Various
Heroines of Mormondom
A REMARKABLE LIFE
BY "HOMESPUN"
CHAPTER I
Many of the noblest lives have been lived in obscurity and in poverty. Nobility and virtue are never dependent upon surroundings. And when you have read the simple little chronicle which I am about to relate, I think you will agree with me that even though humble and retiring, the subject of this sketch was one of nature's own heroines.
In a little cottage in Bravon, Lees-Mersem, England, lived an old lady named Harris. She was given to study although very meagrely educated. She was feeble and sat a great deal of her time poring over her Bible.
One day her granddaughter came to visit her, bringing her little daughter, Mary, with her. The old lady had been reading her Bible, and as her daughter came in she said:
"My dear, I have been reading some of the great prophecies concerning the last days, and I feel sure that either you or yours will live to see many of them fulfilled."
"Not so, grandmother," answered the woman, whose name was Mrs. Dunster, "thou wast always visionary; put by such thoughts. Our religion's good enough for the like of us."
The old lady arose, unheeding her granddaughter's warm reply, and placing her hands on the little girl's head, said solemnly:
"Here's Mary; she shall grow up and wander away from you all and break her bread in different nations."
The solemnity of her great-grandmother's manner and the peculiar spirit that accompanied the words made a vivid impression on the little girl's mind. How well that strange prophecy has been fulfilled you and I, my reader, can tell hereafter.
The little girl, whose name was Mary Dunster, and who was born in Lympne, Kent, December 26, 1818, grew up and when sixteen years of age was asked in marriage by William Chittenden, who was a laborer on an adjoining farm. She did not feel very willing, but the young man urged her so warmly that she hesitated before refusing him. She had always had an irresistible desire to go to America, where many emigrants were then going from England.
At last she consented to be his wife on one condition: that he would take her to America. Very bravely promised the lover, but not until forty-two years afterwards did he fulfill that promise.
After they were married they settled down to work and lived, William as farm laborer, in Lympne for four years. Two children were born to them in this place, Mary Ann, born June 15, 1836, and Henry, born August 18, 1838.
Four years after their marriage, at which time the introduction of convicts into Australia was prohibited and the government of England offered good inducement to skilled laborers to settle up the country, William Chittenden concluded to go to Australia. Previous to this time the English convicts, who were under life sentence, had been sent down to Australia, landing generally at Botany Bay. These convicts were brought down and sold as life slaves to those freeholders who were willing and able to purchase their labor. Sometimes they escaped from their masters and made their way into the interior of the country. These escaped convicts herded together in small parties or bands, and are called "bush-rangers." They have now become a powerful tribe, fierce, vindictive and unlawful. They resemble very nearly, in occupation and temperament, the wild Bedouins of Asia and the wild tribes of Arabs or Berbers of northern Africa.
Between the years of 1840 and 1850, England transported many skilled laborers and artizans to Australia to build up and colonize her possessions in the southern seas. Numbers of the husband's countrymen were going down to the "new country," and he resolved to go too. Mary objected; she wanted to go to America. I think, between you and me, that she used sometimes to remind her husband sharply of his unfulfilled promise. But his was a calm, kind, but essentially self-willed disposition, that listened good-naturedly to all Mary might and did say, but was no whit moved thereby to give up his own way. And so, after much controversy, the removal to Australia was decided upon and accomplished.
The young couple had determined to engage a farm on shares, and so went, immediately upon their arrival, to a country part near Botany Bay. Here they remained a short time and then went up to Camden, which is about one hundred miles from Sydney. William took a farm and then commenced a long career of farming in Australia. Most of their children were born there.
And now let me tell you something of the character of this same Mary, ere I relate to you two strange dreams which she had while living at Camden.
She was a medium-sized, well-built woman, with kind, gray eyes and a pleasant but firm mouth. Her step was quick, and her manner was full of warm-hearted simplicity. She it was who ruled the children, administering with firm justice the rod of correction. Her husband contented himself by controlling his wife, leaving the whole of the remainder of the domestic regimen entirely in her hands. She was never disobeyed by her children. But withal "father" was a tenderer name to their large flock of girls than was "mother." But with all her firmness, she was far too womanly to possess one grain of obstinacy. When it was her duty to yield she could do so gracefully. With these qualities Mary united a sound business capacity, economy, thrift and extreme cleanliness. She was, and always has been, a remarkably healthy woman. With these gifts she had something of the visionary or semi-prophetic character of her great-grandmother Harris.
She has been a dreamer, and her dreams have been of a prophetic character. Most of them require no interpretation, but are simple forecasts, as it were, of the future.
One dream, which was indelibly impressed upon her mind, occurred to her just before the birth of her eighth daughter, Elizabeth. It was as follows:
She dreamed she had to travel a long way. At last she reached a stately white building, with projecting buttresses and towers. Going up the broad steps she entered a room filled with beautiful books. Seeing a door ajar, she walked into the adjoining room. There sat twelve men around a large table, and each man held a pen. They were looking up as though awaiting some message from above. She drew back, so as not to attract attention, when a voice said distinctly to her: "You will have to come here to be married." The thought passed through her mind, "I am married and why, therefore, should I come here to be married?"
She went on out of the building and walked through the streets of the city that were near the building. The streets were straight and clean, with little streams of water running down under the shade-trees that bordered the foot-paths. Everything was clean and beautiful to look upon. Footbridges spanned the little streams, and the houses were clean and comfortable. She saw just ahead of her a woman driving a cow, with whom she felt a desire to speak, but before she could reach her, the woman had gone in at one of the gates. She walked on, pleased with all she saw. Raising her eyes she saw in the distance, coming to the city, what looked like an immense flock of sheep. But as they came nearer she saw they were people, all clothed in white raiment. They passed by and went on to the white building. "Ah!" thought Mary, "if I was there now, that I might know what it all meant!" But she felt compelled to go the other way. And so the dream ended.
When she awoke she related the strange episode to her husband and told him she believed her coming confinement would prove fatal. She thought the beautiful place she had seen could only be in heaven, as she had never seen anything like it upon the earth. William comforted her, but the spirit of the dream never left her.
However her little babe was born and she resumed her household duties.
CHAPTER II
Two years passed away, and ere they are passed let us stop a moment and see a little of this new country which lies away on the opposite side of the earth from America.
Australia, as you may all see, my readers, by getting out your geographies, is in the Pacific Ocean, down in the tropics and lying south-east of Asia. It is generally called a continent; but it looks very small, does it not, compared to Asia or either of the Americas? Now, look down on the south-east coast of this little continent and you will see Botany Bay and the city of Sydney lying close together. Look a little to the south-west of Sydney and you will find Goulburn. Camden, which is a comparatively new town, is not marked on the old maps, lies between Sydney and Goulburn.
This region you will find marked as the "gold region." But gold was not discovered until 1857, eleven years after the Chittendens settled in their new home.
The country in New South Wales is good for farming and grazing; with the exception that it is subject to extremes of drouth and floods. There are no high mountain ranges, and very few rivers. There is no snow there, and the Winter season is a rainy season instead of being cold and freezing like our Winters. There are trees in that country which shed their bark instead of their leaves. I shall speak of these trees and the uses to which their bark is put further on. Then, there grows a native cherry, which has the pit on the outside, and the fruit inside. Wouldn't that be queer?
There are many precious stones found in this country, and also considerable gold; but the discovery of gold failed to excite William Chittenden, or turn him from the even tenor of his way.
On the 15th of April, 1853, a son was born to the Chittendens, who was christened William John, but who only lived a few weeks.
Some time after his death Mary dreamed that she was lying in her bed asleep. It was, as you might say, a dream within a dream. As she lay sleeping two men, each carrying a satchel in one hand and a cane in the other, came to the foot of her bed. She dreamed then that she awoke from her dream and looked earnestly at these two men; so earnestly that their faces were indelibly fixed upon her memory. One of them held out to her a little book.
"What is the use of my taking the book?" she thought within herself, "I cannot read a line, for I have never learned to read." Then, after a moment's hesitation, she thought, "Why, I can take it and my children can read it to me." So she took the book.
One of the men said these remarkable words to her:
"We are clothed upon with power to preach to the people."
She awoke in reality then, with those strange words thrilling her with a new power she had never felt before. She roused her husband up and related her dream, and he replied kindly to her.
They had now been married eighteen years and Mary had borne seven girls and two boys; neither of the two boys, however, had lived but a short time. The farm upon which they lived had been rented, or leased, from a large land-owner named McArthur, for twenty-one years. This McArthur owned some thousands of acres of farming and grazing land in this region, which was leased in farms of various proportions.
The Chittendens' farm consisted of two hundred acres, and was mostly farming land. The terms upon which they leased it were very similar to others in that country. For the first five years they paid sixpence an acre. After that it was ten shillings an acre.
William put up the house in which they lived, and an odd house it was, too. First he took a number of poles, or uprights, which he placed in the earth at regular distances. With these he made the framework of his house. Between these uprights were placed smaller poles. Then he took fine willows and wove them, or turned them round the center, or smaller pole, resting the ends on the larger poles. In and out went these willows, something the same way as you will see willow fences here. Then he made a thick mud and well covered the whole, inside and out. Next came a good plaster of lime and sand, and finally all was whitewashed. The roof was made with rafters laid across the top. Now came in this bark about which I told you. Going up to the forests which were found on the near hillsides, the bark was cut in the lengths wanted at the top and bottom of the tree; then with a sharp knife split on two sides, upon which it peeled off in thick, straight slabs. It was then nailed on in the place of shingles, each one overlapping the under one. Then the floor was nailed down with wooden pegs, "adzed" off and finally smoothed with a jack-plane.
In this manner one large sitting-room, two bedrooms, a dairy and a kitchen, detached from the main building, were built; to which was afterwards added a long porch to the front of the house, which faced east, the rooms all being built in a row.
Mary cooked upon a brick oven, which was built upon a little standard just between the kitchen and the house.
Large fire-places were built in the kitchen and sitting-room. The one in the kitchen, being big enough to take three immense logs, which would burn steadily for a whole week.
The dairy was well furnished with pans, pails, etc.
CHAPTER III
In 1853, William decided to take a trip up to Sydney to sell a load of grain, bringing back with him, if he succeeded as he wished, a load of freight for some settlement or town near his home. There was a great demand for wheat now as many hundreds of emigrants had rushed into the great gold country. William left the farm to be managed by his prudent little wife and started out on his hundred mile trip. How little did he dream of the result of this journey! On his arrival in Sydney after the disposal of his wheat, he walked out to see an old friend named William Andrews who lived in the suburbs of the town. Here he passed the time until evening when Mr. Andrews remarked, "I say, Chittenden, I've got some brothers come from America, and I am going up to see them. Would you like to go along?"
"Oh, yes," replied William, "I didn't know you had any brothers in America!"
And so, arm in arm, they entered the little room where several men sat at a table, or pulpit with a strange book in their hands and strange words upon their lips. Here William heard the sound of the everlasting gospel for the first time.
From the first William felt the truth contained in the words of the Elders although he knew little or nothing concerning them.
On their way home Mr. Andrews explained to him that these men were his brothers, being brothers in the covenant of Christ.
"And Chittenden," he added, "if any of them go down your way, you'll give them dinner and a bed, won't you, for I know you can?"
"Oh, as to that," replied William, "I wouldn't turn a beggar from my door, if he was hungry or wanted a roof to cover him."
William procured a load of freight for a man in Goulburn (one hundred miles further south than Camden) and started on his return trip. His mind was often upon the things he had heard, and he wondered what it all meant. The Elders to whom he had listened were Brothers Farnham, Eldredge, Graham and Fleming, Brother Farnham having charge. They were the second company of Elders ever sent to Australia.
After the departure of William Chittenden, a council was held by the Elders and it was decided that Brothers Fleming and John Eldredge should go up to Camden and the surrounding district. At the last moment however, Elder Fleming was desired to remain in Sydney by Brother Farnham and Elder Graham was sent in his place. I mention this circumstance as it was closely connected with one of Mary's dreams. When William reached his home, he told Mary about these strange men.
"What did you think of them William?"
"Well Mary if they don't speak the truth then I never heard it spoken." And then he went down to Goulburn with his freight.
One lovely day in summer two dusty, tired, hungry men each with a satchel and a walking-cane in their hands, stopped at the wide open door of the Chittenden farm-house. And what saw Mary, when she came to the porch? With a queer throb, she saw in her door the very man who came to her bedside in her dream. She even noticed the low-cut vest showing the white shirt underneath. But as he stepped inside, and her eye fell upon his companion, she saw he was not the second one of her dream, although he too carried a cane and satchel. She invited them within, and the first one said,
"We are come, madam, to preach the gospel."
The words, almost identical with those of her dream. Giving her their names, he whose name was Eldredge explained to her that they traveled up from Sydney, and in all the hundred miles, they had found no one willing to give them food and shelter.
Mary bustled around and prepared dinner for her guests. When evening drew near, Brother Eldredge remarked,
"Mrs Chittenden, can you let us remain here over night?"
"Oh," said Mary, "I am afraid I have no place to put you!"
"Well you can let us sit up by your fireside, and that is better than lying on the ground as we have done lately!"
And then Mary assured them that she would do the best she could for them. So a bed was spread out on the floor of the sitting-room, and here the foot-sore Elders were glad to rest their bodies.
The principles and doctrines of these men fell deep into Mary's heart, and like her husband she felt they spoke the truths of heaven.
One evening in conversation with them, Mary told Brother Eldredge that she had seen him before in a dream. But, she added, you were accompanied by another man, not Mr. Graham.
"Ah well, that might have been. You may have seen Brother Fleming for he was coming with me, but Brother Farnham altered the appointments at the last moment!"
And it proved so. When Mary afterwards saw Brother Fleming she recognized him as the second one of her dream.
The Elders were not idle because they had found a comfortable resting place, but traveled about seeking to get opportunities of spreading the gospel. One family named Davis, whose farm (rented from McArthur) joined the Chittenden's, listened with pleased interest to these new doctrines. In the course of two weeks after the arrival of the Elders, William Chittenden came home, and expressed a gladness in his heart to find the Elders at his home. He immediately fixed up a bedroom near the sitting-room for the use of the Elders. Weeks went into months, and still the Chittendens were not baptized.
The Elders made Camden their head-quarters, but went about through the surrounding country, meeting, however, with very little success. William and his wife, with their oldest daughter were ready to be baptized, as were the Davis'. But almost a year after the arrival of the brethren was allowed to slip by without the baptisms having been performed.
I want to stop and tell you a little about the worldly condition of this couple, as well as mention a detail or two more about the country they were living in before I go on with my story.
They had brought their two hundred acres under good cultivation; they had a large fruit garden back of the house, in which grew the most delicious peaches, plums and cherries. The country is so adapted to fruit that peach-stones thrown out near running water would be fruit-bearing-trees in three years. There were no apples, but such quantities of tropical fruits. Grapes, melons, figs, lemons and oranges were so plentiful and so cheap that William would not spend time to grow them. A sixpence (12 cents) would buy enough of these fruits to load a man down.
They had four horses, one wagon, a dray and a light spring cart, six cows and many calves, plenty of pigs and droves of chickens, turkeys and geese.
The large granary to the south of the house groaned with its wealth of wheat corn, barley and oats.
And while I am speaking of wheat I am minded to give a description of the way adopted to preserve wheat in that country. Mr. McArthur, the owner of all these thousands of acres, received from his tenants a share of the wheat grown. This he stored up as there was little or no sale for it until drought years, when it commanded a good price.
After the three years drought which occurred there prior to 1853, William and his wife went to this Mr. McArthur to get wheat. He had dug a very large vault or cellar, and this had been well cemented, top, bottom and sides. Here the wheat had been stored for twelve years when the Chittendens went to get theirs. The wheat was perfectly sound and sweet. Over the vault a store-house had been built, and the door to it was near the top of the cellar.
You can see that our kind friends were well-to-do, and had every prospect ahead for success and prosperity.
In the Spring of '54, the Davis family and the Chittendens decided to be baptized. Rumors, and false reports had been rapidly spread about the Latter-day Saints, and their enemies sprang up like magic. Many sarcastic and insulting remarks were made about the "dipping" (as the baptism was called) of the two families. Mr. McArthur was a bitter enemy to the new sect.
One day the Davises were over to Chittenden's and remarked they were going to be baptized the following Monday in the river near their house. William decided to come over with his family on the same day. So on the 24 of April 1854 William and Mary were baptized by John Eldredge in Camden, Australia. From the moment of their baptism until now no faltering or doubt has ever been in the hearts of these true Saints. In the evening of the same day, the girls were all baptized by the Elders into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The gospel once having been received the spirit of "gathering" soon follows. And with Mary, who had always wished to go to America, how much more intense that spirit was now!
As she sat and listened to the Elder's description of Zion being built up in the bleak mountains, of the pretty streets lined with shade-trees, and watered by swift-running streamlets she turned to her husband and told him that this must be the place of her dream.
William was a very quiet, determined man, who could not be turned from the way he had chosen.
The days, when through the long summer evenings, they all sat and listened to the various principles and the new and lovely doctrines unfolded one by one, by the Elders, like the petals of a glorious flower, were the very happiest Mary and her family ever knew. Poor Mary! They were the light which shone over her dreary oncoming future, sometimes brightly, sometimes faintly, but always shining over the wretched, darksome road of the next twenty years.
One little circumstance, which will illustrate Mary's simple but powerful faith will perhaps be worth mentioning and may strengthen some other one's faith. Just before the birth of her eighth girl, which occurred in the Fall after their baptism, she felt low and miserable, scarcely sick enough to be in bed, but too ill to work. One evening Bro. Eldredge was talking to her and said that if she had any sickness or bodily ill, it was her privilege as it was of any member of the Church, to call upon the Elders to administer to her, and then if she exercised faith, it would leave her. Mary had never read a word in her life, and so this came to her as a new and very precious truth.