History of
Tamar Loader Ricks
Compiled by Bonnie Smellie Sparks
THE LIFE OF TAMAR LOADER RICKS
Compiled by Bonnie Smellie Sparks
It is only right that we start the story of Tamar Loader Ricks with her own words:
My parents were James Loader and Amy Britnell. My father was born July
10, 1799 at Chiner, and my mother April 2, 1802, at Aston, both in Oxfordshire,
England. They heard and received the gospel about 1850. They were parents of
thirteen children, four sons and nine daughters. Nine of their children came to Utah,
and four remained in London. The first one to die in Utah was Sister Jane, wife of
Frank Bacon, who left three children.
Tamar’s father, James Loader, son of James Loader and Ann Tipton, was 5 foot 3
inches tall with light brown hair and blue eyes. At age twenty he became a gardener for Sir
Henry Lambert at Aston Rowant, Oxfordshire, England. He became head gardener and was
employed by Sir Lambert for thirty-five years until he joined the Mormon Church.
He married Amy Britnell in 1820. Tamar was born in Aston, September 8, 1833.
She was the seventh child. The family lived in a little cottage furnished by the Lambert
estate. There was a public park across the street. Green lawns sloped to a lake where the
children sailed their boats. Tamar’s boat carried white sails made from her mother’s apron.
She loved to roll a hoop. She wore her hair in long braids but on Sunday it was allowed to
run free. She liked to sing “Oh, won’t that be joyful when we meet to part no more.”
Father Loader believed in keeping the Sabbath Day holy. Father cleaned his shoes
the night before the Sabbath and all the children’s clothing was laid out ready for the church
going. There were no games or rowdiness on the Sabbath Day.
Ann Loader became interested in the church and was baptized in November, 1850.
Patience wrote that the Holiday boys brought the church to them. Mother, Amy, and Zilpah
joined on December 18, 1850. Father Loader believed but was afraid because of the
persecution and threat to his livelihood.
Sir Lambert, having heard that the family had joined the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints, gave them one year to leave their new faith. The minister of the Church of
England instigated persecution. The children were not allowed to attend school.
As the girls grew up they left home to get work---Tamar to London to work as a clerk
in a store. She had her own private little room over the store which made her quite
comfortable. Patience lived in London for eleven years working for the same firm. The
elderly man she worked for said he would make her his heir. She worked until it was time to
leave England for America and her employer thought that she should go with her parents.
She had worked in a fashionable London hotel.
When at the end of the year of probation the Loaders had not left their new faith, Sir
Lambert told them to leave. Father Loader was discouraged because he had no way of
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making a living. His sons Jonas and Marshal were in the meat market business and lived in
Kingston. Jonas was not a Mormon but did not like the way his father was being treated. He
helped move the family to Kingston.
Interestingly, the mother Amy felt no animosity toward the Lambert family and in
later years in Utah went to the House of the Lord and had the temple work done for Sir
Henry and Lady Lambert.
As the family prepared to leave, Patience Loader writes the following:
After living in London eleven years, I left to go with my parents, arriving at
Liverpool December, 1855. My parents, James and Amy, and sisters, Maria, Sarah,
and Jane, and brothers John and Robert, John’s wife and two children left Liverpool
on December 10, 1855, on the ship John J. Boyd. Tamar and Zilpah were to leave the
next July with Zilpah’s husband, John Jaques and their child. Ann Loader Dalling
had left England the year before and was living in Springville, Utah. Two brothers,
Jonas and Marshal, and sisters Eliza and Emma remained in England. They did not
join the L.D.S. Church.
Remember that Tamar is only 22 years old at this time. She had kept company with a
young man who was a bookkeeper. “They had a frolicking good time at the fair” and they
walked out together (sweethearts did this). But Tamar asked herself, “Did not the Holy Bible
foretell the gathering of Zion in the mountains?”
Tamar writes, “My father, mother and seven children sailed for America in the fall of
1855, but I remained in Liverpool with my brother-in-law and wife, John Jaques and my
sister Zilpah, until May, 1856, when we sailed for America.”
John Jaques stayed in Liverpool to help assemble the next group of emigrants. Zilpah
was expecting a baby and Tamar stayed to help the family.
Now back to Patience Loader and the rest of the family. Her diary says:
Our company was on the sea about eleven weeks, due to the stormy weather.
The vessel was rocked very hard and we tumbled around in great shape. One night
the Captain, while intoxicated, kicked the stove over and the ship caught on fire.
Once while the storm was raging, the curtains of my berth separated and a bright light
shown through and I saw a person whom I had never seen before standing in the light
which was so bright I could see the color of his eyes; they were brown and he had
lovely hair. He spoke to me saying ‘Fear not; you shall be taken over safely.’ Then
the curtains were drawn. I called to father and mother in the next berth, and told them
not to fear for I believed I had seen the Savior and they felt to rely on this promise.
John Loader and wife buried their baby girl in the sea, and most all were
seasick. After they got better, they enjoyed the voyage. This terrible voyage took 11
weeks, and produced 62 deaths among the passengers. My brother buried his little
girl Zilpah. It did indeed seem very hard to roll her in a blanket and lay her in the big
waves and see the little dear go floating away out of sight.
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We arrived in Williamsburg, New York the latter part of February 1856, and
then went to housekeeping; all that could, got positions. Maria and I did sewing in
the cloak factory. Sarah and Jane went out as nurse girls. Father got work in gardens,
thus we were preparing means to continue the journey to Utah. We expected to stay
in New York for a year, but we received word to go to Iowa, and be prepared to leave
with the handcart company in July. We left New York in June, 1856, for Iowa, where
we found Tamar and Zilpah’s family. We all joined the Edward Martin Handcart
Company, except brother John and his wife. They remained in Iowa and came to
Utah nine years later. We left Iowa July 28 for Florence, Nebraska.
To return to Tamar in England, John Jaques tells the following:
The company of emigrants of which this handcart company constituted the
larger part, embarked at Liverpool, May 22, 1856, on the packet ship Horizon with
Captain Reed, a Scandinavian and a gentleman. The company consisted in large part
of persons who had been “Mormons” for many years, some of the oldest members of
that body in Britain, poor but faithful and they were specially reserved for this
company, to be brought out under the auspices of the Perpetual Emigrating Fund
Company.
On Sunday the 25th about 9:00 a.m. the emigrants bade adieu to the “fertile fields and
flowery vales” of Old England.
The rations served out to the emigrants on board included salt pork, salt beef, sea
biscuit, flour, rice, oatmeal, peas, sugar, tea, mustard, pepper, salt and water.
The passengers on board numbered 856, of whom 635 were Perpetual
Emigrating Fund emigrants, 212 ordinary, and seven cabin passengers. I believe all
were “Mormons” under the superintendence of Edward Martin, assisted by Jesse
Haven and George P. Waugh, the last named a veteran British soldier. The steerage
passengers, including all but the cabin passengers, occupied two between decks. The
berths, each about six feet by four feet six and made of rough boards to hold two
persons each, were two tiers in height, nailed up along the sides of the vessel, the
ends of the vessel’s sides, the lower tier about two feet from the floor. Two cubic feet
more space was allowed to each passenger on the lower than on the upper deck.
Salt Lake Herald, Sunday Morning
December 1, 1876, Edward Martin’s
Handcart Company by John Jaques
On the 30th of June the steamer Huron towed the Horizon to Constitution
wharf (Boston), when the emigrants debarked as expeditiously as they could, fortyeight hours only being allowed for them and their baggage to leave the vessel. They
took cars for Iowa City, crossing the Hudson at Albany, and passing through Buffalo
on the 4trh of July. The night they were in Chicago a fire occurred in that city, which
some of the emigrants went to see and to help to put out. The evening of the day they
arrived at Iowa City there was a very severe thunder and rain storm, turning the
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plentiful dust into plentiful mud. Iowa City was the terminus of the railroad then, and
the remainder of the journey, 1,300 miles, was expected to be done with handcarts
and ox-wagon. Two or three miles from that city was the rendezvous camp, to which
a few of the emigrants went on the day of their arrival in the city, but nearly all of
them remained at the depot, and passed the night in an engine round house.
Tamar, in her story, says:
We arrived in Boston the last of June, 1856, and proceeded to Iowa where we
joined my parents, brothers and sisters. My brother-in-law, John Jaques, went back to
St. Louis soon after to assist in bringing another company, also handcarts, for our
journey to the valleys.
Tamar, it is assumed, arrived in Iowa first as she signed the roster of the Martin
Handcart Company Tamar Loader and family. Patience recounts her feelings when Tamar
sent for them to come and go west with the handcart company.
Arriving in New York in February 1856, Patience was anticipating a comfortable
wagon ride across the plains the following year when word came for the family to prepare to
participate in a new transportation experiment that very summer: travel by handcart. “This
was a terrible great surprise to us all. At first we felt we never could undertake to pull a
handcart from Iowa to Salt Lake City and my poor mother in delicate health. She had not
walked a mile for years and we girls had never been used to outdoor work.”
From John Jaques:
Two or three miles from the city was the rendezvous camp. During their stay
in the Iowa camp the emigrants employed themselves in making carts and doing other
preparatory work until July 28th when the camp broke up, and the handcart portion
moved off nearly a mile for a start and then camped again.
As only a very limited amount of baggage could be taken with the handcarts,
during the long stay on the Iowa City camping ground there was a general lightening
of such things as could best be done without. Many things were sold cheaply to
residents of that vicinity, and many more things were left on the camping ground for
anybody to take or leave at his pleasure. It was grievous to see the heaps of books
and other articles thus left in the sun and rain and dust, representing a respectable
amount of money spent in England.
The company left the mild and mellow and equitable climate of England in
the merry month of May, passed the pleasant month of June on the cool Atlantic
ocean, the fierce heats of an American July in riding from Boston to Iowa City and in
waiting in camp near the latter place, and the sweltering sultriness of August in
pulling the handcarts from Iowa City to Florence. Many were greatly prostrated in
the Iowa camp because unclimated and unaccustomed to the great heat. In starting
from Iowa City with the handcarts and dragging them over the sandy roads, it seemed
like pulling the very pluck out of one, the pluck physical and corporal. The pluck
mental remained with the company much the same to the last. The carts were poor
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ones, with wooden axles, leather boxes, and light iron tires, and the squeaking of the
wheels, through lack of sufficient grease, could often be “heard a mile.”
The last handcart company arrived at Florence, on the west bank of the Missouri on
the 22 of August.
nd
This was the site of ‘Winter Quarters’ of the great ‘Mormon’ camp from Nauvoo in
the winter of 1846. There, owing to the lateness of the season, the important question was
debated, whether the emigrants should winter in that vicinity or to continue the long
wearisome journey to Salt Lake. Unfortunately, warm enthusiasm prevailed over the sound
judgment and cool common sense, and it was determined to finish the journey that same
season.
This excerpt from Handcarts to Zion 1856-1860, p. 96, explains the decision to go on:
The emigrants were entirely ignorant of the country and climate, simple
honest eager to go to Zion at once. Under these circumstances it was natural that they
should leave their destination in the hands of the elders. There were four men in our
company who had been to the Valley, viz: Willie, Atwood, Savage and Woodward;
but there were several at Florence superintending the emigration, among whom Elder
G. D. Grant and W. H. Kimball occupied the most prominent position. These men all
talked at the meeting just mentioned and all, with one exception, favored going on:
Levi Savage declared that they “could not cross the mountains with a mixed company
of aged people, women, and little children so late in the season without much
suffering, sickness and death.” He therefore advised going into winter quarters
without delay. Savage was voted down, the majority being against him. He then
added “Brethren and sisters, what I have said I know to be true, but seeing you are to
go forward, I will go with you, will help you all I can, will work with you, will rest
with you, will suffer with you and if necessary, I will die with you. May God in His
mercy bless, and preserve us.”
The tradition in the family is that the Loader women never had much resentment
about their hardship feeling that they had voted to go on even though they had no idea of the
hardships ahead of them. They left in good spirits as shown in the following quote from
Handcarts to Zion 1856-1860, p. 98, F. D. Richards:
“It certainly would warm your heart with melting kindness to pass along the
line of a camp going by handcarts, and receive the cordial shakes of the hand, with a
fervent “God Bless You!”, as I did when I visited Captain Edward Martin’s train,
several of whom expressed their thanks in a particular manner for being permitted to
come out this year.” Millennial Star, 682-683.”
Tamar reports: “We were assigned to Edward Martin’s Company. At Florence,
Nebraska, I was taken very sick, brought about by exposure and hardships, and we were
visited there by Apostles John Taylor and Franklin D. Richards, who blessed me and
promised me that I should yet be able to walk, for at the time I was bent over and could not
straighten up.”
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Maria Loader tells that Sister Ricks (Tamar) was ill from Mountain Fever (Rocky
Mountain Spotted Fever). “We did not know what it was.”
Patience explains the organization:
When the company left Florence, Nebraska, August 27th, it consisted of 576
persons, 146 handcarts and 7 wagons. We traveled in companies of tens, fifties, and
hundreds, captains over each and all under a general captain of the entire train.
John Jaques explains:
On leaving Florence the loads on the handcarts were greater than ever before,
most carts having 100 pounds of flour on, besides ordinary baggage. The tents also
were carried on the carts. The company was provisioned for sixty days, a daily ration
of one pound of flour per head, with about a half a pound for children, being the
principal item.
While in Florence the Loader family was impressed with their meeting of Brother
Babbitt and they follow his history and his death as they journeyed along the trail:
A while after we left Florence, Nebraska, a Brother Babbitt came to our camp
at Cutler’s Park and he offered to take someone with him on his horse. Mrs. Williams
accepted his kind invitation as she had a babe to carry and she could ride instead of
walking. Her husband was in Salt Lake City. They left our camp and rode on to
catch up with the camp ahead. We had sickness and traveled slowly.
From John Jaques, December 7, 1869:
The company moved on the day named from Florence to Cutler’s Park, two
and a half miles, and camped, stayed there the next day and night and left the next
morning. While there, A. W. Babbitt, dressed in corduroy pants, woolen over shirt,
and felt hat, called as he was passing West. He seemed in high glee, his spirits being
very elastic, almost mercurial. He had started with one carriage for Salt Lake, with
the mail and a considerable amount of money. He was very confident that he should
be in Salt Lake within fifteen days. He intended to push through vigorously and sleep
on the wind, meaning an air filled mattress.
From Patience’s story:
Traveling in the Martin Handcart Company, the Loaders had not proceeded
far before Rocky Mountain Fever and childbirth forced them to remain behind the
rest of the company. All night fires became necessary to keep away marauding
wolves.
John Jaques continues, “One ten and tent of the company stayed another night alone
at Cutler’s Park, a birth having occurred in the tent in the morning of the 27th, shortly after
midnight of the 26th. The next day, 28th, the ten struck their tent and followed the company,
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coming up with it in camp at Elk Horn crossing, very late at night, and after the camp had
gone to bed.
Patience tells of this event:
A baby boy was born to Zilpah. Next morning at 5 A.M. Joseph A. Young
came from Florence to meet us, he said they watched our fire all night and wondered
what our trouble was, then returned to report. We loaded our carts early, having one
sick woman and two babies in one cart, and a woman (Tamar?) and tents and bedding
on the other, and started on the day’s journey. William Cluff came to our rescue by
tying a rope to our carts and then to his saddle helping us along several miles. After
he had left us, five large Indians came out of a cave and stopped us, wanting
everything we could give them. Finally when they saw the sick, they let us pass on.
We came to where a fire was still burning; we stopped for lunch. Here we found
some newly made graves and I found a green sunbonnet. This I knew belonged to
Mrs. Williams. A little company including Mr. Babbitt and Mrs. Williams had been
overtaken by Indians. Mrs. Williams was taken prisoner and never heard of again.
No one knew what happened to the baby. Mr. Babbitt was killed and also the rest but
one teamster, who escaped and told the story of the killing.
We journeyed on till dark and came to an overland station, where we saw a
man standing in the door, and we asked if he had seen any handcart companies go by.
He said, “Yes, but they are several miles ahead.” We reached the place where they
had camped about 2 a.m. The guard there told us not to make a fire for fear of being
seen by Indians. I said, “We will have a fire to prepare some warm food for the sick.”
I did so, after which we laid down without putting up any tents. In the morning, we
arose early and had to start without any breakfast as it was a dangerous place; there
were so many Indians around. We camped at noon and got some warm food for the
sick.
Maria Loader tells this same story:
Nine miles out of Florence, Nebraska, Zilpah’s baby boy was born. We had
to stand guard because the wolves were so bad. We had a sick sister also. We set up
camp for the night by ourselves. We caught up with the main body at Elk Horn
River. Father took our baggage out of the carts. Each child had to carry his own
baggage because we had a sick sister as well as the new mother and a little girl.
Father and Patience pulled the cart. Some Indians stopped us and wanted bead. They
left when they saw we had sickness.
Again from John Jaques (January 5, 1879, published):
On the other side of the Missouri, one of the men drew on his cart his wife’s
sister who was sick of fever, 150 miles, and on this side of the Missouri his wife was
confined of a son, and he drew her 150 miles, his wife’s father meantime taking the
sister along in his cart till she was able to walk, it being much easier and less jolting
for the sick to ride in the handcarts than in the ox or mule wagons. The same husband
also drew his two-year-old daughter much of the journey up to the crossing of the
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Platte. The two sisters did pretty well afterwards, though neither of them was a
strong woman. They now are mothers of large families, and the infant, who was very
puny during the journey, is now the father of a family.
Tamar’s own memories are as follows:
In Nebraska the Indians were very dangerous and we were cautioned as to the
selection of our camping grounds, to choose them where the grass was not high
enough to conceal Indians who were always on the alert for an attack.
My father was now fifty-seven years old, and was small in stature and not
very robust. His occupation in England all his life had been that of a gardener and
unused to such hardships as he was not called to endure, such as drawing loaded carts
during the day and often standing guard at night. He began to fail in health, but the
love of the Gospel burned bright in his soul, and he looked forward to our safe arrival
in the valleys, for as he would carry me weak and ill from the wagon each night into
our tent, he endeavored to cheer me with, “I believe I shall see my dear daughter
safely reach the valley yet.”
Let’s turn to Patience:
Father helped to push the cart as long as he was able and thus we traveled on
day after day, Father getting weaker so that he could only pick up pieces of wood to
make fires when we camped.
On the 23rd of September, Father walked 17 miles but did not get any wood.
He laid down on a quilt while we prepared something to eat, which was flour gruel.
Next morning, the Captain wanted to put father on the wagon where the tents and
other luggage was hauled, but we said, “No, he is dying and we will have him on the
cart.” At 1 p.m. we reached the top of Sandy Bluff. The Elders administered to him
and dedicated him to the Lord and Father said, “Amen.” We remained here until
evening, then started down Ash Hollow, where we arrived at 11 p.m. We pitched our
tents over the cart and 11:15 father passed away, September 24, 1856. His last words
were, “Mother, you know how I love my children.” Next morning, Samuel and
Albert Jones dug a six-foot grave and laid Father away. (In Tamar’s life history she
states that the hymn ‘The Resurrection Day’ was sung and the grave was dedicated.)
A little later, they dug another grave and buried Brother Jones beside Father, then we
moved on. Brother Tyler tried to comfort us, he said Father would wear a martyr’s
crown as he was worthy of one.
We knew that he felt sorry to leave us on the plains on such a hard journey
without a man to help us to get wood or put up or take down our tent, and food was
beginning to get short and the cold weather would overtake us before we could get to
Salt Lake. All this caused him to feel badly and as long as he was able to do anything
he worked after we got in camp, making tent pins. He made a sack full. He said to us
girls, “I have made you lots of tent pins, because when the cold weather comes you
will not be able to make them, your hands will be so cold.” By this we knew that he
would not live the journey through and he also grieved to know that mother and his
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girls would not have anyone to help to make a home or help us to make a living. Yes,
he always had been a good, kind father and husband, good at all times to provide for
his family. When he was well along the first part of our journey he enjoyed himself
very much and he would try to encourage us girls all he could, for I for one thought it
the hardest way we could have started on such a long journey.
John Jaques’ reference to James Loader’s death published January 5, 1879, in the Salt
Lake Herald:
About opposite Ash Hollow, another man, who had had diarrhea and
dysentery nearly all the way from Iowa City, walked fifteen miles one day, fell into a
creek while crossing it, and died the next day. Poor fellow, he was confident almost
to the last that he should reach “the valley”, and his chief solicitude was for his wife,
who, he feared, would not be able to endure the journey. But she did endure. She
endured it bravely, although it made her a sorrowing widow. She has lived a life of
usefulness to the present time, yet still a widow, for she could never believe there was
a man left in the world equal to her husband. She is healthy and vigorous now,
considering her advanced age. In fact, taking into account the natural weakness and
frequent constitutional ailments of women, it is a wonder they endured the journey so
well as they did. But some of them stood it better than many of the men, and pulled
at the handcarts as long also.
Entry in diary on deaths of emigrants reads: “James Loader from Aston Rowant
Branch, Warwickshire Conference, September 27 about 11 p.m., west side of sand hill, 13
miles east of Ash Hollow, of diarrhea. Buried 6 a.m., September 28. Age 57.”
Maria tells of her father’s death:
Father took ill. The family took their baggage out of the cart. Each person
carried their own baggage and they put father in the cart. One of the last things
Father did was to reach in his pocket hoping to find a biscuit but found his pockets
empty. We girls pulled the cart 17 miles with Father on it.
From Tamar:
The company proceeded on its way, as deaths were frequent, and the
following evening the howling of wolves told the sorrowing family that they had
scented the newly covered grave. My mother was prostrate for some days after my
father’s death. She was unable to walk. She had to be placed in one of the supply
wagons to ride.
Let us turn to John Jaques’ diary to see why the deaths and burials could not
stop the train:
The next day, September 24th, the company passed the place where it was
supposed Thomas Maretts and others were killed by Indians, there being a quantity of
feathers strewn about, a blood-stained shirt, and a child’s skull. The company
camped at Duckweed Creek that night, and after dark all the men were called out to
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form a line around the camp, as it was supposed that Indians were lurking around.
About 11 o’clock, the men were called in, a double guard was set for the night.
Patience tells us how they carried on:
After Father’s death, I assumed the task of getting the wood and material for
the camp fire. As the company journeyed on, the weather became cooler, and the
provisions shorter. We were given four ounces of flour a day for each person. Most
of them made gruel, but mother made hers into little biscuits and would have them
through the day, thus having a bite or two for us when tired and faint. I have seen
people so tired they would want to lie down and rest and never get up again. One day
as Mother was walking along, she came to a man lying by the roadside. She spoke to
him and asked him to get up and he said, “If I had only a mouthful of bread I could.”
So she gave him some food and he got up and went on. Sometime after, in Salt Lake,
that man stopped her on the street. She did not know him, but he told her that she
once saved his life.
Maria Loader tells us how Mother Loader helped all she could. This happened soon
after Fort Laramie was passed:
We had to reduce our baggage to ten pounds apiece. We burned our things
because we believed that if the Indians found our belongings they would think we had
more and follow us and demand all we had. Mother put on all the extra clothing she
could carry under her own. This enabled her to carry dry clothing for we girls.
From John Jaques:
The pound of flour fell to three-fourths of a pound, then to half a pound, and
subsequently yet lower. At Deer Creek, on the 17th of October, owing to the growing
weakness of emigrants and teams, the baggage, including bedding, and cooking
utensils, was reduced to ten pounds per head, children under 8 years five pounds.
Good blankets and other bedding was burned, as they could not be carried further,
though needed more than ever, for there was yet 400 miles of winter to go through.
From Handcarts to Zion, p. 108:
Grass for stock also became scarcer, and the oxen began to weaken. On the
nineteenth of October they reached the last crossing of the North Platte, near Red
Buttes and a little west of present Casper, Wyoming. Here the two wagon trains in
the rear caught up with Martin’s Company and helped the emigrants and their
handcarts across. The river was wide, the current strong, the water exceedingly cold.
The company was barely over when snow and sleet began to fall, accompanied by a
piercing north wind. Winter had come upon them suddenly in a fury.
Josiah Rogerson, in the Salt Lake Tribune of January 14, 1914, said of the Martin
Company:
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The crossing of the North Platte was fraught with more fatalities than any
other incident of the entire journey… More than a score or two of the young female
members waded the stream in places that was waist deep. Blocks of mushy snow and
ice had to be dodged. The result of wading of this stream by female members was
immediately followed by partial and temporary dementia from which several did not
recover until the next spring.
Let us go back to the Loader girls and see how they took the crossing. Patience’s
version of the hardships:
Mother always kept dry stockings on hand for us when we had to ford
streams, and made everything as pleasant as possible. A number of songs were
composed by the Saints to cheer each other on this weary and hard pilgrimage. We
were overtaken by storms in the mountains and many died from hardships and
exposure. Sometimes when crossing streams and pulling our carts, our clothing
would freeze stiff on us as soon as we were out of the water.
Maria Loader:
Mother went to a wagon camped along the river. They gave her some bread
and molasses. This she put in her pocket and saved for the family for a time when
she thought they would need it more than now. This she did even though she was
hungry. (This must have been just before the crossing and may have been from the
Hunt or Hodgett’s wagon companies that were close by.)
Mother Loader was taken across by horseback. The girls were in line with the
cart. Patience and Maria pulling, the younger ones pushing. (We assume Tamar was
holding on behind but we do not know exactly how she crossed the Platte). Some of
the men hesitated with their carts at the edge of the cold water. The Loader girls were
waved ahead. There was nothing to do but go in.” They had a hard time because the
river current was so strong. The two older girls pushed and the young and weak held
on behind. The current almost swept them away. John Jaques came back to help but
they were already in the river and almost across. “Our clothes were frozen stiff.
Mother gave us the molasses and bread as we came out of the water.” She also readjusted her clothing producing dry clothes for the girls. This they put on but found
that it was wet and frozen after just a little while. Snow and hail hit them as they
came out of the water. Fires could not be started because everything was so wet. We
went a few miles and set up camp.
From John Jaques:
That was a bitter cold day. Winter came on all at once, and that was the first
day of it. The river was wide, the cold, exceedingly cold, water was up to the wagon
beds in the deepest parts, the current was strong, and the bed of the river was covered
with cobble stones. Some of the men carried some of the women over on their backs
or in their arms, but others of the women tied up their skirts and waded through, like
heroines as they were, and as they had done through many other rivers and creeks.
11
The company was barely over when snow, hail, and sleet began to fall accompanied
by a piercing north wind and camp was made on this side of the river.
The next day after crossing the Platte, their company moved on slowly, about
ten miles through the snow, and camped again near the Platte and at the point where
the road left it for the Sweetwater. It snowed three days and the teams and many of
the people were so far given out that it was deemed advisable not to proceed further
for a few days, but rather to stay in camp and recruit. It was hoped that the snow and
cold would prove only a foretaste of winter and would soon pass away and the
weather would moderate, but that hope proved delusive. Here the flour ration fell to
four ounces per day.
Maria continues her story:
The girls managed to get their tent up. Mother gathered chips and put them in
a kettle and lit them. The girls gathered round when their captain of their 100 brought
a sick man into the tent. This man was freezing and delirious and raved until early
morning when he died. They had to keep him in the tent until someone came and
buried him. In the morning they just had a little dry biscuit to eat. The girls cleared a
path in the snow with their kettles. The captain of the 100 came and said that they
were too weak to go on and that they would have to stay where they were and then he
left them.
Tamar says of this time:
The Martin Handcart Company had started too late in the season to get across
the plains, so that early winter storms overtook them in the mountains.
Tamar Loader told of her mother and sisters singing songs in the evenings as they sat
almost freezing in their tent. She told of the bleeding feet and bloody footprints in the snow.
From Handcarts to Zion, p. 112:
About twelve miles above the last crossing of the Platte, the company was
snowed in and came to a standstill. John Bond, a twelve-year-old boy was in the
Hodgett wagon train stalled beside the Fifth Handcart Company. He later wrote a
graphic account of his experiences: “Day after day passed and still no tidings of help
coming from westward. The bugle is sounded again by John Wadkins to call all the
Saints together for prayers to ask the infinite Father to bring food, medicines and
other things necessary for the sick and needy; after prayers, all are ordered to bed.
Deaths continued in camp. Some died,” says Bond, “Lying side by side with hands
entwined. In other cases they were found as if they had just offered a fervent prayer
and their spirit had taken flight while in the act…some died sitting by the fire; some
were singing hymns or eating crusts of bread.”
From a story by Alice Neeley Moncur:
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Aunt Tamar told that the company was on its knees praying for help, when
some pack horses broke loose from the advance company of 3 men sent by Brigham
Young. These horses came running wildly into camp and stopped still and seemed to
wait for their masters to catch up with them. She told that the first company passed
flour around to the people. Mother Loader and her girls took time to pat it into little
cakes and cook it. The man who gave them food was very impressed by their
manners, as some starving people were grabbing the food and shoving it into their
mouths. He came back and gave them an extra ration.
Maria says:
A mule came into camp by itself. A little later two men came. They had
flour. Our brother was barefoot by this time.
From Handcarts to Zion, p. 114:
On the twenty-eighth of October when despair had almost overwhelmed the
camp, the messengers of rescue came. Joseph A. Young (son of President Young),
Daniel W. Jones, and Abel Garr rode into camp amid the tears and cheers of the
emigrants. These men were an express from the advance relief company from Salt
Lake bringing the glad word that assistance, provisions and clothing were near, that
wagons under Captain George D. Grant were encamped in the abandoned houses of
an old trading fort near Devil’s Gate.
From The Improvement Era, XVII, p. 204:
We found the Martin Company in a deplorable condition, they having lost
fifty-six of their number since crossing the North Platte, nine days before. Their
provisions were nearly gone, and their clothing almost worn out. Most of their
bedding had been left behind, as they were unable to haul it, on account of their
weakened condition. We advised them to move on, every day just as far as they
could, as that was the only possible way they had to escape death.
How did the rescue come? Word had come from a group of missionaries who had
passed the company earlier that these emigrants were on the trail. Patience says:
At October conference in Salt Lake City, President Young called for
volunteers to go and take provisions, clothing and bedding and rescue the handcart
train, which was 350 miles away and stranded.
Brigham Young, addressing the semi-annual conference of the Mormon Church on
Sunday, October 6th, said:
I shall call upon the Bishops this day. I shall not wait until tomorrow nor until
the next day, for 60 good mule teams and 12 or 15 wagons. I do not want to send
oxen. I do not want oxen. I want good horses and mules. They are in this Territory,
and we must have them. Also 12 tons of flour and 40 good teamsters, besides those
that drive the teams. This is dividing my text into heads. First, 40 good young men
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who know how to drive teams, to take charge of the teams that are now managed by
men, women and children who know nothing about driving them. Second, 60 or 65
good spans of mules, or horses, with harness, whipple trees, neck yokes, stretcher,
lead chains, etc. And thirdly, 24 thousand pounds of flour, which we have on
hand…I will tell you all that your faith, religion and profession of religion, will never
save one soul of you in the Celestial Kingdom of our God, unless you carry out just
such principles as I am no teaching you. Go and bring in those people now on the
plains. And attend strictly to those things which we call temporal or temporal duties.
Otherwise, your faith will be in vain. The preaching you have heard will be in vain to
you, and you will sink to Hell, unless you attend to the things we tell you. October 5,
reported in the Deseret News, October 15, 1856.
From Ricks Family History, Section VI, page 85, Thomas E. Ricks:
At the October Conference, 1856, he was called to go and assist the handcart
company through, and stated out on this mission the same day he was called. He met
Captain Martin’s company at Independence Rock (near Devil’s Gate), and arrived at
Salt Lake City with them November 30th.
Of this hard time Tamar has one small paragraph:
On account of the lateness of the season, we were subjected to frequent storms
that grew in severity. We often had to sweep the snow from the frozen ground before
making our beds, and added to this, our provisions became scarce. We were rationed
more closely than before and many lives of our company were lost before arrival in
the valleys, some frozen to death and others losing their limbs, through having been
frozen.
The memories told by Alice Neeley Moncur show us that there were some lighter
moments:
Tamar also told Eva about seeing the man she was to marry in a vision one
night as they were nearing the end of their journey. She did not know his name but
knew his face. She told her mother and sisters, “I saw in a vision last night the man I
was to marry. He walks with a limp, and wears a moustache.” Thomas Edwin Ricks
was sent with wagons and many provisions as he and other men asked by Brigham
Young went to bring help to the Martin Handcart Company. Tamar Loader told Eva
that she first saw him leaning on a wagon wheel, and smiling at her. She said to her
mother: “There is the man I am to marry…the one I saw in a dream.” (See Appendix
II)
In Handcarts to Zion, p. 115:
After the first contact with the advance couriers, Jones, Young and Garr
pushed on to the Hunt wagon train ten miles father east. They got them started west
then Jones and Garr returned back towards Devil’s Gate. They overtook the Martin
Company, now on the move, slowly ascending a long muddy hill.
14
A condition of distress,” writes Jones, “here met my eyes that I never saw
before or since. The train was strung out for three of four miles. There were old men
pulling and tugging their carts, sometimes loaded with a sick wife or children, women
pulling along sick husbands, little six to eight years old struggling through the mud
and snow. As night came on the mud would freeze on their clothes and feet. There
were two of us, and hundreds needed help. What could we do? We gathered on to
some of the most helpless with our riatas (ropes) tied to the carts, and helped as many
as we could into camp on Avenue Hill. This was a biter, cold night, and we had no
fuel except very small sage brush. Several died that night. Next morning, Brother
Young, having come up, we three started for our camp near Devil’s Gate.
John Jaques says:
On November 1, amid falling snow, camp was made near Independence Rock,
only five miles east of Devil’s Gate. There was a foot or eighteen inches of snow on
the ground, which, as there were but one or two spades in camp, the emigrants had to
shovel away with their frying pans, or tin plates, or anything they could use for that
purpose, before they could pitch their tents, and then the ground was frozen so hard
that it was almost impossible to drive the tent pegs into it. Some of the men were so
weak that it took them an hour or two to clear the places for their tents and set them
up.
Jones, Young, and Garr went on to the encampment of the reliever party and,
appraising them of the desperate plight of the emigrants, Captain Grant and most of
the rescuers hitched up their teams and moved eastward, leaving part of the men at
the trading houses with most of the supplies. On the last day of October, Gant’s
rescue party met Martin’s Company at Greasewood Creek, sixteen miles east of
Devil’s Gate. They gave every possible immediate assistance, and helped the
handcart sufferers move along towards the supply depot. Word was sent to Salt Lake
for more help.
From Handcarts to Zion, p. 132:
The handcarts moved on November 3 and reached the river (Sweetwater)
filled with floating ice. To cross would require more courage and fortitude, it
seemed, than human nature could muster. Women shrank back and men wept. Some
pushed through, but others were unequal to the ordeal. But cross they did.
We have no account from the Loaders as to this crossing. We can assume that
Thomas E. Ricks was giving them some help. Patience says:
When the rescuing parties began to arrive, we had more to eat and teamsters
would help to get wood. At one place the men said, “We will have wood in a short
time, as we come near the remains of an old house.” One man said, “Stand back for I
feel like I have the strength of Sampson” and with one stroke of the ax, he knocked
out a log and with the next stroke split it from end to end. Maria and I had waited a
long time and some of the people tot two pieces, so the man said, “You wait a little as
there are young ladies who have been waiting very patiently for some time.” So I
15
said, “Well, Patience is my name,” and he said, “ Now you shall have some,” and we
girls got hold of a large stick and carried it away.
These men made big bonfires in the evening and would ask the girls to sing,
but Mother said,” Not too often as they do not have enough to eat.” However, we
enjoyed ourselves. When the relief trains met the company on the Sweetwater and
elsewhere, the handcarts were gradually abandoned. The suffering was not over for
the family. At Green River Flora Jaques, three year old daughter of John Jaques, died
(November 23, 1856). The poor little thing died at Green River of dysentery, cold,
insufficient nourishment and unavoidable lack of needed attention.
Tamar tells of the death of a little three year old girl who died not many days away
from Salt Lake City. The parents concealed her little body in their handcart. They were
scared that if the captain knew, he would make them bury her on the trail. They not only hid
her body, but their own grief, as well, so no one could suspect that she had died.
Patience says:
There were many deaths on this journey. John Jaques and wife lost their little
girl. We arrived in Salt Lake on November 30, 1856, eleven months and 20 days
after we left Liverpool.
Cluff tells of his feelings when they first saw the valley. He was a member of the
rescue party:
The journey over the Little Mountain into “Emigration” was uneventful
beyond the usual cheerfulness which beamed upon every face as they looked down
upon Salt Lake Valley, which from this summit spread out in grandeur amid the
mountains surrounding it wrapped in snow.
Patience thought otherwise. The following is told by Patience’s daughter, Amy
Rosza:
In looking on Salt Lake City, Patience said, “If this is the city, what must the
country look like? I will not live here.” But she did.
Tamar says of the arrival:
My mother’s family of children all arrived safely and the promise to me was
fulfilled, made by Apostles Taylor and Richards that I should be able to walk straight
before we arrived in the valleys of Utah.
Joel Parrish and Thomas E. Ricks were in the rescue company. They had
been pioneers since 1948 and were residents of Centerville and Farmington. As it
had been the custom for the early residents to share and divide their homes and
substance with the ‘newcomers,’ I was offered a home in the family of Thomas E.
Ricks; my mother, four daughters and one son going to Pleasant Grove to their son-
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in-law John Dalling, and daughter Ann Loader Dalling, where they located. Mother
remained there until her death, July 24, 1885.
From Patience Loader:
The family scattered in different places looking for employment. Patience
went to Lehi, Utah County, and had a good home with John C. Naigle and wife.
They were very kind to her, giving her material for dresses and underwear. She
sewed for them and helped them all she could. She had a very pleasant time in Lehi
and while living there she met Sergeant John Rosza of the 10th Infantry of the U.S.
Army, stationed at Camp Floyd.
Reflecting upon her experience after arriving in Salt Lake Valley, Patience wrote:
I can testify that our Heavenly Father heard and answered our prayers and we
were blessed with health and strength day by day to endure the severe trials we had
to pass through on that terrible journey…I can say we put our trust in God who heard
and answered our prayers and brought us through the valleys. Dean C. Jessee.
Tamar has a brief reference to her marriage to Thomas E. Ricks:
In the following spring, on March 27, 1857, I was married to Thomas E.
Ricks, being in my 24th year. We made our home in Farmington two years, where my
eldest daughter, Amy, was born. In 1859 Cache Valley was being settled, and on
learning of the facilities for farming and stock raising in that valley, we moved there
in November of that year.
Tamar sewed men’s suits to earn extra money, it has been told by descendants.
Remembrances of John T. Smellie to this time:
Thomas E. Ricks settled on what is now known as the tabernacle square in
Logan. He built a home for each wife on each of the four corners. Each wife had a
cow (to be milked), a pig for meat, chickens and a garden spot. A fifth wife was
housed across the street.
Maria, Tamar’s daughter, tells of visiting her “aunts” to learn the household skill that
each excelled in. She loved to eat with Tabitha’s family as they had all boys and a girl at
their table was special. Because Tamar had the smallest family, she was given the task of
keeping Thomas E.’s wardrobe cleaned, mended and ready for wear.
In 1869, Thomas E. Ricks filled a mission to the states of Ohio, Illinois and
Kentucky. We have no record of how his family fared during this time. Soon after his return
from this mission he was found busy in the construction of the railroad from Ogden to
Franklin, being one of the principal contractors in the building of this grade. In 1877, he, in
company with William D. Hendricks, contracted for the laying of the track from Franklin,
Idaho, to Butte, Montana, which work he completed by Christmas, 1880. This work made it
17
possible for him to increase his holdings and arrange work for the many members of his
growing family.
To return to Tamar’s own story:
Six children were born to us in Logan, one son and five daughters. The little
son died in infancy, and some years later we also laid away our little daughters,
Clarinda and Anne, both buried in Logan. We remained in Logan 25 years, and saw
it grow from a wilderness to a thriving, prosperous city. My husband becoming
known as one especially adapted for colonizing was called upon to take his family
and remove to Idaho, and settle up that part of Snake River Valley then known as
Fremont country (in 1883). In response to this call we moved there in May, 1884,
and located in a place known as Rexburg.
My eldest daughter, Amy, and husband, Alpha Jaques, and my second
daughter, Sara Ellen, and her husband, John Dalling, with their families, settled in
Sugar City. My third daughter, Maria, and her husband, John T. Smellie, for some
years lived in Rexburg, then moved to Canada.
From Nellie Murdock’s story we find these words:
It was a homesick family Tamar had to help adjust to the new frontier.
Everywhere was sage brush. Rain made the dirt roads impassible and the mosquitoes
seemed almost beyond endurance.
A four room house was built for Tamar on the corner of First North and Second East
in Rexburg. She soon made the house a home. She had had exceptional training in the art of
homemaking. Her own son did not survive babyhood but she loved the sons of her husband.
She loved the gospel and always observed the law of tithing. She kept a clean neat home
where meals were set always with an extra plate in case someone happened by. She loved
people and always made them welcome.
She was a little woman with rose colored cheeks and twinkly blue eyes. She always
wore a fresh white apron under her work apron so she could be neat if company came. The
Loaders girls kept close ties and got together whenever they could. (See Appendix I) The
story is told of them singing all the songs that they had sung while crossing the plains. Their
mother was with them on one occasion and she cautioned these women (grandmothers all by
then), “Remember who you are and when you are old be nice old ladies.”
Tamar had a polygamy marriage and now the laws of the land began to make life
uncomfortable for her and many other wives. The following excerpt is taken from the life
story of her future son-in-law, John T. Smellie. He had obtained lodging in Tamar’s home
while working on the survey crew in Rexburg:
The men came to the entrance to the house. I was sleeping in the room by the
door and immediately resisted them, warning them to retire or I would fire on them,
though I had not arms. It had its effect, as they kept back for a time, and consulted,
then they came and tried to force the doors and windows, but I resisted them and
18
again threatened to fire on them. This continued for over an hour when they became
uneasy as people would soon be moving, so they drove off and arrested John Roberts,
also George P. Ward, whom they took to Blackfoot, where they were condemned to
the Leise Penitentiary for a period. President Ricks was in the house and as soon as
they left, he crossed to the Tithing barn and hid.
As soon as they left, I became as weak as water, from the strain though while
they were there I felt no fear. The men Dubois had with him were outlaws and
murderers of the worst type. Men to whom life was as nothing, yet they were awed
and told afterward that the house had several armed men resisting them.
President Ricks did not again return to the house, save one evening. As soon
as possible, Sister Ricks and her two daughters were taken off to some secret place,
where they remained for some weeks and I was left alone in the home.
From the Ricks Family History Book:
In 1885, President Ricks was called on a mission to England, which he filled
for a period of over two years. Soon after his return from this mission, while in
Logan, he was placed under arrest on the charge of unlawful cohabitation, but at his
preliminary hearing on May 28, 1888, he was discharged. In 1890 he was again
arrested for his religion’s sake, and this time appealed his cause to the higher court
from the decision of the trial court, which resulted in the case being again dismissed.
One can only imagine the heartache all this caused the family. Maria, Tamar’s
daughter still at home part of this time said that the persecutions of the courts and the law
officers broke her father’s health.
Tamar does not mention the trouble with the law in her own story, but at this time she
was called upon to give up another child. The following is from her life story:
My youngest daughter, Luamelia, born November 24, 1874, a most beautiful
girl of 16 years and the sole companion of my old age, died of membranous croup
March 24, 1891. I could not have survived the sorrow that attended this separation
had not God sustained me. Just previous to her death she was shown in a vision the
work she was called to do and assured us that she had no fear of death; that she had
been shown the beautiful sphere of action assigned to her and that she had seen a
number of little children over whom she was to have special care. “A regular Primary
mother” as she expressed it, and said she had already seen them. (See Appendix II)
On September 28, 1901, President Thomas E. Ricks passed away, having spent an
exceptionally active life in the interest of the Kingdom of God on the earth. After the death
of her husband, Mrs. Ricks spent her time largely in the company of her children, principally
her daughter Sarah E. Dalling. She was a zealous observer of the law of tithing and a faithful
Latter-day Saint. Her posterity consists of seven children (3 lived to maturity), 34
grandchildren and 68 great-grandchildren, a total of 109 souls at the time of her death. A
letter showing Tamar’s later years is attached.
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FUNERAL SERVICE – TAMAR LOADER RICKS
Funeral services for Mrs. Tamar Loader Ricks, who died at the advanced age of 90
years, 4 months and 23 days at Sugar City, Idaho, February 1, 1924, were held at the Sugar
Ward chapel Sunday, February 3, 1924, Bishop Alfred Ricks presiding. The opening prayer
was offered by John K. Orme and the benediction by Bernice R. Harris. The choir sang,
“Resting Now from Care and Sorrow,” “Softly Beams the Sacred Dawning,” “Come, Come
Ye Saints,” “One Sweetly Solemn Thought,” “There is Sweet Rest in Heaven.” Gladys
Bassett Comstock sang “Oh My Father.” Speakers were S. Rolla Harris, John L. Roberts,
Pres. Nathan Ricks, and Fred Schwendiman, Frank L. Davis read the following short sketch
of her life written by herself. (See Appendix III)
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. History of Tamar Loader Ricks by Tamar Loader Ricks
2. Story of Tamar Loader by Nellie Smellie Murdock
3. Story of Patience Loader by Patience Loader Archer
4. Life Story of Maria Loader by Viola Gardner Goats
5. Edward Martin’s Handcart Company – Some Reminiscences by John Jaques, Deseret
News, November 30, 1878—January 1879.
6. Handcarts to Zion 1856-1860, LeRoy R. Hafen and Ann W. Hafen, pp. Arthur H. Clark
Company, Glendale, California, 1980
7. Graves Along the Way by Ruth Smellie Ricks
8. Profiles from the Past – Tests of Her Faith by Dean C. Jesse
9. John T. Smellie by John T. Smellie
10. The Story of Luamelia Ricks by Alice Neeley Moncur
11. Ricks Family History and Genealogy, pp. 86-87 and p. 165
12. Memories of family members.
20