Person:Sarah Ellis (32)

After Uriah died, "Ludie" remarried to Bishop John Thomas Whetten. They had 5 Children.

    Ludie Ellis was born on the 28 January 1875. She was the Tenth child of William Rufus Ellis and Martha Elizabeth Solomon. As this couple had lost two infant daughters, little Fannie in 1866, and little Amanda in 1872, they were very grateful for this last beautiful little girl.
    At the time of Ludie's birth, the family was living near Elba, the county seat of Coffee County, Alabama. But when Ludie was five years old, they moved from Alabama to the northwestern part of Florida. They lived first at Holmes and Bonify and then moved to Carryville, where they settled on a farm. The main crop raised on the farm was cotton, but in that mild climate they raised plenty of fruits and vegetables. They also raised their own chickens, hogs, cows, and sheep, so they had plenty of meat. Fresh fish was also readily available.
    Five of Ludie's brothers and one sister were quite a bit older than Ludie, so they were getting married and moving into homes of their own while she was growing up. Her youngest brother, Rufus Lonzo, was just six years older than she was so she just idolized him, and always tried to do everything to please him. They had great times together and as they both loved to be with their father, they followed him wherever they could.
    The father, William Rufus, was a kind, generous-hearted man, so it is not surprising that when the first Mormon missionaries called at his home, he offered them food and lodging. He wasn't especially interested in Mormonism at that time, but at the same time he was not opposed to them. Apparently the Elders passed the word along that at the Ellis home they were treated hospitably because whenever a pair of Elders were in that vicinity they were welcomed at the Ellis farm. Not all southerners felt that way about the Mormon Elders and persecution became severe even to the extent that mobs were formed to do away with the Mormons. On several occasions William Rufus protected the Elders from the mob, while they were staying at his home.
    About that time, Ludie's mother, Martha Elizabeth, who had been in poor health for some time, became bedridden. After a long illness, during which everthing was done for her that was known at that time, she passed away. Ludie, at the age of fifteen, was left with the responsibility of caring for her father, since her older brothers and sisters had interests of their own.
    The next two years were happy ones for Ludie. It was a heavy responsibility for a fifteen year old to take care of her father and his home but even if it was a lot of work she enjoyed doing it.
    By this time Ludie was developing into a beautiful young woman. She had long thick black hair and beautiful brown eyes. The young men of that area began to take notice of Ludie and she had a lot of invitations which she gladly accepted. As everyone knew everyone else in that locality, Ludie had many friends of both sexes. There was one young man she thought was especially nice. His name was Wesley and he came to see her often.
    One day a pair of Mormon Elders appeared at the farm again. When they learned about the death of her mother, they explained many gospel principles about death and life hereafter that comforted Ludie and her father.
    Most of the Elders who came to stay at their home off and on, were from Utah, so naturally Ludie's ambition in life was to go to Utah or Zion. The missionaries did a fine job of teaching her the importance of marrying a member of the church. She thought of this a great deal because none of the young men that she was acquainted with were members of the church.
    When Ludie was seventeen years old and her father was sixty-five, he brought home a young woman named Amanda Brown and introduced her to Ludie as his new wife. What a shock for young Ludie. Things were never the same at home again, but even though her father was married again, he still expected Ludie to do everything for him. He expected her to keep house, help him in the fields whenever it was necessary and even wait on his new wife.
    On the 9th of October of 1894, after being challenged to be baptized by a pair of Mormon Elders, Ludie, her father and step-mother and two brothers were all baptized members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
    From the day that Ludie was baptized, she had another shock. Suddenly she didn't have any friends. No girl friends nor boy friends called at the farm and no more invitations were issued to any parties or dances. Whenever she went into town, friends she had grown up with would turn their heads as if they did not see her or they would walk to the other side of the street. At least she didn't have to worry about marrying out of the church because it was very apparent that none of the young men wanted to marry her. Even her favorite friend, Wesley, didn't speak to her again. People who joined the Mormon church were not popular in that area of the South.
    The next four years were very unhappy ones for Ludie. Besides not having any social life, her step-mother was in poor health as her babies came along, and the housework that Ludie had enjoyed formerly, became drudgery. Her father depended on her to keep things going as she had before.
    Ludie's only contact with young people were the Elders who stopped by once in a while. When she was twenty-one years old, a Mormon Elder stopped by one day. He was from Jacksonville, Florida and had just completed his mission and was on his way home. He stayed at the Ellis farm for a few days and whenever he got a chance he talked to Ludie. Just before he left, he asked her if she would marry him. He told her that he was a widower and his wife had passed away. Because Ludie was unhappy at home, she told him that she would marry him and he said that he would come for her in two months.
    After this Elder, whose name was Uriah Hassell, went on his way, Ludie began to worry. What had she done! She had always supposed that she would marry for love, and she knew that she didn't even know this man, much less love him.  Besides that, what would her father say.... well, she didn't even dare tell him about it.
    Life went on the same as it had before but as the days passed, Ludie decided that she would have to start doing something about her wedding, so every time she went to the store she would save out some of the egg or butter money and buy something for her wedding. Once she bought a piece of fine white material. On another occasion she saved out enough money to buy a pair of new shoes. Little by little she accumulated a few items that she hid in a trunk that her mother had given her. Whenever there was an opportunity, she sewed by lamplight in her room after the work of the day was completed. Ludie was very good at making hair pin lace so she used that to trim her new clothes.
    Ludie felt very guilty about not telling her father of the promise she had made. On several occasions she tried to tell him but she just couldn't. One day she suddenly announced to her father that she wanted to get married. He turned and looked at her and said, "I thought that you and Wesley had broken up."
    "We have" Ludie said, "and I don't ever expect to see him again."
    "Well, who are you going to marry then?" her father said as he turned back to his work as if to close the subject.
    Soon the two months were up and Uriah Hassell arrived to claim his bride. When he went to talk to Ludie's father and even showed him the marriage license, Ludie could tell that her father was heart-broken. He had expected Ludie to remain at home and take care of him and help raise the young children of his other wife's family.
    Uriah and Ludie were married by the Justice of the Peace and when they returned to her father's home to get her things so they could be on their way to Jacksonville, Ludie couldn't find her father. After searching, she finally found him out in the corral where he had roped a young bronco mule. What a shock it was for her to find that her father was very drunk. He had never been a drinker even before he joined the Mormon Church but because he was so upset about Ludie's marriage, he had gotten drunk. How hard it was for Ludie to go and leave her father. Her last glimpse of her father was to see him standing, with the wind blowing his grey hair, holding the rope as the wild mule ran around him. That is the last time she ever saw her father.
    On arriving in Jacksonville, Florida, Ludie soon discovered that she had actually jumped from the frying pan into the fire, as the saying goes. Uriah introduced his bride to his four children, Palmer, Theodore, Mayner and little Lula.
    Apparently after the death of his first wife, his family had suggested that he go on a mission and they would take care of his children for him, which they did. When he returned home he found his farm in a run-down condition and in two months had done what he could to improve things. Ludie was not afraid of hard work so during the next two years they worked together and soon were out of debt and had the farm in good condition.
    Ludie's first child was born on July 6th 1898 and was named Wilford Clair. During this time Uriah kept mentioning that he would like to move to Utah. Since he had been on a mission, he wanted to get his family where they could be raised in the Church. He also wanted to be married in the temple. He wanted to be sealed to his first wife as well as to Ludie. Many thoughts went through Ludie's mind about this. She thought that if the opportunity came, she would be glad to stand proxy for Uriah's first wife, but she knew that she didn't love Uriah and she didn't want to be married to him for time, much less eternity.
    On the 27th of November 1899, Ludie's second child, Lyman Snow was born. Soon after this, Uriah had the opportunity to sell his property. They sold the farm and everything they had. They put all their earthly possessions in a big trunk, which consisted mostly of clothing, then with a roll of bedding and $6,000 they started by train for Utah. How happy they were. They thought that their dreams were coming ture and that they would soon be in Zion, and with their six children.
    There was plenty of time during the long train ride for Uriah to visit with other passengers, while Ludie was kept busy taking care of the children. One day he was talking to some men who told him about some Mormon Colonies that had been established in Northern Mexico. He was told that it was a good place to obtain land and get started if one didn't have too much capital. It was also a good place where one could live among other Mormons and it was an especially good place to raise children.
    Right away, Uriah decided Mexico would be the best place for him to take his family. When he told Ludie about it, she was very disappointed. She had been excited about going to Zion, but Mexico? From the time that Mexcio was mentioned, she didn't want to go to Mexico. In fact, she hated the thoughts of it.
    The Hassells arrived in Colonia Dublan in March of 1901. They found a little house to live in. Uriah went to a little store and bought a sack of flour, a sack of sugar and a sack of pinto beans. They bought a little stove and a couple of beds and a few dishes. Uriah bought a cow and a load of wood from a Mexican man. (The wood turned out to be green cottenwood). Thus they set up their housekeeping in Mexico.
    Ludie picked over the beans and put them on to cook on that slow-burning green cottonwood fire. The smell of those beans cooking was more than she could take and she told her husband that they must be poison. In the evening, the beans were still hard and she was afraid to feed them to the children so she took them out  behind the house and dumped them out. A neighbor lady asked her about the beans and she was told that beans do smell when they are cooking but when they are done they are soft and they are not poison.  That was Ludie's introduction to trying to cook pinto beans.
    The Country, the customs and even the climate was so different from what the Hassells were used to, that they had quite a time trying to adjust. One day the Relief Society Teachers came to visit Ludie. They asked her how she liked living in Mexico. She tried to be optimistic and tell them that she liked it fine but then she added, "I'm having a hard time trying to cook for my family." After the women left, they sent a child back with a little sack of dried corn and some dried peaches. She could tell that it was corn and peaches but she didn't know what had been done to them or how she should go about preparing them for the children to eat.
    Another bad experience they had with food was when Uriah found out that someone had killed a beef and they were selling the beef out to whomever wanted to buy it. He went and bought a whole hind quarter. Ludie didn't know of a way to preserve the meat so as the weather became warmer, most of that meat spoiled.
    Uriah rented a farm and worked early and late trying to make it pay but without the proper farming equipment and due to the scarcity of water, all his efforts were in vain.
    In the early summer of 1901, Ludie contracted typhoid fever. She became delirious. Bishop Anson B. Call remembered coming to help administer to her and called the Relief Society Sisters to take take the children and take care of her. For forty-one days, Ludie lay with a raging fever and although she didn't know what she was saying, she kept repeating over and over, "If I die, don't bury me here." When she finally did get better, all her long black hair fell out and she never completely recovered. She had health problems the rest of her life.
    As they had had such a discouraging time in Colonia Dublan, Uriah decided maybe it would be better if they moved up to Colonia Garcia, a new settlement in the mountains. The following March of 1902 they moved to Garcia.
    It wasn't easy to find lodging for a family there as the colony was new and everyone who had a place suitable to live in was living there himself. They did get a small frame house on the north end of town, near the bank of the creek, some distance from the rest of the settlement. Right at this point the creek was narrow and the banks were very rugged and steep, making it an ideal place, in one's minds eye, for Indians to make their entrance into the settlement.
    Unfortunately terrible Indian stories which had little or no foundation was about all anyone had taken time to tell Ludie about her new surroundings. The mental anguish she suffered the first few months was terrible, since her husband was gone a great deal trying to provide for his family. How she wished they had never left Florida. When her husband did come home, she begged him to take them back to where they had come from.
    Finally Uriah decided that things were getting so bad that he would have to go to the United States and see if he could obtain employment. Fortunately before he left, he was able to move the family nearer town in a much better house, on a small piece of farm land. He got the land all plowed up before he left.
    With the help of twelve-year-old Palmer and ten-year-old Theodore, Ludie put in a crop. They planted potatoes, turnips, squash, beans, and a little corn. Meanwhile, they had a very hard time existing. Ludie had flour but little else to feed the children. One neighbor lady told Ludie that she would sell her a two-pound bucket of skimmed milk each day if she would sew carpet rags together for her. They used to sew these strips of cloth together and then braid them and make rugs to cover the bare floors. Ludie would sit and sew those little strips of cloth together all day long to get a two-pound ball of rags to exchange for a two pound bucket of skimmed milk.
    Ludie knew that she would have to ration that flour out to make it last as long as possible. She would make biscuits out of the flour and milk. She tried to feed the children what they needed but she rationed herself to three biscuits a day, one biscuit for each meal. Ludie had an old hen, so she gave the hen one biscuit a day. By selling the eggs she was able to obtain a little salt and now and then other necessities.
    Uriah was able to obtain some employment and with the first money he sent home, Ludie bought a cow. In the fall, they harvested their crop, so living conditions began to improve a great deal.
    Before the end of the year, Uriah came home for a brief visit. He told Ludie that he had acquired employment in a logging camp near Alamagordo, New Mexico and he had returned home before starting the new job. He seemed very pleased to find that Ludie had managed as well as she had. He casually remarked, "My, you've done very well since I left you alone. You would make a good widow." Several times during his visit Uirah said,"If anything should happen to me, I don't want you to take the family back. Stay right here with them. We've sacrificed too much to get them here where they can be raised under the influence of the Mormon Church."
    Uriah went back to his work. There was a lot of cold weather. It snowed alot and there was a lot of icy cold wind. One day Ludie received word that her husband, Uriah, had been killed. By the time Ludie received this word, Uriah had been buried a couple of weeks because communication was so slow in those days. Ludie was told that Uriah had been living in a tent at the logging camp. As it was Sunday, he wasn't working but was lying on his bed reading the Book of Mormon. A hard wind was blowing, and it suddenly blew a big pine tree over on his tent and he was killed instantly.
    On hearing the bad news, Bishop John T. Whetton came to visit the Hassell family and brought one of his sons along with him. As young Clifford saw how badly the Hassell children felt about their father's death, Clifford said, "Don't cry. Don't worry. My Daddy will take care of you! He takes care of all the widows and orphans."
    Ludie did some very serious thinking and praying during the following weeks as she contemplated her situation. She finally wrote a letter to her father in Florida and told him what had happened. She soon received a letter from her family and they all begged her to come back. Her father said that she could move right back into his home and he would gladly help her raise the children. Her brother-in-law who had bought Uriah's farm told her that he would give her back the farm and he told her that he would help her raise the children. Her brother, Lonzo, encouraged her to come back home and promised to help her. Of course, that is just what would be the most logical thing to do but every time she would begin to make plans, it seemed that she would hear Uriah say, "If anything should happen to me, don't leave Mexico. Keep the children here and raise them in the church."
    Little Clifford Whetton was more of a prophet than he knew he was when he said that the Bishop took care of all the widows and orphans because the following March, Bishop John T. Whetton took Ludie Ellis Hassell as his fourth wife.