Edwin Thomas Watts (1810–1885), Mary Staniforth (1801-1880), & Emma Taylor (1842-1907)

Prior to 1854, while still in Nottinghamshire, England, Edwin and his first wife, Mary, learned of and converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The childless couple had been married for about twenty-five years, and with Edwin in his mid-forties and Mary in her mid-fifties, they dared to begin a new chapter of their life together: immigration to the United States and settlement among members of their new faith.

Life had not been particularly easy for either them. When Edwin was twenty-one (close to their marriage date [ca. 1830]) his left arm, just below the elbow, was accidentally shot. Though the projectile was extracted, the wound became infected and a doctor suggested amputation. Edwin at first refused, but the doctor warned that further delay might risk not only losing an arm, but life itself. The doctor eventually removed the arm and hand below the elbow and healing ensued. Not too long afterward Edwin fell and “splintered the end of the remaining bone” in his left arm, which in turn led to gangrene. Left again with the decision of life and death, Edwin’s remaining arm to the shoulder was removed. Despite his handicap he made ends meet by becoming a hawker—an individual who peddles goods house to house or in the streets (see https://mormonmigration.lib.byu.edu/ and 1851 England and Wales Census. The 1870 United States Federal Census lists his vocation as that of “Peddler”).

Edwin's and Mary's names

appear on the Perpetual

Education account book

Germanicus Manifest containing Edwin's and Mary's names.

Charles Alfred Harper (1890s)

From 4 April 1854 to 13 June 1854, Edwin and Mary sailed aboard the ship Germanicus; the journey began in Liverpool, England and finished in New Orleans, Louisiana (see https://mormonmigration.lib.byu.edu/). They stayed in the east for a year until they joined and departed with the Charles A. Harper Company at Mormon Grove, Kansas in July 1855. Though the company total of 305 individuals consisted of families capable of providing their own modes of transportation and supplies, Edwin and Mary relied upon the Perpetual Emigration Fund—money borrowed to Church members that allowed them to purchase wagons, oxen, and essentials. Their trek to the Rocky Mountain Basin concluded at the end of October of the same year (see https://history.lds.org/overlandtravel/companies/143/charles-a-harper-company-1855#description). 

1860 Census

1870 Census

The 1860 and 1870 United States censuses confirm Edwin’s and Mary’s locations as south of Salt Lake in Provo and Springville, respectively (see 1860 and 1870 United States Federal Censuses). Both records note that while Edwin was literate, Mary could neither read nor write. The latter census also adds other individuals to the household for the first time. Edwin and Mary entered into the realm of plural marriage when he married a second woman, Emma Jemima Taylor, on 9 April 1864—she was twenty-one and he was fifty-three. Despite their age difference the marriage produced ten children, with eight of the ten offspring living to adulthood.

Homer Duncan (1900s)

Like Edwin and Mary, Emma and her family—siblings, parents, and grandparents—immigrated to the United States after joining the Church. They boarded the ship John J. Boyd on 23 April 1862 and arrived in New York on 1 June (see https://mormonmigration.lib.byu.edu/). Less than two months later they were all in Nebraska, connected themselves to the Homer Duncan Company, and arrived in the Salt Lake valley near the end of September (see https://history.lds.org/overlandtravel/companies/44/homer-duncan-company-1862). In December of the same year Emma met, married, and shortly thereafter divorced a Jacob Fisher—a union which produced no children. As stated, her union a little over a year later to Edwin produced ten children. It appears that Emma and Mary lived convivially side-by-side, with the latter assisting with the children as much as possible in her advanced age.

1880 Census

The 1880 census, taken less than a month before Mary died on 3 July, revealed her age in the upper seventies and noted that she was “unable to work” because of “old age” (see 1880 United States Federal Censuses). By the time of Mary’s death, Emma had six living children—the youngest was months old, and the eldest was fifteen.

Edwin supported his growing family as he had always done—through the selling of wares.  He also became adept at driving horses with his one arm, as well as taking care of the livestock and paperwork at the Springville community pasture. Despite his determination to provide for his family, his body began to succumb to a heart condition in 1884—twenty years after marrying Emma. His death on 1 January 1885 left her with one-year-old May, three-year-old Lucy, Martha was four, little Emma was seven, and Harriet had just turned eleven, with Hannah and younger Edwin in their teens, and the oldest, Mary already wed and out of the house.

Emma Jemima Taylor Watts

At age forty-two Emma and her children struggled to make do by gardening, working an orchard of a neighbor near their home, making bags of cut and sewn material which people could purchase to create carpets, and on occasion, receiving assistance from the Church. Despite their penury, Emma insisted that tithing was a priority; if they could not pay with money, then in kind would do. For instance, one winter, after slaughtering a pig, half of it went to the tithing office.

As the children grew and left the house Emma’s financial obligations eased, but her health declined. From 1897 to her death on 11 November 1907, at the age of sixty-five, she struggled with cancer growth on her face.

It is reported that Emma’s favorite hymn was “Come! Come! Ye Saints.” Her life, along with those of Mary, and Edwin proved these phrases true: “Though hard to you this journey may appear,/ Grace shall be as your day./ 'Tis better far for us to strive/ Our useless cares from us to drive./… We then are free from toil and sorrow, too;/ With the just we shall dwell!”

Unless otherwise noted in the text, the source for the material above was learened in:

Sarah Ina Beardall, “History of Edwin Thomas Watts” (13 July 1961), as found on FamilySearch> Edwin Thomas Watts (KWN2-J4T)> memories 

Perpetual Emigrating Fund image Courtesy of the Church History Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints