June 1st, 2010 is the 209th anniversary of the birth of President Brigham Young.
So much has been written about this “Lion of the Lord” that it is difficult to condense it all into one article. In fact I’m told there may have been more written about Brigham Young than most other public figures of his day.
He captured the imagination of Americans as he led the Mormon Pioneers to their “Promised Land” in the valleys of the Great Salt Lake in 1847. Many people of his day, and even today, only know that he helped lead the pioneers to the West and that he had many wives.
Few people realize that he was a devoted father and husband to his family members. All of them.
Few people know that he was a gifted organizer, a forward thinker, a colonizer, a skilled politician, a religious leader, and a Prophet of God.
As the late S. Dilworth Young said about Brigham, “It is quite evident that after 1832 Brigham Young was moved by just one motive: Determination to obey the will of God as spoken through the Prophet Joseph Smith and to support that Prophet with all that he possessed of time, talent and means.” 1
As a brief background, Brigham was born in Whittingham, Vermont to John and Abigail (Nabby) Young. Brigham learned the skills for carving out a living in the frontier, including carpentry work.
Eventually, Brigham’s mother died at age 49, after a long bout with tuberculosis. They didn’t have a lot of medicinal help for those severely ill. Most had to suffer through the pain of the illness until the very end. Brigham was 14 and dutifully took his turn caring for his mother at her bedside before she passed. Brigham never forgot the experience allowing that compassion he learned then to grow even larger in his heart as he matured.
Fast forward many years to 1830. Brigham Young and many of his family members had now settled in Mendon, New York, not far from Palmyra.
It was about that time that a young man, Samuel H. Smith had walked into town speaking to many about a new religious book that had just been published.
Phinehas Young, Brigham’s brother, and John Greene, Brigham’s brother-in-law, encountered young Smith and heard him declare “if you will read this book with a prayerful heart and ask God to give you a witness, you will know the truth of the work… and that my brother Joseph Smith, Jr. is a Prophet, Seer, and Revelator.”
As the family and friends discussed the Book of Mormon, it eventually found its way to brother Brigham and his close friend, Heber C. Kimball.
After studying it for nearly two years, Brigham was baptized and eventually made his way to Kirtland, Ohio to meet the Prophet Joseph Smith.
Brigham was tried and tested as not only a follower of Joseph and the newly restored Church, but later as an Apostle of the Lord.
He was tested as a leader, tested as a friend, tested as a man.
As a great-great grandson of Brigham, I’ve always heard many stories about Brigham. I went many times with my grandfather to Brigham’s gravesite on First Avenue in Salt Lake City to help place a wreath on his grave during the annual remembrance services on his birthday. I’ve been with my grandfather to the Lion House to see some of the furniture and other items that he donated which once belonged to the family and learned about the room that his father had grown up in with his mother Margaret Pierce (the piano room which opens onto the outside patio.)
But it wasn’t until I was much older that I fully began to appreciate the total devotion Brigham had for the Prophet Joseph and to the Lord to his Church and to his family in general.
For example, a year or so after the Kirtland Temple had been dedicated, there was internal strife among some Church leaders with some of them openly debating whether Joseph Smith had fallen as a Prophet. Brigham faced the arch conspirator head-on and demanded that those dissidents be tried for their membership and lack of support.
At another meeting, Brigham reached a point where he felt he had to speak. “He arose and demanded the floor, then in a plain and forceful manner he told them that Joseph was a Prophet and he knew it. They might rail and slander as much as they pleased, but they could not destroy the appointment of the Prophet of God.
They could only destroy their own authority, cut the thread that bound them to the Prophet and to God, and sink themselves into Hell.”2
Brigham’s loyalty was also appreciated by the Prophet Joseph. In January of 1838, as Joseph, Brigham and their families tried to escape from men intent on killing them, they arrived in Dublin, Indiana.
The Prophet Joseph told Brigham he was destitute of means to pursue his journey and that “since he was one of the Twelve Apostles who hold the keys of the kingdom in all the world, I believe I shall throw myself upon you, and look to you for counsel in this case.”
Brigham was astounded by the proposition, but reasoned it was right since he was conferring on him the right to receive inspiration in order to advise him. Brigham then instructed him that he would have plenty of money for his journey and shortly thereafter a brother Tomlinson after also conferring with Brigham on a sale of a business, straightway took much of the proceeds of that sale and gave it to Joseph to continue his journey.
Fast forward many years after the great trek to the Salt Lake Valley.
Life had been difficult during the early years in the Valley for many of the Saints, but eventually, life for Brigham and his families settled into routines that many families would find admirable and desireable.
In her book “Brigham Young at Home” by Clarrisa Young Spencer, she recalls how her childhood was “one long round of happiness.”
“The family” she recalls, “used to eat an early breakfast, but I always waited until 10 o’clock when Father (Brigham) had his. In those days he wore quite a long beard, and it was my duty to tie a bib over it to protect it from stray crumbs. To be sure, there was always corn-meal mush and milk, which was no treat, but there were also hot doughnuts and syrup, codfish gravy…which Father loved, squabs from the pigeon house and some little delicacy from our own garden.”3
Clarissa Young Spencer recalled there were usually about twelve of his 18 families living in the Lion House. Another wife lived at Forest Farm in Provo, another lived in St. George where Brigham would spend his winters.
Brigham’s 35th child and the only son of Margaret Pierce (my grandfather’s father) was Brigham Morris Young.
Morris was called to serve a mission to Laie, Oahu, Hawaii in 1873-74.
Even with all of his duties as Territorial Governor and Church President, Brigham found time to write to his children, especially those serving the Lord on missions.
Here is an excerpt of one such letter written July 24, 1873:
“My dear son,
We were all exceedingly well pleased with the spirit of your letters.
Your mother is in good health and spirits and the folks feel first rate.
Your labors to acquire the native language will doubtless be a task at first but diligence and perseverance will give you the victory. You have everything to encourage you, for heaven and one good man is a large majority.
Write often when you have time and remember we will watch your course and that you have our faith and prayers.
Your affectionate father,
Brigham Young”4
Shortly after his return in 1875, President Young called his then 21 year old son Morris to travel around the territory and every settlement essentially organizing Young Men’s Improvement Associations.
Morris wrote in his journals of the special times he experienced growing up in the Lion House including the daily prayers, the meals, the good fun including the gymnastic equipment his father provided for the children along a veranda between the Lion House and the Church Office building.
In addition to family organization (keeping track of all of his children was probably no easy task, since I cycle through the names of all six of my children at times when I’m asking them to do something for me) but Brigham was also a master colonizer.
One Berkley professor once told the late Milton R. Hunter that historians need to realize the great role Brigham Young and the Mormons played in opening up the Westernization of America.
Because of Brigham’s efforts hundreds of colonies were established in Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, California and Mexico among others.
Herbert Bolton, the Berkeley Professor also wrote that Brigham “personally directed the founding of cooperative settlements throughout the Inter-Mountain Basin, and in the process shaped a set of political, social and economic institutions which were and to a great extent still are peculiar to the Mormons.
While Joseph Smith founded the Mormon Church, Brigham Young made it a notably successful working organization.”5
Brigham Young, according to historian Orson F. Whitney, “was the foremost citizen of Utah, not in an official way, but by virtue of his ability, personal magnetism and commanding influence.”
Upon his death in 1877, an editorial in the Deseret News read “The leading papers of the United States have each published the notices (of his death)… The name of Brigham Young is familiar all over the globe. His greatness is universally acknowledged, but his goodness is known only to a few.”
Perhaps now, 209 years after his birth, Brigham Young’s goodness as well as his greatness may also be universally acknowledged.
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References:
- Here is Brigham by S. Dilworth Young, published by Bookcraft 1964; Introductin page.
- Here is Brigham by S. Dilworth Young, published by Bookcraft, 1964; page 174.
- Brigham Young at Home by Clarissa Young Spencer, published by Deseret News Press, 1947; page 17.
- Letters to Brigham Morris Young from his father Brigham Young; family archives
- Brigham Young the Colonizer by Milton R. Hunter, published by Perrigrine-Smith, 1973; Introduction page.
