Hangin' Out in the Cemetery

Before you think I'm some sort of morbid freak who enjoys hanging out in a cemetery let me assure you that I am not.  Although I once sat in an old Ford Granada with my high school boyfriend and kissed in my home town cemetery.  Which looking back now seems like bad ju-ju or at the very least the opening scene from a horror movie.  But you know the stars were out, we had a clear view of Gunsight Peak and nothing says romance like graves and headstones.  The obstacles that teenage hormones can overcome is astounding.

Anyway, I've been looking into my family history, this time on my father's side and found a few ancestors who were buried in the Salt Lake City Cemetery.  Most families from my line who came west with the Saints were just passing through and so the majority of my ancestors are buried in Cache Valley.  With the exception of the Coopers who are long standing residents of West Texas, my Grandpa Stewart being the only member of his family who converted and moved to Utah with my Grandma Margaret.  My Grandma Margaret's father was Golden Wesley Barrett and her mother was Barbara Irene Lewis.  

I was looking into the Lewis line.  The Lewis family have roots that go back to before the Revolutionary war.  This information I owe to a distant cousin whose blog I found by typing in a specific ancestor into Google.  Gotta love Google.  The Lewis family gradually moved west.  From Kentucky to North Carolina and then into Illinois which was frontier at the time.  Neriah Lewis Jr., my four times great grandfather and his wife Rebecca Hendricks Lewis were converted to the gospel while living in Illinois by either an Uncle David Lewis or Neriah's older brother Benjamin.  There are conflicting reports.  All of the Lewis siblings converted, and about four or five of Rebecca's siblings converted as well.  Thus began a lot of sacrifice and heart break for Neriah and Rebecca.  They had the misfortune to be some of the Mormons that settled near Haun's Mill in Missouri for a time.  If you know church history you'll have heard of the Haun's Mill Massacre.  By all accounts the Lewis brothers were first hand witnesses to those events.  Most escaped with their lives, except for older brother Benjamin who was shot and later died from the injury.  Shortly thereafter they helped build Nauvoo and had a short period of rest.  

The Lewis and Hendricks family came west in 1850.  Neriah Jr. and Rebecca had four children ages 13, 9, 7, and 2.  Nine year-old Benjamin Marion Lewis is my three times great grandfather.  It makes me think about the song Pioneer Children that we used to sing in Primary.  I wonder what those long days were like for him.  I wonder if it seemed a fantastic adventure.  Rebecca had a younger brother and his wife traveling in the group.  His name was Allen Hendricks.  His wife died in June 1850 in North Platte, Nebraska.  They had four children at the time.  Allen died a month later in Sweetwater Wyoming.  Neriah and Rebecca took in their two oldest children, while the younger boys who were just two and three at the time went with another relative. 

I can only assume they came into the Salt Lake Valley in that same year 1850.  On December 6, 1854 Rebecca Hendricks Lewis passed away at the age of 37.  I can't imagine it.  She had endured so much and finally made it to a place of safety and four years later she is dead, leaving four children and a niece and nephew.  Neriah Lewis Jr. remarried four months later to a Martha Youngblood.  The family then moved to Richmond, UT and settled that area.  Neriah and Martha went on to have nine more children.  They are buried in Richmond.  While I was researching their story I found it really sad that Rebecca was buried by herself in the SLC cemetery with no siblings, spouse, or children around her.  Maybe it doesn't matter to her.  I can't say.  But it kind of matters to me.  She sacrificed so much so I could have a better life.  I went looking for her grave this past Monday.  To my great sadness she had no gravestone.  

I stood there looking at the unidentified grave and tears began to pour down my face.  The trials in my life are so small compared to the things she face in her life.  The faith she had propelled her from a stable life on a farm in Illinois to pioneer.  I don't believe that people's spirit hang around the cemetery that their physical bodies were laid to rest in, but I hope that wherever she was that she was listening as I told her thank you, and that I was glad to be her great-great-great-great granddaughter.  Maybe one day I can put a marker where she is buried.  

The corner plot where Rebecca Hendricks Lewis was laid to rest.

The Barrett story I know less about.  I will have to try to find out more detail.  The Barretts were living in Tennessee when they heard the Gospel and decided to join the Saints.  I know they were in Tennessee as late as 1873, which is when my great-great grandfather, Samuel Bell Lewis was born.  His father William Riley Barrett, and his mother Charlotte are buried in the Salt Lake City cemetery as well.  Samuel Bell Barrett and wife, Margaret Ricks settled in Cache Valley and are buried in the Logan cemetery. 

The view from the SLC Cemetery facing downtown.  The cemetery is on fourth avenue.

Most prophets of the church are buried in this cemetery.  This is the monument to President Hinckley.

I'm not sure why there was change on Pres. Hinckley's headstone.

The prophet's wife.

Looking south from Pres. Hinkcley's gravestone.  The tall monument further down the hill is where Pres. David O. McKay is buried.  I realize that my lens must have a big smudge on it.  Kids.