John Moss Lewis & Martha
Jane Chrisman
History furnished by Walter Beers Lewis, a son
See Story for Martha Jane Chrisman's father, Charles Chrisman
John Moss Lewis was born in Simpson County, Kentucky, Feb. 16, 1829 and died in Mesa, Maricopa County, Arizona. He is the son of Benjamin Lewis and Joannah Ryan, and both died before the exodus of the saints from Nauvoo, leaving four other sisters and brothers orphans and alone in the world. The Lord has been mindful of us and sent Uncle Beason and Aunt Betsy to care for us—we endured all the hardships of the Mormon people during their sufferings as they left loved homes and all they had and faced the trek westward.
Walter Beers says, "When the Mormon Battalion was organized, my father, John Lewis was among the first to volunteer, but his Uncle Beason objected claiming that he could not continue the journey without my father’s help, so Brigham Young had father released, and he continued on and landed in Salt Lake City with the company in 1847.
My mother, Marthy Jane Crisman Lewis, as a child passed through the hardships with her family and other saints. When she was seven years old her father was very sick, and given up by the doctor, and she testifies that he was healed by the power and administration of the Elders to the converting of her mother to the truthfulness of the Gospel as taught by the Latter-day Saints. After the death of the Prophet Joseph Smith, she testified that she saw the mantle of Joseph fall on Brigham Young, to the convincing of the Saints there assembled that Brigham Young was the true successor of Joseph Smith. She testifies to the goodness of the Lord in sending the quail to the camp of the Saints when they were camped on the banks of the Mississippi River after being driven from their homes in Nauvoo. She also told of hearing the people speak in tongues and saw many miracles performed through faith and the power of the priesthood. She saw the mob returning from Carthage after they had killed the Prophet Joseph and his brother, Hyrum, and heard them boast that there would be no more Mormon Church as the Prophet had been killed. She emigrated with her father’s family being the oldest child, and arrived in Salt Lake Valley in 1847.
My father and mother were married by Jeddiah Grant in Salt Lake City, August 10, 1848, and lived there until the 13th of April 1849. They moved to California with the Crismons and other families arriving in Sacramento the same year. There was only one house and a few tents at that time. They later moved to what was known as Mormon Bar, on the north fork of the American River, where they washed out gold to their satisfaction. Father said he could wash out as much as $100.00 a day with a miner‘s gold pan. One time as father was carrying a large amount of gold on horseback he was waylaid by two robbers and when they tried to stop him he fired at them leaning over on the side of his horse and escaped without injury, but his hand was punctured by one of the several shots fired at him. The Crisman and the Lewis families later moved to San Francisco where they met the saints who came around Cape Horn on the old ship Brooklin. Among them was George W. Sirrine who married my mother’s sister, Ann Crisman and later two families moved to southern California, and assisted building up San Bernadino. Here the first four children of the John M. Lewis family were born: Mary Joannah, Charles Benjamin, Clara Jane and Ida Frances.
When the saints were called by Brigham Young, at the time Johnston’s army was marching into Utah, the Lewis, Crisman and Sirrine families moved back to Salt Lake City. There, John Franklin and Emley Ann were born. They then moved to Paris, Berkley, Idaho, where Henry Malin was born. The next move to Coalsville, where Leonard Ryan, Dudley Sanford and Marthy Jane were born.
In 1873 my father married a second wife, Mrs. John Staley, a widow, to them was born, Eva May. The second wife died while they were on their way to Arizona, November 1878. Eva May, was raised by my mother, but four other children by her former husband, was raised by their grandmother.
My father came on the train, via California, being more than a week on the way, he got a ride with a freighter from Maricopa to Tempe, where he met William Newell, who gave him a ride to Mesa. He arrived there May 1879, meeting many old time friends and neighbors from California, Utah, and Idaho. He fit in nicely in developing the Mesa District. He was Sanjaro and Labor Foreman on the Mesa Canal, and for a long time was the director as well as being head of the school board. He assisted in establishing a good school system. He assisted with church and other activities and when the Maricopa Stake was organized he was put in a member of the High Council.
Father was always kind and considerate of the stranger as well as the Protestant preachers, who traveled through the country at that time. He ministered to the needy and fed the hungry.
The family lived in Mesa the first year then moved out one mile east to the southwest corner of the town. There homesteaded one half section of land, being the last house on the desert and on the main road to Pinal, Silver King, Florence and Tucson.
The family spread out until they were the largest farmers and cattle raisers in the district. The Lewis home was the place for the traveler, and such men as Mat Cavanas, Jack Frazer and old man Reeves, the hermit, and many other old-timers found a haven of rest and plenty of food and good beds to rest in.
Mother was a good cook-- she had something ready to eat at any time of the day or night, even in the hard times of pioneer days, made butter to sell. Her cupboards consisted of the wet ground, with pans turned over wet pans that were filled with milk and then wet sacks put over the top and kept wet day and night. The butter was put in cans and hauled to the market by Hyrum Norris Sr. and others. It was wrapped in wet sacks while being hauled to the mining camps and other places.
For many years the Lewis family lived in the United Order, everything was had in common, until the boys were ready to marry, then things were different, and each started out alone. The old homestead and other lands were divided as well as the horses and cattle. And thus the Lewis family spread in all directions and they can boast of a great posterity from their 12 children.
CHARLES CRISMON
(Father of Martha Jane Crismon)
Charles Crismon was born December 25, 1805 at Christian County, Kentucky. He was one of the pioneer builders of Salt Lake City, Utah, prominent colonizer in San Bernardino, California and in the Salt River Valley of Arizona as well as in several eastern states.
In 1830 he married Mary Hill and moved to Jackson County, Illinois where he engaged in farming and built mills.
He joined the Church in 1837. In 1838 during the Mormon exodus from Ohio to Missouri he went with his team to assist the prophet Joseph Smith in moving. On one occasion he helped the prophet Joseph escape a mob by hiding him in a faked wagon-load of firewood and driving to a river where the prophet crossed in a rowboat.
Later he sold his property in Illinois and took his family to Missouri, arriving near Far West about the last of August of that year. In the early part of 1839 he was in Morgan County, Illinois and in 1842 settled at Macedonia, Hancock County, about 20 miles east of Nauvoo. There he engaged in mill building and owned a cording machine. In December 1845 he moved to Nauvoo and remained until the exodus from Illinois.
Crossing the Mississippi on February 8, 1846 he and his family joined the camp on Sugar Creek. They were connected with Bishop George Miller. Mr. Crismon was a captain under Bishop Miller and remained in that position until after the founding of the settlement at Ponca. They spent the winter about a hundred and fifty miles north of Winter Quarters and endured many hardships before returning to Winter Quarters and the main body of the Saints.
Father Crismon had returned from Ponca in advance of his family and in the winter of 1846 was sent by President Young on a mission to Mississippi, to visit some families in that state and make arrangements for their immigration west. He was accompanied on this mission by Bryant Nowlen and returned with John Brown who was chosen one of the pioneers. The Mississippi Saints joined the pioneers at Ft. Laramie and accompanied them to Salt Lake Valley.
Mr. Crismon, with his son George, made two trips with teams into Missouri to obtain supplies for the westward journey. At Winter Quarters they were detained while getting their grain ground and consequently were the last of the party of emigrants to cross the Elkhorn. They reached the Elkhorn the day Jacob Wetharby was killed by Indians and Joined Jedidiah Grant's six hundred and were in Willard Snow's fifty and Jacob Grant’s ten, all the way to Salt Lake Valley.
Among the exciting incidents of the trip was a stampede of the cattle about 250 miles west of the Missouri River. In this stampede Charles Crismon lost an ox which returned to Winter Quarters, and was taken from the stray pond by a friend who returned it to Mrs. Crismon in the fall of 1848. This was remarkable considering the great distance that the ox had to go to get back to Winter Quarters over country roamed by buffalo and infested by Indians. Incidentally the stray pond bill was five cents.
Charles Crismon has the distinction of builder of mills--building first mills in the west and distinction of first mill run by streams.
During the latter part of 1847 Father Crismon built a small grist mill at the mouth of City Creek Canyon near where third street now crosses the bed of that stream, the first mill built in the region of Salt Lake. On this same creek, a short distance above, he put up a saw mill and this was one of the first saw mills erected in the valley. In 1848 he sold both mills to Brigham Young who operated them for many years.
About the same time he built a home near the site of the present state penitentiary and resided there until he removed to California.
It was in the latter part of April 1849, that Mr. Crismon and his family set out for the Land of Gold. They took the Humboldt route and arrived in Sacramento on the 3rd of July; at that time there was but one house in town although there were a number of tents. Mr. Crismon engaged in mining on the Mormon Bar on the north fork of American River for a few months and during the following winter lived at Mission Delores in San Francisco.
In July 1850 he moved to Cheno Ranch in the southern part of the state of California and assisted in founding the city of San Bernardino. He also built the first grist mill in San Bernardino. (I have a picture of that old mill).
When I was seven years of age my father, Charles Crismon, joined the church in Morgan Co., Illinois and went with Joseph Smith and family to Missouri. Later, he came back to Illinois for mother had not accepted the gospel. He took very ill and the doctors gave him up to die when Father Smith and an Elder from Missouri stopped at their house on their return from Kirtland. They expressed a desire to see father and mother objected on account of her disbelief, but they went into his room, spoke to him, knelt down by the bed and administered to him, telling him he should be made well and soon be able to go to Missouri, that mother should be convinced and that he should take his family with him. In ten days he was able to transact his business and sell his property. This convinced my mother, and she was baptized by Elder Levi Merrick. She became a faithful worker in the church and always had a testimony that she had seen the power of healing.
In the fall, with Elder Merrick, our family moved to Missouri where my father bought a home about twenty-five miles from Far West. Being very wealthy, my father had lots of stock and valuables and our home was one of peace until one night after prayers, my mother's sister who had joined the church with father, having the gift of tongues, told father to go to Far West as soon as possible. Next morning he moved the family then returned for some stock but found that the mob had taken all and burned the house, leaving him only the one wagon and team he had used in the moving.
For a time, seven families lived in two log rooms while the mob surrounded the city and took the prophet and leading men prisoners.
In the winter, we were driven out and went back to our old home in Illinois where we lived two years, later moving to MacDonis, eighty miles from Carthage Jail. I saw the mob going back to Layharp, saying there was be no more church for "Old Joe Smith" was dead.
In the winter of '45, we moved to Nauvoo where father and mother received their endowments in the temple, crossed Mississippi River Feb. 8, 1846, wintered on Punca River with Bishop Miller's Company. We traveled to Missouri River with the company, father building bridges and making roads all the way, and were at Sarpee Station when the Mormon Battalion was mustered. Later, we returned to Winter Quarters, fitted out and started for Salt Lake City in '47, along with Grant's "hundred", William Snow's "fifty", and Jacob Gates' "ten" sharing the hardships and trials of all pioneers. Three days before reaching Salt Lake, Sister Grant died. They made her a simple coffin of a wagon box and Brother Grant in company with Brother and Sister Leonard took the body to Salt Lake.
We were in Salt Lake the time the crickets took the grain. That year I went to school to a young woman by name of Mary Jane Dilworth, who later married Brother Hammon from the Sandwich Islands.
In May '48, in company with Father's family and an organized company, my husband and I was sent to California to colonize. Arriving at San Francisco in the fall, we stayed there until '51 when we moved to William's Ranch in Southern California. In '51 Brother Lyman and Brother Rich brought a company to Pasadena and bought the San Bernadino ranch where four of my children were born.
Going back to Salt Lake City in '58, we lived there until called in '64 to colonize Bear Lake, Idaho. After living in Bear Lake four years, we moved to Richmond, Cache Co., Utah (Mahlin born there) in '69 we moved to Coalville, Utah until we left for Arizona, October '78, arriving the last of January '79.
In Arizona times were very hard. I had to cord, spin, weave and knit all the clothes for twelve children.
My father built the first grist mill in Utah at City Creek Canyon, just east of Salt Lake City, the first adobe house with shingles and a floor, which he later sold to Brigham Young.
I am the mother of twelve children, seven boys and five girls, the grandmother of fifty four and the great-grandmother of forty-six. Six of my boys have been on a mission. I have made ten trips to Salt Lake City and return, going once to be present at the Jubilee, and three trips to Mexico to visit children. I have done work for the dead, the genealogy of which I found while on my visit to my old home in the east, traveling to the world's fair at St. Louis. (Oct. 1904)
Now, at the age of eighty-three, I live in Mesa at the home of one of my sons. I still have faith in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and can bear my testimony to its truth.
Allene Lewis