William AUSTIN

                   Temple work has been done for William Austin several temples.

SHORT HISTORY:  Information about William Austin is very sketchy. That which follows comes from a letter written by him to his neice in 1882, just before he died. The ancestral line is through his relationship with Olive Lee. Their marriage is a question. She was born in Ontario, Canada but evidently had moved to New York. She probably married Daniel Shipman and a child was born to her that William Austin helped raise. There are unknowns with this relationship. There was a penciled note on a history of Thomas William Callahan written by Adarin, a great grandson which said, "William Austin finally admitted that Lucinda Austin was his daughter." Draw your own conclusions Further, Austin probably was a polygamist -- wives include Agnes Nicol, 1 Jan 1822;?Olive Lee, 1 Jan 1828?; Isabel Nicol (perhaps the sister of Agnes), 15 Jun 1846; and Agnes McIntire, 15 Jul 1853. The last wife is the only one mentioned in his letter. Agnes Nicol had no children and her sister Isabel took ill from mountain fever at Green River and died in 1852.

William Austin came from east central New York in Washington County. He married Agnes Nicol in 1822-3 from Hammond, St Lawrence, New York. This is where Olive Lee also was living. Evidently he joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints about 1841 and started his treck west, landing in Nauvoo, Illinois in 1842 and started working on the temple. In 1844 he was called on a mission to promote Joseph Smith for president of the US. Upon his return he served as doorkeeper at the temple. He moved west with the saints stopping at Bettensfort, Iowa to plant crops and at other locations along the way. He stayed in Harris Grove, near Council Bluffs, Iowa until 1852 when he resumed his travels to Salt Lake City, arriving in October. William first lived in N Ogden, but later liven in Box Elder (1855-58), Logan (1860-4), Bear Lake Valley (1865-70), and settled in Trenton (1870-87) where he homesteaded 160 acres.