Edward Henry Rhead
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"Jampa was born January 9, 1851. He married Jammy on January 27, 1873. He died on October 13,1930. He had gray eyes and brown hair, and stood about 5 ' 6" tall. One interesting note: He enlisted in the BlackHawk War on June 1st, 1867 and was discharged September 30, 1867."
"Jammy and Jampa liked sauerkraut.. They'd get us kids to take off our shoes and roll up our pant legs. Then they'd put is in a barrel, put cabbage in with us, and we'd have to tromp, and tromp it around. Then they'd put vinegar in with it. That's how they made it. I didn't like it then and I don't like it now. I can understand Jammy liking it though because she was Dutch."
I never heard Jampa swear but . . .
"Never once did I hear Jampa swear and neither did anyone else. But if Jampa said "Hellfire!" you'd better start moving because then he was getting rather upset and his little moustache would start to quiver up and down. But if he got to a point where he said "Hellfire and Turkeyshit!" you'd better be on the move because he was real mad and things were liable to start flying." :-)
The wolves circled round . . .
"Jampa was born in England and came to America with the Martin Company. His family started across the plains when he was only 5 years old with the Martin Company but became separated from them. Jampa said that his Dad was stricken very ill and couldn't go on. The Company unloaded everything out of the wagons and handcarts that was theirs and left them by the side of the road. His mother put his Dad on her back and walked back some three miles to a town they had passed for help. However, she had to leave Jampa and his little sister in the prairie sitting on an old trunk. When his mother got to the town it was dark and the people wouldn't let her go back -- they were afraid of wolves. They said if you left your children out there the wolves will have gotten them by the first hour. His mother and the towns people left really early in the morning to go back out." But Heaven answered a mother's prayers. "Jampa and his little sister were still there. Jampa had his little sister in his arms, still sitting on the trunk, and there were wolf tracks right up around the trunk. Jampa said that the wolves had circled around them all night and that they could see their red eyes looking at them."
I've been troubled by this incident. Were they really part of the Martin Company? They aren't in the official record (although I realize that all the pioneer records are very incomplete). Why would they be abandoned? Where did they go? How and when did they get to Utah? etc.
Last night (3/27/04), while Barb was at the Young Women's Conference, I sat down at the Genealogy Library in front of a computer to see what I could find. An email from Richard Rhead, also a grandson of Josiah Rhead, Edward's father, gave me hope that there might be information available, so I went with guarded optimism. A search on the library's resources by subject and/or surname yielded nothing. Disappointed, I searched the Pioneer Emigration Index (On CD ROM there at the library) and found that they -were- on the ship Horizon and part of the Martin Company ( at least on the voyage over). They are clearly listed on the ship's passenger list as Josiah (age 25), Eliza (age 31), Edward (age 5), and Eliza (age 10 months). It is also noted Josiah's occupation as 'Potter'. There are on the same CD many personal accounts of the Horizon's voyage over (albeit none referencing the Rheads) that are very poignant and give a very good glimpse into life on board for this particular passage. I recommend you read them. As I read a thought entered my mind to retry a search on the Library by author (instead of subject or surname). . . . and there it was! If you will access, in the US/Canadian film section, film #176620, you will find that the whole film consists of Josiah's journal and papers. I recommend you search through these. But, from his personal journal, and other documents on the film, here is ‘the rest of the story’:
They came on the Horizon with the Martin Company (the ship left May 25, 1856 and arrived in Boston on June 30th). After traveling by rail a long time they reached the place where the handcarts would supposedly be waiting for them but on arrival found them unfinished. After weeks (3?) delay they started on their journey. Josiah fell sick and they began to lag behind. One hundred miles into the journey, 3 miles from the town of Newton, Iowa, Josiah could travel no further and they were left alone to fend for themselves, without handcart, and only their belongings stacked on the ground. Edward (5) and Eliza (1) were left sitting on a tin box while their mother carried/dragged Josiah to Newton. The townspeople took pity on them and helped them through the winter; at which time they moved 35 miles further west to Fort Des Moines, where Josiah hoped to find work at a pottery factory. Evidently, that did not work out as his journal states that he found work doing odd jobs and hiring out as a farm hand, while Eliza worked at a public laundry. After 5 years they sold their things a bought a wagon (old and decrepit), and two cows to pull it, and made their way to Florence, Nebraska, where they joined Joseph Young's 1861 wagon train in heading west. Josiah states that 'It was my good fortune to fall sick . . . we started out west with the poorest company and eventually came out west with the best company'. Concerning the wagon, Josiah states that it was in such poor condition (maybe the cows also?) that many people looked with utter scorn at them (hence the poem below) but that the wagon made it all the way to the valley. Another document on the film notes that their first 'house' in Utah (Summit Country) was a dirt dugout in the side of a hill. -- P.S. Neeley
Addendum to the Addendum :-) I submitted the findings above to the Chuch History Library and a couple of weeks later received this reply (dated 4/15/04):
"Thank you for pointing out the Josiah Rhead journal incorporated into the Edward H. Rhead record book in the Family History Library. I added the Rheads to the 1856 Martin company and the 1861 Young/Harmon company in the pioneer database."
Now, a search at the Church's 'Pioneer Overland Travel' database reveals the following:
"When Jampa's family finally did start West they had an interesting thing written on the side of their wagon. It goes like this:
Don't scorn this wagon if you please
Although it's old it giveth ease
In crossing over these western plains
It saves us having many pains."
"He was a very good carpenter. Also he had a way of appeasing people. He was called on many times to go out and run the line between the cattlemen and the sheep men. He became a surveyor in the early 1880's -- perhaps even as early as 1880."
"During the first World War, Jampa was left alone with a big farm because Uncle Jay, Uncle Parl, and Uncle Bill all had to go to war. So being the oldest grandson around, I was delegated to go up and help Jampa. So all for one summer, and the winter, and the next summer we farmed the place. I plowed the fields and cut the hay and racked the hay and hauled the hay, planted the grain, cut the grain, and waited for the thrashers to come. I was only 14 and 15 years old at the time."
"I had to get up early every morning and go to Jampa's place, hook up the horses, and if there was plowing to be done then I'd plow with the horses all day long. Then I'd have to harrow the ground, smooth it, level it, and then I'd plant the grain."
"I had to help Jampa work around the farm and also help him build chicken coops, houses, and barns as most carpenters do."
Hauling gravel to pay Jampa's toll tax.
"There were times when we were permitted to earn money for our toll tax, and the tax on the building of roads, by hauling gravel. I'd have to go haul gravel and that was hauled by wagon that had boards on it called a dump wagon. The side boards and the bottom boards were made of two by sixes and they loaded the wagon with the side boards on and then you put a chain around it to hold it up through the middle. When you came to where you were going to dump you let loosed the chain and started turning the boards over to dump the gravel. They you'd take your horse and wagon on a trot back to the trap -- maybe a mile or a mile and a half -- where they were loading the gravel. I helped with a lot of roads up around Coalville and Springhollow that way while Jay and Parl were out in the army."
"When I was 12 years old I used to go surveying with Jampa Rhead and we re-routed the road up Silver Creek Canyon. The first road made a dugway around out of the bottom. The old road used to wind up out of the bottom across the creek in several places -- sometimes they had to ford it, sometimes they had bridges -- but we developed the first road. I help him do surveying in many, many places."
Another story, which my father (Parley M. Neeley) often told, was the time that Grandpa Neeley and Jampa surveyed line together. It was a hot day and soon their canteens were empty and they were miserably thirsty. But, at the end of a steep section of the line, Jampa came hiking up to Grandpa with a contented look on his face and a full canteen. Grandpa was glad to get the water but was puzzled. When he asked Jampa about it Jampa pointed out a tree down the hill a ways and said "I came upon the most wonderful little spring bubbling up, just by that tree, with the clearest, coldest, sweetest water you can imagine". Grandpa was still thirsty and Jampa suggested he hike back down and fill the canteens, which Grandpa proceeded to do. But although he searched high and low, and Jampa yelled out directions to him from the top of the ridge, he could not find the spring. Grandpa hiked back up the ridge again empty handed. Jampa said simply "It -was- there. You know, the Lord has always watched over me and taken care of me -- I'm not sure why." And he left it at that. (Note: this section added here after a March 23, 2002 trip to Topaz Mtn. on which Dad told this story again and I recorded it here.)
"I remember Jampa was the stake clerk for as long as I can remember, or at least until they moved to Salt Lake City in the early '20s. In those days they paid their tithing 'in kind'. The Tithing House was just across where the old Coalville Co-op used to be and now that's torn down. They had a place where you could stack hay and where you could receive grain and livestock and it was credited to tithing."
Stacking grain . . . and a lesson.
"Now in those days they didn't have the type of harvesters we have today. They had a binder and the binder made sheaves as high as the grain and about 18 inches around. Then the binder would bind them up and drop them on the ground and you had to pick them up and carry them over to a central place -- maybe 15 feet away -- and stack a whole bunch of them there together. You'd let the stay there until they were dry and then you had to go out and haul them in to a farm yard and then build stack. Now the stack was always round and always tapered in at the top. You'd first build a row of those sheaves around, putting the grain heads on the inside and the bottom, where the grain was cut, on the outside. Then you'd put a row around and then another row around and finally build right on up. Jampa was a great one for teaching lessons. He'd say 'Take care of the outside ring, and the inside ring will take care of itself." And that's the way it was. If you built the outside ring, and you always kept the outside ring about one or two rows higher above the inside, the the inside ring pretty much took care of itself. In hauling hay he would say 'Now just build up the corners of the hay rack and the middle will take care of itself". And that's true of life, Jampa said. If you watch the corners of your life your life will be a good life in the center. Yes, Jampa was a good one for teaching lessons."