Mary Ann Phillips

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Deseret News February 1, 1871 Page 1

Mary Phillips was born in Worcestershire, England, December 4, 1773, and died in Kaysville, Utah Territory, January 19, 1871, being in her 98th year. Her parents were Methodists and she was christened in a Methodist chapel.

She was a member of Lady Huntington's Church some fifteen years, and then joined the United Brethern, under Father Thomas Kington, until Elder Wilford Woodruff visited Herefordshire in 1840, when he baptized her into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

She emigrated to Nauvoo in 1844 in her 70th year, in time to see the Prophet Joseph before his martyrdom. She lived on Camp Creek, fifteen miles from Nauvoo; was driven into Nauvoo by a mob, was carried in on a bed of sickness; was driven out of Nauvoo with the rest of the Saints in 1846. She stopped at Winter Quarters, where she lost, by fire, what little property she had saved from the mob.

She emigrated to Salt Lake Valley in 1850 moved to Kaysville in 1851, where she resided up to the time of her death.

She officiated in the capacity of midwife for forty-five years; and until she was ninety-six years of age waited upon some thirty women annually, and never lost a woman under her administration, and never a child until two years before her death.

She had 11 children, two of whom were in the valley at the time of her death, the youngest fifty-four years of age. She had thirty-five grandchildren in the Valley and thirty-one great-grandchildren.

When eighty-two years old she gleaned over twenty bushels of wheat and raised thirty bushels of potatoes and dug and carried them into her cellar. She fatted two hogs, and gave a good yoke of oxen the same year to emigrate the poor from England. During the fore part of the winter of this same season she had a fall, dislocating her shoulder and breaking her collar bone, which affected her afterwards in her labor.

She also had a fall some three months before her death, which is supposed to have shortened her days. She made a will of all the property she had, including some fifteen head of horned stock, to emigrate her relatives from England to Utah. She possessed a great memory, which she retained with her intellect in full up to her death.

She appointed six of her grandsons to be her pallbearers, who fulfilled her request. She has been true and faithful to her family, her friends, her religion and her God, and has gone down to her grave like a shock of corn fully ripe, and awaits a glorious resurrection. She was supposed to be the oldest person in the Territory.

A large assembly attended her funeral on Sunday last, 22nd inst. Elder Woodruff preached her funeral sermon and spoke one hour, which was reported by Elder G. D. Watt, and was followed by Elder Wm. Kay and Bishop Layton. She was followed to the grave by a procession of sixty-one full loaded wagons and carriages, besides several horsemen.