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| Joseph Taylor (1825-1900) |
Having studied both History and English and the process/product of scholarly writing, I can't help but wonder at this narrative. I wish there were sources cited and less of the authors own bias. But, I guess this is a product of its time and the rose-colored look back at history, where things are very black and white. I just have to be sure to be careful in my own writing. I will also have to go back and verify everything stated in this narrative.
JOSEPH TAYLOR
Joseph Taylor,
third son and eighth child of William Taylor and Elizabeth Patrick Taylor, was
born 4 June 1825 at Bowling Green, Warren, Kentucky. He moved with his parents
to Missouri and went through the trying times of the early church history. In
Nauvoo he met Mary Moore and married her 24 March 1844. They went through the
Nauvoo Temple 24 Jan 1846. At the same time his mother, brothers Allen and
Green also went. He served as one of the body guards to the Prophet Joseph
Smith.
Under the
leadership of Brigham Young, he and his family and his mother and some of her
children crossed the Mississippi River on the ice 8 February 1846. They reached
Council Bluffs in June and had planned to go on to Utah, but the calling for
the Mormon Battalion upset all his plans and he was marching away without
bidding his wife good-bye, leaving her in a campwagon and in a delicate
condition. He suffered the terrible persecutions and starvation that this body
of men had to endure. History treats it lightly in comparison to what it really
was. When the men became sick, the government doctor would give them medicine
to make them worse. If they had diarrhea, the doctor would give them medicine
to make them worse or to increase the cramps. Because of this the men would
stay on duty as long as possible before admitting that they were ill. They were
so near starvation that they would eat the decaying meat of dead sheep, even picking
out the eyes and eating them. One time they had one this sheep for a group of
starving men. One man was left to keep guard and cook the meat while the others
rested. The sheep was so this the firelight shone through. This man was so
hungry he ate all of the sheep while he was cooking it. All the rest of his
life he would never eat mutton.
Joseph
returned to his family in 1847 but his cattle and belongings were so scatted
that he couldn’t leave until the last of May 1850. In the company of fifty
wagons where James Lake was captain, Joseph was lieutenant. He had his wife and
children: Clarissa, Mary Melvina, Joseph Allen, and William Andrew. The latter
was two weeks old when they began the journey. Joseph baptized Sarah Jane
Marler in the Platte River on the way to Utah. They suffered the hardships,
privations and horrors of the Indians but were always faithful. They came by
way of Parley’s canyon and arrived in Salt Lake valley 5 September 1850. They
settled in Salt Lake for a time, then moved to Kaysville. He had a farm and was
building a log cabin when his wife took ill and died at childbirth 4 April
1852. He made her coffin out of his wagonbox, and placed her and the tiny baby
in the coffin took her to Salt Lake for burial. She was one of the first to be
buried in the Salt Lake Cemetary.
Soon after he
married Jane Lake Ordway. After they lived in Kaysville for a time, she
persuaded him to move to Ogden so that she could be near her parents, se he
moved and settled in West Harrisville, now Farr West. He settled where Eliza
Taylor now lives. Very few people lived here. He and two others built a small
irrigation ditch to their farms. Tey [sic] made a proposition that if people
would work onand [sic] enlarge this canal they could have water at four dollars
an acre, where it had cost them therty-two [sic] dollars. People flocked here
because of such good terms. He was water master for years. A branch of the
church was organized with Daniel Rawson as head, and Joseph Taylor and Green
Taylor as his two counsellors [sic].
During the
Echo Canyon War, when Johnston’s Army came to Utah, Joseph Taylor was appointed
Major and sent out with forty or fifty men to the Oregon road near the bend of
Bear River to help delay the progress of Government troops and trains. The instructions
given him were “Burn the whole country before them and on their flanks, keep
them from sleeping, by night surprises, blockade the roads by falling trees and
destroying river fords, take no life, but destroy their trains, and stampede
and drive away their animals at every opportunity”. After he had passed fort
Bridger he left his men and returned to that place on important business. He
came upon a body of United States troops unexpectedly and he and his assistant,
William Stowell, were surrounded and taken prisoners. The soldiers tried to
poison them by putting poison in their soup after starving them. Joseph told
his friend not to eat the soup because it was poison. Mr. Stowell just tasted
his soup and then they buried it, yet he became deathly sick. Then the soldiers
tried to smoke them to death in a tent. Joseph told his assistant to dig a hole
in the ground with his hands, put his face in the hole, hold his hand around
the hole and breath in it. By so doing they lived. One day Joseph said to his
companion, “I’m leaving here tonight”.”You’ll be killed if you try it”, his
companion replied. The officers had been given instructions to fire and kill
the men if they tried to get away. In spite of this, that night Joseph kept
asking the soldiers to build the fire higher because he was cold. He took off
his shois [sic], supposedly to warm his feet. The sentinels kept up their duty
of coming together, giving the password, and facing around to go back to meet
the next sentinel, then coming back, which they did every few minutes. He
waited until the sentinels turned to go back, their backs being toward him,
then he bolted from the fireside and out into the midst of the cattle and
horses. This caused a great commotion and started a stampede. His guards fired
and searched but they couldn’t find him. He ran for miles without stoppingthen
[sic] he slowed down some. A day or two later he found an overcoat and in the
pockets of which were some clean, dry socks. He made good use of these,
especially the socks, since he had left his shoes behind and it was winter.**
The next day he saw two men coming toward him on horseback. At first he thought
it was the men hunting him but soon saw that it wasn’t. They were hunting the
overcoat. They gave it to him and ride back besides. William Stowell was
released at the close of the war.
Joseph Taylor
was stern, strong charactered man. He married two other wives, Maria Harris and
Caroline Madsen.
About 1859 he
took a herd of cattle to care for on shares. They milked about fourty head in
summer and took them down to Salt Creek in winter. The winter that Joseph Allen
was eleven and Andrew was nine, they stayed with the cattle, living in a dugout
and their only clothes being straw hats, shoes and canvas suits. One night some
Indians came into the dugout, motioned for the boys to go to bed, that they
wouldn’t harm them, and they ate all of the boy’s food. Of course the boys
didn’t sleep. Next morning Joseph Allen send Andrew home to tell his father
what had happened while he stayed with the cattle. Andrew walked the twelve or
fifteen miles through the snow, arriving hole late in the afternoon. His
step-mother had no food ready so he had to wait until the next day before his
father could take fresh provisions to his brother.
He was father
to the following twenty- 4 children: Clarissa, Mary Melvina, Joseph Allen,
William Andrew, Moroni, Esther, Emma Jane, Lydia Anne, James bailey, Janette,
Julette, Mary Ellen, Elizabeth, Philomela, Amanda, Lamone, James, Heber, Hyrum,
Ada, Evelyn, Frank, Joseph Jr. and Esther.
He lived to a
ripe old age, doing good all his days. He was a Patriarch. He died at Farr
West, Utah 9 August 1900 after a three week illness. His funeral was held in
Farr West with a large attendance. Five Mormon Battalion members were present,
all of whom spoke. They were: John Thompson, James Owen, Lorin Clark, Alexander
Brown and Jess Brown. Bishop James Martin presided and he and George Middleton,
William Fife and Thomas Doxey all spoke of long acquaintance with him and of
his faithfulness in forwarding the Lord’s work. He had always been willing to
defend his people, even to laying down his life.
** some say
that he took his shoes with him when he ran away from the soldiers in
Johnston’s Army.
Some of this
was from Orson F. Whitney book “The Making of a State” Page 107.
(by
Lola Taylor wells)
Source: Lund and Taylor Family personal papers, (genealogical research and documents, ; privately held by Jeanine Lund (Clontz Allen Sinsel), [address for private use], Plain City, Utah); Joseph Taylor narrative report of his life, great-grandfather, scanned and transcribed, 31 Aug 2012. Written by Lola Taylor Wells.
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