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| Condensed from the book "A Journey Back in Time" by Mary Olson Almond | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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THE TWITCHELLS...Continued The Twitchells moved to San Juan. Many other Mormons were thereabouts also, as well as many Twitchells. It was a thrill to find a Mormon grave yard southeast of Sacramento, close to Sloughhouse. It was a thrill to find a big book of early pioneers at a friend's house in Elk Grove with the names of Ephraim and Melissa Twitchell listed in it. To drive to and walk on Twitchell Island was exciting. It seems that the area around Elk Grove was where many of the settlers chose to live. It is quite close to the mines and flat acres of land were easier to farm. This area is where the Mormon grave yard is located, now owned by The Daughters of the Utah Pioneers. It was a thrill to find in the State Library in Sacramento, a record of so many other Twitchells. There in the card files were hundreds of them--surveyors, artists, singers, doctors, scientists--one, William C. Twitchell, who helped to create the Atom Bomb. A bigger thrill was to find in the Census of 1850--Ephraim and Melissa Twitchell with all the members of their family being named as follows:
SAN JUAN BAUTISTA After finding the Twitchells in the Census of 1850 and in Tuolemne County, I then found them after they had moved several places, in Monterey County, just south of San Francisco. Monterey County is where they finally settled in and around the little town of San Juan Bautista. Since that time, Monterey County has been divided and now San Juan Bautista is in San Benito County. San Juan Bautista is very near the ocean and some of the Twitchells built their homes on high ground with a beautiful view of the ocean. I have heard that one year a hurricane (Typhoon) came and took their house and other buildings and stock out into the ocean--that the people barely escaped with their lives. Some of the Twitchells lived in Hollister, another small town close by. Jasper Twitchell became discouraged after the flood of 1850, and joined the others at San Juan. When they had been in San Juan but a short time, they were visited by some of the General Authorities of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Among others, Elder William E. McLellin was there. He could teach the Gospel so very well. While he was there (a few months) he baptized about 50 people. Many of our people were anxious to be baptized. There were cousins, aunts, and uncles among the 50. Joshua Jr. and Ursula Twitchell's son, Silas and his wife, were both baptized. I believe it was at this time that the Branch of the Church was organized, with our Great great-grandfather Ephraim Twitchell as Branch President. You will remember that Ephraim and Melissa Twitchell were already members of the Church--since back in Illinois. They had already been leaders and holding cottage meetings (as we know these meetings) trying to teach their relatives about the Gospel. Joshua and Ursula had a very large house in San Juan, and church services were held in Joshua's house. One conference was held in Joshua's house, when Apostle Parley P. Pratt was there. He and another representative were there and both talked in one meeting. Apostle Parley P. Pratt warned those in the audience of the wild living around that area, telling them it was very bad company for their young people. He pointed out that because of the Gold Rush, many ne'er do-wells and evil people had drifted in, and that law and order had not yet been established, nor police appointed. He told them that because of this, gangs, liquor, gambling and robbing and other lawless actions were prevalent. This day Apostle Pratt advised them to move away, either to San Bernadino, California, or perhaps to Carson City, Nevada. Many days passed after the conference, and the grownups were still thinking about what they heard. They warned their boys to be careful with whom they ran around with--telling them there were many unlawful, ruffians and wild boys around to lead young people astray. After all, it was the "Wild West." Murdering and plundering were common. THE MESSENGER One day Branch President Ephraim Twitchell was coming from Sacramento, which is quite a long distance, taking several days by wagon. It was probably the last day of his journey and he was traveling late, and after dark. He did not stop because he was almost home. He was alone in his wagon, when suddenly there was a man sitting beside him on the spring seat--just appeared from nowhere. He told my great-grandfather Ephraim that he should take his family from San Juan Bautista and go to San Bernadino. Ephraim said, "It is 1854 and we have been in San Juan long enough for it to seem like home--my children have their friends here--I don't think I can get them to go with me." The man beside him replied, "Yes you can, and you must. Go to San Bernadino or you will lose them." When Ephraim turned to answer him, he was not there. He had disappeared just as he had appeared--it seemed like just out of thin air. Ephraim knew the gospel very well, and remembered the story in the Book of Mormon about the three Nephites who had been given permission to stay in this life to help worthy people when they were in desperate need--this was their wish. They were granted their wish, and were translated so they would be able to stay here and not taste death. Ephraim thought of this at once--it must be the answer--it was one of the three Nephites. He then saw a beautiful and new cloak that the messenger had left on the spring-seat beside him. He wondered why, and the answer came to him: The cloak was to prove that the messenger had really been there--that he had not been just imagining or fantasizing. Ephraim went on home and told his wife, Melissa. They talked of the move, and prayed about it for a couple of days, and then knew they must go to San Bernadino, California. Every one of their children, and one nephew, John Newton Twitchell, the oldest son of Jasper Twitchell went with them. John Newton Twitchell was a grand nephew of Ephraim. Anciel, Ephraim's oldest son, had to wind up some of his business, and he came a year later. My mother, Celinda Twitchell, Ephraim's granddaughter, told me this story when I was a little girl about the messenger, the cloak, and moving to San Bernadino. Again, she told it to me when I was a teenager, and again, she told it to me when I was grown up and a married woman. That is why I have it fixed in my head so exactly. I then wrote it down in my journal. SAN BERNADINO AND BEAVER, UTAH You will remember that it was in 1851 that the Twitchells settled in San Juan Bautista, Monterey County, just south of Yerba Buena (San Francisco) and that since then the county of Monterey has been divided, leaving San Juan in the new county of San Benito. It was in 1851 that Brigham Young created many new colonies, and it was on March 24, 1851 that he sent a company of 500 saints to find a place in California to colonize. It was organized for traveling at Payson, Utah, and they commenced the journey the same day under the direction of the Presidency with Apostle Amasa M. Lyman and Charles C. Rich. They were accompanied by Apostle Parley P. Pratt and a party of missionaries going to different countries to preach the gospel. The 500 saints settled in San Bernadino, California. The first stake in San Bernadino was organized on July 6, 1851, and was the first Mormon colony outside of the Great Basin since the arrival of the pioneers in 1847. The Twitchells stayed in San Juan Bautista until 1854, and it was that year, after Branch President Ephraim Twitchell was advised by the "messenger" to go to San Bernadino that they joined the saints there. They were happy in San Bernadino because they were with a large group of other Latter-day Saints. It was still 1854. They stayed and built homes of brick. They had learned good house construction, and brick making back in Nauvoo. After three more years James Ephraim Twitchell and Margaret Frances Moore were married on August 13, 1857. James Ephraim was 23 and Margaret was 17. They built for themselves a small brick house. Very soon after their marriage Brigham Young called all the Saints from San Bernadino to come back to Utah to help colonize the town of Beaver, Utah. It was named Beaver, as was the county, because there were so many beavers in the streams close by. Johnston's Army came to Utah sometime in 1856, and Brigham Young thought it wise to call many other colonists from outlying settlements to come back to Utah also. Beaver County was created by Legislative act in the spring of 1856, and was settled by Simeon F. Howd and only 13 others from Parawan, who located in the town site of Beaver City. The township was laid out on April 17, 1856. On Friday, February the 8th, the saints who were settling on Beaver Creek, Beaver County, Utah, were organized into a Branch of the Church by Apostle George A. Smith, with Simeon F. Howd as President. A few families joined them in the summer of 1857. I know it must have been hard for them with so few to fill church callings, but even if they had only a Sunday School, as many small groups start with, they were successful. In December 1847, the first Sunday School in Utah was opened by Elder Richard Ballantyne in Salt Lake City in the 14th Ward, and the first Superintendent of the Sunday School in the Church was George Q. Cannon in November of 1867. However the whole stake from San Bernadino was called to come to Beaver, and when they arrived, it made the Beaver organization much bigger and stronger. The Twitchells were part of the San Bernadino Stake. The San Bernadino Stake was disorganized late in November of 1857 when Brigham Young called them to come home to Utah to help colonize Beaver. There were no roads then (just trails) and travel was very slow. They arrived in Beaver on March 1, 1858. I can't help but think of our poor dear Melissa who had already crossed three plains, now had to cross another to Utah--for there were no roads then, just trails. She had cared for her big family, had cooked in a wagon and washed clothes in a wagon so much of that time. They arrived in Beaver March 1, 1858 and Melissa died March 2, 1858. Her grave was the first grave in Beaver Cemetery. Anciel Twitchell and Louisa his wife had raised Linda Brown from a very young girl in 1849, and now took her as a 2nd wife in polygamy with them in March of that same year, 1858. Linda then had two children. After her last child was born Linda died and Louisa, (Aunt Lizie) raised Linda's children also. My mother, Celinda, said her favorite uncle was Uncle Anciel. When she was about five years old, he would pull her over to him, feel her ribs and say, "I don't think they are feeding you enough; you feel pretty skinny." Then he would take her somewhere and buy her something good to eat. Every now and then he would examine her shoes, and then buy her some new shoes. She loved him for all his attention. She told me of his swear words: "By hokey, pokey, billy-be-darn-sarn, ding poodleums." After Grandmother Melissa died in Beaver, Grandfather Ephraim went to the Endowment House in Salt Lake City and had his own endowments done on November 8, 1859. He was very lonely and in two more years he married Sarah Jane Hadden on November 8, 1862, and became the father of seven more children. Ephraim had Melissa and Sarah Jane both sealed to him in the Endowment House on November 8, 1862. Grandfather Ephraim died 10 years later on October 25, 1872 and is buried in the Beaver Cemetery. |