The Life Sketch of
GEORGE ANDREW
GRIFFETH, SR.
by, a daughter
Alice Albertie
Griffeth (Griffiths)
George
Andrew Griffeth was the second child of Patison Delos Griffeth and Elizabeth
Carson, born January 3. 1849 at Greenbush, Illinois.
His
parents, with other relatives, heard the testimonies of the missionaries of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and were converted to the
truthfulness of the Gospel and, became members of the Church.
When
the Prophet was killed and the Saints were driven out of Illinois, Patison, his
wife and two small children, Phoebe and Andrew, started on the long tedious
journey westward. They drove a yoke of oxen and a yoke of cows to Salt Lake
City. On the way at Green River, Wyoming another child, Louisa, was added to
the family.
Patison
and family were the only ones of the Griffeth family to come west. The rest of
the family stayed in Illinois, and become affiliated with the Reorganized and
Josephite Church.
This
little family didn’t come with the first company of saints. They reached the
Salt Lake Valley some time in the late autumn of 1851 when father was about two
years and eight months old. They first stopped near where Bountiful, Utah now
is, then moved further south to Lehi. Later they moved to Cedar Valley and
lived for about eight years before moving to Hyde Park, Utah, in Cache valley.
Eudell
Bodily Gailey, (a granddaughter) remembers father telling her how he and one of
his sisters walked a good share of the way from Cedar Valley to Hyde Park,
driving cattle. This was in the spring of 1860, when father was eleven years
old.
He made his home in Hyde Park for
sometime then moved to Fairview, Franklin County, Idaho. In the history of
Fairview written by Eleanor Griffeth Bodily, for the Daughters of the Utah
Pioneers we find this quote; “Commencing in the winter of 1869 Patison Delos
Griffeth and his son George Andrew Griffeth Jr, hauled the lumber to build the
first house that was build in Fairview. It was located on the Sim Inglet farm
down on river west of Fairview. The following spring, on April 12, 1870, Sarah
Gibson Griffeth, plural wife of Patison Delos Griffeth came with her two
children to make her home here. They lived in a one room house.
They lived here during the summer
and herded cattle and sheep, then went back to Hyde Park, Utah for the winter
until the year 1872, when the Griffeths made Fairview their permanent home.”
(End of quote)
Afterwards they went back to Hyde
Park, and father lived there until the spring of 1885. He then came back to
Pairview and took up a place consisting of one hundred and sixty acres, and
began homesteading and clearing sagebrush. He had a house ready to be moved
into sometime in 1890, after having lived in a rented house, dugout, granary,
shed and tent, and the house was far from finished when we moved into it. I
remember how happy we all were when there was enough floor space for us to
start moving the furniture in.
That was father’s home until his
death except the few years when he lived with Eleanor some of the time and then
with his son George and wife, Eva.
So much for where he lived. I hardly
know where to start to try to describe him. Reading between the lines I gather
that he was not particularly strong and robust, for I have often heard him
mention the fact that when he didn’t feel like eating a meal, his mother used
to give him a spoon and a crust of bread and tell him that he could go down to
the cellar and skim a pan milk. That taste for bread and cream remained with
him throughout his life. He also enjoyed thickened milk or a good baked potato
for supper. For breakfast he relished cream biscuits and butter. When he came
home late at night, tired and cold he never turned down a cup of hot milk. He
liked doughnuts too.
As a youth he was athletically
inclined,, good at racing, wrestling and riding wild steers and broncos. He often
wrestled with Indian boys which he said gave him rather stiff competition.
What did he look like? Well, Mother
(Mary Elizabeth Thurman) a pretty grae-eyed, redheaded English girl said the
first time she saw him when they were nearing their teens, she thought him the
most attractive boy she had ever seen. One day she was out in a tent when she
heard a horse come galloping up. She heard the rider speak to her brother in a
very pleasant voice. She peeked through a hole in the tent and there she saw a
rather slender, trim—built boy with medium dark hair, very blue laughing eyes
and a rather large mouth with friendly smile showing pretty white teeth. She
said she fell for him right then and that admiration never waned. It ripened
into love and on December 13, 1969 they were married in the Endowment House in
Salt Lake City, Utah.
From that union came a family of
three sons and six daughters. The sixth child, Annie, died at the age of five
days. Gertrude was fifty years old when she passed away and Eleanor was seventy
four. George , Edward, Irene, Delos, Albertie and Azuba are still living, at
this writing. There are also thirty—nine living grandchildren and seventy—nine
great grandchildren. Five grand children and one great grandchild have died,
making all together nine who have finished their work here, and one hundred
twenty—four living descendents at this time, one hundred years from Father’s
birth. (1949) His first grandchild, Eleanor Delia Bodily (Ransom), was born on
his fiftieth birthday.
As I remember Father, he was a tall
slender, fine—looking, active man. I remember his overalls measured 33 inches
at the waist. He was always jolly, liked to play the violin, sing, and dance
and tell good stories. He enjoyed teaching his children and other children.
When Mother was President of the Primary, he would spend hours with her
training groups of children.
At one time, in dialogue I had to
say, “I should so love to be a beautiful dancer,” then I was supposed to waltz
across the stage. How father did try to get me to do that gracefully. He would
hold his violin, playing and dancing, trying to get me to do it like him. I
wonder that he didn’t lose his patience, but he never did.
During the middle years of his life,
as I first remember him, he wore a full beard. It was heavy, long and silky, a
rich auburn, which matched Mother’s hair. As he grew older and more gray, he
trimmed his whiskers, until at his death he had only a mustache with a very
short growth on his face.
He was a good entertainer. Mother
says when they lived in Hyde Park, there was hardly a night passed without a
crowd of young people coming to their home. They enjoyed father’s violin
playing, singing and story telling.
When Aunt Ina, (the youngest daughter
of Patison and Sarah Roberts Griffeth) came to our place, she, Gertrude, Azuba
and I would all pile upon father’s lap and try to stay there. Just as we would
begin to feel secure into the middle of the floor would tumble four little
girls. Funny, he could tumble us of f his knee, throw us off his back and such
things, but never let us get hurt.
He enjoyed teasing, but he never
left a child crying and they always came back for mote. He was a good teacher
and often asked to administer to the sick because of his great faith. He served
in the Sunday School Superintendency for many years. It seems that he always
acted on program committees for parties or celebrations. We had some very good
times in Fairview. He was a school trustee for many years, always ready with
work and money to better his community.
Father was brave and dependable. To
show this let me quote from Eudell’s letter. “I also recall a story he used to
tell of his being placed as a picket or scout or something of a sort at the
time of the Indian battle at Battle Creek on the Bear River, sometimes called
the Battle Creek Massacre. He was stationed on the east side of the river to
watch. If the Indians were victorious he was to ride and warn the settlers, I
believe. The attack upon the Indians was led by Colonel Edward Conner with 200
soldiers from Fort Douglas, Utah. The historians in describing the battle say
that more of the wounded soldiers froze to death, than were killed in the
battle. If my remembered story is true Grandpa certainly had a cold watch and
rather a hazardous responsibility for a lad of fourteen years. This battle took
place in January, 1863”. (End quote)
Father was unselfish, polite,
hospitable and loved nature rocks, earth, the great out of doors. He was quick
witted. When the “Deps” were trying so hard to get and imprison Grandfather,
uncles and many of our friends for plural marriage, Father did many clever
things to mislead them until the hunted polygamist could get into safety. At
one time someone from Hyde Park had come out to the ranch by the river and had
crossed on the ferry boat that father operated. Before they were very far up
the country the officers came. Father kept out of sight for some time,
pretending not to hear their call. When he finally went to help them across and
tried to get the horses onto the boat, a board squeaked and frightened one of
the horses making it rear backwards. Just as the men would think that every
thing was going fine, father would step on that board again. Thus he detained
them until he was sure that his friends were safe.
Father was kind, but very firm. That
is why he was successful in training horses. He treated his children the same
way. We knew that he would always be considerate and understanding, a real pal and
friend, yet we understood that he expected obedience.
Our home was a happy one due to his
many fine qualities and the congenial spirit that existed between him and his
sweetheart wife.
George Andrew Griffeth, my father,
passed away December 29, 1934 after a long and successful life. I am sure at
his passing there were hosts of friends and relatives who rejoiced as they
welcomed him to his new home.
END OF FAMILY
HISTORY.
The following
is taken from an article published in the book “PROGRESSIVE MEN OF IDAHO” IN
1904.
It gives a
short account of George Andrew Griffeth:
“Successful
in business, active and efficient in church work, broadminded and progressive
in public spirit. George Andrew Griffeth, Sr. of Fairview, Oneida County,
Idaho, is an ornament of the community in which he lives and has been a healthy
stimulus to all its industrial, commercial, social and educational forces. He
was born on January 5, 1849, in Warren County, Illinois, the son of Patison
Delos Griffeth, and Elizabeth (Carson) Griffeth, the former a native of New
York and the latter of Pennsylvania. His father was a prosperous farmer in
Warren county, Illinois, and remained there until 1851. He and his wife were
early converts to Mormonism, being communicants of the church during the life
of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and in the spring of 1851 crossed the plains to
join their people in fellowship in Utah. They Located near where the city of
Bountiful now stands and in Cedar Valley and in Lehi, the father continued his
farming operations until the spring of 1860, when he moved his family into
Cache Valley, settling in Hyde Park, being one of the three first settles in
the region and making his home in that section until his death 13 May 1901. His
wife died on November 7, 1898. Patison was buried in Grover, Wyoming, Elizabeth
was buried in Hyde Park, Utah.
Their
son came with them to Cache Valley when he was a boy of eleven, and finished
his education and reached maturity at Hyde Park. He assisted his father on the
farm until April 1885, when he sold whatever interests he had at that place and
came into Idaho, settling on the land he now occupies in the Fairview precinct,
three miles south of Preston. Fifteen years before this time, in 1870, he and
his father had come to this part of the state and located land two miles west
of Fairview, but they afterwards traded this for property at Hyde Park. When he
finally located in Oneida County, Mr. Griffeth put up the first cabin built in
the vicinity of Fairview and for a number of years ran cattle on his land in partnership
with his father. But when he came to make his home here and brought his family,
he dissolved the partnership and since then has conducted all his enterprises
on his own account, abiding in this place where he cast his lot and devoting
his energies to building up its prosperity, developing its resources and making
it bright, beautiful and engaging with all the blessings of a cultivated life.
He is one of the fathers of the section and one of its most esteemed and
representative citizens. His home has been one of its hospitable centers, and
his influence has been a potential for good to every commendable undertaking
for which the community in which he lives has been noted. In church matters he
has always taken an active and helpful part, aiding in the progress and
expansion of the organization in every proper way, and giving to its members
the example of a board— minded, generous and soulful force in there midst.
George Andrew
Griffeth was married on December 13, 1869, to Miss Mary Elizabeth Thurman, a
native of Nottinghamshire, England, the daughter of Edward Thurman and Mary Ann
Gibson Thurman of that County. The mother and her children emigrated to America
in 1854, and resided in Missouri near St. Louis, and in Illinois until 1862.
They then came to Utah and made their way directly to hyde Park, where the
mother died on May 22, 1899. The family of George Andrew and Mary Elizabeth
Griffeth consisted of nine children, George Andrew Jr., Mary Eleanor, (wife of
Robert H. Bodily), Edward Thurman, Elizabeth Irene, (wife of Richard A.
Talbot), Patison Delos, Annie Esstella, (died in infancy), Maria Gertrude,
Alice Albertie, and Myrtha Azuba..” (End of quote)
