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Other Sites - Added link to David Dalton Descendants Contributed by Brenda Faye Dalton Craig, USA http://www.facebook.com/groups/daviddaltonsr/318526241534998/ |
3/25/2012 | Brenda Fye Dalton Craig | |
| Entire Site - Updated Site Navigation Contributed by David Preston, Nevada | 3/15/2012 | David Preston, Nevada | |
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Added 1884 Directory Information GENERAL DIRECTORY & BUSINESS ADVISOR OF THE CITY OF CHICAGO, 1844 DALTON, OCCUPATION, BUSINESS, RESIDENCE Michael, Laborer, Water and Kinzie, Wolcott St. |
2/24/2012 | Chuck Brown, Chicago | |
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Sydney, Australia - Added Dalton/Cody Marriage information Mary Cody married Thomas Dalton in Sydney in 1857. He had arrived aboard the "Ramillies" in 1855. |
2/23/2012 | Frank Hunt, Australia | |
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County Limerick, Republic of Ireland Parish transcriptions by Johnny Upton - Up to 1898 Date Given Name Parents Sponsors 4 May 1779 Thos. James & Hanna Riordan Dvd. Deady & Eliz Wright 15 Mar 1783 Helen William & Hana Mahony (Killeline) John Cummane & ? O' Brien 28 Feb 1785 Ml. Daniel & Jul. Doolan (Killeline) John Nash & Jul. Doolan 17 Apr 1785 Eug. John & Johanna Dalton (Ballymacasy) Denis Corbett & Cath. Joy 17 Nov 1785 Mauce. James & M McMahon (Templeglantine) Con McMahon & Johanna Leahy 17 Apr 1786 Mgt. James & Mgt. Riordan Wm. Harnett & Mgt. Smark 14 Aug 1786 Patk. Daniel & Jul. Doolan (Killeline) Tim Doolan & Maria Connor 29 Sep 1787 Wm. Daniel & Jul. Doolan (Killeline) Edmd. Quinn & Maria Cotter 3 Nov 1787 Peter James & Maria Mahony (Templeglantine) Mauce Shanahan & Julia Fitzpatrick 10 Apr 1788 Peter John & Cath. Connor (Treanboy) Patk. Dalton & Maria Dalton 25 Mar 1789 John Daniel & Jul. Doolan Patk. Dalton & Eliz. Nash 11 Sep 1789 Chas. Maurice & Maria McCarthy Ds. McCarthy & Helen McCarthy 7 Aug 1790 Edmd. Daniel & Ju. Doolan (Killeline) Edmd. Dalton & Johanna Manning 1 Oct 1790 Maria John & Cath. Connor (Treanboy) N.R. & Cath Hogan ? Apr 1829 Cath. William & Maria Drinane Thos. Drinnane & Cath. McCarthy 12 Aug 1829 Maria Wm & Maria Connell Tim Dalton & Maria Harnett 25 Apr 1831 Mariam Edmd. & Maria Mullane Wm. McEniry & Maria Mullane 7 Oct 1831 Patk. David & Mgt. Creedon (Treanboy) Eug. Reidy & Mgt. Fitzgerald 2 Mar 1834 Maria David & Mgt. Creedon (Treanboy) Patk. Brooder & Maria Lee 19 Aug 1837 Ellen David & Mgt. Creedon (Treanboy) Thos. Dalton & Mary McCarthy 7 Jan 1839 Johanna William & Cath. Mullane (Glendaragh) Ml. Dalton & Mary Dalton 27 Dec 1840 Maria William & Cath. Mullane John Murphy & Johanna Woulfe 30 Dec 1840 Johanna Michael & Hana King (Doonakenna) Wm King & Mgt. Dalton 24 Sep 1842 Dvd. David & Mgt. Creedon Wm. Dalton & Maria Dalton 18 Jun 1843 Mgt. Michael & Hana King (Doonakenna) Wm. Dalton & Mgt. King 16 Mar 1845 Wm. William & Cath. Mullane (Glendaragh) N.R. & Hana Dalton 25 Dec 1845 Edmd. Michael & Hana King (Doonakenna) Js. King & Mgt. Dalton 17 Feb 1846 Ml. William & Mary Woulfe (Sugerhill) Patk. Dalton & Ellen Dalton 11 Jun 1848 Edwd. William & Cath. Mullane (Glendaragh) N.R. & Mary Roche 9 Feb 1849 John Patrick & Johanna Curtin (Ballymuragh) Js. Ashe & Anne Feaheny 26 Mar 1849 Jul. Ml. Woulfe & Mgt. Dalton ( Meeneline) N.R. & Ellen Murphy 24 Jul 1850 Lce. Patk. & Johanna Curtin (Ballymuragh) Lce. Curtin & Cath. Curtin 18 Mar 1852 Brigt. Patk. & Johanna Curtin (Ballymuragh) John Dalton & Johanna Dalton 29 Nov 1852 John Michale & Mgt. Cremin (Ballintubrid) John Connell & Mary Cremin 30 Mar 1854 Patk. Patk. & Johanna Curtin (Ballymuragh) Rev. John Donovan & Mgt. Curtin 6 Jun 1854 Hana. Michale & Mgt. Cremin (Ballintubrid) Patk. Dalton & Hana. Dalton 28 Apr 1855 Con. Patrick & Johanna Feeheny (Ballymuragh) N.R. & Ellen Walsh 4 Jan 1857 Brigt. Michael & Mgt. Cremin (Ballintubrid) John Cummins & Johanna Cummins 5 Apr 1859 Ml. Michael & Mgt. Cremin (Ballintubrid) Patk. Dalton & Hana Dalton 22 Feb 1862 John Michael & Mgt. Cremin (Ballintubrid) Mauce. Dalton & Johanna Woulfe 14 Feb 1865 Mauce. Michael & Mgt. Cremin John Cremin & Maria Lynch 11 Mar 1882 Patk. John & Mgt. McCarthy John McCarthy & Anna Liston 5 Jun 1888 Ml. Laurence & Maria Hough Patk. Dalton & Ellen Hough 26 Sep 1889 Js. Laurence & Maria Hough Js. Hough & Maria Shanahan 26 Jun 1891 Patk. Laurence & Maria Hough John Hough & Win Hough 30 Jul 1892 Con. Laurence & Maria Hough Patk. Dalton & Mgt. Hough 2 Nov 1893 Lce. Laurence & Maria Hough Patk. Dalton & Maria King 29 Nov 1894 Wm. Laurence & Maria Hough N.R. & Cath King ? ? 1898 Johanna Laurence & Maria Hough John Dalton & N.R. |
2/15/2012 | Johnny Upton, Ireland | |
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England - Added link to "Forces War Records" Pay Website Contributed by David Preston, Nevada http://www.forces-war-records.co.uk/ |
2/5/2012 | David Preston, Nevada | |
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County Limerick, Republic of Ireland Parish transcriptions by Johnny Upton - Up to 1900 Date Dalton Spouse Witnesses 31 Jan 1807 Edmund Margaret Vaughan Thomas Vaughan & Catherine Dalton 17 Feb 1810 Edmund Margaret Hunt Daniel Hunt & Catherine Dalton 19 Feb 1833 William Maria Dooling (of Abbeyfeale) John Flynn & James Dalton 4 Feb 1838 William Catherine Mullane Tim Mulcahy & Michael Dalton 3 Mar 1840 Michael Hana King Dermot Murphy & Bryan King 3 Jan 1843 Daniel Bridget Hanley Michael Greene & William Harnett 7 Jul 1848 Patrick Johanna Feeney (of Athea) James Dalton & Patrick Harris |
2/1/2012 | Johnny Upton, Ireland | |
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Historical Maps - Maps revised for non-Flash devices http://www.daltondatabank.org/Maps.htm |
12/28/2011 | David Preston, Nevada | |
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In 1872 the House of Lords requested that "Her Majesty's Government undertake to take any steps for ascertaining accurately the number of proprietors of land and houses in the United Kingdom, with the quantity of land owned by each proprietor. They all knew that out-of-doors there was from time to time a great outcry raised about what was called the monopoly of land, and, in support of that cry, the wildest and most reckless exaggerations and mis-statements of fact were uttered as to the number of persons who were the actual owners of the soil. It had been said again and again that, according to the Census of 1861, there were in the United Kingdom not more than 30,000 landowners; and though it had been repeatedly shown that this estimate arose from a misreading of the figures contained in the Census returns, the statement was continually reproduced, just as though its accuracy had never been disputed." The report was published in 1875, and exclusive of the London Metropolis, provides: 1. The number and names of owners of land of one acre and upwards, whether built upon or not, in each County, with the estimated acreage and annual gross estimated rental of the property belonging to each owner. 2. The number of owners of land, whether built upon or not, of less than one acre, with the estimated aggregate acreage and the aggregate gross estimated rental of the lands of such owners. 3. The estimated extent of commons and waste lands in each County. Our appreciation is extended to DGS Member Mike Dalton of Oregon for his extraction of the Dalton surname data from these sources: Return of Owners of Land 1873, Volume I and Volume II. As with all data, it is the onus of the user to verify. If you have researched your Dalton family and wish to contribute your data to the Bank, it will be most welcome. Contact the Webmaster for more information on how to submit your data. This page was added 15 December, 2011 RETURN OF OWNERS OF LAND 1873 - PRESENTED TO BOTH HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT BY COMMAND OF HER QUEEN VICTORIA OF GREAT BRITAIN Acre = 4,840 square yards; Rood = 1/4 acre or 1,210 square yards; Perch = 1/40 of a rood or 30 square yards Name of Owner County Address of Owner Extent of Lands Estimated Rentals Acre Rod Perch Pounds Schillings ENGLAND Dalton, Charles Bedford Biggleswade 65 3 21 209 17 Dalton, Henry Bedford Dean 260 1 5 432 12 Dalton, Mrs. Bedford Caldscote 21 3 21 65 10 Dalton, Rev. J. N. Buckingham Milton Rectory 11 0 0 27 10 Dalton, Samuel Cambridge Welney 2 0 21 38 0 Dalton, John Chester Hollingworth 30 0 25 767 16 Dalton, Rev. John Chester Kelsall 28 2 6 93 0 Dalton, Rev. Charles R. Cornwall Highgate 2 0 0 120 0 Dalton, Hannah Cumberland Scaleby 2 0 0 5 0 Dalton, James Cumberland Fellside 42 2 5 40 5 Dalton, John Cumberland Bassenthwaite 35 1 35 49 6 Dalton, John Cumberland Wigton 36 2 19 114 5 Dalton, Mary Cumberland Edenhall 3 2 27 5 0 Dalton, Pattinson Cumberland Cummersdale 161 3 19 1,044 14 Dalton, Robert Cumberland Edenhall 33 0 31 44 0 Dalton, Thomas Cumberland Cockermouth 1 3 20 41 5 Dalton, Thomas Cumberland Cummersdale 65 2 25 105 10 Dalton, Thomas Cumberland Whitehaven 152 2 16 130 10 Dalton, Rev. Thomas Cumberland Whitehaven 24 0 0 25 0 Dalton, William Cumberland Alston 8 0 37 22 10 Dalton, William Cumberland Sunnythwaite 94 1 0 95 0 Dalton, William Sr. Cumberland Barclose 148 2 25 171 0 Dalton, John Derby Bents, Totley 4 2 39 13 10 Dalton, William Derby Shatton Hope 5 1 22 8 17 Dalton, D. F. G. Dorset Wincanton 561 3 15 1,110 5 Dalton, Joseph Durham St. Jn. Chap. (Stanhope) 18 1 25 14 0 Dalton, Joseph Durham St. John's Chapel 19 0 0 33 5 Dalton, Thomas Durham St. John's Chapel 5 1 0 17 0 Dalton, William Durham St. John's Chapel 35 0 13 28 0 Dalton, Mary A. Essex Bedford 1 1 5 48 0 Dalton, Mrs. Essex (Saffron Walden) 11 0 37 251 10 Dalton, Rev. S. E. Essex Foulness 14 2 17 65 0 Dalton, Rev. W. B. Essex Little Burstead 81 1 18 140 16 Dalton, Dr. Gloucester Cheltenham 3 2 12 13 12 Dalton, Edward Gloucester Dunkirk 17 1 20 102 10 Dalton, Daniel Hereford Barwell 1 2 18 2 17 Dalton, Charles Hertford Biggleswade 7 2 12 17 7 Dalton, William Hertford Dalston East 124 3 33 124 10 Dalton, Henry Huntingdon Dean 4 0 0 6 0 Dalton, Mrs. F. Kent Eynsford 22 0 0 39 0 Dalton, Herbert Kent Down 2 2 6 294 0 Dalton, William Lancaster Drinkhouse 5 3 24 36 0 Dalton, Eleanor Leicester Hinckley 1 3 10 41 3 Dalton, J. E. Leicester Leicester 237 0 24 350 18 Dalton, Rev. J. E. Leicester Sengrave 381 3 34 536 15 Dalton, J. H. Leicester Leicester 25 0 0 55 0 Dalton, Albert Lincoln Bassingham 29 0 15 49 1 Dalton, Daniel Lincoln Cowbit 80 2 23 239 4 Dalton, David Lincoln Bassingham 9 1 36 15 18 Dalton, Garratt Lincoln Bassingham 2 1 16 8 5 Dalton, George Lincoln Aubourn 22 0 0 19 5 Dalton, James Lincoln Fillingham 248 2 23 396 8 Dalton, Jas., Reps. of Lincoln Swineshead 1 1 0 44 11 Dalton, John Lincoln Sleningford Hall, York 4984 0 28 6,624 12 Dalton, John, Trs. of Lincoln Coningsby 3 1 28 4 10 Dalton, Joseph Lincoln Hull 10 3 38 16 10 Dalton, Joseph Lincoln North Somercotes 28 2 36 57 10 Dalton, M. Lincoln Fillingham 4 0 12 79 0 Dalton, Mrs. Lincoln Mareham-le-Fen 2 1 1 12 0 Dalton, Robert Jr. Lincoln Bassingham 22 0 20 25 12 Dalton, Robert Sr. Lincoln Bassingham 12 1 34 33 19 Dalton, Thomas Lincoln Hull 6 1 1 23 10 Dalton, William Lincoln Stamford (Mortos) 13 0 1 22 7 Dalton, William Lincoln Stamford (Bourn) 12 2 24 24 12 Dalton, Rev. Charles H. Middlesex Highgate - 2 0 0 120 0 Dalton, Thomas Monmouth Cardiff 153 3 11 344 10 Dalton, Mrs. - Norfolk Clenchwarton 442 3 33 807 3 Dalton, Robert Norfolk Tips End 30 2 5 52 10 Dalton, Robert Jr. Norfolk Upwell 16 3 17 58 6 Dalton, R. P. G., Trs. of Norfolk (Snettisharn) 280 3 0 414 10 Dalton, S., Exors. of Norfolk Swaffham 421 1 36 225 0 Dalton, Thomas F. Norfolk Swaffham 51 3 36 115 0 Dalton, Rev. Richard Northampton Kelmarsh 29 2 22 90 11 Dalton, Robert L. Northampton Barnack 14 1 7 19 0 Dalton, W. Northampton Setton 26 0 2 119 10 Dalton, John Nottingham Walesby 10 2 2 28 17 Dalton, William Oxford Minster Lovell 8 0 0 28 0 Dalton, Richard Salop Edgmond 221 0 23 280 0 Dalton, Grant D. F. Somerset Cucklington 796 3 18 1,626 15 Dalton, John Southampton Andover 7 0 2 34 19 Dalton, Rev. --- Stafford Wolverhampton 96 2 18 180 0 Dalton, Rev. William Stafford Upper Penn 1480 0 38 2,935 18 Dalton, Edward & others Suffolk Perchester Square West 544 3 9 833 12 Dalton, G. W. Suffolk Hunston 14 2 36 21 0 Dalton, James Suffolk Bares 2 0 0 326 0 Dalton, Rev. Richard Suffolk Northamptonshire 237 3 5 341 8 Dalton, George Warwick Kings Newnham 16 0 0 32 0 Dalton, Thomas Garner Warwick Berkswell 25 3 3 39 13 Dalton, William Warwick Astrop 1 2 25 52 10 Dalton, J., Trustees of Westmoreland Dufton 70 1 7 72 18 Dalton, John Westmoreland Appleby 93 0 29 151 19 Dalton, Robert Westmoreland Kings Maebarn 28 2 14 40 5 Dalton, Rev. --- Worcester Wolverhampton 49 0 27 75 0 Dalton, Ann York, E. Riding Tunstall 1 2 26 6 15 Dalton, Francis York, E. Riding Tunstall 2 0 0 7 0 Dalton, Joshua York, E. Riding Hull 103 1 25 168 10 Dalton, Matthew York, E. Riding Tunstall 2 0 20 1 12 Dalton, Thomas York, E. Riding Beverley 2 2 0 124 10 Dalton, George York, N. Riding Thirsk 1 2 32 35 13 Dalton, Henry York, N. Riding Osbaldwick 22 3 26 78 0 Dalton, John York, N. Riding Ripon 97 1 30 161 15 Dalton, William York, N. Riding Sheriff Hutton 1 0 9 11 0 Dalton, C. W. York, W. Riding Grewelthorpe 2 0 0 31 10 Dalton, Henry York, W. Riding Halifax 15 1 7 11 7 Dalton, John York, W. Riding Ripon 714 2 11 1,252 16 Dalton, Joseph York, W. Riding Huddersfield 7 0 7 4 3 Dalton, Leonard York, W. Riding London 10 1 13 15 0 WALES Dalton, Mr. Carmarthen Peckham, Surrey 34 3 3 43 3 Dalton, Mr. Flint. Chester 1 0 26 90 0 |
12/15/2011 | Mike Dalton, Oregon | |
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Added photos to the 2011 Gathering information. http://www.daltondatabank.org/SLCPhotos.html |
12/10/2011 | Maureen Collins, Sydney, Australia | |
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Cwrt Pembre or Pembrey Court in Pembrey, Carmarthenshire, Wales Researched, complied, edited from many sources by Rodney G. Dalton, whose ancestor James Dalton married into the Vaughan family who owned Cwrt Pembre in the early 1600’s. Cwrt Pembre c. unknown My Dalton family is originally from the Dalton/Bispham/Thurnham area of Lancashire, then emigrated to Witney/Curbridge, Oxfordshire and then in 1651 they traveled to Pembrey, South Wales where they lived for over 100 years, starting with: Walter Dalton III, James Dalton, James Ormonde Dalton, James Dalton and Thomas Dalton who sailed for America about 1559 and started the Dalton family in America. So then this story is about my roots in Wales. Walter Dalton III, was the Royal army paymaster, who fled from Curbridge into South Wales in the winter of 1651 after the defeat of the Royal army of King Charles II in the battle of Worcester during the English Civil War. Three of his children died during this terrible trip. After Walter III was safe in South Wales, he bought land around Kidwelly Castle. He probably would have even went inside to view its contents, now in a state of ruin. In about 1656 Walter III and his family then moved onto land somewhere in the little village of Pembrey. I have documented evidence of some of these lands in Kidwelly and Pembrey. In June of 2003 I had the opportunity to travel to Pembrey as a member of the Dalton Genealogical Society and visited the very places were my Dalton family lived and died 350 years ago. I attended services in the same church that they did, St. Illtyd’s, and took pictures of the Dalton graves inside the walls of the church yard. I went to visit the old ruins of Pembrey Court and then went to Kidwelly castle for a tour. As I said before it was once in a life time visit. Kidwelly Castle Court Farm, Pembrey Court Farm in Pembrey, Carmarthenshire, Wales, is an ancient and formerly imposing manor house which is now an overgrown ruin, but structurally sound, and capable of repair and restoration. It consists of three buildings: the farmhouse, a complex two-storey house of approximately 99 square metres; an adjacent barn; and a later cowshed. The present farmhouse is sixteenth century, with an earlier medieval core, and may have been a tower house, a form more associated with Pembrokeshire. It is built from local sandstone quarried from a quarry located in its own land, known as Garreg Llwyd Quarry. Court Farm has a line of corbels on the south facing walls which are a particular feature of old Carmarthenshire buildings and, because of its size and visible location it was, together with the nearby St. Illtud's Church, Pembrey, used a navigational point on local shipping charts to help captains of vessels navigate the treacherous Burry Inlet. Originally, there were seven square chimneys, two of which were unusually set diagonally in the chimney breast in the east wall. It appears that every room had a fireplace, yet the 1672 hearth tax lists the Court as only having two fireplaces, probably to avoid paying tax of two shillings. Similarly, many of the early windows were blocked up to avoid paying the half-yearly window tax of 3 shillings. One room retained its Jacobean panelling until Court Farm was abandoned in around 1948. Court Farm has an interesting large barn, with a defensive military appearance, due its embattled parapet on the south elevation. It is not known if the barn had a defensive function of any kind, although it could be part of a more extensive curtain wall. The Pembrey area was “frontier land” in Medieval times, lying between the Norman occupied areas of the east, and the Welsh kingdom, north-west of Kidwelly, which continued to attack the Norman strongholds. Evidence suggests that the Le Boteler family were the first to occupy a manor on the site of the present Court Farm. Maurice de Londres granted the Manor of Pembrey to Sir John Butler of Dunraven in 1128. Maurice de Londres was the son of William de Londres, who was a knight to Robert Fitzhamon, a Norman baron from Gloucestershire. Fitzhamon invaded Wales between 1091 and 1093, established himself as Lord of Glamorgan and built Cardiff Castle. The knights protecting his castle included William de Londres. As a reward for his services, Fitzhamon gave William the lordship of Ogmore. William went on to help Roger, Bishop of Salisbury, defend his lordship at Kidwelly from attacks by the adjacent Welsh kingdom of Deheubarth. On one of his expeditions to Kidwelly, the inhabitants of Glamorgan attacked Ogmore Castle. William’s butler, called Arnold, succesfully repulsed the attack and was rewarded with the castle and manor of Dunraven. To mark his loyalty, Arnold called himself Arnold le Boteler; the Norman word for butler is Le Boteler, or Boteler. The family surname was later anglicized to Butler. Maurice de Londres succeeded to the lordship of Ogmore, upon the death of his father, William, in 1126. In 1128, Maurice also became Lord of Kidwelly when Roger, Bishop of Salisbury, returned his lordship to The Crown, having found it too difficult to protect from the attacks of Deheubarth. The Crown then gave the lordship to Maurice. In the same year, Maurice granted the Manor of Pembrey to Arnold Butler’s son, Sir John Butler, whose male line of issue included seven generations, most of them named John Butler. The line became extinct when Arnold Butler, of Pembrey and Dunraven, died without issue. Arnold’s sister, Ann Butler, then inherited both estates. The manor of Pembrey was held under military tenure under the Lordship of Kidwelly. The occupation of the Manor of Pembrey required each Butler occupant, in time of war, to provide five archers “according to ancient custom” to help the Lord of Kidwelly within the limits of the land under his control. The Butlers also had to order one knight to attend the "Court of Foreignry of Kidwelly", which was held every month. Each Butler heir also had an obligation to pay a sum of money to the Lord of Kidwelly of ten shillings, to give a day’s ploughing and to help with the hay for one day. One of the woods that originally lay on the manorial land of Court Farm is known as Coed Marchog (Knight's Wood, in the English language), it lies on the eastern side of the Pembrey to Pinged Road, below Garreg Lwyd. The Butler's coat of arms appears in Pembrey Church. Its heraldic device is azure, three cups covered, or (heraldry). The Butler coat of arms can be found in the south east window of the nave of St Illtyd’s Church, Pembrey. A monument and altar-tomb of Sir John le Boteler, of circa 1250, can be found at St Brides Major church. In addition to the land surrounding Court Farm, the Butlers also controlled the vast area of flatlands known as Pembrey Burrows, or the Warren, and the greater part of Pinged Marsh, which is now part of Pembrey Country Park. The Butlers were granted rights to all wrecks found on the Cefn Sidan sands as far as Caldicot Point or Tywyn Point The original caput of the Manor of Pembrey was probably the mound castle now called ‘the Twmpath’, which is located about a mile and a half to the north-east of Burry Port Station. This tumulus is 100 feet in diameter, with a ditch of about 12 feet wide and about 5 feet deep surrounding it. The Twmpath has extensive views, but at some stage it became inconvenient and the caput of the Manor was relocated to the site of the present location of Court Farm. Ann Butler was the last of the Pembrey Butlers. She married Sir Richard Vaughan of Bredwardine, in Herefordshire, the Court Farm and Dunraven estates then became part of the Vaughan family estates. The Vaughans claimed to be direct descendents of the Welsh king Moreiddig Warwyn of Breconshire and north Carmarthenshire. The family has an unusual coat of arms: three boys' heads with snakes coupled around their necks. This is based on a family legend. When the pregnant mother of Moreiddig Warwyn (Warwyn means "fair neck" in Welsh) was resting in the garden, she was frightened by an adder. Moreiddig was born with a mark, resembling the bite of the adder, on his neck. Sir Richard Vaughan was born in 1460 and was knighted at Tournai, in 1513. He became sheriff of Hereford in 1530, and again in 1541. Sir Richard was succeeded by his son, Sir Walter Vaughan (1500-1584), who inherited the three estates of Pembrey, Dunraven and Bredwardine. Sir Walter was born at Dunraven Castle, where his parents had decided to live. After his marriage, he moved to Pembrey, and Court Farm was built as a wedding present for him by his father, in about 1530. The Vaughan part of the current building is the main L-shaped section, facing south and east. Sir Walter was High Sheriff of Carmarthenshire in 1557 and also a Member of Parliament for Carmarthenshire. His son, Sir Thomas Vaughan, inherited the three estates and added to it the Fullerston Estate, in Wiltshire. Sir Thomas was High Sheriff of Carmarthenshire in 1566 and 1570. Sir Thomas had a son, also called Sir Walter Vaughan, who inherited the estates but decided to live at Fullerston. He added Caldicot Farm to the estate holdings, in around 1607. During this period, Court Farm was occupied by Sir Walter’s nephew, Roland Vaughan, until the next Vaughan heir, Sir Charles Vaughan, was old enough to take possession. Charles was Sir Walter’s son by his first wife. He bought Porthaml Mansion, near Talgarth in Breconshire, and Court Farm was then occupied by his son, Sir George Vaughan. Sir George Vaughan was a fervent Royalists and supported King Charles I against Oliver Cromwell, in the English Civil War. As a consequence, in 1648, Sir George Vaughan was imprisoned by Cromwell for a short time at Southwark and fined £2,609 for his "Delinquency". Cromwell is believed to have passed through the parish of Pembrey in 1648, on his way to Ireland and his soldiers may have visited Court Farm to charge and apprehend Sir George at that time. Sir George returned to Court Farm, but the huge fine meant that he had to sell the Dunraven estate, in 1648, and the Fullerston estate, in 1649. Sir George died without issue and the remaining Pembrey and Porthaml estates passed to his younger brother, the Reverend Frederick Vaughan, who had been blind from infancy as a result of smallpox. Frederick Vaughan’s only son, Sir Walter Vaughan, married Alice Bond of Wiltshire, in 1653. They lived, in turn, on both estates and had two children, Bridget and Walter. The male line of the Vaughans of Pembrey ended when Sir Walter’s son died in his first year. After the death of Sir Walter Vaughan, Alice Vaughan married William Ball in 1655. He was a lawyer of Gray’s Inn and became High Sheriff of Carmarthenshire in 1682 and died in 1701. They lived, in turn, at the Porthaml and Pembrey estates. Many famous people are said to have been entertained at the Court, including the painters Van Dyke, Lely and Reynolds, who painted the Vaughan family. Some of these portraits can now be seen in Carmarthen museum. Under the Vaughans, the Pembrey Estate was administered by agents comprising at least three generations of the “capable and loyal” Dalton family. It was probably during this period that a number of fireplaces were blocked up. One of Court Farm’s more impressive architectural features comprises seven tall chimneys, made up of five single stacks and two diagonal twin stacks. These reflect a house of substance with many hearths, but the 1672 Hearth Tax records the house as having only two fireplaces. As an economy measure, many of the original fireplaces were blocked-up in order to avoid paying Hearth Tax at the then substantial rate of two shillings per hearth. The Dalton family appear to originate from Witney in Oxfordshire, and some of the family are buried at St. Illtyd Church, Pembrey, where entries can be found in the Church’s burial register. Bridget Vaughan married John Ashburnham, 1st Earl of Ashburnham, in 1677 at Henry VII's Chapel, in Westminster Abbey. She was 17 and he was 21 years old. Thereafter they lived at the family's ancestral mansion, Ashburnham Place, in Ashburnham, near Battle, Sussex and made only occasional visits to the other estates. The Ashburnham family had been settled in Sussex for many generations, taking their name from a village called Ashburnham located in the parish of Ashburnham and Penhurst about 8 miles north-west of Hastings. Like the Vaughan family, the Ashburnham family were fervent Royalists. They suffered heavy fines and imprisonment by the Parliamentarians. After the Restoration, the family was given numerous Crown leases to compensate for losses under the Commonwealth, and the post of Groom of the Bedchamber. Lord John Ashburnham was married 10 years before he saw Court Farm. He noted in his diary, on Sunday, 3 July, 1687, that: "I saw Pembrey House (Court), which is an old stone house, large enough and kept in pretty good repaire. The land hereabouts is very good." In 1697 the government introduced a window tax of three shillings per window. In order to reduce the amount of tax payable, the Ashburnham estate arranged for many of Court Farm’s stone and wooden mullion windows to be blocked up. Window tax was repealed in 1851, but the large windows on the west of the house have remained blocked to the present day. John Ashburnham died at his London residence in Southampton Street, Bloomsbury, on 21 January 1709 aged 44. His eldest son, William, succeeded him as second baron but died of smallpox on 16 June 1710. The Ashburnham Estates then passed to his brother John, who became third baron. On 14 May 1730, he became Viscount St Asaph of the Principality of Wales and Earl of Ashburnham. The family had been elevated in the peerage, because a viscount is one step above the lowest rank of baron. He died on 10 March 1736-7 at the age of 49 and his only son, John, succeeded to the estate as John Ashburnham, 2nd Earl of Ashburnham. The second Earl died on 8 April 1812 aged 87 and his only son, George Ashburnham, succeeded as George Ashburnham, 3rd Earl of Ashburnham. In 1813, George Ashburnham took legal action to bar the entail of his Pembrey Estate so that he could regain the freehold. After that he could mortgage the Estate, which he did on 15 June 1824, together with his other Carmarthenshire and Breconshire properties. Lord Lovaine and Robert Vyner, Esq. of Gautby, Lincolnshire were the mortgagees, and the loan was £19,403,4s, 6d. George Ashburnham died on 27 October 1830 and his son Bertram became fourth Earl. When visiting the Pembrey Estate George Ashburnham usually stayed at Pembrey House, which the family had built on the slope to the north east of St Illtud's Church, Pembrey, in 1823 and which has since been demolished. The house was occasionally let, with rooms being reserved for family use. However, in the 1891 census, Lord Ashburnham, 5th Earl, is recorded as staying at the Ashburnham Hotel. After the death of Bridget Vaughan’s stepfather, William Ball, in 1701, Court Farm was leased to Rawleigh Mansel, of Llangunnor Parish. He was High Sheriff of Carmarthenshire in 1679 and, according to The Red Dragon periodical (1886), he went to live at Court Farm: “thoroughly repairing that old mansion for the purpose, and lived there for three or four years, and died there on 27 November 1702 in his 73rd year” His grandson, Rawleigh Dawkins Mansel, who was High Sheriff in 1730, then lived as tenant at Court Farm. During the tenancy of Rawleigh Dawkin Mansel the house was divided into two separate living sections and accommodated two separate families. Walls were added or removed, several doors and windows were blocked and new ones opened, additional stairs were fitted and at least two attic rooms were added. During this period David Thomas (1738/39-1788) was born at Court Farm. Rawleigh Dawkin Mansel was High Sheriff for Carmarthenshire in 1730 and died ‘under the agonizing pains of the Gout’ in his 44th year in 1749. Thereafter, Court Farm was home to several Ashburnham agents, stewards and other estate officials. On Kitchen’s map of 1701 Court Farm is clearly marked as: ‘Court, Mansel, Esq.’ In 1700, Edward Lluyd, a graduate of Jesus College, Oxford, keeper of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, and a noted Celtic scholar and antiquary, visited Pembrey Court and reported as follows:- “Penbre Court, ye Seat formerly of the Butlers and afterwards of the Vaughans, and now belonging (in right of his Lady) to [William] Ball, Esqr, whence it descends to my Ld Ashburnham’s Lady………..Diwlais Brook divides this parish from Llan Elhi, springing at Croslaw Mountain and falls into the sea………Here are 2 lakes close together called Swan Pool where there are plenty of Eels, and in the Winter store of Fowls such as Ducks and Teal, sometimes wild Swans or Elks and wild Geese. The adjoining one, stored with Turbot, Bret and Sole. They take here a large sort of fish called Friers or Monk fish (in Hereford, Gloucester, and Worcester, whither they carry them, Soucing Fish) about May, June and July. This Pool (or Pools for both may be called one) is called Swan Pool because the Lord of the Manor (Mr Ball) has thereon about 40 Swans. Before the hard frost there were about 80, which all died to 6." Swan Pool was located near Towyn Mawr, and has since been drained. Appropriately, the location is now known as Swan Pool Drain. A picturesque pond, located near to the house, and close to the Mountain Road, was also drained in about 1937. David Thomas was born at Court Farm during the tenancy of the Mansels, when the house was divided into two. He was a gifted, but unqualified, bone setter from an illustrious family practicing bone setting, and is buried in St Illtyd, Church, Pembrey. The Thomas family proved to have other talents, and many vocations. Three generations are listed in the Church's registers as farmers, butchers, shopkeepers, and ship-owners of vessels that traded from Pembrey, Old Harbour. On 24 July 1843, John Thomas, a farmer, and David Thomas, a shopkeeper, jointly registered a brigantine of 185 tons burthen known as the “ELIZA” at Llanelli. Its master was John Thomas junior and it traded to Liverpool, Malta, Ancona, Venice and as far as San Francisco, where the whole crew deserted the ship to join the Californian gold rush. Consequently, the ship was anchored, with hundreds of others, in San Francisco harbour for several years. She was later sold, along with many other ships, by the United States Marshall. John Thomas also owned a sloop of 29 tons burthen called the “SEDULOUS”, which was built in Cardigan and registered at Llanelli on 15 February 1842. Its registry was cancelled on 19 March 1842. Hugh Thomas, together with some other investors, owned the "MARGARET JANE", a vessel built at Pwllheli in 1850, and whose registry was cancelled on 13 December 1865. In 1831, Mr. Edward Driver, a surveyor, made a “Survey and Valuation of the Manor of Pembrey and Estate” on behalf of Bertram Ashburham. At this time, Court Farm comprised 194 acres plus 12 acres of marshland. The tenant was recorded as John Thomas (later succeeded by his son Hugh) who paid a yearly rent of £88.10s. John Thomas occupied a part of the Mansion, whilst a Mr. T.E. Biederman occupied the other part. Mr. Driver reported as follows: "One portion of the Old Court House is occupied by Mr. Biederman. The other portion comprises a very good large kitchen, small cellar, old Entrance Hall, a parlour not inhabitable but now undergoing repairs and filling up, and a new staircase has been lately made to lead to two new formed bedrooms. At the back of the House is a range of offices comprising (besides some held by Mr. Biederman) a dairy and a cheese loft. A newly erected cowhouse and stable with slated roof, and enclosed yard. Adjoining the House is a good barn with cowhouse; coach-house at the end, hereafter described, and held by Mr. Biederman; a stock yard with cowhouse, and another barn, slated, and a lean-to carthouse, thatched, at the back…" Later in the survey, Mr. Driver wrote: “Part of the Court House and buildings, heretofore generally used by the Agent, but for the last 3 or 4 years was occupied by his brother and T. E. Biederman. The buildings comprise the old Court House, and was formerly a good residence; it is stone built with slated roof; part has been kept for the accommodation of the Agent to the Estate, and this is now occupied, and has so been for 3 or 4 years by Mr. T. E. Biederman, and consists of the large principal room, now subdivided, leaving a good Parlor, a bedroom without a fireplace, and a passage leading to another bedroom; another bedroom, kitchen, and small scullery, and a small bedroom for a servant; a cellar under a part; coalhouse and room over; and a coach-house at the end of the barn; a stable in two divisions for four horses: all the above occupied by Mr. Biederman.” During its early period, Court Farm had a high, open-trussed roof, visible from the floor of the main hall and of an elaborate design, with double roll and hollow moulding. Bredwardine Court and Porthaml Mansion, two other ancestral homes of the Vaughan's, have similar surviving roofs. However, part of the original roof of Court Farm was lowered and flattened during alterations made during the 1800s, and the carved ornamental detail of the original trussed roof was lost. In addition, the original stone tiles, which needed a more steeply pitching roof, were replaced with Caernarvon slates (as reported in Mr. Driver’s survey), and the roof valleys were finished off with lead flashing. The 1878 Ordnance Survey map gives the first known ground plan of Court Farm, this shows the original Vaughan L-shaped structure, with two wings enclosing a courtyard in the rear. Nearby, on the south side, is the barn. A large enclosed garden is outlined, together with Court Wood, said to have been planted by the Vaughan's. A Tithe Schedule and map dated 7 June 1839 shows Court Farm with 209 acres, a slight increase in landholding since the survey of Mr. Driver, with Mr. John Thomas still the tenant. The Thomas family were tenants of Court Farm from 1738 to 1902, and most of their baptisms, marriages and burials are recorded in the registers of St Illtyd Church, Pembrey. The Tithe Schedule also includes the names of all the surrounding fields, including Clos Edwin, Wedlanis, Abel Dawnsi, Hunting Knap, and Mumble Head. Two fields, Garreg Lwyd and Maes Graig Lwyd, may have had a religious origin. It was during the ownership of the Pembrey Estate by the Ashburnham's that trial workings for coal were made. These proved to be successful and a number of levels and pits were opened in Coed y Marchog (Knight’s Wood) and Coed Rhial (Royal Wood) on the western slope of Pembrey Mountain. Management of the colliery was undertaken from an office at Court Farm and the coal was carried by packhorse to the estuary of the River Gwendraeth and to the Burry Inlet, from here it was shipped to the west of England and Ireland. The second Earl Ashburnham, impressed by the success of a canal built by Thomas Kymer in the Gwendraeth valley, decided upon a similar scheme for his Pembrey colliery. Kymer’s Canal was built between 1766 and 1768 in order to carry coal from pits and levels at Pwll y Llygod and Great Forest (near Carway) to a place of shipment on the Lesser Gwendraeth river near Kidwelly. The Ashburnham canal ran from the foot of Pembrey Mountain to the Gwendraeth estuary and its aim was to improve the transport of coal from the Pembrey colliery to the sea. The plan initially encountered opposition from colliers, whose ponies used to do the job, but by 1796 work on the canal had begun below Coed Farm, close to the Llandyry-Pinged road. By 1799, the canal had extended across the Kidwelly-Pembrey road, near to Saltrock Farm, and by the end of 1801 it had reached the sea at Pill Towyn, a creek running in from the south bank of the Gwendraeth Fawr river. Two shipping places were built on the canal, one of them at Pill Ddu, and the total length of the canal was about two miles. Flat terrain meant that there were no locks, and in 1805 a short branch was constructed towards Ffrwd when new levels were opened in Coed Rhial. The entrance to Pill Ddu was deepened in 1816 and a dry dock was added in 1817. By 1818, however, the colliery had become exhausted and the canal became redundant. In the returns of Owners of Land in 1873, Bertram Ashburnham is shown as having substantial estates in Wales, with 5,685 acres producing an estimated annual rental of £3,547 in Carmarthenshire, and 1,881 acres producing an estimated annual rental of £1,963 in Breconshire. In Sussex, the family seat, 14,051 acres produced £13,069. Bertram Ashburnham died on 22 June 1878 aged 80. His eldest of seven sons, also named Bertram, succeeded as fifth Earl and actively participated in the development of industry in Pembrey. He died in 1913 leaving an only child, Lady Mary Cathleen Charlotte Ashburnham. The title thus passed to his younger brother, Thomas, the sixth and last Earl of Ashburnham, who had married Maria Elizabeth Anderson of Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada in 1903. George Ashburnham had taken out a mortgage on his Welsh estates in 1824 for £19,403,4s, 6d after he had freed the Welsh properties from entail on certain leases. By 1897 the mortgage debt on the Welsh properties had increased to £87,600, as the loan had not been repaid on its due date. In order to repay the loan, the Porthaml estate was sold in 1913 and the Pembrey estate in 1922. Thomas Ashburnham died without issue on 12 May 1924, leading to the extinction of the Ashburnham title. Court Farm was tenanted by the Thomas family until around 1902. After that, William Bonnell (senior), and his family, were tenants. The house once again became a single dwelling. The Bonnell family farmed Court Farm until August 1922, when the whole of the Ashburnham Estate was sold. The sale was a major local event. The Ashburnhams had, for 245 years, controlled much of Pembrey Parish, and been intimately involved in turning it into a centre of industry. At the auction Mr. William Bonnell (senior) purchased Penllwyn Uchaf Farm and thereafter vacated Court Farm. Court Farm was advertised for sale by auction on 14 September 1929, subject to tenancy, and plans could be inspected at the auctioneer's office or the local butchers. Mr. James Butler of Treorchy bought Court Farm at the auction. The Manor was then let to the family of Mr. Sidney Thomas. They remained as tenants after the death of Mr. Butler, in 1937, and the purchase of the Manor by Mr Charles Harding from the Links, Pembrey. Mr. Harding bought Pembrey Court as a business proposition. He developed the Garreg Lwyd quarries, located on Court Farm land, as a brickworks, and used material from the quarry for his brick mixture. The brickwork project failed when the brick making machinery ran into technical difficulties. Probably as a result of these activities, a large front section of the quarry collapsed. In 1942, Mr. Harding sold Court Farm to William Bonnell (junior), who lived at Penllwyn Uchaf farm. However, the Thomas family remained as tenants until about 1948, after which Court Farm was left empty. Mr. William Bonnell (Junior) continued to live at Penllwyn Uchaf Farm until his death in January 1962 and during this time Pembrey Court was used for storage. After William Bonnell's death, Court Farm passed to his younger brother, Mr. Owen Bonnell. During the 1970s, Court Farm remained unoccupied and thieves twice stole the lead flashings from the roof. After the first theft, Mr. Owen Bonnell replaced the lead, but after the second theft he could see little point in replacing it again. It was at this stage that the structure of the house began to deteriorate. Nevertheless, in 1972, he appointed Messrs, Peter Howell and Donald Jones, Architects, of Uplands, Swansea to apply for grant aid from the Historic Buildings Council. The Marquis of Anglesey and representatives of the Historic Buildings Council visited Court Farm in order to assess the property for grant aid, but their report to the Secretary of State for Wales pointed out that the property was beyond repair and so a grant was refused. Owen Bonnell died in January, 1976 and Court Farm was inherited by his nephew, John Bonnell Davies, who was born at Court Farm. He is the present owner and lives in Pembrey. In 1972, the possibility of saving Court Farm was first put forward to the former Carmarthenshire County Council, but it was believed that the building had deteriorated too far and would cost an estimated £50,000 to put right. Considerable theft and vandalism left the property in a badly damaged condition, and so a planning application was made by the owners for consent to demolish the building. On 23 October, 1980, Llanelli Borough Council refused the application for the following reasons: Court Farm is a Grade II Listed Building of special architectural and historic interest, which is capable of renovation, rehabilitation and use, which would ensure its future conservation; and in line with national policy, the Borough Council is disposed not to grant consent for the demolition of Listed Buildings which are capable of preservation or conservation. Despite the decline in the fortunes of Court Farm, local concern for the building remained strong, as evidenced by the publicity in the local press. The late Mr. John Evans, of Erw Terrace, Burry Port, who was a member of Carmarthenshire Antiquarian Society, commenced a campaign to save Court Farm and. in August 1981, a Court Farm Committee was established. The Committee requested that the Borough Council place a compulsory purchase order on the building and plans were formulated to restore it and develop it as a museum, in a £100,000 project phased over 3 years. Unfortunately, the plans received a set-back when solicitors representing the owners refused to accept a valuation figure of £4,000 for the 1.8 acre site. On 19 October 1984, another application was made to demolish Court Farm, but the application was refused. The refusal notice, issued on 18 July 1985, stated that demolition was considered premature, due to the Borough Architect’s museum feasibility study. By 14 November 1984, the Western Mail newspaper was reporting on the proposed 48-hour fast of Mr. John Evans. The planned fast was the "ultimate threat" if demolition were to come about and "would be a last resort gesture". In his campaign to save the building, Mr. Evans wrote to the former Lord Chancellor, Lord Elwyn Jones (a native of Llanelli), to the Archbishop of Wales, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Llanelli Borough Council, Dyfed County Council, the Welsh Office, the Welsh Development Agency, Members of Parliament, Government Ministers, various trusts and influential academics. Letters of support were received from the Prince of Wales, who was reported to be pleased that efforts were being made to save Court Farm, and a letter of support was also received from Professor Sir Glanmor Williams. By 1985, local concern was such that funding was made available for a feasibility study for the property. Cadw generously offered a grant of 50% towards the cost of preparation of the study and the balance came from Llanelli Borough Council. The feasibility study concluded that Court Farm was worth retaining on the basis of : its uniqueness in the district and probably Wales, particularly in a locality predominantly shaped by the Industrial Revolution; -its rich variety of architectural features within a single building; -virtually no examples of medieval or Tudor settlement remain in the district; and -the extent of local interest and concern over the future of the property, which has long formed part of the local history and character of the village of Pembrey. On 30 August 1985, Llanelli Borough Planning Officer, Mr. Clive Davies, stated that the ultimate step of demolition would not be justified until the results of the feasibility study were known. Apart from Mr. Evans and Cadw, others who objected to demolition included the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historic Monuments in Wales, Dyfed Archaeological Trust, Llanelli Civic Society and Pembrey Community Council. In November 1985, the Reverend W. Roberts of Burry Port wrote to the Western Mail Civic Pride Competition arguing for the preservation of Court Farm, and concluded with the following call to action: "Summing up, the ancient St. Illtud’s Church remains; the notorious wreck-strewn and beautiful Cefn Sidan Sands remain; the third part of the trinity must also remain. In reality, the neglect of the ancient monument is a local and national scandal. Court Farm must be restored." Meanwhile, plans by Llanelli Council to restore Court Farm had stalled because the asking price remained too high. On 27 June 1987, Mr. John Evans urged the Secretary of State for Wales, Mr Peter Walker, to take over the planned restoration, fearing that otherwise the plans would come to nothing. By this stage, the proposed Court Farm museum was in jeopardy because of plans to develop a Heritage and Tinplate Centre at Kidwelly which is now Kidwelly Industrial Museum. The importance of Court Farm was still recognized by Cadw, however, and in July 1987 they agreed to offer a grant to fund restoration at a rate of 60%, which was 10% above the then usual rate. Sadly, Cadw’s offer was not taken up and changes in grant regulations meant that the offer lapsed. However, there was renewed hope when, on 29 January 1988, Llanelli Borough Council announced plans to buy the property in order to develop it as a tourist promotion and information office. Mr. George Harris, estate officer for Llanelli Borough Council, stated that the situation of Court Farm would not be suitable as a tourist attraction in itself, but could be used as a base to promote tourist interest in the Llanelli area. Court Farm remains posted as a building at risk on the web site of SAVE Britain’s Heritage and the posting attracted the interest of Cadw Sir Gaerfyrddin/Carmarthenshire Building Preservation Trust who obtained funding to conduct a fresh feasibility study, which was completed in 2003 by Davies Sutton Architecture. This architectural firm have successfully restored Sker House, a similar type of building. This Study was funded with by Cadw and the Architectural Heritage Fund. The Study established the intrinsic value of Court Farm and looked at all the options for saving the building. The Study established that the building represented an important historical resource and could be saved for a new beneficial use, by with repair retaining a flexible layout, allowing fitting-out for an optimum end use. The structural engineer’s report, prepared by Mann Williams Consulting Civil and Structural Engineers of Cardiff collateral to the Study provided a structural assessment and report on the basis of an inspection carried out during February 2003. This stated that “the main walls remain reasonably plumb and stable when considering the extensive period of neglect. Replacement of floors and roof structures will reinstate the necessary support to the walls and provide a significant improvement to stability.” Court Farm has a panoramic view of Carmarthen Bay and is the only surviving Elizabethan manor house in Carmarthenshire. Before the construction of Whiteford Lighthouse, Court Farm and St Illtud's Church, Pembrey formed two of the few prominent local landmarks in the Pembrey area and so became important navigational aides. It is the seven “towering chimneys” that made Court Farm such a landmark, and both the Manor and Church are clearly marked on William Jones of Loughor’s ‘Plan or Directions for Ships to Come Safe into Burry and to Several Places of Safety to be within the Same’, made in 1757. The Burry Inlet has always been a notoriously difficult place to navigate, due to the quickly changing course of the river and shifting sand banks. Ships crossing the Burry Bar, which is roughly on a line drawn from Burry Holms on Gower to Tywyn Sands or Cornel Mawr, near Pembrey, were crossing a treacherous area. Charts indicate that the contours of the estuary are constantly changing. As an example, in 1764 John Wesley crossed the Burry Inlet on horseback from Pembrey on his way to Oxwich, in Gower. Today, such a crossing would not be possible. In the seventeenth century, Sir Walter Vaughan, conceived a life saving sea rescue scheme, and as local Member of Parliament, enthusiastically tried to get the Government to take-up his plans, to no avail. The Butlers had been granted rights to all wrecks found on the Cefn Sidan sands, and so for centuries the Lord of the Manor of Pembrey had rights and privileges over the disposal of wrecks found along the coast. Cefn Sidan was frequently the graveyard of many unsuspecting vessels, whose victims were buried in the grounds of Pembrey Church, including a relative of Napoleon's Josephine. Entries in the Pembrey Church registers record numerous burials of passengers and crew. The demand for coal, in the nineteenth century, led to a big increase in the number of wrecks along the coast. Despite this close connection with the sea, when King Charles I asked Sir Walter Vaughan if he could supply the Crown with a ship of 30 tons, Sir Walter avoided the issue by claiming that Carmarthenshire was an inland county with only a few creeks. However, this did not prevent Sir Walter from acquiring possession of at least two ships at auction, after mishaps led to them running aground at Pembrey. One of these was of 60 tons burthen and known as “DOROTHY”. She was registered at Burry and leased for a voyage from Laugharne to Chester, with a cargo of salt. The other ship was the vessel “HOPE”, she was registered at Harborough, but was driven by a storm into the North Burry Road in June 1631, damaging the cargo of salt and leading to the desertion of the vessel by her crew. Sir Walter acquired possession of both vessels and cargoes and later assigned them to a Plymouth merchant for £500. By the end of the eighteenth century, uncertainty had arisen as to the exact area to which the Lord Ashburnham, at that time, the Lord of the Manor of Pembrey, and Lord Cawdor, Lord of Kidwelly held rights. Both agreed that their agents and their legal advisers should be allowed to investigate their claims, and depositions were taken from a number of older local men, who indicated that uncertainties about the rights had set in during the seventeenth century. The statements of Lord Ashburnham sought to claim that Lord Ashburnham’s tenants had always exercised their right to take any wreck or articles found on the shore to a recognised storage place, or even to Court Farm itself. The salvors were then granted a sum of money to cover the “salvage and expenses”. It may be that such articles were stored in the barn at Court Farm. The following are two examples of the many depositions that were made in favour of the Ashburnham estate: “1663, 8th day of June, John William Arnold, yeoman of Pembrey, aged 75, Sworn and Examined before the Court of the Steward…” he had always assumed that he had the right to claim any material from the wrecks on behalf of the “Lordship of Ashburnham until now and of late.” “1664, 14th day of July, David William John, village of Pembrey, yeoman, four score years, Sworn and Examined before the Court of the Steward…did lay claim, title unto any of the wreck or materials that happened to be cast up by the sea upon any of the lands within the Lordship of Pembrey by Permission of the Lord of the Manor and his agents.” By 1830 the dispute had been settled amicably, without a court case, and the agreement allowed Lord Ashburnham to maintain his ancient manorial rights over the Pembrey foreshore, and Lord Cawdor to maintain his rights over the Kidwelly foreshore. The agreement document stated: “The right of wreck upon this immediate part of the coast (Caldecott) seems not to have been distinctly exercised within living memory of man, but whenever a ship has been stranded, large parties come down from the Country, some joining the tenantry of Lord Ashburnham, and others the tenantry of Lord Cawdor, and whichever proved the stronger party took the greater share of the Prey.” Cargo from wrecked vessels was sometimes c carried in carts to farms owned by Lord Ashburnham and, when the owner made a claim on the property, Lord Ashburnham’s agent would charge a salvage fee. The following are examples of wrecks claimed by Lord Ashburnham and listed in the 1830 agreement document: 1763 Received balance left unpaid of Wine (salvaged) sold this year, 8s. 10d. For salvage of the tobacco ship that came ashore at Pembrey, 5gns. For timber that came ashore at Pembrey, £1. 10. 0. 1764 For ‘uldge’ cast with a small supply of rum in it that came on shore £4. 10. 0. 1766 Caldecott: received for a boat taken up at Towin (in Caldecott) afterwards claimed on oath by Capt. Jones of Carmarthen, 1d. 1768 Caldecott: received the profit of 4 casks of wine, sold by auction at Towin on 15th March 1768, £17. 4. 0. 1770 Received for the salvage of a Dutch vessel, stranded on the fee farm at Caldecott, 5gns. Received for a hogshead of claret, £4. 18. 0, but deducted 5s. for carriage of it from the sand of Towin. 1776 Received of Mr. Griffith the Collector of Customs at Llanelly, the produce of the tobacco of the ship “POMPEY”, thrown on Pembrey Manor in February 1773, £83. 4. 0. There are also occasional accounts in Ashburnham documents of sales of wreck found on the Pembrey sands: “Account of wreck sold by William Davies for the Right Honourable the Earl of Ashburnham – collected from Pembrey Manor (The Court). September 1804 To piece of elm, timber sold, being 8 cwts. and a half at 2s. 0. 17s 0 August 1805 To an old cannon sold to Mr. Morgan at 4 @ 2/6 10s 0 Received from Steven Jones for use of the storeroom at Court to put the late wreck; £1. 1s. 0 Eventually, all wrecks became the sole responsibility of the Receiver of Wrecks and Droits and it was his prerogative to dispose of a wreck, and its cargo, by auction, or any other suitable means. By this time, all ships from the Pembrey area were registered with the Register of British Ships at the port of Llanelli, and each ship was issued with a certificate of registry and details of the vessel were entered in the Register. There were reputed to be many wreckers in the Pembrey area. "Mat of the Iron Hand", who had lost a hand and boasted an iron hook, used to tie lanterns to the sheep grazing on the headlands during a winter storm to draw vessels into shore. One day, these false lights lured a ship onto the rocks before Sir Walter Vaughan could get the boats of his sea rescue crew out to save them. It was said that Mat's custom was to kill all survivors, so that there could be no witnesses. One swimmer that he allegedly dispatched turned out to be John Walter Vaughan, the eldest son of Sir Walter Vaughan. As Mat had been imprisoned, over the years by, Sir Walter, he took his revenge by cutting off the young man's hand. As he did so, he noticed that he was wearing a gold signet ring with the well-known Vaughan crest of the three boys' snake-entwined heads, given to John Walter on attaining his majority. This was the private seal of the family. Mat was subsequently hanged. In 1979 a group of Carmarthenshire Antiquarian Society members carried out some hedge counting on Court Farm land. This involves counting the number of different tree species in alternate 30m lengths of hedgerow. Each species in the hedge approximates to one hundred years. A narrow strip of land near the Court, known as the "Narrow Yard" (Llathed Fain, in Welsh) was traditionally granted, or leased, by the Lord of the Manor to a favoured yeoman, who quickly delineated his property with a surrounding hedge. At Court Farm, the field shapes do suggest enclosure of former "strips" or "lands" in an open field system. The Antiquarian Society found that, on average, there were five tree species per hedge, indicating an early sixteenth century enclosure from open fields. Most of the survey effort was concentrated here, and in the Kidwelly area, because of the amount of medieval, and later, documentation available for this area, which can act as a “control” check for dates obtained from species counting. The constituent manors of local lordships are described in a 1609 Survey. This covers different soils, field types, settlement patterns and tenurial customs of the Welshries and Englishries. Dr. Max Hooper, of the Nature Conservancy, pioneered this system of calculation from English hedgerows, whose antiquity was attested by similar documents, such as hedged parts of Anglo-Saxon estate boundaries delineated in the charters, medieval "assarts" or clearances in the forest or waste registered in the Court Rolls, etc. The equation between age and number of species present is due to the relative abundance of colonizing species in the immediate vicinity, and the rate at which some species can colonize existing hedges, whether planted or made by clearing woodland either side of them. During the late 1700s and early 1800s, a large number of oak trees were planted on the eastern slope below Garreg Llwyd Quarry. In early times the oak tree was sacred to the Druids, and in 1842 a newspaper reported that "A grand Druidic procession took place in Pembrey", although it is not clear if there is any link to the wood. During the early 1800s, women were employed in the area to strip the bark of the oak trees, which was sent to the nearest tannery, where tannin was extracted from the bark and used in leather production. Fanciful claims have been made that a tunnel connected Court Farm with the nearby St Illtyd's Church. Court Farm used to have a large and heavy stone bowl, filled by spring water, in its grounds, which was used to water cattle for almost a hundred years by Court Farm’s tenant farmers. This was believed to be the "lost" Norman font bowl of the Church, and subsequently, the bowl was moved to the Lady Chapel of the Church in 1933, where it still remains. Interest in Court Farm goes back over a number of decades. On the afternoon of Saturday, 12 September, 1970 the Carmarthenshire Antiquarian Society held its final Field Day of the 1970 season, when a visit was made to the Pembrey area. The seventy members were conducted by Mr W.H. Morris of Kidwelly and Mr Brynmor Voyle of Llanelli. After assembling at Trimsaran, the party proceeded to a point on Pembrey Mountain where they paused to admire a panoramic view of Carmarthen Bay. At Court Farm Mr. Brynmor Voyle outlined the main architectural and historical features of the mansion, including its single hall-type structure. Members were, unfortunately, unable to inspect the inside of the house. The castellated barn structure in front of the mansion aroused a great deal of interest. At St. Illtyd's Church, the Reverend T.A. Jones welcomed the party and made special mention of “Butler's Window” and the hagiascope, the opening in the church tower through which lepers viewed the consecration of the bread and wine at the altar. Members then inspected the parish registers, dating from 1700 and the memorial to families such as Rees of Cilymaenllwyd, Mansel of Stradey, Vaughan of Trimsaran, Thompson of Glyn Abbey and Wedge of Goodig. End. Go to this URL address to view pictures ad information of the ruins of Court Farm in Pembrey. http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/southwest/sites/local_history/pages/restoration_06.shtml Known ‘officially’ as Pembrey Court, and to the inhabitants of Pembrey as Cwrt Pembrey or just the Court, this historic manor-house stands on a hill about a half a mile north-west of the church of St. Illtyd in the little village of Pembrey. The present buildings are dated from the early sixteen century manor house. Dedicated to Saint Illtyd, the parish church contains heraldic memorials to the families of Butler, Vaughan’s and Mansell. It is told in our Dalton history that Walter Dalton III is buried somewhere inside the church. In the courtyard is buried the citizens of Pembrey, including some of my own Dalton family. There is a old door bolted to the wall at the entrance that reads; William Dalton, church warden. In the courtyard against the outside stone wall is the grave site of James Dalton and his wife Joyce. Below is the transcription on this tombstone which is a large flat stone and is inscribed as follows: “Here Lieth the body Of James Dalton of Caldicote Farm of this parish Gent who Departed this life on the 15thday Of May Anno Domini 1721 aged 71 years son of Walter Dalton of the parish of Witney in the County of Oxford Gent Here also Lieth the Body of Joyce the wife of said James Dalton who departed this Life the 10th Day of march Anno Domini 1731 Ages 84 years The information below is from a booklet I bought in this very St. Illtyd’s Church, Pembrey when I attended services there on Sunday, June 1st. 2003. One of the great events of my life. Eglwys llltud Sant, Pen-Bre; the name of the church in the Welsh language. “The Pembrey parish church with Llandyry is in the deanery of Kidwelly, the Archdeaconry of Carmarthen and the Diocese of St. David’s. Pembrey is a name derived from the hill or ridge which overlooks the village and juts out in the south westerly direction towards Carmarthen Bay. Pembre the Welsh form is precise in its meaning, ‘Pen’ meaning head or end and ‘bre’ meaning ridge or hill. The church was dedicated to St. Illtyd, who it is believed lived about 450 to 525 A.D., during the Age of Saints 5th to 8th Centuries …………….. During the Age of Saints hundreds of devout and saintly men journeyed throughout Wales teaching and preaching and helping the needy. Usually one of them would eventually settled in a particular place and preach to the local people from the most suitable spot, rise or mound; this chosen spot or enclosure gradually came to be regarded as hallowed ground, known in Welsh as ‘Llan’. In time a simple crude church of wattle and timber would be established within the enclosure and the Saint’s name added to ‘Llan’, resulting in hundreds of place names in Wales beginning with Llan, as in Llanelli and Llandeio. No exact date can be given for the foundation or building of the church, but it is one of several churches in this area mentioned in the “Book of Llandaff’ which dates from about 1066-71. Due to the many alterations and renovations over many centuries it is impossible to discover whether any of the original building exists today“. Has Pembrey Court a tale to tell? You bet! read on………. As the Norman conquerors advanced through South Wales, they left in their wake a string of castles, the nearest one being Kidwelly. One of the Norman lords, a certain Le Boteler, was granted lands in the Lordship of Kidwelly, at Pembrey. Le Boteler was later anglicized to Butler. The Lordship of Kidwelly had been in Anglo-Norman hands since c.1106. Kidwelly was one of the Norman towns strung out along the coastal plain of South Wales. There is no evidence of any occupation before the King Henry I granted to Roger, Bishop of Salisbury, or even if a small Celtic settlement existed, without influence on the subsequent development of the area.. In 1106, after the death of Howell ap Gronw, who was a Welsh chieftain of Ystrad, Tywy, Kidweli and Gower, Henry I granted these lands to his minister, Roger, Bishop of Salisbury, who erected a castle at the mouth of the Gwaendraeth Fach. This was named Kidwelly Castle and formed one of a series of Norman strongholds designed to secure their newly won conquests in South Wales and to command the passage of the rivers across which the road to the west passed. A mention of the hall of the Castle in a document of 1115 or earlier shows that the building of Kidwelly must have been practically completed by that year. During the up-rising which followed the death of Henry I, the Battle of Maes Gwenllian was fought a short distance away from the castle (1136). The account speaks of Maurice de Londres, Lord of Kidwelly, and Geoffrey, Constable of the Bishop, as leaders of the Norman army. Maurice, who is mentioned for the first time in connection with this district, already possessed Ogmore in Glamorgan, where his father William de Londres appears to have been one of the original conquerors. The coupling of the two names suggests that Roger of Salisbury, while retaining possession of the castle, had granted the lordship of the district to Maurice de Londres, who probably acquired the castle also when the bishop died in the following year. The Battle of Maes Gwenllian: Maes Gwenllian, Gwenllian's Field, lies a mile north of Kidwelly. It commemorates a woman who, with the martial instincts, led a Welsh army against the Normans. The battle followed the death of King Henry I in December 1135, when the Welsh revolted against foreign rule and threatened a national uprising. An army was raised in Breconshire and attacked the Anglo-Norman settlements in Gower. The battle fought between Loughor and Swansea resulted in a crushing victory for the Welsh where 500 Normans were killed. The ruler of the South, Gruffydd ap Rhys, saw the exciting prospect of expelling all foreigners from his Kingdom. He rode north to Gwynedd to seek reinforcements. While he was away, Maurice de Londres, Lord of Kidwelly decided to counter-attack. Gwenllian, the beautiful wife of Gruffydd ap Rhys gathered her forces and led the Welsh army to attack the town and castle of Kidwelly. At Maes Gwenllian, the spot that now bears her name, she was engaged by the forces of Maurice de Londres, the local lord, and utterly defeated. Gwenllian and her son Morgan were killed and another son, Maelgwn, taken prisoner. The story tells that Gwenllian was decapitated and that her headless phantom never found rest until someone searched the ancient battlefield and returned her skull to her grave. Gwenllian's name is inextricably linked with Kidwelly. Even today, her name still provokes admiration and respect locally. Hail Gwenllian - Kidwelly's unequivocal heroine after 900 years! Kidwelly - The settlement: Remember the settlement of Kidwelly started as a hill fort with timber walls. Slowly over the years a few farms and building were built around the Castle. The inhabitants of this small village had to soon build a wall around their houses. The settlement consists of two parts, the castle and the walled town on the west bank, and the priory church with the new town on the other side of the river. The two are joined by a two-arched bridge of fourteenth- or fifteenth-century date. This carried the great road to West Wales, probably replacing an earlier structure. Modern development has greatly altered the appearance of the new town, the last of the picturesque medieval houses having recently been destroyed (1931). The priory church of St. Mary was founded by Bishop Roger before 1115, and became a cell of the abbey of Sherborne. Such foundations are typical of the Norman settlements in South Wales, the alien monks being introduced as a counterpoise to the patriotic sentiments of the native monasteries which too often served as focuses of anti-Norman feeling. The present building dates from the fourteenth century. From the bridge the road to the castle leads through the defenses of the old town. The walls have mostly disappeared, but the main gateway, apparently of early fourteenth-century date, still spans the road. The line of the defenses can still be traced by the earthen bank which preceded the walls. It encloses about eight acres including the castle which it surrounds on all sides except the east. Although the medieval buildings within the walls have been replaced with modern houses, the line of the existing roads probably follows the original layout. Another feature of exceptional interest is the ruins of the medieval mill which with the contemporary weir and leat can be traced on the low ground between the old town and the river. At a comparatively modern date this was replaced by a more efficient type of mill, which in its turn is now disused. Kidwelly Castle Perched high on the banks of the River Gwendraeth are the impressive remains of a stone castle on the site of some extensive 12th century earthworks. The earliest castle was probably an earth and timber 'ring work', built in the first half of the 12th century when the Norman invaders come to the area. There were probably some Welsh small farms there at the time. Kidwelly Castle began as a semi-circular earthwork built on a ridge above the River Gwendraeth by Roger de Caen, Bishop of Salisbury, early in the 12th century. A memorial outside the main gate of the castle commemorates the death of Gwenllian - wife of Gruffudd ap Rhys, Lord of Deheubarth - who was killed in battle as she led Welsh forces against the castle in 1136. (Read her tale below) The victor that day was Maurice de Londres, and his heirs kept the castle until 1216, although they had to endure several successful Welsh raids during this period. Kidwelly Castle is one of the finest castles in South-West Wales, it remains remarkably intact. Dominating a long disputed region, the strong and splendid castle developed during more than three centuries of Anglo-Norman/Welsh warfare. A chronicle in stone of medieval fortress technology. With its walls within walls fortifications Kidwelly looks today as an outstanding examples of late 13th century castle design. Kidwelly is a mighty and imposing monument of Norman power. It is also a beautiful example of castle development, as the castle was dramatically altered on a number of occasions to conform to the latest thinking in military science. Roger, bishop of Salisbury, the Minister of England, established Norman power in the area and the ring work castle that he built here was one of a series of strongholds designed by the Normans to secure the new conquests of south Wales by commanding the river passes here. This castle fell to the Welsh on a number of occasions in the late 12th and early 13th centuries, including once in 1159 when the Lord Rhys took it and burnt it. He is later credited with rebuilding the castle in 1190. By 1201, however, it was back in Norman hands and remained English from then on, despite periodic attacks. It was the Chaworth family, who gained possession of Kidwelly Castle in the mid-13th century and who built the impressive stone castle that we see today. In 1298, the castle passed on to Henry, Earl of Lancaster, who constructed a great hall within the inner bailey to provide a more comfortable accommodation. He also constructed the great chapel-tower, overlooking the river. In the early 13th century, the outer wall was constructed, either replacing the older wooden-wall, or just being an improvement of an already existing stonewall. To gatehouses were incorporated into this wall, a smaller one to the north, and the mighty main gate to the south. The four inner towers were also heightened, in order to maintain an effective field of fire. The great southern gatehouse took more than a century to complete, and was still unfinished by the time of the Welsh uprising under Owain Glyndwr, during which the castle was besieged in 1403. The castle held out for three weeks until an English army arrived, breaking the siege. A Story about the Castle in 1403: “The year is 1403 AD, and you, sir Owain Glyndwr, leader and true prince of all Wales, approach Kidwelly Castle. The castle is owned by John of Gaunt (the Snake), Duke of Lancaster, one of your most hated enemies among the oppressing Englishmen. From this castle his men has raided and overtaxed the surrounding towns and villages for decades, and he holds the castle, as well as his entire fief, in an iron grip. Although the castle is well manned, the Duke himself however has abandoned his men holding the castle, not daring to risk his own life, and has fled back into England, from where he still has a great amount of men at his disposal, meaning that even if we capture the castle, we are by all means not safe. However, it is of great importance that we capture the castle, in order to not lose the strength and impact of the rebellion. A defeat here would lead to a great loss of troop moral, and would allow the English to possibly refortify their positions in Wales. Also, commanding the passage of River Gwendraeth has a great strategic value”. In the late 15th century, a few stone buildings were added to the castle, including the great hall in the outer ward and the great gateway you see today’ The castle played a minor part in the Civil War, laying as it did far from the central area of the struggle. But it’s use a fortification was at this time long since over. Today Kidwelly is surprisingly well preserved, since it didn’t suffer from Oliver Cromwell’s slighting during the Civil war. A story about Gwenllian the Brave: Script by Gill Clarke. After the Norman Conquest a beautiful princess from the House of Gwynedd was married to Gruffydd, son of the soil and natural heir to South Wales. The Welshman's power was threatened by the Norman lord of Kidwelly Castle, so Gruffydd went north with his eldest son to raise support. His wife, Gwenllian, and their two youngest sons remained at home in the Tywi Valley. One day a messenger arrived: ships had been seen near the coast of Glamorgan. Soon English soldiers were marching across country to join their French allies at Kidwelly. There was no time to call back her husband, no time for advice, no time to lose. The princess donned a light coat of mail, put a helmet on over her long hair, and reached for a shield and sword. Then, riding a Scottish pony, Gwenllian led out her sons and a small army into the path of the English troops. On a high bank above the river Gwendraeth Kidwelly Castle overlooked the flat sea marshes. Creeping beneath its round towers, the Welshmen stole upriver and camped under the protecting brow of Mynydd y Garreg. Gwenllian sent half the party ahead to intercept the enemy whilst the rest stayed with her, silent and hidden. For one day they waited and nothing happened. Another day passed, and all was still. Unknown to the princess a Welshman, traitor to his country, had met with the English force and led them along secret paths to the top of the hill. In one mad moment they swept down from above onto the idle Welsh below. At the same time the castle gates opened: Maurice de Londres, the Norman Lord, dashed out on horseback, followed by his well-armed men. There was no hope for Gwenllian, though around her all fought courageously. One son, Maelgwyn, was killed fighting to defend her, and many others were quickly slain. Before long the princess and those of her men who survived were taken captive. She was wounded and helpless but even so de Londres had no pity. In front of the cheering Frenchmen her remaining son, Morgan, was held back as his mother was beheaded. For many years afterwards the headless ghost of the princess could be seen, walking in the field of battle which still has her name today. And in the legends of Wales the memory of Gwenllian, a brave and beautiful lady, lives on. Now onto the story of the Butler family: The Butlers had obligations to their Kidwelly overlords; for instance, in times of war they had to provide 5 archers to the Lord of Kidwelly. The Butlers also had to provide one knight to attend 'At the Court of Foreignry of Kidwelly'. There were other duties, which the humbler inhabitants of Pembrey had to perform; for example, the men of the parish had to give a day's ploughing and help with the hay. The earliest connection with this large amount of land occurs in April 1361 when a John le Botiler is recorded as holding the manor of Pembrey as of the Lordship of Kidwelly. (the present day Court Pembrey house was not as yet built) After the Botiler family changed their name to Butler and as many as 6 generations lived on the lands of the future Pembrey Court, all named John. The daughter of the last John Butler, named Ann inherited the Manor (lands) and she married Sir Richard Vaughan at his resident at Bredwardine Court, Herefordshire. From this marriage started the Vaughan family dynasty at Pembrey Court. Sir Richard Vaughan when he inhered by marriage the vast lands of the Manor of Pembrey, he then had Pembrey Court house built on a piece of land on a hill over looking the town of Pembrey as a wedding present for his son Walter. Sir Walter Vaughan, born in 1500 married Blanch Rydal and they lived at Dunraven Castle in Glamorgan, Wales in 1534. This was for one year only while Pembrey Court was being built. Walter Vaughan and his wife and family continued to travel between Dunraven and Pembrey. In the past there have been many recordings of wrecks along the coast of Glamorgan, and tales tell of smugglers who were known for looting these vessels. One story is about Dunraven Castle at Southerndown, Glamorgan, and was the home of the Vaughan family. The last Vaughan, though to be Sir Walter Vaughan to live there had a son who had been at sea for many years. His father's greed led him into the evil pursuit of wrecking, which is enticing ships on stormy nights by the use of lights on the cliff tops (their captains believing the lights were a harbour) to rocks such as the Witch's Nose on Dunraven Head, and their doom. Vaughan and his helpers then plundered their rich cargos from distant lands. On one occasion one of his helpers who was known as Matt of the Iron Hand (as his hand had been removed as a punishment for piracy and replaced by an iron hook), found the body of the captain of the latest wreck washed up on the beach. He was unable to remove the captain's ring and so cut off his hand and gave it to his master who screamed loudly as he recognized it to be the hand of his son returning at last to his family. Vaughan sold Dunraven shortly afterwards and subsequently turned mad. Rowland Vaughan was the second son of Walter Vaughan of Bredwardine, Herefordshire. He had spent time in the Court of Queen Elizabeth I under the patronage of his great aunt, Blanche Parry, a close friend of the queen. It was the 'bitternesse' of Dame Blanche's 'humor' which forced Vaughan into the Irish wars where bad diet and standing waist deep in water damaged his health and he returned, an invalid, to Bredwardine. After Sir Walter Vaughan died in 1584 his brother Sir Thomas Vaughan moved into Court Pembrey. He had 4 sons and three daughters. His eldest son, Rowland Thomas Vaughan inherited Pembrey Court. Rowland Thomas Vaughan was the ancestor of many Vaughan’s to live at Pembrey Court. Many famous people visited Pembrey Court, including Oliver Cromwell who visited the manor when he passed through Pembrey during the English Civil War. He stayed there on Sunday, July 3rd, 1648. Other visitors were entertained at The Court, many of them noblemen. Writers came, painters such as Van Dyke, Lely and Reynolds. The latter came and stayed for months to paint the many ladies and gentlemen of the Vaughan family and also their guests. The Vaughans welcomed many of their cousins from the North, South, and mid-Wales and even those who had moved to England. All of these loved Pembrey Court and spent many enjoyable weeks boating, fishing and shooting game in the woods. In the 1560 the first Rowland Vaughan (and who may be the same Rowland Vaughan whose father was the Sir Walter Vaughan of Bredwardine) lived at Pembrey Court was a keen gardener and made flower and vegetable gardens and a large fruit orchard. He also planted the great spread of oak forest which runs across the hillside from Pembrey to Pwll and as far as Kidwelly. There was a sizeable pond fed by three springs. There was also a deep well of pure drinking water from a blur rock. This well supplied the house for centuries. The Vaughans used Pembrey Court as a base to buy and build others houses around the area, one of which was built after 1650 in the town of Llanelli, 5 miles east of Pembrey on the main road to England. This was built by a son of Rowland Vaughan, one of several Rowland’s to live at Pembrey Court. His name being Walter Vaughan, and there is a record of 1671 that Walter Vaughan was assessed at twelve hearths for the house which suggests that it was a very large house. Llanelli: this small village was to become the largest town in the area due to the rapid industrialization of South-east Carmarthenshire. Like nearby Kidwelly, this started as a Anglo-Saxon borough in the medieval period. The antiquary, John Leland, writing in the 1530s, observed that Llanelli was only a ‘village where the inhabitants dig coal”. In 1609 a survey of Llanelli was carried out by the Duchy of Lancaster and only 59 freeholders were listed. The church, dedicated to St. Ellwy, was an older formation and there is a late 11th, reference to it in the Book of Llandaf. Edward, Richard and James Ormande Dalton, all sons of James Dalton, are listed as dying in Llanelli. This Walter Vaughan had a younger brother named Rowland Vaughan who married Margaret Ann Mansel, of Muddlescombe, Carmarthenshire, Wales. They had a son named Rowland Vaughan Jr. and whose daughter, Joyce married our James Dalton and by this event James Dalton become part of the Vaughan families involvement with Pembrey Court. James Dalton is listed as an estate agent to the later Lord Ashburnham who married into the Vaughan family; More on this later. The eldest son of Rowland Vaughan Sr. was Thomas Vaughan who inherited Pembrey Court, but he moved onto Tally in Dyfed. The above mentioned Walter Vaughan, brother to Rowland, had two wives, and by the second , two sons, names George and Fredrick. George succeeded to the family estates. The eldest son Walter Vaughan was knighted in 1603. In 1607-8 Walter was granted and purchased the lands called ‘Caldicott’ in Pembrey at a price of ?900.00p. These lands stayed in the Vaughan family for years. Between November 1661 and November 1662 the Pembrey estate passed to an heiress, Bridget Vaughan, the daughter of Walter Vaughan by his wife Alice. A cousin, Rowland Vaughan however, disputed her title in the Bill of Complaint already referred to. He claimed that previous family settlements had stipulated that the estate should devolve upon male heirs only. He also alleged that Bridget Vaughan's mother had persuaded Frederick Vaughan to make a settlement favoring her daughter and that advantage had been taken of the 'age and infirmity' of Frederick Vaughan who was, or so Rowland Vaughan claimed, blind from birth and 'so by his impotence easy to be abused and not knowing what he did but as the confederates should inform him'. Naturally, this version of events was denied by Alice and Bridget Vaughan, as was the assertion that Frederick Vaughan had been blind from birth. They maintained that his blindness resulted from an attack of smallpox in his infancy. That Frederick was blind cannot be disputed since he signed documents with a mark, even though he was a clergyman. Rowland Vaughan's claim was rejected and Bridget married in 1677 John, 1st baron Ashburnham, of Battle, Sussex. Of note is because of the dates, 1661 and 1662, I believe this cousin to be Rowland Vaughan Jr. the father of Joyce Vaughan. George Vaughan, son of Walter, in April 1641, took steps to recover the manor lands called campos de Caldicott, and other lands in Pembrey Parish that his father Walter has lost to the Crown. Caldicott is north of Pembrey at the top of the coast line in Pembrey Forest, and was also called Towyn. James Dalton leased Caldicott from the Vaughans and he and his wife Joyce lived there all their lives, as shown in my Dalton history in Pembrey. In Mrs. Edith Dalton Leanings “Dalton Book” she tells us that James Dalton was a Barrister-at-Law and also a receiver for the Duchy of Lancaster. The story on how one gets to be a Barrister-at-Law. It was necessary for him to begin as a student at one of the Inn’s of Court” in London and a candidate had to either pass a general examination, or to produce evidence of having done so at one of the Universities. After James Dalton received his degree he returned home to Pembrey and as luck would have it, he was named as a receiver of the Duchy of Lancaster. This Duchy was originally created to provide income for John the Grant. The Duchy owned land in many parts of England and Wales. This lucrative position provided a very large income and was enough to give his wife and 7 children a very good life. All these children were born at Caldicott in an area on the coast of which was quite barren, with little woodland. From the positions which they afterwards filled, it is evident their parents did a very good job of educationing them. James Dalton, who was lucky to survive the winter of 1651 as a one year old, lived a long and rich life in South Wales before he died in 1721 when his will was probated. The story of the little village of Pembrey: Here is a extract from the 29th years transactions of the Calvinists Methodist History Society; "Teulue Daltoniaid Pembre, Sir Gaerfyrddin” or the Story of the Dalton family of Pembrey, Carmarthenshire. “Joyce Vaughan, one of the Trimsaran Vaughan's who died on the 10th, of March 1731, 84 years old". Joyce Dalton’s death place is shown to be at Caldicot Farm, Pembrey, Wales. Trimsaran: “Near the northern side of Pembrey is the village of Trimsaran overlooking the vale of Gwendraeth Fawr. The first landowner there was Howel fychan (Vaughan) who come there in the first part of the 16th, century. He descendant from the family of Gwempa, and his son named David succeeded to Trimsaran……………A few generations later there was another David Vaughan of Trimsaran who was the father of Rowland Vaughan Sr. and whose son was Rowland Vaughan Jr. was the father of Joyce Vaughan. Pembrey village at the time amounted to about twenty houses. If you think about this, those of us who have visited Pembrey today, there must have been a very large distance between houses. This would account for the very large acres that Court Pembrey occupied. Pembrey: (Pen-bre in the Welsh language) is a village in Carmarthenshire Wales, situated between Burry Port and Kidwelly, overlooking Carmarthen Bay. Pembrey is a parish in the hundred of Kidwelly, county of Carmarthen, South Wales and is 5 miles (S.S.E.) from Kidwelly, and today contains about 2645 inhabitants. The name of this place, signifying literally the head of a hill or promontory, is derived from its situation at the extremity of a mountainous ridge, beyond which a low promontory extends into the bay of Carmarthen. . . The substrata abound with mineral wealth, this district being thought to be the richest in South Wales in both bituminous and hard coal, both being worked to a very great extent. The quality of the soft coal is peculiarly adapted to the production of gas, the working of iron, and other manufacturing purposes; and vast quantities of both sorts are exported to various parts of the kingdom. . . a capacious harbour was constructed in 1819. . . This part of the coast is of difficult navigation, and to sailors unacquainted of it the most fatal on the shores of the Bristol Channel." The coastline of Pembrey began its retreat from the foot of Pembrey Mountain some 6,000 years ago, revealing land which shows human occupation since the Iron Age, with hill forts dating from around 400 BC. Roman pottery remains have been unearthed in the oldest parts of the village. Evidence of an early Norman motte-and-bailey castle has been suggested close to the village square and buildings remain in the village from later Norman times. Most of the village was created during the 18th and 19th century coal mining boom, when Pembrey was a port. Pembrey Mountain (in the Welsh language, Mynydd Penbre) was thoroughly mined by both Welsh and English companies for about 100 years and some reserves are said to remain underground. Pembrey's harbour was prone to silting and was abandoned in favour of Pembrey New Harbour - soon renamed Burry Port Harbour, just a mile further upstream on the Burry Estuary. The original harbour is now known as Pembrey Old Harbour. Pembrey's mountain and beach Cefn Sidan are reputed to have provided some villagers with careers as wreckers, known locally as Gwyr-y-Bwelli Bach (translated as People with Little Hatchets) - attracting sailing ships with fires purporting to be beacons, then raiding them when they foundered. However, no firm evidence of wrong-doing such as booty has ever been discovered. Nevertheless, a number of vessels were certainly lost around Pembrey, including "La Jeune Emma" bound from the West Indies to France and blown badly off course in 1828. 13 of the 19 on board drowned, including Adeline Coquine, the 12 year-old niece of Napoleon Bonaparte's divorced wife Josephine de Beauharnais. She is buried at St. Illtyds Church, Pembrey. Caldicott Farm: This farm is at the top of Pembrey Forest on the coast line which occupies the greater part of (or ‘Towyn’) Burrows, an area of sand hills of comparatively recent origin. The Burrows developed at the mouth of the River Gwendraeth over a long period. Alongside this a series of reclamations occurred around an initial nucleus formed by a tongue of dry land at the foot of Mynydd (Mountain Penbre) partly represented by the Medieval Manor of Caldicot. The Manor of Caldicot had been merged with the Manor of Pembrey (under the Ashburnhams) and by the early 19th-century, when the coastline had extended almost to its present line and most of this area appears already to have been occupied by sand hills, called ‘Great Outlet’ on the Pembrey tithe map of 1841. Caldicott is believed to mean “a cold inhospitable place’ which is understandable in view of its exposed location to the qcean. Pen-y-bedd: On the low coastal plain between Pembrey village and the estuary of Gwendraeth Fawr, and about 1 ¼ miles north-west of old Cwrt Penbre mansion. This small village was a superior farmstead, home of yeomen and gentry. It formed part of the Cwrt Penbre estate in the days of the when the Vaughan’s and Ashburnham’s owned a large amount of land in the area. It was held by lease in the 18th, century by the Daltons who acted as agents to the Cwrt estate. Source: Carms. PO. Charles Dalton, a son of James Dalton leased a farm in Pen-y-bedd. Next lets tell about what we know about the others of Walter III family. There are two other small villages or farms that our Dalton’s lived on; one was Clog-y-Fran, St. Clears. Clog-y-Fran: in St. Clears, a few miles above Kidwelly, is on a scarp above the river Fenni. A gentry residence from medieval times, it eventually became a farmstead in the late 18thcentury. John Dalton the oldest son of James, and grandson of Walter III leased this farm after his marriage to Mary Powell and a daughter, Hanna married Zacharias Beven, who also lived at this farm. Another son of James, Rev. Thomas Dalton is listed as dying in St. Clears in 1739. Llether-y-Chan: Another area of Pembrey was that of a farm named Llether-y-Chan, on high ground above Pembrey. In the 16th, century it was the home of the gentry of Vaughan. In the next century it changed ownership and let to farmers. The Mansel family owned it for awhile and in 1690 leased it to John Bonvill, yeoman for thirty one years. This John Bonvill’s daughter, Mary married James Dalton, the father of Thomas Dalton who came to America in 1759. James Dalton is listed as dying on his farm ‘Llether-y-Chan’ in 1766. This Thomas Dalton was only known to us by the genealogy notes of John Luther Dalton, of Utah, USA, his great grandson who went to England on a mission for his Church in 1866. In about 1886 he later went back to England and Wales for future research on his Dalton family history. We Dalton’s in America was not sure that Thomas Dalton was one of our ancestors until two events happened; The first was finding the record of the christening of Thomas Dalton listed in the Bishops Transcripts records of the St. Illtyd Parish Church of Pembrey that proved his being the son of James Dalton of Lleth-y-Chen. Here is that record; ‘Thomas terre-fil Jacobi Dalton de Lettyvychan septum dir memsis Mai’ This transcript reads; 7th, May 1732 Thomas, illegitimate son of James Dalton of the adobi of Llettyrvychan. The final proof that myself and the Utah Dalton's as being descendants of this Dalton family in Pembrey was when I took a DNA test in April of 2003. The results was a 100% match with Mr. Michael Neale Dalton, President and founder of the Dalton Genealogical Society in England who took the test also in April of 2003, and who was a descendant of John Dalton, first son of James Dalton, son of Walter III. This proved we both were ancestors to this Dalton family in Pembrey. Back to the Vaughan family: One of the last Vaughan’s to live at Pembrey court had a daughter named Bridget Vaughan. (read above) This Bridget married Earl John Ashburnham of Sussex, in 1677 in Westminster Abbey. They lived at the Ashburnham Sussex seat with occasional visits to their Welsh estates. John Ashburnham never lived in the manor of Pembrey Court and by this marriage the future of Pembrey Court was insured for 250 years. The Ashburnham Estates including Pembrey were sold by auction in 1922. Lord Ashburnham was a visitor and once wrote that Pembrey Court was an interesting stone house, very large and keep in reasonably good repair. Another of the Ashburnham’s homes was a big mansion in Pembrey known as Pembrey House. Lord Ashburnham, who visited Carmarthenshire again in 1687 to survey his estates in the neighborhood of Pembrey, complains very bitterly in his diary of the disgraceful state of the roads which he was obliged to traverse. " "The state of the Carmarthenshire roads in the 17th century was undoubtedly atrocious. There is an account of one of them from the pen of John Taylor, the "Water Poet", who undertook a few weeks' journey on horseback in 1652. ............. He was fortunate enough to meet a Welshman who guided him to Carmarthen. Bridget, sole heiress of Pembrey Court lands become widowed in 1702 and during the years 1711-14 the Dowager had trouble with several tenants in Pembrey, so she went to her local agents to help out. These agents helped to administer her Welsh estates. The Dalton family, living in Pembrey since 1656, provided several agents; The first in 1675 was Charles Dalton, oldest son of Walter Dalton III, was in charge when the Vaughan’s owned it, and in 1721-24, John and James Dalton the agents who were responsible for sale of coal from Lord Ashburnham’s coal works, some being exported in local vessels. It is also noted that my own James Dalton was also an agent for this estate. This makes sense because of his marrying Joyce Vaughan. I believe that these later Dalton agents had leased rooms or an office in the manor of Pembrey Court. We can’t as yet prove that these Dalton’s actually lived at Pembrey Court, but all our records tells us that these Dalton were ‘of Pembrey Court‘ and may be proved by the next statement; A excerpt from a survey and valuation of the manor of Pembrey, a estate belonging to Lord Ashburnham states; “Part of the Court House and buildings, heretofore generally used by the agents; a part has been keep for the accommodation of the Agents to the Estate.” About 1700 Pembrey Court drew the notice of a distinguished antiquary, Edward Lluyd, whose observations containing some interesting facts about the locality and was quoted in a later article is as follows; “Penbre Court, ye seat formerly of the Butlers and afterwards of the Vaughan’s and now belonging (in right of his lady) to William Ball, Esq., whence it descends to my Lord Ashburnham’s lady…… Here are two lakes close together called Swan Pool where there are plenty of Eels, and in the Winter store of Fowls such as Ducks and Teal, sometimes wild Swans, Elk and wild geese. This pool is called Swan Pool because the Lord of the manor has thereon about 40 swans. Before the hard frost there were about 80, which all died down to 6. There is a irrigation ditch extending from the area of the farms of Towyn Mawr to the burrows marked nowadays on maps as “Swan Pool drain” a far cry from the days when the pool harbored elegant swans of the masters of Pembrey Court“. The Estate continued to be owned by the Ashburnham family until 1922 when it was advertised for sale, and with the death of the 6th and last Earl of Ashburnham in 1924, the Ashburnham connection was over. Although the latter-day Vaughan's and the Lords Ashburnham never resided in the old manor-house it was by no means neglected, and was lived in by a series of the estate agents and yeomen who kept the building in good trim. This very large Manor house was then bought by a series of farmers, but during the 1950's it became ruinous, and is now empty and wholly ruinous, and sadly not really capable of being preserved as one of Carmarthenshire's few surviving examples of Elizabethan architecture. The below article is copied from the BBC Wales home page. It tells about one of three old ruins that are being considered for restoration. “Pembrey Court Manor House (Cwrt Pembre), later known as Court Farm, is today little more than a ruin. It is, however, an important and unique reminder of the world that existed before the Industrial Revolution reshaped the Carmarthenshire countryside. The site of the house may have been settled as early as 1361. Though much of what remains is Elizabethan in origin, the house also comprised a medieval tower house, core and a barn with a castellated frontage. The most distinctive remaining feature of the property, the only Elizabethan manor left in Carmarthenshire, are its seven distinctive rubble stone chimney stacks. These days shrouded beneath rampant ivy the chimney stacks would once upon a time have proved a valuable navigation tool for ships negotiating the treacherous Burry Estuary. The house would have been the most important property within the local parish and it is said that Oliver Cromwell once stayed there. In the early 1700's, however, the house underwent drastic alterations to convert the single dwelling for use by two separate families. Substantial remodeling of the interiors led to walls windows and doors being removed and further openings and divisions being introduced. Subsequently the two homes would be leased to a succession of different owners. The house has remained unoccupied since 1948 and is today very dilapidated. However a wealth of original architectural features including the property's haphazard irregular quadrangle plan and massive stone walls, some magnificent paneling, and those landmark chimney stacks still invest the property with enormous character. The presence of so many original features, including portions of the roof, which though very badly deteriorated present clues as to the original design, make sensitive restoration of this unique property a viable proposition. It is hoped that a restored and revitalized Pembrey Court could provide the local community with a valuable resource, which could fulfill any one of a variety of roles. Suggestions considered so far include developing the property as a themed hotel, an arts center and an Elizabethan interpretive center for schools and other visitors to the area.” Another source of information on Court Pembrey is The Friends of Cwrt Farm or Ffrindian ‘r Cwrt in Welsh. The Friends of Cwrt Farm are a group of local people dedicated to saving Carmarthenshire's last ancient manor house, Cwrt Farm in Pembrey. This is a magnificent Tudor mansion with a long and interesting history. This group have been so successful with their campaign that Cwrt Farm is going to be featured on the BBC TV program Restoration, as one of three Welsh buildings worthy of restoration. Cwrt Farm has been an integral part of the cultural, political and social framework of Pembrey since early in the 14th century. Today, though apparently derelict, structural surveys show the remaining structure to be viable for sensitive restoration. “As the Norman conquerors advanced through South Wales, they left in their wake a string of castles, the nearest one being Kidwelly. One of the Norman lords, a certain Le Boteler, was granted lands in the Lordship of Kidwelly, at Pembrey. Le Boteler was later anglicised to Butler. The Butlers needed a manor house as a residence, but also to act as their manorial court, ie sorting out rents etc. So Cwrt came into being. The Butlers had obligations to their Kidwelly overlords; for instance, in times of war they had to provide 5 archers to the Lord of Kidwelly. The Butlers also had to provide one knight to attend 'At the Court of Foreignry of Kidwelly'. There were other duties, which the humbler inhabitants of Pembrey had to perform; for example, the men of the parish had to give a day's ploughing and help with the hay. The manor of Penbre was granted to Sir Arnold Butler by Maurice de Londres, lord of Kidwelly, in about 1128. The last known reference to the Pembrey Butlers was in c.1500. Ann Butler, heiress of estates at Pembrey and Dunraven, married Sir Richard Vaughan of Bredwardine in Herefordshire, High Sheriff of that county in 1530. During the Civil War period, Cwrt was the home of Sir George Vaughan, an ardent Royalist. This crippling fine led him to return to live at Cwrt, and to sell off his estates at Dunraven and Fallersdon. John Ashburnham wrote of Cwrt in 1677: ' I saw Pembrey House (Court), an old stone house, large enough and kept in good repair', 10 years after he had married Bridget Vaughan and had moved to Ashburnham Place in Sussex. So Cwrt now became Cwrt Farm, the home of estate stewards and tenant farmers. In 1823, the Ashburnham’s built themselves an elegant villa, Pembrey House, as an occasional residence, the center of their 8,000-acre Carmarthenshire estate. Cwrt Farm was later sold to the Bonnell family. Friends of Cwrt Farm are committed to the sensitive restoration of Cwrt Farm for use by the local community. A feasibility study carried out for Cadw Sir Gaerfyrddin (The Trust of Wales) states:- “.... whilst the building looks a lost cause, there is still significant merit in a complete restoration of the building, with so many good features still surviving. However, decay is still progressing, and this may be the last opportunity to save the building before a substantial collapse occurs and renders the situation totally irretrievable.” The Building its self: The first impression of Cwrt now is of a large, rambling building of local stone, heavily shrouded in ivy, with many tall chimneys still poking up through the rampant growth. It is clearly ruinous and neglected, as the roofs and internal floors have virtually all collapsed. But the shell of the building, the walls and chimneys are remarkably intact, as they are of such robust construction. Some of the stone walls are up to four feet in width. Cwrt Farm is obviously an ancient house, with massive stone walls and a haphazard plan. A clue to its quality is the pair of great, diagonal chimneys on the West side of the house, a Tudor architectural feature of important houses. Every fashionable Elizabethan gentleman's house would sport at least a pair of great chimneys like this - they are an important clue to the architectural quality of Cwrt. They are decorative as well as supremely functional. Other Tudor details we can spot are the surviving three light mullioned windows, some with hood moulds, so the rain drips safely away; some of them are stone, others of wood. They are so reminiscent of the windows of Oxford colleges, and again, are clues to the quality of this building. The windows at Cwrt are very interesting - there is evidence that at times in the past they have been blocked, possibly to avoid paying the window tax. Some of the larger windows in the hall, the most important room in the house, must have been very fine. Inside the former hall in the South-East wing, you can see two Sutton stone fireplaces on the wall, one on top of the other. They are elegant, simple, but high quality designs, showing that in the past Cwrt was an important gentry house, with fireplaces brought in from outside. The Sutton stone quarry was near Southerndown, on the Glamorgan coast, and it is quite possible that the fireplaces arrived by sea. In the roof space of the former hall, which later became a barn is a collapsing ornate beam, of great significance. It may date back to the 13th Century. It is one of the few roof timbers to survive. The plan of Cwrt is an irregular three sides of a quadrangle; there are many rooms of different shapes and sizes, and little coherent planning, due largely to the various uses that Cwrt has been put to over the centuries. Many clues to its former use and function are no doubt lying in the collapsed rubble of roofs and upper floors. In front of Cwrt stands the barn, also in decay, with a collapsed roof and ominous cracks on the pine end walls. Just under the parapet, corbelling can be seen, projections of stone jutting out from the wall to support its weight. This local building feature is to be found on some old Carmarthenshire buildings. Corbelling can be found on the South wall of Cwrt - (hidden under the ivy) and on the tower of Pembrey church. Another good feature is the pointed arch of the doorway, suggesting an ancient construction, which along with the castellated parapet, gives it a military air.” And so ends my story of a historical mansion that I hope can be restored to its former glory. Sources: Pembrey Court: An old Carmarthenshire Manor House; by Frances Jones; Information off the Internet on the Vaughan and Ashburnham families; Information from Rodney Dalton’s family history database; BBC.com - Wales; Friends of Cwrt Farm; The Carmarthenshire Antiquary Vol. XIX; Calvinists Methodist History Society; Material that is in the Public Domain; Pembrey and Burry Port” by John A. Nicholson; Richard and Pauline James of the ‘Carmarthenshire History Society’ The Dalton Book by Edith Dalton Leaning; From Knights to Dreamers - A book by Rodney Dalton; Kidwelly Town Council. Back to the beginning of the Story Misc. Photos of Cwrt Farm END |
12/9/2011 | Rodney G. Dalton, Utah | |
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Library and Archives Canada has released an online database "Home Children (1869-1930)". The database includes more than 20,000 names of children, who came to Canada. The names of Dalton children have been extracted for the Dalton Data Bank by DGS North American Secretary Karen Dalton Preston, at the suggestion of Michael Neale Dalton, DGS Chairman. Introduction Home Children is a common term used to refer to the child migration scheme founded by Annie MacPherson in 1869, under which more than 100,000 children were sent to Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa from the United Kingdom. The practice of sending poor or orphaned children to British colonies began to help alleviate the shortage of labour there. Labour shortages in the British colonies also encouraged the kidnapping of children for work in the Americas, and large numbers of children were forcibly emigrated. The main pioneers of child migration in the nineteenth century were the Scottish Evangelical Christian, Annie MacPherson, her sister Louisa Birt, and Londoner, Maria Rye. She later became convinced that the real solution for these children lay in emigration to a country of opportunity and started an emigration fund. In the first year of the fund's operation, 500 children were shipped to Canada. McPherson opened distribution homes in Canada in the towns of Belleville and Galt in Ontario and persuaded her sister, Louisa, to open a third home in the village of Knowlton, seventy miles from Montreal. This was the beginning of a massive operation which sought to find homes and careers for Britain's needy children. It is the onus of the user to verify the data. This page was created 5 November, 2011 If you have researched your Dalton family and wish to contribute your data to the Bank, it will be most welcome. Contact the Webmaster for more information on how to submit your data. CONTENTS Surname Given Name Age Sex Ship Year of Arrival Sending Agency Taken into Care by Dalton Ada F Australasian 1901 Dalton Andre 15 M Montclare 1932 Dalton Arthur 12 M Minnedosa 1922 Dalton Charles 15 M Ascania 1912 Dalton Daniel 10 M Circassian 1886 Dalton Donald 15 M Duchess of Richmond 1930 Dalton Edward 15 M Kensington 1905 Dalton Ellen 13 F Pretorian 1904 Dalton Emily 6 F Sardinian 1892 Dalton Emily 9 F Sardinian 1888 Dalton Ernest D 11 M Tunisian 1903 Dalton G. 10 F Dominion 1905 Dalton George 15 M Dominion 1907 Dalton George 14 M Bavarian 1905 Dalton H E 11 M Scotsman 1896 Dalton Henry J 17 M Doric 1929 Dalton Hugh 13 M Corsican 1913 Dalton J Albert 18 M Laurentic 1913 Dalton James 14 M 1874 Dalton James 7 M Circassian 1893 Dalton James 14 M Pomeranian 1903 Dalton James William 15 M Montroyal 1929 Dalton Janet 14 F Sarmatian 1897 Dalton John 10 M Pomeranian 1903 Dalton John 14 M Corsican 1911 Dalton Joseph 11 M Corsican 1910 Dalton Lucy 7 F Moravian 1871 Dalton Mary E 7 F Parisian 1889 Dalton May 6 F Carthaginian 1912 Dalton Michael 19 M Megantic 1913 Dalton Olive 20 F Empress of Britain 1913 Dalton Patrick 11 M Victorian 1914 Dalton Percy G 19 M Ausonia 1927 Dalton Richard 9 M Sardinian 1883 Dalton Robert A 16 M Moravian 1871 Dalton Stephen Matthew 11 M Dominion 1902 Dalton Thomas 6 M Parisian 1889 Dalton Thomas 14 M Montrose 1922 Dalton Walter 11 M Tunisian 1905 Dalton Ernest D 13 M 1903 Canadian Catholic Emigration Society Sheffield |
11/5/2011 | Karen Dalton Preston, Nevada | |
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Lands That the Dalton Family Owned in Lancashire Researched, complied & edited by Rodney G. Dalton from sources on the world wide web and from his family database We know that le Sieur de Dalton and his descendants owned the lands in Dalton*, where they took their name. All these lands and places below are in Lancashire & Yorkshire and a few others. These Dalton’s were very wealthy people and owned 1,000’s of acres of land. They were what was called landed gentry and were Knight’s and Esquires. *Dalton is a village and civil parish in West Lancashire, near Skelmersdale and south of the River Douglas. Dalton was listed in the Domesday Book, and soon after the Norman conquest became part of the Barony of Manchester. We will start off with Sir Rychard de Dalton, born sometime before 1200. He was the son of John de Dalton 2nd. Sir Rychard de Dalton: In the Flower's Visitation of Yorkshire in 1563-4, it gave the main pedigree of the Dalton family. It started with Sir Rychard Dalton I of Byspham* born about 1230 and holding the manors of Byspham in Lancashire and Kirkby Misperton in Yorkshire. He had two sons, Sir Robert and Sir John. Sir John held the manor of Kirkby in 1332 and is said to have founded the Yorkshire line of Daltons. *Bispham is a village in the West Lancashire district of Lancashire, England. Bispham is the civil parish containing the village. The village and is located 1 mile south of Mawdesley and 5 miles north of Parbold. Bispham is south of Croston, Mawdesley and Tarleton, north of Hilldale and Parbold, west of Heskin, Wrightington and Eccleston. The River Douglas travels through Bispham and it is a tributary to the River Ribble and has two tributaries itself, the River Tawd and the River Yarrow. It shares its local parish with Mawdesley as Bispham has no actual churches on its land. The land around Bispham is both pastoral and arable and abundant with wildlife. Bispham covers an area of approximately 1,000 acres of grade 2 agricultural land. Rising to 80 metres above sea level at its eastern tip, it is bounded on the south side of the River Douglas, and on the north side of Bentley Brook. Sir John de Dalton: Sir John de Dalton of Kirby Misperton*, Yorkshire, was born about 1275. He was the son of Sir Richard Dalton II. In 1323-4, Sir John bought a manor and mill at Kirkby Misperton, locally known as "Kirby Owcar" or over-carr, from Richard de Kirkby, apparently that held as a tenancy of the Abbey of St Mary's York. An "Abbot's close" on later maps near the entrance to the nationally known theme park called Flamingo Park, may mark the early manor house site. *Kirby Misperton is a small village and civil parish in the Ryedale district of North Yorkshire, England. It is located about 4 miles south from Pickering by road and about 7½ miles north from Malton. Sir Robert de Dalton: Sir Robert de Dalton, son of Sir Richard Dalton II was born about 1278. He had the upbringing appropriate to his position in feudal society and appears to have been knighted at a young age. He succeeded to his inheritance at the death of his father in 1293; owning land, largely in the Hundred of Leyland at Bispham and Dalton. 1291- Robert de Dalton had lands in *Halewood. His son Sir John, Lord of Bispham, did too. By a settlement dated 1367, the remainders went to Sir John 's sons, John and Robert. The property consisted of a house, garden and 40 acres at a rent of 7s a year. *Halewood, a township in Childwall parish, and a chapelry partly also in Huyton parish, Lancashire. The township lies on the Garston and Warrington railway, near the river Mersey, 5½ miles E of Garston;. 1305- Robert de Dalton claimed common of pasture from Ellen, widow of Henry de Lathom, and prior of Burscough*. *Burscough, a township-chapelry in Ormskirk parish, Lancashire; on the Leeds and Liverpool canal, and on the Southport and Ormskirk railway, 4 miles NNE of Ormskirk. 1323- Emma, wife of Robert de Taldeford, claimed lands at Taldeford (a hamlet near Lathom) from Sir Robert de Dalton of Bispham and his wife Mary and Robert de Bispham. The lands of Bispham village numbered about 900 acres in the 14th Century and today number about 1000 acres. Occupancy of Bispham Hall by a succession of Daltons lasted from 1324 to 1558, when Sir Robert Dalton (later of Thurnham) transferred his interest to William Stopford. During 238 years of known Dalton occupancy, at least 9 generations of Daltons, some with fairly large families, descended from Sir Robert. It was inevitable that they migrated into the surrounding areas for their livelihood. Bispham was originally in the Parish of Croston as was the adjacent small village, Mawdesley. Records show the purchase of land by the Bispham Daltons of Bentley Carre in Mawdesley* where farming was of prime importance and basket making was also a trade of the Daltons. The distance between Bispham and Croston is about two and a half miles. *Mawdesley is a village and civil parish of the Borough of Chorley in Lancashire, England. The township lies on a branch of the river Douglas, Besides being part owners of Croston Hall*, Daltons owned land and farmed in Croston. Records show the sale of tenements in Croston by Sir Robert and his mother Margaret, prior to purchasing the Manor at Thurnham. Our branch shows the family ownership of the same farms in Croston for almost 400 years from 1609. Because they were landowners, rather than agricultural labourers, the land tended to remain in the possession of descendants, usually the eldest son. Many descendants of this family remain in Croston and Mawdesley today. *Croston Hall was a country mansion house, built in a gothic style architecture, situated in the village of Croston, Lancashire. The De Trafford Family built Croston Hall in the 17th century to the east of the village of Croston. Thomas de Trafford was born at Croston Hall and claimed to be a "direct descendant of Edward I". 19 May 1344- Quitclaim: Roger son of Henry of Bispham to Sir Robert, lord of Dalton -- property in Moudislegh, had from William of Hoton and Sir John of Hoton. Sir John Dalton I: Sir John Dalton I, son of Sir Robert was born about 1302. The manor of Preesall* and Hackensall had passed from the de Hackensall family to the Dalton family at some time between 1346 and 1402 and then from the Dalton family to the Pickering family in 1402. When James Pickering died in 1437, it was his son James who inherited the manor. But when this second James Pickering died in 1479, the manor was left to his four daughters and their husbands. *Preesall-With-Hackensall, a township in Lancaster parish, Lancashire; on Lancaster bay and the river Wyr. More about Hackensall Manor: John de Hackensall died in 1346 and in 1357 William granted the manor to John son of Robert Dalton. This also seems to have been a marriage settlement; Ismania, the daughter of William de Hackensall, having married John Dalton in that year. As William and Alice did not have surviving male issue, in 1402 it was Joan the daughter of John Dalton and Ismania his wife, along with Joan's husband James Pickering, who together inherited the manor. 1358 John son of Robert de Dalton had custody of lands at Borwick* belonging to John (son and heir of Ralph de Berwick) who was a minor. *Borwick is a village and civil parish in the City of Lancaster district of Lancashire, England, about 8 miles north of Lancaster, on the Lancaster Canal. 1369- Sir John de Dalton held lands in Whittington* from the Lords de Coucy for knight's service. The free tenants paid a rent of 43s 4d. The tenants at will paid 40s for 60 acres. *Whittington is a small settlement and civil parish in Lancashire, England, forming part of a cluster of sites along the Lune valley, each with evidence of a motte - as with Melling and Arkholme. Sir John Dalton II: It is said that Sir John Dalton II was of Knowsley*. In other words he was probably not born there but may of been an owner of some land there. His grandfather was married to Mary de Latham, whose family once owned the Manor of Knowsley. He inherited all the lands owned by his father. *In the Domesday Book of 1086, Knowsley was known as Chenulveslei, becoming Knuvesle in 1199; Knouselegh in 1258; Knouleslee in 1261; Knusele in 1262; and Knouslegh in 1346. The pronunciation varies between 'Nowsley' and 'Nosely'. The village of Knowsley developed as a direct result of the Lathom/Stanley family better known as the Earls of Derby with their vast estate and residence at Knowsley Hall. The manors of Knowsley, Roby, Huyton and Tarbock were all held by the Lathom family before the year 1200. Sir Rychard Dalton: Flower's Visitation pedigree shows that "Sir Rychard Dalton, Knight, son and heyr to Sir John Dalton, who married Kateren, daughter of Sir Thom as Venables Knight, by whom he had several daughters, but no sons, amongst whom was Ales who married Wm. Gryffyth." Reference is made that Sir Robert received a grant of the "Farm Revenue" of Apthorpe* in Northamptonshire. It appears that this land at Apthorpe remained in the family until the death of Sir Richard in 1442. *Apethorpe is a village and civil parish in East Northamptonshire district of the shire county of Northamptonshire, England. The village is 4 miles north of the Northamptonshire market town of Oundle, Sir Robert Dalton: Sir Robert Dalton, son of Sir John II was born in 1886. 1347- In 1472 Robert Dalton of Bispham and his son & heir apparent Richard leased their Halewood lands to Robert Lathom of Allerton for 39 years at a rent of 40s. 1 May 1472- Letter of Attorney: William Lithirlond, rector of Aghton, and William Bradshagh, to Thomas Bradshagh of Lithirlond -- to receive from Robert Dalton, esq. lands in Croston, Maudysley, Byspham, Dalton, and Halewode, John Dalton: John Dalton, son of Sir Robert was born about 1445. The following is a document stored in the Public Records Office, Kew England. Under the title: Court of Chancery: Six Clerks Office. Early proceedings, Richard II to Phillip and Mary. "John Dalton, of Kingston upon Hull, son of Robert Dalton. v. Thomas Cooke and William Morcell, executors of the said Robert.: Detention of deeds relating to messuages and gardens in Beverley*, York. *Beverley is a market town, civil parish and the county town of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, located between the River Hull and the Westwood. Sir William Dalton: Sir William Dalton, son of Sir Robert was born about 1305. The manors of East and West Hauxwell* and of Barden in Yorkshire belonged after the Conquest to Earl Alan of Richmond and his brother. They descended through various families over the years and early in the seventeenth century were possessed by the Jopsons. From this family they were acquired in 1631 by Sir William Dalton for his son John, who thus became "First of Hauxwell" for our family. John had married Dorothy D'Arcy of Horn by Castle near Bedale and only three miles from Hauxwell. *Hauxwell or East Hauxwell is a village and civil parish in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England. Sir Richard Dalton: Sir Richard Dalton, son of Robert was born about 1445. 2 Dec. 1481- Lease for life: Richard, son and heir of Robert Dalton, esq. to Margaret his mother -- properties in Maudesley in the tenure of Thomas Assheton: a close called the Yate Filde in the tenure of John Haresnape; another parcel of land called the Crabthorne Yorde in the tenure of Henry Wawan -- remainder to John his brother. Witn: James Scaresbrik, esq., Thomas Bradshagh, of Litherland, Thomas Maudesley and others. Given at Maudesley Mon. after St. Katherine Virgin, 21 Ed. IV. 5 Apr. 1483- Lease for 22 years at rent of red rose: Margaret widow of Robert Dalton, esq. and Richard his son and heir, to John Haliwall and Geoffrey Wallhill - a close called the Hillfild in Heskyn, late in tenure of Richard Johnson and Robert Haliwall, lying between the Marehay and the Eghtenacre -- Witn. Master Thomas Maudesley, perpetual vicar of Croston, James Halsall, Robert Standissh. Given at Heskyn. Sir Roger Dalton: Sir Roger was born about 1469. In 1500, Richard's son, Roger, was associated as heir with his father in the grant of various lands in Croston and Mawdesley, but reserving the Manor and demesne lands. The various deeds and documents show that just as Richard had gone further a field, and established himself at Croston during h is father's lifetime, so Roger was doing the same thing, and building up a family inheritance of increasing value. He is described on the pedigree as "of Dalton Hall, Yorks, and after, of Croston." 2 Sep. 1501- Grant: Richard Dalton, Roger his son and heir, William Wall, clerk, and Sir Richard Shirburne, to Seth Wodecoke, clerk, Henry Faryngton, esq., Thomas son heir of William Lathome, and James Anderton -- moiety of manor of Wath* -- to hold for life of Mary wife of Roger Dalton and daughter of Sir William Faryngton. *In 1831 the parish of Wath comprised the township of Wath and the chapelries of Melmerby, Middleton Quernhow and Norton Conyers. 4 Jan. 1519- Deed of Covenants: (i) Thomas Hesketh, esq. (ii) Roger Dalton, esq. and William his son and heir, and (iii) Bartholomew Hesketh -- R.D., W.D., and B .H. sell to T.H. their properties in Longton and Mawdisley late in the tenure of Miles Sompnor and the wife of Richard Sharpuls called Tumlyns, value 23d. yearly; also 8d. rent from the Fysher Erthe in Mawdisley; also at enement late in the tenure of Richard Assheton in Mawdisley value 20/- yearly; also the moiety of Groston Milne value 26/8 yearly; also a tenement late in the tenure of Thomas Dalton, chapman, in Croston, value 9/- yearly -- recovery to be had by John Watkynson and William Tarleton. Etc. Seals. 14 Dec. 1524- Lease for 61 years at a peppercorn rent for 2 years, then 13/4 rent: f or £3 and 26/8: Roger Dalton, esq., William his son and heir and William Walles, gent and James Delater, priest, trustees of Richard father of R.D., to Nicholas Mawdesley and Richard Nelson of M., - close in the manor called Longshawe, late in the tenure of Cristopher Rutter and now of John Bane -- Seals. William Dalton: William Dalton, son of Sir Roger was born in 1513. In 1533 William Dalton "demised to Thomas Hough an acre of the hill and half an acre in the town meadow in Croston". Robert Dalton I: Robert Dalton I, son of William Dalton was born about 1529. In 1574 the Mayor and Corporation of Lancaster granted Robert Dalton of Thurnham a lease of a suitable plot in the waste of the town of Lancaster, commonly called the Green Ayre*, on which plot he was to build a large house for a water-mill or two mills at the point he considered most suitable. He was allowed to make a mill-stream and dam. *Green Ayre is within the city of Lancashire. Robert Dalton also had possession of an area called the Friarage* which had belonged to the House of the Friars covering 15 acres. *The Friarage is within the city of Lancashire. On the 24th June 1556, Thomas Lonna or Lowm, a citizen of London. sold the manor of Thurnham* to Robert for I,500p, having purchased it four years earlier from the Duke of Suffolk for I,080 p. In 1556 and 1557 Robert bargained for lands formerly attached to the Priory of Lancaster. The Priory possessions were described in a document signed by "Gilbert Moreton, deputy of John Kechyn, our supervisor there", and on 22nd March 1557 rated for Robert Dalton for the purchase money of I, 268p. 17s. 4d. The possessions that he purchased included the Aldcliffe** and Bulk*** estates. Aldcliffe is just north of Lancaster. Bulk lies on the north side of Lancaster, part of it now in a suburb, and is bounded on the west and north by the river Lune. *Thurnham Hall stands on slightly rising ground about a quarter of a mile from the left bank of the River Conder in the eastern part of the township, and is a three-story stone-built house, erected probably by Robert Dalton soon after his purchase of the property. **Aldcliffe was an estate within the city of Lancaster. *** Bulk, a township in Lancaster parish, Lancashire; adjacent to the Kendal canal and the Carlisle railway, 2 miles NE of Lancaster. Oliver Roper says "Thus it was that Robert Dalton became possessed of a stretch of country extending from a point on the River Lum, three miles above Lancaster, to one on that river nearly six miles below, intercepted only by the lands of the borough of Lancaster and the demesne of Ashton Hall" On such a large estate "it was only fitting that a substantial residence should be erected, and probably Thurnham Hall owes its foundation to Robert Dalton". Robert Dalton bought Lune mill from the crown in 1557/8. The mayor and burgesses of Lancaster rented it from him for 6s 8d a year until in 1571 a flood destroyed it. The priory estate at Caton* was regarded as a dependency of the manor of Bulk and passed to Robert Dalton of Thurnham [presumably in 1557] *Caton, a township, a chapelry, and a sub-district in Lancaster district, Lancashire. The township lies on the river Lune and the Midland railway, 4¼ miles NE of Lancaster. Robert Dalton I, through his marriage to Anne Kitchen (daughter of John Kitchen of Pilling), acquired the site of Cockersand Abbey* which adjoined Thurnham Hall. *Cockersand Abbey is a former abbey near Cockerham in the City of Lancaster district of Lancashire, England. It was founded before 1184 as the Hospital of St Mary on the marsh belonging to Leicester Abbey. It was re-founded as a Premonstratensian priory and subsequently elevated to an abbey in 1192. It also continued as a hospital. Robert Dalton I appears to have sold his lands in Bispham to acquire Thurnham Hall and other property near Lancaster. In 1558 he bought Aldcliffe and Bulk from the crown. He died without issue in 1578 and left his estates to his nephew Robert Dalton II, son of his brother Thomas. His nephew was then 2 months old. The Inquisition Post Mortem shows Robert Dalton I as owning: - the manor of Thurnham with messuages, watermills etc in Thurnham and Glasson. - the manors of Bulk and Aldcliffe with lands in Bolton, Lancaster, etc; - a fourth part of the manor of Hackinsall. - the site of the Black Friars in Lancaster. - the site of Cockersand Abbey with lands in Ellel*, Forton**, Bankhouses*** and Pilling**** (The Tongues) - lands in Croston, etc; *Ellel, a township, a chapelry, and a sub-district, in Lancaster district, Lancashire. The township is in Cockerham parish. **Forton, a township in Garstang parish, Lancashire; on the Preston canal and the Preston and Lancaster railway, 4 miles N of Garstang. ***Bank Houses is a hamlet in Lancashire, England on the west coast near Lancaster. ****Pilling is a village and civil parish within the Wyre borough of Lancashire, England. It is 6.5 miles north-northeast of Poulton-le-Fylde, 9.4 miles south-southwest of Lancaster. 1560- Robert Dalton I gave Aldcliffe Hall and the Ridge in Bulk to his mother Jane, widow of William Dalton. In 1573 he settled Abbot's Carr on his brother Thomas and Anne his wife, with the remainder to two other brothers, Roger and Richard. In 1571 he gave a rent of £2 a year to Robert Walmesley of Lincoln's Inn. Thurnham was sated in the Inquisition to be held in socage, at a rent of 6s8d, from William Curwen, late of Glasson. 1582- Roger Dalton claimed the land which Furness Abbey had held in Forton by virtue of a lease from the queen, but William Corless, the holder, claimed he had it from a former lessee whose term had not run out. 1557- Robert Dalton acquired land in Heysham* when he bought Aldcliffe and Bulk from the Crown. *Heysham is a large coastal village near Lancaster in the county of Lancashire, England overlooking Morecambe Bay. 20 May 1557- Quitclaim: Robert Dalton of Byspeham, esq., to Roger Nelson of Mawdesley, yoman -- a barn and croft called the Barne Yorde, a moiety of the Fol de Stydde, closes called the Carre, Leye, Wood Acre, Woodlane, Lower Ende of the Sandyflatte in the Owlayfielde, a rood in the Sandyflatt, a rood called the Slacke Buttes, a selion called the Woodacre Hadlande, an acre in 4 parts in Oldmawdisley Roger Dalton: Roger Dalton, son of William was born about 1531. In the year after Robert I's death, a grant of lands in Cockersand for 21 years was made to Roger. In 1581 he claimed turbary (the right of a tenant to dig on his overlord's land) in Preesall Moss and a messuage (use of a house, its lands and outbuildings) called Quatholme or Wheatholme, against Robert Carter. In 1582 a house called Friars Moss, near Quernmore Park, part of the Rigmaidens estate, was sold to him. He held burgages (right of rent) (in Lancaster ). In virtue of a lease from Queen Elizabeth I, he claimed the Furness land in Forton. In 1583 he purchased from Adams an estate in Pilling of 40 messuages, 500 acres of salt marsh, etc., which in 1586 was granted to feoffees (tenants) by "Anne Dalton, widow, Barnaby Kitchen, and Hugh Hesketh ," and next year (I1587) the feoffees with Roger Dalton sold the greater part to Robert Bindloss. 1570- In the early part of 1570 Roger Dalton had a lease of some property at Middleton. 1579- Lands at Cockersand were granted to Roger Dalton for 21 years. 1581 - Roger Dalton claimed turbary (the right to cut peat or turf from someone else's land or from common land for fuel) in Preesall Moss and a property there. 1582- The Ringmaiden family's estate in Lancaster was sold to Roger Dalton. Roger Dalton acquired part of the Cockersand Abbey estate after the dissolution of the monasteries. In 1586 Anne Dalton granted this to feoffees. In 1587 the feoffees and Roger Dalton sold most of it to Robert Brindloss of Borwick. Roger Dalton died in Holbon, which is in the greater area of London and holding the Lower End of Pilling. |
11/2/2011 | Rodney G. Dalton, Utah | |
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The Story of Matthew William Dalton Material researched, collected, complied, and written by Rodney Garth Dalton. Matthew William Dalton was not a member of our Utah Dalton family, but settled in Ogden, Utah to stay and raise his family. His family was from Ireland. Descendants of Peter Dalton Generation No. 1 1. Peter Dalton was born Abt. 1752 in Ardbroccan, Meath, Ireland, and died 22 Mar 1877. He married Nancy NAULTY. Child of Peter Dalton and Nancy NAULTY is: i. John J. DALTON, born 1786 in Navan, Meath, Ireland. Generation No. 2 2. John J DALTON was born 1786 in Navan, Meath, Ireland. He married Mary MCGOVERN 1818. Child of John DALTON and Mary MC GOVERN is: i. MATTHEW DALTON, born 01 Nov 1829 in Madrid, St. Lawrence, New York; died 14 Mar 1918 in Willard, Box Elder, Utah. Generation No. 2 3. Matthew William DALTON was born 01 Nov 1829 in Madrid, St. Lawrence, New York, and died 14 Mar 1918 in Willard, Box Elder, Utah. He married (1) Sarah Ann HYMAS. He married (2) Alice Ophelia MILLER. She was born 09 Jul 1845 in Southampton, Hampshire, England, and died 13 Jan 1900 in Provo, Utah, Ut. He married (3) Rozilla WHITAKER 15 Dec 1850 in Ogden, Weber Co., Utah. She was born 12 Dec 1829 in Fairview, Buncombe, North Carolina, and died 03 Jun 1898 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah. Child of Matthew DALTON and Sarah HYMAS is: i. Moroni Hymas Dalton, born 15 Feb 1903 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 23 Apr 1957. Child of Matthew DALTON and Alice MILLER is: i. Frederick William DALTON, born 07 Apr 1870 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 04 Feb 1959 in Boise, Ada, Idaho . Children of Matthew DALTON and Rozilla WHITAKER are: i. George Alfred DALTON, born 12 Oct 1866 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 31 Mar 1867 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut. ii. John Alma DALTON, born 26 Oct 1858 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 10 Dec 1949 in Soda Springs, Caribou, Idaho. He married Elizabeth Jane COOK; born 02 Nov 1860 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 04 Feb 1948 in Grace, Caribou, Idaho. iii. James Mathew DALTON, born 31 Oct 1851 in Ogden, Weber, Utah; died 12 May 1924 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut. He married Isabella Dock PERRY 14 Feb 1924 in Salt Lake City Utah; born 27 Mar 1857 in Perry, Box Elder Co., Utah; died 14 Feb 1924 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut. iv. Ellen Maria DALTON, born 08 Feb 1864 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 14 Jul 1892. v. Jane Emeline DALTON, born in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 25 May 1932 in Brigham City, Box Elder, Utah. vi. Mary Malinda DALTON, born 12 Apr 1855 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died 14 Sep 1855 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut. vii. Martha Melissa DALTON, born 10 May 1862 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut. viii. William Albert DALTON, born 10 Dec 1856 in Willard, Box Elder, Ut; died in Willard. The history of Matthew William Dalton: He was an outsider in Utah but not for long - By Lyndia Carter, History Blazer, February 1996 Matthew William Dalton settled in Utah: he had three wives. He was born in Madrid, NY, came from a large family and his parents were born in Ireland His father was also from a large family. After the death of Matthew's mother in Madrid, his father went to live in Wyocena, WI. Between Ireland and the U. S. there must be many hundreds of Daltons from this line. Matthew William Dalton was a busy man in the fall of 1850. A newcomer to Ogden, he hurried to find work and get a house and shop built before winter set in. The settlers had been kind, loaning him tools and a team and wagon. They had even helped him "raise" the house. Young and single, he was excited when the other young people asked permission to have a dance and party in his new cabin to celebrate. On the evening of the dance, lively youths filled his cabin. But Dalton's anticipation soon turned to disappointment when he was told he could not participate. He was informed at the dance "that the Mormons or Church members did not dance with any person not a member of their faith. Although I furnished the 'hall' I could only be a 'looker on', at the happy function of 'dancing in' my new house!" But Dalton was a good sport and accepted the fact that people had a right to do what they thought best. In his words, he "acquiesced with their 'peculiar' custom." He enjoyed watching the people dance on his bare dirt floor and marveled at their ability to be happy and full of zest regardless of their humble conditions. He continued: "So on that night, and a bitter cold night it was, I kept up the fires in the house, did the 'good offices', and acted as janitor." Dalton's experience was typical of how many of the gold seekers who passed through Utah in 1849 and the early 1850s were treated. Quite a large number of men going to the gold fields had to spend a winter in Utah, because it was too late to continue on to California. Twenty-two-year-old Dalton had left Wisconsin in the spring of 1850. In Racine he had been a carpenter who built homes and furniture, but he had caught the contagious gold fever. Not having an outfit, he traded his labor for food and transportation west. One duty was to do the hunting for the wagon train with which he traveled. When the company reached Fort Hall, they were told by Captain Grant that the Indians were bad on the California Trail that year and that they should detour to Oregon. Dalton, however, decided to travel with a Major Singer to Salt Lake City. As they moved south, the land was completely empty of any settlements. By the time they reached the area that would someday hold Brigham City, Singer's oxen needed to rest. The impatient Dalton left Singer and set out on his own. About two miles south of where Willard is now located, Dalton ran into a lone gold seeker pushing a wheelbarrow to California. The loner shared his food, and they camped together that night. The next day, September 5, 1850, Mathew arrived at the little village of Ogden. By then he had decided he would have to spend the winter among the Mormon settlers and began searching for work. David Moore paid him $2 a day plus board to cut and haul wood from the Weber River bottoms because lumber was much in demand for homes. Using his carpentry skills, Dalton made a bedstead for Moore and launched his furniture-making career in Ogden. Ogden is named after Peter Skene Odgen, a British fur trapper, part of the Hudson Bay Company, who made an expedition into the Ogden Valley and mountains east of Ogden in 1824-25. Ogden's settlement began in 1843, when Miles Goodyear, a trapper, built a fort and trading post on the Weber River. In 1847 he sold it to James Brown. It was then called Brownsville for a few years at which point it was renamed Ogden. With winter quickly approaching, his outdoor labor was not needed; he then decided to build a shop and make household furniture, which was desperately needed. During the time he was building his shop, Philip Garner allowed him to use his team, wagon, cabins, and axe to get lumber. He lived with the John Garners who treated him as a family member. He was beginning to fit into the community. But as he soon found out at the dance, there was still the barrier of religion. Though he had not been able to dance at the party, he had had a very good time watching the young ladies and discovered a reason for wanting to stay in Ogden. Rozilla Whitaker, one of those present had especially attracted his notice. The young outsider, likewise, impressed her. The day after the dance, Dalton commenced his work in earnest. He purchased tools and a lathe in Salt Lake City, cut wood in the river bottoms, and gathered rushes for caning chair bottoms. He did very well in the furniture business and even had to hire people, including Rozilla's father and brother, to keep up with the demand for furniture. He took a load of furniture to Salt Lake City, selling some to Brigham Young and other prominent people. Dalton was becoming prosperous. As Dalton lived in the Ogden community, he grew more impressed with the people and their religion. He was fitting in. By early December 1850 he had accepted their religious faith; he was no longer an outsider. His attraction to Rozilla had developed into a friendship and then blossomed into marriage by mid-December. It was now time for another party in Dalton's log house-shop. A merry crowd of over 100 guests gathered for a wedding dinner, including all the best things available to eat, even imported apple cider that had crossed the plains. In the evening it was time for the second dance in the Dalton cabin. To be sure, Mathew was not a "looker on" this time around but a full and lively participant. He was now "one of the people," according to his biographer Fred J. Holton. Some gold seekers who "wintered-over" found a place in the early communities of Utah, as did Dalton. But many more left Utah and continued to California as soon as the weather permitted in the spring. Among those who stayed, many aided the early development of Utah by the contributions they made economically and socially. Dalton went on to become a prominent citizen of Ogden and later Willard. He and some of the other gold rushers found all the gold they really wanted right here in Utah. Matthew took a second wife in bigamy, Alice Ophelia Miller, on 5 Sep 1868 at Salt Lake City. They had one son, William Frederick Dalton, and Ophelia divorced Matthew while William was still quite small and "still in dresses". Rozilla died 3 June 1898 and Matthew took a third wife on 7 Jun 1898. She was Sarah Ann Hymas, daughter of George Hymas and Sarah Ann Carter. Matthew's third wife was born in Hockley, Essex, England on 6 Aug 1859. They had two children. Matthew died at age 80 in 1909. From the marriages of Matthew Dalton alone, the descendency chart now numbers 3200. On Sept. 12, 1877, Brother Matthew W. Dalton, on a church mission, states that on a certain occasion it became necessary for missionary companion, Brother Hubbard to get some horses, preparatory to hitching them up for travel. In doing this, he tried to head off the animals in order to stop them, but had hardly taken sixteen steps when he suddenly, without a moment's warning, fell down and instantly expired. Brother Dalton sprang to his side in a moment and did all he could to revive him, thinking that perhaps he had just fainted or become suddenly unconscious, but all his efforts were fruitless. In order to pay proper respect to the body of his companion, Brother Dalton procured the best casket that money could buy in the neighborhood and had it lined with metal, preparatory to having the body shipped to Utah for interment. He had completed all necessary preparations to this end, when he received instructions from home to have the remains of Elder Hubbard buried in the Indian Territory, which consequently was done. He was buried on an elevated spot near Wichita. Elder Hubbard was an honest, humble, and unassuming young man with a profound love for the principles of the everlasting gospel. At the time of his death he was a member of the 59th quorum of Seventy. In 1883, the Indian Territory Mission was re-established with Matthew W. Dalton as president. The Period of God's Work on this Planet By Matthew W. Dalton of Willard, Box Elder County, Utah. Box Elder County, Utah, in 1906. As a preface to this little book I desire to present a short sketch of myself, a brief outline of my life, of my life's labors and of my life's thoughts as to this material world and Him who was and is the great Creator of this beautiful earth as well as of all other great planets by which this Mother Earth is surrounded. I am descended from the line of Sir Walter Dalton, who married the daughter of Louis VII, King of France, and who passed over into Ireland with Henry the Second on the invasion of Ireland, where he acquired large possessions some 60 miles from Dublin, in Westmeath County, settling on Mont Dalton, which is in the barony of Mont Conrath. From this noble sire sprang all the Daltons of Ireland. This Sir Walter Dalton whom I have named was of Norman extraction. I was born in the town of Madrid, St. Lawrence Co., State of New York, in the year of our Lord 1830. I was born of goodly parents whose pursuits in life were farming and stock raising My father's religious profession was that of a Catholic, and of necessity I was compelled to follow the discipline and training of my parents. I was therefore baptized or christened without my consent or choice, but as I became a man I, out of choice, became a student of the Latter- day Saints and the Gospel truths they advanced. In the year 1850, I was baptized in the waters of the Weber river near the point where the present great railroad station in Ogden City is now located. I had the honor to build one of the two first houses that were erected on the lots first surveyed on that at present historic spot. From my youth I was of a philosophic strain of thought. I followed the same pursuits as those of my father, but my mind was always given to a mechanical trend of thought, and when about seventeen years of age my father put me to learn the carpenter trade in which 1 became quite proficient. During all my early life I was given to the study of the sacred history of the Bible and its 66 books written by prophets who were authorized to reveal the great secrets of God which had been made known to them by our blessed Redeemer. 1 love to contemplate the history of this lovely old mother earth, and as my mind is as full of life's and of youth's vigor as a man of thirty years, and my bodily strength as that of a man of fifty years, I feel to write not as a man whose experience is only thirty years, but as a man of seventy-five year's experience. Since I came to Utah I followed the pursuits of the carpenter trade, but found that too confining, so I concluded to follow the same pursuits as those of my dear old father Adam, and I have, as 1 believe, acquired a practical knowledge of the agricultural and horticultural sciences as the world calls them. THE LOCATION OF THE LOST TRIBES AS TOLD BY PHILO DIBBLE; FROM THE PROPHET JOSEPH SMITH The Narrow Neck Proposition, A Sub Theory--Associated with the Unknown Planet Theory, but somewhat removed from its basic premise that the Lost Ten Tribes are now supposedly on a "portion of the earth" that has been "separated, detached or taken away from our globe," and placed on some other "planet, orb, sphere, and or near another star somewhere in the universe," is the "Narrow Neck Proposition." This "proposition" (perhaps better referred to as a kind of "sub-theory" of the main Unknown Planet Theory) states that "attached" to the earth by "a narrow neck of land" are two spheres (invisible or otherwise) which vary in size--one which is connected to the earth "north of the north pole" and the other which is connected to our globe "south of the south pole." This proposition is based on a drawing which the Prophet Joseph Smith supposedly drew about the year 1842, and which was later secured and preserved by Philo Dibble, of Springville, Utah. Dibble later made a copy of the drawing in 1884 which he then gave to Matthew W. Dalton, a resident of Willard, Utah, who eventually published it in 1906. Dalton states that Dibble informed him the Prophet said that in the drawing (see Figure A) the sphere marked "A" represented the earth, and that the Ten Tribes were on the sphere marked "B". He did not state the purpose for sphere "C", but others have thought it to be the location of the City of Enoch. The following is the history and meaning of the drawing as given by Matthew Dalton. Now, how was the diagram obtained? The Prophet Joseph Smith drew the original drawing a short time before his death, or in 1842, in the presence of several witnesses. Philo Dibble, of Springville, Utah, was one of these witnesses, and secured the drawing. In the month of May, of the year 1884, he made a copy thereof for me, the diagram herein shown being the result, with the possible exception that the spheres marked B and C were perhaps somewhat smaller than shown herein. At the time the original drawing was made the brethren were discussing the disappearance of the Ten Tribes and wondering where they were, upon which the Prophet made the drawing and stated that the Ten Tribes were located on the sphere marked B. Some may, and even do, doubt the truth of the diagram of the spheres A and B and C, and even the statement as to how the diagram was obtained. Yet it is nevertheless true. It was drawn in the presence of William and Sarah Beecher and myself in the year 1884 by Philo Dibble, above shown as a resident of Springville, Utah County, Utah. His son, Sidney Dibble, who is now alive and a resident of Springville, went before a notary public and on oath testified that this diagram of A, B and C, was a true facsimile of a drawing made by his father. In 1883, the Indian Territory Mission was reestablished with Matthew W. Dalton as president. In 1898 it was renamed the Southwestern States Mission, signifying it was not only teaching the Native Americans but everyone else in its jurisdiction who would listen. Peter Boyle wasn't the first furniture maker in Ogden. Mathew William Dalton began making furniture in a shop at 24th Street and Grant Avenue in 1851. Matthew William Dalton claimed to have built the first house within the surveyed Ogden townsite. In 1851 he built a log house on the southeast corner of Grant Avenue and 24th Street. Dalton arrived in Ogden on 5 September 1850, a few days after Brigham Young had visited and laid out the city. Dalton described the area: "Now on my arrival at Brownsville now called, Ogden, but then part of the wilderness, I saw a few scattered families, of people, who for protection lived in a fort on the outskirts, of what is now the platted part of the City. The afternoon I came in, the surveyors were running the first lines of the City, and began staking off some of the lots. It was a barren looking wilderness, in places, covered with "sage Brush" and "bunch grass." Upon inquiry, I found the prices of provisions very high. Flour was One Dollar per pound. One hundred pounds of flour would purchase a fine horse! I began at once to look for work, and fortunately made the acquaintance of a man named David Moore; who being in need of a man, engaged me to work for him at a wage of Two Dollars per day and board. I got busy at once, and did my first work, the afternoon I came in. This consisted in cutting and hauling a load of Box Elder trees, from the Weber River bottoms. Dalton's house was a two-room log house, and he fenced the three city lots he acquired and plowed and planted a garden in what would become the heart of the city. He also farmed twenty acres of land north of the Weber River, where he harvested 33 bushels of wheat to the acre. Frederick William Dalton: Frederick William Dalton, son of Mathew William Dalton and Alice Ophelia Miller was a rancher and breeder of registered hogs and dairy cattle, who until recently resided in Twin Falls county, now makes his home on the Boise bench. He was born at Willard, Box Elder county, Utah, April 7, 1870. His father, Matthew William Dalton, is mentioned at length in connection with the sketch of John A. Dalton, a half-brother of Frederick W. of this review. The mother of the latter bore the maiden name of Alice Ophelia Miller. She was born in Southampton, England, July 19, 1845, and died in Utah, January 17, 1900. She was a daughter of John Hawkins and Anne (Shepherd) Miller, who became converts to the Mormon church in England and as such came to the United States, arriving in Utah in 1866, after crossing the plains with a mule team. They lived first in Salt Lake City and afterward removed to Eden, Utah, while still later they became residents of Willard, where they remained for many years. In 1905 they came to Idaho, settling in Bingham county, where the father passed away December 16, 1905, at the age of eighty-five, and the mother on the 27th of March, 1911, she, too, having reached the age of almost eighty-five years. Frederick W. Dalton was reared at Willard and pursued his education in the schools of that town and of Plain City. He was graduated at the latter place and afterward spent one year as a student in the University of Utah. He became a school teacher in early manhood and followed the profession for eleven years in all, teaching for five years in Utah and for several years in Idaho. He was the teacher of the Poplar school near Plain City, Utah, in the winter of 1894-5 and among his pupils was Annie Benson, who is now his wife. They were married June 5, 1895, Mrs. Dalton being at that time a young lady of about twenty-one years, her birth having occurred in Denmark, February 6, 1874. She is a daughter of Andrew P. and Matilda (Aaberg) Benson, the former a Dane by birth and the latter a native of Sweden. Mrs. Dalton came to the United States with her parents when ten years of age, the Benson family settling at Plain City, Utah, whence in 1896 they removed to Bingham county, Idaho, becoming pioneers of that section. There Mr. Benson passed away March 1, 1919, at the age of seventy-four years, his birth having occurred in Denmark, October, 13, 1844. His wife survives and is yet living in Bingham county, at the age of seventy-five, her birth having occurred in Sweden, September 20, 1844. Both were converted to the teachings of the Mormon church in Denmark and at the time of his demise Mr. Benson was a patriarch in the church. Mr. and Mrs. Dalton removed from Utah to Idaho in the fall of 1897 and first lived n old Bingham county, residing in that section that is now Bonneville county. For sixteen years they lived upon a ranch of one hundred and sixty acres, which Mr. Dalton developed with the aid of his wife. In 1914 he sold that property and for and a half years resided on a ranch of four hundred and eighty acres which he purchased in Camas county, on the Camas prairie. In 1916 he traded this for an eighty acre ranch near Filer, Twin Falls county, thus exchanging cheap land for some of the best land in Idaho. Upon the latter place they resided for three years and prospered beyond their expectations, Mr. Dalton being very successful both as a breeder of registered Duroc hogs and as a farmer. In fact he is today one of the best known and leading breeders of Duroc Jersey hogs in Idaho. He has been in the business for more than twenty years and has been a prominent exhibitor at the fairs held in southern Idaho for many years and also at the Idaho state fair of 1919, where he exhibited a sow that won first prize in her class and which is a daughter of the grand champion Duroc sow of the whole northwest. In the fall of 1919 Mr. Dalton was offered an excellent price for his farm near Filer and sold the property for three hundred and twenty-five dollars per acre. He then purchased a small but valuable ranch on the Boise bench and took up his abode thereon, having located near Boise in order to educate his children in the schools of the capital city. He is still breeding registered Durocs and is also engaged in the breeding of registered Holstein cattle, both branches of his business proving sources of substantial profit. Mr. and Mrs. Dalton have become the parents of eleven children, six sons and five daughters. Frederick William, who was born March 5, 1896, is a veteran of the World war, having served for two years as a volunteer, one year of that time being spent in France, after which he mustered out as sergeant major. The other children are: John Andrew, born November 4, 189"; Alice Matilda, September 7, 1899; Audubon Mathias, whose birth occurred July 18, 1901; Bertha Annabelle, whose natal day was December 19, 1904; Lygia Teresa, born December 12, 1906; Nellie lone, born December 16, 1908; Irene Dorothea, born February 18, 1911; Ursus Benson, born June 19, 1913; Albert Matthew, born October 26, 1915; and James Cecil, who was born on the 6th of January, 1919. Mr. Dalton maintains an independent course in politics. He has served in various local offices of importance, acting as ditch director, as justice of the peace and in other public connections, where he has proven his loyalty to the best interests of the community. He is a man of genuine personal worth as well as of excellent business ability and Ada county numbers him among her substantial citizens. Map of Utah showing Ogden and Willard on right |
9/27/2011 | Rodney G. Dalton, Utah | |
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Added personal family information from Linda Magee I have been researching my family tree and discovered my Great Grandmother Annie Brady married a Patrick Dalton in about 1895 in Dublin, Ireland. Patrick was born around 1873 and died 30/12/1899 of TB (have death cert). They had three daughters Mary (1896 - 1904), Margaret (1898 - ?) and Anne (1900 - ?). |
8/30/2011 | Linda Magee | |
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The Christening Record: Oakham 8 Apr 1824, Elizabeth Dalton dau of Richard and Mary Dalton was moved from the Lancashire page to the Rutland page. Many thanks to <em>Gerard M-F Hill of Cumberland UK</em> for this correction. |
6/19/2011 | Gerard M-F Hill, Cumberland, UK | |
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The Biography of Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton, 1847-1925 Researched, complied & edited by Rodney G. Dalton Lucinda Lee or Aunt Lou as she was called married Charles Wakeman Dalton on 03 Oct., 1868 in Salt Lake City, Utah Territory. She was his 4th wife in polygamy. Her father, John Percival Lee was a school teacher and she become one as well. Below is her story. A good way to meet Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton is through one of her poems, a feminist statement of power and passion, irony and even bitterness, yet, paradoxically, of faith. She wrote many articles for the 'Woman's Exponent” periodical. The Woman's Exponent was a newspaper published from 1872 until 1914 in Salt Lake City. Its purposes were to uplift and strengthen women of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and to educate those not of the Mormon faith about the women of Mormonism. Although it was not an official publication of the L. D. S. Church, it was closely tied to the church, especially to the Relief Society. Its influence in politics and other areas was large, especially among Mormon women. Although its influence was great, from what can be seen from limited sources, the number of women in the Relief Society that subscribed to the Exponent was approximately ten percent. "Woman," Woman's Exponent, 21 15 January 1893. By Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton. “Woman is the first to know sorrow and pain, Last to be paid for her labor, First in self-sacrifice, last to obtain justice, or even a favor. First to greet loving a man at his birth, last to forsake him when dying, First to make sunshine around his hearth, last to lose heart and cease trying. Last at the cross of her crucified Lord, First to behold him when risen, First, to proclaim him to life restored, Bursting from death's gloomy prison. First to seek knowledge, the God-like prize, last to gain credit for knowing First to call children a go from the skies, last to enjoy their bestowing. First to fall under the censure of God, last to receive a full pardon, First to kiss meekly the chastening rod, thrust from her beautiful garden, First to be sold for the wages of sin, last to be sought and forgive. First in the scorn of her dear brother, man, Last in the kingdom of heaven. So, a day cometh, a glorious day, Early perfection restoring sin and its burdens shall be swept away, And love flow like rivers outpouring. Then woman who loves, through sorrow and shame. The crown of a queen will be wearing, and love, freed from lust, a divines pure same, shall save our sad earth from despairing. That latter-day work is already begun, the good from the evil to server, the word has gone forth that when all is done, The last shall be first, forever.” This poem contains the four great passions that weave the fabric of Lucinda's life. Most obvious is her strong sense of the injustice done to women, and as an inseparable second, how worthy women are of honor. Equally powerful is her sense that the issue of women's rights was a theological issue as well as a political one. Women's ultimate redemption and compensation for the wrongs of mortality will be part of the purification of the earth itself. The fourth characteristic is simply that Lucinda Lee Dalton is an eloquent and polished poet, clear and forceful in her expression. She is not merely angry, merely sorrowful and merely hopeful. She is all three at the same time, her emotions controlled and channeled by her ironic edge and her poetic form. And the poem, possibly her strongest, is an excellent introduction to the woman, still a mystery fifty years after her death. Her talent, her clear mind, her great personal strength, and her unflinching faith make her acquaintance valuable. In surveying Lucinda's writings, we sense that her feelings about being a woman are inseparably connected with her feelings about men and those feelings were generally not good. She was born in Alabama in 1847 to John Percival Lee and Eliza Foscue. Two years later, they joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Texas, crossed the plains in 1850, went to help colonize San Bernardino, California, in 1851, and after seven years left to settle in Beaver, Utah, in the winter of 1857-58. John P. Lee was a great influence on his daughter. Oldest of thirteen children, Lucinda was intelligent and thirsty for knowledge, recalling with gratitude that her father "at the close of his days” work patiently taught us, while yet too young to attend the common schools. At the age of twelve she helped him teach school; four years later she was a teacher herself a profession she dearly loved and followed for the rest of her life. Lucinda says little else of her father in her unpublished autobiographical sketch, but later he was to take a new wife, a practice that was socially accepted and respected in the Mormon view that countenanced plural marriages; however, his action possibly because of his manner or because of the timing, deeply hurt Lucinda's mother and alienated his children. Lucinda mentions two more men who influenced her youth. One was her first teacher in Utah. "O bless him!" she exclaims. With compassion upon "my ravenous hunger for knowledge. He gave to me instruction many a noontime hour when other children played and other men went home to dinner." It was "this beloved tutor and friend" she had to leave when she began teaching school. The second man, likewise a teacher, was someone she humbly approached, asking, if in his opinion, I was sufficiently advanced in mathematics to study algebra with profit. This "gentleman teacher" replied that it would be wasted time for me to ever study it, because I already had more learning than was necessary for a good housekeeper, wife, and mother which was a woman's only proper place on earth. Then she adds something significant: "It is but justice to him and myself to say that he has since warmly commended my efforts at self culture and the good I have done as a teacher." Lucinda's sense of justice never deserted her; she would not lie, even by omission, and we learn to trust her unsparing honesty. Lucinda, then, entered adolescence with some sense that being a woman meant being limited, and she remembers that she had always longed to be a boy, because boys were so highly privileged and so free. She envied their liberty, their mobility, and the encouragement that they received to seek education, but wryly attributes this envy to "my youth and blissful ignorance." and chastises men in one of the most scathing passages in her autobiography: "Not for all their boasted supremacy, superiority, and extensive advantages would I have women come down to their low moral level. Intellectual acquirements, fame, power, wealth, and even their self-conceit added, are as feathers in the scale against moral purity." She wrote this autobiography in 1876 for Emmeline B. Wells, then editor of the Woman's Exponent, "rising in the night" to do it. She was at that time twenty-nine years old, living in Beaver, the fourth wife of Charles Wakeman Dalton, without doubt the man who was most significant both for good and for ill in her life. They had been married for eight years. Lucinda had borne six children and lost two. Her sixteen-year-old sister Emma had also married Charles five years earlier and had divorced him only the year before; Lucinda herself was to apply to President John Taylor for a cancellation of sealing in 1884, eight years in the future and barely a year after Charles' death. This cancellation President Taylor granted in 1887. Because of these facts, we might be tempted to interpret Lucinda's scorn of men as the result of a disappointing marriage, one in which she had expected too much, or expected the wrong things. Lucinda's marriage was a disappointment, but for spiritual reasons rather than romantic ones. We misread Lucinda completely if we do not take her deep faith and strong desire to obey the Lord into consideration as one of her most enduring motivations. She recounts, in her autobiography, several accounts of answered prayers, including one heart-rending story about the illness of a much-loved little brother. Feeling, in all humility, that she was entitled to claim the Lord's promise that he would grant the prayers of the righteous, the sixteen-year-old Lucinda "fasted and prayed with intense fervor that the little one's life might be spared." Indeed, she seemed to have halted the illness, but he did not improve. He simply lingered, suffering, and she felt "like I had lifted some heavy weight just to the edge of a place of rest, but lacked the one ounce of power necessary to deposit it thereon. Coming at one time suddenly into the room, I saw my mother wring her hands and cry in anguish: 'Why oh why must my innocent baby suffer so much; If it is God's will to take him away, oh, let his cruet sufferings end!” Lucinda says, "My heart smote me guiltily. Perhaps, thought I, it is God's will to take him, perhaps my shortsighted wishes stand between the beloved and his rest. I hastened away and with streaming eyes fell upon my knees crying, 'Thy will, 0 Lord; not mine, be done!' As soon as I was calm enough to re-enter the sick room I did so and was struck to the heart by the change in the precious one's face; and that same evening he died." It was characteristic of Lucinda's faith that she could effect a great work and accept a hard answer. It stood her in good stead later. She tells this story purposefully as prelude to "the greatest spiritual manifestation ever vouchsafed to me." Her decision to marry Charles W. Dalton, she explains, indirectly, why her need of a special manifestation was so great: "I had seen in the married state so much that was disagreeable and humiliating to woman, that I was firmly resolved to remain single." She could support herself and provide for her old age. She knew she wanted children but expected to care for neglected motherless children in the community and also to influence children through her teaching. Obviously, she could not be driven to marriage by economic necessity or because of personal restlessness with her situation. Instead it was her faith in the principles of Mormon theology that brought her to the altar. As her conviction that its teachings were true deepened, she was unable to avoid the stark fact that, "in the highest glory of heaven, none are single." This was in full keeping with the Mormon doctrine that marriage, when performed and "sealed" by the proper authority, is an eternal as well as a temporal union and that the family unit can endure and increase throughout the eternities, the woman and man sharing power, kingdom, and glory together. Lucinda resolutely contemplated the idea of being "handmaiden to some sanctified woman" (the fate she felt was reserved for the righteous but unwed), since she "had been told in express terms by some blind leaders of the blind, that the Kingdom here, and hereafter belonged only to man; and that woman enjoyed its gifts and blessings only in sufficient degree to make her man's efficient servant; and that looked to me not worth striving for." The doctrine of celestial marriage-or eternal union as one of the blessings of salvation-, however, remained "worse than gall and wormwood to me, for in my pride of heart, I had determined to win my soul's salvation alone, forgetting that the best and bravest of us are only too happy to be acknowledged coworkers with Christ." Then she met Charles Wakeman Dalton. She was about twenty and he, nineteen years older, was only two years younger than her father. He had married his first wife a month before Lucinda was born and had married twice more by the time Lucinda's family came to Utah. She mentions no objection to his age or to his other marriages, and apparently objected to him only because he was male-for when he proposed, "I resented the thought, and told him that the man who thought I should be a meek, obedient, unobtrusive servant was very sadly wrong." He was apparently intimidated by neither frankness nor intelligence, for he overcame her objections by reasoning, an approach that communicated respect for both Lucinda's mind and her free agency. By pointing out that Christ had served all of mankind and thus exalted the position of servant, Charles was able to draw the analogy with marriage: by benefiting from Christ's service, we are his debtors. So a husband and wife, in need of mutual service, both have obligations, not just the wife. And no obligation, which bound one did also bind the other. Lucinda exulted: "This was new light on a difficult problem. This was speaking from reason and common sense instead of vaguely hinting at some foggy superstition about man's being created first and consequently best, noblest, and superset. These were arguments at once indisputable and satisfactory." As this new concept penetrated Lucinda's mind, love also began to touch her heart, but fear followed. She remembered the unhappy marriages made by wiser women than she, and felt the salvation of her soul in jeopardy. "For time alone, as the people of the world marry, I could not and would not, because I considered that in a woman's case, the burdens and trials of matrimony far exceed its benefits and blessings. Only for the sake of its expected joys in eternity, could I endure its trials through time; but that cherished 'free agency' which gives a woman the choice with which of her fellow beings she will undertake to find eternal happiness, began to look far more like a burden and a snare than a privilege or a blessing." She applied the energies of her mind to the problem, and took her questions to the Lord: "I thought and dreamed about it," she records. "I fasted and prayed about it; I grew pale and hollow-eyed over it but found no conclusion. I was at last willing to love a man, but dared not assume the responsibility of becoming his wife." The only answer she got to her prayers was one, which drastically humbled her pride: “In very despair-and in deep humiliation because I was impressed so to do-I called on him to pray with me on the subject. I knew he was startled by the demand, and felt it like assuming a great responsibility but he hesitated on enough to learn that there was no shadow of trij7ing in me. He knelt down first, and I placed myself beside him and laid one of my hands on one of his; and as I did so, I felt a thrill through every fiber of my being and I know he fell the same. I was utterly crushed under the knowledge that within a few minutes a question would be settled which would shape and determine my destiny forever, and cowardly I dreaded to meet the decision. The prayer was short, simple and unassuming, but direct, earnest, and sincere; and at every word uttered, a huge stone of my mountain load of doubt and fear rolled from my heart. My stony pride and bitter humility were alike softened; a peace sweeter than joy took possession of my soul; I felt that we were in the presence of the hosts of heaven; and a direct incontrovertible testimony was given me that it was the will of God and not my will that I should accept this man for my yoke fellow. He knew as well as I what the decision was; and in awe-struck solemn silence, we left the spot. To this day it is to both of us a most precious and solemn recollection, and is never mentioned between us except with deepest reverence." They were wed in the Endowment House October 3, 1868, and it should have been the beginning to an idyllic Mormon love story, not the prelude to a cancellation of sealing several years later. Lucinda was teaching, and was loved by her pupils and respected by the community. She also apparently participated in the meager cultural life of Beaver by singing in the choir, partially satisfying "the master passion of my soul," her craving for music. Lucinda was also a mother, little Charles having been born in 1869 or 1870. Her experience with this baby shows again her sensitivity and her faith. Six years after Charles' birth and four after his death, she records: “Early in my married life, one day my mother was sitting with me in my own house, and I was embroidering a delicate muslin robe for my expected child. After much pleasant conversation she inquired playfully, how I felt doing such pretty work for a child of my own. A most natural and innocent question, but my mother thought most direr in its effect; for, throwing down the work and bursting into hysterical weeping I wailed. "Oh! Mother, I feel like I were sewing on a shroud." She was alarmed for my safely, and urged the necessity of self-control, and begged to know if she had said anything wrong. When I was sufficiently recovered, I explained. For months a haunting dread had hung like a great black cloud over me, that my child would died in infancy. I had tried to smile at it; I had refused it admittance to my thoughts; I had fought it like a deadly foe and barred the doors of my soul against it; but still it lay in wall, and my mother's unexpected question suddenly swung wide all those barred doors and gave the enemy full possession. Lying, as I may say, a bound and helpless captive at the feet of my foe, I confessed my secret grief. As in duty bound, even had she not fully believed it, my mother argued that I had mistaken nervousness for presentiment and assured me that by the time I had borne a dozen children I should be able to discriminate better. I sobbed forth "I wish you were right, Mother, but my child will live six months or a year or possibly two years, but not longer. Great was my surprise and delight when, instead of the puny, wailing little skeleton I had expected, my child was a great, lusty boy who seemed the very impression of good health, high spirits, and precocious intellect. Nothing ever seemed to hurt him, and in the pride of my heart I laughed my former fears to scorn. I told my mother she was right and I was tempted to give up my belief in presentiments entirely. But in his fifteenth month, I found myself compelled to wean him; and it was with a sinking heart that I took him from the breast and began the old warfare anew. He pined from that day and in spite of all care, all weeping and praying, he died in my arms on the second anniversary of his birthday, and we buried him in the embroidered dress I had once called a shroud. A strange and sad experience, truly, and my mother lives to testify to its truth; but the warning which was once my torture and foe, is now my comfort and friend, because it assures me that it was not my ignorance of the laws of life and health which deprived the world of so noble a soul, but the will of God.” Lucinda was to mourn this loss with elegiac poems for years; but even in so bitter an event, she was able to find sweetness and strength. It was still far in the future as she moved tranquilly through the opening months of 1870 with her beloved child and loving husband, but within a few months, her happiness was clouded. Ironically, those who had most power to hurt her were those closest. Her father took another wife in 1870, even though the price was the breach of his marriage with Lucinda's mother, the woman who had married him at fifteen and followed him faithfully into a new church and through three different states be- fore they found their home in Beaver. Apparently the rupture was a painful one, for about the same time, Lucinda's sixteen-year-old sister Emma left the family home and came to live with her. A year later, in April 1871, the ward teachers (representatives of the local presiding church authority who routinely visited a given number of homes monthly) were sent to make peace between Charles and his father-in-law. It was apparently an important case, for, in the ward clerk's uncertain orthography, "Bishop Ashworth spoke at some length on the difficulty existing between John P. Lee & Charles W. Dalton. Three of the brethren were appointed to visit these brethren." The trio returned to say that they "could not make any reconciliation with them. The minutes do not specify the cause of the quarrel, but it may have been an event that occurred only six months later. Emma's marriage to Charles, apparently they had been engaged for some time, possibly without the estranged father's permission. Before that fall wedding on October 16, 1871, in the Endowment House, the loss that Lucinda had been prepared for by premonition had occurred and the summer serenity was shattered by the death of her little son, an unimaginable strain on the devoted mother, still recovering from the birth of her daughter Belle on June 1. Apparently Emma shared her sister's home after marrying Charles; relationships between the sisters seem unmarred by jealousy or competition, for Lucinda always speaks of Emma tenderly and affectionately. But the marriage itself was evidently a mistake for the seventeen-year-old girl and the forty-five-year-old man. They had no children and Emma seems to have refused domesticity. We know little of the family during Emma's four years with them. A daughter Rosette was born to Lucinda probably in 1874, but apparently died within months. On February 18, 1875, Lucinda's third child, a son named Clifford, was born. Apparently Emma had reached the end of her optimism and patience the same year, for on September 12, she sent a cryptic letter to Brigham Young: “Sir, I was married to Charles Wakeman Dalton in the house of endowments, on the ninth day of October, 1871. For reasons, which Pres. Murdock has kindly informed me, you do not require me to state, I now desire a divorce. By giving this matter your earliest convenience, you will confer an eternal obligation. Yours respectfully Emma Lee Dalton” A clerk has noted on that letter that blank forms were sent to Bishop Murdock on September 15. However, two weeks later, the Beaver Literary Institute was organized for "persons of good moral character" under the auspices of that same John Murdock, and on October 4, Emma Dalton was there, nominated to serve on a committee to propose a list of officers. Between then and Christmas, she presented an essay, edited the first number of the Literary Star, helped plan the Christmas party, appeared on a spelling team, and gave a recitation. However, this flurry of activity faded suddenly, for the minutes of January 17, 1876, include the report of a delegation sent to find out why Mrs. Emma Dalton was absenting herself from meeting with the Institute at regular meetings. Emma told them "that it is no intention on her part to relinquish her membership in the Institution and considering herself an honorary member, therefore [illegible] to excuse to offer and further-more was not aware that she was violating any of the rules, or by-laws, or that an absentee was required to furnish an excuse in case of being absent a specified time.” Despite these excuses, Emma never reappears in the minutes and apparently left Charles, Beaver, and the church, having decided, in Lucinda's sorrowful words, that "Mormonism was inquiry, and its followers hypocrites." According to Lucinda, she went to work for the Rio Grande and Denver Railroad in Little Rock, Arkansas. In Lucinda's obituary, Emma is listed as "Mrs. Emma Sutherland of San Francisco." She had married Jabez Gridley Sutherland under her maiden name sometime between 1893 and 1897. Judge Sutherland, a widower, was a prominent gentile in Salt Lake City, some thirty years older than his bride, who was then in her late forties. He died in Berkeley "after a lingering attack of paralysis" at the age of seventy-seven, only a few years after their marriage. We know very little of what happened during those four years when Emma, Lucinda, and Charles struggled to make the marriage work and eventually abandoned the effort. It was during those four years, however, that Lucinda began writing for the “Woman's Exponent” a lively paper devoted to matters feminine and feminist, first edited by Louisa Lula Greene Richards with a circulation that never rose above a thousand, although readership may have been that high. It was only five months old when Lucinda saw her work in print for the first time on November 1, 1872. This initial essay was, pointedly enough, a criticism of fathers in a concrete and vernacular style that shows a keen mind and a satirical eye at work: "Oh, yes, I know the boys are wild, that they use bad language and cultivate bad habits, and, as you say, 'Make themselves a great nuisance; but, my friend, I don't think the boys deserve quite so much blame as they get.... When I heard a father complain that 'outside influences' was too strong for him, and it was almost more than he could do to keep his boys under any restraint whatever, I could not help wondering if 'inside influence' were what they should be." “A Plea for the Boys," “Woman's Exponent”. It would be mere wishful thinking to make her articles replace Lucinda's missing journals and letters. She was a woman with a deeply developed sense of privacy, and these articles are very public. But even if we cannot read them autobiographically, they are extremely valuable in showing us her attitudes on certain issues. A common theme was mourning the death of little Charles. She describes his baby beauty and bewitching ways, but finds comfort in his immunity from the world's guises and snares: “I fear not worldly pride may win thee now, Nor guilt betray, nor flames or guilt devour; God's will is wiser than our flail desires, His mercy tendered than our purest love; And I can yield to this since He requires, And name thee now, "My waiting saint above." "A Mother's Resignation.” Woman's Exponent, November 15, 1872 The same issue also contains an article condemning intemperance. Charles drank, both before and during their marriage, and this essay may contain a hint of her feelings about his weakness. One trenchant paragraph slashes: "Do you degrade yourselves 'below' the brutes by disregarding Nature's laws in your own homes, and seeking only your own sensual gratification, persistently closing your eyes to the fact that thus you perpetuate and foster a low tone of morals, and send abroad into the world, exaggerated types of your own depravity, to carry their pestilential presence and shameful deeds everywhere?" “Woman's Exponent”, November 15, 1872. Her opening essay in 1873 was unabashedly feminist. She advocated exercise for girls, not only skating, swimming, and ball, but even shooting. She does not rely only on the relatively safe argument that exercise means better health. Instead she argues the psychological necessity for recreation as well as work and the desirability of a more self-confident generation of women. In passing, she thwacks such "foolish and groundless customs, as the deep prejudice against whistling" and sketches a sarcastic portrait of the nineteenth century miss; "laced up in corsets, with smelling bottle at nose, giving little plaintive screams if she should spy a mouse." “Woman's Exponent”, January 31, 1873. She returns to one of her favorite themes, prayer, for her next essay, a thoughtful and reverent article that differs in tone from the polemics she had written heretofore. From a few paragraphs we can see that her faith was maturing as she successfully assimilated her sorrows and learned to trust the Lord despite her pain: “That very frame of mind, which is necessary to produce true prayer, is in many cases the answer to Prayer-the starting point from which we may accomplish the good we desire. In His wisdom God so ordained it that many prayers should thus answer themselves. To cultivate this prayerful resigned state of mind is the very best preparation against adversity, for we can believe our seeming misfortunes to be blessings in disguise, and generally prove them such. And prayer is an armor fitted to all wearers”. “Woman's Exponen”t, February 15, 1873. She also mentions the great shield prayer can provide for the innocent maiden who may not see beneath the roses. That she herself had formed the habit of prayer early is attested to in her autobiography where she states: "I do not recollect ever attending a ball or place of amusement without asking God to keep me from all ill or unbecoming thoughts, words or deeds, and from accidents or harm of any kind. During the entertainment I often recalled the prayer and I can truly say that my prayers were answered. Few young girls ever met with fewer little mortifying mishaps, or moved amid giddy pleasures with less danger of becoming enamored of them." She returns to the theme of temperance in her next essay, printed on March 1, 1873, but now discusses more than alcohol. One particularly vivid passage described the effects of lust: "Love, that heavenly radiance which ... lifts the weakest of mortals to a level with the angels ... is a name sorely misapplied. Alas, that it should be so! but many, by giving unrestrained liberty to all the emotions which it awakens in their peculiar natures, and pursuing the object with headlong speed, miss it altogether and grasp, in- stead-passion; that adder to sting the heart that warms it." "Moral Temperance," “Woman's Exponent”, March 1, 1873. Lucinda's own life seems to have been free from illicit sexual passion, and even from its temptations: “Even while attentions from gentlemen were in themselves pleasant, I always fell a sort of guilt in accepting for my personality what I knew was rendered merely to abstract youth and beauty; and much disgust at the thought that my quick intellect, my honest heart, my high aspirations, all the sterling worth that was really of myself were never considered in this glittering realm of pleasure to which I was beckoned. What girt that ever paused to think that she was caressed in society merely for her youth and freshness, things not in the least due to herself and which advancing time soon take from her, and that then she will surely be forsaken by this same society through no fault of her own; could ever become enamored of its seething pleasure and hollow praise? I never was. Although the metrical movements of the dance in time to the rhythm of sweet music were very pleasant, I could grow tired as of any other kind of exercise, but I have seen girls who professed never to tire of dancing. I have open looked on while the beautiful girls, radiant of youth and happiness, with their devoted partners, whirled through the dreamy waltz and mused on the possibility of one of these lovely and carefree maidens, become a woman and perhaps wife of one of these same adoring youths, wearing out not only her youth but her very life, drudging from morning till night to keep his house in order, and from night till morning with his ailing baby, and be looked on by him as an inferior being, designed how and true to serve him. I wonder if man could have the effrontery to ask, or any woman the suppleness to lay down the scepter and crown of girlhood to assume the yoke and burden of wife hood. My prayer was then as now, that the time may come when women will know and hold themselves at their true worth; when their eyes will be opened to the degradation of wasting their spotless lives on worth- less and depraved men; when by the depth of their contempt for men who lead unholy lives, and by the firmness of their resolution and the dignity of their self-respect, they shall compel men to come up to their standard of morality and with them seek some- thing still better, or be outcast from the Eden of woman's association.” Possibly Lucinda's mistrust of men generally immunized her against sexual temptation, and she saw with sorrow and compassion those whose uncontrolled love became passion. She may have seen its effects in the marriages in her own family, possibly that of her father, or possibly that of her blooming sister, barely out of childhood, to Charles, who was already the father of twenty-five children. Two months later appears "To Ernest," a love poem addressed to "my own." She remembers a "sweet night" when they wandered out, hand in hand, and: “Lowly bowed before the Eternal throne (But one in spirit, though two hands were joined) .You plead 'for guidance for our troubled souls, O'er our coming lives a Father's kindly care, And that when dread temptation darkly rolls, Our steadfast faith might keep our purpose fair. The pure petition fell like summer rain upon the fields when parched and gray; And doubts and fears that on my soul had lain like cliffs of terror, melted soft away” The details of that last stanza, the shared prayer that reassured her about her choice of a marriage pardoner, made it clear that she is recalling her own courtship with Charles. Why she chooses the name of Ernest we do not know, but six years later she gives that last name to her last child. The hour is spent-thy girlhood's knell is tolled, as by a passing bell. Thy bridegroom comes, with Joyous eye, To lead thee to thy destiny. With smile had sad but wholly sweet, Thou turnest thy heart's lord to greet. "Woman's Exponent”, August 15, 1873. This is hardly a glad celebration of matrimony. The woman's wisdom and acceptance of suffering contrast with the groom's blithe-and blind-happiness, but it reflects Lucinda's own unswerving faith in the essential nobility of womanhood. Perhaps it is only coincidence that the very same issue contains one of the most scathing exposes of male insensitivity that she was ever to write for publication. Deliberately gossipy, she addresses the reader with a cordial confidentiality suitable for raking the male sex over the coals; “You are a young matron whose girlhood, with its peculiar tastes and feelings, stands so near you that you could almost touch the hem of its garments; You think your husband about perfection; You have one baby old enough o toddle about, and in your family lives and aunt whom you greatly respect” (If indeed this is autobiographical, it is Lucinda’s only published reference to Charles’ other wives, all of whom were at the time living in Beaver) She continues, “Your husband is absent on business much of the time, and you have to be both master and mistress of the house; cut your own wood, water your own garden and do your own marketing, but as you pride yourself on your cheerfulness and independence, you do not even sigh over this.” This model little wife decides to forgo the pleasure of celebrating a July holiday with the rest of the town even through a married friend would willingly take her. Her little daughter would enjoy the festivities and she would also like a pleasant holiday herself. The deciding factor is that “Charles, might feel a little sad to think you could really enjoy such an excursion without him; or he might return during your absence to find only an empty house, and in his loneness, he might think you ungrateful for all his toil and care” Then Charles reappears on the night before the outing. The loving wife circumspectly waits until he has been fed and had a good night’s sleep to tell him the news. He decides that it’s too late to arrange for a buggy, but proposes instead, “a little home holiday and a cozy dinner together.” “The darling fellow you are so happy to think a day passed quietly at home could be a holiday to him, that you are a thousand times glad you had not made any arrangement to go aboard. Full of happy thought’s you set about dressing Rosebud while Charles goes on his errand. Presently he returns laden with parcels, and overlooking Baby, who runs to meet him looking like a little white bird, he tells you hurriedly that “Brown and them” encountered him in town, and nothing would do but that he must go out with them to see what the picnickers were doing. He explains that he had no idea of such a thing when he left the house, but that they were good fellows and he didn’t wish to offend them. All your boasted “independence” could not keep your countenance from falling, and as your husband is neither blind nor a fool, he asks co-punctiliously, “Would you like to go too.” “No” you answer softly, winking very hard to keep back the tears while he says in a "livened sort of way, and with the air of one who has done his whole duo. "I didn't think you would, since there are to be only men in the carriage, and I am not an invited party; but you can make yourselves comfortable here and have your little dinner together all the same as if I was with you." Then with hasty adieu your adorable Charles hastens away to his bachelor friends and a day among the rocks. No longer able to conceal your tears, you throw yourself face downward on your bed, grieved to the heart, not for the loss of a day's pleasure, but for the bitterness of the discovery, that all your delicate consideration was unheeded, and because the slight and loneliness you would not risk putting upon him, he would lay upon you ten times magnified.” The anger and hurt of this description comes from the very heart, but by the next and concluding paragraph, the wife regains control with a wry extravagance: she rises, bathes her face, spurns the parcels of groceries, gives the baby to Auntie, and sits down to write a hot letter to the Exponent, "hoping in her secret soul that 'he' will read it and be very indignant, thus proving that his conscience pricks him." That consolation isn't worth counting on, though, and the young wife turns to a more sure consolation, her certainty that "scores of wives, will exclaim, Isn't that the truth? Just the way they do! And applaud your fixed resolution to learn a lesson from this experience, and, where you can in the future, take care of yourself.” Were those tears, those crushed hopes, the wounded tenderness Lucinda's? And even more poignantly, did she, in moments of betrayal, feel sustained by the sympathetic sorority of women who also knew the hard necessity of emotional independence? Two weeks later in an essay written in the middle of the previous month, Lucinda is blasting again at the nineteenth century's equivalent of male supremacists who demand belief without the courtesy of offering proof. After a half-dozen trenchant examples, she gives her crowning illustration: “You women sympathize with the Woman's Rights movement and honestly believe that the mothers of men and women have as deep an interest in their Present and future world as the fathers, and, therefore, would be, if as well educated, quite as capable of properly shaping their destinies. But you learn with wondering and awe that "Woman never was and never will be capable of understanding political economy nor of acquiring a man's education. Having the testimony of all sacred and profane history that women have been chief rulers, high priests, counselors, commanders and warriors, you suppose, in your innocence, that you are to receive some new light on the subject, but instead of that, your informant looks the picture of injured innocence, that you even imagine that statement needed confirmation. Surly you do not doubt his veracity? Now what I want to know is just this. Am I obliged to swallow all these nauseous doses of wisdom and call them "good" for me, or may I speak my mind, and say "If you can give me a reason sufficient to convince my judgment, then I will accept your views, if I shall consider myself at liberty to express my own opinion as highly as yours." Then she issues her own manifesto: “If, in order to be womanly and keep my "sphere," I must do the former, then let spheres take care of themselves, for I've no use for them. I do not feel like 'giving proof’ of woman's inferiority by any such complaint course. Every person within whose soul the least spark of reason exists, has a right to cultivate that reason and give it satisfaction before adopting any principle or opinion; and because my head may be weaker than yours and my judgment less reliable, is no reason I should not cultivate and improve them. And when you give me your views on any given subject and withhold the support of these views, you defraud me of an opportunity to cultivate my judgment and arrive at a just conclusion for myself." “Woman's Exponent”, September 1873. We do not know who these men are, but we are not necessarily justified in numbering Charles among them. If the picnic episode really records an incident of their domestic life, he may have been insensitive to her tender feelings as wife, but there is no evidence that he ever considered her intellectually inferior. In her autobiography, after a particularly scornful passage about men who consider themselves superior, she adds: “I am not so unjust as to make no exceptions to all the sweeping assertions I have been making. I know all women are not good and true, nor all men tyrannical and unjust. I could mention the names of several men pledged heart and soul to the Latter day work of woman's emancipation from her long bondage; and one at least of my acquaintance is a far more ferocious antagonist of woman's slavery than 1. From him I received the first antidolic draught to cure my misanthropy and disgust of life. He it was who first showed me wherein Religion is not leagued with woman's oppressors; who first assured me with a man's lips that a woman has as good a right to her individuality and her free agency on the earth as her brother-man. So you see, my dear friend, that for his sake, did I never know another liberal minded, large-hearted man, I could not, and would not wish to condemn the whole race. I shall give honor where honor is due and while waiting for the good time coming when all men and women shall be free and equal, put in my feeble oar wherever I can in her service. “ A later paragraph makes it clear that this man is her husband. Lucinda wrote voluminously for the rest of that year and through 1874. Only five months passed in those two years without a contribution to the Exponent, usually one but not infrequently two, in every number. She recommends singing to babies, defends women's suffrage, denounces the Frelinghuysen Bill which would have admitted Utah to the Union at the price of permanently disenfranchising its women, contrasts the economic and legal inequality of gentile women with Mormon women, points out the advantages of Relief Society for every Mormon woman, vehemently denounced "interference" from busybody neighbors during first pregnancies, writes occasional verse, writes a rousing feminist song called "Woman Arise!" and writes a tender comparison between her sleeping baby daughter and the dead baby Charles. Personal philosophy giving us another view of her marriage seems to appear in a poetic exchange between her and "Query," who demands somewhat rhetorically, "Is it a crime for woman to love?" meaning, "How aggressively may a woman pursue a man?" Lucinda answers that forwardness is not sin but is usually stupid, since "man is perverseness within, And values not things lightly won." She is not just offering a nineteenth-century version of fascinating womanhood, however. The concluding stanza gives the reason why love should always be kept in check: “No passion should break our control, No love supersedes love of God, This anchor made fast to the soul will save from the angriest flood.” "Woman's Exponent”, 15 December 1874. "Query" responds the next month, hinting that Lucinda's answer was jaundiced by her mistrust of her own husband. Loyally, Lucinda counters, defending Charles, and-what is more significant-explaining the wryly practical need for womanly self-restraint: one rarely meets a man so ideal he won't take advantage of a woman. She continues, expressing concern for women married to the type of man she fears and mistrusts, one who through misunderstanding or a desire for power will betray a woman through her own love: "Who think that God made her a slave to man's will; if not, he will make her so yet, Who will win her affections with cunningest skill and lead her to lifelong regret, I wish her to learn to be wary and wise that by such she may never be won, That poor, sightless Love may be furnished with eyes and never cool judgment outrun." “Woman's Exponent”, 3 February 1875. It is ironic that this is Lucinda's last contribution for almost a year. Perhaps, considering the subject, it is even significant. She wrote her answer to "Query's” romantic argument in January 23 1875. Less than a month later, Clifford was born. Lucinda writes nothing during the entire spring and summer. In September, Emma applied for her divorce, obviously as the result of her own deteriorating marriage. She is gone soon after January 1876. Lucinda is, at that time, pregnant with Guy, who is born April 24 1876. Apparently her babies keep her busy, for we see only four poems: two seasonal offerings, one mother's out poured hopes and fears for her children, and one jibe at men who worry about what their own "true sphere" will be if women begin working. Charles, by this time, is in financial difficulties and his health is failing as well. By1878, Lucinda and Charles are in St. George, returning to Beaver after a three-year's stay. On April 1, 1878, the Exponent published her "Questionings," a poem of poignant power lamenting the bitter lot of women. “An endless round of weakness, toll, and pain, of deep humiliations, longings vain, And blind out preachings for the light above. Self-sacrifice we drain as nectar cup; For others one we are taught to live. Oh, darling, you have last seen His face. And in His presence felt no diffidence; Oh, tell! You forget or my heart break, If now you are forever banished thence? If after we have worn his crown of thorns, And borne, like Him, the cross, with bleeding feet, To touch our outstretched hands He will come, or send, not bring, the balm of healing sweet. Not his the tongue a scornful word to fling, To wound a sister soul and rankle there; Not his the heart to whisper I am king And she my subject now and evermore; Not he says laughing, this child is mine, But tenderly and proud, It is ours; And deems the marriage vow a pledge divine of mutual bonds, and equal joys and powers.” “Woman's Exponent”, May 15, 1878. Since she also hinted broadly that an unhappy marriage could be cured if the wife would change her selfish attitudes, Lucinda quite properly saw in it a personal attack against her own marriage and responded, not by defending herself from charges of selfishness, but by defending her husband from charges of oppressiveness. The next four years see scanty contributions, although Lucinda's carefully reasoned defenses of polygamy and Mormon principles in 1882 are important. Then Charles died on July 18, 1883, in Beaver, and Lucinda mourns him and supplicates his departed spirit for some sign of continued love a year later: “A year and a day-a year and a day! I linger and hearken; one whisper I pray: No matter how lightly your footstep may fall I'll hear it; I'll answer your faintest call; My famishing soul in your presence could gain The courage to labor and struggle again. My heart is weary. No longer delay! I've waited and listened a year and a day.” “Woman's Exponent”, 13 August 15, 1884. After scattered poems and essays during the next four years, she wrote another expression of grieving widowhood: "My eager hands that would clasp his own in fond and fervent grasp, With patient labor strive to still the trembling pains that through them thrill. My paling lips that would press upon his brow a pure caress, may only breathe his name so low. That none but God can hear or know.” "Sundered, Woman's Exponent”. September 15, 1881. These public expressions of love for her husband-certainly with the ring of sincerity-are a continuing counterpoint to the private tragedy she was experiencing. That first lament, "Invocation," was written only a month before she began the steps that would lead to the cancellation of her marriage sealing, and "Sundered" was penned eighteen months, after she was eternally sundered from a man for whom she obviously felt unquenched love. What, then, explains her action? Certainly we do not have full access to all the facts, but we need to remember her unwavering testimony-for ironically, it was her understanding of the gospel, accurate or not, that led her into eternal separation from Charles. On August 24, 1884, she wrote to David Henry Cannon, president of the St. George Temple and the St. George Stake. His uncle, John Taylor, was then president of the church: “It is with reluctance almost amounting to shame that I come to you this time for counsel, because it is on the subject of marriage, and my husband has been gone scarcely thirteen months. I was always true to him in thought, word and deed during his lifetime, and I laid his body in the grave dreaming naught else than that I should be his only in time and in eternally, though I knew he had many imperfections. But now the brethren say he was unworthy, (though I know not who appointed them to judge him,) they urge that I stand in a very insecure position, and that for my children's sake, as well as my own, I ought to marry again.” One of these judges was a suitor. She does not say whether his attentions annoy her; with her fine sense of justice she describes him only as being "beyond doubt, a faithful Latter Day Saint, above reproach in his daily walk and conversation" and already married with a wife and children. The insecurity Lucinda feels is not economic or social, but spiritual. She confesses: "I have indulged in thoughts of being more to my deceased husband than wives usually are; of assisting him with my faithfulness and my favor in the sight of God, to recover any ground he may have lost, to expiate any offenses. Is this vain dreaming or could it be done?" Possibly her suitor and the other "judges" had seized on this dream of "atoning" for another's sins, a mission reserved for the Savior, and stressed the implied pride as a sign of her spiritual "insecurity." It seems uncharacteristic of Lucinda to have discussed this dream openly, however, since it would have entailed discussing the faults for which she was "atoning" and she was obviously reluctant to refer even to Charles' lapses from strict sobriety, evidently a matter of common knowledge in Beaver. In any case, the argument that has the most weight with Lucinda is not that her dream of redeeming Charles is vain but that by remaining married to him she will forfeit her claim to her children: “Here is the thought that appalls me. My feelings as a mother are far keener and deeper than my feelings as a wife. I am the mother of six children; four still living, and two gone before; and I would not forfeit my claim to them as their mother, for the sake of the best man in God's kingdom. And whatever these four may do, I know those two to be spotless in the sight of God, and that they will act under his own perfect counsel; therefore, if I could but know what course they will take, it would decide my own. If they would choose to wait for their father to reprieve his mistakes and come up to their standpoint, then by all means, so would I; but if they thought best to press on toward Perfection, waiting for none, I should be anxious to do the same, though it looks to me like a selfish decision. But since I cannot know this now, I feel too weak and ignorant to decide so great a matter for myself and so many others, alone.” Her request to President Cannon, with whom she has taken counsel before, is rooted firmly in her faith: “God come to you, knowing you to be a sincere friend to my deceased husband, as well as to myself; and because there is not in Beaver any one to whom I can go with the same confidence that I would get disinterested, impartial, unprejudiced advice. As I said before, 1 feel almost ashamed of even asking counsel on this matter; but I am pressed for a decision, and I dare not rely on my own unaided judgment. Dear Brother Cannon, pray for me fervently; pray in the Temple, where your prayers will surely be heard, and if need be, take counsel for me; and then write to me and advise me what course to take”. Her faith in the prayers of this righteous man and her faith that the temple is a house of revelation is clearly exercised in her willingness to abide by his decision. She adds revealingly in the last paragraph: “God knows I would not wrong the dead; I only wish to know what is right. I do not even desire to be married, for I naturally prefer a single life; but I do fervently desire to serve the Lord with all -my might, mind and strength, and am willing to do all that can be required of me in righteousness; and I know that God will not require more than this, and to him I commend myself and all that a" dear to me. Amen.” President Cannon wrote back, giving her what she calls "hard" counsel. Even though we do not have his letter, he obviously advised her to write to the president of the church and lay the case before him. Lucinda protests: “It almost seems more than my soul's salvation is worth, to make a written accusation or complaint against Brother Charles, and then be so cold hearted and relentless as to ask somebody to sign it. I am by no means sure that I can get my own consent to do that, although, as you say, I ought to know him better than anyone else. I have grown so accustomed to befriending, consoling, and sustaining him that it would be hard to recognize myself if doing the opposite. Pray God, pity him as I do." However, his counsel apparently prevailed, at least in part, for she wrote to President Taylor, heard nothing, and sent an anxious letter on November 24, inquiring after the previous letters. Her usually exquisite penmanship is rough, she misspells two words, and has gone back to put in others. If ever a letter breathed agitation, this one mutely does. Her worry must have increased as again she received acknowledgment of receipt but no reply from President Taylor. He was suffering the anti-polygamy persecution that would drive him as a polygamist to the Underground within a few months and she did not hear from him until March 17, 1887, two and a half years later. They must have been anguished years, but we know little of how she spent them. She continued teaching school. Although she is a widow and the sole support of her children, she is listed in Relief Society records as having contributed two bushels of wheat for storage in 1885, that first year of her patient wait. The Beaver Sunday school minute books for 1886-94 list Lucinda as both a student with one hundred percent attendance in a class where no teacher is mentioned, and as a teacher for at least two classes; she also appears on the list of choir members. But we have no indication of what Lucinda was thinking during the nearly three years before President Taylor was able to respond to her request. There may have been other correspondence between them, for when President Taylor wrote on March 17, 1887, he did not address it to Lucinda's home in Beaver but to Inverury (outside Richfield) where she was visiting. He apologized for not having answered her sooner and then said: “After considering your case and giving it such examination as has been possible under the circumstances, I have decided that if you desire the dissolution of your marriage for eternity with your deceased husband, Charles Wakeman Dalton, it should be granted to you. From all that I can learn concerning his life, in addition to what you yourself have written to me, I consider your future unsafe in his hands. If you should decide to have the marriage for eternity dissolved, you will please give me the date when and the place where you were married to him, and I will have the entry made upon the record to the effect that the marriage is dissolved. When this is done you will be at liberty to contract a new alliance for time and eternity and of course will take your children with you” It is worth noting that President Taylor does not tell her what to do. With a delicacy that honors her free agency he gives her the choice, his opinion, and the projected results, thereby assuring her that he has made a separate inquiry as well as considering her own report. The last sentence is ambiguous to a modern reader; was he promising her that she could have her children regardless of her marital status, or was he promising her children if she re- married? Lucinda clearly interpreted his instructions as a guarantee of her children. She sent him the information he requested, then pled poignantly for even more explicit reassurance. She wrote on April 2: “I realize solemnly the magnitude of the step you advise me to take, and my whole soul goes out in prayer to my Heavenly Father that His hand may lead me and his spirit guide me into all righteousness, and preserve me from all evil. and in the Book of Covenants that whomsoever you bless God will bless, and whose so ever sins you remit on earth they shall be remitted in the Heavens; therefore I beseech you, in the exercise of your rightful authority, to pronounce me pure and blameless in this thing, and bestow upon me by the holy spirit of promise the blessings of the Elect; that I may press forward in the battle of Life strengthened by the assurance that I am justified in the sight of God.” President Taylor, responding to this wholesale pleading, re-plied immediately, informing her that her sealing had been annulled. He reassures, "This will make you free to contract such an alliance as may be agreeable to you, for time and for eternity; and on taking this step you may rest assured, from all that I can learn of your former husband's conduct, you are free from all blame and condemnation, and stand acquitted before the Lord. It is not right that you should remain connected and bound up with that man for eternity, and for this you have been released, and are fully justified in the step you have taken.” With this bleak comfort, Lucinda's marriage of almost nineteen years to "that man" came to an end. What do we know of him, the silent partner in this drama? The clues are pitifully sparse. We know that his father, Simon Cooker Dalton, gave him a heritage of sacrifice and courage. Undaunted, Simon took his two oldest sons, one of whom was Charles, and went to Nauvoo where he remarried. He crossed the plains in 1849. Charles, then twenty-three, either accompanied his father or followed him closely, even though he is not listed in the company, since his own oldest son was born "on the banks of the Sweetwater" in Wyoming on August 26, 1849, to Julietta E. Bowen, his first wife. Juanita Brooks lists Charles W. Dalton among those called to colonize the Iron Mission December 2, 1850, "all of whom," she comments tantalizingly, "would be involved with John D. Lee in the blackest deed of Utah history"- the Mountain Meadows massacre." (Of note is that Charles Wakeman Dalton was not involved in this massacre. Charles was, by Lucinda's testimony, a loving husband and father to the end of his life, and was also a good provider. However, only Julietta, his first wife, was willing to retain her title for eternity. His third wife, Sarah Jane Lee, daughter of John D. Lee, and Lucinda's sister Emma divorced him while he was still alive. Lucinda and Elizabeth Allred, his second wife, canceled their sealing after his death, Elizabeth apparently to be sealed to her second husband, Calvin White Moore, whom she had married on July 26, 1887, four years after Charles' death and, coincidentally, only four months after Lucinda's own sealing was canceled. (This cancellation was later revoked by President Heber J. Grant on February 26, 1931, fifteen years after her own death which would, in effect, left her sealed to Charles again.) We cannot, of course, attribute what amounts to the failure of four marriages exclusively to Charles Dalton. We have reason from ward records to believe that his behavior may have once prompted ecclesiastical inquiry, and that people felt he did not deserve his wife and children. We do not know why he did not rebuild what had apparently been a good character. But perhaps, in all justice, we must share that burden of blame with Lucinda. She may have refused to let him repent. She was not a weak woman, and she must have been dismayed to the very depths of her soul that the man she had married with such a clear promise from the Lord had proven himself less than worthy. Possessed of few illusions about marriage in the first place and willing to marry "only because of its expected joys in eternity," as she says she may have seen in both her husband and her father lights that failed, towers that crumbled, whited sepulchers full of the bones of her dead dreams. Responding out of that disillusion, she may have given up on Charles completely and pressed him so closely with her mistrust that he could never build his own self-respect again. She was strong enough to do whatever her faith required; as she interpreted the gospel, her faith required her to press Charles toward righteousness in his lifetime and to separate herself from him after his death. Obviously she loved him during his life and grieved for him after his death. Her decision after his death was obviously agonizing for her. But once she had what she thought was a clear answer, she was inexorable. But did she review her decision during those thirty-eight years? Did her love for her children and the church sustain her through the times of loneliness and discouragement that must have come? Even though our information about how she spent those years is scanty, we have one important piece of evidence; she died, Lucinda Dalton, Charles' wife in name if not in fact. We do not know what happened to that wooing suitor in Beaver. Perhaps his ardor had cooled in the long interval between his first interest and her permission to remarry three years later. Perhaps the ordeal had been so trying that she could not face the prospect of another marriage. And perhaps the simple political facts of the persecution against polygamy dictated her continued single state. She moved, probably in 1888, to Manti, and probably at the same time her mother also transferred her residence to that city so she could "work in the temple." We know that Lucinda continued to teach school and, at some point, taught for a few years in Ogden as well, then returned to Manti "where she spent her last days in working in the Temple and attending to Church duties.” She continued to write occasionally, and her poems and essays appear in the Exponent and the Young Women's Journal. She opened 1893 with the blazing manifesto in "Woman," the poem that begins this sketch of her life. In it we feel her pride in womanhood, her sense of outraged justice, and her unwavering faith that the Restoration includes the restoration of woman's eternal honor as well, ending with its exultant prophecy: "And the last shall be first, forever." That year was a banner year for Lucinda's feminism. "Woman, Arise!" a rousing, militant song, was published March 1, and later became part of a suffrage songbook. The next year she authored a "Woman Suffrage Column" on the front page, demanding rhetorically: "Shall our sons be untainted with servitude and degradation if their mothers be not free, any better than they could be all white if we gave them African mothers?" Her contributions to the Exponent were not her only contributions to the suffrage movement. There are still minutes extant from a suffrage association in Beaver a few years after she left the town that she would certainly have participated in earlier years. Her sister Rose was appointed Utah vice-president of the Utah State Chapter of Women Voters, and Lucinda is listed among five women praised in Manti for making "education and promotion of equal suffrage part of their daily lives.” She was a teacher in Manti North Ward's Sunday School for several years, and gradually, her family dwindled as death took one after another. Her mother died in March 1905, and the obituary contains a curious error: "Mr. Lee died in 1871.” In point of fact, John Percival Lee was still alive and would not die until April of 1907, almost exactly two years later. Given the vagaries of reporters and the case with which numbers may be mistaken by a typesetter, it would be foolish to put too much emphasis on this discrepancy, but we recall that 1871 was, in fact, the year when John P. Lee and Eliza Foscue Lee separated, bitterly and permanently. Perhaps for her that was his death date. Only a brief notice marks the passing of Lucinda's father two years later in Thatcher, Arizona. "Father Lee," it says, "was a man of sterling good character. His funeral was conducted here, where many friends of the deceased turned out to show their respect to him. The summer of 1912 five years later was one that wrung Lucinda's steadfast heart again. Her son Guy, by then the father of a four-year-old daughter, had suffered from tuberculosis for some time. That summer he decided to try the air in a canyon near Manti, but his health was more fragile than he had supposed. He died even before they reached "the point of their intended destination." The obituary reports: "Mrs. Dalton relates that there was nothing she could do but to place the dead body of her husband in the buggy and drive down the canyon to their home. The spectacle was a pathetic one when friends first saw the grief-stricken woman managing the team and seeking to comfort the 4 year old daughter, while the husband and father lay dead in the bottom of the buggy. Thus, only two children survived Lucinda, her oldest daughter, Belle, and her youngest son, Clifford. She died herself on November 24, 1925, seventy-eight years old. Her obituary records that her services were held on a Sunday in the North Ward chapel; her former bishop read some of her poems and commended "the good life and character of the deceased." The minutes list the names of two other speakers and add that the songs sung were "I Know that My Redeemer Lives" and "There Is A Green Hill Far Away."" We have no way of knowing if the songs were her own choice; it would be appropriate if they were, for every line breathes her own unflinching faith in the Savior. We also do not know what poems he selected, but "House of Life" would have been an exquisite choice. In this poem, written a quarter century before, the narrator describes herself as the mistress of a beautiful home, exquisitely built, carefully furnished, and lovingly given to her by "my Lord." Yet the sight of more splendid palaces dispelled her joy. Dissatisfied, she neglected her mansion. Dust collected on the windows, the lovely rooms went un-repaired and un-garlanded, cobwebs festooned corners, and "its beauty began to decay." “A footstep draws near! My Lord-He is here! He gazes in pain and amazement. This wreck is the Temple for you I did rear," For shame I could not raise my eyes. 0, foolish one, what doest thou lack, but the will? If these were too narrow for thee, More stately apartments to plan and to build? Who loves not my gift, loves not me." He passed, and I dared not beseech Him to stay- My opened eyes, yes saw clearly now, How foolish and blind was my envy; straightway I made with repentance a vow- To honor my gift, to fill it with light, Embellish and keep it with care, That henceforth it be in my Lord's kings sight A dwelling place lovely and fair. When next His dear footsteps draw near to my door, With gladness I'll usher Him in; No mildew or rust shall He see as before, To restore it at once I'll begin. I'll live my dear home for the Giver's sake, nor sigh if more stately ones be, For God, the dear Giver, can make no mistake; He knows what is best for me”. That last stanza represents reconciliation, not relaxation; peace, not mere patience. There is a wholeness and holiness about its acceptance that fairly radiates. Possibly it was in this mood-envy laid and dissatisfaction dissolved by joy-that she spent the next quarter century before her death. She had cause for bitterness during those last years in Manti. She had thought marriage something to be endured during life for the sake of its blessings afterwards, and now she would not have those blessings. In this time of double bereavement, she must have clung to her children as the one great good that her marriage had produced-but death took half of those that remained after Charles' death. However, the quality of her previous life and the resolution of her character let us predict with safety that those years at the close were indeed years of peace and faith. If she had, at any point, been given the choice between suffering with eventual salvation, and shallow contentment with dulled sensibilities and a less-than-total achievement, she would have held out both hands to pain at once. She was that kind of woman. The following is the official Autobiography of Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton. Sarah Lucinda wrote the story of her life in the form of this letter to Mrs. Emmeline B. Wells, then the editor of the “Woman’s Exponent” an unofficial journal reflecting the interest of the Mormon Relief Society and dedicated to promotion of woman suffrage. In this letter of autobiographical material discussing her problem of being educated, liberated woman in world dominated by men. Born in Alabama, 1847. Joined Mormons in DeWitt County, Texas, 1849. Crossed plains to Utah, 1850. Settled at San Bernardino but returned to Utah at outbreak of Utah War, 1857-58. She was a Teacher. Married Charles W. Dalton. Spiritual experiences. Written in Circle Valley, Piute County, 1876. The Woman's Exponent was a bi-monthly paper independently published in Salt Lake City between 1872 and 1914. It was outspoken in its support of feminism and suffrage, regularly editorializing and reporting on the movements. It also reported on the activities of L. D. S. women's organizations, including Relief Society and Young Ladies Association. It received encouragement from church leaders but was financed by subscription. AUTOBIOGRAPHY of Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton: Circle Valley, Piute, Co. Utah 27 December 1876 Mrs. E. T. Wells Salt Lake City, Utah Dear Sister: I prefer giving the brief sketch of my life, which you have asked of me, in the form of a letter to yourself; and although I leave you liberty to do with it just as you please, so abridge, to prune--yet I think I would prefer to have you treat me in the third person, still reserving to yourself the right to make extracts from my own words. I was born in the year 1847 on a plantation in Coosa County, Alabama. The Gospel of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints gained my parents in DeWitt County, Texas in 1849. In the spring of 1850, they started with many other converts to Utah. And one incident of their experience, which, as related by my parents, always possessed most fascinating interest to met I must relate. They were waiting at Council Bluffs or Kanesville in company of, many gold hunters and other unbelievers for the spring rain to start the grass for the support of the teams. The spring was warm but dry; and for weeks they waited and watched without seeing the least favorable indication. At last Elder-Orson Hyde, who was presiding over the companies of Saints, instructed them to inquire into the condition of the poor among them, minister to all their actual needs, set all temporal things in order and then come with pure hearts and clean hands before their God and ask for rain. They did so; and the gold hunters looked on in round eyed wonder at the preparation; and when, all 'things being, prepared, a protracted meeting was called and the Saints began to pray so fervently for rain, they, the gold hunters, looked up at the smiling sky and shook their heads. However, they forbore to scoff because they hoped for the same thing the Saints prayed for. The first afternoon a few small dots of clouds appeared and passed over. The second day a small but damp-looking cloud hovered about and I think it was on the third day "they fled, every man to his tent, for the windows of heaven were opened" so widely that some talked of a second deluge. The gold hunters shook their heads more than ever and declared it to be more than they could understand. The warm earth drank the refreshing draught and shot up the beautiful herbage all were so anxious to see, and then all joyfully crossed the river and took their way into the wilderness. I was not more than three years old at the time, but I distinctly remember crossing the river, and also many incidents connected with the journey to Utah. Early in 1851 my Parents went to California with the company led by A. M. Lyman and C. C. Rich; remained there seven years and returned to Utah in the winter of 1857-8. They were so poor that sometimes we wanted for broad; but in my tenth year, a small patrimony of my mother's relieved the case a little. But during the deepest of his poverty, my father determined that his children should not be ignorant as well as poor. At the close of his days work patiently taught us while yet too young to attend the common schools. So effectual was his care on me, that when, according to law I completed 5th year and entered the public school, I found myself in a class of great, untaught girls entering their teens. My mother, too, was so energetic in the matter of sending us to school, that though having many small children, and being under the necessity of "taking in work" for the sake of what she could earn, she kept the older ones in school so resolutely, that I only remember losing half a day in several years. I was eleven years old when we returned to Utah, and though I did not then know, what I know now, how she sat by her candle far into the night while I slept, to keep up with woman's everlasting work so that she could spare me, her eldest daughter (the mother's right hand) to attend school. I was not ungrateful even then for I loved my books and came to regard the head of the class as my rightful place, my parents desired to give me especially every opportunity at their command, hoping that afterwards I would be able to teach my younger brothers and sisters. But the mixed and ill-regulated schools of new countries such as Southern California and Utah were twenty years ago, are not capable, of even when supplemented by diligence, of giving that thorough and methodical training which is the great object of school life. Scattered in- formation is certainly better than none, but in my opinion, for the purpose of life, it compares with symptomatic training much like a weak crutch with a strong leg. I keenly feel this great defect in my merely common school education, but much was the best then to be had. The first teacher whose instruction I enjoyed in Utah, --bless him! Seemed to think me a sort of rough diamond, and compassionating my ravenous hunger for knowledge, gave to me instruction many a noontide hour when other children played and other men went home to dinner. He introduced me to a few of the elements of common philosophy, gave me a few simple lessons in botany and some other branches of natural history, and led me through some of the enchanted vales of poesy; and his criticisms on elevated and manlin sentiment in poetry are still my guide. He also gave me the first sweet drought from the immortal fountain of music--and the love of music was truly the master passion of my soul. On his authority I have the temerity to say that I had a genius for music: but alas, and alas! It is dying of hunger. His rudimentary instruction, the village choir and an accordion limit ray musical advantages and attainment. And OH, pity me that it in so ! because my longing for musical culture has been so intense as to be beyond expression. No weary traveler across the burning desert ever longed more bitterly for water, nor famished slave for bread, than I for music. At the age of twelve years, this beloved tutor and friend began training me for a teacher; but a few months later my father opened a private school and took me to assist him, and from that time I was a pupil no more. I worked with him the greater part of the time until about sixteen years old, when I was installed teacher of an infant school. I followed teaching as a profession several years during which time the infant school resolved itself into a mixed or common school, and I found myself under the necessity of applying myself to my books or acknowledging myself vanquished by industrious boy or girl. Many an evening I faithfully fathomed the few pages in the Arithmetic which the first pupil would likely to achieve during the following day and the knowledge that it must be done, so sharpened wits that I never failed, and seldom had any serious difficulty. Thus I advanced my knowledge of the common branches of learning, but my great ambition to gain a liberal education is still ungratified. In the early days of Utah, the struggle for bare sustenance was so severe that there was little time or opportunity for anything else, but I am thankful it is so much better now. I am truly thankful for every advantage I did enjoy, and truly wish I had improved them better; but there are times when my heart faints within me as I think of my God-given talents rusting away for want of polishing and I do believe there is sin in coveting that which is my neighbors when I see others slight their privileges and trifle those inestimable opportunities for which I have been almost consumed with longing. And it is most humiliating to see boys and girls get in their teens acquiring greater proficiency than all my tedious years of self culture have enabled me to gain. But I am glad they are not limited to my meager opportunities and I console myself for all that I lack, with the hope and determination that my children shall have a large part of that which I sought but never found. From my childhood I have done considerable thinking and long years ago, pondered questions which puzzle me still. As long ago as I can remember I longed to be a boy, because boys were so highly privileged and so free. Thousands of things for which I heard girls gravely reproved, met only an indulgent smile when done by boys. They could go when and where they pleased, alone or otherwise, without a thought of danger or impropriety. Education was offered to them accompanied with bribes, promises and persuasions, while doled out to girls grudgingly as something utterly wasted and expected to be of no further use. Well I remember my disgust when I asked a gentleman teacher if, in his opinion, I was sufficiently advanced in mathematics to study algebra with profit and he replied that it would be wasted time for me ever to study it, because I already had more learning than was necessary for a good housekeeper, wife and mother which was a women’s only proper place on earth. However, it is but justice to him and myself to say that he has since warmly commended my efforts at self culture and the good I have done an a teacher. Often I have winced under the unconcealed contempt for "Females" expressed by masculine of all grades from the urchin in pinafores to the finest scholars and ablest stamen of the world. For these and many other reasons, in my youth and "blissful ignorance” longed to be a boy; but like Fanny Ferin "I am now thankful that I belong to a more respectable class of society". Not for all their boasted "supremacy", "superiority" and extended advantages would I have women come down to their low moral level. Intellectual acquirements, fame, power, and even their self conceit added is as feathers in the scale against moral purity and since undeniably there are vastly more good women than good men on the earth, who will dare decide that it would not be better for all potent custom to allow, two or more of these good woman to marry one good man, than to condemn them whether they would or not, either to live single or to wed a man a thousand fathoms beneath them? I never could see a spark of justice in that rule, inalterable as the laws of the Medes and Persians, that unless married, a woman passing to middle age must be severely condemned, while there is so little in the condition of matrimony and its male candidates to tempt a refined and noble minded woman. (When I first entered "society" it did not take me long to perceive that the smiles and courtesies, the attentions and polite services which were showered upon me were given, not to me, but to my youth and personal appearance; while my mother whose noble soul and heroic self sacrifice for her children’s good I knew to be so well worthy of respectful homage, was indebted for brief courtesy to the sole fact of being a sort of appendage to a young lady's state.) Even while polite attentions from gentlemen were in themselves pleasant, I always felt a sort of quilt in accepting for personality what I knew was tendered merely to abstract youth and beauty; and much disgust at the thought that my quick intellect, my honest heart, my high aspirations, all the sterling worth that was really of myself were never considered in this glittering realm of pleasure to which I was beckoned. What girl that ever paused to think that she was caressed by society merely for her youth and freshness, things not in the least due to herself, and which advancing time will surely take from her and then will surely be forsaken by this same society through no fault of her own, would ever become enamored of its fleeting pleasure and hollow praise? I never was. Although the metrical movements of the dance in time to the rhythm of sweet music were very pleasant, I could grow tired as of any other kind of exercise but I have seen girls who professed never to tire of dancing. I have often looked on while the beautiful girls, radiant in youth and happiness, with their devoted partners whirled through the dreamy waltz or sprightly cotillion, and mused on the possibility of one of these lovely and carefree maidens, become a woman and perhaps a wife of one of these same adoring youths, wearing out not only her youth but her very life, drudging from morning to night to keep his house and from night until morning with his ailing baby, only to be looked on by him as an inferior being, designed by nature to serve him. He will also think her a lucky women to have won so superior a man as himself to take care of her; and he will talk about supporting her as if she did not perform more actual work and do more real contriving in twenty-four hours than her lord and master in a week. I wondered how any men could have the effrontery to ask, or any woman the supiness to lay down the scepter and crown of girlhood to assume the yoke and burden of wife hood. M pray or was then as now that the time may come speedily when women will know and hold themselves at their true worth; when their eyes will be opened to the degradation of wasting their spotless lives on worthless and depraved men when by the extent of their knowledge of life as it is and as it should be by the depth of their contempt for men who lead unholy lives, and by the firmness of their resolution and the dignity of their self-respect they shall compel men to come up to their standard of morality and with them seek something still better, or be outcast from the Eden of women’s association. Since there is nothing in nature to prevent woman from sharing all the good things of this world. I am proud and thankful to see her beginning to burst the bands of that ironhanded custom which has so long warned her not to touch, and asserting her co-heirships with her brother man. I am not so unjust as to make no exceptions to all the sweeping assertions I have been making. I know all women are not good and true, nor all men tyrannical and unjust. I could mention the names of several men pledged heart and soul to the Latter day work of woman’s emancipation from her long bondage; and one at least of my acquaintance is a far more ferocious antagonist of Woman Slavery than I. From him I received the first antidote draught to cure my misanthropy and disgust of life. He was the first showed me wherein religion is not leagued with woman's oppressors; who first assured me with a man’s lips that woman has as good a right to her individuality and her free agency on this earth as her brother man. So you see, my dear friend, that for his sake, did I never know another liberal minded, large-hearted man, I could not, and would wish to condemn the whole race. I shall give honor where honor is due, and while waiting for the good time coming when all men-women shall be free and equal, put in my feeble oar wherever I can in her service. I am religious by nature; and in behalf of my religion I will bear witness that it has upheld me through many a bitter trial, and comforted me in grief when nothing else could. I was early taught to pray, and for the greater part of my life never closed my eyes for sleep without prayer. I do not recollect ever attending a ball or place of amusement without asking God to keep me from all ill or unbecoming thoughts, words or deeds and from accident or harm of any kind. During the entertainment I often recalled the prayer and call truly say that my prayers were answered. Few young girls ever met fewer little mortifying mishaps, or moved amid giddy pleasures with less danger of becoming enamored of them. I was baptized at eight years old with the understanding from my parents' teaching, that this ceremony and covenant, entered into willingly, entitled me to all the privileges and blessings of a beloved child of our Father until I should arrive at years of discretion; when it would become necessary for me either to ratify or repudiate the covenant. Looking back, I see Multiplied Manifestations of grace which should have comforted and strengthened and satisfied me. But, from reading and tradition, I was so deeply imbued with the methodistical idea of a sudden and entire change of Heart that I was blind to try open sweet experience of the grace of God; and sought mourning for that, which was already mine. Where can be a need of a "change of heart" if one's heart is already at the feet of Christ? And what could convince one of being accepted by God, if not such an experience as that. When I was about sixteen years old, a beloved baby brother was very sick and sinking so rapidly that 1 had great fear that he would die; but I felt, in all humility, that I had lived near to the Lord, had tried to do His will and was entitled to claim the promise “Whatever ye ask in my name in faith that ye shall receive". Un-know to my parents, I fasted and prayed with intense fervor that the little one's life might be spared. I could not fail to see that he no longer grew worst, but neither did he grow better; but just remained at one point which was a point of deep distress. For several days he lingered thus, I felt like I had lifted heavy weight just to the edge of a place of rest but lacked the one-ounce of power necessary to deposit it thereon. Coming at one time suddenly into the room, I saw my mother wring her hands and cry in anguish: “Why, Oh why must my innocent baby suffer so much” If it is God's will to take him away, Oh, let his cruel sufferings end!" My heart smote me guiltily. Perhaps, thought I, it is God's will to take him, perhaps my shortsighted wishes stand between the beloved and his rest. I hastened away and with streaming eyes fell upon. my knees crying: "Thy will 0 Lord, not mine be done” As soon as I was calm enough to reenter the sick room I did so and was struck to the heart by the change in the precious one's face and the same evening he died. But the greatest spiritual manifestation ever vouchsafed to me was in relation to my marriage. I had seen in the married state so much that was disagreeable amid humiliating to women, that I was firmly resolve to remain single. I knew I was quite able to provide for myself and lay up a competence for age without any man's assistance and although I loved children, I could not bring myself to believe that rearing children was the only way in which a women could serve the Lord acceptably. I knew that in my own profession of teaching I could do more to mold the moral nature of the young than any one mother in the privacy of her home. Moreover there are few who yearn for children who cannot find some poor, motherless lamb of the fold needing shelter and though I never tried to cheat myself into the belief that any such could ever be quite one’s own flesh and blood. I believed then as firmly as I do now, that it is the good we do rather than the personal pleasure in doing it, which brings us joy hereafter. I was quite willing that those who chose that manner of serving the Lord might marry; but I was determined to choose the "better" way according to St. Paul. But as I gained "here a little, and there a little" knowledge of the religion I professed and especially when after much meditation, study and prayer, I in my twentieth year, willingly renewed my covenant and enrolled myself a responsible member of the church. I learned that in the highest glory of Heaven, none are single. One man or one woman is but half of a perfect individual and we must bid adieu to reason itself when we try to suppose that anything short of absolute perfection will attain to the highest glory. The highest Heaven had always been my goal, this little insurmountable piece of reasoning was worse than gall and wormwood to me, for in my pride of heart, I had determined to win my soul's salvation alone. I did not want a co-worker, forgetting that the best and bravest of us are only too happy to be acknowledged coworkers with Christ. It took some time to reconcile my hard heart to this fact; I even told myself I should prefer to become handmaiden to some sanctified woman than what I termed "chief servant in a gentleman's household". I had been told in express terms by some blind leaders of the blind; that the Kingdom, here and hereafter be- longed only to man; and that woman enjoyed its gifts and blessings only in sufficient degree to make her man's efficient servant; and that looked to me not worth striving for. It was in this state of mind that I first became acquainted with Charles Wakeman Dalton, who, after a time, intimated to me that I would make a most desirable wife. I resented the thought and told him that the man who thought I should be a meek, obedient, unobtrusive servant was very sadly wrong. When he comprehended my bitterness and my position on the subject, he mildly reasoned that to be a servant is not always a degrading thing, but the reverse. The greatest service ever performed on earth was done by Christ for the whole human family, and which left us all deeply his debtors. It benefits conferred, produces a corresponding obligation on the part of the one benefited. Between husband and wife there is need of mutual service and whichever fails in discharging this obligation falls thus far under condemnation. For the wife is no more bound to follow the husband's advice than he hers; but when advice is really good, either would lose by not doing so. He know of no such obligation which was not equally binding of each. This was new light on a difficult problem. This was speaking from reason and common sense instead of vaguely hinting at some foggy superstition about man's being created first and consequently best, noblest and supreme. These were arguments at once indisputable and satisfactory. No true woman wishes to evade her just obligations, but she scorns to enter into a contract which binds only herself. While mutual service is pleasant and desirable, one-sided service is bitter and detestable; the one is truly ennobling, the other degrading. I began to see that artificial rule had superseded natural ones in this matter, but that because most people arrived at a false conclusion by taking a false starting point, I had no need to do the same. With a husband who is willing, a woman may easily preserve her individuality even after marriage; always provided she has any to be preserved, and that I considered I did have. Here, thought I, is a man who does not think that merely because he is male he stands a whole flight of stairs higher in creation than a woman and believe him to be honest and true as well as liberal minded. I could see that it would be easy to love him. At this point a new hydra rose up before me in this shape: "Who are you and how did you become so wise as to dare choose with whom you will pass not only this brief life but the countless ages of eternity?" I felt that I did not dare; for had not thousands of wiser and better women than I made mistakes which wrecked not only their own happiness here and hopes for the hereafter, but entailed misery, disgrace and ruin on. innocent children. For time alone, as the people of the world marry, I could not and would not, because I considered that in a woman's case, the burdens and trials of matrimony far exceed its benefits and blessings., Only for the sake of its expected joys in eternity, could I endure its trials through time; but that cherished "free agency" which gives a woman the choice with which of her fellow beings she will undertake to find eternal happiness, began to look far more like a burden and a snare than a than a privilege or a blessing. I thought and dreamed about it; I grew pale and hollow-eyed over it but found no conclusion. I was at list willing to love a man, but dared not assume the responsibility of becoming his wife. Getting no answer to all my prayers, in very despair and in deep humiliation because I was impressed so to do--I called on him to pray with me on the subject. I know he was startled by the demand, and felt it like assuming a great responsibility, but he hesitated only long enough to learn that there was no shadow of trifling in me. He knelt down first, and I placed myself beside him and laid one of my hands on one of his and as I did so, I felt a thrill through every fiber of my being and I know he felt the same. I was utterly crushed under the knowledge that within a few minutes a question would be settled which would shape and determine my destiny forever. Cowardly, I dreaded to meet the decision. The prayer was short, simple and unassuming, but direct, earnest and sincere and at every word uttered a huge stone of my mountain load of doubt and fear rolled from my soul. I felt that we were in the presence of the hosts of heaven and a direct incontrovertible testimony was given me that it was the will of God and not my will that I should acquire this man for my yoke-fellow. He knew as well as I what the decision was and in awe struck solemnity we left the spot. To this day it is to both of us a most precious and solemn recollection and is never mentioned between us except with deepest reverence. Early in my married life one day my mother was sitting with me in my own home, and I was embroidering a delicate muslin robe for my expected child. After much pleasant conversation, she inquired half playfully, how I felt doing such pretty work for a child of my own. A most natural and innocent question, but, my mother thought, most direful in its effect; for, throwing down the work and bursting into hysterical weeping I wailed: "Oh! Mother, I feel like I were sewing on a shroud." She was alarmed for my safety, and urged the necessity of self-control, and begged to know if she had said anything wrong. When I was sufficiently recovered, I explained. For months a haunting dread had hung like a great, black cloud over me, that my child would die in infancy. I had tried to smile at it; I had refused it admittance to my thoughts; I had fought it like a deadly foe, and barred the doors of my soul against it; but still it lay in wait, and my Mother's unexpected question suddenly flung wide all those barred doors and gave the enemy full possession. Lying, as I may say, a bound and helpless captive at the feet of my foe. I confessed my secret grief. As in duty bound, even had she not fully believed it, my mother argued that I mistaken nervousness for presentiment and assured me that by the time I had borne half a dozen children I should be able to discriminate better. I sobbed forth "I wish you were right, Mother, but my child will live six months, a year or possibly two years, but not longer.'' Great was my surprise and delight, when, instead of the funny, wailing little skeleton I had expected, my child was a great, lusty boy who seemed the very impersonation of good health, high spirits and precocious intellect. Nothing ever seemed to hurt him,, and in the pride of my heart I laughed at former fears to scorn. I told my mother she was right and I was tempted to give up my belief in presentiments entirely. But in his fifteenth month, I found myself compelled to wean him; and it was with a sinking heart that I took him from the breast and began the old warfare again. He pinned from that day and in spite of all care, all weeping and praying, he died in my arms on the second anniversary of his birthday and we buried him in the embroidered dress I had once called a shroud. A strange and sad experience truly, and my mother lives to testify to its truth; but the warning which was once my torture and foe, is now my comfort and friend; because it assures me that it was not my ignorance of the laws of life and health which deprived the world of so noble a soul, but the will of God.. In the year of 1874, one of my inmate friends lost her husband by death. She was a woman of weak nerves and frail health and it was a heavy blow to her. I visited her in her bereavement and thought she found comfort in my visits. One night a few months after, when alone but for my second and only living child, I was suddenly, but without any stock or fear, with a vivid impression or consciousness that my friend's dead husband was present. I opened my lips to say: "Are you here Bro. and what can I do for you?" When the thought, "Who are you and what were you to him that you should receive communication from the dead?" I checked the words upon my lips. But the drawer was given that the husband dared not approach the wife because it would endanger her life and it was necessary that she should yet live--and that she would believe my word just as implicitly as a direct communication. At this point a pang, like grief reflected from another personality smote my heart and I knew that the presence was gone. Sorely did I repent my wicked humility, and with a sense of guilt I felt that I had lost an opportunity of doing good. After a few weeks my friend’s youngest child, an angle on Earth, died after only a few hours of languid discomfort which could hardly be called sickness. When I heard of it, I seemed to know that it was warning of this very thing, which I had been, desired to convey. When looked on the lovely, smiling face and dimpled hands, in all but color, a picture of blooming life and health, and beheld the frantic grief of the mother, my sense of guilt was almost more than I could bear. Soon afterward, I attempted to ease my mind by relating to the stricken one by incomplete experience, hoping she would utterly refuse to credit its genuineness. So far from doubting, she asked: "Oh, why did you not tell me even what you could? Do you think that had I known even that much, when my little girl came to see as she did only the day before she died, kissing and petting me, and saying so earnestly and so lovingly, "Oh, Ma, what makes you so good?" I say do you think anything on earth could have hindered me from returning her sweet caresses and precious love, instead of saying as I did say, "Shame on me, run away, dear, I am busy now” Do you think I would have been so busy as that, had you told me even a little?" Thus did that self-distrust which many are pleased to call modesty, become in me a sin; and as such do I repent it. These are not all of my spiritual experiences, but sufficient to be here related. I acknowledge my comparative ignorance of the things of God and the laws of spiritual progression here and hereafter; but what I do know. I know! I bear my testimony that God has stretched forth his hand to redeem his people; that Joseph Smith was a Prophet, Seer and Revelator, and Brigham Young his rightful successor; that the whole content, of the records from which the "Book of Mormon" was translated have not yet been revealed; but will be in the own due time of the Lord, at which time all who love him will rejoice. Blessed be most holy name. Amen (Signed) Lucinda Lee Dalton P.S. Dear friend: Even after "Rising in the night" I have overstepped the limits I gave myself, but truly have done my best. My husband's full name is Charles W. Dalton., and you may insert it where I had left it out if you think best. I hope I have not been tedious and that my story may do some good. I think you should send me a proof sheet. Received your postal too late. Sent a letter too just before, "By" unimportant. Please write as soon as you read this. In love and haste, L. L. D. (Lucinda Lee Dalton) Another letter written by Lucinda Lee Dalton: Payson, Utah Co., U.T. Dec. 9, 1891. Dear Cousins Lois & John. Mother forwarded your letters and her reply to me so that mine could go with hers. I was very glad indeed to hear from you, for I was feeling very lonesome, because I am a stranger here. I am teaching school here, and of course you will want to know how that is. Well, I "had too much to say"; that is, I always took the liberty to assert that it was a disgrace to the town to hire girls who had education enough, ability-enough, and character enough, to be trusted with our little children, for three dollars a week. The girls learned my tune and sung it to the Board until they were forced to raise their wages to the extravagant sum of $4.50 a week! Holding me to blame for this squandering of the publics funds, the Board resolved to take it out of my salary this year. But when I refused to rebate a hundred dollar of my wages, they hired another man, paid him as much or more, and left me to learn wisdom by the things I suffered. But Providence was on my side; I know, because Payson sent for me unasked, and I am all right yet. Annie had been urging mother for some time to come and visit her and since I was to be away so long, she thought it a favorable time for her visit, so it works well all around. Clifford has been having mumps, but very lightly, and is on the mend. Emma was in Provo last week with Rose but is now back in Salt Lake. Mary Black, Mary's oldest daughter, visited mother at Manti since I came away. Mother does have letters from Rupert and Charles, and will now get more news, Ellen lives in Provo. Please write again. Your affectionate cousin, L. L. Dalton. (The following was written upside down in the top margin) Love to all your children and Ida Udall, and all inquiring friends. Cannot answer you properly this time, but try, please. Lu. Obituary of Lucinda Lee Dalton from the Deseret Evening News, 1 December 1925 - Section 2, p. 14. "Pioneer School Teacher is buried at Manti" Manti, Dec. 1 - (Special) - Funeral services for Mrs. Lucinda Lee Dalton were held in the North ward chapel Sunday under the direction of Bishop E.T. Reid. Speakers were: Bishop N. R. Peterson, Ezra Billings and L. H. Hoogard. Bishop Reid read some of Mrs. Dalton’s poems. The choir furnished the music. Mrs. Dalton was born Feb. 9 1847 in Coosa County Alabama. She came to Utah in 1849 with her parents, John P. Lee and Eliza F. Lee. John P. Lee was called with others by Brigham Young to go to California to settle the town of San Bernardino. Mrs. Dalton started to teach school when 15 years old and taught 35 years in Manti, Beaver, Payson, Ferron and Ogden. She was a writer of both prose and poetry. She was married to Charles Wakeman Dalton in 1868. Six children were born to her, two of whom survive; C. W. Dalton, Salt Lake City and Belle D. Robbins of Los Angles Calif; Also four sisters; Mrs. Mary Black, Fruita; Colo. Mrs. Emma Sutherland, San Francisco; Mrs. Ellen Sanders, Salt Lake City; Mrs. Rose Sutherland, Washington D C. and a brother, Charles A. Lee. Buried in Plot A, Block 21, Lot 2, Grave 3. The Head Stone of Sarah Lucinda Lee Dalton in Manti, Utah |
5/9/2011 | Rodney G. Dalton, Utah | |
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County Limerick - Added Abbeyfele Baptisms & Marriages Contributed by Mike Dalton, Norfolk, UK MARRIAGES ABBEYFEALE Co Limerick 4Feb 1827 John Maria Wrenn James Dalton & John Herrick 21 Feb 1846 Tim Joan Fitzgerald Edmund Fitzgerald & Patrick Dalton 29 Jan 1854 Stephen Maria Collins Robert Ellis & James Dalton 7 Mar 1859 James Eliza Fitzgerald Tim Dalton & Bridget Fitzgerald 18 Feb 1863 James Ellen Nolan Ml. Shaughnessy & Mgt. Curtin 25 Feb 1879 James Anna Roche Thomas Roche & Johanna Roche 28 Nov 1893 John ( Purt) Maria Murphy Daniel Collins & Sarah Collins 18 Feb 1896 Henry (Dromtrasna) Brigt. Leahy John Collins & Hanora Hartnett BAPTISMS Date Child Parents Sponsors 13 Jul 1830 James James & Cath. Wrenn NR & Maria Wrenn 11 Dec 1830 Stephen Henry & Helen Sullivan Tce. O'Connor & Maria Moore 15 Nov 1832 Deborah Henry & Cath. Sullivan NR & Hanora Duggan 10 Nov 1834 Marion Js. & Hanora Wrenn NR & Mgt Riordan 2 Dec 1834 Cath. Patrick & Maria Dowling Js. Dalton & Maria Dooley 11 May 1837 Js. Wm. & Maria Doody Edmd. Dalton & Maria Doody 19 May 1837 John John & Helen Wrenn Rich. Fitzgerald & Cath. Fitzgerald 28 Jul 1839 John Ml. & Maria Doolin Dan Dalton & Jna Dalton 25 Feb 1841 Jna. John & Maria Wrenn NR & Ellen Fitzgerald 17 Jul 1843 Marion Denis & Maria Dolan Ml. Curtin & Helen Curtin 9 Jun 1844 Wm. John & Maria Dalton Con Donoghue & Ellen Fitzgerald 27 Sep 1846 Cath. Stephen & Maria Collins Re. Rich. Power & Maria Collins 23 Aug 1857 Maria Edmd & Judith Collins Patk. Ferris & Maria Collins 4 Feb 1858 Brigt. Stephen & Maria Collins Rev. Rich. Power & Cath. Collins 19 Feb 1859 Eliz. Stephen & Maria Collins Con Collins & Ellen Brick 25 Jun 1859 Hanora Edmd. & Judith Collins Ml. Brouder & Cath. Brouder 31 Mar 1861 Jna. Edmd. & Judith Collins Js. Dalton & Maria Dalton 28 Jul 1861 Batt. Stephen & Maria Collins Rev. M. Coughlan & Jna. Collins 6 Nov 1862 Maria Js. & Ellen Nolan Bernard Nolan & Cath. Nolan 11 Nov 1862 Js. Edmd. & Julia Collins Js. Dalton & Maria Collins 1 Dec 1862 Stephen Stephen & Maria Collins John Cotter & Ellen Cotter 21/ Dec 1863 John Stephen & Maria Collins John Collins & Brigt. Collins 20 Oct 1864 Edmd. Edmd. & Judith Collins NR & Ellen Fitzmaurice 15 Apr 1866 Maria Wm. & Helen Sexton Thos. Mescal & Maria McCarthy 8 July 1866 Julia Edmd. & Judith Collins Thos. Brouder & Mgt. Flaherty 3 Dec 1867 Js. Stephen & Maria Collins Wm. Leahy & Cath. Leahy 4 Aug 1868 Rich. Edmd. & Julia Collins Dl. Doody & Maria Connell 12 Jun 1870 John Edmd. & Julia Collins Patk. Collins & Maria Rourke 17 May 1871 Maria Js. & Jna. Curtin Lce. Curtin & Mgt. Curtin 4 Sep 1872 Wm. James & Jna Curtin Wm. Curtin & Julia Dalton 27 May 1873 Jna. Ml. & Cath. Wrenn John Wrenn & Maria Wrenn 28 Jun 1873 John Edmd. & Julia Collins Ml. Collins & Cath. Prenderville 14 Mar 1875 Patk. James & Jna. Curtin NR & Julia Curtin 26 May 1875 John Ml. & Cath. Wrenn NR & Maria Wrenn 13 Apr 1877 Jna. James & Jna. Curtin Con Curtin & Maria Quirke 30 May 1877 Cath. Ml. & Cath. Wrenn John Wrenn & Julia Wrenn 11 Aug 1878 Con. Js. & Jna. Curtin Lce. Curtin & Marie Quirke 19 Aug 1879 Helen Ml. & Cath. Wrenn Dl. Wrenn & Mgt. Riordan 11 Mar 1881 Js. John & Jna. Curtin Wm. Dalton & Julia Dalton 15 Jun 1883 Js. Ml. & Cath. Wrenn (Dromtrasna Collins) Mauce. Flynn & Ellen Flynn 1 Mar 1895 Stephen John & Mgt. Donovan (Abbeyfeale Hill) Batt. Collins & Maria Culhane 11 Jul 1896 Js. John & Mgt. Donovan ? Dalton & Cath. Donovan 31 Jul 1897 Joe John & Mgt. Donovan Peter Donovan & Maria Allens |
4/16/2011 | Mike Dalton, Norfolk UK | |
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The History of Edward Dalton By Rodney G. Dalton who is Edward Dalton's first cousin, four times removed. Edward Dalton was born March 23, 1827, on a farm called Dalton Hollow in the Township of Wysox, Bradford County Pennsylvania. He was the son of John Dalton, Jr., and Rebecca Cranmer. He had gray eyes and black hair. He stood five feet ten inches tall and weighed 190 pounds. He grew up in Wysox like his cousins, children of his four uncles and four Aunts. When the Dalton family pack up and moved, Edward traveled with his family to Michigan in Freedom, Washtenaw County. He moved to Wisconsin when his father, John Dalton Jr., decided that he had to move to a new location. He went with his family when they moved to Nauvoo, Illinois about 1842. Edward was 15 years of age when he was baptized on June 4th, 1843 in the Nauvoo Temple. He received his endowments in 1846 in Nauvoo. Edward helped build the Nauvoo Temple in Illinois, and contributed and assisted in the erecting of every Temple up to the time of his death. Edward owned two lots in Nauvoo. This was very good for a young single man. Track R8, Sec 1, NE, 160 acres and T4 R8, Sec 22, NE, 160 acres. He helped pack his families belongings when the Saints was driven from Nauvoo in Feb. of 1846. He endured all the hardships the others did. After many stops on the road to Utah, he was camped in Council Bluffs, Iowa when the call came from the President of the United States for 500 able bodied Latter-day Saints to march across the country to California to defend the country from Mexico, Edward and his brother Harry, and his cousin Henry Simon Dalton enlisted in the Mormon Battalion. Edward and Harry belonged to Company "D", known as the Santa Fe detachment. The Captain was John Brown; Edward and Harry were both privates. Edward was taken sick along the way so he could only make part of the trip. There being a numerous Mexican population in the Territory of Colorado, this detachment along with sick members were sent to Pueblo, Colorado. He was joined by his older brother Harry who stayed with me to take care of him. Here they were joined by a small company of Saints from Mississippi and Illinois. They spent the winter of 1846-1847 in Pueblo. A story about this winter trip to Pueblo: On the 10th, it was decided that a detachment of fifty-five sick men, under command of Lieutenant W. W. Willis, be sent back to Pueblo, by way of Santa Fe, to winter. The Colonel ordered that they be furnished with twenty-six days’ rations, allowing ten ounces of flour per day-eighteen ounces being the usual soldier’s ration. It appears though, that through some mistake, probably an oversight in loading the wagon, this amount was not taken. Lieutenant Willis, writing from memory of the incidents of the Battalion, says: "Active preparations now commenced to carry into effect the Colonel’s orders, and by 4 o’clock of the same day we had collected of invalids fifty-six, one big government wagon, four yoke of poor cattle, five days’ rations and two dressed sheep, as food for the sick. Our loading for the one wagon consisted of the clothing, blankets, cooking utensils, tents and tent poles, muskets, equipage, and provisions, and all invalids who were unable to walk. With some difficulty I obtained a spade or two and a shovel, but was provided with no medicines or other necessaries for the sick except the mutton before referred to, and only five days’ rations, to travel near three hundred miles. "Thus armed and equipped we commenced our lonesome march, retracing our steps to Santa Fe. We marched the same day about two miles and were visited by Captain Hunt and others at night, who spoke words of comfort to us and blessed us, administering the Church ordinance to the sick, and bidding us God speed. They left us the next day. "We resumed our march, camping in the evening near some springs. One yoke of our oxen got mired in the mud. We took off the yoke when one got out. The other we undertook to pull out with a rope and unfortunately broke his neck. Our team was now too weak for our load. In the night Brother John Green died, and we buried him by the side of Brother James Hampton. "What to do for a team we did not know. This was a dark time, and many were the earnest petitions that went up to our God and Father for Divine aid. "The next morning we found with our oxen a pair of splendid young steers, which was really cheering to us. We looked upon it as one of the providences of our Father in heaven. Thus provided for, we pursued our march. We traveled two days without further accident. "During the night of the 25th of November, Elijah Freeman was taken very ill. We hauled him next day in our wagon and could distinctly hear his groans to the head of our little column. We lay by next day for his benefit. It was very cold and snowy. Next day we resumed our march, but were forced to stop the wagon for our afflicted comrade to die. After his death we resumed our march until the usual time of camping when we buried the corpse. Richard Carter also died the same night and we buried him by the side of Brother Freeman. Their graves are four miles south of Secora, on the Rio Grande. "We continued our march to Albuquerque, where we presented our orders for assistance to Captain Burgwin, of Kearney’s brigade. He gave me five dollars, cash, and the privilege of exchanging our heavy wagon for a lighter one. I had fuel and everything to buy, and spent $66.00 of my own private money before reaching Santa Fe, which was, as near as I can recollect, about the 25th of November. "On my arrival at that place, General Price, commander of the post, ordered me to Pueblo, on the Arkansas river. He also ordered Quartermaster McKissock to furnish us with the necessary provisions, mules, etc. I obtained from the Quartermaster ten mules and pack-saddles, ropes and other fixtures necessary for packing. With this outfit we had to perform a journey of about three hundred miles, over the mountains, and in the winter. "Packing was new business to us, and at first we were quite awkward. This was about the 5th of December. The first day we marched about ten miles. Here we gave Brother Brazier, who was too sick to travel, a mule, and left Thomas Burns to wait upon him and follow, when he got able, to a Mr. Turley’s, where I designed leaving those who were unable to cross the mountains. "The next day we traveled about twenty miles and camped on a beautiful stream of water where we had to leave one broke-down mule. The day after, we marched about fifteen miles, and camped in a Spanish town. Here Alva Calkins, at his own request, remained to await the arrival of Brothers Brazier and Burns. About ten inches of snow fell that day, and the next day it snowed until about noon, after which we marched ten or twelve miles and hired quarters of a Spaniard. Here the men bought bread, onions, pork, etc., from their own private means. Brother William Coleman was seized with an unnatural appetite, and ate to excess. In the night we were all awakened by his groans. Dr. Rust gave him a little tincture of lobelia, the only medicine in camp, which gave him partial relief. "Continuing our journey, we traveled within about ten miles of Turley’s, Brother Coleman riding on a mule with the aid of two men to help him on and off. The next morning, started early for Mr. Turley’s to make arrangements for the sick. I left my saddle mule for the sick man, with strict instructions to have him brought to that place. On my arrival I made the necessary arrangements, and about noon the company arrived, but to my surprise and regret without Brother Coleman. They said he refused to come. Mr. Turley, on hearing me express my regret and dissatisfaction at his being left, proffered to send his team and carriage to go back next day and bring him in, which offer I accepted, and agreed to pay him for his trouble. I left quite a number of sick with Mr. Turley, paying him out of my own private funds for their rations and quarters, and then traveled about ten miles. At night, strong fears were entertained that the snow was so deep we could not cross the mountains and some resolved not to attempt it, accusing me of rashness. I called the company together and stated the fact to them that I was unauthorized to draw rations except for the journey and other necessaries unless for the sick, and that I was expending my own private money. I also stated that I should carry out my instructions and march to Pueblo to winter, if I had to go alone. I then called for a show of right hands of all who would accompany me. All voted but one, and he fell in afterwards and begged pardon for his opposition. "We continued our march from day to day, traveling through snow from two to four feet deep, with continued cold, piercing wind. The third day, about noon, we reached the summit of the mountain. Before reaching the top, however, I had to detail a rear guard of the most able-bodied men, to aid and encourage those who began to lag, and felt unable to proceed farther, whilst with others I marched at the head of the column to break the road through enormous snow banks. It was with the greatest exertion that we succeeded, and some were severely frost-bitten. When we got through the banks, to our inexpressible joy, we saw the valley of the Arkansas below, where the ground was bare. The drooping spirits of the men revived, and they soon descended to the plain below, where they were comparatively comfortable. From here the command had good weather and pleasant traveling to Pueblo, their destination for the remainder of the winter. "We arrived on the 24th of December, and found the detachments of Captains Brown and Higgins as well as could be expected, and enjoying themselves with some comfortable quarters." John G. Smith, of Captain Brown’s detachment, gives December 20th as the day upon which the first portion of Willis’ detachment arrived at Pueblo, instead of the 24th, as stated in the narrative of Lieutenant Willis. It is likely that Brother Smith’s date is the correct one; as he kept a daily journal and was very accurate in regard to dates. He states that the men in Willis’ command were haggard and emaciated on their arrival, from the sickness, hunger and fatigue which they had endured. Lieutenant Willis got Gilbert, son of Captain Jefferson Hunt, who had accompanied the families to this point, to go back to Mr. Turley’s and bring up the sick he had left there. They started on the 27th, and the same day the Lieutenant started for Bent’s Fort, a distance of seventy-five miles. He arrived on the 2nd and was very kindly received by Captain Enos, commander of the post and acting Quartermaster, who furnished sixty days’ rations for the company and transportation to Pueblo with ox teams. On Lieutenant Willis’ return, the detachment went to work, preparing their quarters, each mess to build a log cabin. About the middle of January Corporal Gilbert Hunt and company returned with all the sick except Brother Coleman. Mr. Turley forwarded the Lieutenant a letter by Corporal Hunt to the effect that he sent his carriage as agreed upon, but on arriving at the place where Brother Coleman was left, he was not there. The Spaniard reported that after the company had left, in spite of entreaties to the contrary, Brother Coleman, followed on after the company, and it was supposed, after traveling a short distance, he expired, as he was afterwards found dead, by the road-side not far distant. It was this group of Mormons who first established the Anglo- Saxon civilization there. They held the first religious service in English, taught the first school, and erected the first meeting house. The first white child born in Pueblo was a girl born to Mormon parents. Three Mormon Battalion sick detachments of disabled men along with some women and children, after spending the winter in 1846-47 at Pueblo, Colorado. An advance party of 13 soldiers met Brigham Young's company on 4 July while trailing livestock. The remainder of the sick detachments left Pueblo on 24 May and in company with some Saints from Mississippi, arrived in Salt Lake City on 29 July 1847, five days after Brigham Young had entered the valley. This group was led by Captain James Brown with Captains Nelson Higgins and Wm. W. Willis and 140 of the sick detachment of the Mormon Battalion arrived at the pioneer camp in Great Salt Lake Valley. President Bright Young and a number of the brethren went to meet them. The yellow line on map is the sick detachment route to Pueblo, Colorado. There were 140 of the Mormon Battalion and forty of the Mississippi Saints with them. They had 29 wagons, one carriage, 100 horses and mules and 300 head of cattle, which greatly added to the strength of the pioneer camp. The names of most of these are to be found in Journal History, July 29, 1847, pages 1-9. These should be designated as Pioneer companies of 1847, but not as part of the Original Pioneer company, which consisted only of the 143 men, three women and two children, known as the "Original Pioneers." Edward and Harry Dalton both settled in Salt Lake City, probably in one of the forts. Edward was single and Harry was waiting for his wife to arrive from the east with his father. Later Edward was assigned a lot where the other Dalton's would soon build on the same block. Edward Dalton met a young lady in Salt Lake City whose name was Mary Elizabeth Meeks and they were was married on March 6, 1848 by Brigham Young. Edward was the son of John Dalton, longtime friends of the Meeks family. Elizabeth and Edward had known each other in Nauvoo. Edward Dalton was called by Brigham Young to assist the surveyors in laying out Salt Lake City. His vocation being that of a farmer and lawyer. In January 1852 Edward was called on a mission to southern Utah. He moved to Parowan, Utah, where he took an active part in the improvement of that community. He was a leader in governmental, church, and military affairs. Edward Dalton also married a second wife, Lizzina Elizabeth Warren. The settlement of "Little Salt Lake" Valley - Parowan: In December, 1850, a company which numbered 118 men, in which there were thirty families, with 101 wagons, left the Salt Lake colony for "Little Salt Lake Valley," to make a settlement. The "valley" takes its name from a small body of saline water on the east side of what is now Iron county, and just east of the Escalante wide, desert valley. This undertaking was in further fulfillment of the promise made to Walker, the Utah chief that settlers would be sent to his country. The party was under the leadership of George A. Smith, cousin of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and a very practical, sturdy character, henceforth active and prominent in nearly all the colonizing movements in southern Utah. The company of settlers arrived in Little Salt Lake valley, over 200 miles south of Salt Lake City, on the 13th of January, 1851, and settled on a mountain stream "about three yards wide, one foot deep, with rapid current, and gravel bottom and banks;" afterwards called "Center Creek." The first site of the settlement, after thorough exploration of the surrounding country, was made permanent, and named Parowan, after a Utah Indian chief of the vicinity. The settlers were welcomed by Chief Peteeneet and his people, a miserable tribe known as "Piedes," who expressed themselves as pleased that the brethren were settling in their valley. Peteeneet said his tribes owned the country - a declaration afterwards confirmed by Chief Walker. The pipe of peace was smoked by the Indians and whites. Canarrah, another Piede chief, having first sent in one of his braves to ascertain if it would be safe for him to venture into the settlers' camp, paid them a visit. "His apparel consisted of a pair of moccasins, short leggings, and a kind of small cloak made of rabbit-skins. He was tall and stately in appearance, though apparently suffering from hunger. His followers were not as well dressed, being really specimens of humanity in its most degraded form." In March, Chiefs Walker and Peteeneet and about seventy braves visited the settlement and smoked the peace pipe with President George A. Smith. Walker was very friendly and expressed the desire to build a house and teach his children to work. He represented that he had visited all the Indian bands in the surrounding country and advised them to be friendly with the colonists, and not disturb even a brute belonging to them. The object of his visit was to exchange horses for cattle as his people were in need of beef. Walker made known his intention of making a raid into California, but President George A. Smith persuaded him not to go, warning him of the likelihood of coming in contact with United States troops. In the first year the settlers built a fort, at Parowan, enclosing a stockade for their cattle and horses, and on the bastions of the fort placed their cannon in such manner as to command two sides of the fort. Later other settlements sprang up in Little Salt Lake valley, but Parowan marked the southern limits of the settlements founded during the actual existence of the "State of Deseret." In May 1851 the settlement was visited by Brigham Young and a party of church leaders. They were met some distance from the Center Creek settlement by a large company of horsemen and escorted into the fort, amid the salute of cannons and the rejoicing of the people. Public meetings were held through three successive days, the 11th, 12th, and 13th, of May. The counsel of President Young to these settlers was of unusual interest, and is thus recorded by himself: "I spoke upon the importance of the Iron county mission and the advantages of the brethren fulfilling it. I advised them to buy up the Lamanite children as fast as they could, and educate them, and teach them the gospel, so that not many generations would pass ere they would become a white and delightful people, and said that the Lord could not have devised a better plan than to have put us where we were, in order to accomplish that thing. I knew the Indians would dwindle away, but let a remnant of the seed of Joseph be saved. I told the brethren to have the logs or pickets of their fort so close that the Indians could not shoot arrows through. I recommended the adoption of the Indian name Parowan for the city." The history of Elizabeth Meeks Dalton: Mary Elizabeth Meeks life started out in July 02, 1823 in Spencer Co. Indiana, where her father, Priddy and her mother, Mary was living at the time. She had two brothers and one sister born before her. Mary Elizabeth was only 7 months old when her Mother passed away on Jan. 2 4th, 1824. Mary Elizabeth was then raised by her step-mother, Sarah Mahurin, who her father married on Dec. 24th, 1826. The Priddy Meeks family moved from Indiana to Illinois and settled on a farm on the River Embarras. The family however did not stay for long, but next moved west to Morgan County and built a log cabin on the banks of the Illinois River. Again they did not stay for long, before moving west. In Priddy Meeks own words: "I lived on the south side of the Illinois River (Morgan Co.) Shortly after this i bought land at the bluffs on the north side (Brown Co.) ha lf a mile from the river and moved over to it. Three miles west of us w as a new town was laid off, called "Versailles" right on the public road.. ..built a good log house under the bluffs and had a good sugar orchard on the land" Again it was time to move further west. This time to the city that the Mormon's were building on the Mississippi River. The Meeks family arrived in t he city in April of 1842. The move to Nauvoo was the fourth that the family had made in Illinois. First were the farms on the Embarros River, then Morgan county, next across the Illinois River to brown county and now finally to Nauvoo in Hancock county with the Mormon's. It was while living in Nauvoo that Mary Elizabeth, now about 18 years old had a harrying experience involving her father. It seems that her father h ad been arrested on a charge of Forgery. The explanation for this is copied from the book; "The life and times of Dr. Priddy Meeks and his Progenitors by Dalton R. & Lenora Meeks. Meeks was one of the many involved in wagon making. He was trying very ha rd to be ready to move with the Saints on their projected departure in April. It was imperative for him to sell his real property in Brown County to have the cash to buy the supplies he would need. His son-in-law Ors on Adams had property to dispose of there as well. Orson had given Dr. Priddy his power of attorney to sell his land, Orson's non-L.D.S. brothers said that Priddy had forged Orson's name, so they went to Carthage and had him arrested and jailed in the same cell where Joseph and Hyrum Smith had been killed. Dr. Priddy's oldest daughter Elizabeth often went to see her father in jail. One day she went with Sheriff Beckenstoes on horseback to Carthage. The Sheriff led a horse on which her father could ride home. Elizabeth w as left in the woods outside Carthage. She was holding the extra horse and the Sheriff went to the jail and talked with her father. The Sheriff told Priddy Meeks if the jail door should happen to be left open and he got out, for him to walk right into the woods and he would find a girl there on a horse, holding a horse for him. The Sheriff then went out leaving the door open. Priddy soon found his daughter with the extra horse and they rode quickly to Nauvoo. Priddy's daughter Margaret Jane Hamilton reported on this event: My father was imprisoned in Carthage jail, just after the bodies of Jose ph and Hyrum were taken away, their blood was still on the floor. We were not permitted to go into the building, but Mother and I went there and talked with Father thru the iron grating over the window. Priddy continued with his story: "I then had to wheel and cut to the best advantage to get away from my persecutors and go across the river. I had been working with William McCleary, brother-in-law to the Prophet, making each of us a wagon to cross the plains in. Mine was only half done, but I had to drop everything to get aw ay and give a one-horse wagon two-horse wagon that looked like failing to pieces, having no iron about it but the tire. I wedged and wet it with water, then put a light load in it. It was thought I might go twenty mi les to a blacksmith shop, supposed that twenty dollars worth would f ix it so I could get to the buffs with it, having to leave part of my family in Nauvoo with my house and lot and furniture and stock and books, in fact, everything that I had, and never got anything for it" So once again, Priddy Meeks uprooted his family from its home. This was one time he had done it for religious purposes. This time he was actually forced to leave his home and possessions. His family was compelled to travel in a flimsy wagon with few provisions. Mary Elizabeth Meeks after a very long and hard trip across the plains with her family finely arrived in the "Valley of the Saints" on the first of Oct. 1847. Upon arriving in the Valley most Saints, including Priddy settled in the 'Old Fort" built of adobe by the first group of Pioneers on the ten-acre site which is now Pioneer Park. Romance did not wait for comfort to come to the Valley. Twenty-four year-o ld Elizabeth Meeks was married to Edward Dalton on March 6, 1848 by Brigham Young. Edward was the son of John Dalton, longtime friends of the Meeks family. Elizabeth and Edward had known each other in Nauvoo and Edward had served in the Mormon Battalion Company C. In December, 1850, a company, which numbered 118 men, which included thirty families, with 101 wagons, left the Salt Lake colony for "Little Salt Lake Valley" The company of settlers arrived in Little Salt Lake valley, over 200 miles south of Salt Lake City, on the 13th of January, 1851. In this first Company there was Priddy Meeks and Edward Dalton and his wife, Mary Elizabeth Meeks Dalton. They named this new settlement, "Parowan" It is believed that Mary Elizabeth never lived anywhere else by in Parowan, even after her husband married two other wife's in polygamy and he moved around to other towns in the Southwest. Mary Elizabeth Meeks Dalton raised eight children to maturity. His first wife raised eight children to maturity. One of Mary Elizabeth's sons, Edward Meeks Dalton was murdered by U.S. Mar shall William Thompson Jr. on Dec. 16 1886. This happened in Parowan, Iron Co. Utah. After living a tough and hard life as a Pioneer women in a era of polygamy, Mary Elizabeth Meeks Dalton died on October 04, 1892 and is buried in t he Parowan City Cemetery. This Cemetery has a rock wall around it and is one of the most beautiful and well-kept cemeteries in the West. Edward Dalton and his family settled in Parowan, Iron County Utah after being called to the Iron County Mission by Brigham Young in 1851. Here their children Edward Meeks, Joseph Priddy, John Cranmer, Franklin Stephens, Ida Mary, and Ada Elizabeth Dalton were born. His family bore all the hardships of pioneer life without murmur, always keeping an open house and never turning anyone away. The visiting authorities from the north and most of the people that come up from Dixie to sell fruit stayed at his home. He was a man of great faith and a student of history. Edward surveyed and laid out the city of Parowan and took a prominent part in helping to divide the water of Center Creek, both for city and field purposes. He also surveyed the City of Panguitch. He was one of the first Mayors of Parowan and his name is attached to many original deeds for lots in the city. Ranching in the Early Days in Iron County: “One of the first ranches was owned by Edward Dalton and Robert Miller, north and a little east of the Cheney meadow. They milked cows, made cheese and butter all summer, spring, and fall for many years. John West owned a ranch and dairy a little south of the Dalton Ranch. William Adams ran a dairy on his land east of the Dalton Ranch, right next to the Paragoonah fields. Zach Decker owned a pasture a little south and west of the Cheney Meadow, but did not do much ranching. In Parowan, Edward took a leading role in all the labors for the improvement of the country, serving as alderman, mayor, probate judge, and being a representative in the legislature. He was a leader in the military operations in the Mormon War, 1857, and the Black hawk wars with the Indians. In June 1866 Indian raiders plundered Beaver of a herd of cattle. Edward Dalton's Militia Company routed the Indians and saved the cattle. Edward Dalton was Captain of the Militia for the protection of the people. He was noted for his fearlessness and was afraid of nothing, yet he would not go blindly into a trail. On New Year's day, 1870, the men were called out of a dance as the alarm was given that the Navajos had rounded up about 500 head of horses. Among the men who started up Parowan Canyon were the following: Capt. Edward Dalton, Sydney Burton, Horace Smith, Samuel Orton, Peter Wimmer, Johnathan Prethro, Hugh L. Adams, Charles Adams, James J. Adams, Ed Clark, Ed Ward, Nels Holingshead, Wm. C. Mitchell, Henry Harrop, Oscar Lyman, Hy Paramore, Bill Lister, John Butler, Heber Benson, Tom Butler, Allen Miller and Tom Yardley. There was so much snow in Parowan Canyon that after attempting to traverse it, they ascended Little Creek Canyon. The men did not overtake the Indians because of the deep snow. They went over to the East Fork of the Sevier River, with no success, so Captain Dalton gave the order to go home. Some of the men wanted to proceed further, but their captain was impressed to go home and all the men followed him. It was learned from scouting parties that they had avoided annihilation from hordes of ambushing redmen. Source: Luella Adams Dalton. Note: Muster roll of the Company C, 1st Battalion, 10th Regiment of the Legion of Nauvoo, Commanded by Captain Jesse N. Smith mustarded in the Iron County Military District, Parowan, 10th day of Oct. 1857; Edward Dalton. “Once when Daniel Clark was sheriff, they got onto the trail of a bunch of cattle rustlers, who had driven off a large bunch of cattle from the north of the valley. William West and Edward Dalton offered to help Sheriff Clark. They rode hard to get on their trail, and the second day out spotted the cattle, just before sundown. They planned to camp for the night and surprise them early in the morning. They made camp in an old shack close by. Shortly after making camp William West became violently ill with a pain in his side. The men talked over what was best to do, and decided to send one of the men over to St. George for a doctor. With the snow completely covering all traces of the trail in the darkness, they decided to wait until daylight to go. Before morning Mr. West became so bad, that he passed away with what was most likely a ruptured appendix. When morning came they rolled him in a quilt, packing snow around him and bound him on his horse, and started home with him on his horse. He was a fine man. He left a wife and three children, one boy and two little girls to mourn his early death.” Source: Luella A. Dalton. While in Parowan Edward served on the High Council. On Feb. 15, 1865, Erastus Snow stopped in Parowan on his way to St. George and organized the 9th Quorum of Seventies. He ordained seven Presidents, one of whom was Edward Dalton. Parowan Stake House is one of the old-time structures erected less than fifteen years after the arrival of the first pioneers. It was built in 1862 of stone at a cost of $10,000, and, strange to say, has never been dedicated. The height of the building is 28 feet with 45 by 50 feet outside measurement. It has a seating capacity of 800, and has seven rooms. The architects were Ebenezer Hanks, Edward Dalton, and William A. Warren. The house stands in the center of an eight-acre block. An entrance to the building leads from each side of the block. On either side of the paths leading from the gates, are avenues of trees, some ornamental and some fruit. A man is paid to take care of the grounds and do the janitor work in the building. Part of the grounds is used for raising crops. The President of the stake, Lucius N. Marsden, in giving a description of the building, says: "If the people would now build a meeting house according to their means, as the people did in 1862, we would have a most magnificent building." Edward Dalton was gifted in dramatics. He was the President and Director of the Parowan Dramatic Association for many years. They tell the story that Edward and James Adams were fighting a duel in the early plays, but they both were so stubborn that neither one gave up so they had to roll the curtain down. As Mayor of Parowan City in 1874, Edward Dalton was a delegate to the Territorial Legislature, and while in this capacity, he entered a large tract of 760 acres for the first deeds to land in the valley, farms and city lots. After Fort Cameron was established at Beaver, there was some trouble about land rights. The settlers had held their farms and homes only by squatters rights. Now all the land they held had deeds. One of the first ranches was owned by Edward Dalton and Robert Miller. It was to the North an a little east of the Chimney Meadow, where they milked cows and made cheese and butter, all summer, spring and fall for many years. A Mayor's Deed from Iron County: THAT I, Edward Dalton, Mayor of Parowan City, in Iron County, Utah Territory, by an Act of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Utah, approved February 17, 1869, entitled, "An Act prescribing Rules and Regulations for the execution of the Trust arising under an Act of Congress, entitled, 'An Act for the relief of the Inhabitants of Cities and Towns Upon the Public Lands,' approved March 2, 1867," and in consideration of the sum of Two ($2.00) Dollars paid by John Wardell, of Parowan City, County of Iron, Territory of Utah, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged, the said John Wardell, on the Ninth day of May, A. D. 1872, having been adjudged by the Probate Court of Iron County, Territory aforesaid, to be the rightful owner and possessor of the following described Lots or Parcel of land, viz: The east part of Lots eleven (11) twelve (12) and thirteen (13) each part of Lot two (2) by eight and eleven-sixteenths (8 11/16) rods, and the east part of Lots fourteen (14) and fifteen (15) each part of lot two (2) by eight (8) rods. (Signed) EDWARD DALTON Note: One of Edward's son Edward Meeks Dalton was murdered by U.S. Marshall William Thompson Jr. on Dec. 16 1886. (His story is told in another chapter of my Dalton book)) His first wife raised eight children to maturity. His eldest son Edward Meeks Dalton went on a Mission to North Carolina, where he converted Martha Harrell Warren and her daughter Lizzina Elizabeth. They came back to Parowan with him. Edward Dalton took Lizzina Elizabeth Warren for a plural wife on the 14th of June 1882 in the St. George Temple. They left Parowan to live in Manassa, Conejos County Colorado. On March 7, 1886, he was set apart as first counselor to President Silas Sanford Smith in the San Luis stake presidency. While in Colorado, Edward’s first wife died and he had four more children by his second wife. He remained until 1892, and he then returned to Parowan. He was a Patriarch at the time of his death, April 6, 1896, of stomach cancer. Dalton, Edward, first counselor of the San Luis Stake presidency, Colo., from 1886 to 1892, was born March 23, 1827, in Bradford, Penn., the son of John Dalton and Rebecca Cranmer. He was baptized June 4, 1843. He was appointed first counselor March 7, 1886, and was set apart to that position June 27, 1886, by John Henry Smith. He died April 6, 1896. The headstone of Edward & Elizabeth Meeks Dalton in the Parowan, Iron Co., Cemetery. The Official LDS Church records of Edward Dalton: Source: From the CD: LDS Family Suite 2, by Ancestry Inc. Orem Utah. Dalton, Edward. Birth: Dalton, Edward - Date: March 3, 1827 - Place: Wysox, Bradford, PA. Parents: Dalton, Edward - Father: Dalton, John - Mother: Cranmer, Rebecca Turner. Death: Dalton, Edward - Date: April 6, 1896 - Place: Parowan, Iron, UT. Buried: Parowan, Iron, UT. Marriage Information: Dalton, Edward - Spouse: Meeks, Elizabeth -Date: May 13, 1852 Children: Dalton, Edward. 1. Dalton, Hulda Amanda, December 6, 1848. 2. Dalton, Sarah Cedenia, September 8, 1850. 3. Dalton, Edward Meeks, August 25, 1852. 4. Dalton, Joseph Priddy, September 17, 1854. 5. Dalton, John Cranmer, January 9, 1857. 6. Dalton, Franklin Stephen, February 26, 1859. Marriage Number 2 Dalton, Edward - Spouse: Warren, Lizzina Elizabeth - Place: St. George, Washington, UT. - Date: June 14, 1882. Marriage 2 Children: 1. Dalton, Randall Warren, June 9, 1883. 2. Dalton, James Edward, February 16, 1885. 3. Dalton, Martha Rebecca, October 3, 1886. 4. Dalton, Ida, February 13, 1888. 5. Dalton, Francis Marion, November 26, 1891. 6. Dalton, Harrell Warren, July 19, 1894. 7.Dalton, Harley Warren, July 19, 1894. 8.Church Ordinance Data: Dalton, Edward – Baptism: Date - June 4, 1843. Temple Ordinance Data: Dalton, Edward – Baptism: Date - March 31, 1964 - Temple: Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, UT. Endowment - Date: January 21, 1846 - Temple: Nauvoo, Hancock, IL. Sealed to Parents - Date: March 31, 1951 - Temple: Manti, Sanpete Co., UT. Sealed to Spouse - Date: May 13, 1852 - Temple: Endowment House in Salt Lake City Sealed to Spouse - Date: June 14, 1882 Places of Residence: Dalton, Edward-Montpelier, Iron Co., UT. 1860, Parowan, Iron, UT. August 25, 1852. Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, UT. December 6, 1848. Mill Creek, Salt Lake, UT. September 8, 1850. San Luis, Costilla, Co. 1886-1892. Vocations: Dalton, Edward-Farmer. Comments: Dalton, Edward. Edward was a Private in Company C of the Mormon Battalion. Comments: #21. Edward was listed on the Daily Log of Persons in Nauvoo. Comments: #31. In 1860, Edward had a household of 8 with $400 in real wealth and $700 in personal wealth. On the day that Edward Dalton received his Endowments in the Nauvoo Temple: The City of Joseph, Wednesday, January 21, 1846, Nauvoo, Illinois: There were snowdrifts three to four feet high. It was warmer during the day but below freezing at night. A record two hundred eight people received their temple ordinances. Brigham Young received a letter from Judge James H. Ralston of Quincy containing, "I have long known many of the Mormons, who I have always thought good citizens, let them now show that they can suffer and forgive, and that amidst oppression their patriotism grows the brighter." At 8:00 p.m., a report came to Hosea Stout that some men had come into town under suspicious circumstances and that some writs had been sent in by two strangers, one for Hosea Stout and the other for Elder Orson Hyde. Hosea Stout immediately went to the temple. It proved to be a false alarm. |
3/8/2011 | Rodney G. Dalton, Utah | |
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Added Newcastle West RC Marriages Date Year Name of Groom Name of Bride Married at Witness 1 Witness 2 23 Apr 1815 N.R. Johanna Enright Newcastle West RC Parish Church Patrick Enright Elizabeth Enright 1 Nov 1824 William Bridget Fitzmaurice Newcastle West RC Parish Church Jemh. Enright Wm. Houlihan 25 May 1828 John Mary Walsh Newcastle West RC Parish Church James O'Grady Mrs. Mullane 15 Feb 1829 James Cath. Bluett Newcastle West RC Parish Church Mary Harte Ellen Donovan 2 May 1830 David Mgt. Creedon Newcastle West RC Parish Church James Dalton William Dowling 3 Mar 1835 James Cath. Purcell Newcastle West RC Parish Church Edmd. Dore Cath. Currigan 16 Aug 1849 William Mgt. McMahon Newcastle West RC Parish Church Patk. Dalton Cath. Shine 21 Feb 1852 Michael Mgt. Cremin Newcastle West RC Parish Church Hanora Dalton Mary Cremin 13 Nov 1852 Martin Mary Roche Newcastle West RC Parish Church William Roche James Dalton 26 Feb 1854 Patrick Hanora Dalton Newcastle West RC Parish Church Maurice Dalton Patk. Broder 13 Nov 1855 William Hanora McAuliffe Newcastle West RC Parish Church Hanora Quinn Cath. Shine 9 May 1883 David Mary Sheahan Newcastle West RC Parish Church Jemh. O'Shea Eliz Gayer |
2/14/2011 | Mike Dalton, Norfolk UK | |