A Biographical
Sketch of
William J. Lloyd
By his Grandson,
Charles H. Lloyd
William J.
Lloyd, one of a family of ten children, was born August 9, 1823, at Carmarthen
Town, Carmarthenshire, South Wales, and was the son of John Lloyd, born October 16, 1784, and Mary
Thomas Lloyd, born September
11, 1790. His mother died
while grandfather was still a young man, and his father then married Martha
Jones, who was born in 1801.
William J.
Lloyd had the following brothers and sisters: Thomas, born February 22, 1816;
John, born May 10, 1817, died November 22, 1883; Anne, born June 10, 1819;
David, born September 8, 1821; Jane, born August 20, 1824, died December 21,
1893; George, born December 1825. The
foregoing children were by the first wife; the following by the second:
Benjamin, born October 20, 1832, died December 9, 1856; Thomas, born February
22, 1831; Henry, born April 23, 1835, died February 18, 1905. The dates of the death of Anne, David,
George, Thomas I and Thomas II are unknown.
Grandfather
Lloyd's father died about March 1835, just before the birth of his son Henry.
While in
his twenties, grandfather Lloyd went over into Monmouthshire to the town of Blackwood, probably to
work, for it was in the Blackwood Branch of the Church that he was baptized on February 15, 1852. It was also in Blackwood that he met Anne
Thomas, who later became his wife. Since
Anne was baptized on July
20, 1849 and was, therefore, a member of the Church when he went to
Blackwood and first became acquainted with her, it is possible that she had
something to do with his conversion. William J., John, Benjamin, Thomas, and
Henry are the only members of the family who joined the Church.
On July 17, 1852, the 'Seventh
General Epistle of the First Presidency' was published in the British Isles, in
which the saints were exhorted to gather to Utah.
The following quotation is taken from this Epistle: "Let all who can procure a bit of bread and
one garment on their backs, be assured there is water plenty and pure by the way,
and doubt no longer, but come next year to the place of gathering, even in
flocks, as doves fly to their windows before a storm."
The Spirit
of Gathering got into grandfather's blood early and he heeded the exhortation,
for just a year after his baptism he decided to emigrate to America; so
together with his sweetheart, Ann Thomas, and his stepmother, Martha Lloyd, he
went up to Liverpool and arranged for the transportation. At this time Samuel W. Richards was in charge
of the British Mission and was the Church Emigration Agent at Liverpool.
Passage was secured on the
'Falcon', a 900 ton boat, under Captain A. T. Wade. A voyage across the Atlantic
in those days of slow ocean travel consumed a great deal of time. It was a matter of some concern, therefore, to
have the boat sufficiently stocked with food to last the entire trip. The British Government fixed the scale of
provisions for ocean-going vessels, and the following was the weekly dietary
scale for an adult for voyages between England and North America on a boat like
the 'Falcon:' 3 ½ lbs. of bread, 1 lb. flour, 1 ½ lbs. oatmeal, 1 ½ lbs. rice,
1 ½ lbs. peas, 2 lbs. potatoes, 1 ¼ lbs. beef, l lb. Pork, 1 lb. sugar, 2 oz.
tea, 2 oz. salt, ½ oz. mustard, ¼ oz. pepper, 1 gill vinegar, 3 quarts of water
daily; and 10 gallons of water for cooking purposes to every hundred
passengers.
Through an
error in the Emigration office grandfather Lloyd was notified to come to Liverpool two weeks before the 'Falcon' sailed. This unanticipated expense of having to pay
board and lodging for three for a period of two weeks in a strange city greatly
reduced his already meager funds, so that after paying his passage, he had
practically nothing left.
Just before
the boat left the harbor at Liverpool on March 28, 1853, he and Anne
Thomas were married on board the ship by one Mr. [McNaughton]. After fifty-two
days of ocean voyage they landed in New
Orleans on May 18, 1853. There
were 324 passengers on board, and those of that number who were Church
emigrants were under the jurisdiction of Cornelius Bagnall, who was the
president of the company.
From New Orleans they went up
to St. Louis to Keokuk, Iowa, which was a camping place for all emigrants prior
to their journey west by land. On June
2, 1853, they left Keokuk and traveled overland in an ox-team company, passing
through Council Bluffs on July 16, and came into the Salt Lake Valley on
September 30, 1853.
Being a
shoemaker by trade, grandfather Lloyd opened a shop as soon as he arrived in Salt Lake City and made
boots for the apostles and the other leaders of the Church, including President
Brigham Young with whom he was on intimate terms. He made a practice of
presenting each missionary from his ward with a pair of shoes made by himself.
His shop
was located in front of and adjoining his residence at 544 West First South
Street. Ha had almost more work than he
could take care of, so he worked long hours.
People from all over town brought their shoes to him, and his policy was
not to turn down any business. Late at
night a light could be seen in his shop and he could be heard at his
bench. The first thing he would notice
when meeting a friend or a stranger would be his shoes, and when his
grandchildren would go into the shop, he would have them raise their feet while
he looked at their shoes to see if they needed mending. His shoe shop, like the
proverbial barber shop, was a rendezvous for anyone- and particularly Welshmen-
who wanted to discuss or argue religion, politics, Welsh history or any other
subject.
The
following four brothers of grandfather Lloyd also came to America: John, Benjamin, Thomas and
Henry. Thomas and Benjamin came into the
Salt Lake Valley
on September 26, 1856
with the first hand-cart company in
charge of Captain Edmund Ellsworth and Daniel D. McArthur. Benjamin did not live long after his arrival;
the journey across the plains was evidently more than he could stand. He was
ill when he arrived in Salt Lake City
and died less than three months later, on December 9, 1856. Thomas settled in Spanish Fork and raised a
large family. Henry, who emigrated about
1875, remained a bachelor and resided with grandfather Lloyd and worked in the
shoe-shop with him. John remained in Newton,
Iowa, having apostatized from the
Church. He left his home in Iowa on November
1, 1883 to come to Salt
Lake City to visit his three brothers and two
children, and died of asthma twenty-two days later, or on November 22, 1883, at the home of
grandfather Lloyd. He was buried on the
William J. Lloyd lot in the Salt
Lake City Cemetery.
Grandfather was pleased that John came out here and he told John that he was
supposed to finish his journey to Utah,
even though he died a few days after his arrival.
Grandfather
Lloyd was known for his liberality and unselfishness. He was always willing to render aid,
financial and otherwise, to those in need, and if he did not happen to have the
money when someone needed help, he would borrow it. There are always some
people who will take advantage of generous souls, and grandfather Lloyd's case
was no exception. Often people came to him to borrow money for different
business ventures, who never intended to pay it back, and never did.
In 1879
when a diphtheria epidemic swept the community and adults as well as children
were stricken and whole families died, grandfather Lloyd went about fearlessly
helping to relieve the suffering of the sick, and assisting in laying out the
dead. He seemed to be immune to the
disease, for in all his contact with it he never took it. All during his life he was among the first to
appear at the sick-bed of friends or members of his community. He would sit up nights with the sick, and in
case of death, as was customary in those days, he would sit up with the dead. He made it a point in his earlier life to attend
all the funerals held in his ward, and always preferred to ride on the hearse
with the driver. He was known as 'The
Funeral Father'.
He had
absolute confidence and implicit faith in President Brigham Young, or
'Brigham,' as he was known among the early pioneers. He would go to Brigham with his troubles and
problems and receive counsel, and would not think of acting contrary to the
advice given. To him, Brigham was the paragon of wisdom in all matters pertaining
to the affairs of this life or the life hereafter. This implicit faith in their leader was
characteristic of practically all the early settlers who lived in Utah under Brigham
Young's leadership.
In 1857,
after the report was received in Salt Lake City
that a detachment of the United States Army was on its way to Utah,
the residents of the Salt
Lake Valley
decided to abandon their homes and move South.
They further agreed that if it became necessary they would apply the
torch to their homes and farms and make the valley as desolate for the army as
it was for the pioneers in 1847. Under
this arrangement grandfather Lloyd took his family down to Spanish Fork, while
he returned and took part in the so-called Echo Canyon War, where a handful of
men prevented the army from entering the valley until the commanding officer
agreed to the terms of entry dictated by Brigham Young.
Grandfather
Lloyd was also a veteran of the Black Hawk Indian War which took place in Utah in 1865. In later years he took great delight in
exhibiting his various guns to his grandchildren.
The
following children were born to William J. and Anne Thomas Lloyd: Mary Jane and
Elizabeth Anne, who were twins, born June 7, 1854. Mary
Jane died on the day of her birth, and Elizabeth Anne lived just ten days. William Thomas, born May 24, 1855; died March 28, 1902. John Heber, born July 23, 1857; died October 30, 1928. Thomas Hyrum, born March 2, 1860; died October 13, 1861. Benjamin Ira, born April 5, 1862; died December 2, 1913. Anne Isabella, born March 16, 1865; died June 16, 1868. George Willard, born April 25, 1868; died July 15, 1904; Charles
Henry, born March 1871; died August
21, 1871.
On December
7, 1867 grandfather Lloyd entered into the order of plural marriage when he
married Elizabeth Evans, whom he called 'Eliza.' Eliza was the daughter of John
Evans and Mary Thomas Evans, was born March 25, 1829 at Brechffa
Village, Carmarthenshire, South Wales, and was baptized in November, 1855. There was born from this marriage on July 6, 1869, a son, David,
who died the same day.
On April 25, 1856 William J.
Lloyd and Anne Thomas Lloyd received their endowments in the Salt Lake
endowment House. Eliza Evans Lloyd
received her endowments December
7, 1867.
Anne Thomas
Lloyd died in March 1871 in childbirth, when her ninth child, Charles Henry was
born. Anne was born May 24, 1834; she was taken,
therefore, in the prime of life, having just passed her thirty-seventh
year. She was a very fine little woman;
reserved, extremely neat and immaculate and a fine seamstress. She was very careful of her appearance, and
people who knew her say that she always looked so prim. She was a very unselfish woman and was
fervently devoted to her religion and her family. She had borne a large family; nine times she went into the Valley of the Shadow and then gave her life that life might be born. The fact that she consented
whole-heartedly to her husband's plural marriage and lived under the same roof
in perfect harmony with the second wife, evidences the magnanimity of her soul
and her absolute loyalty to her husband and the marriage relation. No two women living together in such a
relationship ever got along any better than did Anne and Eliza.
After the
death of Anne, Eliza, who had been deprived of children of her own, mothered the
five children left by Anne. There was the new-born babe, Charles Henry; who
followed his mother to the grave six months later; George Willard, 3 years old;
Benjamin Ira, 9; John Heber, 14; and William Thomas, 16. Their own mother could not have loved the
children more and cared for them better than did Eliza. All that has been written about the character
and personality of Anne, applies with equal sincerity to Eliza. She was neat in appearance, a fine
housekeeper and so devoted to her home that she seldom went out anywhere except
possibly to the Tabernacle meetings on Sunday.
It was one of the greatest blessings that ever came into grandfather's
life that he had a woman like Eliza to take care of his home after the death of
his first wife.
On December 2, 1869,
grandfather Lloyd was ordained a seventy in the sixty-second Quorum by James F.
Cleary, Richard Golightly and William Jones, and on May 9. 1874 he received a
call to perform a mission in England. He accepted the call and arrived in Liverpool in July of that year. In the Millennial Star of July 7, 1874 appears the following
item: 'William J. Lloyd and Thomas F.
Thomas have been appointed to labor in the Welsh Conference under the direction
of Elder Henry Hughes.' Prior to his
emigration, grandfather Lloyd was troubled with an asthmatic condition which
never did leave him entirely but which was greatly improved after his coming to
this country. On account of this
condition he was rather reluctant about accepting a call to return to his
native land as a missionary, so he took the matter up with President
Young. He was counseled to go, but if he
found that living in England
aggravated this condition, he was to return home immediately. After spending a short time in Wales
he found that the climate was again bringing back the old trouble, so he
returned home.
One example
of the spirituality of the family is shown in the following incident. In the early Spring of 1875, his son Will,
made a trip to Emigration
Canyon to inspect what
was supposed to be a coal mine in which Will was interested. He let himself down a sixty-foot shaft on a
rope, which unfortunately did not reach the bottom. When he reached the end of the rope, and
found it short, he attempted to climb back to the top. Failing in this he dropped to the bottom of
the shaft and suffered bruises about the face, and lost several teeth. Will was missed around home, and when three
days and nights had passed with no word of his whereabouts, the family became
alarmed. Inquiry was made, but there
were no clues as to where he had gone.
Grandfather Lloyd related that after Will had been in the hole three
days without food or water, grandmother Lloyd, who had been dead for four
years, appeared to him during the night and told him where her son was. Will's brother, John, had been to the place
before and was able to take father to the mine.
When they reached the shaft and kicked some snow down, they heard Will's
voice below. After being rescued, Will
related the interesting fact that his mother had also appeared to him and
assured him that his father would come to his aid. It is very probable that had it not been for
this manifestation he would have perished from hunger and cold.
On August 6, 1882, another
shadow passed over grandfather's life, for on that date Eliza, who was then in
her fifty-third year, passed away very suddenly. He felt this loss very keenly, and it is
undoubtedly true that he missed her more than he had missed Anne. When Anne died, he still had Eliza; when
Eliza died, he had no one. For the
following twenty-one years he lived alone without a companion. The declining years of his life, therefore,
when he needed the loving care of a wife, he spent in loneliness.
It was also
in the winter of 1882 that grandfather's step-mother, Martha, died. Martha married again and was living in
Spanish Fork at the time of her death.
While
shoemaking was not an exceptionally lucrative trade in those days, grandfather
Lloyd managed through hard work and frugality to accumulate considerable
property. His hobby- if it can be called
such- was to build houses on this property, and nothing pleased him more than
to have a building under construction.
The adobes that went into these houses were made on the property by him
or his sons. He built approximately
twelve houses- or more- which he rented.
He gave his sons lots on which to build, and they all lived on the same
block with him.
In his
building activities he employed a number of men. He had an arrangement with these employees to
hold back ten percent of their wages which represented their tithing. He would
then pay their tithing to the tithing office in shoes equivalent to the amounts
withheld from each man. Under this
arrangement the benefits were twofold: the men were encouraged to pay their
tithing, and the shoe business was stimulated.
That
grandfather Lloyd was a family man can be seen from his own large family. Child mortality was very high in those days;
out of his ten children, five died within nineteen months after birth. One lived thirty-nine months and only four
grew to maturity. These were the four
sons: William, John, Benjamin and George.
William married his cousin, Martha Lloyd; John married Sarah J. Jones;
George married Kate Davis. Benjamin
married Laura Morgan, who died shortly after the marriage. His second marriage was to Margaret Harries
whom he also lost. He then married
Carrie Harries, a sister to Margaret.
William,
John and Benjamin were printers, grainers and decorators; George was a
carpenter. Grandfather was very proud of
his sons' ability in their respective vocations, for each was an expert in his
line. He would frequently bring his
friends to his son's places to show them the interior decoration of the houses
and the oil paintings on the walls.
William, John, and Benjamin enjoyed the reputation of being the best
grainers in the state of Utah
and their services were in great demand where first-class work was
desired.
William J.
Lloyd was what people call a good man.
He had his faults, it is true, and in his later years was inclined to be
a little eccentric in some respects, but he was a man of strong character. He was honest and straightforward; a man of
strictly temperate habits. He was
sympathetic, and his charities were bestowed without show or display; he helped
the needy because helping seemed to be an inherent trait of character. He was industrious and thrifty. He was devoted to his religion and made it
part of his daily life; he was loyal to the leaders of the Church.
On arising
one morning in the autumn of 1902, he had the misfortune to fall, which
resulted in the breaking of some of his ribs.
This was the beginning of the end.
For the following six months he was confined to his bed, dropsy set in
and he gradually grew weaker. He died on
May 29, 1903,
then in his eightieth year. The funeral
was held in the old Fifteenth Ward where he resided for fifty years.
William J.
Lloyd is entitled to all the credit due one who came to Utah in the early days. He came in 1853, six years after the first
pioneers, but was here early enough to experience some of the hardships and
trials of the early days. The deeds of
good men live after them. The life of
William J. Lloyd will always be remembered by those who knew him as a life of
service to his fellowmen, and his good deeds will always stand as monuments to
his memory.
Salt Lake City,
Utah
April 15,
1933
