Hannah Chapman Chester Goodworth Babcock Raymond (1813-1898)

Hannah Chapman, my Great, Great, Great Grandmother was born March 2, 1813, the eighth of ten children in the family of William Chapman and Mary Drury. She came into the world in Ousefleet, a small hamlet in Yorkshire, England. The following month she was baptized by Minister Simpson in the Whitgift Methodist Parish.

Just short of her twentieth birthday, she married Thomas Chester from the nearby town of Crowle in Lincolnshire. In the next nine years, seven children were born to Thomas and Hannah, three of whom (James, Mary and Emma) died in early childhood. When the youngest, baby William, was only sixteen months old, his father died from an abscessed knee at the age of thirty-three, leaving Hannah with four children: Ann, Thomas, Frances, and William.

About a year later, Joseph Goodworth became smitten with the widowed mother of four, who was thirteen years his senior. They were married October 29, 1845. Three sons were born within the next four years: Richard Brooks (my Great, Great Grandfather), Joseph, and Frederick, making Hannah the terribly busy mother of seven. This marriage was also short lived, as her twenty-eight-year-old husband passed away May 11, 1853, from kidney disease and a back problem.

Forty-year-old Hannah Chapman Chester Goodworth, twice married, twice widowed, was left to care and provide for seven children. Her first husband's parents quickly came to her aid to help rear her fatherless children.

A few months after Joseph’s passing, Hannah was converted and baptized into the Mormon faith. Her in-laws were not happy about her choice and did their best to dissuade her, but her testimony was strong and unwavering.

Determined to migrate to Zion, Hannah took advantage of the Perpetual Emigration Fund to finance the family’s passage to America. It would not have possible for her to afford the journey without this assistance and she was incredibly grateful for the loan which she would repay after arriving in America.

As Hannah made plans for her departure from Liverpool, she was responsible for four Chester children and three Goodworth children and she had every intention of keeping her family together. By this time, her oldest son, Thomas Chester, had married and determined to stay in England with his new bride. 

Hannah applied for the remaining six children to emigrate. Unfortunately, there is no evidence that sixteen-year-old Frances and fourteen-year-old William left England. Some histories purport that their Grandfather Chester convinced them to stay due to his opposition to Mormonism; other tales claim that their Grandfather took them off the ship after boarding and before departure, but if that were true, Hannah did not record it. It is not believed that she ever saw either of them again during her lifetime, although Thomas did eventually come to America.

Enoch Train

Hannah, with the remaining four children set sail on the ship "Enoch Train" March 23, 1856, along with five hundred thirty other saints, on the first shipload of emigrants who would participate in crossing the plains with handcarts. I can only imagine her courage.

They crossed the ocean in thirty-eight decidedly unpleasant days, arriving in Boston, May 1, 1856. The very next day they boarded a train for New York City. From there they went to Iowa City to prepare for the handcart trek across the plains.

Hannah, her three sons, six, seven and ten years old, and twenty-year-old Ann, walked approximately twelve hundred miles. It is said that Richard, the little ten-year-old, pushed the handcart while his mother pulled. Hannah did not record the hardships - the sand, dust, heat, exhaustion, storms, hunger, illness, fear, deaths and burials along the trail, and constant handcart repair, but others in the company did. They finally arrived in Salt Lake City on September 26th.

Hannah, concerned with repaying her P.E.F debt, found work as a housekeeper with the Adolphus Babcock family in Spanish Fork. Brother Babcock was a widower with probably three of his nine children still living at home. Hannah and Adolphus had a child, Hannah Alice, but there was no joy in their marriage, and they separated shortly thereafter.

The next event recorded in Hannah’s life is her sealing to Charles Jeremiah Raymond on November 7, 1865, in the Endowment House. Hannah was quoted as saying, following this, her fourth marriage, that for the first time in her life she had found happiness.

Unfortunately, great sorrow seemed to follow Hannah. Only two weeks after the marriage, her son Joseph was fatally shot, not quite seventeen years old. The accident occurred when the militia were assembled for drill and target shooting. A gun went off uncapped and shot him in the right temple, and he died about half an hour later. Her son Frederick also passed away in his early twenties of pneumonia.

Charles and Hannah Raymond were cited among the first early pioneers in Bear Lake County. Later, the family moved to Soda Springs. It is notable that in 1876, Hannah was one of the seven sisters who formed the first Relief Society in Soda Springs and was chosen as a counselor in the presidency. Three years later she became president, in which capacity she served until she was 83 years old. By this time, Hannah was once again a widow. Charles had died in late 1883.

As if she had not suffered enough affliction in her life, Hannah had one final trial. Her dearest wish had long been to see the finished Salt Lake Temple. By the time the temple was completed in September 1893, however, Hannah could not see anything - even with the aid of glasses.  

She attended the dedication anyway and when she arrived at the temple, she received a marvelous blessing from heaven. Her eyesight was miraculously restored so that she could see everything around her distinctly.  After the dedication she went to her daughter's home in Woods Cross, Utah, where she was able to read the newspaper and thread a needle.  Within hours her vision was once more dimmed, and she finished her life in darkness, and without complaint.

Hannah Raymond died February 15, 1898, in Soda Springs, Idaho.

Chester Family Plot in Pioneer Cedar Cemetery, Soda Springs, Idaho

Hannah's Burial Site in Pioneer Cedar Cemetery, Soda Springs, Idaho.

Source History 1

Source History 2

Two books

Take a look at the home of my Great, Great Grandparents, Richard Brooks and Johanna Evans Goodworth in Kamas, Utah. 

Richard was born in England and came to Utah in  a handcart company of Mormon immigrants.

Richard's formal education was limited to the 6th grade, but his thirst for knowledge didn't stop as he left the schoolroom; he continued to learn through self-education. His life story lists only two books that he studied and absorbed, but these two provided what he needed  in sacred and secular learning.

1. The Bible - Richard was known as quite a Bible student. With a remarkable memory, he not only studied this sacred book, histories state that he could quote much of the Bible from memory giving chapter and verse. 
2. The dictionary was said to be his constant companion and he used it almost continually.
   

Richard's example of perpetual learning and making the most of what you have available is inspiring to me. With vast amounts of information available instantaneously through electronic access, the skills of study and memorization are sometimes neglected in our day. 

Richard must have understood and believed the principle that is now included in the Doctrine and Covenants 130:18. This section includes instruction that the Prophet Joseph Smith gave in 1843:

•  "Whatever principle of intelligence we attain unto in this life, it will rise with us in the resurrection." 

I hope to meet my Great, Great Grandfather someday and maybe he'll teach me a thing or two.

Happy Birthday Grandpa Beard

Happy Birthday, Grandpa Beard, born October 15, 1905!

Grandpa’s early life in Wilford, Idaho, in a family with twelve siblings, was no doubt full of hard work and sacrifice. From a very young age, he was required to labor in the fields and the barn. From this he learned to love work and he never shied away from it throughout his entire ninety-four years on earth.

Today’s focus is on happy times with his playful father and loving mother, as gleaned from delightful memories recorded by his niece, Edna Beard.

The following are excerpts from Edna’s account of Grandpa’s parents, who she refers to as Grandpa Beard (James Thomas Beard, Sr.) and Grandma Beard (Mary Goodworth Beard):

• I have so many memories of Grandpa Beard. The thing that stands out in my memory most is Grandpa blessing the food.  When we sat down to the big long table on benches that Grandpa had made, Dave and Elmer were at the end of the table on their special benches.  We all knew we couldn’t start to eat until the blessing was given on the food, which was given most of the time by Grandpa.  As soon as he lifted his head, he would reach for a bunch of watercress that he had gathered fresh from the spring, and give it a good shake at one of his grandkids.  It really gave you a start, with that shake of cold water!

(I am conflicted between envisioning an nostalgic scene from the television series, "The Waltons", or the dinner brawl from, "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers".)

Whittling

• Grandpa always got up early in the morning and built the fire with shavings he had whittled the night before on kindling sticks mostly with good pitch that took off like lightning. 
• My very special memory of Grandpa was when he whittled me a little doll from wood.  For hair, he put corn silk on her head.  I really loved that little doll.  He was always whittling a lot.  I can still see him now, in deep thought, just whittling away.

Toasting bread on a fork

•  I also remember him toasting bread on a fork in the front door of the old cook stove.  The toast was made form Grandma’s big slices of bread. 

• For a long time there was a high chair around that Grandpa had made for the babies to sit on.  He whittled all the spokes and the arms. It was really something.

• My fondest memories are of the wildflower garden that Grandma and Grandpa had in front of the mill house. They had a good tight fence made of 2 x 2. It was so lovely.  Grandpa had dug wild columbine from the canyon. The columbine was Grandma’s favorite flower.  They also grew Sweet Williams. The humming birds came several at a time, to flutter in and out of the garden. It was so beautiful, and Grandpa watered and took care of it faithfully.

• Grandpa liked to tease and always had to pull a little tuft of hair, and act like he hadn’t made a move. 

• Grandpa had a nickname for everyone. He called me “Betty Blue Clothes”.  When he called me that he sang a little song that he had made up about it. 

• Grandpa played the accordion, tunes like “Pop Goes the Weasel” and “Wait for the Wagon”.  Grandpa called the cows out of the canyon, and I can still hear him singing “Dandy Cow-ow”.  When he called Grandma, it was “Mary-e-e”, with a loving ring.

• My first memory of Grandma Beard is of how clean she always smelled.  She didn’t have deodorants or body powder that we use today, but I always loved to sit on her lap and have her pat me and sing very softly a little song to me, or even just to hum to me was very special.

• If Grandma ever gave a baby something, like a cookie or a piece of bread and butter, she had to put it in both little hands. She always loved their little hands most of all, and would hold their little hands in her hands and say, “I do love their little hands”.

• How, I wonder, did she cook and take care of so many, and always had lots of food on the table, along with peace and harmony? 

• She always called her sons “My Dear Boys”, and the daughters, “My Dear Girls”. 

• I loved Grandma’s house at the ranch, but I especially loved the one at the mill. The old floorboards and the tables and benches were always scrubbed white with lye water.  

• I remember at the mill house, huge bumblebees would fly in. Of course we were always scared of them, but Grandma would just talk to them and somehow get them into her apron and carry them outside. She would never let anyone harm a bee. 

• At the birth of each grandchild, Grandma would be there for the delivery, and stay until the new mom was back on her feet. She bathed the tiny one, cooked meals and kept up everything else that needed to be done. 

• Grandma was never idle. If she had to go to town with Grandpa to take lumber, she would always take her knitting along and sit there knitting away as the oxen slowly made their way along. 

• Grandma made the best teacakes. Mid-afternoon she always thought the men needed a bite to eat around 3 o’clock. She hurried and stirred up the teacakes, with a few raisins in them. When they were fresh and hot from the oven and spread with fresh butter and cut in squares, she would send them out with a child to the mill. The men would shut the mill down and have their bread. They either had tea or root beer from the spring house, which Grandma made and kept in a big keg with a spigot on it. I don’t know how she made that either. I wish I did!  It had stinging nettle and dandelions in it, and various barks and roots. 

• Living at the mill most of every summer, Grandma would milk the cows.  Sometimes she made cheese; but once a week she would separate the milk and take the cream to town to trade for groceries. Sometimes she would trade a little of the cream for a piece of cloth to finish a quilt she was making. 

• Her quilts and knitting were beautiful.  

• How she ever got so much done besides is a mystery to me; like 12 huge loaves of bread every day, washing on the board, scrubbing, and making the meals.

Fearless Fiery Heart

Great, Great Grandmother Goodworth

My Great, Great Grandmother Joanne (Johanne) Evans Goodworth enjoyed good health and was unafraid of the illnesses of others. Often during this period in history even the family members of the disease ridden didn't dare to come within a block of the patient's home. But, the community could count on Joanne to be there and nurse the ill back to health, or sit by them during their final days and then lay them to rest.

Histories contain references to her loving service:

"When Arthur Page died of diptheria, she went over and 'laid him away'."

"When Osborne's had had small pox 'she came waltzing right over and helped'."

When she returned home after her service was no longer needed, she would change all of her clothes in the old shanty before going into her own home, protecting her family from contagion.

Perhaps this service was due to a

charitable heart, or maybe an indication of her "fiery disposition". Her son said "She'd fight a circle saw and give it a couple of turns head start. She would fight if anyone gave her an excuse, but she wouldn't go out looking for trouble."

In contrast, Joanne had a feminine side that appreciated beauty, especially flowers, and she raised a lot of them. If anyone stopped to admire them, she would cut a beautiful bouquet for them to take home. It was not common in the small frontier town of Kamas to grow flowers, in fact, hers was about the only home with such adornment. About half of her front yard was planted in flowers and the other half was planted in strawberries. Her fierce protective spirit returned to chase many a young strawberry thief away with a whack from a long stick.

Her fearless, fiery heart had a very special tender spot reserved for her grandson, Richard V. Goodworth. The picture above shows Joanne holding Richard. She showered all of her love on him and in her eyes he could "do no evil". She was "little Richard's" port in every storm. Whenever he anticipated punishment, he would run around to Grandma's and she would hide him.  

I have learned from this history that grandmothers have apparently not changed much in the intervening 150 years. Our hearts expand with each new grandchild and it's amazing how completely perfect each and every one of our grandchildren are.

Sing, Sing, Sing

This is my Great, Great Grandfather Richard Brooks Goodworth. He is the Grandfather of my Grandfather Beard.

Richard was born in Crowle, Lincolnshire, England on March 26, 1846, to a large family with three half-brothers, four half-sisters, and later two younger brothers rounded it out to an even ten children. His mother had been widowed with seven children and her second husband, Richard's father, passed away when Richard was only seven years old.

Great, Great Grandfather Goodworth's appearance was very distinctive with an abundance of black, straight stiff hair. A very creative person, he enjoyed changing his look often by wearing different styles of facial hair, sometimes chin bare and sometimes not.

Although the exact date is unknown, he was probably baptized in his native land, and after emigrating to America he served as a Sunday School teacher in the Kamas Ward. 

As sometimes happens through miscommunication and misunderstandings, Richard became offended. He chose to let his feelings keep him away from church activity and could not be persuaded to return. Nevertheless, he was known in the community for his friendliness, honesty and consideration.

Everyone knows that the Beard family is blessed with superior musical talent. Some of that musicality was inherited from this good man. His talents and hobbies were writing poetry and singing. 

It was said that he could sing all night long and not repeat himself. Many neighbors were invited to spend evenings in the Goodworth home enjoying this entertainment.

At the age of 50 he contracted severe pneumonia. There were no doctors in the area, so his wife Johanna treated him with every remedy she could acquire, but his strength never returned. 

Richard did not feel worthy due to his inactivity, but obviously had great faith he God. He knew that his eighteen year old son Joseph was a righteous man and that the Lord would answer his prayers. So one evening he asked Joseph, "Mind doing me a favor?" His son eagerly replied, "Anything I can." Richard's request shocked his son, "Before you go to bed, pray that if I can't get well, I may die. Pray for me to die without suffering." Joseph protested vigorously, "I can't." But his father was insistent and reminded him, "I've always taught you to keep your word." 

From that moment on Richard refused further medication. Joseph's prayer was answered and Richard passed away on May 9, 1896. He is buried in the Old Cemetery located in Francis, Utah.