DAVID CROCKETT

 

 

 DAVID CROCKETT

    David Crockett was born on December 30, 1806 on one of the Fox Islands off the Atlantic coast of Maine.  The place is called Vinalhaven and is in Knox County.   The islands are covered with pine trees and the main industry is fishing.   James was the son of James Crockett and Elizabeth Breckett and the grandson of Isaac Crockett, who was also born on the island in 1746.   David married Lydia Young on December 20, 1830 when he was twenty-three years old.
    David was among the first people on the Eastern seaboard who accepted the gospel as taught by the missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.   The missionary who taught David and his family was Wilford Woodruff when he was on his first church mission;
    Wilford noted in his missionary journal about the receptiveness of the people and they had been able to convert the entire congregation after preaching to them, The Crocketts had been attending a church where the minister was Baptist.
    In 1847, the Crockett family had a strong desire to be associated with the main body of saints.  ,  So with a team and a wagon, they started for Nauvoo, Illinois.  They arrived there during October of 1841.   They had seven children at that time, the oldest, Alvin, was ten years old and the youngest Wilford Woodruff Crockett was only a few months old at the time.   The baby was three months old when they reached Nauvoo.   They became eye witnesses to and shared in the hardships that were endured prior to the great exodus to the west in 1846.
    During the entire winter during their stay in Nauvoo, the whole Crockett except for Alvin, was confined to their beds with the fever that was probably malaria.   Twelve-year-old Alvin took care of them as best he could.   He chopped wood in the nearby forest and brought t home in a wagon for  fuel to keep the family warm during the cold winter months.
    When the saints were driven from their home in Nauvoo, the Crockett family settled in Dover, Davis County, Iowa. They made their living by farming on shares until April 1849.   They then traveled to the Missouri River where they remained until July 4, 1849.   On that day, they left for the Great Salt Lake Valley with the Williard Richards Wagon Train Company.
    By this time, they had added three more children and they now had a total of ten children.   David William was just fifteen months old.   Lydia, who was now thirty-seven years old was pregnant while crossing the plains in the heat of the summer.
    David Crockett,  arrived in the Salt Lake Valley October 19, 1849, on the 18th birthday of his son, Alvin.  In 1851 he was sent by Brigham Young to help colonize the settlement at Peteetneet.  
    When they arrived, they were told that all of the land had been taken up that could be watered by the creek.  Disappointed, they and the David Fairbank family turned eastward and became the first settlers of Pond Town.
    Later, the people at Fort Peteetneet reconsidered and the Crocketts returned when more land was opened for settlement.  The city was incorporated January 1, 1853, and David Crockett was elected first mayor of Payson.  He served the term of 1853-54, and was reelected for two additional terms, 1855-56 and 1857-58.  He was later elected alderman and served the term of 1859-60.
    David's wife Lydia,  was a midwife.  The family moved to Logan about 1860, where Alvin Crockett became the first mayor of that city.
    The Payson City was incorporated on January 21, 1853 and the first Mayor elected in the new     city was David Crockett.   Payson had been  incorporated, through action of the Territorial Legislature of Utah.  The settlement then included Spring Lake Villa to the south and Summit (Santaquin) to the southwest.   He was elected immediately after the  incorporation of the city.   He served the term of 1853-1854.  Later, he was re-elected and served two additional terms, 1855-56 and 1857-58.  After this he served a term as alderman in 1859-60 and then moved his family to northern Utah.  His son, Alvin, became the first mayor of the City of Logan.  
    The year 1855 was ushered in with all the peace and prospects of a good life that one could expect in a new country with the people surrounded with tribes of Indians, almost shut out from the knowledge of the world, subject to plagues of insects, droughts and so on.
    The "Reformation" was faithfully preached into the first part of 1857, and its constantly burn¬ing fire finally began to make havoc in the ranks of the unbelievers.   The work was so successful that on March 16th of that year some 228 persons went down to Peteetneet Creek and were re-baptized in the icy waters that flowed from the snow banks in the canyon.  Public and private confessions of faults and sins were common and a very happy state of affairs existed.  Every man was inspired with a desire to do right, make restitution for injuries to others, and accept peace offerings from his neighbor.  Meetings were well attended and speakers spoke as men with authority.
    Immense quantities of grain were sown that year and a large harvest was reaped.  It is possible the Lord saw the humbleness of the people and rewarded them accordingly.
    Now word reached the settlers that James Buchanan, president of the United States, was sending an army to quell an uprising of the Mormons in Utah Territory.
    Because of the pressing need for doctors and midwives, a few Payson women went to Salt Lake City to take a course in obstetrics offered by the Relief Society.  Romania Hyde was instructor.  Those attending were Lucinda Patten, Mrs.  John (Sarah) Koonz and Mary Oberhansly
The colonists at Peteetneet (Payson) were among the first to use irrigation as a means of watering their crops.
    Only three years earlier, Brigham Young's pioneers of 1847 had been some of the first Anglo- Saxons to use irrigation in the North American continent.   So it was that when John C.  Searle plowed the first irrigation ditch in Payson, he was among the first in the New World to try this method of turning water onto arid lands.   Within a few months after their arrival, the first seventeen families believed the water supply too low to support additional settlers.  Thus it was that they directed newcomers to the springs three miles east of Peteetneet.
    The situation was serious, more settlers were coming into the colony almost every week, and the people began to look about for means of developing additional water.
    In 1854 Mayor David Crockett  and other city officials caused a dam to be built at the spring where Spring Lake Villa would be established three miles south of Payson.  Water could be stored in this man-made lake and used as needed.  It was channeled through what has always been known as Spring Creek and used to irrigate lands southwest of Payson..
    David married Lucinda Sophronia Ellsowrth Pierce I 1856, who was divorced from her prvious husband.   She was one of Payso’s first school teachers.   David's wife, Lydia, was a midwife.   They family moved to Logan about 1860, where his son, Alvin Crockett, became the first mayor of that city.
    David Crockett died on April 12, 1876, and Lydia died March 11, 1888,   Lucinda died December 11, 1915.  David and both of his wives are buried in the Logan City Cemetery.