John Nicholas
was born on August 12, 1815, in Fishguard, Pembrokeshire, Wales, to William Nicholas and
Hannah Jenkins. His father, William, was born on May 12, 1786, at Fishguard,Pembrokeshire, Wales. His
father and mother married on December 28, 1813, at Fishguard.
John with his father and mother and brother David, left Liverpool on February
4, 1854, on board the ship Golconda.
They arrived in New Orleans on Saturday, March
18, 1854, just 42 days after leaving Liverpool.
They traveled up the Mississippi River to St.
Louis. There were ten deaths in their company of
saints between New Orleans and St. Louis. John's mother, Hannah, died and
was buried on March 30, 1854, somewhere in Mississippi.
The
remaining family traveled to and settled in Brigham City, Utah.
John's father, William died on April 30, 1865, at Brigham City. John worked as a shoemaker.
John and Mary Ann Morgan were married in Spanish Fork, Utah. Mary Ann Morgan was born September 16,
1838, in Llanelly, Carmarthenshire, Wales to John
Morgan and Lydia Leigh.
John and Mary Ann's eldest child, John M. Nicholas, was born at
Spanish Fork on June 27, 1858. William
H. Nicholas was their second child and was born in Brigham City on October 21, 1862. John and Mary
Ann moved to Malad City, Idaho, sometime between
January of 1874, when their daughter Martha was born in Brigham City, and April
of 1876, when the youngest child Hannah was born in Malad.
In addition to
working as a shoemaker, John owned and operated a hotel and planted the first
fruit trees grown in the Malad Valley.
The hotel business continued in the family, later on being owned and operated by
daughter Elizabeth Emma and family.
William Henry
Nicholas was the second of seven children born to John and Mary Ann. He was born
at Brigham, Utah, on October 21, 1862. The family
consisted of four girls and three boys. William Henry would have been 12 to 14
years of age when the family moved to Malad.
William Henry
related many stories of his experiences while employed by a freighting company that
transported supplies from Corinne, Utah, to the mines at Butte, Montana.
At the time, Corinne was the terminus of the Oregon Short Line Railroad and was
the closest railhead to Butte.
The freight was hauled in covered wagons and pulled by four or six oxen depending
on the size of wagon. The person driving the ox teams was called a drover and walked
alongside the oxen, and with the help of a sturdy staff, prodded the oxen on
their way. The oxen responded to the verbal command "Gee" for a turn
to the right and "Haw" for a turn to the left. They were constantly
on the lookout for bandits or marauding groups of hostile Indians.
Submitted by: Mark Nicholas
