14 Sep 1903 – 24 Nov 1983

2nd great-granddaughter of Philip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn
Great-granddaughter of Louis Philip Cardon and Susette Stalé
Granddaughter of Joseph Samuel Cardon and Selenia Mesenile Walker
Daughter of Joseph Elmer Cardon and Lucinda Hurst

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Autobiographical History

  I, Ella Cardon was born on September 14, 1903, in Dublan, Chihuahua, Mexico.  My parents were Lucinda Hurst Cardon and Joseph Elmer Cardon.  I was their second child to the oldest and the oldest daughter and was born in a brick house that my uncle Louis Paul Cardon built.  My Mother’s family had moved to Mexico from Fairview, Utah, when my mother was nine years old.  I was just turning nine when we left Mexico on July 7, 1912.  I call it a “generation of Mexico.” 

                I was blessed November 1, 1903 at Dublan by Miles P. Romney.  I was baptized on September 14, 1913 by my father, in a lake six miles east of Dublan and confirmed October 1, 1911 in Dublan by Albert E. Thurber.  I well remember how frightened I was as I went to the stand to be confirmed. When Brother Thurber said, “I say unto you receive the Holy Ghost,” I felt a strong tingling go all the way  through my body.  Nowadays it isn’t said quiet the  same.  I always notice that all the children look very happy as they take their seats after being confirmed.  I know just how they feel. 

                My first years of school were rather hectic.  We lived at a ranch six miles from town and my brother, Joseph Phillip, and I rode on horseback or in a small one-horse cart to school.  Part of one winter I stayed in Dublan with my Aunt Lois Hurst McClellan.  I didn’t start school til I was seven because of an illness of my mother.  We enjoyed living at the “Pasture” as the ranch was called. The stars were always very bright and clear The place was called the “Pasture: because my father had charge of cattle belonging to the people of Dublan.  Other men would come at set times for  roundups which made a lot of excitement as they branded the cattle.  We lived in a  frame house my father built  I remember the ceilings were made of strips of unbleached muslin, factory sewn together.  One day my mother went into the bedroom to see about the baby, my sister, Mildred, and found the ceiling on fire.  It had just started to go through the roof.  My brother, Joseph went up on the roof and my mother managed to hand him buckets of water.  We were able to put the fire out.  It had started from the wood heater we used. 

                We  rode into Dublan on Sundays to church, etc., on a hay wagon covered with straw, with a quilt over it.  We children were usually asleep by the time we arrived home in the evening.  I remember one night a storm was approaching and my father  whipped up the horses to get home before the storm hit.  He told my mother to  hurry the children in while he took care of the team.  Just as my mother got to the steps leading to the door, a bright flash of lightening revealed a huge rattle snake curled in the doorway.  She called to my father who thought she might be mistaken, but he too saw the snake by another flash of lightening.  I have often wondered how he managed to kill the rattler with no more light than that from the sky. 

                In those days we milked several cows, separated the milk and made butter and cheese.  Our warm drinks were made from roasted barley, boiled for a time and mixed with milk and sugar.  Sometimes we had “crust coffee” made by dark brown crusts of bread heated in milk and strained into our cups.  Milk and sugar were added.  This tasted like our “Postum” of today. 

                During the year 1910 while we were at the ranch, the most famous of all comets could be seen plainly from our yard.  It is Halley’s Comet, named for an English astronomer, Edmund Halley.  It circles the sun every 76 years and should be back on schedule in 1986.  I hope some of our grandchildren and great grandchildren will be living where it can be seen. 

                All this came to an end when the Mexican Revolution started.  We left our home to live in town for a time.  Soon the rebels took everything they wanted from our home, then burned it to the ground.  We were told to prepare to leave for El Paso, Texas at a moment’s  warning, which came during the night of July 7, 1912.  I remember walking to the railroad a short distance from where we were staying.  It was a bright moonlit night.  By morning we were piled into baggage cars on top of rolls of bedding.  With my grandfather Phillip Harrison Hurst in charge of the women and children.  We were on our way to El Paso.  Many of the people of Juarez and Dublan were on the train.  The men folk, my father included, stayed to try to protect their property and stock.  Most of the people leaving took a few clothes and a blanket or two, thinking they would be back home in a short time.  Most of us never saw our homes again.  My father was able to, later on, go back and get some teams and wagons.  Many tears were shed at leaving beautiful gardens, orchards, barnyard animals, as well as lovely homes.  Most of the men turned all animals loose as they left. 

                We arrived in El Paso late the next day.  About a thousand people had been crowded on the train, some in open cattle cars.  The weather was very hot, so many hardships were endured.  About 4,500 refugees were crowded into El Paso.  Six hundred people were settled into a lumber yard for a time.  My grandfather was among them.  He had two large families.  Grandfather was made Presiding Elder.  He helped to find houses for all he could.  We were provided rations from the U.S. Army  This was the first time many of us had tasted canned milk, prepared cereals, and cans of sardines. 

                We were also told to be vaccinated for smallpox.  Our family had already had the vaccination before leaving, but many had not, so there were a lot of sore arms, and some quite ill. 

                When my father arrived, arrangements were made for us to go to Arizona.  There was work, clearing land at a railroad station called Jayne’s Station near Tucson.  We all lived in tents till small lumber houses were built, just two bedrooms, with a “boarded-up tent” for a kitchen and eating area.  We were able to move into these houses before my mother gave birth to her sixth child, a beautiful little girl we called Gladys.  My mother’s trials had been harder for her because of her expected child.  A midwife delivered the baby.  Her name was Sister Nardy.  We children all had chicken pox and measles that winter.  My brothers, Joseph and Ernest, and I went to school at Jayne’s Station that winter also.  Water supply failed so we moved on the next year to Binghampton, a little town also near Tucson, where a number of families from Mexico had settled.  There we lived for our growing up years, which is another story. 

                When we left El Paso my grandfather Hurst was still Presiding Elder and my grandmother was President of the Relief Society.  I never saw them but once after leaving there.  My father’s parents had been dead for some time before the exodus, so we grew up without grandparents.  It’s a great loss for anyone. 

                Binghampton was a good place to grow up.  We made our own amusements such as “shows” we put on ourselves, hikes to the hills nearby to gather wild flowers. We had candy pulls, etc.  There were good show houses in Tucson.  Of course they were silent and no color as today. 

                After  8th grade we all went to Tucson to high school.  After several years, there  were buses to ride. I remember part of one winter riding from school holding on to the running board of a truck. Another part of a winter I was privileged to ride in the car of our neighbor, Gordon Kimball, a brother of President Kimball.  President Kimball at that time was going to Tucson University.  They all moved into Tucson after that, and President Kimball soon went back to Thatcher. 

                My mother had three additions to her family while living in Binghampton.  Eugene Hurst, Udell Wilson and Lloyd Woodruf. After my parents moved to Virden, New Mexico, Lois, number ten, was born January 25, 1926. 

                I well remember my first teaching experiences in Sunday School and Primary.  The year I turned 12 was the year the Church lowered the Mutual age from 14 to 12, so I thought it was something to be a Beehive girl two years early.  I was Sunday School organist for several years. 

                In the spring of 1922 there was a gathering of all the nearby Mutuals  for sport’s contests, programs, etc.  These were always enjoyable times.  At this particular one, I met a returned missionary from St. David by the name of Howard Arthur Goodman.  We saw one another several times that summer.  Then after a whirlwind courtship, we were married on September 16, 1922, by the Presiding Elder of the Branch of Tucson.  We were a part of the California Mission at that time.  In January of 1923, Grandpa Goodman accompanied Uncle Ed, Aunt Rosa, Howard and I to the St. George Temple to receive our sealings.  Ed and Rosa had been married in July of that summer.  That was quite a trip, part of the time in six inches of fine dirt.  Deep mud filled chuck  holes on the way back.  Shortly before we reached St. George we slid off the road part way down a canyon.  It took several hours to get a good Indian with his team to pull us up again.  We arrived in St. George on time to go straight to the temple.  The session started at nine a.m. and was through at five p.m.  We were happy to get a good meal and bed in St. George that night.  We were so glad we had been able to go to the temple. 

                Our first son, Ervin Howard was born at St. David on June 13, 1923.  We were living in Mesa when our second son, Joseph Clyde, was born June 10, 1925.  We were at Virden to be with my folks at the time of his birth, so that is why the records show him being born at Virden.  We did the same thing a little over two years later when our third son, Thomas Arthur was born.  It was so nice to go to Virden in the summer and get out of the heat of Mesa.  At that time, none of us had even an electrical fan.  Our cooling of foods was an icebox.  Cooking was done on coal-oil stoves mostly, or wood burning ranges. 

                Our first little girl, Geneva, was born on November 16, 1929.  By then my parents had moved to Kirtland, New Mexico.  We were so happy to have a girl. 

                We had lived near the new Arizona temple from start to finish.  Daddy had worked there hauling supplies.  We were at the dedication on October 23, 24, 25, 26 of 1927.  We had the privilege of going to the Arizona Temple many times.  We were there in October, 1977, to the 50th anniversary commemoration of the dedication.  So we feel this is our temple. 

                When the big depression of the 1930’s hit the country, work was hard to find, so we moved to New Mexico, first to Kirtland then to Farmington.  Here our family grew up.  The boys served in the armed forces and went on missions.  Our second daughter, Erma Ruth was born, February 5, 1935, and our family was made complete when another girl, Alice Lynn was born November 27, 1945.  Her oldest brother, Ervin, got home from the army on time to carry his little sister out of the hospital.  He was 23 years old. 

                The following years were very busy for us, with a good sized family to care for and holding many positions in the Church.  For four years, Howard served as Bishop of Farmington 1st Ward, being the first bishop after the ward was divided.  He was released as bishop and became first counselor in the Stake Presidency to President Hilton.  We went to all of the general conferences in Salt Lake during that time and to all of the regional welfare meetings.  One winter we were privileged to have Apostle Adam S. Bennion and Brother Stover stay at our home.  Several general authorities stayed with us on different occasions. 

                I was class leader of the gospel doctrine class for seven years after moving to Farmington. One year, I was counselor in the MIA.  I taught in Primary and Senior Sunday School.  For two years I was first counselor to Georganna Lillywhite in the Relief Society.  When the ward was divided, I became literature leader of the Stake Relief Society for three years.  Then I was first counselor in the Ward Relief Society with Sister Helen Foutz.  Later I was counselor to Bessie McGee and Ora Christensen as they were presidents.  A number of years I was stake work director, then second counselor to Helen Stock.  Our stake covered many miles, so we traveled a lot.  Sister Stock was home economics teacher in the high school and county economics leader, so we in the stake board learned a lot from her.  Minnie Stock was her other counselor.  She had many homemaking skills and was a wonderful person to work with.  After we were released from that, I was teacher to the ward adult class in the M.I.A.  and was serving in that position when we moved to Mesa in the spring of 1966. 

                After coming to Mesa, I have been a visiting teacher continuously, making about 40 years as a visiting teacher.  I have taught classes for homemaking days, sewing, quilting, and nutrition.  With my husband, I filled a temple mission of four years at the visitor’s center.  We go to the temple as often as we can. 

                We are glad we were here to be with Grandma Cardon (my mother) the last seven years of her life.  She was a wonderful person to be around.  I did all her personal sewing but she still made many quilts almost to her last breath.  She passed away on August 3, 1973 after a very short illness. 

                The highlight of 1977 for us came at Thanksgiving time when we had a reunion of our own family.  All our children were here  except Erma.  She was far away and getting ready to move.  Many of our grandchildren and six of our great grandchildren were here.  We had a wonderful time.  Plans for another reunion next year was made. (editor’s note: one of the highlights were delicious chicken tamales that she and Howard had perfected, I’m still craving them.)

                We are thankful for all our family and for the 55 years we have had together.  We send love to all of you.

                                                                                                 December 9, 1977

Ella passed away November 24, 1983, from the effect of an airplane that crashed into their home in April 1978.  Howard, her husband was so severely burned he lived only hours passing away April 14, 1978.  Ella survived her burns but was infected with Hepatitis from a blood transfusion which finally took her life Thanksgiving Day, 1983.  They were buried close to Ella’s parents in the Mesa Cemetery in Mesa, Arizona (near the corner of 5th and A).

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Ella C. Goodman

MESA – Ella C. Goodman, 80, of 933 S. Lesueur, died Nov. 24, 1983, at Mesa Lutheran Hospital.
Mrs. Goodman was born in Chihuahua, Mexico, and moved to Arizona from Farmington, N.M., 18 years ago.
Survivors include daughters, Geneva Palmer, Erma R. Ausburn and Alice Christensen; sons, Ervin,J. Glyde and Thomas A.; two sisters; four brothers; 31 grandchildren and 46 great-grandchildren.
Services will be 2 p.m. today at the Mesa 23rd Ward Chapel, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1050 S. Hobson. Meldrum Mortuary made arrangements.

-Published in the Arizona Republic, Sat, Nov 26, 1983, Page B8

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GOODMAN, Ella C. Mother of Geneva Palmer, Erma Ruth Ausburn, Alice Christensen, Ervin, J. Clyde and Thomas. Sister of Mildred Kleinworth, Gladys Jack, Ernest, Eugune, Udell and Lloyd Cardon. Services Sat. 2:00 P.M. Mesa LDS 23rd Ward, 1050 S. Hobson. Interment Mesa.

-Published in the Arizona Republic, Sat, Nov 26, 1983, Page D34

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Mesa City Cemetery, Mesa, Maricopa County, Arizona

By Grand-daughter Rebecca Cardon Hickman Peterson

Son of Philip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn

In order to understand the background and characteristics of my grandfather, Paul Cardon, I think it will be well and appropriate to give a brief history of his people. In an article published in the Improvement Era, January 1948, Bro. Archibald F. Bennett called them a “unique and valorous people.” 
John Paul Cardon was born in a village in the Piedmont Valleys, called Prarustin, in Italy. His ancestors were of the Vaudois peoples, sometimes known as Waldenses. These people have been known as martyrs for Christianity since the time of Christ. I quote from Dr. Bennett’s article now: 
“Aptly described, by one author, as the “Israel of the Alps,” the Vaudois, or Waldenses, are probably the oldest continuous Protestant community in the world, and their church was influential, among other reformed churches. By tradition, they are credited with a line of Pastors running back even to the time of the apostles. All other dissenter groups were crushed by the power of Rome. 
Detested by Popes and Monarch, as teachers of dangerous doctrines, they suffered centuries of horrible and desolating persecutions, scarcely a generation escaping barbarous torture and massacre, or the fire, pillage, famine and treachery. 
Burned at the stake, buried alive, stoned, sawn asunder, hanged, herded into vile and disease-laden dungeons, the repeated objects of pitiless crusades, their homes burned, and possessions plundered, hunted down by blood-hounds, pursued from glen to glen, over rocks and crags and icy mountains, yet they defied their assailants, defended their rugged defiles, putting whole armies to rout, and maintained their ancient faith.” 
In a book written by James D. McCabe in 1881, called the “Cross and Crown” he tells of the forms of torture visited upon these people. I quote, “And now, how can we give an idea of the horrors which ensued? Little children were torn from the arms of their mother, dashed against the rocks and carelessly cast away. The sick or the aged were burned in their homes or hacked in pieces, mutilated half-murdered and flayed alive. They were exposed, in dying state, to the heat of the sun, or to flames, or to ferocious beasts; others were tied, in a state of nakedness, into the forms of a human ball, the head between the legs, and in this state were rolled down the precipice. Some of them, torn and bruised by the rocks from which they had rebounded, remained suspended from some projecting rock, or the branch of some tree, and still groaned forty-eight hours afterwards. Women and young girls were violated, impaled, set up naked upon spikes at the corners of the roads, buried alive, roasted upon lances, and cut in pieces by these soldiers of the faith, as by cannibals. Two of the most infuriated of these fire-raisers were a priest and a monk of the order of St. Francis. “And let it not be said, adds the historian Leger, that I exaggerated things upon account of the persecutions which I myself personally endured. In some places fathers have seen their children torn through the midst by the strength of men’s arms, cut through with swords. In other places mothers have seen their daughters forced, or murdered in their presence. Daughters have witnessed the mutilation of the living bodies of their brothers and fathers, brothers have seen brothers whose mouths have been filled with powder, to which the persecutors set fire, making the head fly in pieces; pregnant women have been ripped up and the fruit of their womb had been taken, living, from their bowels. What shall I say: OH! My God, the pen falls from my hands..” He describes further harrows and then he ends these descriptions with these words before he continues on with their history. “All these noble and courageous persons, thus put to death, might have saved their lives by abjuring their religion.” These people were driven higher and higher up into the Alps by their pursuers. They would try to keep above these soldiers and would surprise them by rolling rocks down upon them, as a means of self-defense. Bro. Bennett states “The tales of atrocities which brought death to thousands, horrified all Protestant peoples. The poor Vaudois, who were able to escape, concealed in their Alpine fastness, sent to Cromwell in England for relief. It was then that Milton, in righteous and indignant remonstrance, penned his great sonnet: 
ON THE LATE MASSACRE IN PIEDMONT 
Avenge, 0 Lord thy slaughtered saints, whose bones Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold; When all our fathers worshiped stocks and stones; Forget not. In Thy book record their groans Who are Thy sheep, and in their ancient fold Slain by the bloody Piedmontese, that rolled Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moans The vales redoubled to the hills, and they To heaven. Their martyred blood and ashes sow O’er all the Italian fields, which still doth sway The triple tyrant; that from these may grow A hundred-fold, who having learnt Thy ways Early may fly the Babylonian woe. 
Threatened with extermination and reduced to less than three hundred, they would not surrender, and were saved from annihilation only by a rupture between the ruler of Savoy and Louis XIV. Though some fled and formed colonies in Switzerland and in Germany, the valleys became over-populated and all were reduced to the life of the peasant and shepherd. They lived from the chestnuts, grapes, figs and other fruits which they cultivated, together with the products of their few sheep and goats, and the culture of the silk worm. Each family owned its own little home and plot of ground and they lived in independent poverty. It has been said that it was not at all uncommon to see these people, even the aged women, traveling up steep mountain trails with a basket of soil upon their backs, to replace each year, the soil which had washed down the mountain slopes. Only by doing this could they plant and grow their food. Many of these trails were so steep and treacherous’ that not even a horse or mule could climb them. 
These persecutions continued until Feb. 1848, when the King of Sardinia granted the Vaudois the right to exercise their religion and to enjoy civil and political rights, and to attend schools, colleges, and universities, Many Cardons were numbered among these Vaudois martyrs. 
In 1849, the very next year, Apostle Lorenzo F. Snow was called to open a mission in Italy. He writes concerning these peoples, “I find an opening presented in the Valleys of Piedmont, when all other parts of Italy are closed against our efforts. I believe that the Lord has there hidden up a people amid Alpine Mountains and it is the voice of the spirit that I shall commence something of importance in that part of this dark nation.” 

These Vaudois people were of French extraction, originating around Lyons, France and were driven into Italy by religious persecutions. They maintained their French names, ways and language, and did not intermarry with the Italian people, due to their religious convictions. Their language took on some Italian influence and became somewhat of a mixture of French and Italian, making it very hard for them to be understood by outsiders. James D. McCabe writes, “Within this little area (Valleys of the Piedmont) scarcely larger than the District of Columbia, has existed from remote times, a peculiar race of people, rarely numbering more than twenty thousand. They have retained their primitive appearances and manners to a greater degree than almost any other European community. They have always been noted for the simplicity and purity of their lives, and their absolute freedom from ignorance, superstition, and vice which have cursed the countries around them. The men are tall and well made, graceful in action, vigorous and hardy. The women are fair, endowed with a native grace and refinement, and have always been noted for their chastity and modest deportment.” My grandparents were fair of complexion with blue eyes and answered this description. 

My grandfather, Paul Cardon, son of Phillippe Cardon and Marie Tourn Cardon, was born December 28, 1839 at Prarustin, Italy. His family had found a place of refuge in the Italian Alps during the awful persecutions that raged in the Piedmont Valleys. 
They were of the Vaudois or Waldenses, and Philippe Cardon was the second person in all of the Italian mission to join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. He was the first person in his community, or locality, to join the church. This notable event took place under the direction of the late Pres. Lorenzo F. Snow, who had opened that mission but a short time before. My grandfather Cardon’s sister, Madeline Cardon Guild (now dead) tells this story concerning an early experience with the gospel of Jesus Christ, as it was restored to the “Mormons” and the family’s conversion to it. This is found in her autobiography. 
“When I was a child of about six or seven years old, in the year 1840 or 1841, I received a remarkable manifestation, one which changed the career of my whole life. I desire to tell it just as it happened so that you may realize how I felt. 
I was upstairs in bed. A strange feeling came over me. It seemed that I was a young woman instead of a mere child. I thought I was on a small strip of meadow close to our vineyard, keeping father’s milk cows from the vineyard. It seemed that I was sitting on the grass reading a Sunday School book. I looked up and saw three strangers in front of me. As I looked into their faces I dropped my eyes instantly, being very much frightened. Suddenly the thought came to me that I must look them straight in the face so that I might remember them in the future. I raised my eyes and looked them straight in the face. One of them, seeing that I was afraid said, “Fear not, for we are the servants of God, and have come from afar to preach unto the world the everlasting gospel, which has been restored to the earth in these last days, for the redemption of mankind.” They told me that God had spoken from the heavens and had revealed His everlasting Gospel to a young boy, Joseph Smith. That it should never more be taken away again, but that His kingdom would be set up and that all the honest in heart would be gathered together. They told me that I would be the means of bringing my parents and family into this great gathering. Moreover, that the day was not far off when we would leave our homes and cross the great ocean. We would travel across the wilderness and go to Zion where we could serve God according to the dictates of our conscience. 
When they had finished their message to me they said they would soon return and visit us. They took some small books from their pockets and gave them to me saying, “Read these and learn.” They then disappeared instantly. 
When I realized what had been said to me and what I had seen, I became frightened. I took my clothes in my arms and ran downstairs to where my mother was preparing breakfast for our family and hired men. As I came in she saw that I looked pale. She asked me if I was sick and I said no. Just at that instant I was unable to talk. My mother told me to sit on a chair and she would soon see to me, and learn what was wrong. Soon my father came in and she called his attention to me. She knew what if I was not sick, that something had happened which caused me to look so strange. My father took me up, dressed me, and questioned me until I had told him all I had seen and heard.” Later in her life this scene was to be almost exactly duplicated in real life. And although she almost forgot it in the years in which she was growing up, it made a deep and lasting impression on her father and he always kept it in his mind. 
In 1850, three Latter-Day Saints, Elder Lorenzo F. Snow, a Brother Stenhouse, and Brother Toronto, came to Italy to open that mission. They stopped at a town called Palais de la Tour (Torre Pellice), where they were not allowed a church or place of shelter in which to preach. Soon the people of Palais de la Tour became wild and crazy and organized into mobs and laid plans to drive these servants of the living God out of the country. Elder Snow called his companions together and proposed that all three of them go to the mountains and there fast and pray. This they did in humbleness of heart, they asked their Heavenly Father to look down upon them in mercy and guide them to the honest in heart and bless them in their labors. They were kneeling on a large flat rock on the mountain side, in fervent prayer to God that He might open the way before them that their journey and labor in that country might not be in vain. Instantly a voice came to them saying, “Cheer up, your prayer is granted and you shall meet with friends who shall protect you in your labor and who shall receive the gospel of Christ.” (Elder Snow proposed that this mountain be known among the people of God, henceforth and forever, as Mount Brigham and the rock upon which they stood as the Rock of Prophecy.) 
Mrs. Guild writes further, “I well remember my father coming home on Friday or Saturday afternoon and asking my mother to get his Sunday clothes ready. He had just heard of these three strangers being at Palais de la Tour and preaching the same doctrine which the three strangers had taught me in my dream. or vision when I was a child. I was just seventeen or eighteen years of age. When he heard of their strange doctrine, he became so excited and so intensely interested that he could not proceed with his work. After he changed his clothes he started afoot in search of the strangers. He traveled over mountains and through valleys and arrived on Sunday morning in time to hear Elder Lorenzo Snow preach. His heart was full of joy! After the meeting my father approached these servants of God, shook hands with them and kindly invited them to come to our home where he desired them to make their headquarters. They kindly and willingly accepted his hospitality. On the way home, my father related unto them all about what I had seen and heard in my dream or vision. He had stored it in his heart and in his memory and had kept it in his bosom, a secret until now. 
When the elders reached our home that Sunday evening they inquired for me, being interested in what my father had told them concerning me. I was not at home at the time, but was out on a small strip of meadow land. It seemed to be the identical spot I had seen in that vision of childhood so many years before. I was sitting on the grass reading a Sunday School book. I did not hear them until my father said to the elders, “This is my daughter who had the vision or dream concerning the strangers who told me to “Fear not for they are the servants of God”. Upon being introduced I shook hands with each of them. They took some tracts or small books from their pockets and spoke the very same words I had heard in the dream. Thus was that remarkable manifestation partly fulfilled. As you read further you will learn that it was fulfilled to the letter.” 
The elders preached the gospel to this family and they soon joined the church. The gospel was not well received in this community and soon the persecutions began against those who had joined the church. Many of the people who had joined the church could not withstand the trials and persecutions and fell away and were excommunicated. 
The Cardon family made plans to emigrate. Due to the opposition arising against the saints, it was hard to dispose of their property and possessions for a fair price, but the Cardons were blessed and were able to sell their goods and raised enough money to come to Utah, themselves as well as to pay for another family of five persons to emigrate, also. Among the first families to leave were the Cardons, Stalles, Goudins (Goudins were my grandmother Cardon’s people} the Beuses and the Chatelainns. 
It was February 1854 when Phillippe Cardon, his wife and family, consisting of four sons and two daughters, left their native home to cast their lives and fortunes in with the “Despised Mormons”. Having already endured persecutions for their honest belief, it was nothing new for them to share in the hardships and persecutions that followed the Saints. 
On a later date when the gospel had taken root in Italy, Elder Snow wrote that they went to the mountains, climbed to Mount Brigham and the Rock of Prophecy, and there inspired by the grandeur of those lofty mountains and with the history of these people in mind, wrote the hymn “For the Strength of the Hills We Bless Thee”. This beautiful and stirring hymn, revised to apply to the mountains in the West, has long been printed in our hymnbooks with the words, “Altered by Edward L. Sloan”, in lieu of the name of the original author, Lorenzo F. Snow. 
They arrived in Utah, October 29, 1854, with the Robert Campbell Company, settling in Weber County, near Five Points, just north of Ogden, Utah. Their journey over land and sea was fraught with many dangers and trials. They had been promised that if they would live the principles of the gospel and trust in the Lord that they would reach their destination in safety, and this they did. 
They remained in Ogden until the move south, which took place during the year 1858. My grandfather Cardon was engaged with the Utah militia in the trouble with the Johnston’s Army, and was stationed as a guard at the head of Echo Canyon to prevent the approach of this army. He was instructed to set fire to the homes and grain if it was found to be necessary. 
In the year 1857 he married Susannah Goudin, who had come from the same Valleys of th4e Piedmont, was related to him, and had walked across the plains in the first Handcart Company, as his first wife. From this union nine children were born. 
When Johnston’s Army came, the saints were moved south and my grandmother, Susannah, accompanied them.   She carried a small babe in her arms and walked much of the way. In the fall of 1859 Paul Cardon, his father, and a brother Phillip, were called by President Brigham Young to go and help in the settlement of Cache Valley. Phillip later went to Mexico to help colonize and another brother, Thomas, who had been in the army during the Civil War, came to Cache Valley and there settled. 
During the first spring in the valley they sowed over 40 bushels of wheat, but reaped only 7 bushels, due to the grasshoppers. There were only a few families in the valley at this time and the Cardons entered, at once, upon the activities necessary to protect themselves and neighbors against the then savage Indians, and to the work of building a new “Mormon settlement”. 
Paul Cardon assisted in erecting the first log house in Logan which was located on the block west of the old Lincoln Hotel. This was situated on the corner of 1st west and center street, where the Logan City School offices are now located. It was a home for a family by the name of Peacock. 
He became actively engaged in defending the settlers against the many Indian raids that took place during the early settlement of Cache Valley, and risking his own life upon many occasions in defending others. He was almost constantly engaged in this work, neglecting his own personal affairs. This admirable quality characterized his entire life. He was very ambitious, quick, and full of energy. It has been said by those who knew him, that he didn’t consider that he was doing his best until he could look behind himself and see his coat-tails flying. He was prominently identified with the religious, social, military and civil organizations of the early history of Logan City and Cache Valley. As a member of the Church, he placed himself and all that he possessed at its service, for it was because of his great love for the work of the Lord that he and his people had left their native land. In a military capacity he held the rank of 1st Lt. of Cavalry, having received his commission from the President of the United States. As a local officer he served as first Treasurer of Logan City, and for many years acted as Marshall. He had charge of the Temple Mill in Logan Canyon which furnished the lumber for the Logan Temple. He assisted in the surveying and building of the Logan Canyon Road, thus connection the Bear Lake region with Logan. In all the affairs of the Valley he was foremost among men. 
The following is taken from an article edited by Pres. W. M. Everton and printed in his page in the Herald Journal, dated June 2, 1934. In speaking of Paul Cardon he writes in part: “He assisted in building the first house in Logan, which was made of logs. He and his family lived in a log house themselves for some time and in about 1869 or 1870 he built the first adobe house of any size to be erected in Logan. This was a very pretentious building for those days, costing in the neighborhood of five thousand dollars. Here, for ten years, Paul Cardon ran a hotel called the Cache Valley House. He helped in the construction of both the Logan-Richmond and the Logan-Hyde Park canals. In about 1865 he was called by Peter Maughan to go with Thos. E. Ricks, Joseph Rich and Josiah Ricks and begin construction of a road through the canyon to Bear Lake. He spent three or four months each season for the next five years in this work. They followed an Indian trail up the left fork through Beaver and St. Charles Canyons down to the settlement of St. Charles. 
For ten years he was identified with the local militia, having received his commission as first lieutenant in the cavalry from the President of the United States. As a minute man he helped keep the Indians from getting too bold around the settlements, and often accompanied Brigham Young in his visits around Cache Valley. He was the first treasurer of Logan City and also served for many years as Marshal. He had charge of the Temple mill during its construction. This mill furnished nearly all the lumber for the building of the Logan Temple, and was located at the union of Spawn Creek and Temple Fork in what was known then as Maughan’s fork in Logan Canyon. The scouts of the Coe and Carter outfit (Railroad Tie Company) were annoyed at this invasion of their intended domain but evidently determined to make this place (Temple Mill) a base of operation in spite of priority claims. The local church officials, however, had their own scouts and when it was learned that Coe and Carter scouts had been inspecting Maughan’s Fork they acted quickly to protect their interests. Paul Cardon was called, with George Batt and two or three other men to leave immediately for the canyon to commence construction of a saw mill in Maughan’s Fork and to be on hand to prevent its occupation by the Coe and Carter outfit. 
John P. Cardon, (Son of Paul Cardon) was about nine years old at this time, but he remembers his father, coming home one afternoon in great haste and asking Mrs. Cardon to get food packed for him to take to the canyon. At the same time he told little Johnnie to hitch the mules to the wagon and fill the wagon box with hay and corn while he gathered the necessary clothing and tools. They left early in the evening and proceeded to their destination without delay. When the Coe and Carter outfit arrived, some forty-eight hours later they found the first logs laid out for a big sawmill and men busily engaged in constructing shelters, etc., but not too busy to tell visitors that they intended to continue occupation of Maughan’s Fork to the exclusion of any and all other outfits. It is thought that this event probably happened in 1876 or more likely in the spring or summer of 1877…. 
The following, taken from the Utah Journal, May 8, 1886. “It will be noted that this sets the date when Paul Cardon and his company started out to construct the Temple Mill as May 11 1877, just six days before the site of the Temple itself was dedicated. This apparent haste, in commencing operations in the canyon was occasioned by the approach of the Coe and Carter Tie Company who it was feared would appropriate the intended site of the mill if they were not headed off”. 
In 1880, Paul Cardon was called upon by the church authorities, to build a large house which was to be used as a hotel and rooming house. This, they requested to be built, so that the many people who traveled here to work in the temple would have a decent and suitable place to stay. This building was located one half block west of main street on first north, near where the Dean 
C. Pack Motor Company is now located. It was called the Cache Valley House. The Cardons continued in this business for about ten years, making friends with many people who came to Logan. He was instructed to make friends with the US deputies who were in this part of the country trying to apprehend and punish polygamy offenders. There was a room especially constructed with very thin partitions, next to the room where these deputies were roomed, and the family took turns listening through this wall. Many plans were revealed this way, and my father has said that many times he went out the back door of a home after warning the saints, just before the deputies came in the front. He said that he took many a fast run or ride to the various homes of the saints to give them warnings. 
The following is taken from Logan Memories by Preston Nibley and may prove of interest. 
“Paul Cardon inserted the following advertisement in the Logan paper on March 19, 1880, over 75 years ago: ‘Having been encouraged by the leading men of Logan to commence a hotel and realizing that the needs of the public require another such house, I have concluded to open a place of entertainment. My establishment is centrally located and conveniently located, being situated on Third, between Main and Washington streets and I am satisfied that it can be made a first class hotel. I expect to open the house between the 15th of April and the 1st of May. In addition, conveyances will be kept for the use of the guests and for those who desire to take trips to the canyon and the settlements surrounding”. 
When the deputies became suspicious of my grandfather, he left Logan and went into the northwest to help build railroads. He took the older part of his family with him to work, and left his wives and the younger children here to run the hotel. This proved too much for them and they later sold it. 
The Herald Journal, many years ago, printed an article which reads in part: “To the Italian origin of Paul Cardon, Cache. Valley owes its mulberry trees and its attempts at silk culture. Both he and his wife, Susannah had become familiar with all branches of silk culture in their youth and seeing the climatic similarity of Cache Valley and northern Italy they determined to start the culture here. They imported mulberry seeds and silk worms from France and for a while it appeared that Utah might become a center of the silk industry.” The trees grew well and some were still living a few years ago. I do not know of any at this time. 
Grandmother Cardon grew very proficient at this work. She reeled the first silk produced in Utah. She received many medals from all parts of the United States for the excellence of her work. She also taught this art to many other ladies of the church at the request of Pres. Brigham Young. 
Paul Cardon sang in the tabernacle choir for many, many years. My mother says she used to notice him there each Sunday when she was still a child. She always admired him and called him the “pretty man”, even before she knew his name or that he would one day be her father-in-law. He had a fair pinkish complexion and was always neat and well dressed and pleasant. He took pride in his appearance and so did grandmother. She made him hand-tucked white shirts and always kept his clothes clean and neat. He loved people and wanted to be with them. He loved parties and fun and the social activities of the community. He was always a gentleman in every sense of the word. 
My mother has told me that he liked her and her family and was very pleased when my father married her. He always treated her with kindness and consideration and affection. He loved to help people and was generous to a fault. He had the gift of being able to make money but would give it away as fast as he made it. He had a rather quick temper but was soon over it and did not hold grudges. He was a forceful and attractive man. 
My grandmother was 6 years older than my grandfather and due to that and other reasons, she was not sure she should marry him. He persuaded her, however, and people who knew them have testified that they have never seen a more devoted couple than they were, even into old age. I have been told that he was always master in his home and that his wives and family always gave in to him and obeyed him. He always tried to do what was right and was a true and devoted husband and father all of his life. He ruled with love and understanding and sympathy. 
I remember going to visit them, as a small child, and I remember that both wives always lived in the same house, having separate apartments and furniture. They seemed to love each other and never had any trouble or quarrels that I could learn of. We always went into “Auntie’s” side of the house to visit when we went to see Grandpa, and their boat house on the Bear River was a source of pride and admiration to me. 
In 1900 Paul Cardon returned to his native land as a missionary and also to try to get some of the genealogy of his people. At this time he was 61 years old. Quoting from Elder Daniel B. Hill Richards in his book “The Scriptural Allegory: “while still laboring as a missionary at Neufchatel, Switzerland, in the winter of 1900, Daniel B. Richards received an appointment from Platte D. Lyman, Pres. of the European Mission at Liverpool and from Louis S. Cardon (my father) who was Pres. of the Swiss and Italian Missions, to go into Italy and see what could be done in re-opening the Italian Mission and establishing a branch of the church there. April 26, 1900, I met Elder Paul Cardon of Cache County, Utah at the Railway Station in Turin. He has come to this part of Italy to assist me in this part of the vineyard and also to look up his genealogy, as not a great distance from here was the home of his ancestors”. 
As far as the writer’s researches have extended, Elder Daniel B. Richards and Paul Cardon are the only Latter Day Saint missionaries who have labored in the Piedmont Valleys of Italy since June 16, 1856 –44 years –and so far as the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is concerned, nothing remained. 
Elder Cardon located a lone woman over 80 years of age, whom he had once known. We visited this woman in her cottage high on the top of the mountains, and conversed with her. She had forgotten her early faith and was now ashamed of the “Gospel of Christ”. 
My father has told us that while grandfather Cardon was laboring in Italy on his mission, he was moved by the poverty and great need of these people and father had to practically take his purse away from him as he wanted to give more than he had to them. Only a few of these people ever joined the church and many who did could not withstand the trials and persecutions and later left the church as were excommunicated. 

In 1892 Paul Cardon and some of his younger family moved to Benson Ward where he bought a large farm. Here he became a member of the bishopric and was loved and honored by the good people of that area. They lived there until 1912 (ten years) and then desiring to spend their remaining years among their children, and also to do the Temple work for their kindred dead, they moved back to Logan. They located in the Logan Seventh Ward and lived there until the time of his death. Paul Cardon was the father of 20 children, and his posterity numbers into the hundreds. 
His children were as follows: 
Paul and Susannah Goudin Cardon: 
Mary Cardon Merrill, Preston, Idaho. 
Sarah Cardon Turner, Logan, Utah. 
Susette Cardon Ricks, River Heights, Utah. 
Lucy Cardon Merrill, Richmond, Utah. 
John Paul Cardon, Logan, Utah. 
Louis Samuel Cardon, Logan, Utah. 
Joseph E. Cardon, Logan, Utah. 
Moses Cardon, Ogden, Utah. 
Phillip Cardon, Logan, Utah (died at age 4 months) |
Louise Cardon, Logan, (Died at age of 2 years) 
Ezra Cardon, Logan, Utah(Died at age 20 years) 
Children of John Paul Cardon and Magdalene Beus Cardon: 
Marian Cardon, Logan (Died at age of 4 months) 
James Cardon, Logan, (Died at age of 2 years) 
Ollie Cardon, Logan, (Died at age of 22 years) 
Hyrum Cardon, Benson Ward, Utah. 
George D. Cardon, Ogden, Utah. 
Earnest Cardon, Salt Lake City, Utah. 
Amanda Cardon Ricks, Benson Ward, Utah. 
Violet Cardon Walker, California. 
Katie Cardon Jensen, Ogden, Utah. 
John Paul Cardon died February 12, 1915, after a lingering illness. He had some type of stomach trouble which had afflicted him for some months previous to his death. It is generally supposed to have been cancer in this more enlightened era. 
I can barely remember his funeral. I was almost seven years old and can remember getting excused from school and riding in a fancy carriage. This was horse drawn and many others of his grandchildren rode in it also. I do not remember very many things about him, but have talked with many who knew him well. All of them have told me that he was true and faithful to the end and was respected and loved by all who knew him. 

A clipping from the newspaper “Logan Republican” dated Feb. 16, 1915 says in part, “In the passing of Paul Cardon, another of the old faithful pioneers goes to his well earned rest, and leaves, in his large posterity, and multitudes of friends, the richest legacy that can come to any mortal. He is the last member of the second generation of Cardons to pass to the great beyond. Of him it can be truthfully said. “He was one of God’s noble men, an honest man ­-devoted to good works.” His funeral was held in the old seventh ward chapel, and he is buried in the Logan City cemetery. 
In writing this sketch of my grandfather’s life and people, I have become better acquainted with him and realize anew, how very much our pioneers did for us when they left homes, possessions and loved ones and came to this country to be with the saints and to worship their God according to the dictates of their own conscience. May we, their posterity, be ever mindful of their great sacrifices and of their great faith in God. May we endeavor to live our lives so that when we go to meet them we will not hang our heads in shame at the way we have carried on the name and great work that they have left to us. 
To Our Pioneers 
     R.C.H. 
Nurtured through years of ignorance and dark, 
In their souls burned this divine spark, 
At a touch it burst to flame, 
For they recognized God’s holy name. 
They recognized His holy truth, 
Sent from Heaven, through a youth. 
How their testimonies burned. 
On to Zion! How they yearned. 
Thus in answer to that clarion call, 
They left loved ones, homes, possessions all. 
They walked with poverty, death and fear. 
But their God was ever near. 
He lead them on each mile, each day, 
When they could only stumble on, and pray, 
They kept their faith, and to Zion came, 
Built humble homes and a noble name. 
Their sacrifices bought our faith, our God! 
The right to worship on free man’s sod. 
These Pioneers! The great of earth! 
They brought us here, and gave us birth. 
When our brief days on earth are through, 
To this great heritage will we prove true? 
When we shall meet them heart to soul, 
Will we have shamed them by our goal? 
Surely we must make them know 
Our humble gratitude for the debt we owe, 
Surely, we must bow our heads and say, 
Thanks for life, the truth, the way! 

A PATRIARCHAL BLESSING GIVEN AT LOGAN, UTAH, JULY 18, 1865, BY C. W. HYDE UPON THE HEAD OF JOHN PAUL CARDON, SON OF PHILIP AND MARY CARDON, BORN DECEMBER 28, 1839, AT PIEDMONT, ITALY. 
Paul, in the name of the Father, I place my hands upon your head and I seal upon you a Father’s Blessing. Thou shalt do a great and mighty work in Zion, and thou shalt proclaim the gospel with the sound of a trumpet. No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper. 
Thou shalt do many mighty miracles in the name of Jesus, for the Father shall cut his work short in righteousness. 
Thou art of Joseph and a lawful heir to the Priesthood with wives, and a great kingdom upon the earth. 
It is your privilege to stand upon the earth at the Second Coming of the Messiah, and partake of all the Glories of Zion. 
These blessings I seal upon your head with crowns of Glory, Amen. 

Grave Markers Located in the Logan City Cemetery

Jean Paul Cardon

Cardon, Paul, first counselor in the Bishopric of Benson Ward, Cache Stake, is the son of Philip Cardon and Martha Mary Tourn, and was born in Italy, in the valleys of the Waldenses, Dec. 28, 1839, where he passed his boyhood days. In the year 1851 (Feb. 7th) he was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by Elder George D. Keaton. The Cardon family was one of the first to join the Church in that country. Shortly after joining the Church the family decided to immigrate to Utah, and in February, 1854, they left their native land and arrived in Salt Lake City in October of the same year. Paul drove an ox team across the plains. He settled in Mound Fort, Weber county, Utah, where he remained for one year. Thence he moved to the settlement known as Marriotts Ward, in the same county, where he lived until the early spring of 1860. In the fall of 1856 he was ordained an Elder and was set apart as an acting Teacher and home missionary. He spent the fall and winter in Echo Canyon and Lost Creek, building fortifications to stay the progress of Johnston’s army. He was a member of Capt. Lot Smith’s company most of the time. On the 16th day of March, 1857, he was married to Susannah Goudin. In the spring of 1858, when the people were called upon to leave their homes and go south, he sent his wife and child to Spanish Fork, Utah county, and he was detailed to stand guard over property in Ogden, Weber county, under the direction of General C. W. West. In the fall of 1859 he went to Cache valley and there selected property and started to build a home. In the spring of 1860 he moved his family to Cache County, where he has lived ever since. Shortly after arriving in Cache valley he was selected as one of the famous body of so-called minute men. This company of minute men was organized for the purpose of protecting themselves and families against the attacks of the Indians. He held a commission, signed by the governor, as first lieutenant of cavalry. In December, 1862, he was ordained a Seventy, and at the same time set apart as an acting teacher in the Fourth Ward of Logan and also as a home missionary. In the year of 1868 he was chosen and set apart as one of the seven presidents of the 64th quorum of Seventy. In 1887 he was compelled to go into exile, where he remained for about five years. This left him in financial straits and he was obliged to sell his home and property in order to pay his debts. In 1892 he left Logan and went to Benson Ward to build up another home for himself and family. Feb. 10, 1895, he was ordained a High Priest by Apostle Marriner W. Merrill and set apart as first counselor to Bishop Henry W. Ballard, of Benson Ward, which position he still holds. In 1899 he was called on a mission to Switzerland and Italy for the purpose of gathering genealogy; in this labor he was very successful and returned home in March, 1901. Elder Cardon’s life has been a very busy one and he has helped build up Cache valley from its beginning, having been public spirited and held many public offices in Logan city and Cache County. He is the father of a large family; fifteen of his children are still living.
Latter-day Saint Biographical Encyclopedia
Volume 2 Biographies
Smith, Thomas X.

 Click here for a printable PDF copy of the history.

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The hymn “For the Strength of the Hills” was actually written by Felicia D. Hermans (1793-1835).  Elder Snow quoted it in a letter addressed to President Orson Hyde dated January 25, 1851.  In that letter he said:  “Many a tribute of admiration has been paid them (the Waldenses) by men of ability from the chief sects of Protestantism, till their little church has been flattered into immeasurable self-importance.
The following hymn expresses the feelings engendered by their romantic situation:—.”  He then quotes six versus of the hymn and goes on to say:  “Their self-esteem, joined with deep ignorance, presents a formidable opposition to the progress of the Gospel.”  
He continued on in this vein, related a dream about catching a small fish of high quality among many large and beautiful fish to further emphasize his point, then tells of an experience he had on Sunday the 24th of November where he relates how they again ascended to what they had named Mount Brigham.  He says “Amid this sublime display of the Creator’s works, we sung the praises of His eternal Name, and implored those gifts which our circumstances required.”  He then ordained Elder Woodard as a High Priest, and turned the work in Italy over to him.   He also ordained Elder Stenhouse as a High Priest and prayed that his “…way might be opened in Switzerland for carrying forth the work of the Lord in that interesting country.”  Although this letter mentions both the song and Mount Brigham, he does not take credit for writing the words to the hymn, nor does he indicate they sang it while on the mountain in November.  On the 6th of February, he indicated that he had reserved the closing of the letter till he had himself arrived in Geneva Switzerland. He then mailed the letter to Orson Hyde.  From Switzerland he journeyed on to London where he presented two neatly bound copies of the Book of Mormon to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, and His Royal Highness Prince Albert.  This ended his mission to Italy.  Portions of the letter and the synopsis of the conclusion of Elder Snow’s mission to Italy were extracted from “The Italian Mission, By Lorenzo Snow, one of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.”  It was printed by W. Aubrey, Brandon Street, Walworth London in 1851.

THE SISTER WHO STAYED BEHIND

COMPILED BY BROOKIE PETERSON AUGUST 2003

Daughter of Philip and Martha Cardon

Anne Cardon was born the 20th of May, 1822, the first child of loving parents, Philippe and Marthe Marie Tourn Cardon. She died sixty years later. She was the only living child of the family who did not go to America. Anne was the oldest of nine children. When she was nine years old her four-year-old brother, Barthelemi died. When Anne was twelve years old her little sister, Louise, was born on Christmas Day, but before the young girl turned five, she too passed away. So, you can see, Anne was “acquainted with grief” from an early age, yet because of the loving kindness in her family, she had many happy times also. Besides her two siblings who died as children, she had four brothers and two sisters who all outlived her, yet moved away from her and lived on the other side of an ocean on another continent. But, to begin at the beginning, as far as is known Anne didn’t’t write her life history or any part of it. The following points of her life have been determined from the history of her sister, Marie Madeline, from five letters written by Anne, or for her by someone else, to her family and from facts gleaned from Church and public records. Her daughters have also written letters which shed light on their mother’s life. Anne was born in a village called Borgata Cardon [see appendix A] located in Prarostino, Torino, Italy. [However, as a country, Italy did not exist until 1861 when Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia proclaimed it the kingdom of Italy and became its king.] Her birthplace is in an area known as the Piedmont in the foothills of the Cottian Alps. It is situated in the north of Italy near the present day cities of Turin and Milan and even closer to the town of Torre Pellice. Her ancestors were French speaking and belonged to a protestant religion known in English as Waldensian, in French as Vaudois [Voh dwah] and in Italian as Valdesi. This group of Christians was much persecuted because of their beliefs which were different from the dominant Catholic religion. For a history of the Waldensian people see Appendix B. In 1848 there was an Emancipation Edict which gave Anne’s people civil rights, the right to education and an equality before the government. However, there was still prejudice against their religion although its outward manifestation no longer took the form of kidnaping children and, forbidding further contact with their parents, placing them in Catholic homes. This despicable practice, among other heinous acts of cruelty, had been common for centuries. Soon after the Edict, the Cardon family were able to move off the rugged mountain and live in the valley near San Secondo. We know little of Anne’s growing up years, but can surmise that they were years of hard work to help her parents with the younger eight children. Her sister Marie tells of their religious training. “The only book which my father had was a Bible which then was over two centuries old, handed down by his ancestors. I well remember the time when all our family would gather around my mother and father each night, just before retiring, and listen to him read a chapter in whole or in part from the Bible. After he had read he would review what he had read and explain to us little ones many good principles.” In her letters, Anne speaks of her feelings about her parents. Writing to her sister in 1873, just after her mother had passed away, she describes her mother’s character and the love she exhibited towards her children. “You can understand very well how much the death of our dear Mother afflicts me. To me it seems that she is always before my eyes. With her great goodness that God gave her she never stopped showing us the way to Heaven. With a sweet spirit, and with charity. She didn’t weigh our mistakes, but she asked forgiveness from God, warning us with sweetness and tears. My dear Sisters, I thank you infinitely for the attention you have given to me in sending hair from our dear Father & our tender Mother. [It was a common practice to send hair which was an intimate and easily preserved object connected to a loved one. Often it would be mounted and framed or put in a locket.] More than that, I see that you think of me and I hold dear these precious hairs. Even more precious because they are from our dear Father & Mother, who have been so far away, and that they are in my hands.”In a letter to her sister, written in 1881, the year before she died, she expresses her love and admiration for her father. From it we can know that she must have had a largely happy childhood and youth, feeling peace and security because of their wise and loving direction. “I will never be able to thank you enough for the good details you give us of all my dear family and my dear, dear father.(Philippe Cardon) . . How I would like to see him, hug him and take loving care of him, he who took care of me like the apple of his eye. Ah, my memory and my heart do not fail me as far as affection and filial respect are concerned. It is with the strongest memory, the greatest respect, the sweetest and most thankful affection that I remember his fatherly tenderness, his instructions, his counsel, his wholesome and corrective counsels. They will always be the traveling companions …. of my pain, my intimate friends in my solitude. His good instructions were blessed by the grace of God in Jesus Christ for my soul. May God’s divine blessing rest on him. May the Lord God be his strength and his shield.” 

When she was twenty-five years old in 1847, Anne married Jacques Rivoir, who was nineteen years older than she. This marriage only lasted ten years before he died, leaving her a widow at age thirty five. It would not be possible to give a complete version of Anne’s life without referring to the dream her sister Marie had as a child. [See Appendix C]. Partly because of her father’s knowledge of this dream and its look into the future, he was open to the teaching of Lorenzo Snow and the other missionaries when they came to Italy in 1850. During the year 1852 her entire family–parents and siblings–was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. That is the whole family except for Anne; her husband, Jacques Rivoir, was antagonistic toward the new religion, and forbade her to visit her parents’ home or to have anything to do with the Mormons. It is said that, at the time, she was receptive and sympathetic towards the religion her family chose. Her sister reported that she wanted to hear the elders explain the gospel; however, in her letters written two decades later, it is clear that she has misgivings about the practice of polygamy. The names of her parents have already been mentioned. Her brothers and sisters, in birth order are second after Anne, Jean–also the name of her paternal grandfather, born 1824; Catherine, 1829; Philippe-later Louis Philip, 1832; Marie Madeleine, 1834; Jean Paul-later Paul, 1840; and Thomas Barthelemy, 1842. Anne’s husband, who had objected to her even learning of the gospel, died just three years after her family emigrated to the United States. She was left with two small daughters, Marie age seven and Anne or Annette, age two. Three years later, she married her second husband, who was her cousin, Barthelemy Gaudin, son of her father’s sister, Martha Cardon Gaudin. He must have been good to Anne’s daughters as her older daughter, Marie, speaks very lovingly of him and calls him her “second father.” Another factor in Anne’s day to day life was a permanent house guest – Aunt Marthe, who was very handicapped and so required hours of time for her care each day. Aunt Marthe was the sister of Barthelemi Gaudin, Anne’s second husband. She is also the sister of the wife of Paul Cardon, Suzanne. She lived with Anne and Barthelemi for over a decade, and later, after Anne’s death, lived with her daughter Marie for more than another ten years. They continually struggled to take care of her financially and physically. Later letters [1888] from Marie describe best for us Marie’s own life and work and the great trial Aunt Marthe posed to their livelihood. “As for me, I’m rather well, and I work as much as I can in order to raise my five children, who are still quite small, and to take care of your poor sister Marthe (Gaudin), whom you can’t help but feel sorry for. Last winter she had the misfortune to fall on a stick of wood that poked out one of her eyes and caused her terrible suffering for a long time. She is becoming fatter and soon will not be able to stand up. I have to wash her and take care of her like a little child. So, my dear relatives, pray God for me that he gives me much patience. I still have a lot to do, especially since my little girl was nearly always sick since the death of my dear husband. Then we had a very long and difficult winter. Papa (Bartholemy Gaudin) was also feeling poorly. He often complains of having pains in his arms. He can scarcely work, even though he does everything that he can. He is no longer very strong and can neither plow nor even work in the vineyard, which means that to stay here I need a good domestic, and I would really be thankful if you could help me pay for one. …. I can only thank God for having such wonderful relatives, and I hope that He will keep you a long time in good health.”

To understand something of the country and times in which Anne’s life was lived it is enlightening to read a commentary on the reason most of the emigrants chose to leave their homes and farms to venture to the new world. Devastating crop failures struck in the 1850’s. A pastor wrote: “It is dreadful; if we do not receive substantial subsidies our people will starve by the hundreds…most of our families are ruined. Some have six, eight or ten children – all of them dependent, with no prospect of food for the next day. So great is the poverty that most of our people are on the brink of an abyss –[crops] have failed for four consecutive years. – our villages are destitute.”

Population increase, agricultural crises, debts and extreme poverty; all pointed to emigration in the interest of survival. One emigrant who sailed for Argentina said, “Neither the love of adventure nor the prospect of wealth drives us to take our families to remote countries we do not know and from which none of us will probably ever return. No, poverty, suffering, and hunger are the forces that expel us.” You Are My Witnesses – Giorgio Tourn and Associates page 235-6

Quoting from Anne in 1871 “You must know that among us, namely in Europe everything has changed; everything has an excessive price, from the meats to the grains. Cows that before sold at the price of 120 Franks today sell from 350 to 400 Franks, fat pigs from 14 to 16 Franks and the big ones from 25 to 40 Franks. “We must tell you that here we have had our own worries and our own concerns. Our uncle Jacques has had the misfortune to burn down his house; they are left with almost nothing; they have to stay here with us, and many other things have happened. Did I not tell you that here grain is sold at the price of 8 Franks per bushel, potatoes are more than one Frank, fruit and other foodstuffs are sold in proportions… anyway everything has changed in price. Everything goes at a great rhythm, everything runs fast, the time as well as the money.”

As before mentioned, many of Anne’s feelings are expressed in her letters to her sisters or brothers. We have no record of any exchange of letters between them for seventeen years after their emigration. Perhaps the cost of sending mail was prohibitive. Some things Anne writes in the earliest letter we know of [1871] would lead you to believe they had little or no communication during all those years. “My dear sisters, I want to tell you that it gave me great pleasure to receive your letter. … You are manifesting in me the desire to receive your news more often. We are surprised to find that the letters can get lost. Many letters have been addressed to you but you have received only that one. “Does the great railroad that you have from New York to San Francisco pass near your city? Tell us also what you do and if you live in the city or the country. “Thanks to God we are well just as we see that you are. It gives us great pleasure to see your photographs, especially to see your beautiful clothes, your beautiful attitudes, elegant, and the beautiful hair you have. Here we find that neither our hair nor our look conserve themselves as well as yours; this shows that good air is there among you.”

Her last comment — attributing their beautiful hair and look to good air is fascinating, the fact probably being, that she had a life of drudgery eking out a living from vineyard and farm and taking care of Aunt Marthe while theirs were lives of hard work, but of better quality. Anne was a very spiritual person. She understood many gospel truths. Often in her letters she speaks of the Savior and her Heavenly Father. However, if in her young married years she was inclined toward the Church, she had a change of thought about one of its practices as she matured. Quotes from a letter written in 1871 show this. She must have just learned of her father’s taking a plural wife some eight years after the marriage. “I must tell you that the last letters that you wrote to me gave me great pleasure but at the same time sorrow; can you understand this? It has been years that I have [not] known what our father had done ….. and so violate the seventh commandment of God but what do you want? We cannot judge him nor condemn him, but we can regret it and this shows that God did well at the beginning to create a man and a woman, in his great wisdom; and who are we to change His Statutes and His Laws? “You tell us nothing of Jean and Philippe, you tell us nothing of Barthelemy; do they as well have many wives? I have always had a great disgust for this … polygamy. It seems to me that we can be children of God through Jesus Christ, following His commandments, and if those missionaries that took you away had never talked about polygamy but only of baptism; that is following the ordinances of the Lord, because ours comes to us from Rome (this we know for certain), they would have had hundreds of people instead of a few that accepted them.”

Most of their letters were written for them by someone else; apparently, it was hard for them to write, although from several clues I believe they knew how, but perhaps their ability was superficial. It may have had something to do with writing in Patois which was what they called the dialect they spoke. “You ask me how I can be happy without the presence of my family, but I can tell you that most of my time I am sick to know that I wasn’t able to follow you and our dear parents.”

Writing 17 years after their departure, Anne writes of her lifelong dream to join her family in America. Late 1870’s “You know that we have a problem with Marthe, our sister and sister-in-law. We fear that she will not be able to face such a voyage, because she is too fat. Barthelemi says it would be too difficult to travel only us two with her, because we would have to help her get on and off the train and from the boat, just like you would have to do for a baby, and then our conscience impedes us from leaving her here alone, but also we fear that if we leave her here with what little land we own, she would not be able to take care of it. Therefore, now we have taken a decision, and now we all wait for your answer to know if we can come or not. “Regarding our trip, we could pay only one half and no more. We pray you, tell us if you think it will be possible for us to have land because here we sell all that we have; we are forced to do it to pay a part of the voyage. When we will be in America, we will be under the grace of God and also under yours.”

The following letter was composed by Anne about one and one/half years before she died. 1881 “We would all like to come, but for all of us to come would make nine people. Marie has a baby boy to wean and Annette also has a baby girl to wean; with their husbands they make six plus the three of us. “To come, without counting the babies, it would cost us about 5,000 Franks. In coming there, we would like to have land that doesn’t cost too much, that is fertile and not too far from you. If we have to come and live far away, without seeing each other more than we do now nothing would change. We are coming to be with you. We could divide the cost of the voyage. Now I’ll explain the reason. Barthelemy and I still have some debts and our land is not worth much. Marie could sell but even in Milan, land isn’t worth much, and her husband is the family son [probably means the oldest or birthright son or possibly the only son of his parents.]. Annette also has her land in Milan, and her husband is a bricklayer by profession and the family son as well. “When we want to sell we must do it at a cheap price. Dear family, we would come with pleasure but we have need of time to sell and gather the money necessary. Is polygamy still there among you? And even if it is, will we be obligated to practice it? Written to her sister Catherine Cardon Byrne, by Jacques Constantin of Collaray: From “Your most affectionate Anne Cardon Gaudin. My husband is Barthelemy Gaudin of Balcoste and I have two wonderful daughters Marie and Anne Rivoir.”

Anne, the mother, died July 25, 1882. This is an account of her death written by her daughter Anne, signing Annette, the diminutive form of Anne. It tells the family in America of her mother’s last days.Prarustin August 8, 1882 “Very dear and well-loved family: Uncle and aunt and cousin [masculine] and cousin [feminine] and especially to our dear grandfather if he is still living, “It is with great sorrow that we write you a few lines to inform you of the long illness of our dear mother — 3 months when she was ill before taking to bed and then 4 months in a bed of pain of which the 8 last days the violent pain almost surpassed her strength, but she endured her torments with a great patience. She said it was nothing in comparison to the suffering which Jesus Christ had on the cross for some hours before his death. She got a stomach ache which did not leave her until her death. “She said that she would have liked to be healed physically in order to see you in her last days. As she saw herself approaching death, she said that she would like to be able to run to meet death in order to more quickly be close to her Savior and to her dear mother. At last she died the 25th of August [Should be 25th of July; she writes this letter on the 8th of August] at 2 o’clock in the afternoon with her bed surrounded by her two daughters and some other women with us. Well, I hope and have a firm belief that she waits for us at the feet of Jesus where we will find ourselves soon all together. I think that my sister will write to you more of our dear mother; pardon all our faults and don’t forget to write to us I beg you. “I declare myself [to be] for life your niece Rivoire Annette”

The daughters, Marie and Annette, continued to live in poverty, to long to join their American relatives to the end of their lives. Living with Marie is her second father, Barthelemi Gaudin and his sister Aunt Marthe Gaudin, who continues to be a great problem for them as she was for their mother, Anne. December 28, 1888 “And now I will send some details on me and my family as you ask me to. My Papa [in another letter she says “your cousin, my second father Barthelemy Gaudin and his poor sister idiot–Martha Gaudin] lives with me since more than a year…. poor Aunt Marthe continues to be in a deplorable state. She fell recently and the only eye that she has left was so badly damaged that I think that she doesn’t see any more at all. She has to be fed like a baby, and I dress her, and tend her as if she only had a few more months. “This is a terrible trial that God sends us, and you can’t imagine the sad condition of the poor aunt, and of all the trouble that she gives me. Without her, I could with my children look for another house, sell my land, and find an occupation that would procure me the daily bread. But no one wants to take me with the unfortunate Aunt Marthe, and that is why I am obliged to continue to live in the house where I am. I would be very grateful to you if you could send me something which would help me from now till next summer, and would provide for the needs of the Aunt. I have tried three times to get her into a charitable establishment, but they absolutely will not take her because of her state of complete dependance.” Your niece Marie Gonnet

And [writing] for her: Emma Pons The godmother of Marie Rivoire was Catherine Cardon who was her mother Anne’s sister and the 4th child of Philippe and Marthe Marie Tourn Cardon. Showing her immense gratitude and her feelings of love and dependence on those in America, Marie writes some years later: 4 April 1892 “Believe it dear godmother that it is impossible for me to describe to you the gratefulness which I feel in thinking of you who were so good to me at the time of the death of my dear mother and the 500 francs which you sent to me contributed greatly for me and I weep in thinking of so many of your good deeds of which I have been witness myself and pray that God will bless you and preserve all of you a long time. I see that you have always been very good to me and I am extremely grateful to you for that. I find myself at present still at La Tour [Torre – Pellice] on this farm. I still have Marthe. Marthe has been my little one and my charge, but what would you? I must have patience and be content with my lot. But I assure you that I must have enormous patience to tend this miserable one. I went to visit my sister yesterday and she is also very unfortunate with 4 or 5 small children. She tells me to greet aunt Madeline and receive from the bottom of our hearts our sincere greetings. Your Affectionate Goddaughter,” Marie

In closing the small window of opportunity we have had to view Anne Cardon’s life let me mention again the high priority faith in Jesus Christ and God held for her. It seems that many of the Waldensians had the Gift of the Spirit called beholding of angels and ministering spirits [Moroni 10:14] for they had in their histories records of dreams and visions. Some were given at an early age as was her sister’s, Marie Madeline, when she was six or seven years old. Anne wrote this in one of her letters [1873]. “…when I was 13 years old I saw in a vision how God guided you and me at the same time. I heard a great voice that said to me ‘through fasting and prayer many sins will be forgiven you.’ I hope that God will — give us strength from his Holy Spirit so that we can say as St. Paul, when he said, ‘Oh God how happy I am to have learned to live in the state in which I find myself.’ “And it is the same for all of us to be happy in the state in which we find ourselves. It is enough that we live worthy of being among the elect. Seems to me that, we should all pray to God on our knees with fasting. “I am not coming to America to search for the riches of this world but I go to find the peace of my soul, and also because my two daughters have always desired since their infancy to reach you one day. This has always been their greatest desire. [Of course, she never realized this dream, although she writes as if it is about to happen.] “Well, by the grace of God I feel that I am one of his children that he has redeemed with his precious blood. Faith, hope and love are not feeble and spiritless words for me. My hope is in God, who by the merits of his well beloved son, our only Savior, gave us a celestial inheritance. [He] will be my strength, my support, my light and my everything for time and eternity.”

To me, this is the story of a valiant woman who loved God all her life and also had great love for her family. During the 1990s some of the extended family were able to contact some of her descendants. All of them were descendants of Annette, her younger daughter. The older daughter, Marie, lost three children to death when they were very young; her son Jean Gonnet, who lived to adulthood, died without leaving children. Annette’s descendants — grandchildren and great grandchildren know something of her, but know no stories nor any facts about their great-great grandmother, Anne. She has been forgotten because of lack of information about her. In the summer of 2002, when a group of family members visited Italy, they met several of these descendants. They were very gracious and interested in their history. They also asked for three copies of the Book of Mormon and one couple have since had the missionary lessons. It is hoped that in time some of them will accept the gospel message. Surely this would bring great joy to grandmother Anne.

DATES RELEVANT TO ANNE’S LIFE

1822	20 May Anne Cardon, [first child] daughter of Philippe Cardon and Marthe Marie Tourn his wife, was born.
1847	30 September Anne 26 md Jacques Rivoir 44 at Prarustin
1850	15 December Anne’s first child, Marie Rivoir born. [Father Philippe and Marthe Marie’s first grandchild]
1855	7 Jan Anne’s daughter Anne Rivoir [known as Annette] born in Prarustin
1857	5 February Anne’s husband Jacques Rivoir died
1860	29 November Anne md cousin Barthelemy Gaudin. They had no children. [Barthelemy was the son of Marthe Cardon and Barthelemy Gaudin. Marthe was sister of Father Philippe and the senior Barthelemy was the brother of Jeanne Marie Gaudin Stalle, Father Philippe’s second wife.]
1864	20 February Marthe Cardon Gaudin, sister of Father Philippe, died
1874	16 April Anne’s daughter Marie 24 married Jean Gonnet
1878	2 May Anne’s daughter Anne [Annette] md Jean Pierre Constantin All living descendants of Anne have come through her daughter [Annette] Rivoire Constantin.
1879	24 September Anne’s grandchild Jean Michel Gonnet, son of Marie, was born.
1882	25 July Anne died.
1895	Probably January Marthe Gaudin died. She is the “Aunt Marthe” in many of the letters, also known as Martrota; she is the sister of Anne’s second husband Barthelemy Gaudin. Marthe Cardon Gaudin who was sister to Father Philippe, who died some thirty years earlier was her mother[1964].

Marie Rivoir Gonnet: On church records the spelling is Rivoir, but they sometimes spelled it Rivoire. Marie had two more Gonnet children.

1884	Jacques died at age 1.
1886	February Her husband Jacques died. Her son Jean was 6 years old and her daughter Marie Alice, 8 months old at the time.
1889	Marie Alice died at age four.
1890	married 2nd Bernardino Francese. They had one son Alberto, who died age 3. Husband #2 died.
1892	married 3rd Barthelemy Volle who died before Marie.
1895	Her letter says she is married to a man named Pinot.
1931	Marie, who never got to come to America, died in Italy.

The death date for Annette Rivoir Costantino was not established at the time Brookie Peterson compiled this report. She died as Rivoir Anna widow Costantino, on the 30th of May 1934 in Torre Pellice and was buried on the 1st of June in the Torre Pellice cemetery. 

 

The death record of Marie Rivoire as is the burial record of Anna are in the Waldensian Evangelical Church Records, 1679-1969 and can be found on familysearch.org. Below is photo of Marie’s record.

APPENDIX A

The Cardon Borgata

The Cardon Borgata appears on a map as early as the seventeenth century. Borgata means hamlet or small village. According to the Masters’ thesis of Diane Stokoe page 41, the family of Philippe and Marthe Marie Tourn Cardon lived in the Cardon village prior to the Edict of Emancipation for the Waldensians which brought new freedoms in 1848. It was in that village that Marie Madeleine had her childhood dream. Soon after 1848, as there was no longer reason to hide in fear, Philippe moved his family down to San Secondo di Pinerolo, on the edge of the Piedmont plains where he worked as an architect and stone mason. So it was in San Secondo that the family lived when the father first heard of the missionaries and went to hear the gospel preached. However, the Borgata is the place we identify as their home. There are a number of things to look for in a visit to it. Some of the homes have been restored, and people live in them either year round or use them as summer retreats. You will remember that in early days, the animals lived on the first floor and the family on the second to take advantage of the heat which would rise16 from the animals and which would make their homes warmer. Take notice of the wild strawberries. Suzette Stale Cardon brought strawberry plants from her home and carried them in the first handcart company. She was a master at drying strawberries. In Arizona, the University asked her to explain her method as the extension division had never been able to do it so well. You will discover that the doors and windows are very small. There are probably two reasons for this. Our ancestors were small people. Also a portion of their taxes were determined by the size of the windows and doors. The smaller they were, the lower the tax. We should be able to find the outdoor ovens. Marie Madeleine writes that, in Italy, they would bake as much as one hundred pounds of flour and roast meat to feed those who came to their home to hear the missionaries. Near the homes is the symbol of the Waldensians – the eternal flame meaning Keep the eternal flame of the gospel alive. Off in the distance we can see an old Waldensian temple. Climb up the terraces to get a beautiful view and feel the connection that will come into your heart that our ancestors lived and worked, loved and died here. 

APPENDIX B

WALDENSIAN HISTORY FOR CARDONS

Much of the following comes from an article by Ron Malan, “Waldensian History .. A Brief Sketch” Available at PFO web site http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~waldense/ All serious historians now agree that the Waldensian movement began in Lyons about 1170. Claims to greater antiquity came much later and are unfounded. These claims seem to have been brought about by a desire to show descent from the time of the Apostles, but they have proven to be incorrect. It is now also universally agreed that the founder’s name was not Peter Waldo; he was never called Peter until some 150 years after his death. The form of his name currently accepted is either Vaudes or Valdes –. We’ll use the form Valdes here, as the “l” sound is maintained in the current name Waldensian and will therefore be more familiar. And, until joining the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s, his followers never called themselves “Waldensians.” That term was applied to them by those who sought to destroy them and therefore carried pejorative connotations. Rather, they consistently referred to17 themselves as the “Poor of Christ,” the “Poor of Lyons,” the “Poor in Spirit,” or more simply “Brothers.” By the middle of the 13th century they were considered to be heretics and they had to move to rural areas, eliminate public preaching and simply try to maintain their group, not increase it in size. Most of their preachers settled down, married, and raised families. They were no longer inclined to give away all they had, but they came to devote much of their effort to providing for their families, including legacies for heirs. Their wills demonstrate this, yet they still had the attitude of being generous to and caring for the poor. Due to the influence of the reformation, there was a major change in their worship habits and status as a church in the mid-sixteenth century. They began to erect formal buildings of worship, in place of the traditional secret meetings in the open or, for smaller groups, in homes. The openness increased their numbers, but being more visible also increased the persecution they experienced. They began to call themselves Waldensians; though formerly it had been a belittling name used by their persecutors, it now became a compliment. Their pastors or Barba began to be educated–mostly in Switzerland. Up to this time they had been opposed to formal education for the Barba. For the century following the mid 1500’s persecution of the Waldensians became very severe, constantly increasing. There was the massacre of 1545 and in 1630 a terrible plague killed many of their number including eleven of their thirteen pastors. In April 1655, the Waldensians were ordered to quarter the soldiers of the Duke of Savoy in their homes. Early on Easter morning, at a given signal, these troops arose and brutally murdered their host families. This became known as the Piedmont Easter, and led the English poet Milton to write his famous sonnet, “On the Late Massacre in Piedmont,” about the “slaughtered saints.” In 1685 The Waldensian pastors were expelled, Waldensian worship was forbidden, and all children were to be baptized Catholics. Following the refusal of the Waldensians to do this, within three days their persecutors killed some 2000 of them. Some 8500 were sent to prisons; most of these died from lack of food, water, disease and poor shelter. Those who remained were sent into exile. Four years later in 1689, those who could, came back to their homelands in what is known as “The Glorious Return.” Persecution continued for almost another 200 years. In the time of Napoleon there was the infamous “home for Waldensian children,” in which kidnapped or enticed children had been raised as Catholics, their parents not even permitted to visit them. There was a long history of child snatching by the enemies of the Waldensians. The purpose was to force the children to become Catholic. They were sometimes taken with18 the knowledge, but not the consent, of the parents and at other times simply abducted. No child wandering on its own was safe. Besides the home for Waldensian children, sometimes they were taken in as a servant to a Catholic family or at times as a family member. In 1848, Savoy which had been a principality became part of Italy, and finally the Waldensians were granted full rights of citizenship. For the first time in centuries, Waldensians could hold public office, choose the profession they wished, and acquire land; and their children could qualify for higher education. But the declaration failed to provide greater religious freedom. Still, it was the beginning of that process. Upon receiving the news, the Waldensian villages celebrated by building bonfires, visible all up the mountainside. It is interesting to observe that Lorenzo Snow was sent to Italy in June of 1850. It could hardly have been a coincidence; had he gone much earlier the Waldensians would not have been at liberty to listen to his teaching. During the last half of the nineteenth century, very hard economic times befell inhabitants of the valleys. This led to emigration. Besides those converts to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who left for Utah in the 1850’s, other groups emigrated to South America–Uruguay and Argentina. Some emigrants went to South Africa. They also went to other areas of the United States. In the 1880’s and 90’s additional groups, who were not members of the Church, but related to member immigrants, came to Utah. Most of the time through the centuries, the Waldensians were extremely poor, partly because of spending all their efforts on their own security, but also because of heavy taxation. Often Catholics were exempt from taxation while they were forced to pay doubly. However, their hard work paid off in the fruit they obtained from their fertile soil. They grew vines for grapes, chestnuts, figs, olives and many other kinds of fruit. Silk production was a cottage industry. Higher up, the land was devoted to pasture, and there was an abundance of milk and wool. Enormous quantities of chestnuts were grown. They were dried and cleaned and the surplus sold or bartered for grain. They were an important source of food and could be made into biscuits. The following paragraphs are descriptions of the Waldensians taken from the writings of Marriner Cardon entitled “Children of the Valleys.” “There were two characteristics of their religious devotion that were frequently noted. The first was their knowledge of the scriptures. All classes studied the Bible, which from the 12th century onward they had in their popular tongue. Many, both men and women, could recite complete books of the Bible. Their pastors and missionaries often memorized — the New Testament.19 “Their second notable characteristic was the singing of biblical psalms. So common was it for the Waldensians to entertain themselves by singing psalms while working in the fields or about their homes that anyone found to be so engaged was presumed to be a Waldensian.” Two quotes from Catholic Inquisitors when writing against them, rather than condemning them, seem to be very complimentary: “‘The heretics may be known by their manners and by their language; for they are well ordered and modest in their manners; they avoid pride in their dress, the materials of which are neither expensive or mean…’ “‘They are such scrupulous observers of honor and chastity, that their neighbors, though of a contrary faith, entrusted to them their wives and daughters, to preserve them from the insolence of the soldiery. They are temperate in eating and drinking — they do not frequent taverns or dances. – They are on their guard against the indulgence of anger. They may be known also by their concise and modest discourse; they guard against indulgence in jesting, slander or profanity.’” From Reverend William S Gilly we learn the following: “– they form terrace upon terrace, in many places not exceeding ten feet in breadth and wall them up with huge piles of stone. Upon these terraces they sow their grain or plant vines. “— Picture this torn and rugged country, where neither carts nor beast of burden can penetrate and where the farmer is constrained to serve both as a cart and as a horse. I have seen slender women crushed under enormous weights during the summer months – picking up dirt at the foot of the mountain and carrying it on their back to the summit. In successive years the same soil, washed back down in the valley, is again carried up on backs a second, a third time, indefinitely.” “All the members of the family from eight years on had their part in the active life of the family, then almost entirely farming or pastoral. The heavy work was done by both men and women. Children looked after their younger brothers and sisters, herded livestock and helped with all the lighter work of farming and raising stock. —families ate meat only on special occasions. Baths were not frequent. — Births were attended often only by the grandmother of the baby. – One thing is astonishing, that [such] persons — should have so much moral cultivation. They can all read and write. They understand French, so far as is needful for the understanding of the Bible, and the singing of psalms.” — These observations give a few insights into the lives and homes of our ancestors.

APPENDIX C

Marie’s Dream

Marie Madeleine Cardon Guild [Charles] wrote an autobiography which describes much of the life of the Cardon family; it is priceless for our understanding of earlier events. We do not know if she began writing as some of the events happened or made notes of them. Possibly it was all written in her later life, but it was addressed to her children and edited in the year 1903, when she would have been 69 years old. [She was born 6 July 1834.] She was the sixth child of Philippe and Marthe Marie Tourn Cardon and the younger sister of Anne the subject of this brief biography. When Marie was six or seven years old in 1840 or 1841, she had a most remarkable dream which is often retold in family gatherings. In her dream she saw herself as a young woman. She was sitting on a small strip of grassy meadow near her home, watching over her father’s cows to keep them away from the vineyard. As she was reading, she looked up and saw three men approaching. She dropped her eyes being very much frightened. They told her not to be afraid, that they were teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. They also said that her family would join his church and later emigrate to America. They gave her some small books and told her to study them. Quoting from her writing: “When I realized what had been said to me and what I had seen I became frightened. I took my clothes in my arms and ran downstairs to where my mother was preparing breakfast for our family and hired man. “As I came in she saw that I looked pale. She asked me if I was sick. I said ‘No.’ Just at that instant I was not able to talk. My mother told me to sit on a chair and she would soon see to me and learn what was wrong. Soon my father came in and my mother called his attention to me. She knew that if I was not sick that something had happened which caused me to look so strange. My father took me up, dressed me, and questioned me until I had told him all I had seen and heard.” As the years passed, Marie forgot her dream, but her father never did. Many years later her father Philippe also had a dream about21 missionaries coming. It reminded him of Marie’s dream. The very next day, when he was working at his stone masonry, one of his hired men told him he had heard of some missionaries teaching in another town. He went home mid-morning. His wife was very surprised and asked, “Why are you home at this hour?” and he replied, “I can see two strangers coming up the mountains bringing us a message concerning the gospel. I must dress in my best clothes and go down to welcome them.” He quickly changed into his Sunday clothes and began the long walk to find the missionaries. He walked that afternoon and all night and the next morning arrived in time to hear Elder Lorenzo Snow preach. He invited them to his home and to make it their headquarters. They went with him to the mountains. They asked about Marie, and the promise of Marie’s dream was fulfilled when they stood before her as she was seated in a meadow. Upon seeing them she remembered her dream and recognized them. They handed her a book and told her they were teaching of Jesus Christ. They held Sunday meetings at the Cardon home–sometimes forty or fifty or more were present. These were mountaineers who had arisen at two or three in the morning and walked for hours to hear the Elders teach. They baked bread in their big oven and cooked meat for many so that none would go away hungry before their long walk home. After doing what they could as a family to convert some of their friends and neighbors, they were told in a directive from the Church issued in 1853 to “come to Zion.” Their journey, beginning on February 8, 1854, has often been described, and it was a rigorous one. They traveled by carriage, railway, regular coach and a coach placed on sleds, drawn by sixteen mules up the steep mountain through ice and snow. Continuing by rail and steamer they finally reached Liverpool where they waited for their ship, the John M. Wood, to be completed. Their journey across the Atlantic took almost two months. Arriving in New Orleans May 2, 1854, they had to travel both the Mississippi and Missouri rivers by steamer. At Westport, now a part of Kansas City, Missouri, they prepared and began their pioneer travel overland with ox teams. Leaving in early May, as part of the Robert L. Campbell company, it took almost six months to reach Salt Lake City on October 28, 1854. They had walked for more than 130022 Much of the information in this appendix comes from the Autobiography of Marie Madeleine Cardon Guild, copied by DJS, April 8, 1909 by order of Mrs. Charles Guild, obtained via Edna Cardon Taylor. miles in the final phase of their nine month journey.

14 Feb 1858 – 20 Dec 1943

Grand-Daughter of Philip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn

Daughter of Jean (John) Cardon and Anna Regula Furrer

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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 

BY LAURA R. JENKINS

Anna Rosina Cardon Shaw was born in Marriott [near Ogden], Weber County, Utah, on February 14, 1858. She was the daughter of John Cardon and Anna Furrer Cardon, both early pioneers of Utah. Her father came to Salt Lake City in the P. E. Fund Company, arriving October 16, 1853. Her mother crossed the plains with the first handcart company and arrived in Utah September 26, 1856. 

The Cardon family was of French descent, but had settled in the mountains of Italy, where they owned beautiful vineyards. They were thrifty people, by trade weavers, cabinetmakers, and builders. Anna Furrer Cardon was a native of Switzerland and had been educated in medical science in that country. This knowledge made her an angel of mercy to the company with which she traveled. Her labors among the sick after her arrival in Utah will never be forgotten. It was of this noble parentage that Anna Rosina was permitted to enter mortality. 

The early home of the Cardon family was in Marriott ward where they owned considerable property. An incident might here be related showing the implicit faith of the mother of the subject of our sketch. Desiring a blessing from the great prophet and seer Brigham Young, the day before the birth of the babe, Dr. Anna walked to Salt Lake City from her home in Marriott. The next day she walked back and the night of her return her child was born. Brigham Young promised that the babe was a chosen spirit. Satan seems to have known, for he was always on the alert to destroy her life. 

The winter following her birth was unusually severe. The Wasatch Mountains were packed with snow from summit to base. The spring brought heavy rainfalls, and the genial warmth of the sunshiny days melted the winter snow. Ogden River over swept its bounds, and the farms of the surrounding country were completely inundated. The night on which the river gained its greatest strength Dr. Anna, with her infant Rosina, were alone. A neighbor, feeling impressed of her condition, came to her rescue and assisted mother and child onto a stack of hay, where they spent the night in safety. Had this neighbor not heeded the warning voice, both mother and child would undoubtedly have perished. 

When Rosina was five years of age, an accident occurred which, but for the interference of Providence, might have deprived her of life. Her mother had engaged a neighbor woman to look after her three little ones while she went out for an evening’s recreation. Locking the door behind her, she made the mistake of leaving her darlings before the neighbor arrived. 

Rosina exerted herself in every way she knew to entertain the younger children. A bright fire burned in the open fireplace. Finding that swinging a long stick caused the baby to laugh, she continued to do so, until she suddenly found her clothing in flames! The door was locked! Apparently there was no escape. Her guardian angel, however, was present. She was silently prompted to break a window, climb out, and run toward her father who was working in a field nearby. Had she not followed the dictates of this “still, small voice”, the cabin would most certainly have been burned and the three children would have perished in the flames. 

She succeeded in getting out of the window without setting fire to anything else. The father noticed the smoke and heard her screams, but thought them the wailing of a coyote, there being so many of them in the vicinity at the time. Soon he recognized the voice of his child, and he ran in the direction from which the moans came, and found the little girl where she had fallen, burned beyond all recognition. 

In relating the sad story, Rosina later said, “I was still conscious enough to hear the agonized cries of my father as he gazed on the terrible spectacle. ‘My God!’ he wailed, ‘Can this be my child? How can I pick you up! Your flesh is gone, and you are failing to pieces!”‘ 

The burned flesh dropped to the ground as he tried to move the charred figure. Carefully he pushed back the intestines, or they would have fallen from the abdominal cavity. He carried the little body home and dispatched a messenger for the mother. How the heart-broken woman reproached herself for her sad mistake! With a tenacity seldom witnessed Rosina clung to life, but no one thought she could live, and at times life seemed extinct. In her great grief, the mother remembered the promises of President Young in his blessing to her before the child’s birth. Feeling that he alone could assist her, she sent him word of the terrible accident. ‘Dead or alive, bring her to me, ‘was the reply. To the great Latter-Day Prophet the tiny charred frame was borne. 

President Young called in the brethren and held a Circle Prayer. He then anointed the little head and placed his hands upon it. The prophetic power of God was upon him and he promised her complete recovery with no visible scars or bad results. He told her she should live to be a mother in Israel, a savior to her husband, and an instrument in the hands of God for the good of his children on the earth. At the close of the blessing a brother standing nearby remarked that those blessings might as well have been made to a stone, for the child could never live. 

President Young insisted on the little one remaining in his home for about two weeks, and his wife Mary Ann Angel and Sister Vilate Kimball cared for her. She was then taken again to her father’s home. Weeks passed with so few signs of life, she was often taken for dead. Friends even declared mortification had set in, but tenaciously the mother clung to the promises of the Prophet of God. At length, life’s forces were renewed and the little one began to revive. Weeks of intense suffering followed, but through the mercies of God and the vigilant efforts and faith of the mother, the little girl’s life was spared. Though until eight years of age she walked on crutches, Rosina lived to see President Young’s promises fulfilled and today has no visible scars and suffers no discomfort from the accident. 

When Rosina was fourteen years of age the family moved to Lynn ward, Ogden City, and there engaged in the general merchandise business, dealing heavily in fruit, manufacturing molasses, and operating a wool carding machine. The delicate little girl assisted in all these enterprises. She had little opportunity for education, but she advanced rapidly with the little schooling she did have. She studied music under Eliza Snow, daughter of President Lorenzo Snow of Brigham City, and at one time had the honer [sic] of entertaining President Young. In 1874 she attended school for a few weeks under the tuition [sic] of Professor L. F. Moench, but on account of ill health she was obliged to discontinue. 

In 1876 Rosina apprenticed herself to Mrs. Carter, manager of the Relief Society millinery store of Ogden City. She rapidly advanced and in a short time became head trimmer. The practical business training she had received in her father’s store now was of great value to her. Her employers recognized her business ability, and she became assistant manager of the millinery store, holding the position for three years. On December 29, 1878, she became the wife of William Shaw of Lynn. Though Mr. Shaw was not a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints at their marriage, he soon after received the gospel, and in 1882 the desire of his wife’s heart was gratified; they were married for time and eternity in the Endowment House of Salt Lake City. 

William and Rosina Shaw engaged in the mercantile business and through thrift and economy built the brick store which stands at Five Points today. William Shaw was always an honest tithe payer. When he built his store at Lynn, he valued his property and sold his only cow to meet his tithing. He prospered greatly and lived to know that God fulfills His promises to the tithe payer. He was always strictly honest in all his dealings and insisted on full weights and measures. 

Rosina always assisted in her husband’s business and when, in 1896, he was called on a mission to New York, she assumed control of his business. She was then the mother of five children. Her son William Alben, aged sixteen, assisted her in the store, while her daughter Rozina Diana cared for the home and younger children. At one time she had just sent out a heavy order for goods for her store. To meet the payment required all the money she could raise. At this most inopportune time her husband wrote to her from his field of labor for the sum of forty-five dollars. She was at a loss at how to obtain the requested amount. 

Soon after, while driving up Washington Avenue with her son, he noticed a strange- looking parcel in the street. They picked it up and found it to be a pocket handkerchief in which were tied two twenty-dollar gold pieces and a five-dollar gold piece, just forty-five dollars, the amount for which her husband had sent. Rosina advertised for the owner, but as the parcel was never claimed, she sent it to her husband, feeling the Lord had sent her the money she required. 

Many instances in the life of Rosina Shaw might be related wherein she was warned of dangers, and through these warnings enabled to avert many accidents. Through her great faith her children have been healed, and when death called them, the Lord in His mercy comforted her with dreams and visions. She was the mother of eight children, two of whom have preceded her to the spirit world; two of her sons have carried the gospel to the nations of the earth. 

In August 1909, William Shaw rented his store at Lynn and removed his family to Logan, as Rosina was very anxious to work in the temple for her kindred. In August of 1913, they were about to return to Lynn when William Shaw was suddenly called from this sphere of action. He had arisen as usual and was starting a fire in the family cook stove, when he fell over on the floor unconscious and passed away before help could reach him. William Shaw’s sudden death came not without warning. Both he and his wife were warned in dreams before the sad event took place. After her husband’s death Rosina Shaw decided to remain in Logan and rent her store to her son. She had more work to do for her kindred dead, and she spent much of her time in the House of the Lord. 

Rosina has held many positions of trust in the Church and faithfully performed all duties required of her. She has taught her children the gospel as she knew it, and her great desire is that they may emulate the good works of their parents. 

L. M. Jenkins, author Date: probably in 1930’s Handwritten copy made available by Daughters of Utah Pioneers Typed copy (with minor editing for clarity) by Colleen Blankenship, Nov 2005 Anna Rosina Cardon Shaw lived 14 Feb 1858 – 20 Dec 1943. 

Note from Colleen Blankenship: Anna R.C. Shaw’s granddaughters, Genevieve Sherner and Marjorie Sherner Johnson, remember Anna relating the story of being burned as a child. Anna showed Marjorie her side, and Anna said her mother (Anna Furrer Cardon) had cut the scar tissue later so that her daughter could stand up straight. 

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Ogden City Cemetery, Ogden, Utah

15 Mar 1826 – 25 Aug 1907

Wife of Jean (John) Cardon

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Anna Regula Furrer was born 15 March 1826 in Pfaffikon, Zurich Canton, Switzerland to Regula Hess and Hans Rudolf Furrer. In the many hand written histories by her daughters and grand-children as well as newspaper accounts, her name appears as any of the following: Anna Furrer, Anna Raglea Furrer, Anna Regula Furrer or Netta Anna Furrer.

She entered school at the age of five and at age 14, expressing a desire to be a nurse, was sent to Lamples Hospital for four years. Not being content as a nurse, she was encouraged by her cousin, Dr. David Eptner, a medical professor at Geneva Hospital, to train to be a doctor. She entered Geneva Hospital and subsequently graduated as an M.D.. During this time she learned French, Italian and English. German is believed to have been her native language in Zurich. During her last year at medical school, her brother Casper and her father were killed at war and her mother died shortly thereafter from grief. This knowledge was withheld from her until after her graduation so as not to interfere with her studies. When learning of their deaths, however, she grieved deeply. Later she studied at Leipzig and then served in the medical field in Constantinople.After returning to Switzerland, she was introduced to the LDS faith by Elder John Smith and baptized in 1854 by Elder Heurs in the River Rhone. Against the objections of her remaining family, she prepared to immigrate to Utah and, assuming the name of Anna to prevent being discovered in her departure, reached Liverpool and sailed in the ship Enoch Train in March 1856. She was known on ship as “Doctress Anna” as she helped care for the sick during the six-week crossing.

Proceeding by rail to the Missouri River, she purchased a wagon and ox team but gave these away to a poor family and then purchased a handcart for the journey to Utah. She enlisted in a handcart company ( the name of Anna Furrer is found in the Second Company of Captain Daniel D. McArthur ). This company departed on 11 June 1856 and arrived in Salt Lake City on September 26th, the same day of arrival as the first company under Captain Edmund Ellsworth. During the handcart journey she helped to care for the sick and injured. Also during the travel Anna and a “Aunt Susanna” helped others who had fallen behind and often shared their ration of flour with others.

Shortly after arriving, she was introduced by Brigham Young to a young man, John Cardon from the Piedmont Valleys of Italy, who had arrived by ox team and wagon with his family two years earlier. Brigham Young advised her to marry John Cardon instead of returning to Switzerland to marry her betrothed, whom she had never heard from since her departure. So she followed his counsel and was married to John Cardon by Bishop B. H. Harding on 20 October 1856.

They moved to Big Cottonwood and remained there until March of 1857 when they moved to Marriott in Weber County. Except for a short time in 1858, when they were ordered to move south because of the advance of Johnston’s Army, they remained in Marriott, at one time surviving a disastrous flood from the overflow of the Ogden river in 1861. At that time Anna Regula and her three infant children found refuge on a haystack until rescued by neighbors who arrived on a raft.

In 1863 John and Anna Cardon moved to Bingham’s Fort, later called Lynne, where John built for his family at 507 Washington Avenue a log cabin and later in 1866 a rock house. At this same location, John and Anna, working together, built the first carding mill in Weber County. It was operated by water power from a ditch ( forerunner of the Lynne Irrigation Canal ) which John Cardon and a helper dug from the Ogden River beginning at 12th street. John and Anna did all the carding, mostly at night, after the farming duties were done. Wool was brought to this mill from all over Weber and Cache counties. This mill operated for about 15 years before being sold and taken to southern Utah. During this time, they also operated a general merchandise store adjacent to their home and mill.

By the end of 1868, they were the parents of five children, one daughter having died within six months of birth. Because of her medical training, Anna cared for herself during the birth of all six children. In addition, Anna cared for many of the sick and injured in the community, often setting broken bones and once even sewing on the scalp of an injured youth. Anna would often be called upon to leave at short notice, often on horseback, to attend to the sick. Her service was provided without charge because Brigham Young had counseled her many years earlier that her mission was to use her medical knowledge in healing the sick and needy without remuneration and great would be her blessings.

After the sale of the carding mill, John and Anna apparently looked to Idaho for other opportunities. They lived in Franklin, Idaho about 1879, later moving to Blackfoot, Idaho where they built and operated a general merchandise store. While living there in 1882, Anna and John adopted a baby girl, Edna May, who was later sealed to them. 

In 1885 they returned to Ogden where John built a two-story brick home by 1887 at the same location as the former rock house.

Anna remained there until her death on 25 August 1907. During her years in Ogden, Anna was a member of the first Relief Society of the Lynne Ward. Later she contributed generously to the construction of the Weber Stake Relief Society Hall, now standing on the Ogden Tabernacle and Temple block. John and Anna together vigorously pursued a life consisting of hard work as well as great enterprise and initiative. The descendants of their two sons and four daughters will always cherish the example of these two courageous and noble pioneers.

Children of Anna and John are listed below:

Name	Birth	Location
Anna Rozina (Shaw)	14 Feb 1858	Marriott
John David	5 Aug 1859	Marriott
Anna Hermina (Shaw)	23 Jan 1861	Marriott
Susette	19 Apr 1863	Ogden
John Herman	21 Sep 1864	Ogden
Olga Mary (Drumiler)	8 Oct 1868	Ogden
Edna May (Clegg)	4 Mar 1882	Blackfoot

Presented at the Philippe Cardon Reunion in Bountiful, UT on 9 August 1997 by Daniel W. Drumiler. This brief history of my great grandmother represents the editing of nine handwritten or typewritten documents prepared by her daughters, Anna Rosina Cardon Shaw and Anna Hermina Cardon Shaw, various grand-children, Daughters of the Utah Pioneers ( based of course upon submission of the foregoing histories ), newspaper reports, and a copy of a “record of families made for citizenship” from Zurich, Switzerland in German script. Many of these same sources were used by Genevieve Porter Johnson and Edna Cardon Taylor in greater detail in their landmark publication of 1986, “CARDONS! 1799-1986”.

These histories and documents were contributed by my cousins: 

Virginia Lee Petersen of Elwood, UT
Lillian Perry Roundy of Bountiful, UT
Marian Shaw Sant of Bountiful, UT
Helen Underwood Hill of San Jose, CA
Richard J. Shaw of Logan, UT

Daniel W. Drumiler
1173 South 1500 East
Bountiful, UT 84010

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Ogden City Cemetery – Plot Annex 28-4-1W

1/23/1861 – 9/8/1947

Granddaughter of Philip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn

Daughter of Jean Cardon and Anna Regula Furrer

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Myrtillo Shaw, Jr and Anna Hermina Cardon Shaw

Life Sketches from the Mormon Diaries Project

 

Introductory Notes 

I, Michael Brown Shaw, compiled this 7 page document in June 2006. It consists of brief life sketches of my Great Great Grandfather Myrtillo Shaw, Jr, and his wife, my Great Great Grandmother, Anna Hermina Cardon Shaw. Each sketch begins with a third-person introduction of the individual and the bulk of each sketch consists of first-person accounts of life events. 

My source for these life sketches comes from the Utah State University Special Collections Library. The library has a collection of documents which make up the “Mormon Diaries project.” The USU Special Collections staff printed copies of the pertinent documents and mailed them to me. The documents were typewritten and I transcribed them into modern computer format for improved searching and distribution. In so doing, I have preserved all spelling, punctuation, and grammar exactly as they appear in the source documents, including any errors. I have made no editorial attempt. 

Finally, I am in no way an expert on the Mormon Diaries project. The background information contained herein is taken from descriptions obtained from the USU Special Collections Internet website with minor editing for length. 

Table of Contents

Background on the Mormon Diaries Project

Life Sketch of Myrtillo Shaw, Jr

Life Sketch of Anna Hermina Cardon Shaw

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Background on the Mormon Diaries Project

During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the federal government of the United States established the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in an effort to provide employment opportunities. Among the undertakings of the WPA was the Mormon Diaries project. 

With assistance from the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, the Historical Records Survey, as well as the WPA , Juanita Brooks supervised a project to collect and transcribe the diaries, journals, and biographical sketches for over 400 Latter-day Saint pioneers. The project ran from 1934 until 1942. 

In 1942 the WPA was disbanded and the original transcriptions were turned over to the Library of Congress. Other complete or partial copies were deposited with the Utah State Historical Society, Brigham Young University, the University of Utah, and Utah State University. In 1950 the Library of Congress microfilmed the entire collection. 

This collection contains three types of material: first person accounts (diaries, journals, and autobiographies); second person accounts (biographies, life sketches, and local histories); and transcripts of interviews with pioneer Utahns. For those pioneers who had kept written histories, WPA workers copied their diaries (over 400) by hand and then typed them out. For those pioneers who had kept no diary or other record of their lives, WPA workers interviewed them using a standard set of questions.

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FEDERAL WRITERS PROJECT

Elvera Manful

Ogden, Utah

Weber County

October 17, 1939 

Pioneer Personal History 

Myrtillo Shaw 

UTAH HRS 314 

Revised 3-9-37 

Mr. Myrtillo Shaw of 559 Washington Avenue, was born in Ogden, Weber County, Utah, on March 29, 1858. His father was Myrtillo Shaw Sr. and his mother was Orilla Austin Shaw and they were born and raised in New York. They joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints and moved to Nauvoo, Illinois. When the Saints were driven from Nauvoo they moved to different places and finally came to Utah in Lorenzo Snow’s Company in 1848. They lived in Salt Lake City for two years and then moved to Ogden where they lived at first on 22nd and Jefferson Avenue and later moved out on 17th and Washington in the Mound Fort District. 

“The first school I attended was a little rock schoolhouse that stood where the Mound Fort School is today. William Barker was the first teacher I ever had. We used McGuffey’s readers and also had a blue back speller. I went to school until I was in the 5th reader and then quit. We had short school terms so that we could work late in the year and start working early in the spring. My parents paid tuition but not in cash but in produce. The benches were just slab benches with no backs and there were two legs at each end. The building had no running water like we have today in our homes and public buildings and in one end of the room was a water bucket with a tin dipper from which we all drank. 

My father was a farmer and I helped him on the farm all I could and also took odd jobs wherever I could get any work. I worked for a while in Higginbotham’s Store which was located about where the Hylton Flour Mill was. D.H. Peery built the store and Frank Higginbotham ran it. 

I remember when the railroad first came to Ogden, we heard it whistle and a few other boys and myself climbed on top of a straw stack to watch it. This was the first train that came in and it didn’t come clear into Ogden but stopped out at Taylor’s mill in Riverdale which was as far as the tracks went. I had four uncles who didn’t come with the Saints to Salt Lake City but stayed in the east and they came in on that first train as a surprise to their family. My grandparents and father never knew they were coming at all. It was towards evening when the train came in and therefore quite late by the time that my uncles walked into Ogden. They went to a little hotel and rented one room and all stayed there until morning when it was light enough and they could get out and hunt up their relatives. I will never forget that reunion. My Grandfather Shaw cried for joy and Grandmother didn’t know he was crying because he was so happy and she said to him, ‘Hush up, for my part, I’m glad they came.’ 

In those early days quite a bit of responsibility fell on the shoulders of us boys. My parents had 12 children, nine boys and three girls. We boys had to go up to Monte Cristo to get our supply of wood for winter use. My brother and I usually went together but once in a while I would drive our team and wagon alone and some other boy would drive the team up for his family’s supply of wood. At nights we would wrap up in quilts and sleep under the wagon. There was a toll gate at the mouth of Ogden Canyon where we had to pay 50¢ toll. In some places the canyon was so narrow that it was impossible to pass anyone and before we got to those places we would have to holler every little ways, ‘Yoo hoo.’ This was so that any other team or wagon would wait where the road was wide enough to let us pass. We also often hauled our wheat to the mills to be ground into flour. Still another job we had during the summer was to take our little herd of sheep, nearly every family had several sheep of their own, up to the foot hills east of Ogden to graze. We would take a sego digger, a long sharp pointed stick along with us so that we could dig sego’s and eat. That was usually all the lunch we had for our dinner. 

One year the grasshoppers were so bad, they came from the south and settled on the farms. They were so thick they darkened the sun. We got out and took sticks and brooms or anything that we could get hold of to shoo them away. We finally had to drive them into ditches and cover them with straw and set fire to the straw and try to burn them out. 

We had many good times though along with all our hard work. Cardons had a molasses mill on 5th and Washington avenue and they very often invited a group of us young people over and had a molasses candy pull. We would sing and dance and play games. Jesse Brown played the fiddle for us to dance by. We would go to different peoples houses every week or two and dance. 

On September 25, 1879, I was married to Annie H. Cardon. The day after we were married we got in our wagon with a team of horses to pull it and we took our wedding trip to Franklin, Idaho where we made our home. It took us two days to make the trip and now days we could go the same distance in just a few hours. 

We lived in a one room log house with a dirt roof, but my wife never complained about it ever. She made a real home of it. She would take straw and make frames for little mottos that she made and she also framed chromos. We had a rag carpet on the floor. One day a salesman remarked how homelike it was and said he had a lovely home in Salt Lake City but his wife was a society woman and their place was never really a home like our one room log cabin. 

I farmed and also worked in a grocery store for a while. My wife would churn butter and then sell it and eggs at the store. 

I was called on a mission on January 26, 1886 to the Southern States. I traveled through Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee and in those days it wasn’t like it is now. There were no headquarters and often we never had a place to sleep but would lay down under trees. While I was gone my wife moved back to Ogden, taking our two little boys with her so when I returned we made out home in Ogden and have lived here ever since. I purchased a wholesale produce business and stayed with it two years, then sold it and started the Ogden Cracker and Biscuit company in connection with two others. After a year of this I sold out and established the Shaw Mercantile Store at Five points with my two sons and a nephew. I was elected city councilman from the Third ward in 1898 and 1899. 

My wife and I celebrated our sixtieth wedding anniversary on September 25, 1939. It has been sixty years of happiness for us and we have many things to be thankful for. We have had seven children, five now living. These are: David M. Shaw, Austin H. Shaw, Mrs. Nettie Hermine Drumiler, Mrs. Bertha Mary Lee, and Mrs. Lillian Orilla Underwood. We also have 21 grandchildren. It is indeed a family to be proud of and they all live in Ogden some of them right next to us. Yes, we have been well blessed.” 

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FEDERAL WRITERS PROJECT 

Elvera Manful 

Ogden, Utah 

Weber County 

October 17, 1939 

Pioneer Personal History 

Mrs. Annie Hermine Cardon Shaw 

UTAH HRS 314 

Revised 3-9-37 

Mrs. Annie Hermine Cardon Shaw was born in Marriott, Weber County, Utah on January 23, 1861. Her father was John Cardon who came to America in 1854 from Piedmont, Italy, and with Lorenzo Snow’s company of Saints to Utah the same year. He lived in Salt Lake City for a while and then moved to Little Cottonwood and was living there when he met Anna Furrer who came to Utah from Switzerland in 1856. She crossed the ocean on the sailing vessel ‘Enoch Train,’ under the direction of James Ferguson. She was a graduate of a medical college in Switzerland and had a doctor’s diploma. Both her parents were dead. She was converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and baptized by John Smith and came to Utah because of the church. Captain Leonard was captain of the ‘Enoch Train.’ They landed in Boston on May 1, 1856 and went from Boston by rail to New York City and then to Iowa City, Iowa. When she reached America, she had money enough to purchase a wagon and a yoke of oxen to cross the plains in but she met some people who were very poor and they were anxious to get to Utah so she gave them her wagon and oxen and she pulled a hand cart across the plains. 

After she met and married John Cardon they made their home in Cottonwood for about a year and then moved to Marriott where they lived for several years and it was in Marriott that several of their children were born, one being Annie Hermine. 

“My first recollection of Ogden was when my father would bring me with him while he was clearing the ground on 5th and Washington so he could build his carding mill. It must have been about 1864 as I was only three years old. He would ride to town on horseback and I rode up in front of him. While he worked clearing the sage brush from his property he would lay me on a blanket near by so he could watch me. After he built the carding mill he built our home in Ogden near by. He was a mechanic and builder by trade and used to make tubs, wooden buckets, barrels, pans and such articles for our own use and for many of the early settlers. He made all our furniture, making the chair bottoms of rushes. The hoops for the buckets and barrels he made of cottonwood. He built the slab benches they used in the bowery that they built on 2nd street about where the railroad tracks are now. 

One day when mother was out in the field helping father plow, she had left us children in the house and the baby had started to cry so my sister older than I would stick willows in the fireplace and get them lit and then wave them in the air to amuse the baby, letting it watch the light. She caught her dress on fire and ran screaming out to father and mother. When they turned around they could see her all aflame in the rushes and even the rushes around her were on fire from her clothes. They didn’t think for eighteen days that she could possibly live. She was burned so very bad. The elders came very nearly every night and sat with her for a while and blessed her. Mother and father took her to Salt Lake City to Brigham Young who blessed her and said that she should live to raise a family. She did recover and when she grew up married and raised a family of eight children. She is now 82 years old and lives in Logan, Utah. 

The Indians used to pass our home a lot as it was on the main highway to Montana. They often camped right near our place and had their wigwams there and when they had gone my sister and I used to go and pick up beads they had left behind. Mother and father were good to the Indians and used to give them flour and supplies. One time some Indians were going by our place and they had a sick papoose and they left it with my mother as she was a doctor and they thought she could make it better. She kept it about a year but it died and is buried in our lot in the City Cemetery. I guess the Indians didn’t know what to do for their sick and they often left a sick papoose with white people. I remember the Barker family had an Indian girl they raised to be quite a young girl before she died and Chase’s also had one they raised. 

Besides the carding mill, father had a store and a molasses mill. Many freighters would stop at our store and get groceries and soda water. 

When I was still a small child I went to Corinne to live with Kupfer’s some friends of my mother and father. They had a small boy and wanted me to live with them and help look after him as he was sickly. I stayed with them three or four years and it was in Corinne that I first went to school. It was a Methodist school held in the Methodist church there and they had a lady teacher. It was when I was in Corinne that the Golden Spike connecting the two railroads together was driven. I remember I went with Kupfers to the celebration in Promontory and we made the trip on a hand car. They held me between them while they pumped the hand car. 

When I returned from Corinne and stayed at home I attended school in the Lynne Ward and then later I went to the Mound Fort School. Mr. Goff was the first teacher I had in Ogden. 

I used to help father in the store and also in the carding mill once in a while. People brought their wool from up around Cache Valley and nearly every where it seemed. I was about sixteen and was taking the rolls out of the carding mill when the belt slipped off. When I went to put it back on I got my finger caught in the cog wheels of the roller and it ground my finger. I suffered terribly with it as I got blood poison and it was thought they would have to amputate the finger but I was keeping company with Myrtillo Shaw, whom I later married, and he wouldn’t let them cut it off. They kept doctoring it and it finally healed although it is crooked. 

My mother was one of the first doctors in Ogden, even before Dr. Anderson and Dr. Canfield were here. She used to even go up into Cache Valley doctoring. Brigham Young blessed her and told her that was to be her life’s mission to doctor people and not charge for it so she gave her services free wherever she went. She was the doctor during the smallpox epidemics of 1870 and also 1876. She had three of us children down and she still went doctoring others. When she would come home father would have her clothes outside and she would change them by a tree before she came into the house. They also burned sulphur to fumigate. No matter what hour of the night anyone came for her she was always willing and ready to go. 

One time Ben Chadwick was thrown from his horse and cut his head tearing his scalp nearly off. Dr. Anderson couldn’t sew it on and I helped mother by holding the candle for light for her to see to sew it on. She did a good job and he lived. We never had lights in those days and made our own candles. I still have my candle mold around someplace. 

Another experience mother had was when the railroad was being built into Ogden. There was an Irishman working on the tracks and he got drunk and went down to Butlers and took an axe and brutally murdered three children and also struck and cut Mrs. Butler in the head. The children couldn’t be helped at all but mother took Mrs. Butler home to our place and doctored her and cared for her and she lived. It was sure terrible though the way the three children had been whacked up and mother gathered the three little bodies together, having to pick up brains here and everything, scattered all over the house. 

Mother used to ride horseback to get around to the ones she attended and one winter she was riding down second street when the horse slipped and she fell cutting her head open. She was near the home of the woman she was to attend and she doctored her head as well as she could and bound it up and the woman’s husband came out and helped her into the house and she delivered the baby and went on home. She cared for her own head and it was such a terrible cut that it never did heal real well and she later had to have a silver plate put in it. 

Still another time she gave birth to a baby herself and cared for herself all through it and someone came for her to assist them. They got a covered wagon and put her feather bed inside it and lifted her in it and took her to the bedside of the other woman and she delivered her baby for her. I tell you she had many experiences in her years of doctoring and without the modern conveniences the doctors have today. 

We had many good times though during all the building of the community. We had our Mutual and held debates and spelling bees. Every week or two we had our dances. Father planted twenty acres of peaches and in the fall of the year we would dry them and sell many thousands of pounds of the dried fruit to Abe Kuhn who shipped them to Montana. When we had our peach cuttings we often followed them by a molasses candy pull. Children often brought little buckets to father’s molasses mill to get skimmings of the molasses to make candy. 

There was a family of colored folks by the name of Able who went around from ward to ward and put on performances for the public. They were converts to the Mormon Church and I think there were the older couple and they had two or three daughters. I guess they traveled all around in Utah putting on minstrel shows. 

At Christmas time we hung up our stockings and were tickled to get a few pieces of candy and a few nuts. On Christmas morning the children would get together and go from house to house and knock on the door and holler ‘Christmas Gift, Christmas Gift,’ and the people were supposed to give them a treat of some kind, either candy or a cookie. I have seen mother tear off a yard or so of calico from a bolt in the store and give to a little girl for an apron or a dress. 

One year the grasshoppers were so bad they came in such swarms they darkened the sun and made it seem like evening outside. Father had two rows of beans that we tried so hard to save. Mother ran into the store and got a bolt of jeans cloth and she went ahead and unrolled it and my sister and I went along and covered the beans with it. When we went out the grasshoppers had eaten right through the cloth to get at the beans. 

My uncle Paul Cardon told me how at one time he walked clear to Logan with a $20 gold piece in his pocket with which he bought a bushel of wheat for seed. He carried the wheat on his back all the way home to Ogden. 

On September 25, 1879, I was married to Myrtillo Shaw. We were married in Ogden by Lester J. Herrick and later went through the Endowment House in Salt Lake City. On September 25, 1879 we got a horse team and a wagon and moved to Franklin, Idaho. We moved onto a little farm there with a one room log house with a dirt roof. We moved back to Ogden about ten years after and have lived here ever since. We had seven children, five that are now living. These five are: David M. Shaw, Austin H. Shaw, Mrs. Nettie Hermine Drumiler, Mrs. Bertha Mary Lee, Mrs. Lillian Orilla Underwood, all of Ogden. I have 21 grandchildren.

23 Jan 1861 – 8 Sep 1947

Granddaughter of Philip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn

Daughter of Jean Cardon and Anna Regula Furrer

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BIOGRAPHIES OF MYRTILLO SHAW JR. AND ANNA HERMINA CARDON 

Myrtillo Shaw Jr., son of Myrtillo Shaw Sr. and Harriet Orilla Austin, was born 29 March 1858, in Ogden, Weber, Utah. He was one of a large family.

In April of 1858 the family moved South to Provo area, on account of the Johnston’s Army coming to Utah. 

When they returned to Ogden the family home was on the North-East corner of 17th and Washington Ave. In the spring of 1861 the Ogden River overflowed its banks and washed away their home and all of their belongings, the family was lucky to get away alive. They next built a home at 15th Street and Washington Avenue. 

Myrtillo attended school in a rock building at 12th Street and Washington Avenue, where the Mound Fort Junior High School now stands. The school only taught to the Fifth Grade. His family could not afford to send him to Professor Moench’s School, (now Weber State College), so he started to work wherever he could find a job. 

He worked at Peery’s Mill on Washington Ave. at 15th Street. Mr. Peery built a store next to the mill and Myrtillo worked there for a while, but the wages were small so he left and took work in the transfer department of the Union Pacific Railroad. 

During the summer of 1879 Myrtillo worked for John Cardon in Franklin, Idaho, they had a store business and sold all kinds of merchandise. 

Anna Hermina Cardon was born 23 January 1861 in Marriott Settlement, a daughter of John Cardon and Anna Regula Furrer. Her parents engaged in farming, the day she was born they were planting a garden. 

In the spring of 18 61 the Ogden River overflowed and flooded the Marriott area. It was necessary for Mr. Marriott and others to carry Anna Cardon and her baby up a ladder to the top of a haystack where they had to remain until a raft could be made to take them to Marriott’s home. They stayed there until the water receded so they could go back to their farm. 

They lived on their farm until March 1863, when they moved to Bingham’s Fort at 5th Street and Washington Ave. 

When Hermina was about 8 years old, her mother sent her to Corinne, Utah to work for a family named Kupfer, they were friends of the Cardons. They ran a store for outfitting freighters and trappers. Corinne was the point on the Union Pacific Railroad, where freight wagons loaded for the trip north to Idaho. While she was there the Kupfer family traveled, by wagon, to Promontory Summit to witness the driving of the Golden Spike. They took Hermina along on this trip. 

As a young girl she helped pick and dry fruit and prepare and pack these fruits and produce for shipment to the Cardon Store In Franklin, Idaho. 

On 25 September 1879 Myrtillo Shaw Jr. and Anna Hermina Cardon were married in Ogden, Utah. They moved to Franklin, Idaho. They traveled in a wagon. The first night they camped about ten miles north of Brigham City, and arrived In Franklin late the second day. They lived on a farm which was owned by John Cardon. They had a two room log house with a dirt roof. 

Myrtillo hauled logs from a nearby canyon and built another room, he also put a good shingle roof on. Hermina was very handy at helping to make this house into a home and they were very happy. 

On 6 November 1881 a son was born, David Myrtillo. It was necessary for Hermina to go to Ogden so her mother could take care of her. 

Myrtillo and Hermina went to Salt Lake City and were endowed and sealed on the 29 March 1882, this was done In the Endowment House on Temple Square. 

Austin Herman was born in Ogden on the 9 April 1884.

With what they raised on the farm and income from other work he had, they were able to pay for the farm in about five years. They were hard working and thrifty people. 

In November 1885, Myrtillo received a call to go to the Southern States Mission, he accepted this call and moved his family back to Ogden. 

He built a two room house at 6th Street and Washington Ave., where they later built a larger home. Hermina’s family lived at 5th Street so she was not alone. 

Myrtillo was ordained a Seventy and set apart for his mission by Apostle Franklin D. Richards on 24 January 1886 and he left home the next day. 

He labored in various places, such as the following: Energy, Clark County, Why Not, Lauderdale County, and Corinth, all In Mississippi. He also worked some in Cuba, Sumpter County, Alabama. During this time he traveled without much money or without purse or scrip, depending on the people to give him food and lodging. 

The people generally were not receptive to the Gospel but were very opposed to it. They enjoyed the Protestant revival meetings but were not interested in the true Gospel. There were some honest people who gave the Missionaries food and lodging, among them were the James Granthams, who were baptized by Myrtillo and his companion on 5 June 1866. 

The people persecuted the Missionaries and refused to let them hold meetings. We quote from notes kept by Myrtillo, while he was on his mission: “25 June 1886, we went to James Grantham’s and we had a nice visit until Monday noon, 28 June . While we were eating dinner a mob of about one hundred men surrounded the house. They marched us to an old church, near by, that was closed. They ridiculed us all they wanted to, then they made my companion strip and show his garments, they made light of them and ridiculed them and abused us verbally. They then chose twenty men to march us out of the County, they would not let us gather up our things, they forced us to go where they wanted us to go. The men got on their mules and drove us in front of them, we had to carry our valises, they kept crowding us as fast as they could. It rained all the way and they marched us about nine miles, they then left us and told us to go to Meridian, Mississippi and get on the train and go back to our own country and not come back or they would kill us. ” 

“We walked to Meridian, about three miles, and went to a hotel. We were very tired and I was sick, I did not sleep all night. Next morning we took a train to Cuba, Sumpter County, Alabama. ” 

Incidents such as this were not uncommon, but the Missionaries were usually able to find people who would give them food and a bed to sleep in. 

During his mission, Hermina and her two small sons lived alone. She was always encouraging him with cheerful letters and news of home. She grew a garden and had her flowers, she also had chickens and did much to support herself and the boys. 

Hermina had a lean-to summer kitchen built on her home. She paid a Mr. Lund $8. 00 to build it, she was very proud of it, the floor was tight and it had a shingle roof. 

In June 1886, Hermina was awakened by the smell of smoke. She got out of bed and looked toward her parents’ home. The bam was on fire and large cinders were failing everywhere. She ran outside and shouted as loud as she could, she then wrapped the two boys in quilts and took them to a neighbor to be taken care of and then she ran to the fire and helped to carry things from the home which was on fire also. The fire started while the Cardons were asleep, they had to be awakened to get them out of the house. The bam with several horses and all of their farm equipment , hay and tools were destroyed, the home was also badly burned. The fire was started by a farmhand who Anna had discharged. He threatened to burn them out, but they had watched the place for three nights and thought he had left. 

On May 7, 1886, Hermina’s sister Rosina took her and the boys for a ride in her buggy. As they were returning, on Harrisville Road, they passed a covered wagon. The driver of the wagon flipped his whip across the nose of Rosina’s horse, causing it to run away. The horse became very frightened and traveled fast. The buggy lurched and threw Hermina out. She managed to hold baby Austin in her arms, thus protecting him. Hermina fell and struck her face on the road, breaking her jaw and knocking out two teeth. The buggy wheels passed over her upper legs, bruising them badly. Rosina and the other children were not injured. Hermina’s mother set her jawbone and put the teeth back in place, and they healed very well. 

After about six months’ service, Myrtillo became ill with malaria fever and had to return home, he arrived 27 July 1886. 

During the latter part of 1886, from September until the late part of January 1887, Myrtillo worked in Blackfoot, Idaho. He worked for John Cardon and Son, dealers in fruits and general merchandise. They were packers and shippers of choice mountain fruits, California produce and green and dried Tropical fruits. Hermina remained in her home and helped In preparing and shipping fruits and produce from Ogden to Blackfoot, to be sold in the store. 

Myrtillo again returned to Franklin and sold his farm to the Oneida Mercantile Union. e bought stock in the company and was made a director in the firm and was head of the shoe department. 

The family moved back to Franklin and rented a house from Websters. On I March 1887 David Myrtillo was sealed to his parents in the Logan Temple. Hermina Nettie was born 28 July 1887. It was necessary for her mother to again journey to Ogden for this event. 

In 1890 Myrtillo became sick with rheumatism and had to quit work. He sold his holdings in Franklin and moved his family back to Ogden. At this time he built a two story four room brick house at the same location as the home Hermina lived in while he was he was on his mission. He hauled rock from the mountains for the foundation. He hired the Lund boys for the brick work and other help. 

Rosina Pearl was born 21 June 1890 In Ogden. 

Myrtillo worked his farm as he recovered his health. He then purchased the J. R. Brown Wholesale Produce Company, it was located at 24th Street and Lincoln Ave., it was known as the Shaw Produce Co. 

Lester Moses was born 12 October 1894. After a short illness he passed away on 16 December 1894. This was hard for Myrtillo and Hermina, they grieved for their little boy. 

Bertha Mary was born 23 January 1896 and she was greeted with great joy as she helped to ease the loss of their baby boy. 

Myrtillo was elected to the Ogden City Council for the Third Ward, in about 1898 and 1899. Lillian Orilla was born 12 October 1900. 

About this time the home was remodeled, one room was built on the front and two rooms on the back, each had a bedroom above and a cellar under the back rooms. 

Myrtillo sold the produce company and organized a baking company to manufacture crackers and cookies. The factory was located east of the Reed Hotel, now the Ben Lomond Hotel. The company did not do well so he sold it to the Hess Baking Company. 

David Myrtillo was married to Gwendolyn Williams in Ogden on 11 June 1907. They received their endowments and were sealed 21 November 1907 in the Salt Lake Temple. They had four children. 

Myrtillo founded a company with his two sons David and Austin and a nephew William Shaw. They rented a store on the southwest corner of Washington Ave. and Second Street, it was known as the Shaw Mercantile Company. They sold general merchandise and groceries, and the Station “A” of the United States Post Office was located there also. 

Hermina Nettie was married to Elbert Perle Drumiler on 3 June 1908 in the Salt Lake Temple. They had five children. 

Austin Herman was married to Eva Belle Brown in the Salt Lake Temple on 22 June 1909, they had three children. Austin answered a call to the British Mission, he left home 13 July 1910. 

The Shaw Mercantile Co. did well for some time until Myrtillo got sick with rheumatism and was confined to his bed for four months. He then sold the business to his nephew. 

Rosina Pearl was married to Lester Irvin Perry in the Salt Lake Temple on 14 June 1911. They had four children. 

Austin returned from his Mission in 1912. 

The Shaws owned some property on Washington Ave. between 21st and 22nd Streets, known as the Farr Property. They built a store building there and rented it to have some income. They worked on their farm and raised fruit and produce which they sold to grocery stores and to the Union Pacific Commissary, they had regular customers. Hermina raised many flowers which she sold from their home. They made many friends this way. 

Bertha Mary married Earl Edward Lee in the Salt Lake Temple on 26 May 1920. They had three children. 

Austin Herman was ordained a High Priest 9 July 1916 and was set apart as councilor to Bishop Lawrence W. Sherner in the Lynn Ward. He was ordained a Bishop by David 0. McKay on 3 April 1927 and set apart to preside over the Ogden Fifth Ward. 

The Shaws were active in the Church all their lives. Myrtillo had been President of the Young Mens Mutual Improvement Assn, he was a Sunday School teacher and was leader of the High Priests in the Fifteenth Ward. These peopled loved their children and grandchildren. Many times the family would gather at the home for family dinners, especially on Thanksgiving and Christmas and on some birthdays. These were happy occasions which the children and grandchildren remember well. 

David Myrtillo was ordained a High Priest 28 February 1926 and was set apart as a councilor to Bishop Earl E. lee In the Fifteenth Ward. 

Lillian Orilla was married to Louis William Underwood in the Salt Lake Temple on 16 June 1926. They had two children. 

Myrtillo and Hermina continued to work their garden and flowers, Hermina would spend her evenings in making quilts and cutting strips of cloth which she would sew together and braid them in long braids, which she sewed into oval rugs, very pretty and quite serviceable. 

Rosina Pearl died 30 December 1933 In Pleasant View. 

Myrtillo and Hermina celebrated their Sixtieth Wedding Anniversary on 24 September 1939, they received many relatives and friends in their home, and received letters and telegrams from people out of town. 

Myrtillo would lay on a couch, with some of his grandchildren by him and tell them stories. These would usually start with a statement like this: “In the early history of Franklin, ” or “In the olden days. ” The children remember these times and cherish them. 

Myrtillo died 4 May 1942, after a short illness, thus ending sixty- three years of love and devotion between two of God’s choice people. 

Hermina continued to live In her home, and take care of her garden and flowers. Her daughter Bertha and family lived next door and her other children lived close by so she was not alone. She died 8 September 1947. 

Elbert P. Drumiler died 5 June 1951 in Ogden. David M. died 1 March 1967 in Ogden. Austin H. died 21 August 1967 in Ogden. 

This history was compiled by Bertha Shaw Lee and Earl E. Lee from records and notes kept by Myrtillo and Hermina Shaw, and from the personal knowledge of Nettie, Bertha, Lillian and Eva B. Shaw. 

April 1974

 

2 Jan 1820 – 22 Mar 1904

Husband of Catherine Cardon

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History of Moses Byrne

by Alta Byrne Fisher, a great grand daughter 

Moses Byrne was born in Northwich, Cheshire, England, January 2, 1820, the son of Denis (O’Byrne) – Byrne and Jane Scarsbrick. Until he was sixteen years old he attended the government school of England and the school of seamanship. 

He joined the Navy and followed the sea for about fifteen years as nearly as I can learn. My grandfather, William Byrne, said he had been told that Moses had misrepresented his age when he joined the Navy in order to be accepted and the Navy registers seem to bear this out. The Registers of Seamen at the Public Records Office – London shows – “Moses Byrne, born Northwich, Cheshire – age 21 in 1839.” By 1843…. it shows – Moses Byrne, born Northwich, Cheshire – age 23 in 1843.” He aged only two years in four years. According to this he was in the Navy when he was nineteen. To know how much earlier will take more research. 

Moses joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormon) in 1853 and in 1854 left England for America, leaving a wife and children behind in England, for what reason I’ve never learned. He sailed from England, April 4, 1854, on the ship, “Germanicus” and crossed the plains in Captain Robert Campbell’s company arriving in Utah October 29, 1854.

Shortly after he arrived in Utah, six days in fact, he married Catherine Cardon on November 5, 1854. She was the daughter of Phillip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn of Prarustin, Piedmont, Italy. According to emigration records Moses and the Cardons were in the same company as they crossed the plains. These records also indicated there was more than one Byrne in the company as the record states, “Byrne Brothers.” 

After he reached the valley, Moses worked for the Pony Express Stations as a contractor for grass hay. Their home base was Slaterville, Utah but the procurement of hay necessitated moving to where grass was available so they moved often, living in tents and occasionally a log house. Catherine cooked for ten men who they employed in their work. He continued to cut hay for a period of ten years. 

On December 10, 1859, Moses was sealed to Catherine Cardon and Anne Beus in the President’s Office in Salt Lake City. Anne was also from Piedmont, Italy and was the daughter of Michael Beus and Marianne Combe. Anne came to Utah September 26, 1856 with the first handcart company that came into the valley. (Edmund Ellsworth Company) 

Early in 1860, Moses Byrne took a contract from The Overland Stage Company from Denver, Colorado to build stage coach stations on the old emigrant trail through western Wyoming and part of Utah and early in 1861, as nearly as I can tell, he and Catherine moved to Wyoming, leaving Anne in Utah. 

Quoting now from Robert C. Byrne – a grandson of Moses Byrne – “These stations were built every fifteen miles beginning at Point of Rocks, Wyoming and going westward into Utah. I don’t know where the last one was built by him. He built one on the Muddy Creek where he also built a toll bridge which he managed for several years. This station was about fifteen miles west of Fort Bridger and where evidence still remains. 

He built the cabins mostly of logs which he got from the forests many miles away. He would go to the timber and cut and fit the logs on the spot so that there would be no waste material to haul. He used mostly ox teams to haul with. 

He did considerable trading of horses, ox and supplies with the emigrants while he was at the toll bridge on the Muddy. He would often trade one strong fat animal for two that were leg weary and played out. 

He would also go to the natural meadows through the country and cut hay with scythes and hand raking it and piling it he would leave it there until winter and then haul it to Fort Bridger where he would sell it to the U.S. government for use there at the Fort. 

Just before the Union Pacific Railroad came through there by the station by the toll bridge my grandfather sent for Charles Guild and his wife to tend the station and bridge while he moved three miles father up the Muddy where he was building a store and had contracted some work on the railroad grade and to furnish ties from the Piedmont woods. He started a town here when he built the store and named it Byrne. This name was changed, however, by request of the Union Pacific Railroad because of confusion with the town of Bryan farther east on the railroad. The new name was Piedmont named in honor of the country in Italy where my grandmother, Mrs. Moses Byrne and her sister Mrs. Charies Guild came from. 

Piedmont was essentially in Shoshone territory, but there were only two instances of serious Indian trouble. The first occurred while Moses Byrne was still running the Muddy Creek Stage Station. A small hunting party of Sioux rode by and kidnapped Byrne’s two-year-old son Eddie while he was playing in the yard. The Indians moved swiftly and by the time the child was missed, all chances of rescue were gone. Heartbroken, Byrne gave up all hope of ever seeing their son again. One summer day two years later, Chief Washakie rode into the station and handed the stunned Moses his now four-year-old boy. The chief would not tell where he had gotten the child. Eddie Byrne grew up to become mayor of an Idaho town, where he was buried.

The second event occurred one evening at Charles Guild’s ranch. Sixteen of Washakie’s braves broke into the house while Charles was away and threatened to burn the house if Mrs. Guild didn’t give them firewater. While under the pretense of searching for whiskey (she had none in the house) Mrs. Guild managed to sneak her seven-year-old son James out of the house. James rode to the Moses Byrne ranch about a mile and a quarter East of Piedmont, and Byrne, rallying some other men, returned with James and ran the Indians off. Washakie, upon hearing rumors of the raid, promptly came to Mrs. Guild and demanded to know the names of the braves who had frightened her. Although she knew most of them through business dealings with them in her husband’s store, she refused to tell Washakie because she knew his punishment of them would be severe. After her refusal, Washakie had his squaw make a beaded purse for Mrs. Guild and a pair of moccasins for Mr. Guild as a token of his good will.

On March 31, 1871, Moses and Catherine were excommunicated from the church, for just what reason I’m not sure. Moses told his son William, my grandfather, he had broken his leg and was unable to pay tithing and for this he was excommunicated. I told grandfather I doubted this but in 1976 when I visited the archives in Salt Lake City about having his blessings restored I was told that at about that time some excommunications took place for rather insignificant reasons (some because the bishop didn’t approve of the store a person shopped at) and Moses and Catherine may have been in such a situation but I never learned the reason for certain. Maybe the broken leg was the cause. Moses was baptized 19 March 1976, since the date of July 21, 1901, when he came back into the church could not be verified. I had a copy of the Temple Index Bureau card giving this as his baptism date but it could not be found in Salt Lake so the work had to be re-done. The endowment he received in life, together with all sealing and blessings which were received in this life were restored. 

The contract Moses made with the Union Pacific Railroad proved to be a very profitable business. The procuring of the ties and poles was quite an operation. The men would go into the aspen groves and cut in the winter and then haul the timbers in the spring and summer into Piedmont with ox teams. There they would load them on the Railroad cars. Later he brought the poles down on Muddy Creek which later became known as the “Tie Drive”. He also engaged in the manufacture of charcoal and the burning of lime in large kilns, in the transportation of which he utilized over fifty teams. The magnitude of this operation and the necessity of the community and his employees caused him to open a mercantile establishment. This business he successfully operated for years and his son Francis took charge of it when Moses retired. He had several ranches and a herd of cattle and horses in the Piedmont area. 

The small community of Piedmont grew up around the care and operations of the kilns and the task of bringing the poles down on the “Tie Drive”. Homes were built to accommodate the people employed in these activities along with a school to educate the children. 

Simon Bamberger was a hide buyer for a “Hide and Fur” establishment in St. Louis and he bought many hides in the Piedmont area. One winter the snows became very deep and weather was very cold and it became impossible to get his hides into Piedmont to ship them out on the railroad so he remained through the winter in the valley and stayed at the Byrne home. We are told that during this winter he made the suggestion to Moses that they build the charcoal kilns. This suggestion was put into action and became a thriving business with the charcoal product being shipped to the smelters in Utah. The business remained very profitable until the Union Pacific Railroad completed the Aspen Tunnel and then the profits dwindled, people moved away and the once busy community eventually became a ghost town. 

‘And the grasses and the flowers withered and the 
herds and villages melted way – 
In time the wound healed, but a scar was left.” 
Robert Carr

He made a trip back to England to visit his brothers who were still living in Liverpool. In later years cataracts developed on his eyes and caused considerable damage. 

During all these years his wife Anne was living in Utah. When Moses left for Wyoming she moved from Slaterville to Ogden where she lived in a small home by her father and mother. He made numerous visits back to Utah but didn’t come back permanently. Anne had five children after 1861 when Moses and Catherine left and sometimes had a struggle taking care of them. Can you imagine bearing and caring for these babies with your husband living in Wyoming all the time? 

Moses and Catherine moved back to Utah in August 1886 and returned to Piedmont in 1893. While in Utah they built a frame house on Uintah Bench and lived with Anne for a few months while the home was being built. During that time (1890) Ann moved with her family to Idaho where her son Will was already living. Catherine died November 15, 1902 and once more Moses returned to Utah but he returned to Piedmont in 1903 to live with his daughter Alice, who was a widow. Moses died March 22, 1904, age 84, at Piedmont and was buried there. His services were held in the Piedmont school house March 24, 1904 with Bishop Brown officiating. 

He had been a very industrious, energetic man who came to America with very little of this world’s material things. My grandmother, Maria Byrne, Moses’ daughter in law, who knew him well, described him as a very pleasant, jovial person; witty, quick of movement and always ready to sing or whistle the tunes of the sea. Somewhat impulsive, he sometimes did and said things for which he was later sorry. 

The following is taken from a sketch of Moses Byrne published in the book “Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming” (A.W. Bowen & Co. 1903) 

“During the forty years of his residence in Wyoming, Mr. Byrne has steadily and without exception, maintained the character of a worthy, reliable and honest citizen. For years his counsel upon all questions of public interest had been that of the Democratic Party and in its cause he has labored earnestly and well. Fraternally, he is identified with that Ancient Order, The Honored Brotherhood of Free and Accepted Masons, with which he became affiliated in England, the place where he is still maintaining his membership.

His life during the whole of his long residence here has been one of activity, not only in his own interests but in those pertaining to the public as well. He is a representative of that energetic class of men who have made the Western portion of the United States famous on account of their enterprises and determination with which they have undertaken and pushed to completion, plans for betterment of their own and their children’s material condition and also the business and moral interests of the communities where they have resided. None of the present generation has a higher place in the esteem and love of the people, than the honorable and venerable Moses Byrne. 

Only the hardiest and the self-sufficient could survive the severe winters and the isolation of the Wyoming area. Living was dangerous not only because of the elements but because of the cattle rustling gangs and vigilante groups. No one was safe from the wrath of these mean ruthless groups. Moses and many others instrumental in conquering this harsh, rugged region, to me are described in this verse by Edgar A. Guest — 

“Born for a little while to blaze 
In action in the heat of strife, 
And then to Shrivel with Time’s blast 
And fade forever in the past. 

Joseph Walter	25 Aug 1855
John Phillip	31 Mar 1857
James Bartelomew	26 Mar 1859
Alice	18 Oct 1860
William Henry	20 Jan 1863
Charles Lewis	6 May 1864
Albert	5 Dec 1865
Edwin Washikie	31 Jul 1867
Francis K.	27 Apr 1869
Arthur	28 Dec 1870
Minnie Catherine	11 Dec 1871
Mary Jane	11 Dec 1871
Katie Bertha	19 Sep 1873

David Robert	20 Oct 1858
William	10 Nov 1860
James	11 Mar 1862
Michael	23 Nov 1863
Anne	18 Apr 1871
Moses Louis	8 Aug 1874
Martha	13 Apr 1876

Footnotes: 

1- The spelling of the name Scarsbrick, Jane Scarsbrick, daughter of James Scarsbrick and his wife, Alice, born 27 Oct 1800, chr. 23 Nov 1800, St. Peter, Liverpool, England, taken from the St. Peter printout – P 2027- 1. 

2- The following note written by Robert Byrne – ‘At this time 1869 Simon Bamberger came to Piedmont from South Pass, Wyoming and entered into the store business with my grandfather where he ran a dry good department. Mr. Bamberger remained here through the winter and sold his interests. He said he did very well at Piedmont, but decided to go to Utah where he became interested in mines and smelting. 

He came back to Piedmont and interested my grandfather in making charcoal for the smelter at Midvale which was, by the way, the first in Utah. This visit with my grandfather led to big timber and charcoal business in Piedmont.” 

---

Byrne Family Cemetery, Piedmont, Wy

12 Sep 1829 – 15 Nov 1902

Daughter of Philip Cardon and Martha Marie Tourn

Moses and Catherine Byrne, A Brief History 

by Myrtle Byrne Whittaker

Moses O’Byrne, born Leftsvich, England, 1822. The O’ Byrne people were Irish, the paternal ancestors of Moses O’Byrne run back in an unbroken line for many generations in Ireland where the families were connected with agricultural activities in the “Emerald Isle”, but as my great Uncle told me that the O’Byrne people were on the wrong side of the political fence in Ireland and they moved to England where Moses was born and that when they dropped the “0” from their name they later lost a fortune from their inheritance.

Moses intermittently attended Government Schools in England until the age of sixteen, then he became apprenticed on a merchant sailing vessel, sailing the Atlantic. I have been told that Moses’ brother was Captain of that ship and that there were other younger brothers on board that this man was raising. Moses followed the seas for a number of years and had some notable adventures and narrow escapes from death, but received no disabling injuries.

Then meeting some Mormon missionaries he was converted to their religion and cast his lot with them and immigrated to America, sailing on the ship Mayflower in the year of 1854. He arrived in America and started the long overland trek to the Utah territory, and upon this trek he met a lovely young lady named Catherine Cardon

Catherine Cardon, born Sept. 12, 1829, Prarostino, Torino, Italy. Daughter of Phillipe Cardon and Marthe Marie Tourn, as Phillipe’s wife is known because Vaudois (pronounced voh dwah) women are always known by their maiden name even after marriage, and the Cardons were of that belief.

The Vaudois people were severely persecuted for many years because of their religious beliefs, many being massacred, the remnants being driven from their homes to take refuge in the Alp Mountains between France and Italy, where they subsisted for centuries as best they could, living in caves and their diets consisted mostly of barley, rye and the flesh of wild animals. They would terrace the steep rocky hills, and when the spring rains came and the run off would carry their soil down the steep hill they would then pack the soil by the basketsful up the hill and return the soil to their plots.

Once the King sent a decree to the Vaudois people, that if they would house soldiers in their homes and the soldiers were to protect the Vaudois people, then there would be peace between the Kings people and the Vaudois and there would be no more persecution. So the trusting Vaudois, with earnest hearts took the soldiers into their homes even though it worked a severe hardship on them with their meager food supplies, but early in the morning hours at a pre-arranged signal by a canon blast, the soldiers arose and slaughtered their host families with but a few surviving, with the survivors hiding in the dense forests.

Finally in 1848, under pressure from the British Government, whose good will the King wanted, King Charles Albert issued a decree granting freedom to the Vaudois and placing them on a footing of equality with other Italians and restored them to their lands in the beautiful Piedmont Valley, where upon a great feast was ordered and prepared for the Vaudois people lasting three days and nights, with great torches lighting the streets and houses, and a large parade was held and with a great show of good will the committee decided that the Vaudois people would march in front of the parade.

One day in 1852, the Mormon missionaries came to the Cardon home and daughter, Marie was greatly surprised as these were the faces of the good men that she had dreamed of earlier on. After listening and talking at great length with the missionaries the Cardon Family decided to come to the United States, mainly the Utah territory, having already joined the Mormon church, even Catherine who was governess for the Vaudois minister who had a few years before baptized her, but married daughter Anne’s husband forbade her to have anything to do with the Mormons.

Then in 1854, after selling part of their land and giving the rest to their daughter Anne, the Cardons prepared to come to America.

After crossing the high mountains by donkey, they embarked from Liverpool, England on the ship “John M. Woods” and arrived in New Orleans, La., May 2, 1854 and went by steamers up the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers to Kansas City, Missouri where they began their long trek overland to Utah territory. They, along with five other converts that Phillipe had paid passage for, arrived in October of that same year. The Cardon’s were agriculture people and soon spread out over the states of Utah, Arizona and New Mexico. The Cardons were the first ones in Utah to raise the silk worm on mulberry trees, and to make silk material. Catherine knew fine silk as soon as she touched it.

The wagon train that Moses and the Cardon family were with arrived in Utah October 28, 1854 and Moses and Catherine were married one week later. Soon after, Moses took a second wife, Ann Beus. Moses and Catherine had thirteen children and Ann had several. In later years Ann’s family moved to Idaho.

In 1861, Moses and Catherine moved to Wyoming Territory and due to a falling out with Brigham Young, Moses was excommunicated from the church. Moses built a Pony express and Overland Stage Station on the Muddy Creekthat he operated for many years, he was also commissioned to build a Pony Express-Overland Trail Station at what is now known as Point of Rock, Wyo. This station is made of native rock and is still standing and is now designated as a historical site.

Moses had to freight his supplies for his station on the Muddy from Utah. My Uncle Leslie told us that Moses rode a white mule and carried a sawed-off shotgun as there were robbers and avenging angels lurking in the shadows up and down Weber Canyon. The old white mule had an uncanny way of sensing or smelling out danger where upon the mule would-stop dead still with his ears pointed in the direction of the danger, so that his master never came to any harm. My grandmother told me that on the occasions he went to get supplies, Moses also visited his other wife, Ann.

To supply hay for the Pony Express horses and the livestock coming on the Overland Trail, Moses would hire a crew and go cut the natural meadows in the area.

In 1868, the railroad was coming into the area, so Moses contracted to supply ties for the railroad bed and a tent town spring up and because it was such a steep haul to the summit more engines were needed from there on so a town was started and it was called “Byrne” thought to be in honor of the Byrne family, and a deep well was drilled for the train engines and the town and a water ram pumped the water high into the water tower. But as time went by the town Byrne was confused with the terminal station Byran so the town of Byrne had to change its name. Now Catherine’s sister Marie and her husband Charles Guild had also moved to this area at the same time as Catherine and Moses, so in honor of the two sisters the town was named “Piedmont” after their valley in the old country. The word Piedmont is a French word meaning foot of the mountain. 

Moses contracted to build many of the culverts in the railroad grade that are made of native stone and are still standing and in good shape. 

In 1869, a small hunting party of Sioux Indians swept by and kidnapped Moses and Catherine’s two-year-old son, Eddie, from their yard and by the time it was noticed that Eddie was missing and a search party organized, the Indians and the boy were long gone. The family gave up all hope of ever seeing their son again. Moses and Chief Washakie had become great friends, Moses would always butcher a beef and give it to the tribe when they came through in the spring and Washakie’s tribe would spend quite some time in Piedmont trading and buying from the stores. Moses Byrne had a store and the Guilds had a store in Piedmont. One summer day in 1871, Chief Washakie came riding in with four-year-old Eddie astride behind him and returned him to a surprised and grateful Byrne family. Eddie was wearing Indian moccasins at the time, and in later years Eddie’s mother gave one moccasin to his sister Minnie and the other to sister Katie, each in turn handing their moccasin down to a daughter. I don’t know if Eddie had forgotten the English language in the two years that he was gone or not. Washakie would never tell Moses where or from whom he had rescued Eddie.

Moses being an enterprising man, built five charcoal kilns at Piedmont in the year of 1869, and employed 50 teams in the bringing down of the timber to be used in the kilns. The charcoal that he made was shipped by rail to ore smelters in Utah and Colorado, also the railroad used the charcoal for heating the engines, and many restaurants bought it for cooking fuel. He operated these kilns for many years. All the kilns are not standing. Many people took stones from the ones that fell. The remaining kilns are fenced in and a marker placed there and these kilns are designated a Historical site.

Moses and Catherine accumulated ranches in Piedmont, and with son Joe in Robertson, which is now owned by the Mort White’s. Son Frank settled on Thunderbolt which is now owned by Jr. Petersen.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

28 Oct 1850 – 9 Apr 1938

In 1849 Elders Lorenzo Snow and Toronto had been sent on a mission to Italy. Elder Snow, then of the Twelve and later President of the church. Soon after his arrival in Genoa, President Franklin D. Richards of the European mission wrote as follows: “Now, with a heart full of gratitude, I find that an opening was presented in the valleys of Piedmont, when all other parts of Italy are closed against our efforts. I believe that the Lord has there hidden up a people amid the alpine mountains, and it is the voice of the Spirit that I shall commence something of importance in that part of this dark nation.” Somewhat later he wrote the following: “There has long been an intimate connection between the Protestants here and in Switzerland. I intend to avail myself of this circumstance, that the Gospel may be established in both places.”

One of the converts of these missionaries from Salt Lake City and of other missionaries from England, was the father of Margaret Stalle Barker; Jean Pierre Stalle. He had married Marie Croyer. She had died, leaving one child, a baby girl, who lived to womanhood, married, did not join the Church, and remained in Italy. She died in 1909. Later he had married Susanne Gaudin. She also died, leaving a baby boy who lived to be about two years old. About a year after, in 1836, he had married Marie Goadin (or Godin), The mother of Margaret Stalle (Barker). The Stalles and probably the Godins, as indicated by the names, were of Provencals or southern French descent. The country where they lived in Piedmont was very hilly, and the hillsides were covered with chestnut trees, fig trees, and grape vines. It is somewhat warmer there than it is here. The frosts are not so hard, and the winters are not so cold. Pierre Stalle raised fruit and farmed, and he also kept a few cattle. The farms were small and each family made the best use of what it had. They made their own clothing. Spinning the yarn and weaving it as they did here in the early days. The Stalle family lived at first in the Angrone valley where three children were born: Susanne, February 13, 1837; Bartholome’ June 2, 1839; Marie, August 15, 1844.

Pierre Stalle invested in sheep and a disease got among them from which they all died. At the same time the phylloxera Attacked the grape vines, After these misfortunes over a period of several years, he was compelled to sell his farm in Angrogne and move to Prarustin (Prarostino) where be owned another farm. This farm was further in the hills and not so good as the one he had to sell. Here Margaret Stalle (Barker) was born, October 28, 1850.

The Stalle family belonged to the WaIdenees. The WaIdenees were not numerous. They were to be found some 35 miles south west of Turin in the fertile and well-wooded valley of the Pellice and in the neighboring valley’s. The history of their origin is obscure because largely written by their enemies. Catholics regard them as simply the followers of Pierre VaIdo (or Valdes) of Lyons. They themselves repudiate this view and push back their beginnings to the age of primitive Christianity, claiming to have preserved the purity of the Faith through the age and that the Church was founded by St. Paul on his way from Rome to Spain. Another theory of their origin is that the seat had its origin in the time of Constantine as a reaction against the corruption of the Church of the Fourth Century. What seems more probable, however, is that the sect resulted from a fusion of the heretical followers of Claude of Turin (Eighth Century), Arnold of Brescia (executed in Rome in 1155), Peter of Bruys (1104-25), and Pierre Valdo who died in Bohemia in 1217. Valdo, a rich silk merchant of Lyons, had disposed of his property, giving part of it to his wife and the rest to the poor, and had begun preaching, at first as a lay member of the Catholic Church, and had then continued to preach after he had been excommunicated. Many of his followers took refuge in the Cottian Alps or in what was also to be known later as the Vaudois valley’s. Pierre VaIdo secured a translation of the Bible into the language of Southern France, the Provencal. This Bible has served as a basis for later French translations. The sect was subjected to terrible persecutions. The writer in Hastings, “Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 12, page 664, says: They were able to withstand the attacks of opponents in a way that has almost suggested the miraculous. The need to realize the physical characteristics of the area in which it (the people) grew up, it was necessary to understand its rare characteristics and account for its sturdy independence and heroic achievements.”

Mention may be made of some of these persecutions. In 1487 Innocent VIII-issued a bull for the extermination of the Waldensees, and Alberto de Capitanei, archdeacon of Cremona, put himself at the head of a crusade against them. In 1655, French troups of Louis XIV and Irish soldiers who had fled before Cromwell were garrisoned in the valleys. In 1695 the Edict of Nantes, which had granted freedom of worship in France was revoked, and a persecution which aimed at entire extermination was begun. The resistance of the Waldensees in guerrilla warfare was so stubborn that 2600 of them were permitted to withdraw to Geneva. From Geneva they scattered over Switzerland and a number passed into Germany. Four years later, however, their pastor, Henri Arnaud led a band of 800 to a re-conquest of the valleys. The writer in Hastings’ Encyclopedia says that they made “One of the most magnificent stands for religious liberty ever recorded in the annals of history.” In 1695 all Church records that could be procured, together with their churches, were burned by the troups of Louis XIV. One document bearing the date 1290 survived this burning. It contains the name Stalle as an inhabitant of the valley of the Angrogne, which was later to be the birth place of Jean Pierre Stalle, father of Marie Stalle Barker.

In 1855, the Stalle’ family received word from Franklin D. Richards, president of the European mission, that they could go to Zion, and they were ready in two weeks. It was impossible to sell the place in so short a time and it was left without their receiving anything for it. The missionaries were persecuted a great deal, and soon (1862) were driven cut, and there have been no missionaries there since. (Missionaries are once again proselyting in Italy.)

When the missionaries came to the Stalle” home, the family gave them the best they had, gave them their best bed, and slept on a poor one. Their home was always open. The last time F. D. Richards was there before they left for Zion, he came in the early morning hours to escape from the officers, got a bite to eat and a moment’s rest. At that time he told them they would soon be leaving for Zion.

Three weeks later they left Prarustin in Piedmont and traveled, probably like the Malin family two years before, in carriages to Pignerol (Pinerolo) and, from there to Turin, the capital of Piedmont, thence to the town of Suza by rail, then up the steep Mt. Cenis in a large coach placed on sleds and drawn by sixteen Government mules, much of the way being covered by perpetual snow and Ice. Then to Loundsburg on the Savoy side where the coaches were taken from the sleds, and then by coach to Lyons, France. From Lyons they traveled by railway to Paris from there by railway to Calais, by steamer to London, and by railway to Liverpool where they remained a short time while waiting for the ship to sail.

The family left Liverpool on December 12, 1856. T hey are listed on the list of emigrants sailing on the ship John J. Boyd, as follows:

Pietro Stall’e 48 agriculturist

Maria Stall’e 45 wife

Susanna Stall’e 19

Bartolomeo Stall’e 16

Maria Stall’e 11

Margrita Stall’e 5

The following is taken from a letter describing the voyage written by 0. R. Savage and published in the MILLENNIAL STAR, Vol. 18, Page 209: “We left Liverpool on Wednesday, December 12. at seven A. M., and had a fine run down the channel, sighted Cape Clear on the Friday morning following, and had mild weather with a fair wind for three days after. Daring this time we had leisure to devise plans for the maintenance of order and cleanliness during the voyage.

The Saints, were, by the sound of the trumpet, called to prayer morning and evening. Meetings were also frequently held in the Danish, English and Italian languages during the voyage. On the whole we enjoyed ourselves first rate, notwithstanding the gales and hurricanes we experienced from the breaking up of the fine weather in longitude fifteen degrees, to our anchoring off SandyHook.

“About midway on our passage we fell in with the clipper ship, Louis Napoleon, from Baltimore to Liverpool, laden with flour, with all her masts and spars carried away, and leeward bulwarks stove in; upon nearing the ship we found her in a sinking condition The captain and crew desired to be taken off, which was done. This acquisition was of great advantage to us, as the bad weather,” sickness and over exhaustion from overwork, had made quite a gap in our complement of sailors. We had much sickness on board from the breaking out of the measles, which caused many deaths among the Danish, chiefly among the children. In the English and Italian companies we lost three children. The weather got worse after crossing the Banks, so much so, that we driven into the Gulf Stream three times, and many of our sailors were frost bitten. Our captain got superstitious on account of the long passage, and ordered that there should be no singing on board; the mate said that all ships that had preachers on board were always sure of a bad passage; however, the Lord heard our prayers, and in His own due time we arrived at our destination. On the evening of the fifteenth of February we were safely at anchor – having been sixty-six days out from Liverpool.

“our supply of water was almost exhausted, – we had on arrival only about one day’s water on board. The provisions were very good and proved abundant to the last.”

THE CONTRIBUTOR Vol- 13, Page 554, relates that “On the sixteenth of February, 1850, the emigrants landed in New York and after tarrying a few days in Castle Garden the journey was continued on the twenty-first or twenty-second by rail via Dunkirk and Cleveland to Chicago, where the company, according to previous arrangements, was divided into three parts, of which one, consisting of about one hundred and fifty souls, went to Burlington, Iowa, another to Alton, Illinois, and a third (the one Margaret Stalle, was in) to St. Louis, Missouri. Most of those who went to Burlington and Alton remained in those places or near them a year or more working to earn means wherewith to continue the journey, The part of the company which went to St. Louis, arrived in that city on the tenth of March, and soon afterwards continued the journey to Florence, Nebraska. where they joined the general emigration that crossed the plains in 1856.

Pierre Stalle’s wife, Marie Stalle, desired to earn means and come by ox team; Pierre Stalle’ himself wanted to follow the advice of Brother Richards and come on at once. In consequence, they joined the first or Ellsworth handcart company at Florence. It had. left Iowa City, the Mormon outfitting post, June 9, 1856.

The following quotation is taken from the diary of the Company:

August 17: The camp moved out at a quarter to 9 a.m. and traveled 12 miles. We crossed over Wolf Crook and ascended the Sandy Bluff. We crossed the Bluff to the left instead of going-up the old track. It is easier for handcarts and ox teams. The road today was very sandy for several miles. Passed over several creeks. Camp at 4 p.m. on the side of the Platte opposite to Ash Grove. Brother Peter Stalle’ died today. He was from Italy.

Note: The notation, “Brother Peter Stalle died today. He was from Italy. to in part written over something else and was perhaps added later. Margaret, Stalle (Barker) relates his death as having occurred on the Sweet Water (In what Is now Wyoming) when the company was one week from Salt Lake Valley. This is undoubtedly correct.

A grave was dug, sage brush put in the bottom of it, then the body wrapped in a sheet, then more sage brush, and then the grave was covered over. Henry Barker crossed the plains in the Sixties to bring in the immigrants from, the Missouri, and later thought it strange that he should have particularly noticed the grave of the father of Margaret Stalle who was later to be his wife.

Deseret News, October 1, 1956

THE FIRST HANDCART COMPANIES.

Having learned that Captain Edmund Ellsworth’s company camped at the Willow Springs on the evening of the 25th inst., on the 26th Presidents Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball, Lieut. Genl. D. R. Wells, and many other citizens, in carriages, and several gentlemen and ladies on horseback, with a part of Capt. H. B. Clawson’s company of lancers and the Brass Bands under Capt. William Pitt, left the governors office at 9 a.m. with the view of meeting them and escorting them into the city.

Within about a mile and half of the foot of the Little Mountain, Pres. Young ordered the party to halt until the hand carts should arrive, and with Pres. Kimball drove on to meet them. Ere long the anxiously expected train came in sight. led by Capt. Ellsworth on foot, and with two aged veterans pulling the front cart, followed by a long line of carts attended by the old, middle aged and young of both sexes.

When opposite the escorting party, a halt was called and their Captain introduced the new comers to Pres. Young and Kimball, which was followed by the joyous greeting of relatives and friends, and an unexpected treat of melons. While thus regaling, Capt. Daniel D. McArthur came up with his hand-cart company, they having traveled from the east base of the Big Mountain.

From the halt to the Public Square on 2nd West Temple street, the following order was observed, under the supervision of Capt. Clawson; Lancers; Ladies on horseback; Pres. Young’s Pres. Kimball’s and Lieut. Genl. Well’s carriages; the Bands; Capts. Ellsworth’s companies; Citizens in carriages and on Horseback. The line of march was scarcely taken up, before It began to be met by men, women and children on foot, on horses, and in wagons, thronging out to see and welcome the first hand-cart companies; and the numbers rapidly increased until the living tide lined and thronged South Temple street.

The procession reached the Public Square about sunset, where the Lancers Bands and carriages were formed in a line facing the line of handcarts; and after a few remarks by Pres. Young, accompanied by his blessing, the spectators and escort retired and the companies pitched their tents, at the end of a walk and pull upwards of 1300 miles

This journey has been performed with less than the average amount of mortality usually attending ox teams; and all, though somewhat fatigued, stopped out with alacrity to the last, and appeared buoyant and cheerful. They had often traveled 25 and 30 miles in a day, and would have come through In a much shorter time, had they not been obliged to wait upon the slow motion of the oxen attached to the few wagons containing the tents and groceries.

On the day of Peter Stalle’s death, during the mid-day halt his wife Maria had climbed on the hub of the wagon in which he was riding. Margaret Stalle (Barker) relates the conversation as she had it from her mother. He said he would not reach the valley, but the family would; that they should never want for bread, and that the youngest daughter (Margaret) would some day be well-to-do. When mother, (Maria Stalle) came back to the wagon at the next halt, he was dead.

During the entire journey Pierre Stalle had been Ill and unable to pull the handcart. His wife, Maria, had been ill the entire time of the crossing, and the pulling of the handcart had fallen to the lot of Suzette, 19, and Daniel, 16. Maria 11, walked the entire distance, and Margaret, 5, walked except while crossing some of the streams and when carried by her sister Maria,

ACCOUNT OF MARGARET STALLE BARKER

When we entered the Salt Lake Valley, Mother found herself in a difficult position. Neither she, Uncle Dan nor Mary could speak English, and I only a little. And we no longer had Father to help us. How to live was a problem. Aunt Susette went to work for a family, I no longer remember the name. Aunt Mary, who was eleven, was taken by Mrs. Alfred Randall to take care of her sick daughter, who was seventeen. She was treated by Mrs. Randall, who desired to adopt her, as one of the family. And though Mother wouldn’t consent to the adoption, she remained with Mrs. Randall until she got married. Paul Cardon (the Cardon Family also came from the Piedmont area of Italy) came from Bingham’s Fort Ogden, to meet them.

Mother went to gleaning wheat, and gleaned all the wheat, and more, that we could use.

The Cardon’s had a high funny house with a stable by it. I can still remember it. (It was built, no doubt, side by side like the houses and stables in the valleys of Piedmont and in other parts of Europe.)

When Mother and Dan couldn’t glean wheat any more, they went to work and dug a dug-out in the side of a hill. They covered the dugout with willows, bull rushes and dirt, and had a piece of canvas for a window. Of course, it was rather dark inside. They had no furniture, and for a bedstead they stuck forked sticks in the ground and made holes in the wall in which to rest the ends and one side of the bed. They then laid willows across the bed, then bull rushes and then straw. My brother (Dan) borrowed an ax of Cardon’s and a saw, and sawing a tree trunk into suitable lengths and splitting it in two and putting logs into the rounded side, he made three stools and a table.

The winter was a hard one, and it buried us up with snow In the night. We had no watch nor clock, and did not know that it was early day when Paul Cardon’s folks, seeing only our chimney, came and dug us out.

Mr. Cardon raised some flax and some hemp, and managed to divide it into two grades. Of the roughest he made ropes, and Mother spun the rest. He made himself a loom, and together they wove cloth for sheets, bed ticks, and underwear. I remember well how when Mother had worked all day, she still continued to work spinning at night. We had no candles, but we gathered dried sunflowers and while Mother spun I lighted them, one by one, in the fireplace and held them up for her.

Whenever Mother could get a little work she would go for miles to do it, perhaps getting a squash in pay and then carry it home. At times she walked in this way as far as North Ogden and back.

We stayed at Bingham’s Fort a year. When Mother no longer had anything she could put on my feet, I gleaned wheat bare-footed.

We had no team, but we went as far south as Spanish Fork ‘on the move’.(When Johnstons Army threatened and every one from the north went to Utah valley,) Provo River was alive with fish, and they were easily caught About this time Mr. Cardon found some shoes or boots that had been thrown away by emigrants, using the tops of the worn out boots and making soles out of wood, be made clogs’ for us. I still remember how he cut a groove around the wooden sole and fastened the leather to it. If It hadn’t been for this, I would have had nothing but rags to wear on my feet.

When Mother returned from the “move” she stopped at Kaysville in a little house to which the owner had not yet returned, Those who had left hens when they had gone south, found them when they came back with lots of little chickens, some of them mixed with the wild ones. There was no sale for milk or butter, and Mother milked three cows for a family for her milk and butter. They would have given it to her, but she wouldn’t take it that way. She gleaned wheat again, and when she couldn’t glean any more, she came to Ogden where Liberty at 27th Street now is. At that time there was a hollow and a stream of water there. It was in this stream, backed up for the purpose, that I was baptized.

Mother made a little house here, but the Cardons went to Cache Valley and coaxed Mother and Dan to go with them. Older sister Susette eventually married Louis Philippe Cardon March 11, 1857. By this time Dan had a yoke of two year old steers, a wreck of a wagon and two heifers. He drove the steers to Logan, and had quite a time. He went to Cardon’s again, and next year Mother gleaned wheat again, and after that I was ten years old — we didn’t glean any more.

Four years later I came to North Ogden to live with my sister, Mary, who had got married. I lived there three years until I was seventeen, when I got married.

The following quotations are taken from the diary of the handcart company:

August 13:

The camp rolled at 30 past 9 a.m. and traveled 12 miles, the roads were rather heavy owing to last night’s rain. Camped about 5 p.m. along side of Bluff Fork. We forded the river previous to camping.

August 14:

The camp rolled at 10 past 9 a.m. and traveled eighteen miles. The first 12 miles was nearly all over heavy sandy bluffs right from the camp. It made heavy pulling the last six miles the road was pretty good. One of the covered hand carts broke down. Camped about 7 p.m. alongside of the Platte.

August 15:

The camp rolled out at a 1/4 to 9 a.m. and traveled fourteen miles for the first 6 miles the sand was fully as bad if not worse than yesterday. We crossed four creeks took dinner at Goose Creek for the rest of the road was good. We forded Rattle Snake and camped about 1/4 mile from the old Rattle Snake camping ground camp about 1/4 past 6 p.m.

August 16:

The camp moved off at a 1/4 to 9 a.m. and traveled 16 3/4 miles a good part of it heavy sandy traveling. Other parts of the road was good traveling. We crossed several creeks, had dinner on the banks of camp Creek about 7 p.m. on the East Bank of Wolf Creek. Buffalo chips not so plentiful here, good feed for the oxen.

August 17:

The camp rolled out at 20 past 7 a.m. and traveled 19 miles. The road was good today forded Castle Creek, passed no other creek during the day, had dinner alongside of a slough passed over a sandy ridge today. Slough on the left hand side of the road about 4 miles from the Platte. Camped 20 to 7 P-m- on the side of the Platte. (This is the second entry for the 17th: See text, P. 6, for other.)

August 18:

The camp rolled out at a quarter to 8 a.m* and traveled 20 miles the road today in parts was very sandy especially crossing the Coble Hills it was very sandy. We crossed the Crabb creek today camped about 30 Past p.m. on the Platte opposite Ancient Bluff Pains.

August 19:

The camp rolled out at 30 Past 7 a.m. and traveled 20 miles. The road was tolerably good till we came to the last five miles when it became very sandy in some parts especially in crossing over a sand Bluff. Camped on the side of the Platte 45 past 6 p.m.

NOTES CONTINUED

Sunday, October 27, 1850

Elder Lorenzo Snow baptized Jean Antoine Bosc at La Tour, Valley of Luserne Piedmont, Italy, as the first fruit of the preaching of the fullness of the gospel in Italy, Soon afterwards a number of others were baptized in the same locality.

Letter of Lorenzo Snow to President Young from “La Tour, Valle do Luserne Piedmont, Italy November 1, 1850.

“The Protestant inhabitants are called Vaudois or Waldenses They number about 21,000; there are also about 5,000 Catholics. The fertile portion of these valleys are rich in their productions, but two-thirds, or more, present nothing but precipices, ravines and rocky districts, or such as have a northern aspect. The inhabitants are far too numerous, according to the nature of the soil. They are often compelled to carry mould on their backs to form a garden amid the barren rocks. The French language is generally understood, but in many parts it is spoken very imperfectly, and with an admixture of provincialism and Italian. The latter is understood by a considerable number of persons, but not extensively used. In fact, this is a place where there are at least five distinct dialects spoken by different classes.