The Women of Mormondom. Edward W. Tullidge
of the State of Ohio bordering on Lake Erie on the north and the State of Pennsylvania on the east, known then as the "Connecticut Western Reserve." They purchased land and settled in Mantua, Portage county.
Eliza R. Snow, who was the second of seven children, four daughters and three sons, one of whom is the accomplished apostle Lorenzo Snow, was born in Becket, Berkshire county, Mass., January 21st, 1804. Her parents were of English descent; their ancestors were among the earliest settlers of New England.
Although a farmer by occupation, Oliver Snow performed much public business, officiating in several responsible positions. His daughter Eliza, being ten years the senior of her eldest brother, so soon as she was competent, was employed as secretary in her father's office.
She was skilled in various kinds of needlework and home manufactures. Two years in succession she drew the prize awarded by the committee on manufactures, at the county fair, for the best manufactured leghorn.
When quite young she commenced writing for publication in various journals, which she continued to do for several years, over assumed signatures—wishing to be useful as a writer, and yet unknown except by intimate friends.
"During the contest between Greece and Turkey," she says, "I watched with deep interest the events of the war, and after the terrible destruction of Missolonghi, by the Turks, I wrote an article entitled 'The Fall of Missolonghi.' Soon after its publication, the deaths of Adams and Jefferson occurred on the same memorable fourth of July, and I was requested through the press, to write their requiem, to which I responded, and found myself ushered into conspicuity. Subsequently I was awarded eight volumes of 'Godey's Lady's Book,' for a first prize poem published in one of the journals."
The classical reader will remember how the struggle between Greece and Turkey stirred the soul of Byron. That immortal poet was not a saint but he was a great patriot and fled to the help of Greece.
Precisely the same chord that was struck in the chivalrous mind of Lord Byron was struck in the Hebraic soul of Eliza R. Snow. It was the chord of the heroic and the antique.
Our Hebraic heroine is even more sensitive to the heroic and patriotic than to the poetic—at least she has most self-gratification in lofty and patriotic themes.
"That men are born poets," she continues, "is a common adage. I was born a patriot,—at least a warm feeling of patriotism inspired my childish heart, and mingled in my earliest thoughts, as evinced in many of the earliest productions of my pen. I can even now recollect how, with beating pulse and strong emotion I listened, when but a small child, to the tales of the revolution.
"My grandfather on my mother's side, when fighting for the freedom of our country, was taken prisoner by British troops, and confined in a dreary cell, and so scantily fed that when his fellow-prisoner by his side died from exhaustion, he reported him to the jailor as sick in bed, in order to obtain the amount of food for both—keeping him covered in their blankets as long as he dared to remain with a decaying body.
"This, with many similar narratives of revolutionary sufferings recounted by my grand-parents, so deeply impressed my mind, that as I grew up to womanhood I fondly cherished a pride for the flag which so proudly waved over the graves of my brave and valiant ancestors."
It was the poet's soul of this illustrious Mormon woman that first enchanted the Church with inspired song, and her Hebraic faith and life have given something of their peculiar tone to the entire Mormon people, and especially the sisterhood; just as Joseph Smith and Brigham Young gave the types and institutions to our modern Israel.
Sister Eliza R. Snow was born with more than the poet's soul. She was a prophetess in her very nature—endowed thus by her Creator, before her birth. Her gifts are of race quality rather than of mere religious training or growth. They have come down to her from the ages. From her personal race indications, as well as from the whole tenor and mission of her life, she would readily be pronounced to be of Hebrew origin. One might very well fancy her to be a descendant of David himself; indeed the Prophet Joseph, in blessing her, pronounced her to be a daughter of Judah's royal house. She understands, nearly to perfection, all of the inner views of the system and faith which she represents. And the celestial relations and action of the great Mormon drama, in other worlds, and in the "eternities past and to come," have constituted her most familiar studies and been in the rehearsals of her daily ministry.
Mother Whitney says:
"I was born the day after Christmas in the first year of the present century, in the quiet, old-fashioned country town of Derby, New Haven County, Conn. My parents' names were Gibson and Polly Smith. The Smiths were among the earliest settlers there, and were widely known. I was the oldest child, and grew up in an atmosphere of love and tenderness. My parents were not professors of religion, and according to puritanical ideas were grossly in fault to have me taught dancing; but my father had his own peculiar notions upon the subject, and wished me to possess and enjoy, in connection with a sound education and strict morals, such accomplishments as would fit me to fill, with credit to myself and my training, an honorable position in society. He had no sympathy whatever with any of the priests of that day, and was utterly at variance with their teachings and ministry, notwithstanding he was strenuous on all points of honor, honesty morality and uprightness.
"There is nothing in my early life I remember with more intense satisfaction than the agreeable companionship of my father. My mother's health was delicate, and with her household affairs, and two younger children, she gave herself up to domestic life, allowing it to absorb her entire interest, and consequently I was more particularly under my father's jurisdiction and influence; our tastes were most congenial, and this geniality and happiness surrounded me with its beneficial influence until I reached my nineteenth year. Nothing in particular occurred to mar the smoothness of my life's current and prosperity, and love beamed upon our home.
"About this time a new epoch in my life created a turning point which unconsciously to us, who were the actors in the drama, caused all my future to be entirely separate and distinct from those with whom I had been reared and nurtured. My father's sister, a spinster, who had money at her own disposal, and who was one of those strong-minded women of whom so much is said in this our day, concluded to emigrate to the great West—at that time Ohio seemed a fabulous distance from civilization and enlightenment, and going to Ohio then was as great an undertaking as going to China or Japan is at the present day. She entreated my parents to allow me to accompany her, and promised to be as faithful and devoted to me as possible, until they should join us, and that they expected very shortly to do; their confidence in aunt Sarah's ability and self-reliance was unbounded, and so, after much persuasion, they consented to part with me for a short interval of time; but circumstances, over which we mortals have no control, were so overruled that I never saw my beloved mother again. Our journey was a pleasant one; the beautiful scenery through which our route lay had charms indescribable for me, who had never been farther from home than New Haven, in which city I had passed a part of my time, and to me it was nearer a paradise than any other place on earth. The magnificent lakes, rivers, mountains, and romantic forests were all delineations of nature which delighted my imagination.
"We settled a few miles inland from the picturesque Lake Erie, and here in after years, were the saints of God gathered and the everlasting gospel proclaimed. My beloved aunt Sarah was a true friend and instructor to me, and had much influence in maturing my womanly character and developing my home education. She hated the priests of the day, and believed them all deceivers and hypocrites; her religion consisted in visiting the widow and the fatherless and keeping herself 'unspotted from the world.'
"Shortly after entering my twenty-first year I became acquainted with a young man from Vermont, Newel K. Whitney, who, like myself, had left home and relatives and was determined to carve out a fortune for himself. He had been engaged in trading with the settlers and Indians at Green Bay, Mich., buying furs extensively for the eastern markets. In his travels to and from New York he passed along the charming Lake Erie, and from some unknown influence he concluded to settle and make a permanent home for himself in this region of country; and then subsequently we met and became acquainted; and being thoroughly convinced that we were suited to each other, we were married by the Presbyterian minister of that place, the Rev. J. Badger.