Mormon Pioneer

Whipple, Edson –(9th Ten) Born Feb. 5, 1805, in Dummerston, Windham Co., Vt., to Timothy and Elizabeth Safford Whipple.* (see note below as this parentage seems to be a mistake). He married Lavinie Goss on Feb. 16, 1832. He was baptized in Philadelphia, Pa., on June 15, 1840, and was set apart as first counselor in the Philadelphia Branch. They moved to Nauvoo, in September 1842. In 1844 he was called on a mission to promote Joseph Smith's candidacy for president of the United States. During this mission, the martyrdom occurred. He returned to help complete the Nauvoo Temple and spent the winter of 1845-46 making wagons. At Council Bluffs, Iowa, he was counseled to locate at Pony Creek, 30 miles south. There, his mother died Sept. 9 and his wife died Sept. 13, and their only daughter a few weeks later. "Of the whole camp, consisting of 14 families, all but two persons were sick," he wrote in his history. "Thus my whole family died, martyrs to Christ." In the first company, he was assigned to be a night guard, taking watch half the night every third night. After arriving in Salt Lake Valley he farmed for Heber C. Kimball and raised some 400 bushels of grain. He was a member of the first high council in Salt Lake City. He started east on a business trip with 11 members of the Mormon Battalion. While there, he was called to assist Wilford Woodruff to gather out the Saints from the Eastern States. Whipple was later a captain of Fifty on a wagon train to Salt Lake Valley that arrive Oct. 13, 1850. He married gain and went to Iron County with George a. Smith and helped settle Parowan. It was his city plan that was accepted and followed. He and a Brother Brimhall built the first water-powered threshing machine and threshed the first crop of grain grown in the settlement. He was elected to the Parowan City Council in 1851. Shortly after, Brigham Young visited the new colony and advised him to move to Provo, Utah Co., and he complied. He died in Colonia Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico, on May 11, 1894, at age 89..."

SOURCE: http://www.ldschurchnews.com/articles/58061/Biographies-of-the-original-1847-pioneer-company.html

Relationship Note:

The LDS news article above says that his parents are "Timothy and Elizabeth Safford Whipple..." Other online family history sites indicate that this is incorrect and that his parents are John Whipple (1756-1830) and Basmoth Elnore Hutchins (1769-1846)

SOURCE: http://genweb.whipple.org/d0482/I176.html

Resources:

• Biography
• Diary
• Autobiography part 1
• Autobiography part 2