Roxena Meacham Carter (1830-1919) – Autobiographies

Roxena Meacham Carter was the second wife of William Furlsbury Carter and my 3rd Great Grandmother. She had quite amazing life, and lucky for me, she told her life story to her daughter who recorded it. This autobiography was handed down to me from my mother who got it from hers. The copy I have was typed by Mrs. Chatwinson from the original written by the hand of Roxena’s daughter Mrs. Sally A. (Carter) Richmond.

Interestingly enough, I found another account of the same history online as told to another daughter, Anelia (Carter) Van Ausdal, on the 7th of October 1916. Thought it makes this post quite lengthy, I’ve included both written accounts starting with Sally A. (Carter) Richmond’s, followed by Anelia (Carter) Van Ausdal’s.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ROXENA MEACHAM CARTER
(As recorded by her daughter Mrs. Sally A. (Carter) Richmond)

I was born in Salem Township, Mercer County, Pennsylvania in 1830. My father Edward Meacham and my mother’s name was Irene Currier Meacham.

In September 1838, father sold his farm to go with the Saints to Missouri. After traveling two months we came to Indiana and stopped three weeks with Uncle Moses. My uncle had not yet joined the Latter Day Saint Church but father persuaded him to accompany us westward.

Dimich Hutington, came to father and warned him against crossing the river river for the mobs were killing many people. Fifteen had been murdered that day including a small boy and girl. Their bodies were thrown into an old dry well by the mob and Joseph Young, hurriedly covered them to prevent further mutilation. Mother was too ill to leave the house so father and I stayed out in the rain all night while we guarded our home. Our neighbor’s fifteen-year-old son, Alfred Nelson, was killed by the mob. I use to attend Sunday School with him.

When we arrived at the Missouri River, many people who had been driven from their homes were sitting on the banks. It was the latter part of November and a larger portion of them were suffering from the effects of fever.

My father drove to a place called Quincy where we stopped over night. The lady with whom we stayed had lost her husband and all but one of twelve children one month earlier from cholera. Next morning father drove on to Columbia, some thirty miles away. We moved into a house on my birthday, December second. The house was so open however, that much suffering resulted from the intense cold. Two weeks later we moved to Columbus, Illinois, and rented a house from a Mr. Capps. We did not dare let them know about our being Mormons for fear of being massacred.

My father’s brothers, Moses and Ephraim, also moved to Columbus. Neither of them had been converted to Mormonism; so father asked them to pray for a testimony, which Moses did. In a few nights he awakened his wife my talking in a strange tongue. She thought he had gone crazy and sent for Uncle Ephraim and father to come. Uncle Ephraim’s wife, mother and I also went with them. My age at this time was eight years. His talking in tongues sounded very strange and impressed Uncle Ephraim so much that he motioned for them to take him to be baptized. This was done making him a member of our faith. Uncle Moses talked in seven languages for three weeks, but could not speak a word of his own language during this period.

We lived in Columbus until spring, then moved across the Mississippi River into Iowa. This was a fine place with plenty of deer and other wild game father would go out and kill wild turkeys and deer. The deer were as numerous as cattle and came in large herds around out house to eat the hazel brush. I used to gather the hazel nuts. We lived here five years. Uncle Moses and Lewis, another of father’s brothers also lived here.

We were so frightened of the mobs that father moved us back across the Mississippi. During my play I used to wade in the river, get mud between my toes, make little play dishes and bake them. Father built a log house five miles below Nauvoo. WE all became ill with fever while living at this place.

Mother’s father, John Currier, joined us after having walked with a cane from Pennsylvania to Nauvoo. His coming was a great surprise to everyone of my family. I had climbed a tree to cut a willow for a whistle and by chance saw him coming. His weary look as he neared the house will never be forgotten by me. Running into the house I announced his approach to mother, she merely kept on with her washing saying, “do not be so simple, for he could not have walked from where we left him in Pennsylvania.” She was almost angry when I repeated, “Here he comes.” And much to her astonishment, in he walked.

Grandfather had a few things tied up in a big red handkerchief, including a roll of paper lies clipped from various papers about the Mormons. Then he spoke to mother, “Rena, I have come all this distance to take you back home away from these terrible Mormons.” Mother begged him to read the Book of Mormon, but he refused.

Mother had a very good knowledge of human nature, so she left the Book of Mormon on a windowsill knowing her father would read it if unobserved. Sometimes we caught him reading the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants.

Every one of us became sick with fever that no one was able to give the other a drink of water. After becoming a little better we moved back to Iowa, so my grandparents Joshua and Permelia Meacham, could take care of us.

Grandfather John Currier, who walked so far with his cane, lived with Grandfather Meacham. While there he became very ill and did not expect to live, but he became somewhat better and walked to our house with his cane. (We still have this cane in 1916). He walked in and said to father, “Edward, if i cold get to the river I would be baptized into the Mormon Church.” Not the Mormon Church father replied. “Yes, the Mormon Church”, he repeated, “for I believe now it is the only true church.” Then father said, “if ou want to go you shall have a way, for my cousin, Joseph Meacham, is coming tonight to administer to us and he will take you.

The next morning being Sunday, my Uncle brought his wife and Grandfather and Grandmother Meacham. They went five miles to the Mississippi River, where John Currier, was baptized and became a member of the Latter Day Saint Church. At this time we was still quite sick and very weak, yet his determination to be baptized overcame these handicaps.

Mother received word he would not be over for a few days but he felt so much better that he believe he had been healed. One week later Grandfather Meacham heard him cough after going to bed. After speaking to him twice and receiving no reply, Granfather lighted a candle only find him dying. He ran to our house and called to mother, Rena, our father is worse. Mother started to cry saying, she had seen him in a dream covered with snow. Being too sick to walk, I crawled on my hands and knees about four rods to see him before he was buried. My parents were too sick to get out of bed to go see him. When Grandmother Currier, who was still in Pennsylvania, heard of his death, she became ill and remained in bed for thirteen weeks. John Curried, was buried in the Montrose Cemetery, located on the west side of the Mississippi River, across from Nauvoo, in October 1842.

On December 22, 1842, my only sister, Sally Ann, was born. She only weighed five pounds and did not gain one ounce for three months.

Father bought a piece of land at Golden Point in the vicinity of Nauvoo, where he built a shanty until a house could be constructed.

One day father left on business not expecting to return until late. In the meantime a very bad thunder shower came up, so mother asked Henry Snelson, who was plowing in a field nearby, to stay all night as we were alone. Just as father came home at eleven o’clock, the house was struck by lightning, tearing the roof from over our heads. My eyes were knocked loose from their sockets and from all appearances no life remained in me. Mother was burned and father was stunned for a few minutes. Father then threw a pan of milk over me to extinguish the fire. Snelson, was sent a half mile away for a Brother Chase to come to our assistance. Before Brother Chase arrived, father had pressed my eyes back into their sockets and administered to me three times. His great faith was rewarded as I began to struggle for breath. Brother Chase moved us to his home but the effects of the lighting left me blind for four weeks.

We all went into Nauvoo, to hear the Prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum. At this time my eyesight had been restored just enough to see the Prophet Joseph wave his hand in the light as he spoke to the saints from a large bowery. One week and a day later we moved into Nauvoo, and on this same day Joseph and his brother Hyrum were martyred by the mobs. Together with my parents and the Saints, I went to meet their bodies about 5 miles outside of Nauvoo, at the Prophet’s mansion. Next day we went to view their remains and they surely looked like an embodiment of all that was pure and good. It was a sad day, one never to be forgotten, to see those two young and innocent men lying there with their lives taken because they would not lie against what God had revealed to them from the heavens. My father with twelve other men buried them in Nauvoo House cellar at midnight. It was discovered the mobs knew the location of the burial place, so father and the other men buried them in another place.

After the mob had so brutally murdered Joseph and Hyrum, they were not satisfied, for a large reward was offered for their heads.

Father rented a house of David LeBaron in Nauvoo. Here my only brother, Amasa, was born March 30, 1845.

One year later the mobs gave orders for all the Mormons to leave Nauvoo, or they would be killed. On June first my family was among the seven hundred Saint to leave on their long journey that would eventually lead them to Salt Lake City. We crossed the Mississippi and Missouri rivers coming to Mt. Pisga, where we stopped for a while. Later, between five and six hundred members of the Church moved to Council Bluffs. We then went to a place named Bonaparte. Grandfather Joshua Meacham died here and Grandmother Peremelia was left alone. Later she was brought to a place called Garden Grove. Father went there in the fall with an ox team and brought her to live with us.

Our house was located at Parley’s Springs, near Council Bluffs. This town was later renamed Carterville in honor of my husband William F. Carter and his brother Dominicus.

While living at Carterville, I became acquainted with William F. Carter. We crossed the river on ice to Winter Quarters, and were married by Brigham Young.

Later returning to our home, my husband built a large blacksmith shop only to have it and his house burned to ashes by a mob. Father’s first wife Sarah had a baby only three weeks old yet she was forced to sit on a box and watch the house burn.

Just before my marriage, father became very sick with measles, so it was necessary for me to yoke and drive an ox team five hundred miles.

At the Bluffs the Governor called for five hundred Mormons to go and fight the Mexicans. Brigham told them to go and not a drop of blood would be shed. His prophecy was fulfilled. Drums were beat for volunteers. Mother and I watched father fall in line although he was so weak from sickness that he could scarcely walk. Brigham Young called father to his camp that night and said, “Brother Meacham, I do not want you to go with the battalion, you are not strong enough at present to go with them. Stay behind and help build houses for our windows.” Father remained behind to do as he was bid. He went into the timber and cut logs for two houses, one for ourselves and one for William Casto’s wife. I hauled the logs with an ox team.

Nathan Tanner, baptized mother and I into the Mormon Church in 1840. We were taken to a large creek in Iowa and confirmed on the banks of the stream by the Prophet Joseph Smith.

After our marriage my husband and I moved to Cainsville. My husband made hobbles, horse shoes and many garden tools. These articles were sold to people on their way to the gold fields of California. We made enough money from these sales to continue our journey to Salt Lake City. I carried my infant daughter many miles from across the plains.

My husband bought two homes upon our arrival to Salt Lake City, but we sold out fourteen months later and moved to Provo. My husband built the first threshing machine in Provo. He also operated a saw mill and did carpenter work.

We went up on the east bench where the State Mental Hospital now stands and took up 160 acres of land.

In 1852, my husband and Brother Fotheringham, were called upon to fulfil a three year mission in East India. They drove an ox team to California, then sold them together with a violin for transportation across the ocean.

The Blackhawk War broke out while we were residing in Provo. One day some Indians came up to our house looking very angry. They muttered something and rode away so we all moved into town expecting trouble at any moment. Next morning we found our pigs and chickens shot full of arrows.

I am now almost 89 years old and live in Santaquin, Utah. I have 10 children, 110 grandchildren, a large number of great grandchildren and a few great great grandchildren.

Written word by word for my mother as she told me while lying on a sick bed.

Mrs. Sally A. Carter Richmond, her daughter.
Typed by Mrs. Chatwinson.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ROXENA MEACHAM CARTER
(As recorded by her daughter daughter, Anelia (Carter) Van Ausdal, 7 October 1916)

My name is Roxena Mecham Carter, daughter of Edward Mecham and Irena Currier Mecham. My father joined the Mormon Church when I was seven years of age. he sold his farm in Pennsylvania to go with the Saints to Missouri in September 1837. We traveled two months, stopping in Indiana three weeks with my father’s brother Moses Mecham. My father persuaded him to go with us to Missouri although he hadn’t yet joined the church. My father’s brother, Ephraim, came with us also. Dimick Huntington came to father and told him not to cross the river for the mobs were killing the people. They had killed fifteen that night. I stayed out with father in the rain all night in a wheat field when he was guarding our house. Mother was too sick to leave the house. They killed our neighbor’s 15 year-old boy that night along with a little boy and girl and threw their bodies in an old dry well. The older boy’s name was Alfred Nelson and I used to go to school with him. The little boy was named Smith. They also killed his father. Joseph Young covered them up with brush.

When we arrived there the people that had been expelled by the mobs were sitting on the banks of the Missouri River and many were sick with the fever and ague. It was the last of November! My father drove to a place called Quincy and stopped all night. The family who took us in had just had the cholera one month before. Her husband and twelve children had all died but one. The next morning my father drove 30 miles to a small town called Columbus. He moved us into a house in a field on my birthday December 2nd. The house was very open and cold and we sure suffered. We only stopped there two weeks, then moved into the town of Columbus, Illinois and rented a house from a man named Mr. Chapps. We didn’t dare let them know we were Mormons as they were gentiles.

We lived in Columbus until spring, then we moved across the Mississippi River to Iowa. It was a fine place with plenty of deer and wild game. Father would go out every few days and shoot the wild turkeys. Deer were as numerous as cattle. They came in herds around our place to eat hazel brush and other browse. I gathered hazelnuts there. We lived there five years as did father’s brothers, Uncle Moses and Uncle Lewis. Mother was so frightened of the mobs that father moved us across the Mississippi River. I used to go to the edge of that river and get mud with my toes to make play dishes, then I would bake them. Father put up a house five miles from Nauvoo. We lived there four months and all took sick with the fever ague.

Father went away one afternoon and didn’t get back until late in the night. While he was gone a big thunder storm came up. It happened that a young man named Henry Snelson was plowing in the field. It rained so hard mother got him to come in the house and the storm was so bad he stayed all night because we were alone. Father came at eleven o’clock. Just then the house was struck by lightening and nearly all torn from over our heads. I was struck and to all appearance I was dead. For a half hour my eyes were knocked loose from my head. Father pressed them back as he laid hands on my head. He sent Henry Snelson a half mile away to get a brother Chase to come to our assistance and he told him I was killed. Mother was burned by the lightening and stunned. Father was also stunned for a few minutes. He laid hands on me and asked the Lord to restore me to life three times before brother Chase got there. He and mother would not give me up, and his faith brought me back. I began to struggle for breath just as brother Chase got on the door step, and he moved us to his house in the night. I was blind for four weeks from the effects of the lightening.

We all went into Nauvoo to hear Joseph Smith, our beloved prophet, preach his last sermon before he went to Carthage Jail to give himself up. It was just one week and one day before he was killed. He preached under a bowery. I had come to my eyesight just enough to see the wave of his hand through the light, but I slowly recovered my sight and the Lord heard our prayers. We then moved into Nauvoo the day he was killed. I went with my parents and the saints to meet them as their bodies were brought into his mansion. We went about two and one-half miles to meet them. We went the next day to view their bodies as they lay there, an embodiment of all that was good and pure. It was a sad day, one never to be forgotten. We also attended their funeral. My father, with twelve other men, buried them in the Nauvoo house cellar at the hour of midnight, and after they heard the mob had found out where they were they took them and buried them in another place. Even after they had so brutally killed them, the mob was not satisfied. The blood thirsty villains were still wishing to do more, for they offered a big reward for their heads.

Father rented a house in Nauvoo. The mobs had given orders for all the Mormons to get out of Nauvoo or they would kill us all. There were seven hundred of them. My father and many others moved out the first of June. We crossed the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers and stayed at Mount Pisga awhile. Five or six hundred members of the church came on to Council Bluffs. We then went to a place called Bonaparte. My grandfather, Joshua Mecham, died there and grandmother, Permelia, was left there alone; but some of the saints brought her with them to a place called Garden Grove. It was in the fall of the year. Father went with an ox team and brought her to our house in Council Bluffs. The place we lived in there was called Parley’s Springs, but after that it was called Carterville. We lived there two or three years and became acquainted with William F. Carter. He played the drum in the Nauvoo Legion Band. We were married on the 13 of March 1846. We crossed the Missouri River on the ice and were married by Brigham Young and then went back to Carterville (which was named for my husband), and lived there for two years. Then we moved to Cainsville, and my husband set up a big blacksmith shop and the mobs burned it to ashes. Also his first wife’s house when her baby was only three weeks old. She was ordered out by the mob and she sat on a goods box and watched her house burn.

Just before I was married, my father was so sick with measles I had to drive three ox teams and yoke them up. I drove them 500 miles. I drove two yoke of oxen and one yoke of cows all on one wagon. Mother had two small children and father was too sick to drive. The measles settled in his back. Sometimes the young men of the camp would come and help me yoke up the cattle. When we got to the Bluffs six hundred Mormons were called on by the governor to go and fight the Mexicans. President Brigham Young told them to go and there would not be a drop of blood shed and his prophecies were correct. They beat the drums for volunteers and my mother and I saw father fall in to line in the ranks, although he was weak and could hardly walk. Then Brigham Young sent for him to come to his camp that night and he said to father, “Brother Mecham, I don’t want you to go with the Battalion. You are too weakly a man. Stay behind and help build houses for the widows that will be left.” And he did. He went into the timber and cut logs for two houses, one for us and one for William F. Carter’s first wife Sarah York. He built her house adjoining ours. He would cut logs and I would haul them with an ox team. The six hundred volunteers went and we stayed there three years.

In Cainsville my husband made hobbles and horse shoes, and many garden hoes for the gold diggers that were enroute to California. He sold them and got plenty of money to go on our journey to Salt Lake City (they arrived in time to be counted on the 1850 census). I carried my baby across the plains. She was so small and weak. When we got there he gave one thousand dollars for one home and he sold stock for another home. We lived there fourteen months, then sold out and moved to Provo. He rented a farm from Isaac Robbins. We lived there three years. My husband went up on the east bench in Provo and took up one hundred acres of land where the asylum now stands. He built two houses for his families to live in. In 1852 he was called on a mission to the East Indies. He and Brother Forthingham went from Provo to California in an ox team. He sold his oxen and violin for transportation across the ocean to Calcutta, and he stayed there three years.

As soon as he left home, there was trouble with the Indians, and the Blackhawk war broke out. My father and Uncle Lewis Mecham lived up by us. One day some Indians came up there. They looked angry, and they muttered something to themselves. Father and Uncle Lewis took their families and ours that day and went down to the town of Provo for fear of being killed, and I believe we would have, for the next morning they went up there and the Indians had shot arrows into our pigs and chickens. So we had to move to town to stay.

I am the mother of ten children, 100 grandchildren and a good many great grandchildren and great great grandchildren. I was born in Salem Township, Mercer County, Pennsylvania. My name is Roxena Mecham Carter. My father’s name is Edward Mecham, my mother’s name is Irena Currier. My father’s mother is Permelia Chapman Mecham. His father was Joshua Mecham. My mother’s father was John Currier and his wife was Sally A. Silver. My husband was William F. Carter. Our children were: Irene Chatwin b. 1849, Elvira Houghton b. 1851, Edward M. Carter b. 1853, Arletta Chatwin b. 1855, William F. Carter b. 1858, Meribah Clemens b. 1860, Sally A. Richmond b. 1862, Junietta Wall b. 1865, Amasa Carter b. 1868, Anelia Van Ausdal b. 1872.

My mother and I were baptized into the Mormon Church when I was ten years old in 1840 by Nathan Tanner. We both were confirmed by the Prophet Joseph Smith. We were baptized in a big creek in Iowa and we were confirmed on the bank of the stream. I was 16 years old when I was married 13 March 1846, and was endowed in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City, 25 October 1869 by Brigham Young.

Source: This was copied from the blog of Raelene called RAGDOLLS. You can visit her page with this second account at: Oh Pioneer!

If you’re related to this family or have more information about them including stories, pictures and dates and family member names, I’d love to hear from you. Please leave a comment below or email me directly from the About Us page.

Tags: Book of Mormon, California, Capps, Carter, Casto, Chapman, Chapps, Chase, Chatwinson, Clemens, Curier, Currier, GGG-Grandparents, Illinois, India, Indiana, Iowa, LDS, LeBaron, Meacham, Mexican War, Mississippi, Missouri, Mormon, Nelson, Pennsylvania, Richmond, Robbins, Silver, Smith, Utah, Van Ausdal, Wall