Myron Barber CHILD

                             POLLY (Sally) BARBER  BARBPOLL.798  RIN 2492


    Polly Barber, also know as Sarah Ann, the daughter of Ichabod and Annie Dake (Deake) Barber, born on March 30th, 1799, at Greenfield, Saratoga County, New York.  She was the second child in the family of 7 children.  For a time before her marriage to Alfred B. Child, March 19th, 1817, she attended the Milton Academy in New York.

    In 1822, they moved to Morristown, New York, where she first heard the gospel preached, which was revealed from heaven to Joseph Smith by an angel sent from God.  After thoroughly investigating, being fully convinced of its truth, she was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ OF Latter-Day Saints, June 5, 1838, by Elder Charles Blakesly.

    Polly Barber Child accepted the gospel quickly after hearing it.  The family did the same.  On the 11th day of August following, their baptizing, they left for the state of Missouri, stopping on the way for a few weeks at Kirtland, Ohio.  They arrived in Caldwell County, Missouri, in September of the same year, having traveled the entire distance from the state of New York, by a two horse team and wagon.  The family at that time were ten in number.

    (It has been said by researchers, that in the early period of the church, no group in the church ever sacrificed more than the early Kirtland saints, in the monumental task in the building of the Kirtland Temple.  Polly and Alfred were part of that sacrifice.)

    She had taken with them only that which was necessary and joined the saints, moving in with them into the Missouri persecutions, loyal to the Prophet Joseph an the cause of righteousness, covenanted with others to stand loyal to one another in their hardships in their extermination from the state of Missouri, and their exodus to Illinois.  She was ever faithful during the Kirtland and Nauvoo period.

    They lived in poverty because they gave up all they had, toward this labor of love for the lord, and he was watchful of their welfare.  During this period, many of the saints received revelations and visitations from heavenly beings, to increase their faith and strength to endure the trials and persecutions that lay before them.

    On the 11 of August they left Ohio for the state of Missouri.  While traveling through Ohio, enroute for Caldwell County, Missouri, and passing through a heavily timbered country, a singular incident occurred.  One morning, soon after leaving the camp, a very aged person, whose hair was long, and as white as wool, appeared suddenly in the track immediately in front of the team and cried, "Whoa"  The horses stopped immediately.  Then he came up to the wagon, commenced with the oldest of the family, shook hands, and talked with each one in turn, according to their age.  He blessed them in the name of the Lord, Jesus Christ, after which he disappeared as suddenly as he appeared, and vanished from sight.  Whither he went, the family never knew.

    Upon reaching Caldwell, County, the persecutions arose against the Latter-Day Saints, in which Alfred and Polly were victims.  Polly barber described this episode in a letter to Phoebe Wooster, her sister.  (Don't confuse this Phoebe Wooster with Polly Barbers' daughter Phoebe Wooster Child)
    In March, 1839, they arrived at Quincy, Illinois.  They were in destitute conditions, and remained there about eight months to recuperate.

    They moved into Davies County, at Adam-Ondi-Ahman.  They called it the city of tents and wagons. In February 1839, Alfred Bosworth and his son Mark were taken prisoners by the mob but later released. (I must read the history of the saints in Adam-Ondi-Ahman. What exactly happened there?  What would occur to have our grandfather and his son persecuted by a mob?)  Orders came to leave the state of Missouri in 15 days.

    During this period mother had to devise every means to provide food for the family, much of our little store having been exhausted and confiscated by the mob.  My brother Myron, the oldest left home, being quite young, and our best horse stolen, she borrowed a neighbor's horse to work with our remaining one and started for Jackson Co., If possible to get such supplies as were needed to feed and clothe the family, which , though invasions, had been rendered quite destitute, taking this youth, (Myron) with her to render what help he was able to give in caring for the team and driving.

    All the saints had to struggle to get out of the state.  Most had lost their teams to the mob.  Alfred had only one horse, the mob had stolen his best horse, so Alfred gave his remaining horse to the older brethren, Mr. Allred, for helping them move out of the state.

    Many of the saints had to go on foot across the frozen prairie, destitute of food and clothing, with the sand burrs cutting their feet.  There is no way to describe Polly's suffering as she watched her husband struggle to maintain and keep his family safe.  Many tears were shed as she watched her children struggle to keep pace with the frantic moments of the saints to get out of harms way.

    When they got to the river, the ice was running and they could not cross.  It was now the middle of March and so very cold.  Polly and her family had to help build shantys of brush and blankets and wagons were turned into homes.  The suffering was
very intense for they had very little food and no warm homes.
(Polly ann, Polly Barber's daughter tells us that she never had a pair of dry, warm stockings and shoes. She had to wash them, wring out her stockings, wash the mud off her shoes, and put them right back on.)  Bitter, bitter cold.

    In Feb 1839 when Polly B. arrived in Quincey, Illinois, Alfred found them a shell of a house, no floor and a few slabs on top for a roof.  They built a fire on the ground as they had no chimney.  Polly B. Took in washing to help way for their needs.

    As the country became settled she was usually sent for, sometimes to go distances ranging from one to ten miles, to prescribe and wait on the sick, her more special practice being that of midwife.  Mother always kept a stock of medicine consisting of lobelia, loneseteatis with turnip, jangshan, a pills made of butnut bark, which were manufactured by mother, she being the physician of the family and considered to be a very good one.

    She was quite expert in horseback riding, sometimes riding a distance of twenty miles on strange horses, and often during the nighttime and dark, and sometimes storming.  No kind of weather would deter her from responding in an urgent call of midwife.  She was usually very successful and considered one of the best of her day, seldom ever losing a case.

    They were able to raise a pretty good crop of flax that spring and summer of 1841 and 1842 Polly B., and her girls made it into cloth for clothing and sheets and pillow cases.  They even had dresses made of flax.

    We moved into Spring Prairie, Lee County, Iowa and in the spring of 1842, Alfred was appointed post master.  "Alfred was away a good deal so I took charge of the office.  With the help of our sons we had a nice farm.  In 1843 I was not very well and had to have more help from Polly Ann.  Our family enjoyed a year or two of peace in Iowa."

    The family apparently enjoyed a year or two of peace here in Iowa.  Their son, Mark, had enlisted in the army in 1844, and was stationed at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

    In 1846, at the time of the exodus, we moved to Pottawatomie County, Iowa, where we lived for 6 years, to procure and outfit to cross the plains, having three times sacrificed comfortable homes for the Gospel's sake.

    While the family was at Pottawatomie County, Iowa, Alfred and his son Warren G., then 14 years of age, went out into Missouri to work for provisions.

    "While at work, Alfred was taken ill at Pottawatomie County, Iowa and had to leave his work and come home.  We needed the money which he had not been able to collect before he was brought home.  I took my son Warren G., with me and we traveled by ox team traveling a distance of 75 miles to collect the pay my husband and earned.  It took us about two weeks.  My other children were left with a sick father to care for while I was away."

    Polly's unwavering faith and strong testimony had carried her through when her nights were long, dark and cold; it put strength in her heart when it seemed all would be lost; helped her to see and feel the power and promise of god's love in the dawn of a new day.  She had been blessed by a heavenly being that day in the wagon, to give her the spiritual strength she would need.
Also having her children living close by was a very important element of her strength.

    In reading Polly B.'s story we must feel and see in our minds, her unwavering faith and strong testimony had carried her through when those nights were long, dark an cold.

    In her letters to her mother, sister, and brothers in New York, this strength is shown forcefully.  The mobs in the near distance all around her tent, her husband and son out trying to protect themselves and their families; yet, she wrote that she "had no fear, all fluttering of the heart was gone from me.  I was as calm as I ever was sitting in your home, mother."

    "When the brethren came with the word that the mob was a few miles distant and all men were needed," she fixed her husband and son's supper and sent them off.  She and the baby, (whose name was Orville) went to bed.  She was tired because she had been washing.  She slept peacefully because she said, "I had no remembrance of it in the morning."

    She wrote that her feelings sometimes were melancholy, because she didn't know "how soon her loved ones would be lost in death."  (She had the right to be melancholy with the harassments and hardships she was enduring.) Polly's correspondence with her two brothers and one sister, there is evidence of much love and devotion, in their relationship with each other.  (Their letters were also written as their thoughts came, without regard or skill as to grammar or punctuation.)

    According to the correspondence between the members of the family, Alfred and Polly were evidently thinking of going to California with the Mormons, if that was the destination chosen by Brigham Young.  Her brother, Asa Barber, in his letter is heart broken and pleads with her not to go so far away.

    After the death of the Prophet Joseph Smith and the expulsion of the saints from that area of the country, and on July 12, 1852, she followed her husband, following the counsel of Pres. Brigham Young.  The Child's family joined in the exodus to Utah and made their way to the Salt Lake Valley on October 1st of the same year.  They settled in Ogden, Weber, Utah.

    For the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Polly and her family had left their home in Hammond, New York, where they had lived for more than 10 years.  They endured a perilous journey to Kirtland, Ohio, and Missouri.

    She was driven from homes in Missouri, Illinois, and Iowa.  She lived in dug-outs, crude log cabins, a wagon, and tents.  Many were the days she lived in tents as they were forced to endure those many years of hardship and persecutions, in their travels in a wagon from New York to Ogden, Utah.

    Polly was a courageously strong woman, with all of the poverty, privations, hunger, and sickness with cholera, and sorrows that she experienced in coming to Utah, and until her death.  She had to be strong.

    At last, in Utah, even after she safely arrived , on October 1, 1952, her faith and testimony was further tested, in the death of her husband Alfred, just two months later on 22 Dec. 1852.  She had her seven children and several grandchildren around her to comfort, in a strange and barren land, not much of a home, and prospects were dim for a livelihood for any of them.  (Note: "around her to comfort")  How did she feel that first christmas day?  Was it cold and snowy?  Did they have enough food, clothing and shelter?  Nothing has been recorded that I can find.
Possibly we should take the time to study other histories recorded of that time.

    She had buried her first three children as infants, two sons and a daughter, and a seven year old son, Asa Thomas who died in Iowa, just before they were driven out.  Her son, Mark, who was in the U.S. Army, was killed in California by Indians.

    The Lord had taken her mother, Annie Dake (Deake) Barber, who died the 23 of December 1851, and her brother Lonson died 4 days after her husband, on the 26 of December 1852.

    Had she not endured enough?  Did she say, "Lord, how much more do you want me to suffer before I can have peace and rest?"

    No, I don't think so.  She knew life must go on.  She probably just prayed for strength to carry on and make the best of it.  For 31 years more -- in fact, most of it had just begun.

    Most of her surviving children were now married, and her two un-married sons, Warren and Orville would lend their support as much as possible.  They were old enough, 18 and 15 years respectively, to help themselves.  She knew the Lord would continue to bless and sustain them all, and he did  They were faithful children.

    She not only was strong in character; physically, spiritually, and emotionally; but she was blessed with wisdom and intelligence and a kind and gentle disposition.

    Polly Barber had a God-Given ability for relieving pain and suffering.  She was always willing to help anyone, and rendered her service freely.

    This great lady could have written many faith promoting stories, but little is recorded about her life.  My what a great, strong willed lady to be so secure, and determined that she, with strength known only to herself and God, could take on such a task.  Think of her husband's story and then compound it by the strength it must have taken for this woman to under take all the tribulations of her life to follow him.

    As a nurse  and mid-wife, Polly Barber Childs had introduced hundreds of children into this world ...She has made thousands of warmhearted friends, and her name wa a household word among the earlier settlers.  She had practiced midwifery for a period of fifty years, during which time she dressed over 2,000 infants.  Being kind and gentle disposition she was endeared to all with whom she became associated.

    In her Patriarchal Blessing, she was promised wisdom and knowledge, and this promise was fulfilled.  She was blessed when she needed some remedy, and her faith-grounded intuition prompted her to use a certain herb, oil or plant for medicine.  There were no drug stores for medicine then.

    She had such tremendous faith, and relied upon the Lord constantly for help and guidance, in her ministrations to her patients.

    She willingly went where ever and whenever needed, day or night.  No wonder they spoke of her, at her funeral, "as a ministering angel, fulfilling her mission with love, intelligence, integrity and an unwavering faith in God.

    After all the trials of her younger years, Polly's faith and patience was further tested in her old age.  She lived to be 84 years old.The summit of polly's suffering was reached when about five years before she died, she suffered a paralytic stroke, which rendered her almost helpless, physically, but her mental faculties she retained almost unimpaired until her death.

    After her stroke, Polly's pathetic struggle during these last years of life was made more endurable by her many friends and relatives who visited her and attended her.

    She died peacefully, relieved of all of her burdens, on the 4th of February 1883, in Ogden, utah and was buried by the side of her dear Alfred in the Ogden cemetery.

    She had suffered much for the sake of the gospel of Jesus Christ, but she was a strong woman  She had endured courageously and faithfully to the end

    She was a mother of twelve children.  At her death she left six children, eighty-eight grandchildren, and one hundred and fourteen great-grandchildren. All are members of the Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints, and not one of them was of them was ever known to swerve from