Eliza R. Snow Smith
President of the Women’s Organizations
of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Eliza R. Snow was born in Becket, Berkshire Co., Mass. Her parents were Oliver Snow of Mass., and Rosetta L. Pettibone, of Conn. They were of English descent, their parents were of English descent, their parents having emigrated to America at an early period. n 1806, the family removed to Mantua, Portage Co., Ohio. Mr. and Mrs. Snow bestowed great care upon the education of their daughter, intellectual and domestic. She began her literary labors when quite young, her contributions over a nom de plume receiving much admiration.
Two volumes of her “Religious, Historical, Political” poems have been published, the first in Liverpool, England, in 1856, the Second in Salt Lake City. Her poems are life like and embody most of our Church history.... The one by which she is best known, perhaps, is, “O, My Father, thou that dwellest,” and ranks in its individuality and popularity as a Latter Day Saints’ doctrinal hymn.... “O My Father” contains doctrine that was new to the world, it was the essence of Mormonism. Every Mormon child is familiar with it and would recognize it in any country.
Sister Eliza early devoted her attention to the Scriptures and in her girlhood formed the acquaintance of the famous preacher and scholar, Alexander Campbell, and other noted divines. In 1835, she went to Kirtland, Ohio, and boarded in the family of the Prophet Joseph, teaching a select school for young ladies. Miss Snow returned home to visit her parents but on the 1st of January, 1837, bade farewell to her paternal home, to share the joys or the afflictions of the Latter Day Saints.
She became a governess to the children of the Prophet, and was a companion for Emma, his wife, for a number of years.
From means she brought with her, Miss Snow gave freely toward building the Kirtland Temple. Persecution soon arose and raged so that, with her family who had now joined the Church, she left Kirtland, going to Davies Co., Mo. On the 10th of December, 1838, Miss Snow with her father’s family, left Davies Co., the Mormons in that locality having been ordered by the Governor to leave the county within ten days.
They passed through almost unendurable sufferings, and reachign Far West found the Prophet and many others had been dragged to jail leaving their families destitute. March 1839, they left Far West leaving much of their property behind. Eliza and her sister stopped in Quincy, Ill., awhile. In July 1839, Miss Snow went to Commerce, (since called Nauvoo) to teach school. During her seven years’ residence there she wrote much and advanced rapidly in her knowledge of the principles of the Gospel. Here, the Relief Society was organized by Joseph, March, 1842, and Sister Eliza was chosen for secretary.... Eliza was at this time the wife of the Prophet. In the latter part of July, 1842, Mrs. Smith, President of the Relief Society, proposed a petition to Governor Carlin, asking his protection of Joseph. Sister Eliza, as secretary, wrote the petition which was signed by several hundred ladies, and in company with President Emma and Mrs. Warren Smith visited the Governor at his residence in Quincy, Adams, Co., Ill., where they were most cordially received by the Governor. He replied to them, “I believe Mr. Smith is innocent.” Soon after their return home they learned that the Governor in connection with Missouri officials was plotting the destruction of the lives of those noble men.
The Prophet and Patriarch were massacred! For awhile, thouth of all else was forgotten but this overwhelming woe. But God gave them his sustaining love, and Eliza, widowed, turned again to the work Joseph had established, consecrating even her life to its service. The Temple was at length finished, and Sister Eliza then began another era, ministering in the Temple in the holy rites that pertain to the House of the Lord, as Priestess and Mother in Israel to hundreds of her sex.
In Feb., 1846, she left Nauvoo, on her way to the Rocky Mountains.... When they were leaving here, they were minus a teamster. Sister Eliza undertook to drive ox team, and after some experience became an adept. August 27th they crossed the Missouri river, and on the 28th, arrived at Winter Quarters. From constant exposure and continued hardships Sister Eliza broke down. Fever set in, chills and fever followed; heavy rains came on and she was wet nearly from head to foot. She felt that she stood at the gates of death, it was but a step beyond, and once inside the portals she would be free from pain and suffering. But the great lifework lay before her, and she summoned sourage and supreme faith to her aid.... About the close of the year she received the sad news of the death of her mother.
April 7th, 1847, the pioneers under the direction of President Brigham Young started to find a gathering place for the Pilgrim Saints. In June Sister Eliza resumed her journey westward. Nursing the sick in tents and wagons, and burying the dead by the wayside in the wild desert were indeed mournful, yes, pitiful.... [They] arrived safely in the valley in October. Here Sister Eliza took up her abode with Mrs. Clara Decker Young.... As time passed on a place was selected and consecrated in which holy ordinances might be administered. Sister Eliza was called upon to take part, in which calling she has officiated up to the present. When the wards and settlements were pretty generally systematized, Pres. Young re-organized the Relief Society. He called on Sister Eliza to assist, and associate with her in the labor, Zina D. Young; this gave to them the precedence which they have since held.
At a Mass Meeting held in this city January 13th, 1870, in the Old Tabernacle, (where the Assembly Hall now stands) by about 6,000 women to protest against the “Cullom Bill,” Sister Eliza made a strong and brilliant speech.... In 1854-5, the Lion House was completed and Sister Eliza has ever since resided there. It was some years later before the domestic spinning, dyeing, and weaving were discontinued, in these things Sister Eliza also exceleld....
October 26th, 1872, Sister Eliza left Salt Lake City on a journey to the Holy Land, her brother, Apostle Lorenzo Snow, joining her in Ogden. Pres. George A. Smith and party met them in New York. They took the steamer for Liverpool November 5th. In Rome Sister Eliza spent five days, visited Naples, Corfu, Alexandria, Cairo, Suez, Joppa, the plains of Sharon, the Valley of Ajelon became realized, and in due time they beheld Jerusalem. This tour through the Holy Land was a mission pertaining to the Latter Day Work.... Sister Eliza had been enduring twenty-nine days of tent life, and twenty-one of riding on horseback. And this in her seventieth year! At Athens they took tea with the American Minister, and met the American Consul General to Constantinople. They visited Munich then went to Vienna and thence to Hamburg. May 16th, 1873, they took steamer for London, and met the Saints in their Conference, May 25th. Embarked for home on the 28th. Returning early in July, she visited many old scenes and friends of her early life, received with honors from place to place. So quiet was her return to Utah, that four days elapsed before her many friends became aware of it. A brief rest sufficed, Sister Eliza could not be idle. She visited Ogden and Provo in August, Cache Valley in September, holding meetings in these and many other places.
Just after the October Conference of 1876, Sister Eliza entered upon the superintendency of the “Woman’s Store,” a Commission House for Utah home made goods. Officers and employees were women. During this year she prepared her second volume of poems for the press, also assisted in selecting and preparing the manuscripts for the “Women of Mormondom,” and in raising funds for its publication, and not least of all, gave the proof her attention. Also still continued her labors in the House of the Lord. At this time occurred the death of President Brigham Young. To one so disciplined in order, with such continuity of purpose, such adhesiveness to principle and friends, it would seem that to ordinary persons, the loss of one in house she had her place, and whose friendship and counsels she had shared for over twenty-five years, would be an overwhelming shock. But the same strength of mind which had risen from the martyrdom of the Prophet and Patriarch supported her again, and she renewed her diligence, if it were possible, in her broad field of labor. Political events and duties occupied her attention during December and January 1878. During the ensuing summer she traveled hundreds of miles, holding generally two meetings a day wherever they stopped. While attending a meeting at Farmington, Davis Co., the efforts of Sister Aurelia Spencer Rogers received her consideration and the Primary Associations, for children, became part of our system. The first Organization at Farmington dates from September 7th, 1878; about this time an Association was organized in the Eleventh Ward of this city, taking the lead. This new feature so suggestive of great benefit to the children so enlisted her feelings that she has visited most of the settlements and wars in this matter organizing Associations. Sister Eliza returned from a long tour of missionary labor just in time to preside at a grand Mass Meeting of 15,000 women, held in the Theatre, November 16th, 1878, in reply to representations of the Anti-Polygamy Society. The year 1880 was spent visiting the L.D.S. Women’s Organizations, and the production of the Childrens Primary Hymn Book, soon followed by a tune book to accompany the above. On Saturday, July 17th, Fourteenth Ward Assembly Rooms, President John Taylor ordained Sister Eliza to the office to which she had been elected; President of Latter Day Saints’ Women’s Organizations throughout the world, wherever our people are; also, Sister Zina D.H. Young as her First Counselor, Elizabeth A. Whitney (since deceased) Second Counselor, Sarah M. Kimball as Secretary, and Mary Isabella Horne as Treasurer.
In August Sister Eliza visited Sanpete Co., and in Thistle Valley assisted the Bishop in organizing a Relief Society, with an Indian sister as a counselor; the first Indian woman ordained and set apart to an office in this dispensation. November 8th, Sister Eliza accompanied by Sister Zina D. Young, left home for St. George to do a work in the Temple. They traveled over one thousand miles in carriages and wagons, doing missionary work among the Saints. In St. George the anniversary of Sister Eliza’s birthday was celebrated, and on the same day the people of Weber Stake paid a delicate tribute to the honorable lady by a similar celebration at Ogden City.
Sisters Eliza and Zina returned from St. George March 31st, and were met at the depot by a party of thirty ladies who escorted them to the Lion House, where a reception, a welcome home, awaited them. In 1881, during the intervals of her many public duties, she prepared her new book Bible Questions and Answers. In September, visited Thistle Valley, organizing a Primary Association with ten little Indian children enrolled as members. April 1883, the Relief Society was organized among the Indians at Washakie, an Indian village in Box Elder Co. After duly considering the long-felt necessity among our own people of an institution for the sick and injured, where the ordinances of faith might be administered freely and without restraint, in fact, one that we might term our own, and as one of the links in our system of organizations, the sisters took a course that led to the establishment of the Deseret Hospital, at which institution the dedication services were held, July 17th, 1882, by the First Presidency, Stake Presidency, Apostles Wilford Woodruff and F.D. Richards; Mayor William Jennings, C.W. Penrose, Editor Deseret News, L. John Nuttall and Joseph Horne being present. Eliza R.S. Smith, President, E.B. Wells, Secretary.
