Allen Family History

Patriarchal blessing given to William Davies:

(Volume 12, page 604) No. 1495

A Blessing by John Smith Patriarch upon the head of William Davies Son of Thomas & Mary born Glamorganshire, South Wales Jan 13th 1810.

Brother William in the name of Jesus Christ I place my hands upon your head & Seal upon you a patriarchal or fathers Blessing. Even all the Blessings of the new & Everlasting covenant. You are of the Blood & Lineage of Abraham through the Loins of Judah & Ephraim by inheritance to the everlasting priesthood which shall make you acquainted with all the hidden mysteries of the Redeemers Kingdom. You Shall be Blest in your family they shall increase like Jacob inherit all the blessings and gifts of the everlasting Priesthood. You shall have power to rebuke the waves of the Sea and turn rivers out of their course cause streams to spring forth in dry places feed thousands by the power of faith your children shall stand their dominions to the ends of the Earth, by the power of your prayers you shall overcome every opposition. Gather your wife & children to the land Zion live to see the (______) of wickedness on the Earth that see your Redeemer & converse with him face to face & inherit all the Blessings of Zion & his Kingdom with all your fathers house. Even so amen.

Life Sketch of William Davis and Elizabeth Williams:

William Davis was born October 3, 1810 in Gwytherin, Denbighshire, Wales and Elizabeth Williams was born April 10, 1812 in Llansannan in the same county. The two were married August 9, 1834 and had three chidlren.

William and Elizabeth joined the Church in 1850. Wanting to join the main body of the Saints, they set sail on the Samuel Curling April 19, 1856 with their children, Jane, Ellen, and Elizabeth and about 700 other Saints. They arrived in Boston on May 23 and then traveled by train to Iowa City. Since the rail line ended there, the Saints disembarked and began gathering supplies for a trek across the plains to Utah.

William, who was a carpenter and wheelwright, was very useful to the company and made several handcarts for the Saints. He was asked to stay and help make more carts for other handcart companies. His daughters soon left for Utah with a handcart William had made but William's wife remained behind with him.

Sadly, while working on handcarts in Iowa City, William was stricken with camp fever and died July 25, 1856. He was only in his forties. Heartbroken, Elizabeth left for the west with the next pioneer company. She was so grief stricken that she was too weak to push a cart and had to ride in a wagon. She cried day and night until one day she heard the voice of her husband call, Elizabeth, three times in a reprimanding tone. It brought her to realize she was doing wrong and helped her overcome her grief.

Elizabeth made it to the Salt Lake Valley and settled in Provo, Utah, where she died on October 29, 1888.

Research Report:

Davies2006Oct/0346 20 October 2006

Objectives

Determine if Elizabeth (Williams) Davies (1812-1888) crossed the plains in the famed Willie & Martin Handcart Company. Verify birth and death info for William Davies.

Results

At website “Mormon Pioneer Overland Travel, 1847-1868,” under Church History at www.lds.org, which contains a complete listing of handcart companies and participants, clarified statements in article “A History of William John Lewis and Jane Davis,” found at www.welshmormonhistory.org.

Elizabeth (Williams) Davies (1812-1888), crossed the plains in the Edward Martin Company (1856), according to her obituary in The Daily Enquirer [document 1]. This company departed on 28 July 1856 and arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on 30 November 1856 [document 2]. It was one-half of the well-known Willie & Martin Handcart Company according to the Wikipedia article “Mormon handcart pioneers,” available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_handcart_pioneers#1856:__Willie_and_Martin_handcart_companies.

Printed a complete list of members of the Edward Martin Company (1856) [document 3]. Additional biographical information and sources are available for each participant in this incident. To access this material, please visit the website sited above. There is also an extensive bibliography about the company available online at that site.

William John Lewis, age 24, and his wife Jane (Davies) Lewis, age 21, appear in the Edward Bunker Company (1856) [documents 4-5]. Included is a brief description of that company [document 6]. The participants in this handcart company and sources regarding them are available online.

Initial attempts to verify birth info for William Davies through LDS Branch Records in Wales frustrated by fact that chapel register for Denbigh, Denbighshire, in North Wales, does not survive. Denbigh was the closest meetinghouse for Latter-day Saints who lived in Gwytherin and Llansannan according to the Wales-LDS Maps & Registers finding aid at the Family History Library.

It appears that the article at Welsh Mormon History is factually accurate, except, as you pointed out, it should have stated that William Davies was 44 when he died, not 41. A closer reading also indicated that it did not identify the company in which William’s widow traveled. In attempts to verify the date of death, we checked his widow’s obituary (he died before newspaper began publishing obituaries) available online at the University of Utah’s Utah Digital Newspapers database http://www.lib.utah.edu/digital/unews/ [document 7]. Her husband’s date of death is not specified. There were probably few contemporary records made of William’s death in Iowa City, unless an LDS pioneer recorded his passing in his or her journal.

The Family History Library has acquired published transcripts of the parish registers of Gwytherin, Denbighshire, Wales. There is indeed a christening recorded for Wm. Davis s/o Robt & Eleanor Davis of Pentre dated 10 Oct 1810, with the annotation that he was born on 3 Oct. Curiously, there is also record of a Wm. Davis s/o Robt & Eleanor Davis of Pentre dated 23 Jan 1810 (born 10 Jan). There is no burial for this individual in 1810 on record in that parish. The first entry matches the data we have from secondary sources; however, additional research would need to be conducted in order to verify that this source applies to the LDS pioneer.

Research Report

[LewisEvansDavies102504 / 0346] 31 October 2004

Davies Lineage

After retrieving this researcher's previous research notes from the project file, it became clear a major review was needed of the follow up research which was conducted in the report davies081104 dated 31 August 2004. A brief review of the results demonstrates this need:

Corrected christening date of John Hughes (to 28 Oct 1751, Llansannan); the original date being about 1750. This same date was found previously in October 2003 during a research trip to Wales.

Corrected marriage date of John Williams@ (from no date to 23 Sep 1807, Llansannan). This date was also found in the October 2003 research trip.

Moving on to the research report itself, on page 2 the will of John Williams of Rhydidion Bach was located B however, the original of this will was located in Wales and copied for that report. His christening was previously found, which stated his mother was Elizabeth, formerly Elizabeth Davies of Heskin. His marriage was also located, and a copy of the license obtained.

William Davies

The report mentioned above states the marriage record of William needs to be obtained by correspondence, duly ordered, and received. However, this information was obtained on the Welsh research trip during 2003. Much of this report was a re-do of the Welsh research trip, so it appears the researcher either did not have access to this information, or did not review it prior to his research .

At this point, we agree with the researcher that the lineage of Gaenor (or perhaps Eleanor) Owens is in question. We are a bit concerned that the marriage of Robert Davies to Gaenor was not in the Gwytherin Parish Registers, the Gwytherin Bishop's Transcripts, nor the Hayes Marriage Index for Denbighshire. We also checked the Llangernyw Parish Records for the same information, but no record was located.

While searching in this parish (Llangernyw), we searched 1730-1779 for other children of Robert Davies and Dorothy, and found entries for the following children who were in the data file: David, Catherine, Margaret, Anne, John, Robert, Thomas, and Eleanor, before stopping this search. All of them were children of Robert (shoemaker) and Dorothy.

We also re-examined the Llansannan Parish Registers for more information about the family of Elizabeth Davies wife of David Williams. We found a potential entry for Elizabeth Davies, daughter of Hugh Davies of Heskin and Catharine, christened 13 March 1763. This fits the chronology of a marriage in March 1785 to David Williams. We also searched for the christening of Jonnet Pierce from 1747 to 1761, but it was not located in this parish.

The christening for John Hughes (28 October 1751) in the client PAF file lists his parents as David and Joan Hughes. Looking at the same records above, we discovered his mother was actually Sina or Sinai [document #7] and found additional family members:

William, son of David Hughes of Llwyn y Gibws and Sina his wife 8ber 8 (1749) p. 101 John, son of David Hughes of Llwyn y Gibws and Sinai his wife xber 28 (1751) p. 103 Edward, son of David Hughes of Llwyn Gibws and Sinai his wife May 5 (1754) p. 106 Adam, son of David Hughes of Llan and Sina his wife 9br. 20 (1756) p. 109 John Hughes of this parish and Jonnet Pierce of this parish were Married in this Church by Banns this third Day of May in the Year One Thousand seven Hundred and seventy six p. 351

We now turned our attention back to the marriage of Robert Davies and Eleanor Owens received by correspondence. This marriage took place in the parish of Ysbyty Ifan and a copy was sent to us [document #5]. The transcript states the following:

8 Jan 1797 Robert Davies, X (signed by mark) and Elinor Owen X both of this parish by banns, witnesses: William Davies, X and Edward Davies, X

We checked the Isbyty Ifan Bishop's Transcripts to follow up on this entry, since these records are here. The information is the same, except for the fact the witnesses were not mentioned. We also found an Elizabeth Davies, daughter of Robert Davies and Elinor Owen his wife, who was baptized 6 August 1797. This appears to be a sister of the ancestral William Davies, if this is the right marriage.

We then turned to the Hayes Marriage Index for Denbigh in an attempt to locate a marriage for either of the witnesses mentioned above. The idea behind this search was perhaps one of them was Robert's father. There were no marriages for Edward Davies from 1732-1797 in this parish, but there were several for a William Davies:

William Davies married Sarah Richard 1764 William Davies married to Jane Hughes 1754 William Davies married to Margaret Ellis 1744

We then returned to the Isbyty Ifan Bishop's Transcripts, where we found the family of William Davies and Sarah Richard:

1764, Jan 7 William Davies Bach and Sarah Richard Spinster both of this parish were married by banns 1766, Nov 9 David, the son of William Davies and Sarah his wife (christened) 1768, May 12 Catherine, the dau of William Davies of Tyn Nant and Sarah his wife (chr) 1770, Dec 15 Richard, the son of William Davies of Tyn Nant and Sarah Richard his wife (chr) 1772, Apr 14 Alice, the dau of William Davies of Tyn Nant and Sarah Richard his wife (chr) 1775, Mar 20 Gwen, dau of William Davies of Tyn Nant and Sarah Richard his wife (chr)

As one can see, there is a gap between 1770 and 1772 into which Robert could fit, but it seems unlikely. We also found a Robert Davies, son of Thomas Davies of Plasiolyn and Jane Roberts his wife, christened 25 November 1771. This could fit chronologically with a birth of 22 June 1771. Again the marriage sent to us via correspondence was found in the same source here at the Family History Library in Ysbyty Ifan Parish Registers. Lewis lineage

The report lewis080904 on this family was much better, in that only a little overlap was noticed in comparison to the Welsh research trip of 2003. There was a bit of a red herring in following the John Lewis of Colwinston, but this was a logical item to track down and eliminate. The concern here is this is the only marriage found in the state church for a John Lewis to a Margaret John, and at this time period all people regardless of religious affiliation were required by law to marry in the Church of Wales.

Previous research in Wales determined John Lewis Jr. was buried at a Welsh Independent chapel in 1854; neither of them are in St. David's Probate Index; and they are not in the parish registers of St. John juxta Swansea. There seems to be only one logical conclusion to the marriage issue: perhaps we do not have the correct version of John Lewis and Margaret John's last names (either or both).

During the 2003 research trip we discovered neither the Lewis family nor the Evans family were in the parish registers of St. Johns juxta Swansea, which of course indicates a non-conformist association. We also briefly looked at recommendation #3 from the 27 August 2004 report, which was to search the Llangyfelach Bishop's Transcripts, where we found the baptism of Margaret, daughter of John and Martha Lewis, at Pwllyr dur, Colier, 5 April 1817. We searched these records from 1815 to 1833. Recommendation #4 was dependent upon the 1851 Census Index of Glamorgan arriving at the Family History Library, but it has not appeared yet. Recommendation #5 is really not a great idea, and probably would not work, so should be deferred until everything else has been done.

What remains to be done in Wales on these combined families is still quite imposing. We do need to locate the records (if they exist) of the six Non-Conformist Chapels outlined in the Lewis report. We also need to examine the estate papers of the local landed gentry who were the landlords of the property the ancestral families inhabited in Wales. We can probably find a copy of the 1851 Glamorgan Census Index in Swansea. We also need to order any certificates mentioned.

As for the Davies side, we also need to order any outstanding certificates. The burial records could be retrieved while in Wales quite easily. Here, also, we need to determine if estate papers will help us. This would require us to again travel to the Denbigh County Record Office.

It has been a pleasure to assist you in researching and documenting your family history. We look forward to continuing research according to your instructions.