Lafayette Guymon

GEDCOM Note

New Family Search person Id: KWCV-CYJ Lafayette Guymon was born September 19, 1840, on a farm. The place was called Bear Creek in Hancock Co., Illinois and was twenty-five miles from Nauvoo. One day while living here, his father came into the house, sat down and cried like his heart would break. He asked his mother what was the matter, and she said the mob had just murdered Joseph and Hyrum. One day while living here, grandfather and Lafayette were in Nauvoo, they heard a steamboat coming up the Mississippi River. Grandfather said, “Do you want to see a steamboat?” Father was delighted, and as they were hurrying down toward the river, a man who stopped and shook hands stood and talked a few minutes. When they started to go on, the man put his hand on Father’s head and said, “Is this your little boy?” After they had passed on, grandfather said the man was the Prophet Joseph Smith. Quite a memory; the only time he ever saw the Prophet and a steamboat. It was here in Parowan that father grew to manhood. When he was eighteen years old he was called by Wm. H. Dayne, the President of the Stake to go on what was called the White Mountain mission. This mission was a company of men who were selected to go into the mountains and pick out a place for the Saints to drop back into when Johnston’s Army came to Utah. This was a trying experience for a boy of eighteen as he was thrown into an environment where to ride a bronco and smoke a cigarette was the most important achievement. The consequences were that he achieved some of those things together with swearing. They were grave months. (In Father’s younger days he learned to smoke and drink coffee, and he did this for thirty years. There came a time in his life when he awakened to the fact that it was not good for him, then he had a young family to raise and he might not be equal to it. He determined to quit. Well do I remember him throwing his pipe away and then hunting it again. It took the supreme effort of his life to put that under his feet. One day while plowing in his field, he kneeled down behind his plow and sought the Lord in dead earnest, and in the humility of his heart to give him strength to quit. We all know how well he succeeded, and how we all love him today for that struggle. Ever since then he had strictly observed the Word of Wisdom and has lived in a spiritually better way.) When he came back he hired out to a man named Jefferson Hunt to drive an ox team to Salt Lake; to Carson Valley. He kept a mail station on the head of the Humboldt River for three months. Here he passed through some very rough and dangerous experiences. After this he came back to Parowan where he met and married Margaret Mortensen, a Danish girl, when they were both twenty one years of age, in the year 1861. During the next thirteen years they were blessed with seven children. One of the hard experiences which they passed through was the severe illness of their 19 month old baby, James, who had spinal meningitis. After he was well, they noticed he seemed very independent and paid no attention to those around him. One day father grew curious and rang a little bell directly behind him. The baby never even looked around. It was then that they realized their little boy was deaf. Also their baby boy Isaiah died. In spite of these sorrows they were very happy and were just getting well fixed financially when his wife died of heart trouble and left him with six children: Marcus, James, Anne, Mary, Enoch and Heber. Father said one of the bitterest experiences of his life was when she passed from them. Soon after this misfortune came financial reverses and they lost practically everything they had. Their dairy herd perished in the snow at Fountain Green. The snow was four feet on the level and six feet in the mountains. Two years later he met, loved and married my mother, Phoebe Perkins. Though still in her teens she cared for his large family. Soon after their marriage, Mary, a lovely girl of eleven years old died on the 4th of July with heart trouble, while they were returning from seeing a doctor about her. They were stopping at a man’s home, named Dodson, in Minersville. Her mother was buried here so they laid her away there too before returning home. They passed through some very trying times together. Mother lost her first babies, a pair of twins. Their financial ventures all seemed to utterly fail, but during these trying scenes, while working hauling ore at the little town called Shonty, they went to the St. George Temple where they were sealed for eternity. Aunt Margaret was sealed first and all the children but the oldest son, Marcus.

One of the sterling qualities which always stood out in Father’s life was his absolute honesty. Wherever he went he seemed to gather about him a circle of warm and true friends. I can remember the spirit of sociability that existed among the people when I was a child; how neighbors and friends would visit back and forth and give help to each other with their different kinds of work.

While here [Mancos, Colorado] , Father and Mother passed through an experience which will always be a great testimony to me. Living in Mancos were some very well-educated and refined people from the east who were not members of our church. Their refinement and culture appealed to our folks and before they were aware they were drinking in with their ideas. They were well supplied with books such as Ingersoll and Tom Payne’s “Age of Reason”, etc. The result was that less and less time was spent by our parents, studying their own religion and they began to wonder if Mormonism amounted to much after all. Yet during these years Father said he felt a restlessness and dissatisfaction, which he could not get away from. Bishop George Halls and his brother William were very dear friends of ours and often came to visit them. When one has once had the light of the Gospel, they can go to the ends of the earth, but they cannot get away from the truth. The spirit of the Lord was striving with them, so one day Father left his work and went up in the pine trees above his farm and knelt down in earnest prayer to his Heavenly Father to let him know the truth of things. All the beauty and truth of the Gospel came flooding back to him, and from that day the Gospel was dearer than life to him.

Just as prosperity seemed to be ours at last, Mother’s health began to fail. Everything that money could do was done for her but all to no avail. She went to Battle Creek, Michigan, New Mexico and different places but she grew steadily worse. Well do I remember the partings when she went away and left us at home with Father. These were surely anxious, trying years for them both and naturally used up the accumulated resources and left them in debt. At last it was found that the climate of the San Juan River Valley agreed with Mother, so they decided to move there. I can just see the look of pain and regret on Father’s face when the men came to buy his beloved farm. There seemed to be no alternative but to sell the farm and go to a lower climate. I was only ten years old then and did not realize what a struggle Father was passing through. I can today, in a measure, realize the emotions in his heart as he prepared to leave the dear old place, and take us children in the wagon to join Mother and Lucy who had already gone to New Mexico. It also meant leaving Enoch, and Jimmy and Annie, which was hard for him to do. I don’t think a man ever left it and faced the future like a hero. There was always that quality in Father, when he made up his mind that a thing had to be done and it was his duty, he would pitch in and do it without looking back.

I shall never forget the day we arrived in the little town of Kirtland, New Mexico. It was in the spring of 1900 and springtime in New Mexico generally means sand storms, and one was raging in all its fury and mother happened to be gone. Well, we were not overjoyed at the reception in the new place, but our hearts soon warmed at Mother’s return, and our joy was very complete to see that her heath had improved. Now began an altogether new experience for Father. He had been used to farming on a large scale, on the best fertile soil, and an abundance of water. Here there seemed to be principally sand, sand burs, and broken ditches. His farming experience became very trying and it became necessary for him to do something besides. Mother kept the Post Office and a small store, and Father took care of the stage horses.

Though we were not particularly financially prosperous here, we dearly loved the people, and enjoyed our activities in a church capacity. Among the pleasing incidents here were the beautiful prayer meetings which we and the officers and teachers of the ward attended every Sunday morning. It was after that, that the beauties of the Gospel first took root in my heart, and it strengthened us all to see our parents taking an active part in the Church. Some of the dearest friends of Father’s life were made here; Bishop Ashcroft, Elmer Taylor, and one in particular, Brother L W. Hendrickson. I can just see him now coming in on Saturday morning for Father to go ward teaching. Sometimes Father was not very anxious to go, but he would not be put off and they went. All through these years the love of the Gospel was growing in Father’s heart, and as I look back over these years I can see what a glorious refining influence the Gospel can be when one opens his heart to its blessings. One of the precious memoires of my life is my father’s earnest prayers. When any real problem faced him he would get down on his knees and talk to the Lord just like he would to a father. By this time Lucy and Chauncey had arrived and gone to homes of their own. Just Grace, Lafe and I remained of all the two families. When we had lived here about ten years, mother’s health again began to fail and we girls were very desirous of attending the BYU at Provo, Utah. Well do I remember the earnestness with which Father asked the guidance of the Lord of this move. It seemed that the way opened beyond our expectations, for we sold the home and all the furnishings for much more than we ever dreamed of getting. We came to Provo in June, 1910 and bought a home in the fifth ward. We were very happy here and how we did all enjoy and appreciate the BYU and all that a place like Provo had to offer in education and culture. Father and Mother soon adjusted to this change and in just a few short years gathered around them a host of warm friends. It was such a comfort to us all to know that though we had left our dear friends behind, that the same Gospel was here as there and whenever the saints are found the friendly spirit is present. We children soon met our companions and moved to homes of our own; they were pretty lonely for a while but they soon grew used to being without us and they were happier together than they had ever been in their lives. They were both working in the Church organizations, and their big responsibilities had rolled from their shoulders. Father was custodian of the fifth ward meeting house for many years, and Mother was president of the Primary for some time. They both became associated with some of the finest people in the ward. While here they were called by Bishop Albert Manwaring, and President J.B. Keeler to go to the Salt Lake Temple and receive their second anointing’s. A few peaceful years went by and Mother became very ill and after several months of intense suffering, she passed away on the 6th of July, 1922. This was a great sorrow to Father as he had come to depend on Mother so much. He always had a very independent disposition and would not hear to think of living with any of us. Finally Lafe and Minnie came to live in part of the home. During the next few years Father devoted his energies to research and temple work for his mother’s people. He secured a life membership in the Genealogical Society of Utah. I helped him with his research and letter writing. We hired a trained researcher and secured 666 names which were placed in the Salt Lake Temple for baptism and endowments. This work was a great joy to him. Although his extreme age made it very difficult for him to accomplish, he worked in the temple until his health began to fail. After a severe spell of sickness, Father, after much persuasion, came to make his home at our house. H did his own cooking and waited on himself just as long as he possibly could. He had a very pleasant frame room of his own and appreciated very deeply every kindness shown him. He loved to work in our garden and did so until he could no longer distinguish the weeds from the vegetables. It was a great trial to him to be idle. I think he rolled our baby, Marjory, nearly a thousand miles in her buggy. He was always an early riser and would often get up several hours ahead of us and wait for his breakfast. He lived with us for nearly six years, and while here, I sat with him for many hours while he related to me the history of his life which I have written here. His life has been an inspiration to me. It was not easy for him to live the Gospel, but he did so the very letter, and those who knew him best loved him the most. The things he overcame and put under his feet gives me courage to go forward and overcome the obstacles and trials, and difficulties that confront me from day to day. At the coming of our last baby, Father went to live with his daughter, Lucy, at Toadlena, New Mexico. It was with strange fear that we bad him goodbye, for we could not help but know that we would not see him again in this life. He stayed with Lucy for just one year when he passed from this life, sure in the faith that he was going home to his wives and his Father in Heaven. Lucy said the last thing he did was to sing the “Doxology”, and when he had finished he said, “Did I sing it right?” and she answered, “Yes, every word.” He lived to the age of 94. They brought him to Provo for his funeral and laid him beside Mother in the Evergreen Cemetery at Springville, Utah.

• Reference: FamilySearch Genealogy - SmartCopy: Jun 17 2021, 1:45:54 UTC