Margaret Pierce is another beautiful grandmother of ours whose correct name spelling remains a mystery. As her 3rd great granddaughter, I’ve adopted the spelling mentioned at the first as that is the spelling found on her headstone in the Salt Lake Cemetery. Other spellings include:
Margaret Peirce
Margarette P. W. Young
Margarett Peirce (This is the spelling found in her actual signature, found in James H Cockrell’s booklet, and the spelling found on her death certificate)
I happened to find a wonderful life sketch written by Margaret herself, so although I’ve condensed it a bit, I’ll allow her to introduce her own early life.
“I think it good to keep a record of what one does and genealogy of one’s family. Though it may seem some trouble to us now, perchance it may benefit our posterity to know from what lineage we sprang and how and why we left our beautiful homes to find comfort in the desert.
I was born in Aston Township, Delaware County, Pennsylvania. My parents, Robert & Hannah, were Quakers. My mother was well educated, a gifted writer and spiritually inclined. My father was a prosperous farmer. My parents… abode in Brandywine. Our house was beautifully situated on a low hill affording a fine view of a large part of our farm, which was green and pretty…
When I was but a young girl, I took cold on the ice ponds and fever and heart trouble followed and I was ill for many months. One evening two men passing our way stopped and knocked at our door and said, “We are Latter-Day Saints and have been directed to this house by the Spirit. Have you sickness here?” Mother answered, “Yes, come in,” and she brought them to my bedside. They took my hand and looked upon me for a moment, when one turning to my Mother spoke as follows: “If she will obey the Gospel of Christ and put her trust in him, Who is able to save, she will be healed from this very moment.” Declining to sit or refresh themselves with food they pursued their way. I was healed and next morning was on my feet.
We knew not who these servants of God were, from whence they came, nor did we ever after hear aught concerning them. In the ensuing summer of 1839, there came two elders preaching the Gospel of Christ… These missionaries were Elijah Davis and Lorenzo Barnes. From them we heard the gospel explained in its fullness and in power. Their words sank deep into our hearts… Weekly meetings [for the Brandywine branch] were held at our house, which was commodious and freely opened… In January of 1840 word came that the Prophet Joseph Smith was to visit our Branch on his way from Philadelphia. Father said, “Let us get our carriage and go to meet him.” So, Father, (Robert Peirce) and others brought him to our home. Mother served a splendid supper and then the neighbors gathered in to hear the Prophet’s discourse.
I wish that I might describe my feelings at that meeting. Though they are fresh and green in my memory today (over 50 years later), I cannot but fall short of expressing myself. So animated with living kindness, so mild and gentle, yet big and powerful and majestic was the Prophet that to me he seemed more than a man. I thought almost an angel…
When the Prophet was allowed to retire to rest and had gone from the room, my Mother said, “I don’t see how anyone can doubt his being a Prophet of God. Thee can see it in his countenance which is so full of intelligence.”
…Mother made me wait [to be baptized] until the weather was milder, so it was not until April 1840 that I became a member of the Church, my Father joining the day after. Father sold his property with a fixed purpose of gathering with the Saints. One lovely day 22 September in the harvest season of 1841 we bade farewell to the land of our Quaker parentage. Traveling by rail and by steamboat we soon landed n beautiful Nauvoo. At the landing, who should meet us but the Prophet and his wife, who took us home and entertained us most hospitably. Their family was always very friendly to all of us, seeming never to forget my Father’s hospitality in Pennsylvania. We all received our Patriarchal blessings under the hands of Brother Hyrum.
I have never courted sadness so will pass over the mobbing of the Saints, burning of homes and other distressing scenes in which we were forced to take part less than five years after our arrival. In the darkest hours God was our refuge and our faith sustained us when it seemed we must perish.” (1)
While living in Nauvoo, Margaret married Morris Whitesides July 3, 1844. He died about 8 months later.
Following Morris’ death, Margaret married Brigham Young in 1845, Heber C Kimbal officiating. She emigrated to the Salt Lake Valley and resided with the family at the Lion House. There, she and Brigham had one son, Brigham Morris Young, who Brigham’s 50th child.
Susa Young Gates remembered Margaret as follows:
“Aunt Margaret Pierce was a true Latter-day Saint. Industrious, kind, loyal to truth and to her husband’s family, she was an Israelite in whom there was no guile. She bore her trials so quietly that none knew she suffered. And she did suffer, for she loved children, and bore but one son, Brigham Morris, when she would gladly have mothered a dozen. She too, was exquisitely neat in all her appointments, and one of the best weavers of cloth and carpets in the Lion House.” (2)
“Sister Young is a little above the medium height, fair complexion and bright, active and intelligent, has been an earnest, faithful worker in cooking and caring for her husband’s workmen, mill-hands and others, with the assistance of others of his family. She was also actively engaged for about two years in raising silk from the worms.” (3)
She spent the rest of her life very active in the Relief Society as well as in performing temple work for the redemption of the dead.
She died January 16, 1907 of “chronic bronchitis,” at the age of 83. (4)
Notes:
1 - https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/memories/LC7D-4V8
2 - Susa Young Dunford Gates in her biography of and with her mother, Lucy Bigelow Young.
3 - Pictures and Biographies of Brigham Young and His Wives. James H Cockrell - publisher.
4 - Utah Death Certificate. https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HT-D8Q7-N7M?i=64&cc=1747615&personaUrl=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3AXZLT-MWL