1826 - 1912
Jennett Burton Taylor was born in South Carolina, May 2, 1826. She was the daughter of Kenyon Taylor and Esther Traywick; she was from a family of 13 children, 5 boys and 8 girls.
Later she moved with her father's family to Alabama, hence to Mississippi; it was here she heard of Joseph Smith and the restoration of the Church of Jesus Christ. It was through the missionaries she with her mother and some of her sisters heard the gospel preacher in 1845. In later years she recall's "After attending meetings held by the missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints with my mother and other members of my family, we were favorably impressed.
Before we had a chance to join the church, my mother was thrown from a horse and died from the injuries the 28th of May, 1845.
"In the spring of 1846 the Saints were gathering in a camp in preparations for going West and joining the main body of the church. My sister Louisa had already, along with her husband Thomas Warrick, joined the church and my sister Gilead had already joined them at the camp. I was undecided about leaving the rest of my family and joining the church. After going to bed one night, I prayed thusly, "Dear God, if there be a God, give me a sign if the Church is true and tell me if I should go west with the Saints. A light came into the room and in that light was a personage, he said, "yes, the Church is true but is wrong to ask for signs. Yes, you should join the Church and go West with the Saints, if you don't go now you will never have a chance to go, as there will be wars and pestilence which would keep you from going". "I gathered some of my belongings, also some keepsakes of my mother's, and joined the Saints at the camp. I was baptized in the Mississippi River May 1846, and we went on as far as Council Bluffs, Iowa where the main body of the Church spent some time in preparing to go on West and taking their turn in crossing the plains. This place was called Winter Quarters." (Personal testimony and experience as told to her grand-daughter Etta Smithson Boggs).
Jennette worked for James M. Flake and family, she did the family work and drove a team all the way to Salt Lake Valley, enduring all the hardships incident to such a journey.
The following paragraph was taken from "The Life of Amasa M. Lyman." On the 30th of June 1848, a company of 500 or more people started away in a long, slowly moving wagon train from Winter Quarters to the West, arriving in Salt Lake Valley 17th of October. James M. Flake was made Captain of hundreds, under him were placed Captains of 50's and 10's. They traveled in two companies, one by Willard Richards.
Jennett settled in Cottonwood, after working in several homes, including that of Amasa M. Lyman, she worked in the home of Allen Freeman Smithson, who had lost his first wife, Letisha, leaving him with five small children. December 16, 1849, she married Allen, and the 27th of February 1851 they went to the endowment house in Salt Lake and received their endowments and were sealed for time and all eternity by President Brigham Young. Jennett was the mother of fourteen children, eleven boys and three girls. She also raised and cared for her husbands five children by his previous marriage and she also raised two of her grand-daughters, Burton and Etta, daughters of her son Charles William, who had lost his first wife, their mother.
On the 11th of March, 1851, Jennett went with her husband and many of the Mormon Pioneers under the leadership of Amasa M. Lyman and Charles E. Rich, across a most horrible desert to South California to establish an LDS colony. They established the City of San Bernadino. Here they lived and worked hard for about seven years. Six of her children were born there. They were called back to Utah and the main body of the Church on account of the threat of Johnston's Army to wipe the Mormons off the face of the earth. They left San Bernadino the 24th of November 1857. They stopped in Beaver where they lived for a short time.
They were called again to Dixie or Washington, Utah. The people from the Southern States being more familiar with cotton raising and cloth-making were put in charge of the Cotton Farms under the direction of the Church. The man folks raised the Cotton and the women folks carded, spun and wove the cloth, besides making all the clothing for their families.
The next call came by letter to her husband, dated 5 December 1871, signed by Apostle Erastus Snow, asking them to go with others to establish a settlement on Pahreah Creek in Kane County, Utah. They accepted the call, leaving their home and many friends in Washington, removed to that isolated spot in the rugged beauty of wind swept desert cliffs and sun-soaked, thirsty gullies and ravines.
Here they worked hard and served well for the good of the people, and building up the country. Her husband Allen F. was the first presiding Elder and Bishop serving until his death on the 27th of September 1877.
Jennett was among the first of the church members to do Temple work for her kindred dead, when the St. George Temple was opened in 1877. She and family stayed on in Pahreah until the fall of 1884 when their next move was to Woodruff, Arizona, where they stayed until October 1886, when they pioneered again to the Gila Valley, in the South Eastern part of the state, locating at Layton. Her sons did freighting, before the railroad was built, they hauled coal one way and copper the other way to the railroad in Bowie, Arizona.
Jennett left this earthly life the 29th of May, 1912, at the age of 86.