thanks to Adrian Ralph Lissamore
Friday, February 18, 2011
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Obituary for Charles Henry John West
Davis County Clipper 1906-10-19
Obituary for Eliza Dangerfield West
Davis County Clipper 1915-12-31
Mormon Pioneer Overland Travel Record for Charles Henry John West Family
Charles Henry John West came across the plains as a Mormon Pioneer in 1863. With him were is wife, Eliza and children: Caroline, Thomas, Ann Lydia, Jabes William, Mary Ann, Eliza Alice.
http://lds.org/churchhistory/library/pioneercompany/1,15797,4017-1-361,00.html
http://lds.org/churchhistory/library/pioneercompany/1,15797,4017-1-361,00.html
West, Charles Henry John, Reminiscences [ca. 1900], 7-9.
Trail Excerpt
RELATED COMPANIES
Company Unknown (1863)
RELATED PERSONS
Eliza Dangerfield West
Mary Ann West
Charles Henry John West
Jabez William West
SOURCE LOCATIONS
Church History Library, Salt Lake City
We stayed at Florence a few days before starting across the plains. We were 10 weeks on the plains and arrived in Salt Lake City the 4th day of October 1863, just in time for Conference.
In giving a description of our journey across the plains I must trust to memory as I was not in a position to take notes. The brethren from Salt Lake were there at Florence to take charge of them, they had been there some time waiting, they had brought from the valley a goodly number of wagons loaded down with Dixie cotton. After getting their cotton disposed of they had then to fix up for the Saints, besides merchandise, there were in all about 60 wagons in our company and so many Saints and their families allowed to each wagon with their luggage and provisions, with a captain over all. When all was in readiness some of the young men, being appointed teamsters, we had three and four yoke of oxen to each wagon. We started for a thousand mile trip, all able-bodied men and women and young women and children that could walk, had to do so.
The first day to me the walking behind the slow gait of the oxen was fun. When we got to a place where there was good grass for the cattle we could stop and cook our dinner or supper as the case may be. My wife not being used to the way of mixing our flour for bread got too much salaratus in, so we had some nice looking yellow bread for buskits, one of the boys told my wife what proportion to put in, so afterwards we had some good bread. Our captain looked after the teamsters and saw that they (the oxen) all done their duty in pulling. He had a long black snake whip, when that came down on the cattle they had to get. In the evening we camped they would form a circle with the wagons, and had night herders to watch the cattle. We then had to build our fires of any dry sticks we could find near the water's edge. If we had to camp where there was no wood, we would on our journey pick up and carry Buffalo Chips and make a fire with that. It was the dry dung of oxen. Before going to bed a few would gather together in the dance, but we allways had prayers each evening. Sometimes we would come across some greens good for food, my wife would make many a good meal so we faired very well.
We had made up our minds to enjoy the trip without grumbling and found it the best way, we had a few grumblers in the camp. We had to wade up to our breasts some rivers we had to go through, if the current was very strong we would hold hands. I would sometimes have a child in one arm and holding on to another. If we got wet would let our clothes dry on so we would not take cold. We would average in traveling 20 to 30 miles each day. Sometimes we had travel by night in order to get to good camping ground.
One day towards evening our Captain told us to prepare for a big wind storm, had all the fires put out and the wagons all in a circle, the wheels of each wagon fastened together with heavy log chains, and the cattle all inside of the inclosure. We had barely got ready when the storm came, such a piercing and stormy wind, that it seemed to allmost take our breath away. We had to hold on to the wagons less we be blown away. After it was over I don't think there was one wagon cover left all had been blown to pieces.
Our little daughter, Mary Ann Young, she was sick more or less while crossing the plains, her appetite failing her, I thought I would goto the river side (being near one) and get a fish. I know it would do her good. The river being very low and leaving small puddles of water I would try and chase the fish by my hands into shallow water, so catch one. I did not exceed in getting any. I then and there prayed to God that I might get some if it was only one. I was about leaving to catch up to the train, when a man came along with a string of fish and offered me one, my prayers being answered, I went along rejoicing.
Our son Jabez William he got hurt through being run over by one of the wagons, and was badly hurt. I did not know whether it was broke or not it swelled up to a great size. I was recommended by one of the teamsters to catch the drippings of the oxen and apply it as a poultice. I done so several times, and the swelling went down and he soon got the use of his leg again.
We continued our journey day after day about the same routine, one continous stretch of country no houses to be seen on the journey. We would come across some of our young brethren, who were left to look after the provisions for the Saints, when we got to these different places, they being alone so long, when they saw our train, they would jump for joy and make quite a demonstration with their frying pans clapping them together. After loading up all the provisions they had for the camp, they would turn in and follow. We were in all 10 weeks on the plains, when we arrived at Salt Lake City on the camping grounds in the 8th Ward square. The friends and relations of different ones would come and take them away to their homes.
Picture of Charles Henry John and Eliza Dangerfield West Family
top row Jabez, Annie, Thomas,
middle row Caroline, Charles HJ, Eliza, Eliza Alice,
front row William, Charles
Obituary for Christina Anderson Edvalson
(Ogden Standard Examiner 1927-09-17)
City Directory for Erick Edvalson family
Grandpa Edvalson
Before he was married, he was a shoemaker's apprentice. Later he was a shoemaker, going from house to house making shoes. In about 1782, he quit the shoemaker business and sold tailor made clothes having made a stand. Then started up the bakery business. That business he kept up until he moved here. They had a shop, and Grandpa and Grandma did all the baking. Elder Larson, who later married Grandma's sister, first brought to the gospel into their home. Peter A. Peterson was the Elder who baptized Grandma and Grandpa. The children all waited until they got to West Weber to be baptized. They all wanted to come to Utah, so their oldest son Conrad borrowed about $150 and came over to America. To get the money, he was on his way to see about work at the sawmill. He stopped at the home of farmer that he knew that slightly, and asked him if he could borrow the money and he lent it to him. Conrad had never had any dealings with the man but knew he had money. In place of working at the sawmill he went to work at Stockholm for about a month and a half working on the railroad fixing the tracks until time for the ship to leave. He was in steerage from Stockholm to Copenhagen, Denmark. Then he went in second-class the rest of the way. He went from Copenhagen to Hull, England and then went by train across England to Liverpool then on the ship named Wyoming. He then had to work and pay that back. In a little over a year, he had saved enough and sent for Erik. They both work hard for another year to earn enough to bring the rest of the family over. They bought a farm in West Weber and went there to live. The boys all helped their father on the farm and he also did shoemaker's work between.
Erick Edvalson (Person) and Christina Anderson
Erick Edvalson (Person), son of Peter Persson and Kajsa Ersson, was born on 31 Oct 1842 in Olofsfors, Norberg, Vastmanland, Sweden. He died on 8 Oct 1928 in Taylor, Weber, Utah, United States. The cause of death was Influenza. He was buried on 12 Oct 1928 in Ogden City Cemetery, Ogden, Weber, Utah, United States (1875 Monroe Blvd). He married Christina Anderson on 25 Apr 1867 in Knallesbenning, Grytnas, Kopparberg, Sweden.
Christina Anderson, daughter of Anders Persson and Stina Persson, was born on 21 Sep 1839 in Knallesbenning, Dalarne, Sweden. She was christened on 22 Oct 1839 in Knallesbenning, Dalarne, Sweden. She died on 13 Sep 1927 in Taylor, Weber, Utah, United States. The cause of death was Carcinoma of the stomach. She was buried on 16 Sep 1927 in Ogden City Cemetery, Ogden, Weber, Utah, United States (1875 Monroe Blvd).
They had 5 children:
Conrad Emanuel Edvalson
Erik (K) Werner Edvalson
Carl Patrick Edvalson
Abel Eugene Edvalson
Bror Josef Eugene Edvalson
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Passenger List for George and Priscilla Goodyear Family
http://mormonmigration.lib.byu.edu/Search/showDetails/db:MM_MII/t:passenger/id:31844/keywords:george+goodyear
Marriage Certificate for George Goodyear and Priscilla Lissimore
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Introduction
As told by Hazel West Lewis--
At a meeting of the John West Family Organization, I was requested, as a granddaughter of Charles Henry John West, to write a history of his life that would be interesting and readable, especially to the younger members of the family.
At a meeting of the John West Family Organization, I was requested, as a granddaughter of Charles Henry John West, to write a history of his life that would be interesting and readable, especially to the younger members of the family.
The source of most of my information was a rather small but comprehensive journal written by Charles himself. It covers (1) the period of his birth and early life in England (2) his coming to Utah and (3) all the years he lived in Utah, up to and including his and grandmother's golden wedding anniversary, December 25, 1900. Grandfather's small green leather journal (3.5 inches by 6 inches) contained 115 pages of small legible writing in black non-fading ink except for the last few pages which were written with ink that has faded considerably.
The material contained in Charles' journal was first typed (mimeographed) about 18 years ago. The typist had the help and advice of Ruth West Sorensen, Agnes (Dot) West and Myrtle West Bitter, who are daughters of Charles' son, Jabez. The typed copies made Charles' life story available to more of his descendants. But since it retained the unique spelling and sentence structure of the original material, older members of the West family urged that a complete rewrite of the material was necessary if it was to be read by all of Charles' descendants.
It is largely from Charles' journal that the writer has obtained the information to write a history of her grandfather Charles Henry John West. In general the manuscript follows the journal closely. But in several instances notes from other sources are used to round out the history of his life. If I have taken the liberty of interpreting some events or conditions that arose in his life, it is because I was trying to understand him better as a man of character who gave up a great deal when he left his secure and comfortable home in England for a new home in foreign land which was full of severe hardships but where his religion continued to be the motivating force in his life.
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A few weeks ago my husband and I stood by the graves of Charles Henry John West and Eliza Dangerfield West, my grandfather and grandmother. The sun was setting and a rosy glow pervaded the atmosphere. The cemetery was so peaceful and quiet. The birds were singing their last little sleepy songs before settling down for the night. In my mind's eye the lives of these two cherished grandparents passed before me. Why was I so proud of them? It certainly was not because of their success in accumulating worldly goods during
their lifetime. But they left to their children and their children's children something more precious than material possessions. They were shining examples of traits. such as humility, integrity, dependability, a love of their fellowmen, a capacity and love for hard work, and a keen sense of humor. Most important of all was their love of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which was so sincere and motivating that their example has been an
inspiration to all their descendants.
Among their descendants are to be found fine doctors and nurses, dedicated teachers, excellent farmers, talented musicians, writers, lovers of art, artisans of various kinds and above all devoted members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, many of whom have fulfilled missions for the Church.
In terms of their influence for good on this earth, Charles and Eliza lived lives that were inspirational models for their devoted descendants and friends to follow.
Twilight Years
On Christmas day, December 25, 1900 the family of Charles Henry John West and Eliza Dangerfield West met at the home of his son, Bishop Jabez West. The party was held in honor of their golden wedding anniversary. Most of the family except those in the Big Horn basin was there to celebrate this special occasion. Charles in his journal mentioned the names of those who were present and the expressions of love and gifts given to him and Eliza. Charles says, “We had a very enjoyable time with our families and friends that day. Jabez and Jessie made us all welcome and spared no expense to make us all feel happy. It was a time long to be remembered by us. We ask Father in Heaven to bless all those present and absent for kindness and good wishes. We visited all our children on our return home with the exception of those living too far away.”
Charles and Eliza moved to Clearfield, Utah in Davis County. They became members of the Syracuse Ward, Davis Stake October 15, 1909. (Clearfield at that time did not have a ward organization). They lived in the home just a short distance from the home of George H. and Eliza Alice West Draper and family.
In the fall of the year 1906, a very important event happened. William, the youngest son of Charles who lived in the Big Horn Basin, and who had been a bachelor for a number of years married the talented Maud Houston June 6, 1906 at the home of his sister and brother-in-law Joseph Neville. They had come to Salt Lake for their marriage to be solemnized and to receive their endowments on October 10, 1906. This event made Charles and Eliza extremely happy because now everyone of their children had been married in the temple. To celebrate this important event, a number of the family of Charles and Eliza met at the Draper family home for an evening of enjoyment. The evening was spent so happily --Grandmother Eliza giving readings and Grandfather Charles singing so many of the songs they love.
After the party, they said good-night and walked home. Zilnorah Draper walked with them. Zilnorah D. Barnett tells the story of grandfather's death. A few minutes after grandfather had shut up the chickens for the night, he came into the house coughing. Grandmother had him sit in a chair and he held his handkerchief to his mouth and spit up some blood. He had had asthma for many years and perhaps had exerted himself that
evening. Grandmother cried out excitedly, “Run Norah, run for your mother quick.” I ran, but before Mother (Eliza West Draper) arrived, he had passed away. Some of the other members of the family came before my mother arrived, so witnessed his death. He was taken to Salt Lake for the funeral, and he lay in state at Bishop Jabez W. West's home. Many sorrowing friends and relatives came to look upon his handsome bearded face for the last time. His funeral and burial was October 15, 1906. How the family would miss
this wonderful, kind and friendly man.
More Busy and Eventful Years
In 1886 Charles purchased some land about two and one-half miles from Peoa, called Oakley. Soon he, Eliza and their sons, Charley and William, went out there to live and improve the place. Perhaps Charles and Eliza felt that farming would be a good experience for their teenage sons.
In the early part of the year of 1891, Charles was asked to take charge of the co-op store in Peoa as Superintendent. In order to do so he had to buy two shares of stock at five dollars a share. During the week while Charles worked at the store, he stayed at Caroline's home, leaving the farm work to the boys. When Will, the youngest son recalled his life on the farm, his most unpleasant memories were of frightening nights
when he was left alone, while Charles was away at work and his mother was out nursing. Then every strange sound such as the thud of dirt thrown on the roof by neighbor boys, or the “Tap, Tap” of a big mountain rat in the darkness had an eerie meaning for him. On the other hand, his happiest memory of the farm was of a big family reunion, when all his brothers and sisters assembled there with their families. He never forgot the joke the older boys played that day, when they fastened some old horns to the head of a yearling
calf, and then called their father to see the “strange steer” in the stockyard.
On the 25th of February 1891, Charles Jesse the next to the youngest son of Eliza and Charles wed the lovely, soft spoken, dark-haired, Elizabeth May Newman of Peoa in the Logan Temple. In reference to his work as superintendent of the Co-op store in Peoa, Charles had this to say in his journal. “I got along there pretty well for nearly two years. The directors thought they would like a change.” (Apparently the directors and Charles didn't see eye to eye on company policy.) “So in 1892 I went to Salt Lake and worked as a bookkeeper for Knight and Company, my son Jabez being of the company.”
While working in Salt Lake, Charles was taken ill with the rheumatic fever at his son Jabez's home. Jabez and Jessie were very kind to him, nursing him through his illness. When he was able he went back to Oakley where his wives Eliza and Mary Ann nursed him back to health. The latter had sold out her home in Salt Lake City and purchased a farm in Oakley. With the help of a mason, Charles and Mary Ann's two sons built a rustic home for her. Her sons, William and Edward, worked the farm. Not being content on the
farm in Oakley, Mary Ann moved back to Salt Lake City.
The latter part of the spring of 1895, Charles went again to Salt Lake and did some work for Knight and Company on their farm at Kaysville. His son-in-law, George Draper, had charge of the farm. In July 1895 Charles began to homestead one hundred sixty acres of land situated in Mountain Green, Morgan County. (“It was about three miles up a mountain ravine from the main road,” said Charles.) The latter part of October (31) 1895, Charles and Eliza moved from Oakley to Morgan, where they, rented a log house which was near his son Thomas and Maggie. Here Charles wintered stock. In the summer he was kept busy
putting up hay for Knight and Company farm in Kaysvil1e. While there he and Eliza lived in a one-room summer house which George Draper and Charles had built. This arrangement was good because he was a close neighbor of his daughter Eliza and family.
In addition to working for Knight and Company on the farm, he also worked at times on his own homestead or ranch, which was mainly grazing land. One of the great joys of Charles and Eliza was to see their son Jabez depart on April 25, 1897 for a mission to Great Britain. How thrilled Charles was to receive letters from his son telling of his missionary experiences and to know that he was assigned to labor in the
Oldham District of the Manchester Conference.
Charles had given his son Jabez letters of introduction to his brothers and sister, John, Benjamin, William and Maria. In June of the year 1897, Charles was pleased to receive letters telling of the reunion of his son with his uncles and aunt in London during the Golden Jubilee in honor of Queen Victoria. Uncle William had treated Jabez royally and had taken him to see his other relatives. In other letters that Jabez had written his father and brother Thomas, he said that Uncle William had attended some Mormon meetings with him and that he had shown an interest in the gospel. --Still later Jabez reported to his father that Uncle William had written him, asking his nephew to come to London and baptize him. So Jabez went to London, spent the holiday with his Uncle William and baptized him January 5, 1898. Charles felt this to be one of the rewards for the sacrifice he had made in coming to Zion, also to later learn that his son Jabez had been made
President of the London Conference.
Note: Among Dot West's papers (given to her by Amy West Heiner) was found a letter written by her father Jabez, to his brother Thomas C. West. In the following Jabez had some interesting details to report of his visit with relatives in London while on his mission. Only a portion of the letter is reproduced here.
No. 56 Chief Street
Oldham, Lancashire England
October 22, 1897
T. C. West Esquire
Dear Brother,
I spent a very pleasant time with Uncle William and Uncle Ben in London during the Jubilee. I found Uncle William very much like Father, both in looks and ways. You could hardly tell them apart. They walk just alike. Uncle William is straighter than Father, about the same in height and disposition. He would give you his all if Aunt Lizzie did not stop him. She takes care of the money. Uncle Ben is very poor, depending on days work. His girls also go out to work. I was only in his company twice. Uncle John looks like a Jew with his long thick beard, cut rather short. Aunt Phillis is very poorly and has no use for the Gospel. Uncle John would be all right if he was alone by himself, but he is dependent entirely on his boys. When he started to
talk on the Gospel they told him that was enough of that nonsense. I only called on them once as I wanted to see all of London while I was there. I am going to get moved to the London Conference and then I shall wake them up on the Gospel. I got Uncle William and his family to go to meeting and took the Elders to their place, and made them acquainted. Uncle writes me often. I sent the Millennial Star every week for them to read. I also gave them a Book of Mormon and a variety of tracts and I think they are coming along all right."
While Jabez was on his mission, grandmother Eliza Dangerfield West had responded quickly to assist with cases of illness in Jabez's family. How wonderful it was for Jessie, the wife of Jabez, to have the comfort and assistance of her mother in-law. Jabez arrived home from his mission on June 4, 1899, but he missed the smiling face of his brother Thomas. The latter had died in the summer of June 25, 1898 of complications
following typhoid fever and a subsequent operation, at the age of forty-five years.
The spring of 1900 brought many revolutionary changes in the West family. Joseph and Annie Neville had been called by Apostle Woodruff to help settle the Big Horn Basin in Northwestern, Wyoming. William West and Charlie Wright (young bachelors then) were also going as members of the company. The family of Charles West was once again represented in a great pioneering undertaking. Just as these pioneers were leaving for Wyoming, Charles Henry John West learned that his son Jabez was made bishop of the Ninth Ward. Charles Jesse, his next to youngest son, was running a butcher shop for the Utah Slaughtering Company in Murray, acting as its manager, and he had also bought up fifty acres of land.
Family Activities in the 1870’s in the Eleventh Ward
On April 12, 1870, not long after the family moved into the new home, another son was born to Eliza and Charles. He was John Henry West, but only lived a few hours. This was a great disappointment but Caroline West Wright, their oldest daughter, gave birth to a son about the same time and their new grandson, Charlie, was a comforting and joyous compensation.
There were important activities in the family during the early 1870's. Charles found time to work on the Tabernacle and the Assembly Hall on Temple Square. This paid the debt he owed to the Perpetual Emigration Fund. Meanwhile he had joined the Tabernacle Choir. Brother Sanders was the leader. Because grandfather's clothes were a little shabby, he stayed away several Sundays. Finally he made up his mind to go because he said, “It was not my clothes but my voice that was needed.” It was a good thing he finally gained
courage to go back, otherwise he would not have heard of an opening for a clerk in the Knowlden Grain Company on Main Street. He applied for the position and obtained it at a salary of forty dollars a month. He worked for this company several years and enjoyed it very much.
About this time, Thomas went to work for a Salt Lake butcher named George Chandler as teamster. His work came to an end when he was kicked by a mule. The doctor said he could not recover. Once more through the faith and prayers of a family and after a long illness he got better. Thomas now however, turned his attention to other kinds of work and finally became a plasterer. While Thomas was working for George Chandler, Jabez went along to see the slaughterhouse. He became so fascinated watching the men at work with the meat that he returned again and again, doing odd jobs to make himself useful as an errand boy. The
men would reward him by giving him left over pieces of meat to take home. Jabez was so well liked that he was finally given employment in the meat market. (For Jabez this was the beginning of a very successful and prosperous career in the meat business.)
On June 7,1872 another daughter was born to the West family. How happy Eliza and Charles were to have a little daughter after having lost two other little girls. She was named Fannie Elizabeth. When about five months old she developed a swelling in her neck. The doctor looked at it and said it should be lanced. He did this but she got no better and died November 29,1872.
A few months previous to little Fannie's death, Charles and Eliza welcomed Eliza's sister Mary Ann, Charles Denny, her husband and four of their thirteen children to the valley. They had come on the Emigration train. Some of the older children in this family were already in Utah. Some had died and were buried in England. However, one son remained in England. It being a holiday, July 24, when the newcomers arrived Grandfather took them to the nearest saloon to have a glass of beer. This quite astonished Eliza's sister,
Mary Ann, because she thought that in Salt Lake City (Zion) there could be nothing of this kind. Grandfather told her that it was only done out of good feeling and that they did not make a practice of visiting such places. They then took the streetcar to the home of Mary Ann's son, Charlie, who lived in the Eleventh Ward. The reunited family had a good time chatting over days gone by.
Not long before Charles' and Eliza's youngest child was born, brown eyed, vivacious Annie became the bride of Joseph Neville, a tall, handsome cornet player. They were married in the Endowment House May 5, 1873.
On August 29, 1873 Eliza gave birth to her eleventh and last child, William Joseph. He was such a frail baby and his mother in such a weakened condition because of childbirth, that she couldn't nurse him. Caroline came to her mother's rescue. She had had a son born to her about the same time but he had died soon after birth, so she nursed her own tiny brother to health.
Mary Ann Denny, Eliza's sister, had been having some unfortunate marital troubles. In England she and her husband, Charles, had been having difficulty but it became intensified in Utah. She wanted to take her to the Endowment House to be married to him for time and eternity, but he would not listen to her. Instead of living an upright life he took to drinking. Finally Mary Ann got a divorce. Later, with the consent and advise of
her sister Eliza, Mary Ann was married and sealed to Charles Henry John West the 23rd. of August 1874.
On a lot east of the city that Mary Ann's son Charles had given his mother, Brother Leaker, Jabez Dangerfield and Grandfather built a home for Mary Ann. Referring to the house Charles said, “We went to work and dug out a building spot and got up one good room, one half dug out also.” Later Charles rented a place for them on the same block on which he had his own home. It was a time of great adjustment for both families, what with the added strain of more people to feed and clothe, but Charles said, “I did the best I could with my means in looking after the family, -- also I divided up my time according to what I thought was
right.”
Eliza was helpful and understanding and did her best to help. One fall she dried nearly three hundred pounds of apricots and peaches, which she sold to buy Charles a new suit. Mary Ann worked at the Holy Cross hospital and with her savings bought a lot from her son-in-law, Joseph Taylor, near the hospital on Eleventh East between First South and South Temple. Charles with some assistance from Mary Ann's son, Charles, built her a home.
Another marriage occurred in the West family in the very late fall. Thomas was married to lovely young Margaret Felt, the eldest daughter of N. H. Felt, the 10th of November 1874 in the Endowment House. Thomas already had a home for her, which he had built on a portion of his father’s, land which the latter had given him. Mary Ann's youngest child Arthur, who was fond of Charles, died the 29th of August 1875. This caused them great unhappiness because they loved the boy so. An important event occurred on the 27th of October 1875. Charles became a citizen of the United States and received his final papers.
During the next five years, the family of Charles Henry John were growing up and scattering in many directions. In the year 1880, ten years after the family had moved to the Eleventh Ward, we find them engaged in the following pursuits. Charles was still working in the grain business, only now his employer's name was Thomas C. Armstrong. Caroline, now a widow with several children, had moved to Peoa, Summit County. Thomas, who had followed the business of plasterer, sold his home in Salt Lake and with
his wife and family moved to Round Valley, Morgan, Utah where he took charge of a piece of his father-in-law's land. Annie was a happy and contented wife and mother sharing her husband's interests wherever his work of making bricks and building houses led him, such as to Woodruff, Bountiful and Ogden. Eliza Alice, a baby in her mother's arms when they left England, was now a lovely young woman of eighteen. She married
her sweetheart, George H. Draper, in the Endowment House before the year was over, November 25, 1880. Jabez worked for William Peterson, a butcher on Market Row. But at the time of his marriage to beautiful Jessie Hoggan of the Eleventh Ward on the 20th of January 1881, he was working for Mr. Chandler.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Christmas Miracle
Have you wondered how this family spent Christmas under such poor circumstances? Again Annie West Neville tells of a Christmas while they were in the Sixth Ward and while her parents were teaching school. “Mother told us not to hang up our stockings as they had no money to give Santa Claus and he could not come to poor folks. In fact, there was no Santa Claus. We all felt very badly as the children in school told us what they were going to have him bring them. I prayed that there was a Santa Claus and hoped he would bring us something. My folks felt very badly about it. At about eleven o'clock that Christmas Eve, there was a rap on the door and in walked a man. He had his arms loaded with sacks of things for his children. He said, ‘Where are the children's stockings?’ My mother told him they had nothing to put in them. He was feeling good. He had had a little liquor. So he said, ‘Fetch the stockings here and I will put something in them.’ He opened his bags. He put oranges and candies and nuts in them; and gave my parents a little good cheer and left. He was a good neighbor. When we got up and saw our filled stockings, we were delighted. I thought surely that the Lord had heard my prayers and that there was a Santa Claus.”
Early Days in Utah
Brother Miller invited Charles, Eliza and children to stay at his home. This they did for a few days, but Charles and Eliza were independent, so they took a small room in Provo. They had such a very few things to start housekeeping. Their sea chest was used for a table. They had a chair with a rawhide bottom, a baking kettle, tin ware and their bedclothes.
Charles' first work was helping to make molasses, and he got his pay in molasses, potatoes and carrots.
Utah the Story of Her People, p. 196, Deseret News Press. Salt Lake City, Utah, 1946, furnishes us some details of this event. “When the rails were being laid across the plains of Wyoming, Brigham Young took a contract to lay 190 miles of road from Echo Canyon to Promontory. The people of Utah profited by this contract. Many sturdy Utah men and boys flocked with pick and spade, cart and ox team to help construct the road.” Charles was among the twenty-one men working up Echo Canyon, clearing off oak brush and later making a fill. They were paid so much per yard. Later four men of the group (Charles included) took a small contract under John Sharp about one-half mile east of the Long Tunnel. They had to make a cut in the earth, which was-- their dream had become a reality.
From the security of a good position in England, we find Charles trying to do most any menial job to eke out an existence for his family. He, like many other saints, was inexperienced in farming and in other kinds of labor that was required in a frontier settlement. But work he did! One of his first jobs was hauling out dirt in the tithing yard. But people passing by laughed at him because he was so clumsy in the use of a wheelbarrow. He helped Bishop Miller in his field binding wheat. When he asked the Bishop for more work the latter said, “You and your family had better turn out and glean wheat.” Which they did! When it was threshed they found they had over twenty-one bushels of wheat for winter. And as the price of flour went up to twenty dollars per hundred pounds, they had "plenty and to spare."
Annie West Neville in her Biography had this to say about their gleaning experiences. “Father and Mother would take us children into the fields to glean wheat. When Father could see quite a bit of wheat laying around, he would call us like a rooster calling his hens, and we would run and get it. That made a play out of it. We all gathered twenty bushels that fall. We had a nice lot of things for winter; a small barrel of molasses,
a big pig, vegetables, plenty of flour and clothes enough to keep us warm. These were homespun but we were happy.”
In the spring Eliza went to Salt Lake to see her brother Jabez who had been in California, and also some old London friends, David and Ann Leaker, who were living in the Eleventh Ward. While there she obtained some temple clothes for herself and Charles. The latter started out on foot for Salt Lake --a fifty-mile trip. A few days later on March 23, 1864, they went to the Endowment House and were married and sealed together for time and eternity. Charles reported, “We felt fully repaid for our journey and the few trials we had been through.”
While living in Provo, Eliza and Caroline had typhus fever. They were very ill. It was up to Charles to take care of the sick and to be the cook. He generally managed quite well, but one day the bread he had made did not rise. He had forgotten the yeast!
The West family was persuaded by some friends to go to Provo Valley or Heber City, as it is now called. Charles could take up all the land he wanted. But their troubles really began now. Eliza and Charles were not told how cold and hard the winters were, how isolated the little community became when the deep snows made the roads impassable, and of the constant danger of Indians in the vicinity, nor how hard it was to earn a living there. But Charles worked at anything he could find to do. When the family moved into the valley their great desire was to make friends. They went to meetings in a log-meeting house. Because Charles was fond of singing, he joined the choir and made some friends.
In Provo Valley, the family first lived with friends under very crowded conditions. When everyone was at home, the children had to stay in bed because there was no room around the fireplace for all to keep warm. So Charles decided to take up some land and build a home for his family. The land agent helped him select a site. However, he told Charles that a certain man had looked at the lot a year earlier and wanted the land agent to keep it for him but that the gentleman had not paid the necessary fee. So the agent took Charles'
money for recording and entering the claim. When Charles commenced digging out a foundation for a log house, a man came along to claim the land. Grandfather explained to the gentleman what had been done, that he had made an entry and paid for it, which the stranger had not, so he had a perfect right to the land. Rather than have a most unpleasant argument and to save feelings, Charles was counseled to withdraw his claim even though he knew the land was rightfully his.
Thirteen year-old Caroline did not go with her family to Provo Valley at first. Instead she had gone to Coalville in Summit County to live with a family to earn her board and clothes. But after living there a year she earned her board all right but the clothes she received was only a pair of shoes and a made over dress. When she went back to her parents she found them living in a small log house with a dirt floor and a dirt roof. It was there on a cold wintry day, January 9, 1866 that another baby was born to Eliza and Charles, a daughter, Mary Rebecca. While Eliza was in bed with the baby the makeshift wooden pipe caught fire. Charles was away from home, so Thomas ran for help. Through the help of a neighbor, the fire was put out with snow before much damage was done.
That winter was a hard one indeed for the family. Although Charles didn't give too many details of the extreme poverty the family suffered, Caroline gave the following details in her history. “My parents continued to live in Heber City for a year or two. (Perhaps sixteen months) Father worked in the limekiln. --They were very poor, some of the time eating bran bread. They had frozen potatoes. (No one had mentioned to
Charles that he should put them in a pit to keep them from freezing). He sold his watch to buy a “step” stove. (He had parted with his cow, the camp kettle and the value of a few dollars besides to get it). Mother had sold some of her best baby clothes to buy a table, and when the kilns froze up, they boiled wheat to eat."
Some of their troubles no doubt were due to grandfather's high standards of honesty. Other dishonest men in the community often took advantage of him. Finally Eliza in desperation told Charles that if he did not find a better place in which to live and more food for the hungry children to eat she would go find a job herself.
Consequently Charles left his family for a while and went to Salt Lake City and it was several months before he returned for them. Meanwhile Eliza and the children were having their difficulties. How resourceful this pioneer wife and mother had to be now. The Indians became very troublesome and orders were given for everyone to move to the fort for safety. Before Eliza found a way to go, the people who owned the home where Eliza and family were living, came in while they were away, took possession of the house and put Eliza's belongings out in the rain. Fortunately, a friend by the name of James Cole came by with a team and hayrack and took the family and the West's meager possessions to his home as a temporary refuge.
During this time Eliza did sewing or anything else she could find to do. When the Indian scare was over Eliza moved to a two-room house and taught school until her husband came back. This work helped them to get something to eat. Meanwhile Charles, in Salt Lake City, was having difficulty trying to find work. He
finally found employment with Jesse C. Little, running a farm near the Jordan River on shares. So he borrowed a wagon and two yoke of oxen and went to Provo Valley for his family. They greeted him joyously and had so much to tell him. Charles thanked Brother Cole and his wife for being so good to his family. Now Charles and Eliza eagerly loaded the wagon, tied a heifer on behind, and happily left the isolated valley for a new adventure.
The house on the farm near the Jordan River was warm and comfortable and they were soon settled. There was plenty to do on the farm and it was a challenging experience. Thomas was a help to his father in the fields, and young Jabez could perform many chores. Caroline was usually away from home working, but Annie was her mother's helper. Eliza as a farmer's wife was busier than she had ever been. She learned to churn butter for her own family and for the Little family also. That fall Charles harvested a good crop of wheat and after threshing he got a good share.
In the winter and spring Charles borrowed his brother-in-law Jabez's team and hauled wood from Lambs Canyon (which is reached by the way of Parleys Canyon, just Southeast of Salt Lake City). Some of the wood he sold to Fort Douglas in order to buy food and clothing for his family. Clothing was an urgent necessity now, for the clothes they had brought from England had to be replaced. Eliza washed wool for the J. C. Little's, which in those days, with their limited washing equipment was no easy task, and in return took her pay in cloth.
The first year on the farm was a satisfying experience for the family until the floods came. Early in the spring the Jordan River and the Millcreek overflowed their banks. The farm being near the streams was practically inundated. Almost every time the family left the house they had to wade through water. “From our house,” Charles reported, “my wife had several times waded through water to go to the city to take their share of butter to Jesse C. Little.” Again he said, “after returning from my trip to the canyon, I left my wagon near the bridge. When I returned it seemed that from the bridge to my house was one sheet of water.”
Charles was now very much aware that it would be impossible to plant crops on the farm that year, so he was compelled once more to seek other ways of earning a living. That fall, he and Eliza became schoolteachers. It was a profession that suited their cultural background better than that of farming. Since their teen-age romance began they had had no formal schooling that we know of but they had been good students and had absorbed a great deal of knowledge even though much of it was of a practical nature.
They had always taught their children. Charles taught them to sing and to love music. Eliza taught them the elementary skills of reading and writing.
The school trustees came to Eliza and Charles and asked them to teach in the Sixth Ward, meeting house. All the children from both Fifth and Sixth wards and some from the Fifteenth Ward were their students. Charles taught the boys, Eliza the girls. The West family lived in a small house at the rear of the meetinghouse. They would have done well if they had received payment from all the parents, but it was a year of hard times for most all people in the Salt Lake Valley. Charles and Eliza often took food and other things in payment for tuition. Annie West Neville in her biography, writes of this time. “We stayed in the Sixth Ward about one year. I went to school that winter and learned to read and spell and got in the fourth reader, but was too poor to buy a slate and pencil so could not get along in the other studies. My parents were afraid the people would kick if we used their children's books or spent much time on us as they could not get enough
money from the students to buy things with.”
Have you wondered how this family spent Christmas under such poor circumstances? Again Annie West Neville tells of a Christmas while they were in the Sixth Ward and while her parents were teaching school. “Mother told us not to hang up our stockings as they had no money to give Santa Claus and he could not come to poor folks. In fact, there was no Santa Claus. We all felt very badly as the children in school told us what they were going to have him bring them. I prayed that there was a Santa Claus and hoped he would bring us something. My folks felt very badly about it. At about eleven o'clock that Christmas Eve, there was a rap on the door and in walked a man. He had his arms loaded with sacks of things for his children. He said, ‘Where are the children's stockings?’ My mother told him they had nothing to put in them. He was feeling good. He had had a little liquor. So he said, ‘Fetch the stockings here and I will put something in them.’ He opened his bags. He put oranges and candies and nuts in them; and gave my parents a little good cheer and left. He was a good neighbor. When we got up and saw our filled stockings, we were delighted. I thought surely that the Lord had heard my prayers and that there was a Santa Claus.”
After Christmas the family moved again to a house near the old Pioneer Fort. It was in this home in February 22,1868, that another baby was born to them. It was a son and he was named Charles Jesse. In April of 1868, the family moved to the Eleventh Ward. They were tired of the cramped uncomfortable home they had rented so Charles planned to build his own home. He bought a very fine building lot from Bishop McCrea and worked at many odd jobs such as helping a mason and plasterer and digging wells to earn a living for the family and make payments on the lot.
About the time the Union Pacific Railroad was being built, twenty-one men out of the ward took a small sub-contract to work some distance up Echo Canyon. Milton R. Hunter in his book,
about twenty-two feet high, and haul out the dirt with wheelbarrows. Not having heard from his family for a considerable time, Charles felt uneasy; so he made up his mind to walk home. He stopped overnight at a Brother Gleason's home in Farmington. When Charles was asked by one of the family how many children he had, he answered one short of the number. As he thought it over, he smiled about how foolish he was. Next day he walked on until he reached the Hot Springs, when he met Brother William Brighton. The latter told him of the death of Mary Rebecca, his little daughter, on December 8, 1868. She was almost three and had died of diphtheria. What a shock it was to Charles: He arrived home finding it only too true. But this time the West family had friends to comfort them in their grief.
Charles, following the death of Mary Rebecca, worked out at Promontory Point under Brother Brighton for a short time. Thomas following later, was to work on the same piece of construction. Their job was wheeling up coarse gravel in wheelbarrows to make a fill. The work was extremely hard on the boy Thomas, so he was given the job of driving mules on a dump cart.
For over a year Caroline West had been working in the home of Thomas H. Wright of the Eleventh Ward, where she was treated very kindly and was well provided for with food and clothing. Mr. Wright thought so much of the eighteen-year old girl that he asked her to be his second wife, and so they were married on February 8, 1869.
Charles worked for Brigham Young doing all manner of chores, sometimes in the garden, the orchard and the harvest fields for two dollars a day. When a street railway was started, he left President Young's employment so that he could earn more money. Charles worked with pick and shovel on Main Street making grade for ties. He also worked on South Temple Street from the Deseret News Building west to the
railroad station. Quoting this interesting bit of news directly from his journal, Charles says, “I rode in the
first street car that left the Deseret News Office, all down grade. President Young was there in his carriage. He jumped aboard the car, and ran a race with his carriage, no horse on the car, being down grade. All that had to be done was to watch the brakes. We beat the horses on the carriage.”
The work that Charles was doing was very hard but he had dreams of a home of his very own and he needed adobes and other material for its construction. Charles started work on the new home by digging out a foundation for a two-room house. Then he with the help of his son, Thomas, dug out the rock needed for the foundation at the foot of the Tenth Ward bench. It was dug out laboriously with Charles' own tools, a
shovel, a pick and an old ax. He had the rocks hauled to the lot. In the meantime Charles had bought an old log house for fifty dollars and had it removed to his lot. The mud roof leaked very badly. He put on a better roof and raised the house two logs higher. Charles didn't say in his journal how long, or if the family lived in this log house, but it can be assumed that perhaps they did until the new house was finished.
Grandfather purchased eleven thousand adobe from a Mr. Bulto, an adobe maker, for his two-roomed house. A man by the name of Brother Swain, a rock layer and mason, put up the house. But he was in such a hurry to get the job done that when he had the building six feet high, the back part was one inch out of plumb. When Charles complained, the builder got angry and took his tools away. Grandfather Charles finally got another man to finish the house and he made a good job of it. Meanwhile Charles had found the clay and
sand he needed for the inside work by digging a hole on his property. After removing the topsoil he found clay, then sand, and still deeper (thirty feet) a spring of water. When Charles needed lumber for the house, Thomas, who by this time was working for a lumber company, charged a bill of goods on his son's pay. A man by the name of Brother Jabez Taylor who lived in the Eleventh Ward did the carpentry work on the house. During the building of the house, Charles had spent his spare time setting out fruit trees and bushes. He was not only thinking of the future food supply for the family but also to make the surroundings more beautiful. Finally the house was finished and the family moved in.. How they appreciated their own
home
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