David Cazier
David Crockett Cazier (PDF)A Copy of the Sketch of the Life of David Cazier As Written By Himself
21 January 1913 – ________1918
I, Martha (Mattie) Cazier Eager have copied and edited grandfather’s sketch of his life. In doing so I have tried to preserve the style in which it was written and thus retain grandfather’s personality. I have corrected the spelling in many instances but have also left many words as he spelled them. They were spelled as the word sounded to him. In most instances I have left the sentences long as he wrote them. There was no punctuation. There was no paragraphing. I did as little punctuation and paragraphing as possible.
Grandfather’s sketch was written in three school note books. The first book ends with page 6, the second book at page 13, and the third at page 15. It was written with a lead pencil. He began his sketch in 1913 and made the last entries in 1918. Grandfather died on the 19 May 1929. He lived to be ninety-five years of age. The notebooks were given to me by Aunt Sadie Cazier who has had them in her possession since grandfather’s death. Aunt Sadie was the wife of grandfather’s youngest son, Edwin Cazier.
During the years 1924-1927 grandfather would frequently ask me if I would help him write his history. This would be on my visits home from Idaho and southeastern Utah. It seemed that he was “not in the mood” when I approached him and was ready to help hi,. I do not remember that he ever told me that he had already written the above sketch. I wonder now why he wanted my help – maybe it was to write the last few years of his life. Maybe he wanted to rewrite his life’s history. I am very grateful that he has left us this excellent history and autobiography of his life.
I David Cazier, now propose to give a sketch of my life.
I am now 78 years and 9 months old. I was born May 1, 1834 in Oldham County, Kentucky. My father’s name is William Cazier who was born January 21, 1794 in Virginia. My mother’s maiden came was Pleasant Drake. She was a motherly woman, rather stocky built, medium complexioned, very little education. Her people I know nothing about. She was born in Virginia on 31 March, 1796, in the same locality as my father. I never heard her talk about her people, but I once understood my sister Marandy to say that she was a child of Mr. Drake but not of his real wife, but she said after she never told me so but I think she was rite in the first assertion. Maybe she denied it on the grounds of Modesty but that cuts no figure with me. God bless my mother, Glory to God in the Highest that I had a mother at all. She was the mother of ten children seven sons and three daughters, James, Marandy, John, Benjamin, Elizabeth, William Jr., who died while a child, Samuel, David, Charles and Rosana. The first two was born in Virginia, all the rest were born in Oldham County, Kentucky.
I was born in a log cabin by a little spring in the middle of a large field. From there my father moved about half a mile and lived in a better house on a rented farm belonging to one Isaac Smith. It was on this farm that my memory begins. My mother was very fond of vegetables and we used to go over to the former home to pick greens and it was there that I was picking greens. Now it was on the Smith farm that I remember many little things – it was here that I lived till I was about seven years old. Now that part of Kentucky at least was thickly wooded and a great variety of wild fruits and nuts and oh what a field of pleasure for boys, to tap maple trees and make molasses or syrup, to hunt the game and gather the popos, black berries, raspberries, may appals, black walnuts, hickory nutts, beech and lack berry nutts.
My older brother would cobble up little wagons and we would go among the timber and gather the nutts. It was at this time and place that I began to sue the ax so that I could strike four or five times exactly in the same place. Now Kentucky is a mild climate, very little snow in the winter also a slave state at that time and the little white boys as well as the negros would go in there shirt tails or nothing on but their shirt and bair footed all the summer. Sometimes I would have by big toe stumped on one foot and a stone bruise on the heel of the other so probably I would have a cry and then go ahead and hurry for a stick horse and then a race. Our house was about a mile from Brown’s Burough and I ust to go there to buy candy and there was a race track by the road side and I would watch the horses rum so boy like I must play horse and of course we must have out little tails bobed up. Being in our shirt tails only I bobed up my brother’s shirt close behind his shoulders and he mine and after the race was over I unbobed him but he wouldn’t unbob me so I was left to go and get an old negro woman to unbob me, a bad brother that. So many things done, to many to mention.
I remember my father seeing he couldn’t own a farm in that old state and Illinois was inviting and sparously settled and plenty of prairie land and cheap so he took his family in the year 1841 and moved to Moltry County Illinois and rented a tavern for 4 years and in the mean time he build up a home of his own. Now while living in Illinois which was five years my life was spent on the farm howing corn and doing chores and I went to school a little. Now Illinois furnished plenty of sports for boys in the way of wild fruit and game, the prairie chickens was so thick that they would darken the sun when they would fly and wild strawberries galore. Now the part of Illinois we lived in was very flat and large swamps of stagnated water which caused chills and fevers and I came near dying the fall of 1845. The chills and fever was so bad that one half of the people would be sick at the same time.
Now while we was living in Illinois the Mormon elders came along and wanted to preach in my father’s house so he let them but the neighbors advised him not to do so. So I think he was impressed with what they said so time went on till some time in the fall of 45. At that time my father was sick in bed and there was some holy persons, three of them, and he said they stood at the foot of his bed and told him that the Mormon church was the only true church on earth, so in a day or so he and my mother was baptised but previous to his baptism he told his vision in a sabbath meeting in a Cambolite church thinking they would believe him but to the contrary. They said he was crazy and wouldn’t believe a word of it. So persecution started and my father being somewhat in debt they pushed him and sold his property for just what they pleased. But in the meantime he was fixing to come with the church to the Rocky Mountains, so while I write these lines I am thinking how plain to me that they was possessed of the devil. They also was in the act of putting him in jail so he had to leave leaving his family behind and after fixing up business the best they could we followed him. My father, my brother John driving the team up to Laharp about 18 or 19 miles east of Nauvoo. There we waited till the spring of 1846, then after parting with all of our horses and getting together some five or six yoke of oxen, but let me mention while or during the part of the winter my father heard me out to drive an old blind horse to grind tan bark for one McFarlen a tanner and to cury a big bludded bull and when he would turn his head I would start for the door.i
The first four years after coming to Illinois my father rented a tavern belonging to John Keller and ran it for four years. At the same time he prepared him a home out on the prarie but on leaving he had to sell it for one half its worth. I will now go ahead with starting out from Laharp but a few months prior there was back on at the old place we had left my brother John, Andry Love, my brother Samuel a boy, also my brother-in-law Charles Bryan and there was one Cathern Lowther and she was the sister of Love’s wife and she wanted to come and he Louther got jealous and raised a mob of fifty men and it was a narrow escape that they got of alive. Louther wanted to kill Love. My brother James wanted to come with the church and his wife didn’t, so her people as a mob kept James farm, his wife and all the children, four of them and allowed him a span of horses and a wagon and told him to get out. So he did and came along with the church.
Now some time in May 1846 the families that I have mentioned and a few others put there affects and families in there wagons and driving there loose cattle started out, and not wanting to feed there dogs they left them to howl for there masters. Now while I pen these lines my soul is moved and tears flow in meditating of those terrible times and I say in my heart O My God who knows of those times only those who past thru them. The wagon was old style and all cooking was done with the pot bake skillet and frying pan over a log fire. The covers of our wagon was only common sheeting and many a poor soul was drenched threw while in bed.
There was one man in camp by the name of Orten Burns who had married Josiah Miller’s daughter Harriet and all the property he had was one cow so while we were on the bank of the Mississippi waiting for the ferry boat he concluded not to go any further so he kissed his wife, took his cow and went back. I remember as a boy seeing his wife crying, she staid with her father and gave birth to a boy child in the winter of 46. So after crossing the Mississippi we moved on and passing as it was a new found country for we were now in Iowa which was sparsley settled at that time so we hadnt gone far till we had to make our own roads. It rained and we traveled and camped some times a week in place and then move on again. I remember my brother Samuel suffered awful with the tooth ache no body had anything to pull teeth no doctor in our camp. Now at this time my father’’ famaly consisted of father and mother and Elizabeth, Samuel, myself, Charles and Rozana so some time in July or August we arrived at Council Bluffs. Here we camped two or three weeks waiting for council to know what to do. Finaly President Brigham Young said ‘Stop here bild cabbins and cut hay for our cattal and go down in Missoury and work and get what we could and not wait till next spring. So we moved into a grove of timber and working in a company put up several hundred tons of hay.
Now at this time by brother Benjamin, mother and myself took sick tho I was not very bad but my mother died in a hay shed crying out for vegetables but there was none to be had we had nothing but bread bacon bans and coffee and there being no coffins to be had my father and a neighbor cut one out of a solid log. There was no funeral services and no flowers. Oh how folorn she died a martyr for the truth. Now she was not the only one there was scores died around Council Bluffs that winter. One of the leading causes was having no vegetables.
At this time I think in August the United States called for 500 men to go in the Mexican war, so my brother James and John enlisted and went leaving there families and when the hay was cut and stacked for the cattle and a cabin built my father and Brother Bushman went down to Missoury and worked splitting rails for six bits a day and took corn and pork for there pay and sent the same up to the Bluffs and us children would boil the corn on the cob and eat it no fruit or vegetables of any kind. Now the winter was a hard one and thousands of cattle died having been uset to corn and good hay. At this time my brother Benjamin went and worked on a steam boat and went as far as New Orleans so in the spring not having what was termed a fit outfit of breadstuff we had to stop in Iowa and take up a squatters claim and plough and raise wheat and corn which we did for four years.
Now as a boy my time was spent in the fields, fishing, swimming, hunting the wild hen and wild fruits. There was no schools all this time. Now during this time all of the children was baptised except myself and I wouldn’t. I had no religion and took pride in being stubborn but while my stubborness may of stood in my way it has kept me out of many evils. Now as I have said my mother died in the fall of 1846 my father married a widow woman the next spring by the name of Margaret Ewen. She was very strict in her family discipline which made trouble for me which I will show later on. As I have said I didn’t manifest much religion, I was anxious to be with the church and go to the valles or rocky mountains.
My brother in law Bryan and my sister Marany and brother John and Benjamin was there so in the spring of 51 my father concluded that he could make the trip to the great Salt Lake so he traded off his squatters claim for some oxen of a man that had belonged to our church and fitted out six yoke of oxen and one yoke or cows, two wagons and one buggy or small wagon and started out in company with my brother in law James Bigelow also my sister Elizabeth his wife. Now this was in May and it was a very rainy season and a small creek became a river, and the Missoury river was very high so after a few days we ferried over at the old Winter Quarters and camped on the high lands. Here is where one man tried to leave his dog but the dog wouldn’t be left so he swam the river after running up and down the banks a while and howling for his master.
The next thing to be done was to be organized in a company of sixty wagons which was done and a captain by the name of Phelps. Now these companies was subdivided in tens and a capten of each ten wagons. Now I had to drive one of our wagons and I was bare footed and the oxen ust to tread on my feet. Now at this time what was called the Elkhorn river which ran into the Plat river was very high so we would haft to wait or go another way so the men thought they could go around the head of the Elkhorn and strike the old road up towards Laramy but the map didn’t tell all the truth. We encountered all sorts of trouble in the way of slues, sand hills, bad water and no water and after traveling 400 miles we struck the old trail and we was only 200 on our way.
Now while we was traveling threw these sand hills we past one company camped and a good many of there cattle had run away with the buffalow. Now that was a pitiful site. Now soon after we struck the Plat my brother took sick with the mountain fever and it was expected that he would die but he lived but wasn’t able to drive his team any more. When we struck the Pacific springs my brother Charles and little sister took sick with the mountain fever and that left me to look after all of the cattal father being a poor hand with oxen. Now I had to take my turn in herding the cattle by night, bare footed and plenty of prickly pears. After three months of weary travel we ascended the big mountain where we could see the valley or the promised land. Men shouted and swung their hats and the women swang their bonnets. The next day we arrived in Salt Lake and found our folks all rite.
Now this was on the first of October 1851 and here we staid nearly a month and I and my brother Samuel had to hall wood from red butte canyon. And to haft to clime those steep hills was hard for me for I had been ust to getting wood on the level. Now that we had gained our object in reaching the valley I began to look back to my old home and I cried out in my heart for my fishing and swimming rezorts and wild fruits but to I was here and couldn’t very well get back tho I would of done so if I could but this feeling gradually wore off and I began to get ust to this country.
So after stopping about a month in Salt Lake my father and family came to Salt Creek as it was called at that time he being one of the first settlers. This being the last of October 1851. At that time the first thing to be done was to get logs to build houses and no roads in the canyons so after a time we managed to get a log house for the winter. There was no schools or any meetings tho I hadnt lost any meetings nore was I hunting any religion. So as a boy I spent my time in getting wood and hunting ducks. There was quite a few Indians about but they were peaceful and we were kind to them and gave them our food so the winter past off and there was very little water the next year for crops.
Now all this time my step mother’s tongue was going to my discomfort as I never could nor never can nor will stand to be drove in the least but I could be persuaded to do most any thing so after deep meditation I concluded to run away and go to California. So one evening on the sly I put on my best clothes which was poor enough and when dark came on I took my shot gun and said nothing to any one and started out for Salt Lake perposing to go with a merchant who was going to drive cattal thru to California by the name of Osker Mittlton. The nite was still and the stars shone brite. There was no house short of Payson and I hadnt taken anything with me to eat so I got along where Santaquin now stands I began to get tired and had a thought of lying down in some brush but I kept trudging along till I reached Springville. Now by this time I was tired and hungry and having no money I begged a breakfast at the house of one Caldwell then after that I went on to American Fork. Not being ust to walking I was very tired so that I could hardly step over a small ditch so I asked to stop at a house by the name of Laws I think and they gave me supper and bed so I slept with a man in the same bed and I took care to get on the back side of the bed for there was a crazy woman in the house who was raving all the nite so I staid close to the wall and went on in the morning and reached Salt Lake. I don’t remember where I staid all night but my first object was to find my man Mittlton so I found him and made arrangement to go with him and drive cattal to California.
Now when my father missed me the next morning after I left he sent by brother John to hunt me. So he started for Salt Lake and I think he made the trip in a little over a day. Now when he reached Springville he called at the house of Caldwell and he told John that I had breakfast there so John know he was on the rite track. John was a man that was naturally shrud so he was acquainted with Mittlton in St. Jo Missoury so he went straight to him and learned where I was and he found me and persuaded me to come back home and I could live with him of I had rather. I was repenting of my rash act so I went home> after a few weeks my father contracted to supply a saw mill with logs in Mount Pleasant canion Sanpete Co. so I went with him and drove the ox team and he chopped the log and we hauled 600 in six weeks. We didn’t haft to hall them over a mile and we carted them.
My father only chopped those logs in the forepart of the season and by brother Samuel chopped the latter part of the season. As the cold weather came on we returned home for the winter. Now by this time the people of Nephi had bilt a log meeting house and there was a man and his wife by the name of George Spence who taught school and lived in the meeting or school house so I went to school. I was 17 years old and hadnt gone to school only one quarter since I was a small boy and I knew nothing about figures or writing. I could spell boy maby.
Now during the winter we occasionaly had a dance in the log school house so during one of those dances I was there and I shall never forget while sitting on the opposite side of the house fronting the door Bro Bigler having just lately come to Nephi with his wife Emma and his second wife Caroline Mangum and Sarah Francis Mangum. They four came walking in the door and as my eyes struck Sarah Frances tho she was only about 15 years old and spare and delicate the sensation I had I never have found language to tell and I have always believed we was acquainted in the spirit world prior to taken mortality. We shall now see what providence can do and did do. I don’t remember whether I danced with her that night nor wether I spoke to her but my love for her was intense but I was young and so was she besides that I was bashful. But I mustered courage to go an see her the next morning at the house of Bro Bigler tho I only looked at her across the room. After a few days she returned to her fathers house at Payson, Utah co. So after a few weeks I called and saw her as I was passing thru Payson, but nothing said or done only in a boys way I being young, poor and ignorant. I could do nothing more.
So time went on but my love didn’t die. There was no encourgment given me to marry her. My step-mother only made fun of her to me. In the spring of 53 poligamy was being run with a fanatical zeal which was void of conscience or decency in many cases. Sarah Frances uncle my marriage who had married her aunt persuaded her father to let her be sealed to him and she being a mere ignorant child she didn’t know enough to refuse so he took her over to Manti and when Brigham Young came along he had her sealed to him.
Now all this undoubtly was providence for me in the end but what about the man that would take the advantage of a baby and what about the man that would seal a simple child to a ruffian. The endorser of a crime is no better than the one who commits the crime. Now all this was providence to come to me course of time to keep her till I was prepared to take a wife. It must needs be that offences come but dam him by whom they come. Now when I heard this my boys heart was sick and lonesome for my loved one was gone for all that I knew.
Sarah Frances lived in Manti for four years and when croping the valley I would look towards Manti and feel lonesome but she would come occasionaly to Nephi to see her sister and I would see her and she was as beautiful and sweet as ever but lo she was another mans wife and I had not thought that she would ever by my wife. Now all this time I was looking here and there for a wife but those I wanted I couldn’t get and those I could get I wouldn’t have so time went on till the spring of 53 in June.
An Indian war broke out so all the territory had to be under arms more or less and we in Nephi had to pull down all of our houses and build in a fort two clocks wide. All men and boys of fifteen and up had to bear arms and I had to stand guard half the night every other night and work in the field all day and deep my gun close by. Now that was the case for twelve months. Then in the fall of 54 the grasshoppers flew in from the east and laid their eggs and in the spring of 55 they hatched out and ate up all the grain in Utah with exception of some late corn so that the people suffered for bread.
I had twenty acres of wheat and they ate it all up so I spent my time mostly working the canions getting out lumber. Now along in these days there was nothing very particular happened to me only hard work. Now in the year 1855 we had to build a fort wall around nine blocks. The wall was 12 feet high, 6 feet at bottom and three at the top, built of mud. Father and myself built nine rods three for myself and 6 for him so he had one half acre and I had one quarter. You see I began to do for myself. Now in these times we had no teams but oxen. I drove no team but oxen for twenty years.
Now in fifty five I couldant get along with my stepmother so I went and lived with my sister Elizabeth Bigelow. I had bought a house which was better than theres so they lived in mine. So time went on and 56 rolled around then what was called the reformation took place. President Young preached that there was trouble coming if the people didn’t repent and confess their sins so there was a great revival and some fanatism and the doctring of poligamy ran high and every woman was saught in marriage young and old. There was so many plural marriages that President Young would stand them several couples in a row and marry them in consert or all with the one sermon. So many of those marriages was performed in haste and divorces at leasure like all other things that are illconserte and poorly conducted never suckseeded. Scores were divorced in a few months. Old men of 75 married young girls.
Now along at this time Sarah Frances had grown to be about 19 years old and began to exercise her mind and freedom and concluded that her marriage was not of her choice or had got her eyes open to her condition so she concluded to leave so she did and came to Nephi to her sisters and of course I saw her often but thought no farther not in the least. So she went to Salt Lake to see president Young and got a divorce. She staid a while in Salt Lake and worked for a Albert Carrington tho she didn’t stay long till she returned to Payson to her father. Now let me say all this time she was the pooarst girl in the way of clothes that could be found hardly enough to cover her nakedness. So my brother John was passing threw Payson and she saw him and sent her best regards to me so when he got home he told me and as he delivered her message I was struck with the same old love that was indescrible but I said nothing to John. But now my heart went out with anxiety to see her ere it mite be to late for she had offers a plenty. So in a week or so she came to Nephi. Now this was about the first of May. Now I was very bashful and cautious about what to do or say so I saught my opportunity to take a walk with her so one Sunday afternoon in May we took a walk along with an other couple up on the bench of Bigelows canion. It was a nice warm day and we picked some flowers and then say town in the shade of a small seedar tree. Oh how often I have looked up to that three and said in my heart Oh could I preserve that three in my dooryard all of my life and I have said God Bless that sedar tree. So after sitting there a while we walked down the bench and as we walked I wanted to say something that she mite know that I was being drawn towards her so I said “what are you going to do this summer” and she said “I think of going down to dixey to my people “ and now my heart fluttered and in modesty I said, “hadnt you better stay here with me”? These words likely pleased her for she could see that my heart was being drawn to her. So ended that Sunday.
Let me say right here that it was partly thru her that I was baptised into the church as I hadn’t joined as yet tho I believed all rite. So I was baptised by her uncle Thomas Adair.
The next Sunday I went to see her and while so doing our love began to me mutual and on the third meeting my mind was fully made up to make her my wife. At this time she was pushing matters to get a divorce and when obtained it had to be paid for so she had no money and I paid for it so all was clear now for our marriage. I had a house, adobe, with a dirt roof so I went to Salt Lake to get some chairs and she went with me as far as Payson and stopped with her father till I came back then we came home.
We set the day for our marriage to be on the 7th of June 1857 at the home of Bro. Bigler. This was on Sunday and he performed the marriage. I had bought Sarah Frances a pair of low shoes and she borrowed a dress of Amy Bigler and our supper was bread and milk. After a marandering providence I had gained my once lost sweetheart! Oh, the providence of God, how kind he has been to me! Not the management of mine but the decree of Heaven! I was told in my patriarchial blessing when I was 19 or 20 years old, that I should have a wife suited to my disposition. I was now 23 years old and my blessing was fulfilled for she was beautiful in the extreme and angelic in her nature.
Now let me say to all who may read this that the young and inexperienced may think that they love and appreciate all that is possible but how far they come short to what they can see in old age and sad experience.
My father and stepmother was opposed to our marriage but I was going to please myself, not them, so I didn’t even ask them to the wedding. God had fordained our union and he was not to be frustrated. My sweet wife’s poverty just suited me for therein I had a chance to exercise my love and devotion. My home being about two blocks way we moved from Bro. Bigler’s and all that she had in the world she put in a bushel basket and I took one handle and she the other. We had no dishes or cooking utensils or table so Sister Bigler gave us a couple of cracked plates, two knives and forks, and my sister gave me one of her stove kettles and an old time bake skillet and I had a rude bed stid that I had made and a straw bed (all but the tick I was going to say) so we went to housekeeping.
I had a yoke of oxen and wagon and one cow, bob tailed. I had very little education and she had less. But I am led to say “Oh the mystery of Godliness past finding out at this time. How little we knew what was before us in life. I have always believed that we were acquainted in the spirit world in our prior state this I felt when I first saw her.
I was ordained to the office of a priest before I was married and as I have said we went to housekeeping with our scanty supplies and I ocuppied myself farming and working in the canions getting lumber and building. Sometime in August my father and I bought an old time threshing machine and I run it and thrashed the people’s grain it being the only machine in the place and we threshed all the grain about 20,000 bushels.
While in the midst of threshing there was fifty men called from Nephi in the morning to start in the afternoon, armed, to go to Salt Lake to stop what was called Johnson’s army of 2500 hundred soldiers. These soldiers were being sent out to straighten p the Mormons who was accused of being treasonabale and other accusatons. I was called, also my brothers John and Samuel. I had more seal that judgment but God was with me to keep me from further trouble which I will omit here. I have often in after experience that I couldn’t go off so content under such circumstances and leave a sweet young wife, mabe never see her again for I didn’t know but I should have to fight the army in Salt Lake City. Where ignorance is bliss it is folly to be wise so bid farewell to my wife and home and was gone about two months. It was in the dead of winter with no underclothing whatever, with one blanket that I could pack on my mule. Three of us would sleep together to keep from freezing. I had to stand guard at night often and some times in the saddle twenty four hours at a time. Sometimes we had only poor beef and no bread and we had to roast over cakes in the ashes. The army after stopping some weeks on Hams fork, they moved up to Bridger and spent the winter and we dismissed to go home and how glad I was for the privelege to see home and wife again.
Now in the spring of 58 peace was made and the army came in and by the army and the merchants that followed we had plenty of everything to make us comfortable. Before this we was very poor indeed. The army stayed two or three years and then went back and took part in the cival war. I plodded on farming and other work.
My wife Sarah Frances gave birth to my first baby on the 14th of May 1858 David William.
Nothing of a serious nature happened along about this time. We had to fight the grasshoppers considerable.
In 61 or 62 we went to Dixey to see her people. By this time we had another baby Adelbert Cazier and we took them with us. About this time I was ordained a seventy in the church. We moved along in life nicely. I was very proud of my wife for she was not only beautiful but sweet in
her disposition and there was nothing to good that I could do for her. We kept a hired girl the most of the time and I run a thrasher every season in 61 or 62.
I was called upon to send a wagon back to Missoury river to bring on the poor saints so I furnished the wagon two seasons and a yoke of cattal the third season. In 1864 my son Orson was born.
One of the parties that came in my wagon was one Eliza Naylor, a very nice looking young woman about 20. Polygamy was preached and it was a common matter or practice so I believed the principal was rite. I was young, full of vim and love for the opposite sex so I thought I would take another wife, so I made love to Miss Eliza but my present wife opposed my marrying her. I was stubborn and determined to have my way against all odds so I went ahead and got it in the neck as you will see. We went to Salt Lake and my wife went with us and we were married in the Endownment House. Now the night before my wife dreamed that a little squirrel kept trying to bite her and she told me in the morning but I was to blind to see the interpretation till it was to late.
It seems that God designs a purpose he makes people blind, so I was but we hadn’t been married no more than one hour till I rued my bargain but I said nothing at that time to me wife but I continued to get worse. I felt for one thing that I had married below my station and dignity. Then I called to me mind the saying that of all the thoughts of tongue or pen the saddest of these ‘it might of bin’. I saw a thousand was that I could of escaped that step but what was I to do. I had made covenants with God and her but I thought at times I should have to put her away and then I would take a little courage and keep on. Oh how often I have cried out in the bitterness of my heart “Why did I” “Why did I”? I don’t think it is possible for any person to depict a greater hell for a man of my dignity and taste. She was a woman that was very jealous and made trouble for my other sweet wife. I found that it is impossible to change the spotts of the leopard or the skin of the elephant. Whatever is the disposition of the wife he marries that he will have all of her life. I tried to make the best of my bargain and take the council of my brother in law – if a person made a bad trade stick the tighter to it, so I did.
Now my father gave me a blessing when I was a young man and said that the Lord loved me and had given his Holy angels charge concerning me and that I should pass thru trials and tribulations but the Lord would overlook and overrule all for my own good. I have experienced the truth of his words for the providence of God has been with me all my life and I have proven the truth of the words ‘Do what is right, God will protect you, Do what is right’.
This went on till about the year 1870. I was impressed to read the Bible through this I did a little at a time. At the April conference of 1872 I was called on a mission to England. I only had fourteen days to get ready. So I rented out my farm and left on the first of May. This was a sore trial to leave my wife and little boys to be gone two or three years. Nothing but my zeal kept me up. I had to leave my wife Eliza in one place and my first wife in another for they wouldn’t live together. I bade them goodbye and went on and all went well till I got to New York and looke out on the empty deep and homesickness struck me most piteously, but on I went. Seasickness of the worst kind lasted all the voyage and homesickness combined, but I landed in Liverpool all rite but now I was in a strange land among a strange people. Homesickness seized me and I felt that if it were possible I would willingly walk all the way home if I could have had an honorable release. When these homesickness spells came on me I would go to God for relief and I always found it.
Brother Carrington sent me to labor and preside over the Bristol conference with Brother Jessay Gardner to be with me. My first business was to go to Eastwood to se Eliza’s mother and people which I did. Then I went to London to attend a conference. Then I spent four days sightseeing. I also went to Hemelsted to See Frank ________ people and then to Bristol. While I was at the conference house in London the post man delivered a lot of letters that had come from Liverpool and one for me and when I saw the handwriting I had to leave the room to keep from exposing myself.
When I arrived at Bristol I found Bro. Box who was everything to me that he could do to help me. He traveled with me around the conference and also gave me a directory to all the saints in the Bristol Conference. Now Bro. Gardner wasn’t much help to me for he got sick and came home in about six weeks, so I traveled alone all the balance of the time about 14 months. I was well treated and I can say it was the best spent years of my life. I was very zealous and did the best I could considering my limited education. I knew scarcely anything bout history and but little of scripture. I baptised some and I think I was responsible for bringing one into the church at least. The preaching was pretty dry for the people wouldn’t come out to hear me. They seemed to think that they had enough religion to take them to Heaven.
I received letters often from home and things weren’t alright at home so it made me homesick but I said nothing to Bro. Carrington. But I prayed to the Lord to put it into the heart of Bro. Carrington to send me home and the Lord heard my prayers and I was released with honor.
During my travels around the conference I visited one branch in a city called Crucusn and while I was speaking in meeting in walked one of the sweetst beautiful young woman my eyes ever behold and I was so struck that it was with difficulty that I kept on talking> I have always believed I was acquainted with her in the spirit world before this probation. Her name was Elizabeth War. I was so attached to her that I paid her immigration and brought her to Utah in 1873 and she worked for my wife a year or more and I wasn’t deceived in my first impression of her. I could of married her and I have always regreted that I didn’t but my family affairs was of such a nature at that time that I was discouraged in regards to marrying her. She married a man by the name of Brown and at this time (1913) she is living in Portland, Oregon – at least she went there.
Let me mention here that about the year 1865 or 66 I was called to go with the sheriff and 80 others to go out about one hundred miles our west to look after supposed cattal thieves and while out there another company was out and mistook us for the thieves and it was in the night and we were in bed and we came near losing our lives for the other party called upon us to stack our arms or we were dead men. My brother Samuel being the sheriff said “No, he would die first”. Now there were six rifles with our fingers on the trigger close to our breast. In this critical moment I happened to think who they were and I called their names and saved our lives as by a thread.
I arrived home from my mission in August 1873. I found myself behind financially and had to resort to hard work to catch up again. I followed my old occupation of farming and running the thrasher and in the year 1879 my self and my brother Charles and brother in law Cyrus Mangum opened up a road at the head of Salt creek and got ties for the railroad which was being built along past Nephi at that time.
About the year 1875 my wife Eliza was taken with the falling sickness or epileptic fits and they increased till some times she would have five or six during the night. Finally she fell when no one was present in the fire and burned the top of her head to the skull. She kept on having fits so that I had to stay with her to the neglect of my first wife and my first wife having to wait on her and she never having any love for her it was an offense to her and she being a woman full of vanity and high strung and there being plenty of flatters, especially one boarder by the name of Alfred White and my wife being a woman that was quite a castle builder she concluded that by getting a divorce from me and marrying this White that she would just jump out of discontent into a paradise.
Now at this time I could see and feel that she was getting cool toward me but I had all confidence in her and not wanting to show any jealousy I kept silent, for I had often heard her say that she had no use for a jealous man that was jealous of her. So one day when opportunity afforded she told me she wanted a divorce. Now that was a terrible shock to me past expression and I thought what a contrast now beside out glorious sparking and honeymoon days when we loved each other so devotedly. I cried out to her ‘shall I loose you a second time’ then she retorted and said ‘out upon any man that would seal a mere child to him when she knew nothing of what she was doing’. I thought as she did on this subject. But providence was working to bring an end to my life. I plead with her not to leave me that I would see that Eliza would not bother her. I prayed to God that He would change her heart and intentions. I plead with her for her children’s sake and called her attention to them, our four little boys. To tongue can express my sorrow and my love for her should have been killed but I love her still and always shall while time lasts.
She made no claim to our property. All she seemed to want was her freedom. In a few weeks she left me and married Mr. White and then left Nephi. She called herself Franky White instead of Sarah Frances and I said to myself ‘Oh what vanity – what vanity will do in making blind the hearts of the children of men and women! She and White drifted about, part of the time they were in Logan, Chache Co., and she came twice to Nephi and stopped at my house and waited on us because we were sick, once when the children were ill and once when I was sick. She stayed with us for three weeks when I was sick and I believe she would have returned for good to me had I given her encouragement but she would speak of Mr. White which was offensive to me and my dignity, so after some weeks she left reluctantly. On her departure when she was leaving she wept most bitterly and I went up to her and kissed her for the last time in this life. While writing this my soul seems to melt within me and I say in my heart that I will have her in eternity. I must be faithful in the cause of truth and keep my covenants and all will come out alright for God has promised me as much. In my patriarchial blessing he told me that he loves me and I know that I love the Lord with all my heart.
After Sarah Frances left my house for the last time se and White went some where at the head of Spanish Cork on the Denver Rio Grande road and run a restaurant a month or so. Then they went to Salt Lake City and she took typhoid fever. She may have had the typhoid before she left the restaurant or got it is Salt Lake. She went to the hospital and after some days she died. Now I heard that she was sick and would of went to see her but you see White would have been there and that wouldn’t suit me so I wrote a nice letter to her telling her that I hoped she would soon be well and come to see us again and then I gave the letter to my son Adelbert to take to her and read to her. When Adelbert got there she was so low he did not try to read to her. So she passed away to another and better sphere – the woman whom my heart had doled upon so much. I think of the many times I have said to myself ‘of all the women my eyes ever beheld she was the one for me’ but I don’t remember of ever telling in those words to her. Now I can see that it would of pleased her and me to but the fear of what flattery might do I refrained.
Adelbert procured a nice casket and had her embalmed and brought her to Nephi, to my home, for former home. So I had the pleasure, if it can be called a pleasure, to bury her in a nice grave in my family lot and in my name and there was none abut my self to preach her funeral sermon. What a circumstance and what a happening in our lives and what an end to our once glorious beginning/ I counciled myself by saying “Lord Thy will be done not mine.” White did not come to the funeral. They both had suffered dissapointments. My prophecy to her “that she would know nothing but dissappointments” was literaly fulfilled. I have been told that she [cried] rivers of tears after leaving us. Quite some time after she married White, he White, wrote me a letter asking my forgiveness saying that he would rather be riddled with bullets than suffer what he had if that would settle what he had done, but I never answered the letter. I have thought since that his letter was a feeler to see if I would take her back. Now while I was on a mission in England she didant deport herself as she should of done which caused the neighbors to talk and my sister tried to council her but to no avail so the storm was brewing. Amidst all of this I can see many of my mistakes and when we meet again I hope we will be willing to strike off our accounts and be profited by our sad experience. Once when I was pleading for her to stay with me she exclaimed “I must go”, as tho there was an unseen power that she couldant resist.
Through her loss it left me in a sad fix, but I prayed and cried and plodded on with a fitty wife and a hired girl and it was hard to get a nice girl for they was timid to stay with Eliza so I was in that fix for 14 years. Realizing that it was a bog part on her account of her bad disposition that I had lost my best companion and if she hadant been afflicted I would have divorced her but under the conditions I couldant do such an dishonorable thing so I went to God that He would support me under my trial. As it was possible that I could take another wife, pologamy wasant stopped at that time, so I plead with the Lord that he would overrule my destiny that I might get a wife that would be a companion to me. I sought God constantly, in secret, that if he would bless me with such wife I would be all that was possible to her or the best I could do. So I looked here and there but made no proposals as none seemed to suit me.
So time went on and scarsly could get any woman or girl to stay with Eliza. I made a nice addition to my house and got my son Edwin and his wife to live in my house and take care of her so that I mite be more at liberty. After a year or so, what was called the crusade or the enforcement of the law punishing poligamy so that I couldant take an other wife and my way seemed to be hedged up. But I continued to pray to God that He would take care of my case. My friends sympathized with me and said there was no way but to give Eliza a sham divorce and continue to take care of her and to her praise and to bless me she gave her consent.
Now about this time my mind led me to go and visit Sarah Ann Andrews who had been a widow by the death of her husband. He had been killed by his horse running away with him. So I followed my impression tho I was timid and bashful for she was a woman tat I was not to well acquainted with and had never danced with in all of our many dances. So I brushed myself up and went with trembling steps and knocked at her door. She seemed to be surprised to see me and I apologized and said I hoped that I was not intruding. She invited me to sit down. Now she was peeling some fruit and had cut her finger so I talked with her, ate some fruit and spent the evening in social chat and as I went out I said I would come again and she didant say no, so after an evening or so I went again and I told her my troubles and she sympathized with me and I for her and I would go and fix plank walks for her in the dirty corral where she had to feed her cows. I cleaned up her buggy and harness, I remembered the saying that a faint heart never won a fair lady so I wasant to be dented by anything. So we became affectionate and learned to love one another.
Sarah Ann and her husband had formerly lived in Ephraim but had moved to Nephi about the time that my first wife had left me. Sarah Ann attended Sarah Frances funeral and I spoke at the funeral and rehearsed much of our life. Now many of Sarah Ann’s neighbors tried to talk her out of marrying me but the more they talked the more she thought of me and I encouraged her all I could and all praise and honor for ever be to condescend to by my wife considering the circumstances that surrounded me at that time and all praise be to her and God. Bless he name forever.
I took my case before the high Council in regards to giving Eliza a sham divorce and marrying Sarah Ann and they gave there consent, so I bless there names also. I married Sarah Ann on the 40 of November, 1892 in the Manti Temple. We were married for time. That was a most glorious day and circumstance in my life. God bless the day, a day I shall never forget.
I moved my household effects to her house and we started out in married life. Her home was the home left to her by her former husband for her to occupy during her life time then it was to go to his heirs. Now his heirs would of turn her out if they could of done and they threatened her with the law but she told them to go ahead but they didant try it so they looked on with anxiety to her death to get the property.
Now our lives was mutual and she looked to my interests and I to hers and we lived happy together for about 20 years. She was given to me in answer to my prayers for she filled the bill to the letter. She was very industrious, economical and liked housekeeping. A woman calculated to make money, which she did and she liked her home and it was hard to get her to travel anywhere. She never had any children tho she in nature was a great mother. She liked domestic animals was fine with chickens, she raised several new born pigs on the bottal. She had a fine memory, a great reader and was one of the best singers that ever sang in Utah any where etc. She was a fine public speaker and was president of the ward Relief Society for years. She was one of the finest wives that God ever gave to any man. In size she was about 5 feet six inches tall weighed generally about 190 lbs, a fine build. She never was afraid to say what she wanted to say, was witty. She was born in Birmingham, England – her maiden name was Sarah Ann Warlow. Her mother’s maiden name was Caroline Mavita, she died in England. Sarah Ann came to Utah alone, a young woman, the only one of her people to join the church and the first one to come of her people and she has often told me of her tearful lonesome times she passed thru and her misfortune in her first marriage but she was told that her last days would be her best days and that happened in our union. God be praised!
My wife Eliza Ann Naylor was born in Eastwood, Nottingham, England on the 2nd of October, 1841. She came to Utah in my wagon in 1864. I married her as a second wife on July 2, 1864. She died in a fit on October 1, 1893 and was buried in my family lot. I placed on her grave a nice headstone of grey marble.1
As I have said Sarah Ann had her money and I had mine and we got along fine and I never wished to take any of her money and she never would be pursuaded to have any of mine only on one occasion when the hospital fee was to be settled. She allowed me to pay one third of the bill ($100.00)
1 I remember my father, Orson Cazier, telling us about Eliza Naylor. Father said that she was a very lonesome person and often enticed the boys, when they were playing on the other side of the creek, into her little home by giving them a piece of bread and jam. Father said he believed she did this to get them into the house so she could talk to them. She lived in what is now the granary on the Lila C. Richardson property. – Martha C. Eagar.
Now when Sarah Ann and I were married she was a hearty and apparently healthy woman, full of life. About the time of Eliza Ann’s death she often had vomiting spells and I think it is likely that the cancer that killed her was doing its work slowly. Along in 1911 her right leg began to swell and then her abdomen began to protrude on one side. So she went to the doctor and he advised her to have an operation. I went with her to Salt Lake L.D.S. hospital about the last of August 1911. She was operated upon and they took away a tumor and the doctor said to me that he had done all that he could with the knife but she had a cancer and couldn’t live more than twelve months except she was cured by faith. I never told her for I hated to do so. So I was in the funeral of my beloved wife for 12 months. I besought the Lord with all my heart that He would heal her that she might live long upon the earth for she was only 64 years old. But I always said Thy will be done. After she was in the hospital some three weeks she was able to return home feeling happy. After a few days she did her own house work but my heart would fairly melt within me in sympathy for her knowing what hung over her. She even did her own washing. Two or three months prior to her death her left leg began to swell and dropsy and cancer combined and her pain was awful, more swelling of the legs and abdomen kept creeping up in her body with excruiating pain day and night till she made her will and went to her bed for the last time. Her mind was clear and sound within ten minutes of her death. In fact it failed not to the last word as she cried out “Morphine, morphine” and the doctor inserted morphine in her arm and she breathed her last in a few minutes.
So died my wife that I loved with all my heart for she was a woman of my heart ever ready to bless my home with her presence.
I am a man that loves life and dreads death and I have often wondered how could I feel to give my consent to leave this life but since her death and the death of my first wife I can see that the attraction on the other side grows stronger and when I become feeble I expect I shall be willing to go and meet my loved ones on the other side Sarah Ann died about 8 oclock in the morning of the 8th of August 1912. She had a large number of friends and one of the largest attendance at her funeral that was ever given to any person in Nephi. The flowers were profuse.
The principal part of the property went to the heirs of her former husband so she made her will of what she wanted and gave me one-third which amounted to $1400.00. Sarah Ann was scarcely dead before the hears were here and they seemed to want the money for the property and my having put some buildings on the place and liking the home I bought them out and then spent about $1000 on the house and made it a nice home.
A few days after the death of Sarah Ann I was taken sick with bowel trouble very bad and went to the home of my son Orson for several weeks. Then I went back to my home and had Edwin and wife to keep house for me which they are doing at this time Sept. 13, 1918. I keep on with my work as usual.
While I am now writing I am confined to the house having met with an accident while working on the thrasher machine, and I have had my big toe and the one next to it cut off close up. I have run a threshing machine for fifty-five hears and met with no accident before.
In regards to Sarah Ann I gave her a fine burial and monument in my burial lot. She was sealed to her first husband and was married to me for time only.
I shall now see what providence has in store for me. There have been many things happen in Nephi since I came here as a boy, things of various kinds, too numerous to mention. The grasshoppers on 1855 swept the whole of the territory and ate everything green so lots of families had to eat weeds to live. All grain and grass was cut with a sythe. I have cut as much as 500 acres.
My testimony regarding the gospel is – It’s true. No other could take its place. This or nothing. The most progressive religion on the face of the globe. Joseph Smith’s mission was as true as the sunshine. I believe in poligamy as I cannot think of loosing any of my wives. The decision was that every man who has done his duty will have their wives in eternity. The Bible says “Deep in the infallable mind of never failing skill He treasures up his bright designs and works his soverign will”.
His soverign will has been deep rooted in me. What was man in embryo is the question? The greatest question in my mind in regards to my life here in Utah is – “Why are we here? Where are we going? Where do we go?”
My father would not have told me in my blessing that I would live to a good old age if he had not been prior prompted. I have it in my mind that the time will come when there will be a reunion and Elizabeth and Maranda will say “Now for the happy meet, Dave has come, Dave has come”! “He has fought the good fight and glory is his”. In those early days I was subservant to all priesthood, No evil did I speak, even of a bishop who was one of the finest loving man ever lived. My father was a loving father. My father did not want to live longer than he did. He was a great believer in administration but did not ask once to be administered to.
–The end of grandfather’s sketch of his life —
Charles Hinkle Bryan and Maranda Cazier Bryan Family History OR
Bryan, William A. C., Life History Charles Hinkle Bryan & Maranda Cazier Bryan, compiled and retyped by Larry Galli, p. 20-23 ALSO
Burton, Thomas H, Judge, Biography of David Crockett and Sarah Frances Mangum Cazier, (1927), p. 1-2.