Santa Clara, Utah, to Jacob Hamblin relate his incidents and experiences among the Indian tribes. She felt sure the Walker War trouble in Utah came about because white men broke their promises to the Indians.

Martha taught school in Colonia Diaz in the winter of 1901-1902. The 1902 the family moved to Colonia Morelos in Sonora. By 1906 Martha had moved to Colonia Juarez and for several years taught the Mexican children there. The class was held in the rock basement of the schoolhouse. When Bishop Joseph C. Bentley informed her that the people of Juarez refused to furnish funds to maintain the Mexican school any longer, she was astonished. The Bishop, too was grieved over the condition.  “It is better,” he said, “for us to educate them than to try to control a hoard of uneducated ones.”  On visiting the home of a Mexican family Martha met the mother, an intelligent woman who spoke her mind on the closing of the Mexican classes. “You Mormons,” she said, “came her poor, you were good people. You teach our little children, we work for you, wash, scrum, anything. You are now rich, you got your riches in our country, now you say you do nothing for us, not teach our children, we are fit only to do your work. You will treat us right or we will in a little while drive you out of our country.” The woman knew more than Martha at the time thought she knew.

Martha taught school in Guadalupe, Chihuahua, the last year or so before the Exodus. Returning to the States, Martha joined her family members including her two sons Edward and Frank Cox and their families. Again she taught school in Utah and Nevada for many years before moving to Salt Lake City where she worked in the LDS Temple as recorder and did other services there. She also taught classes in the next branch of the church, and the MIA and the Relief Society.

In 1928 she commenced writing a biographical record of her life entitled “Reminisces of Martha Cox.” This record ran to 300 handwritten pages, well done and very legible. The journey to Mexico, she writes:

… was the commencement of what I term the fifth chapter of my life.  The first being my childhood to adult period. The second chapter, the time from my entering marriage until our family came separated. My third chapter seemed to be proper to my life on the Muddy, in Nevada, comprising nearly 10 years being instrumental in acquiring over 300 acres of good farmland on which the town of Overton was built. The fourth chapter might be my years in Bunkerville and the fifth of our lives in Mexico.

A six chapter, consisting of the 20 years after the Exodus from Mexico, might have been added.

Martha died at 80 years of age on November 30, 1932 in Salt Lake City and was buried there.

Emerald W. Stout, grandson

Stalwarts South of the Border page 123

A longer account of Martha’s life taken from her 300 page autobiography can be found here:

http://goo.gl/fgC179

James Douglas Harvey

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James Douglas Harvey beardJames Douglas Harvey

(1863-1912)

My father, James D. Harvey, had two wives and when Church leaders advised men living in plural marriage to go to Mexico, he was one of those who made that long journey south in 1890. He and my mother, Sarah Elizabeth Kellett, went to Colonia Diaz, leaving the other wife, Nancy Anderson, with her folks until they could get a place. They bought an adobe structure with a dirt floor.Father worked for John W. Young who was attempting to build a railroad through the country at that time. This required my mother to stay at home and care for the garden and similar chores by herself. The railroad project failed. Father came home but receive no pay for his work. Mother had worked so hard while he was gone getting the garden planted that she was sick and lost the baby.

In the autumn of 1890, they sold the place where they were living for a team and wagon and moved into a tin shop. In March 1891, they took the team and wagon and went to Deming to meet my father’s second wife, Nancy, and her little boy.  They succeeded in buying two lots on which all live together.  My mother inherited a home which she sold for sheep that she was able to also sell for enough money that she was able to buy a nice three-room house in which the entire family lived for some time.

Both my mother and Father’s wife Nancy gave birth to children 1892. There was a drought at the time and nearly all the cattle died from thirst. My parents’ only cow was one of the victims. Then it rained so much that the wheat grew in the bundles. They would pound it out on a canvas with sticks and grind it into flour.  Flour was so scarce that it was selling for $10 a hundred.  There were some fruit but no milk and no grease of any kind. They learn to make cake without grease.  The Church gave them some beef but it was so poor they just made soup out of it.  They raised garden vegetables and lots of cane and made lots of molasses. It was delicious. They made cornbread with vinegar and soda. Mother could not eat it. It gave her heartburn and took all the skin off her throat and tongue.  On one occasion, a family came from their hometown in Utah and stayed with them for a week. They had brought lots of flour with them and other groceries. They divided them with our family for which we were very grateful. Then the family went on up into the mountain colonies to settle.

The next summer our family raised grain, plenty of fruit and garden vegetables. They also made butter, cheese and had lots of eggs. My father took these things out to the mines in the mountains to sell. After a great deal of hardship and saving all we could, my father was also able to purchase a farm five miles west of town.

On this farm my parents raised two crops of potatoes every year, grain, corn, and came to make molasses. There was a two room house on the farm. My father’s wives took turns living there in the summertime.

I remember being told as a child how Apostle George Teasdale had dedicated a certain spot on which he wanted Colonia Diaz to be built. He named it Rock Joseph.

But the settlers were already starting their farms elsewhere and didn’t want to move. As it turned out, it was wise that they didn’t move because when the river flooded the area was so swamped that a levee had to be built.  They named the place where the settlers located Colonia Diaz.

During all this time father’s families were growing. Eventually each of his two wives had nine children, 18 in all.

In 1912, Frank Whiting arose at two o’clock in them morning with a crying baby and heard a commotion in the co-op store next door to his home.  He looked out the window and could see some Mexicans trying to pry open the doors of the store. He slipped out of the house rounded up some of the men of the town. When they arrived back at the store the Mexicans were leaving. Whiting and the men with him shouted for them to halt but they refused. Consequently, the men fired on them and killed one of the thieves. One of those running away was named Cesario. He didn’t have a horse but succeeded in making his way to his home on the edge of town. It was his brother who was killed. When he found out that his brother that was shot, he went out to his farm which bordered on the land we owned. He allowed his mother-in-law to live at the farm house and kept his own family at home in town. He knew how to get into the store because he was always hanging around and observing the Mormons who owned and operated it.

Once a Cesario reached his farm, he turned his horses in my father’s grain, which, at the time, was ripe and ready to harvest. On the morning of May 3, 1912, my father and my brother Will were in that part of his properties the horses were permitted to enter.  When they saw the horses, Father told Will to go over to the house until Cesario to please take care of his horses. Will said he was afraid to go over there because the family had such a mean dog. So Father said he would go, taking a shovel for protection against the dog. When he had almost arrived at the house, Cesario came out swearing, using foul language. His mother-in-law was crying, begging him not to be violent. But Cesario swore that he would get gringos to pay for the death of his brother.  He had a pistol and pointed at Father but his mother-in-law knocked his arm down forcing him to miss. This made him so angry that he knocked her to the ground.  Father raised his shovel and was going to hit Cesario, trying to escape him by running around the house. My brother Will was shouting at Father telling him which way to go but Cesario was able to get close enough to fire, and shot my Father through the heart. He shot him three times. He walked up after Father fell and shot him in the temple close eye.

Will ran to Mexican neighbors and told them what happened. They took him into their house and told him that if Cesario were to come after him, they would protect Will with their own guns. But rather than pursue Will, Cesario had taken a horse into the Mexican town of La Ascension.  Will then went to the house and told the rest the family what had happened, telling him to go cover Father’s body with the quilt and that he would go to town and get help. Everyone was terribly frightened. I was married at the time and Will had to pass by the home where I was living, and gave me the sad news. I then took my baby and went to comfort my mother as best I could.

The Bishop and others of the men from town took a wagon and went to the home of Cesario where my father still lay. Some other men went to La Ascension to get the authorities to conduct an inquest so that the body of my father could be brought home. It was late afternoon before the Mexican authorities came out to the place were my father’s body was. When they arrived, they arrested Brother Jim Jacobson and those with him rather than pursuing Cesario. Father’s body was placed in a wagon and brought home. It was drenched in blood and was a horrible sight. When Jim Jacobson and the boys got to the La Ascension they said it was like going into a den of hungry wolves. The Mexican population was so aroused they didn’t expect to get out of there alive. The next morning three Mexican officers came out and looked father’s body but never did anything about it. Cesario was allowed to go free.

Some of the Church brethren  went over to La Ascension to see if they couldn’t have Cesario restrained or put behind bars so he could not do any more killing. The Mexican sheriff just cried and said that if he tried to do anything more people would be killed and to please just go home and peace. They did allow Jacobson and the boys to leave jail and return to their homes. My father was buried on May 5, 1912.

His sons went to the farm, gathered the grain and planted a second crop of potatoes. They lived in fear all the time. We were told later that Cesario was killed by Poncho Villa. I and my husband, George Guile Hardy, then went with my mother and her four small children north across the border to visit her people in Utah and Idaho. While there, we heard that the leaders had directed the colonists to leave, taking only what they needed for they would be gone for only a few days.

Those in Colonia Diaz went to Hachita, just across the line where some American soldiers were stationed.  Some men and boys remained in the colony to watch and care for the people’s livestock and properties but word was sent for them to come out also and to join the rest in Hachita.  They never went back.  The Rebels that came through were so upset at not obtaining guns and ammunition that they burned and destroyed everything they could.

Sarah Agnes Hardy, daughter

Stalwarts South of the Border Nelle Spilsbury Hatch pg 235

 

James Wilson Memmott

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James Wilson MemmottJames Wilson Memmott

James Wilson Memmott

(1851-1919)

James Wilson Memmott was born February 25, 1941 in Sheffield, Yorkshire, England to William Memmott and Ann Wilson.  He was the third child in a family of seven. James had some schooling until he was 10 years old. When he was 12 years old he commenced to learn the engineering trade and at the age of 18 learned part of the milling business.

James married Elizabeth Hopkins on March 24, 1861, and they started for Utah that April 23, sailing on the ship Underwriter.  They arrived in New York on May 29, about six days before the Civil War started. From New York they traveled by river to Saint Joseph, Missouri, and by steamboat to Florence, Nebraska, arriving June 10. They traveled from Florence to Salt Lake City in the Milo Andrews and Abner Duncan train. “We had a first rate time and a good trip. I don’t think we were $5.00 to the good or$5.00 to the bad when we arrived in Salt Lake.” Here James and his wife met some of their Sheffield friends, including Harry Roper and Mathew Rowman.

Came to his wife settled in Payson, Utah. There a baby girl, Annie Elizabeth, was born July 16, 1862, but James’s wife never recovered and died September 13, 1862. This was a great sorrow to James who felt many times that it would be easier to return to his home in England. His mother took the baby girl to raise as her own.

James remained in Payson even though his family moved to Scipio. He did well in the shingle making business. In 1866 he took charge of Or Simons’ mill and held it for over 20 years, during which time he bought about $10,000 worth of land, two threshing machines, two sawmills, and built a good home. On May 15, 1871 Jane married Jane Mathewson, a young lady from Scotland. They had 10 children.

1890, James left what he had accumulated to this family and went to Mexico, arriving in Colonia Juarez July 9. There he met William R. R. Stowell who was leaving the next morning for Deming, New Mexico to find a Miller to run his gristmill. James, being a miller, was hired at one dollar a day. As people moved in, business increased, and it wasn’t long before James began to accumulate earthly possessions. Making a new start in business at the age of 49, and establishing himself and progressing as he did, is evidence of his industry, good management and thrift.

James married Mary Ann Miller Hills on June 14, 1894. They soon bought a home of their own. James ran the Stowell Gristmill for six years. He then bought a mill in Casas Grandes from Joseph Jackson for 12,000 pesos and operated it for seven years. After this, he sold it back to Joseph Jackson and moved to Colonia Juarez. During seven years James ran the mill at Casas Grandes he also ran a farm in San Jose which he had bought from Peter N. Skousen.  Later, he purchased a farm in Colonia Dublan and moved his family there. In 1907 he built a good trick home like many of the Saints were building in the colonies at that time.

James and Marianne had five children and a son of Mary Ann’s by a former marriage whom James treated as his own.  He and his family left Mexico in 1912 when all the people left. They returned once in 1915 the left again when general Pershing’s army came out. James died at his home in El Paso, Texas, on February 13, 1919, at the age of 78.

Violet Monroe Jensen, granddaughter

Stalwarts South of the Border page 480

Eli Whipple

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Eli Whipple

Eli Whipple younger

      Eli Whipple

      (1820 – 1904)

Eli Whipple was the fourth child of John and Mary Jane Whipple. He was born October 17, 1920, at Lucorn, Warren County, New York.

 At the age of 15 his parents left New York and went to Pennsylvania where he located in McKean County in the town of Bradford. They bought a farm and put in a sawmill in store. His father was very successful in all these ventures. Eli was in charge of the work until he was 21 years of age. He then met Patience Foster, who was the daughter of a successful lawyer. They were married and were happy in their home. They were members of the Christian Church until 1845. Then Eli joined the Mormons. Patience, however, was unhappy with this. Eli tried to persuade her to leave her mother and go with him and the Mormons, but to no avail. A child was on November 15, 1846. Her name was Marion.

Eli heard of riches in California and saw prospects of wealth. His wife Patience consented to go, so in 1852 they left New York and went to San Francisco where he went into the store and lumber business. They soon had three mills and made lots of money. However, early one spring, two mills burned down. They became discouraged and went to Utah, arriving on March 17, 1858. Eli invested in some woolen mills with some other fellows but lost a great deal of money. In the fall of 1861, Eli was called to help settle Dixie. He sold all he had and bought land there. It wasn’t long until he was busy making lumber to build homes. Here in 1861, he married a widow, Caroline Lytle, as his second wife, and had her two children, Edgar and Harriet, sealed to him. He bought more land and cattle and raise lots potatoes. In fact, he was called the “Potato King of Utah..”  He was called on a mission in 1872 to Ohio. On his return he started making butter and cheese. A man named Benjamin Clark then came to work for him. Clark had with him to nieces and a nephew: Mary Jane, Sarah, and Samuel Legg. Eli took Mary Jane as a third wife in the St. George Temple on July 6, 1877. At that time Eli was 57 and she was 19.

Because the enforcement of anti-polygamy legislation, Eli decided it best to go to Mexico. Two of his wives, however refused to go. Eli decided to make the move anyway. This was a difficult decision. Patience and Caroline, with their children, by choosing to remain behind, well knew that it meant not having a loving father to help in raising their families. Many tears were shed. They had all the worldly goods necessary to make them happy. For, at this time, Eli was one of the wealthiest men in southern Utah. By spring of 1887 everything was in readiness. They departed for a strange land where they knew they would have to pioneer and there would be many hardships. They knew little of the customs of the people of Mexico. It was a trial in many ways. It was a cold and long journey. They were two days in getting across the border.

The spring after arriving, Eli was an accident. He was thrown off a wagonload of lumber. He broke both his legs and some of his ribs. He was laid up for a year and had to walk to with two canes for the rest of his life. With his wife Mary Jane and her children he made cheese and butter and raise hogs for sale. He moved to Colonia Dublan and put up a blacksmith shop to get money for his family. He also had a vineyard and sold many grapes. A deeply religious man, Eli Whipple also enjoyed writing poetry. He died at the age of 84 on May 11, 1904.

Jennie W. Brown and Pearl W. Cooley granddaugters

Pg 770 Stalwarts South of the Border Nelle Spilsbury Hatch

Manrique Gonzalez

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Manrique Gonzalez

(1880 – 1976)

 Manrique Gonzalez was born October 19, 1880.  His parents, Juan Francisco Gonzalez and Juliana Rodriquez Campos, lived in a small town in the northern part of the state of Coahuila named Nadores.

Manrique’s father was a school teacher in the surrounding farming districts.  He and his wife had 15 children, ten boys and five girls.  Manrique was the seventh child.  He left home when he was 14 years old, living first with an uncle in Torreon, Coahuila, Mexico and later in San Pedro close by, but keeping his whereabouts a secret for fear of being forced to return home.

At San Pedro he was employed by American railroad contractors and for the first time heard the word “Mormon.”  He became acquainted with David A. Stevens and wife and with Samuel Jarvis and his son George.  When he came to know the principles and beliefs that actuated the lives of these men, he as most favorably impressed.  He wanted to be like them, to do the things they did, which to him seemed perfect.  They didn’t use tobacco, tea, or coffee, neither did they drink liquor, and they kept the Sabbath day holy.  Even more important, they treated their workmen with consideration and kindness.  Life could offer nothing better than to allow him to remain always in their society.  Nothing gratified him more that to take his money to Mrs. Stevens to save for him.  When it had reached the fabulous sum of sixty pesos, he sent it home to his father.

When he moved with the contractors to Chihuahua where railroad grading was continued and the job was completed, he gladly accepted an invitation to move with the company to colonia Juarez where he took up residence with the Mormons.  From 1898 until the preset time (1966) he has remained a part of society in the colonies.  The only exception to this is the period he spent in the United States in search of higher education.  In Colonia Juarez he lived with first one family and then another, all the time working to learn the English language.  Despite his age and his adult growth, he entered Sarah Clayson’s Primary Department and took his first schooling in the language with little tots in the first grade.  He was kind to them and they responded well to the friendly young man who sat on an adult-sized chair brought in especially for him because the school benches were too small.  In five years he had mastered the essentials in elementary instruction and was given the customary certificate of graduation from the eighth grade in the spring of 1903.  He was then twenty-two years of age.

His progress in the study of religion was also rapid.  His eager questions about Mormonism were answered to his satisfaction.  On September 2, 1899, at the age of  18, he was baptized by John c. Harper and confirmed the following day as a member of the church by Anthony W. Ivins.  He later said, it was “the happiest day of my life.  I was no longer alone, I had brothers and sisters who cared for me and were interested in my welfare.  I felt bound to the community in every way.”

As soon as the hands that had confirmed him and bestowed upn him the Gift of the Holy Ghost had been lifted from his head, the venerable Patriarch, John Holt arose from his seat and walked solemnly to the stand.  In the hush that followed this pretentious action, he began to speak.  His first words were unintelligible, then all realized they were listening to one speaking in tongues. When he had finished, the congregation waited eagerly for interpretation. When it came, it concerned Manrique’s conversion and future:  that if he remained true to the covenants made in the waters of baptism his power and influence for good would be felt throughout the nation; that his baptism would open the door through which many of his people would pass; that he would be a saviour to his own family. “What surprised me,” said Manrique later, “was why interpretation was necessary. I understood every word of it.”

In October, 1903, Professor Guy C. Wilson, in a characteristically discerning decision, asked Manrique to accept position at the Juarez Academy as a Spanish teacher. To fortify Manrique’s extreme lack of self-confidence, Professor Wilson promised to remain in the room to help should annoying situations arise, and bolster Manrique with his support until he grew more self-assure.  On this condition Manrique accepted. He had little formal study in the Spanish language, but because it was his native tongue, he learned quickly. In the first year he learn the fundamentals along with the other students. He also took lessons on the side. By teaching and studying together, he felt that he learned far more than he taught. He graduated from the institution in 1910 at the age of 28.

For seven years he held his place as a faculty member, taking class after class of students through De Torno’s Spanish Grammar, leading them into supplementary reading fields, drilling them on the rules to govern correct speech, and encouraging them to make use of the language in conversation groups he organize. He knew that free discussion and constant use of Spanish was the shortest road to fluency it was also his best means of learning English, and both he and the classes he taught discovered that studying two languages made each a supplement to the other.

The prediction uttered the day of his confirmation was literally fulfilled. Through him, several members of his family followed him to the colonies and life was changed for them as it had in for him. He was the first Mexican citizen to graduate from the Academy, but not the last. He was but the example that led dozens of others to follow in his steps in the years that followed.

By 1912 when the Madero Revolution broke up the Juarez Stake, he had a wife and five children. With these and little else he entered the Agricultural College in Logan, Utah, where two more children were born, and by his own efforts, coupled with encouragement from professors and friends, earned the credentials to head an experimental agricultural station. When he failed to achieve this ambition, he took position in the U.S. Department of Agriculture in New Mexico, that position he held for six years. During that time he worked for the United States government, he developed by patient experimentation and hours of hard work, the New Mexico Pinto Bean.

At the height of his career, his family life broke up and he was released from his influential position through discrimination against his religion. He returned to his native land and settled in Colonia Dublan with the words of A.W. Ivins ringing in his ears: “Manrique,” he said, “would you like to be rich and happy? “Well,” he continued when Manrique nodded vigorously, “it’s in your hands.”  In his hands! That was all he had besides what he had learned through study and experience. But with those he went to work.

He married Regina Del Palacio about 1920 and began a happy married life. In the course ofd raising six children he preached by example what he called the Gospel of Righteous Farming. First on rented lands, later on his own acres, he demonstrated correct methods of raising alfalfa, wheat and other grains and finally with orchards he used scientific methods that raised standards in farming.

Within a few years his financial standing was an enviable one. In 1966, at the age of 85 he is a contented, retired farmer living in Colonia Dublan, Chihuahua, enjoying the fruits of his labors in a comfortable and well furnished home, and is respected and esteemed by all who know him.

But only he knows how far it is from the life of a peon to the prominence of an agricultural expert, or what has gone into the fulfilling of the promise made him by Patriarch Holt, or the pride he takes in his numerous posterity. A son, Ernesto, is an eminent physician. A grandson, Carlos, appeared in “I Believe,” a column of the Improvement Era.  And there are auxiliary leaders and priesthood quorum directors and church workers sprinkled through his descendents. One grandson, Miguel, recently serving in the northern Mexican mission (1966) with his companion were having little success in the city of Zacatecas.  Other missionaries before them had failed to make successful contact, much less perform a single baptism. Returning to their room one night, Miguel said, “There must be someone in this big city ready for baptism, let’s pray about it.”  Accordingly they both knelt in first one and then the other humbly prayed for guidance to that one individual. It was 10 p.m. before their Ernest please had come to an end. Then Miguel said, “let’s go right now and find him tonight.” And in spite of the lateness of the hour they knocked on the door of the most pretentious house they could find. The doors open by the lady of the house and heard housecoat, and already for bed. “We have a message for you,” said Miguel when she met them. “Come in,” she said, and led them to a reception room. “But first,” she said, “I will call my husband to hear your message, too.”  He soon appeared in robe and slippers, having already retired. Before they could give all of the message she said, “wait! My children was hear this, too.”  Soon, tousleheaded and sleepy-eyed, they were in the room. The message was given. In six days the entire family was ready for baptism. The man, being politically influential, gained other investigators and within a few weeks a branch of 30 souls was organized.  Manrique’s determination and zeal still lives on.

Nelle Spilsbury Hatch

Stalwarts South Of the Border page 212

Apache Indians Massacre Members of the Thompson Family

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In 1891 when Helaman Pratt moved his family back to the Colonies in the lower valley, he leased his ranch to Hans A. Thompson, a Scandinavian, who moved there with his wife, Karren, two sons, Hyrum, age 18 and Elmer age 14, and a granddaughter, Annie, age 6.

The ranch was about 10 miles from Pacheco in the Piedras Verde Rio area.

Mr. Thompson had only left the previous day for Pacheco where he was working on the thresher. The morning of September 19, 1892 promise to be a fine one at the Thompson ranch, as ominous clouds had not yet risen above the horizon. In the absence of the father, who was working on the thresher (of which he was part owner) at Pacheco, his two sons, Hyrum and Elmer, started early to the fields, carrying a bucket a feed for the pigs as they went. As little Annie skipped back to the house with empty pails, her screams of terror alert the boys to the presence of Indians on the ranch. As Hyrum turned to look, a bullet passed through his body but he did not fall. Thinking to protect his mother, Elmer ran toward the house for the Winchester gun, calling back to Hyrum that the pistol was on the saddle in the barn.  Just then two more shots were fired, one killing Hyrum who fell behind the pigpen, the other entering Elmer’s body in the left chest and passing out below the shoulder about three-fourths of an inch from his spine.

Though still able to stand, Elmer fell into a week ticket thinking thus to avoid a second bullet. When Indian, coming from behind the haystacks to loot the barn of saddles and harness straps, failed to see Elmer, he crept into the chicken coop from where he watched the proceedings. When the Indians broke open the kitchen door where Mrs. Thompson and Annie had barricaded themselves, they ran into the yard in full view of Elmer.

Bathed in his own blood and almost paralyzed with horror of seeing in Indian shoot his mother through the body and left arm and then crush her head with a rock, Elmer might have fainted except for his concern over Annie.  Her savage captor amused himself by her frantic efforts to escape and protect her grandmother. When flailing him with her sunbonnet and attempting to scratch his face was not enough amusement, he turned her loose, then tripped her as she ran past by throwing a harness strap over her head and holding it to both ends as she fell he struck her with his scabbard until she began to fight. This horseplay was halted by a call which took the tormentor into the house and Elmer had a chance to beckon Annie into the chicken coop with him. Lying by the door, armed with rocks, he determined to protect her as best he could.

The Indians looted the house of everything, even taking two suits of temple clothes. They entered the feather ticks, and 1000 pounds of flour in order to use the sacks to hold the loot. Like ants they hurried back and forth carrying the plunder to be strapped onto pack animals. They also took a new wagon cover, two saddles, and cut the harnesses for straps. They found considerable money hidden in one of the trunks.  When Annie’s captor returned from the house he brought some cheese, which he threw to his companion, and began looking for the child. When she was not to be found and Elmer had also disappeared from where he had fallen, the Indians left hastily, driving 15 valuable ranch horses with them.

When the savages had gone, the children began the trip to the G. C. Williams’ ranch for help, but Elmer soon faded from loss of blood. The little girl ran to the stream and cupping her hands, carried water until he revived. She left him under a tree and ran alone with her dog. Soon she met a horseman, Sullivan C. Richardson, who heard the story, took her to the Williams’ ranch and hurried to Cave Valley to give the alarm.

The news had quickly spread.  Kind friends from Cave Valley, four miles away, took care of the dead and administered to Elmer. A posse of men went in pursuit of the Indians, but was not able to catch up to them. Following the strategy every man carried a gun, even to church.

The following is told by Sullivan C. Richardson:

“I left her (Annie) at Williams’ ranch and hurried to Cave Valley to give the alarm. While brother Heaton got in touch with Hans Thompson at Pacheco, I and brothers Robert Vance, P.S. and John Williams, N.H.Perry and James Mortensen went with team and wagon and on horseback to the Pratt ranch.  On the way we found Elmer under the shade of the pines where he had fallen during his attempt to reach Williams’ ranch. He was made as comfortable as possible on a coat in the wagon and afterwards, with the care of brother Mortenson and the blessings of the Lord, got well. We went on to the ranch and then to Cave Valley with Elmer and the bodies of his mother and brother.  There Bob Vance and I hurried on to Dry Valley. Some may realize my joy and thankfulness, when, from the timbers across the valley, I saw Eliza come to the door of the cabin—all right and unaware of any trouble.”

That night coffins and burial clothes were made for the dead bodies. One sister who helped, wrote: “For years after, whenever I closed my eyes, I could see those awful scenes at Thompson’s ranch, and that woman’s bashed in head, and feel my fears when I thought the Indians were upon us and would take our children.”

The next day at sundown, the bodies of sister Thompson and her son, Hyrum, faithful members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, were interred side-by-side at Cave Valley.

 

Taken from the book Heartbeats of Colonia Diaz from the compilation Pacheco History and Stories by Sylvia Lunt Heywood.

Laura Ann Hardy Mecham

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Laura Ann Hardy Mecham

(1865–1933)

Laura Ann Hardy Mecham, the fourth child of ten children born to Josiah Guile Hardy and his second wife, Ann Denston, was born November 26, 1865 in Mountain Dell Salt Lake County, Utah.

She married February 13, 1881, to G.O. Noble, to whom was born a daughter, Laura Maude. Due to the severe persecution of polygamous families, he chose to abandon Laura, his second wife.  The divorce became effective in 1889.  Then she married Lucian Mormon Mecham in the St. George Temple.  The daughter Maude died at the age of two years and was buried in St. George.

At this period of time many people from Utah were looking south for new fields to colonize as well as for freedom from religious persecution. The Josiah Guile Hardy family joined the stream of pioneers looking to Mexico and new opportunities. Lucian and Lara joined with them and, in 1891, traveling by team and wagon across Arizona and into New Mexico, crossing at Columbus into the land to be their new home. Colonia Pacheco was the birthplace of their last three children. Their first child was born in St. George and, as an infant, endured the difficult trip.

Pioneer life was hard and privations many. Lucian found farming the small acreage in this remote mountainous settlement very difficult with his handicap from birth of club feet, and especially following a freighting accident where his feet were crushed and bones broken. As a couple, they resorted to itinerant merchandising from colony to colony, selling books and dry goods that the colonists could purchase or barter for. This brought but a meager income. Then they tried operating a restaurant in Chihuahua City as a source of income.

Many are the loads of lumber freighted down the San Diego dugway, with Laura accompanying Lucian to help him with his handicap. He was as handy as any of the other freighters in hitching and managing the teams. Her hand was apt around the campfire and with the nosebags and harnesses.  Many children and adults alike delighted at Christmas time to find a new pair of buckskin gloves in their stocking which had been made by Laura’s talented and never tiring fingers. Her children more beautiful homemade dresses, suits and other peril as a result of her talent and ambition.

Finding living difficult and means scarce, Lucian and Laura heard of opportunities for freighting from Cananea to Naco in Sonora, so they, along with others from both the Sonora and Chihuahua colonies, headed that way. Living in tents and freighting with six horse teams and heavy wagons was not an easy life. During all those ventures away from home the children—Theodosia, Lucian, and two adopted children Pearl and Edgar Hallett—were left in Grandmother Hardy’s care.  As a dutiful daughter Laura had assumed much of the responsibility for her mother’s care, along with that of her feeble-minded sister, Mary, her father having passed away in Colonia Pacheco in 1894, three years after their arrival.

After being in Pacheco short time after the Cananea venture they headed for Cos station in Sonora which is halfway between Agua Prieta and Nacozari. Here they freighted between the end of the railroad and Nacozari, carrying merchandise to Nacozari and copper ore on the haul back. This continued until the completion of the railroad when they moved to Nacozari. The money spirit was high and prospecting was tempting, so a claim was taken up in the mine of the Pilares.  This was worked for some time and developed for sale. A fine prospect for a lucrative sale was promoted for $50,000 pesos (the peso was then worth $.50 to the dollar). But the idea of making the terms in American money and doubling the price upset the deal and the sale fell through. The property was never sold. All the labor, time and expense was lost. At that time $50,000 pesos would have been worth a fortune, like $1 million a day. Dame Luck never followed their path.

Lucian turned a stagecoach venture and build up a promising trade and a lucrative stage system, driving a four and six force “Royal Coach” from Nocozari to Moctezuma, adding other stages when needed with higher drivers. This ended in disaster when the many horses use in the stage system were to have been sold and delivered; but through the negligence of the person sent to deliver them, becoming drunk, some of the horses foundered and died and others were turned out of the corral and became lost. The financial loss was heavy.

The greatest event in Laura Mecham’s life came at this critical time when she was asked by a Doctor Keats, the company physician, to help him in the small and poorly equipped hospital which served both the employees and the public. Although she had enjoyed but a third grade education, she had not let her time pass in idleness and had developed greatly her reading ability and talent for learning. Doctor Keats was very willing to train her and give her needed assistance. She, being eager to learn, advanced happily became able to they just technical medical books, as her later years attested. Her training continued under Doctor Ayer, who was a retired army Doctor and very exacting, which was excellent training for her. In all, she served under many doctors and learned from each one during the years from 1903 to 1912. Then she left the hospital and moved to Douglas to be with and provide a home for her family that had been driven out of Mexico during the Revolution.

One great event happened while she was working in the hospital Nacozari when the explosion that nearly wrecked the town occurred. The train headed for the mine at Pilares, loaded with three cars of dynamite, caught fire. To save the town, Jesus Garcia, engineer, conducted it out of town before it exploded, losing his life and killing scores. The town bears the name of Nacozari de Garcia in his honor.  The explosion occurred over a mile from the hospital, but window panes were broken and plaster shaken from the ceiling, leaving the hospital in a disastrous condition to receive the dead and wounded that were rushed in.

In Douglas from 1912 to 1917, Laura operated a rooming house to make a home for the family. It was here that in 1913 Theodosia married Joseph P. Lewis from Colonia Morelos. Lucian married Kate Brown, the daughter of John Wesley Brown and Sarah Elizabeth Styles, converts from Alabama and recently from Colonia Chuhuichupa. After these marriages, Grandmother Hardy went to Orderville, Utah, to be with her son John Hardy. Lucian and Laura then moved back to the colonies as things had settled in Mexico by this time. For the first time Laura could enjoy the Elsie McClellan home, as she had previously stayed in Nacozari to help pay for the property and the family had lived in the home from 1910 to 1912.

Then commenced a number of mercantile ventures in the buying of property, the purchase of the Richardson home adjoining the two Brigham Stowell properties north of the main home, and in being the community doctor.  Laura began restoring properties, making them livable and attractive. She did much of her own freighting for the store from in Dublan and Pearson. She clerked, irrigated and helped in farming. Always her medicine cabinet was filled and hand satchel in readiness for emergencies. Winter or summer, heat or cold, day or night, on foot or horseback, in buggy, wagon, or car, it was all the same to her if someone sick demanded her attention. Many are the times that she went for days only with her “forty winks” for rest and a change of clothes.

During her period of service, she delivered and cared for, including the customary 10 day period following confinement, some 2200 babies. Most of them delivered in homes where often there were the most unsanitary conditions and the most meager and modest of circumstances. Yet, through it all, they were very few serious complications. There are literally thousands who call her blessed. She had a natural gift for healing and although she had no medical schooling or specialized training, her ability to diagnose and expertly treat sickness and emergencies are vouched for by hundreds, and your place in the hearts of the colonists and the Mexican people alike abides as an angel of mercy.

In 1925 she suffered a paralytic stroke, leaving her partially paralyzed and unable to carry on her normal activities. She then spent two years in Salt Lake City working in the temple, doing endowment work for hundreds. Through her life she had been a hard worker, doing the work of several persons, putting in longer hours than was wise, often working as though she were a man. In this she definitely was not observing the Word of Wisdom, as she was taxing her physical strength, and suffered another stroke in 1930, which left her bedridden until her death in 1933.  She spent her last years in Douglas and Chandler with Theodosia and Lucian, passing away January 29, 1933 in Douglas. She was buried in the Douglas cemetery.

Of the five children born to Laura Mecham, three died in infancy, but Theodosia and Lucian where a comfort and joy to their parents. Lucian and Laura’s descendants now number more than 60. Among them are doctors, teachers, artisans, housewives, missionaries, and loyal, good citizens.

Lucian M. Mecham, Jr., son

Stalwarts South of the Border page 477