They spend whole days in hunting & yet their houses are left in an unfinished state. The only child of Isaac and Elizabeth that did not inherit the name of a family member was one of their daughters, Emma, who was born when her parents had a special relationship with a prominent family within the American gentry who may have influenced the name selection. Home; Services; New Patient Center. Ancestry and Posterity of Joseph Smith and Emma Hale: With Little Sketches of Their Immigrant Ancestors All of Whom Came to America between the Years 1620 and 1685, and Settled in the States of Massachusetts and Connecticut. [citation needed] She often took in young girls in need of work, giving them jobs as maids. B. Buck noted most residents of the valley were drawn into Methodism during this early period, but religious enthusiasm quickly waned as the fires of conviction soon died down and the valleys residents largely returned to their previous indifference.210Some members of the Hale family continued their persistent involvement in religion despite the declining interest. After living out their days, Isaac and Elizabeth passed away and were buried in the little cemetery adjacent to the Smith Harmony home. American Legal and Political Institutions, Christian Churches in Joseph Smiths Day, Daily Life of First-Generation Latter-day Saints, Joseph Smiths 1844 Campaign for United States President, Lectures on Theology (Lectures on Faith), Martin Harriss Consultations with Scholars, Printing and Publishing the Book of Mormon, Religious Beliefs in Joseph Smiths Day, Restoration of the Melchizedek Priesthood, Temple Dedications and Dedicatory Prayers, Vision of the Redemption of the Dead (D&C138), Emma Hale Smith, Church History Topics, Emma Smith, wife of Joseph Smith, played a prominent role in the restoration of the Church. Seehttp://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=brendablack&id=I1806, accessed November 5, 2014, for possible details on Ward family history. 242. Anderson,Ancestry and Posterity of Joseph Smith and Emma Hale, 42728. Blackman,History of Susquehanna County,102. Stocker,Centennial History of Susquehanna County,550. Major Bucks father had placed him with the Onondaga people when only eleven years old to learn their language. He continued to express similar discouragement in his letters for the next decade, such as when he noted, poor Backsliden Lanesboro is left to mourn her bareness and Distance from her Duty and privilege. John Comfort, letter to Dear Children, April 8, 1837, and it is poor wicked Lanesboro still. John Comfort, letter to Silas Comfort, March 28, 1838. Nathaniel Lewis dedicated much of his time during that year to working for the Unitarian Timothy Pickering and assisting the dying Tim Pickering in his last hours, but he was also likely involved in Methodism by then, since he had preached for years in Vermont before marrying and coming to Pennsylvania. See Jirah Mumford & Co., in the Harmony Township Tax Assessment records from 18261831. Travelers complained in letters and reminiscences how during wet months of the year the hard clay became deep ruts, supporting treacherous puddles on the Harmony Turnpike.1Despite their complaints, the turnpike was the quickest route from western New York to the urban areas of southern Pennsylvania and the thoroughfare was always busy. I learned from her many facts relative to her husband, Joseph, August 1, 1875. As the first lady of Nauvoo, she hosted diplomats in her home, made public appearances with Joseph at civic and community events, and presented political petitions in support of the Church and her husband. 19. F. Russell Meyer,The Reverend Elam Potter(Enfield, Conn.: Enfield Congregational Church, 2002). attended a Girls school for one year, he did not document his source. Rachel Cope, A Sacred Space for Women: Hymnody in Emma Hale Smiths Theology, Journal of Religious History (2017). It would be twenty years before forests would become cultivated fields. On 23 December 1847, which would have been Joseph's 42nd birthday, Bidamon and Smith were married in Nauvoo by a Methodist circuit rider. After Isaac married Elizabeth Lewis in 1790 they moved into a 15 by 30 foot log home on their property where they raised five boys and four girls. Blackman,History of Susquehanna County,103. When the Lewis family arrived in Vermont, they settled in Wells Township. 250. Her cousins named their son Algernon Sidney Lewis after the English philosopher Algernon Sidney who opposed absolute or divine right monarchy, and the Litchfield area became a central base for operations during the war where the Continental Army could rely on consistent support, store supplies, and keep prisoners of war. 40:1, [and] James 4:8. George Peck, Memorandums of Circuit Travels, 18161818.. Both families were financially well placed and both played a significant role in community life. Blackmans use of the phrase a little deluded suggests in her published history the Hale family initially believed Joseph Smiths revelations. [26], Emma Smith stated that the first time she became aware of a polygamy revelation being attributed to Joseph Smith was when she read about it in 1853 in Orson Pratt's booklet The Seer. These roads would open trade to the Genesee Valley where men like Joseph Knight Sr. and Josiah Stowell could purchase large supplies of grain inexpensively and take their loads down to the river destined for the higher priced urban markets in Pennsylvania. It was too wet and humid for a crop more susceptible to fungi than other grains.116 Barley suffered from similar challenges. Soon after this happened, Martin Harris informed me that he must have a greater witness, and said that he had talked with Joseph about it -- Joseph informed him that he could not, or durst not show him the plates, but that he (Joseph) would go into the woods where the Book of Plates was, and that after he came back, Harris should follow his track in the snow, and find the Book, and examine it for himself. J. They were Henry Drinker, who acquired large tracts of Willingborough Township, particularly on the south side of the river, and John Hilborn, who served as his land agent helping to sell the Drinker property. The Susquehanna Land Company bought its land from Connecticut, but Pennsylvania also claimed ownership and bloody skirmishesthe Pennamite Wars erupted between Yankee and Pennsylvania settlers, and the most recent conflict was still not fully resolved. 1828 Susquehanna County Tax Records. He was a man of refined taste, a poet, and a scholar.227 Rose set up camp in the woods and used a large box of chocolate as his chair while writing his fianc a letter in which he promised her he would build her a frame house, whose habitation ought to be a palace on the mountain where he sathe soon built her an elegant mansion, on the bank of Silver lake, surrounded by one of the largest farms in the state.228 Based on his several letters to his fianc, Rose knew he would buy the land before he even investigated it, and shortly after his visit he bought the land owned by the Francis family of Philadelphia for $75,000, including the tract owned by the Hales, and on February 18, 1809, Rose formalized a new deed.229 He registered his purchase a week later on February 25 and immediately contacted Isaac Hale and the other men who headed the 150 families on his property, demanding payment.230. Not everyone in the Hale family participated in the search for silver, however, as Isaacs brother-in-law Nathaniel Lewis seems to have separated his family from these efforts. Nina M. Versaggi, Director, Public Archaeology Facility, Binghamton University, Personal communication to author, September 13, 2013. Sherman Day outlined Roses management of Carmalts lands and suggests he acted as an agent for Carmalt when the latter left the region. See Julia A. Details of the assessment and the value of the Hale log home in relation to those listed for others in the valley suggest Isaac and Elizabeth Hale had a comparatively large 900 square feet of living space in a 1 1/2 story log structure, but the building had no windows in the upstairs garret and few if any downstairs.136 The Hale family swept their garbage out the doors of their home into the yard as did all Americans during the late eighteenth century; this was not a sign of an unkempt family.137 The artifact scatter of broken ceramics, food scraps, and other items found around the Hale log home suggests the place where the family lived for approximately twenty years, and where Emma was born, originally stood on foundations repaired and reused for their later frame home. But fellow Methodist JoshnComfort, at whose home the Methodists met when they did not meet in the Payne home, concluded, abolitionism is the most destructive to the peace of society in familys neighborhoods and the churches of god it has Divided the Baptist Church and presbeterian Church at Mont Rose. 100. Paul,History of Wells,3334. Isaac did not indicate the men stayed at his residence,while in the same affidavit he noted his daughter Emma and her husband Joseph lived with him briefly until they would move out, andresideupon a place near myresidence.280. Photograph by Mark L. Staker. Ezra Stiles, the president of Yale College, lived near both Isaacs maternal and paternal families when he recorded in his diary gossip he heard from Governor Trumbull, who, he believed, received it directly from governor John Winthrop the Younger himself, how Winthrop had found plenty of Gold in a secret gold mine in the nearby mountains and had made a gold ring he showed off to his friends. Isaac Hale, the father-in-law of Joe Smith, the Mormon prophet, killed four within less than 1 mile of there, 3 of them in one day. 75. Bartlett, Crawford and Stearns Architects. Their marriage faced unusual challenges due to the hardships of founding and leading the Church. Alva Hale, Letter to His Brothers and Sisters, February 20, 1842, Wilford C. Wood Museum Collection, Bountiful, Utah. A transcription of the trial notes has also been placed on file with Betty Smith, Susquehanna County Historical Society, Montrose, Pennsylvania, hereafter cited as Trial Notes of Scribe A. Photocopies of the original trial notes were provided by Shari Whitney of the Susquehanna County Courthouse, Montrose, Pennsylvania. 13. John Comfort, letter to Silas Comfort, January 17, 1840. When the twins were nine days old, their father, John, gave the infants to the Smiths to raise as their own. The sons likely visited their fathers grave at some later point and replaced the original Hale and Lewis marker since a nicely carved 1820s headstone with a weeping willow and well-carved lettering now marks the grave.165, A religious transformation in the Hale family followed the death of Tim Pickering; and a transformation in the Hale home and land followed their religious transformation. 275. http://popular-archaeology.com/issue/june-2013/article/george-washington-s-incredible-garbage-dump. Paul,History of Wells,81. Chaffee,History of the Wyoming Conference, 37. In response to Emmas invitation, Isaac and Elizabeth Hales children who had already left the Susquehanna Valley settled farms within visiting distance of the city of Nauvoo, although they elected to not live within the Mormon community. None of the daughters named a child after their mother, although two of Emmas sisters, Elizabeth and Tryal, named a daughter Emma. A photograph of the map is in the authors possession. 6 Moved to Wells, Albany Co., New York (later in Rutland Co., Vermont), ca. Timothy Pickering to Rebecca White Pickering, February 21, 1808; Rebecca Pickering to Timothy Pickering Jr. March 27, 1808. Isaac Hale and James Westfall, Joseph Smiths death on June27, 1844, created tremendous upheaval for Emma. 272. He was a member of the Army. Blackman,History of Susquehanna County,102. Emma and her family remained rich in real estate but poor in capital. Robert H. Rose, letter to Isaac Hale, January 2, 1810, Deeds. Cowdery continued a scribe for Smith until the Book of Mormon was completed as I supposed and understood. Peck,Life and Times,68; George Peck, Memorandums of Circuit Travels, 18161818; Peck,Early Methodism,256. Smith Sr., 9 December 1834, Deed from Isaac and Elizabeth Hale, 25 Doing so, he apparently jumped to conclusions about a temple site because of the Joseph Smith names. Quaker John Hilborn was the best educated man in the valley. 123. 235. The information presented in this article is an outgrowth of my research for the Historic Sites Division of the LDS Church Historical Department in conjunction with the reconstruction of the Isaac and Elizabeth Hale farm (17871841) and the Jesse and Mary Hale/Joseph and Emma Smith farm (18131830) in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. A final report of the excavation is forthcoming and will be placed in the same files. On June 13, 1840, Emma gave birth to a son, Don Carlos, named after his uncle Don Carlos Smith, Joseph's brother. When he arrived, Colonel Pickering wrote to his son Henry that Nathaniel Lewis, who has been much used to sick persons, and whose experience enables him to judge better than I, thinks your brother not likely to survive three days longer.160 Tim Pickering mentally prepared to die in good nineteenth-century fashion with a serenity of mind, flowing from a sincere and constant endeavor to preserve aconscience void of offence toward God and toward man!161 Lewis was right and his brother-in-law died three days later on May 14, 1807.162 Isaac Hale helped bury him on the brow of a hill between the mountain and Starucca [Creek]. On the day of his burial, Colonel Pickering wrote of his son, I intimated to Hail and Lewis my wish that flat stones might be set up at his grave. . Mary S. and John W. Parks, present owners. Thou hast grieved for the hardness of the hearts of thy fathers house, and thou hast longed for their salvation. He specifically mentioned in court testimony that one of his neighbors particularly liked his sugar. He experienced some melancholy while he was away from his fianc, Jane Hodge, and he wrote her of his homesickness, Even the talisman around my neck, which I fondly thought would have defended me against all mischance, cannot shield me from this evil spirit . 40. He had been relaxing in his home when he was called upon to walk to the neighboring Treadwell home to interview a neighbor. I told him as God has convinced him it is his duty to pray in secret, he ought to pray for a heart to pray. The minister then went on to partially defend his inability to pray as directed by telling Colbert about the Shaking Quakers, or Shakers, a religious group Colbert had not heard about, who had an old woman among them calld the Elect Lady, who fortold her own death. While she accurately predicted the time of her death, the minister was convinced the devil had come to take her. As the foliage colors warmed and deepened, Hale joined his efforts with Buck at Ouaquaga where he hunted for meat while Buck gathered frost-bitten corn growing unattended in the fields. Understanding the physical setting of the Hale farm and its mansion,helps us to not only better place the events of 1825-1830 Mormonism within their physical and cultural setting, but also enlarges our appreciation of the Isaac and Elizabeth Hale family. [citation needed] She had persuaded John Taylor and Joseph Smith to call the organization the "Relief Society" instead of the "Benevolent Society". Blackman, who wrote forty years after Wilkinson noted the earliest homes had no windows and used oiled brown paper to let in light, and also concluded that many of the earliest log homes in the valley were poorly lighted. Blackman,History of Susquehanna County,469. 316. But although the term summer kitchen is anachronistic in this context, it is so widely known and helps to describe the purpose of the work kitchens that Ive retained it here to refer to the extra kitchen that was part of the Hale home. 177. James Deetz,In Small Things Forgotten: An Archaeology of Early American Life(New York: Anchor Books, 1996), 17172. As the play begins Isaac has agreed to house several treasure hunters for an old neighbor, Josiah Stowell, who is digging for a Spanish silver mine. Other sermons he listed under the name Isaac Hales as having preached in the Hale home were based on the texts, Luke 11:28, Rom. Wood was excluded from the Congregationalists some twelve years before, but the history does not indicate before what. Independence, MO: Herald Publishing House, 1929. But it also aligned him culturally with the local Native Americans since they considered it shameful for a man to do agricultural work; men were expected to hunt and fish.126. Whatever the ultimate motivation for Hales decision to ignore the controversy, after having worked one summer in Connecticut, he concluded to try the West.29. . 93. Shortly before this, Joseph had initiated the Anointed Quoruma prayer circle of important church members that included Emma. 102. (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1984), 80405; Lorraine Cook White, ed.,The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records(Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 19942002), 16:21617. Joseph Smith left no record of what he thought of the Isaac and Elizabeth Hale farm and recently expanded home when he first encountered them at nineteen. [20], On November 6, 1832, Emma gave birth to Joseph Smith III in the upper room of Whitney's store in Kirtland. See Sacred Music,The Centinel,1 (December 1, 1816): 3; Church Music,The Centinel2 (May 17, 1817): 3. Against the wishes of Emma's father, Emma and Joseph married on January 18, 1827. Jesse Hale noted in his assessment of December 1827 that Joseph Smith had arrived since the last assessment while he continued to assess a tax on a Joseph Smith for 434 acres that same year and subsequent years. In late 1806 Joel Smith replaced Stier and Lee as the Methodist circuit rider assigned to the Tioga circuit that included Harmony. Isaac Hale, McKune Cemetery, Oakland, Susquehanna Co., PA, Find a Grave, posted 29 June 2002 (memorial no. Photograph by Mark L. Staker. Blackman,History of Susquehanna County,577. 183. As the elect lady, she presided over the Female Relief Society of Nauvoo from its founding in 1842 until 1844, providing relief to new immigrants and destitute families. Even though he was farming rented land nearby, David was still tied to his father, and his father paid taxes on both homes as residences on his property.252 Twenty-nine-year-old David married his neighbor Rhoda Jane Skinner in 1822. He was considered one of them but not in all things.31, One day Buck tried to follow some of the Onondaga men south as they slipped away to gather salt at a hidden spring. She noted they were a lovely intelligent and highly respectable Family, and their home and farm did honor to the good taste of the intelligent proprie.12 The Hale mansion fit into a class of homes described by Early American historian Richard Bushman as middling mansions.13 Their recently expanded home helped give the Hale family a level of vernacular gentility that had recently found its way into the remote valleys of the Endless Mountains. Blackman (History of Susquehanna County,9596) believed John Comfort built the first sawmill in the valley in 1809. --- The below. Two of the ominous headstones at the edge of the turnpike were for Joseph Smith, who died on March 10, 1792, and Josiah Stow, a local farmer and grave robber, who died on April 2, 1820, the latter not to be confused with Josiah Stowell. 240. He has an almost strictly sexual relationship with Feyre. Even decades later, the Hale men were hired by their neighbors to cut meat, soften it with saleratus, and smoke it for eating in later months. Smith, and his father, with several other "money-diggers" boarded at my house while they were employed in digging for a mine that they supposed had been opened and worked by the Spaniards, many years since. Despite Isaacs deathbed charge to his family, after his death a rift between him and his daughter Emma and her husband seemed to no longer matter to his immediate family. He was likely a local Freemason. 205. While the Spanish had discovered or appropriated gold and silver mines in Peru and other places in South America, the British had not been as successful, and so they turned to the more common way of getting goldtaking it from others. 278. Nearly two years later, a close friend and non-Mormon,[citation needed] Major Lewis C. Bidamon, proposed marriage and became Emma's second husband on December 23, 1847. The first large scale sawmill in the valley began operation in 1809.239Since the Hales were under pressure from Pickering to build the Lewis home in 1809, and Methodist meetings were held in the Hale home as early as 1810, it is likely the Hale family finished building their own new frame home in early 1810, the same year they gained legal title to their property. Buck served as the first permanent minister stationed in the Everlasting Hills.166 He found success in his attempt to spread religious conviction, and he developed a congregation downriver eight miles from the Hale home. . Glass looking was a common scam in which the glass looker claimed to have the ability to find buried treasure for a fee. If correct, this places the Hale land payments at somewhere around $35.00 a year for a decade. After Nathaniel Lewis joined the Methodists, he preached at his house where he established a small class and became the class leader.77 His young son Nathaniel Jr. may have been his first convert. He was also educated and his son Jesse Lane served as a local Justice of the Peace. Joseph SmithIII, Last Testimony of Sister Emma,290. Thou Art an Elect Lady: D&C 24, 25, 26,27,, My Great-Great-Grandmother Emma Smith,, My Dear and Beloved Companion: The Letters of Joseph and Emma Smith,, A Heart Full of Love and Faith: The Prophets Letters to His Family,, Emma Smith letter to Joseph Smith, Mar.7, 1839. The copyist added Joe Smiths wife next to her name to preserve her famous status but did not include her baptismal date which is now lost. After the Buck difficulty, instead of nearly all the families being pious, not but two or three were to be found entitled to that sacred epithet.175 The community still gathered for social interaction on the Sabbath, but they held their Sunday meetings in the local log schoolhouse and read from Thomas Paines Age of Reasoninstead of the Bible. Harmony, February 22, 1826, Elial T. Foote Papers, 26:137; and Paul,History of Wells,119. Alva remained in the valley with his family and cared for her. 243. Blackman noted, William Smith arrived in the valley the same year as Isaac Hale and occupied the land east of him later purchased by the Westfall family.259 It is possible William Smith was already on the property when Isaac Hale arrived since Pennsylvania surveyed the Smith property early during the Pennamite Warson either July 2, 1784, with Jacob Smiths neighboring tract of land in number 236, or on April 4, 1785 with George Rupers land, part of which was later purchased by Isaac Hale.260 William Smith was sometimes known as Governor with his 364 acres.261 Jacob Smith was sometimes assessed a tax as Joseph Smith but it is not clear if that was his alternate name or the name of his son.This Joseph Smith was first assessed for 434 acres in 1823.262, The similarity in names between this Smith family and Isaacs later son-in-law Joseph Smith has caused some confusion over the years.