Married Charles William Merrell 24 Apr 1878 in St. George
Mary Frances-Fenly-Clifford
Died 26 Jun 1939 in New Mexico
Buried in Virden
1870 Census
1920 Census
1930 Census
This is from the Charles William Merrell book.
Mary Frances Adams was born 27 August 1863, in Richmond, Cache, Utah, sixth child of Jerome Jefferson and Mary Angeline Frost Adams.
Fannie (or Fan), as Mary Frances was called , experienced extreme privation during her childhood. Cache Valley, where she was born, was then in its early years of settlement. Added to the cold climate and primitive living conditions of that northern area was the fact that her parents were not financially prepared for such a venture when they moved there. The family had interrupted its westward migration to California, staying in Utah only because they had no funds with which to continue their trip. Moreover, the family didn't remain in any location long enough to establish themselves solidly before receiving a call to move elsewhere to assist in colonization.
When she was just a toddler, Fannie loved to visit a particular neighbor lady and asked every day to be allowed to go "play" at the woman's house. Her mother soon learned that the reason she liked to go visiting was that the lady gave her bread and butter.
When Fannie was about four years old the family moved over five hundred miles south to the Muddy Mission, a desolate and harsh area where none of the settlers could make more than a subsistence living. Her father left when she was seven to search for a means to improve their economic situation, and while he was gone the Muddy settlement broke up. Fannie, along with her mother and her six surviving siblings, then moved to Washington City, Utah, where they eked out a living until her Grandfather Frost could arrange to move them to Spring City, Utah, where he lived.
A letter to one of her granddaughters, Vera Stevens, gives us some insight into her early school days:
"My first day in school I was about three years of age. I went to school with my brothers and sisters. Of course I got sleepy and went to sleep on the bench. While asleep I knocked a book off the bench and the teacher came along and was ornery because I had knocked the book off the bench. She picked me up and knocked a boy or two off the bench with me.
"When I was about six years of age, we went to a very kind teacher. We all loved him. He would take turns going home with us to our dinners and we were glad when it was our tum. He took the whole school out to a salt mountain. It was almost pure salt. There were pieces six inches thick and they were so clear that you could see through them like glass.
"Our next teacher was a very cross, strict man. Everybody had to walk the chalk line. To punish he would take his pencil and thumb and rake it up the back of the head and take hair, hide, and all. He was a good teacher, though. If everybody would do as they should, he was very kind.
"My next teacher in the same school house was a lady teacher and she was more like a little girl. She had no discipline. She would take gum away from the pupils and chew it herself, and if they would take bread to school, she would take it and eat it herself.
"My next teacher was a man. He was very strict. He would hit the pupils over the head with a large ruler, and he whipped very hard for little things sometimes. He would get a long peach limb and make two boys chew it from each end and chew it all up till they came together.
"We had no paint, powder, or lipstick. My clothing mainly was calico.
"We never had many books and we never had to study at home.
"Lots of Love,
"Grandma"
The years between 1871 and 1876 were possibly Fannie's time of least privation. The communities in which the Adams family lived during those years were less primitive, as they had been settled longer. The family lived in Spring City for some time, and Fannie's daughter Olive wrote that in 1876 when her Grandfather Adams, Fannie's father, was called to go to the Arizona Mission on the Little Colorado River he had been helping with the construction of the St. George Temple.
The trip from Utah to Arizona was no picnic for the Adams children. In the biography of their mother Mary Angeline Frost Adams, two of Fannie's sisters wrote about being hungry, cold, tired, and having to travel through rain and snow. When Fannie and some of the other children, traveling in a wagon separate from their parents, arrived at Little's Ranch somewhere along the way, they entered the ranch house where the heat and the smell of horses kept in one end of the building caused Fannie to faint. Another sister wrote that Fannie's health was not especially robust when she was a child, so the strain of the trip may have been too much for her. Or it could have been a combination of fatigue, hunger, and the conditions prevailing in the ranch house that were overpowering.
Somewhere along the way to Arizona, the Adams family met Charles William Merrell and his wife Din, who were going to the Arizona Mission to settle in a town other than the destination of the Adamses. Fannie, not yet thirteen years of age, sometimes rode in the wagon of the Merrells as they traveled.
Fannie's parents settled in Brigham City, Arizona, and little has been told of their first two years in that location. Before her fifteenth birthday, on 24 April 1878, Fannie was married in the St. George (Utah) Temple to Charles William (Will) Merrell, as his second wife. How long he courted her we do not know, but the first wife, Din, went with the couple to be married and continued traveling with them on their honeymoon.
From St. George the trio went north to Willard, where the newlyweds left Din with her parents while they continued to Malad, Idaho. Will worked for his brother in a nearby lumber mill for several months. In the late summer Will and Fannie returned to Willard, and Din accompanied them back to the Arizona Mission.
Fannie's first child Olive was born in Brigham City on 7 March 1879 at the home of her mother, who was a midwife. Din gave birth to a son shortly after Olive was born, but the child died as an infant and Din grieved for a long time. Fannie's second child, Cora May, was born in Brigham City on 8 February 188l. When May, as they called this new daughter, was weaned, Fannie gave her to Will's first wife Din as a Christmas present. That was one of many indications of the love and understanding that existed between the two wives during their entire lives. On 10 April 1883 Fannie gave birth to her first son, William Jerome, in Sunset, Arizona.
During the years spent in the United Order, Fannie helped in the dairy that was operated in the mountains during the summer months. She also took her turns with the cooking, washing, and other household chores that the women of the settlement shared. She had a room in the fort that comprised Sunset, as did each wife in the mostly polygamous group.
Her daughter Olive recalled the window curtains Fannie had knitted from coarse yarn to make her home attractive. Olive also wrote of Fannie's skill in making clothing from homespun fabric which she had dyed with native plants gathered for that purpose. Fannie knitted the stockings for the family and helped with the home manufacture of nearly everything they used in the household. Olive remembered the window boxes full of flowers that her mother planted and tended while living at the fort, as she always wanted to make her home a beautiful place in which to live.
Fannie insisted on milking the cows so the milk would remain clean, and that was considered to be her job for many years. She said she could get more milk from a cow than her husband could extract.
She was an excellent cook-salt rising bread and roast lamb were two of her specialties, as was a delicious cobbler made from sheep sorrel, which she used as a substitute for fruit. The pumpkin butter she made was another favorite with her children, and also something they called "Johnnycake. " She learned enough about sanitation to realize its importance and trained her children to wash their hands before they performed any chore that required cleanliness. When her daughter Olive entered nursing school as a young lady she was assigned to work with infectious cases in the hospital because the doctors had watched her wash her hands and could see that she had learned correct principles of sanitation. Such training was valuable to all of Fannie's children later in their lives.
In 1884 the settlements of Sunset and Brigham City began to break up. That was partly due to the raids carried out by the marshals in the Arizona Territory, zealous in enforcing the Edmunds-Tucker Act, passed in 1882. In August 1884, six men including Ammon Tenney, who later married Fannie's sister Hettie, were arrested and tried for polygamy. Ammon was one of three of the six who were sent east to serve prison terms in a federal prison in Detroit. There were gangs of outlaws roaming that part of the country, making it unsafe for the settlers, which may have influenced their decision to break up the settlements.
When the leaders of the LDS Church advised the polygamists to go to Mexico and establish colonies on land they were negotiating to purchase, Will was away from home. He had taken his first wife, their daughter Rhoda, and Fannie's daughter May to Utah to visit Din's parents and to attend the temple in Logan. The "Mormon grapevine" was probably running at top performance in Utah at that time, as Will immediately went back to Arizona to help with preparations to join the other families in the trek to Mexico. Din and the two little girls went by train to meet him on the way south, and Fannie went to Wilford, Arizona, to live in the same town with her parents. She was expecting her fourth child and was in no condition to travel to such a precarious destination. Her second son, Fenly Frost, was born in Wilford on 4 June 1885, with Fannie's mother acting as midwife.
About six months later Fannie's assistance was needed at the home of her brother John Quincy, whose wife Mary was expecting. Fannie and three men traveled to Canyon Creek on four horses, taking with them Fannie's three little children, Olive, Jerome, and Fenly. They stayed there until the following summer. That fall Fannie went with her parents to Logan, Utah, for a Frost family reunion, taking her youngest child with her.
When the reunion ended, Fannie and Fenly went by train to Deming, New Mexico, where they were met by someone from Colonia Diaz with a wagon to transport them to join Will and Din. It is not known whether Will was still in prison in El Paso del Norte when Fannie and her son arrived. Stories by different members of the family disagree as to the time of Will's release from prison; according to the Ward Clerk of Diaz at that time, Will was not released until November of that year.
Until Will finished a home for his two families, Fannie lived in a converted chicken coop that Sullivan Richardson offered as shelter for Will's newly arrived second family. The roof consisted of poles with willows across them to hold the mud and dirt which were put on top to keep out the heat of the sun. Fannie lined the ceiling with sheets and whitewashed the inside of the structure to make it bright and clean.
Because of the time Will had spent in prison, the building of a more permanent home was delayed. The family's first permanent-type dwelling was an adobe home with two rooms, each with a private outside entrance. Fannie's daughter Mary Belle was born to her there on 13 November 1887. Will later built a two-room home for Din on the other lot on their block, and enlarged the original house to give Fannie more room for her increasing family. Their daughter May wrote that they had dug a well to provide water for that house and for watering Fannie's kitchen garden. They used a tripod with a pulley attached on top, and a rope to draw up the bucket of water.
When Will suddenly became very ill during the fall of 1889, the doctor diagnosed the ailment as smallpox. He was taken to a small adobe "pest house" and cared for by a Mexican, then Elijah Pomeroy, who had had the disease. On the day Will was taken away, Fannie became very ill with a fever and severe headache. Nobody was allowed to visit her home because the family had been put under quarantine, so Fannie was left without help to care for her five children (by that time, May had returned to her own mother by choice). She called the children to her and told them if they would pray for her in turn, she would get well. Olive, May, Jerome, Fenly and Mary, who was barely able to walk, knelt by Fannie's bed and each prayed for her to be healed. The following morning her fever and pain were gone.
During her husband's illness, Fannie was visited by kind neighbors who came to her gate each day to give her and the children messages from Will and to see if they needed anything while they were under quarantine.
Additional children were born to Fannie-Ernest Leroy on 15 December 1889 and Orson, born 2 October 1891. About 1892, or possibly later, the family moved to the place they called "The Orchard." Will had built a home with two rooms on the front, two more rooms on the back part of the house, and two rooms upstairs, which they considered to comprise one and a half stories. At that location they had an orchard with peaches, plums and apricots. The landscaping consisted of a row of locust trees across the front to act as a wind break, catalpa trees by the house, and a nice lawn. They dug a well from which they drew water by means of a pulley; later it was replaced with a pump.
Another daughter Inez Abbie was born on 4 November 1893, and a son Vern Clark arrived on 4 July 1896. There were many things that the family needed for the new home that could not be procured without additional effort from someone in the family. Because all the older children, as well as her husband, were fully occupied with their current pursuits, Fannie took her five youngest children to Deming, New Mexico, in 1896 or 1897, where she worked until she had earned enough money to buy the items she felt they could not do without. The result was added comfort and convenience in their daily living. Her tenth child and sixth son Douglas Burdel was born on 16 April 1899 in Colonia Diaz.
It was probably the home they called "The Orchard" which Will traded in early 1900, along with his share of the tannery, to Edson Porter for a farm located just across the river from Colonia Dublan. There was a comfortable lumber home on the newly acquired property, with some fruit trees, but no shade trees.
According to Cora, wife of her son Fenly, Fannie and the oldest son Jerome had returned to Colonia Diaz to move more of the family's belongings to their new home when Will left to cut limbs in the river bottom to plant as shade trees around the new dwelling. Will was knocked from the top of a tree by a limb blown in a gust of wind, and was critically injured. He died on 14 March 1900, surrounded by his loving family.
The law in Mexico required that the remains be interred within 24 hours of a death. Since Fannie was in Colonia Diaz and Din was still living there, a messenger went on horseback to take the tragic news to the widows. They left immediately to attend the funeral, and even though the officials allowed for a few hours' postponement due to extenuating circumstances, the service was nearly over when the wives arrived.
Now Fannie was left with nine children to support. The oldest daughter Olive was married in 1894 and had moved away, but returned home to live just before her father passed away. Din remained in Colonia Diaz, so the two wives could be of help to each other only on a long-distance basis.
Though Fannie and Din were separated by diverse circumstances, they wrote to each other as long as they both lived. A letter written by Fannie to Din exactly a year before Fannie passed away gives some insight into their closeness:
"My dearest Aunt Din,
"Mesa, Arizona
"June 26, 1938
"I was so happy to get your letter and our dear husband's blessing [probably a copy of the patriarchal blessing given him in Mexico]. It seemed as though he were near. I think the one promise was fulfilled about doing a great work among the Lamanites [Native Americans and Mexicans] when he went to prison and would not lie to get his freedom. And we know he always set a good example wherever he went. I feel that blessing will be realized every word and hope we will live to gain all those blessings with him and know he will be proud of his family if they keep on as they are striving to do now.
" ... I am glad to know about your family. I am sure you are proud of them. They are a fine family. I would hate to have to write about all of mine. It is so hard for me to write since my hand was broken. I can't use a pen, it has to be a pencil.
"Yes, Olive is very busy with her missionary work, garden, and temple work. When she has a few moments to spare, she is so tired she does not feel like writing. She was putting up apricots yesterday besides spading her garden. She works hard all the time.
"I received a nice letter from Ernest's second girl. She was married the 8th of February. She married a nice young man. I will send her letter to you. She is a sweet girl.
"I will say goodbye with love to all
"As ever lovingly,
"Aunt Fannie"
As a 37-year-old widow, Fannie raised chickens and sold her home-churned butter to augment their income while her sons worked the farm. According to at least one of her children, she also did laundry for some of the wealthy Mexican families in Casas Grandes, a town very near Colonia Dublan. She functioned as a nurse and midwife. She worked for the local general practitioner, Dr. Gay, and from him she learned more about obstetrics and became proficient in her field. She practiced for many years and never lost a patient even though she delivered many complicated cases.
She had the latest instruments and used them as the situation demanded. One of her fine stainless steel syringes was handed down to her son Douglas. His daughter Velma recalled its use when Douglas' wife was ill and needed a series of injections when no doctor was readily accessible.
In their later years Fannie's children told of several qualities of strength she possessed. She was always punctual for any assignment or appointment. Whenever her nursing or obstetrical services were needed, she went regardless of the hardship, fatigue or disagreeable circumstances. On two different occasions, once in Mexico and another time in Virden, New Mexico, a young man had been badly mangled while being dragged to death by a horse. In each case Fannie carefully washed and dressed the body for burial.
Olive recalled a stormy night when a Mexican man came for her mother to go with him six miles away to deliver his wife's baby. Because the transportation he offered was inadequate and the storm was dangerous, Fannie's sons begged her not to go. She told them, "I was set apart for this work; they need me, and I must go." She returned the next morning after saving both mother and child, happy that she had been able to help in the crisis. She practiced quite extensively among the Mexican people and they all loved and trusted her as much as they had revered her husband.
About a year and a half after losing her husband, another tragic blow was dealt to Fannie. Her son Jerome was working on a railroad bridge in El Paso, Texas, when he fell from the structure and was fatally injured on 17 September 1902.
In August 1902, six weeks before Jerome's death, Fannie became the fifth wife of Jabez Erastus Durfee. A short time later they moved the farm house to town and placed it on a lot bought by Fannie's son Fenly. They jacked the building up, put it on two wagons with four horses pulling each vehicle, and transported the house across the river in to Colonia Dublan. The children were happy to be in town where they didn't have to ride three miles in a buggy to every meeting or social event they attended, and Fannie was saved a lot of extra traveling to reach her patients.
The first of Fannie's children born of the new marriage was Naomi, born 28 May 1903, in Colonia Dublan. She lived only two days. Two years later on 1 August 1905, another daughter Nila Faye was born in Colonia Dublan. On 28 April 1907, Fannie's last child made his appearance in the same town; they named him Enzley.
The first week in July 1912, Fannie became foster mother to two nephews after their parents were deceased. Domer Adams, mother of the boys, passed away, and their father Will (Fannie's brother) notified a daughter named Edyth, who was in Columbus, New Mexico. Edyth hired a man to drive her by car to Colonia Diaz to attend her mother's funeral. When they crossed the border into Mexico, the driver neglected to obtain papers showing he had permission to take
the car into the country.
Mexican rebels learned of the mistake and confronted Edyth and her driver, asking them to pay a fine to them on the spot or leave the country. Will tried to convince the men that it would not do any harm to allow the visitors to stay a few hours longer for the funeral. In the ensuing argument, one of the Mexicans shot and killed Will. Fannie took his sons, Lloyd and Martell Adams, into her home as part of her family until they were grown.
Previously Fannie had become foster mother to a young girl of Mexican and French descent, after assisting with an operation performed in the home of a patient. Staying in the home was 13-year-old Marie Antoinette Poblette (pronounced Po BLAY), a relative of the patient, whom the family had mistreated. Fannie took the girl, called Tony, home to live with her, where she stayed for several years.
Fannie continued to practice nursing throughout the time she was raising her children. Her last daughter Nila recorded: "My mother took care of the Mexicans as well as the Mormons. She was a friend to all of them and the were a friend to her. They called her their little white angel. So many times on a dark night when a big Mexican would come to take Mama to care for a sick friend or relative, my brothers would just beg her to let one of them go along because they were afraid for her to go alone. She'd laugh and say, 'Why, he would no more hurt me than fly.' They were friends to Mama all through the years. She never had any real trouble."
Nila told of her mother's experience with some of Pancho Villa's men regarding her nursing practice: "Mama had an old mare that pulled her buggy, which was her only means of transportation to get to her patients. One day some of these bandits came into the yard and tried to take the mare. Tony went outside and as fast as they put the bridle on the horse, she would take it off. Tony told them off as fast as they worked. But, they finally took it [the horse].
"Then later, someone was ill and the captain sent for Mama to come. Mama just sent word back saying, 'No, I can't come any more. Your men have taken my mare, and that is all the transportation I have to depend on.' The captain saw that the mare was brought back immediately. He came right down to the house himself, and left a written order for Mama to keep. If anyone came there again to take the mare, she was to show that note to them. He said that if anyone took the mare again, he'd deal with them. This probably would mean their life. The bandits didn't have laws to live by. They just did what popped into their heads at the time. The mare was never taken again."
In July 1912, Fannie took her youngest son Enzley to Salt Lake City, Utah, to attend the temple because of his poor health. He had stomach trouble, and she felt that a blessing in the temple would effect a cure. Because of that trip, she was not in the colonies during the "Exodus.'"
On her return trip she learned that the women and children of the colonies had been evacuated, so she stayed in El Paso, Texas, for a few months until she felt it was safe to return home. She joined two of her daughters, a daughter-in-law, and two grandchildren in El Paso and shared a house there. When she returned to Colonia Dublan in January 1913, nearly all of the furniture remained in her home, but the Mexicans had ransacked the place and taken everything of any value. Several months later when the Mexican rebels made it too dangerous to stay in their home, Fannie and the children who had not married during the previous year moved to El Paso. In that move they could take their household belongings in a wagon. Her older unmarried boys obtained jobs in the El Paso area where they stayed until 1914 before returning to Colonia Dublan again.
The last stay in Mexico for the family had a duration of more than two years. In 1916, when General John J. Pershing followed Pancho Villa to Colonia Dublan, his troops were camped within a few blocks of Fannie's home. She and her family sold butter, milk, eggs, and buttermilk to Pershing's cook. Fannie became acquainted with General Pershing when he came to her home to see who had been supplying his table with real buttermilk, and the general had dinner in her home more than once.
Fannie and children Vern, Nila and Enzley went to the United States with Pershing's army early in 1917, and proceeded to Virden, New Mexico, where her sons Fenly and Orson lived. She bought a three-room tent with boards around the bottom, and in it she lived with her four unmarried children until her sons built a home for her.
She continued her nursing profession in the community. In August 1919 Fannie had a paralytic stroke and was forced to give up her obstetrical work. Her doctor recommended that she keep active and get out and around as much as she could. She often visited a friend in Thatcher, Arizona, and seemed to feel better there than in Virden where the elevation was a little higher.
When Douglas decided to go to high school, they sold the place in Virden and moved to Thatcher so that he and Nila could both attend school at Gila Academy. Fannie lived there for about six years, during which time Douglas and Nila were married (both in 1923). Vern had married while the family lived in Virden and had moved away.
Fannie and Enzley moved to Mesa, Arizona, and bought a little house where Fannie lived until 1938. She was an ordinance worker in the Arizona Temple from the time it opened in October 1927 until her health failed. Her daughter Olive had taken care of her from 1936 until 1938, but when Olive had an accident and could not get around for several months, Fannie went to Virden and stayed alternately with her sons who lived there.
On 26 June 1939 at the home of Orson, she passed peacefully away, leaving a large posterity to revere her memory and honor her good name. All eleven of her surviving children attended her burial in the Virden cemetery.
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This is by Cora Ward Merrell:
Mary Francis Adams was born to Mary Angeline Frost and Jerome Jefferson Adams on 27 August 1863 in Lewiston, Cache County, Utah.
In the early days of the church, the authorities called good, strong families to colonize various places because there were so many converts they had to have more land. When the country on the Muddy River in Nevada was opened for settlement in 1867, her parents were called there to establish their home. Fanny was four years old.
Helaman Pratt was called there too, and he often told of the hardships they experienced. The wind would blow and the land was of such a texture they couldn't keep canals up so they nearly starved. Finally, the authorities let them leave, and in 1873 they returned to Spring City, Utah.
In 1874, they were called to St. George to work on the temple. Soon they were called to colonize again, this
time in Arizona. On their way there, they met other families on the same mission. Among them was the family of Charles William Merrell. The Adams family settled in Brigham City and the Merrell family in Sunset. These towns were on the opposite sides of the Little Colorado River.
This was one of the few areas where the United Order was lived. The ladies took turns working in the kitchen so when not on duty there, they had all their time to do as they chose. This condition encouraged the association of the people living in these settlements. It wasn't long before Brother Merrell fell in love with the pretty Francis Adams, and with the consent of his first wife, Mary Malinda Hubbard, and in her company,
they made the trip to St. George and were married in the temple on 10 April 1878. She was only 15 years of age and was a mother at 16. Because of the persecution of plural marriage, they were advised in the temple to never talk about the marriage. On the honeymoon trip, they left the first wife, "Din" with her parents in
Brigham City, Utah, and went on to Malad, Idaho, where they spent several months while Brother Merrell worked in a saw mill. Then they all came back to Arizona where they lived for several years.
"Aunt Din" had been married only six weeks when they were called to settle in Arizona. They hadn't been married long when he married "Fanny". Francis had the first child, Olive. She was born at Sunset on 7 March 1879. Sometime later, Aunt Din gave birth to a son whose name was John. When he was just a baby, Aunt Din was making a trip to see her family when the baby became sick. They were traveling with some people who were going to northern Utah. When the baby got sick, they stopped in St. George where John died. He was buried there. She went on and stayed for some time with her family, seriously grieving over her lost child.
In February 1881, Francis had another daughter, Cora May. This meant that she had two children and the other wife didn't have any. When the baby was weaned, about Christmas time, she took her baby girl, May, and gave her to the other wife, Aunt Din. May lived with her for about five years and then she found out, somehow, that Aunt Din wasn't her real mother and she went home. Aunt Din said she couldn't have any of the nice things she had bought for her if she went, but that didn't make any difference. She went anyway.
Next, both women had babies about the same time. Francis had a boy, William Jerome, named for his father and grandfather, and Aunt Din had a girl, Rhoda Ann. Aunt Din wouldn't consent to Francis naming her son Charles William after his father. She wanted that name for her son when she had one. Two more babies were born before they moved to Mexico. Francis had a son, Fenly Frost, and Aunt Din had a son, which,
of course, was named Charles William.
After remaining in Arizona for several years, the persecution became severe on account of plural wives, and in 1886, President John Taylor called several families to locate in Mexico. They were: Charles Whiting, Scully C. Richardson, Brother Rogers, Joseph N. James, and Charles William Merrell. Here, again, they experienced the hardships of building up a new country. Materials of all kinds were hard to get. They had to be hauled long distances to be built into homes, churches, mills, ditches, roads, fences, etc. They built a one-room adobe house where they held church. When they organized the Sunday School, Francis was the assistant secretary in the first Sunday School.
While they lived in Colonia Diaz, Francis gave birth to another six children, making ten children in all: Mary Bell, 13 November 1887; Ernest Leroy, 15 December 1889; Orson Adams, 2 October 1891; Inez Abbie, 4 November 1893; Vern Clark, 4 July, 1896; Douglas Burdell, 16 April 1899.
Brother Merrell had a tannery and tanned leather. He had worked in the tannery in the Order and had learned the trade at Wilford, Arizona. He also had a half interest in a molasses mill with Brother Holden. There was also a small farm. Francis had a two-story adobe home with four rooms downstairs and two upstairs There was a nice orchard and grape vineyard. In the orchard was a peach tree that had three kinds of peaches on it that Brother Merrell had grafted.
While they lived there, Olive married Dave Wilson and went to Sonora to live. After a short time they separated and Olive came back home to live. Early in the spring of 1900, they traded the tannery and home to Brother Porter for a farm at Dublan. Douglas was still just a baby. There was a little orchard, but no trees around the home. Aunt Din and her family stayed in her home in Diaz and she had the farm house there. Francis and Jerome went back to Diaz to move more of their things and Brother Merrell was chopping cottonwood limbs to set out for trees around the house, when he fell from one of the trees and broke his neck. Before Brother Merrell died, he called Fenly to him and charged him with the care of the family, seemingly knowing of Jerome's early death.
They stayed on at Dublan and ran the farm. They had chickens, she made butter and sold it, she was a nurse and midwife also, and spent much of her time at it. She was dauntless and carried on. She reared a large family with two preceding her in death. She worked for the local doctor, Dr. Gay, and with him she studied and learned obstetrics and became efficient as a nurse and midwife. She practiced for many years and
never lost a patient even though she delivered many complicated cases. She had instruments and used them when necessary.
They had lived in Dublan for about a year and a half when the next daughter, May, was married to John Hatch by President Ivins. They moved to Colonia Juarez, where he raised fruit and did carpentry work. Later Olive married Manrique Gonzalez. In August 1902, Francis became the second wife of Erastus Durfee.
A year and half after her husband was killed, she also lost her eldest son, Jerome. He was working on a railroad bridge in El Paso, Texas, when he fell from the bridge and was killed. Sometime later, they moved from the farm, across the river to the town of Dublan. The house was made of lumber and they jacked it up, put it on two wagons with four horses on each wagon, and pulled it that way. They had a good farm and
soon bought more acres of land, and with the help of the boys they got along. Of course, they had a lot of cows and sold milk and butter. Fannie worked in a tailor shop some, and at other jobs.
The first child of her second marriage, Naomi, died at birth. The next year, 1904, Nila Durfee was born and in 1907 she gave birth to a son, Enzley Durfee.
They enjoyed living in town as they didn't have the three-mile trip from their farm to town in a buggy every time they went to church or anything in town. Then, too, there was the river which had to be crossed. Sometimes it was too, high to ford.
On 10 June, 1910, Fenly took his bride, Cora Elizabeth Ward, to the Salt Lake temple where they were married.
Just at the start of the revolution in 1911, Francis's brother's wife, Domer Jones Adams, was sick and died. Her son-in-law and daughter, Edith and Charlie Parks, came from their home in the states to the funeral. The Mexican petty officer questioned his right to be across the border. The husband, William Adams, was
talking to the officer about it, telling him that all the papers were in order and that they would go back when the funeral was over. Somehow they got in an argument and the Mexican officer pulled out his gun and shot Uncle Will. They had a joint funeral and buried husband and wife in the same grave.
This left a family of five children without parents. Francis took the two youngest boys, aged 11 and 9, Martel and Lloyd Adams. Lloyd was a sweet, but deaf child. Just a little later, she took in a Mexican girl, Antonetta
Pableto. Francis had helped with an operation on a relative where the girl was living. They were mean to her and Francis said she could come and live in her home if she wished, so she did. She was about 13 years of age and lived there until she went to work in El Paso in about three or four years when people left Dublan.
In July of 1912, she took her youngest son, Enzley, to Salt Lake to get a blessing in the temple for his health. He suffered from stomach trouble. He was promised in the temple that he would grow to manhood and he did.
She was away on this trip when the people were driven out of Mexico so she stayed in El Paso with
them on her way back home. The boys and men stayed on in Mexico and sent money out to the family. Mary and Inez got jobs so they managed to get along. The boys took an overland route out of Mexico on horses. Six months later in January 1913, they moved back to their homes. About all of the furniture was left, but everything else had been robbed. The Mexicans had ransacked everything.
That fall on 2 October 1913, Mary and Ira Wilkins Pratt were married in the Salt Lake Temple. The next month, Ernest was married to Verna May Moffett on 14 November 1913 by Bishop A. B. Call in Fenly's home. The next year, Inez married William Alden Stevens on 30 May 1914, and Orson married Lucinda Payne in the Salt Lake Temple.
Early in the spring of 1913, when American troops entered Mexico, the people feared that the Mexicans would be hostile to all Americans wherever they were, so they moved out. This time, they were able to take their belongings in a wagon. Fanny moved to El Paso and Vern got a job in the depot. Sometime after Orson was married, they moved back to Mexico for a while.
In 1917, a company of 21 men bought a big tract of land in Virden, New Mexico. Fenly and Orson were among the group. Fanny and the boys bought lots and moved to Virden. The boys pitched a tent and they moved in until Douglas got a house built for them. Vern married Catheryn Mortensen not too long after they
moved to Virden. She was offered the honor of her second temple ordinances, but never received them because she had to go to Salt Lake to get them.
Francis continued her nursing profession there in Virden. Her mother died at Thatcher while living with Aunt Sade (Sarah) Richardson. Finally she was forced to give up her obstetrical work when in August of 1919, she had a paralytic stroke. Her health bothered her a great deal through her life, but she never gave up. The
boys took care of her in Virden. The doctor told her to be active and get out as much as she could. She visited with a dear friend, Sister Taylor, in Thatcher often and finally decided she felt better there where the altitude was lower.
When Douglas wanted to go to high school in Thatcher, they sold their place in Virden and moved to Thatcher, Arizona. They lived there about six years. Douglas married Emma J. Layton on 7 June 1923 and Nila married J. Klin Darton on 9 March 1923.
Enzley and his mother moved to Mesa, Arizona, and bought a little house. When the Mesa Temple was dedicated on 23 October 1927, she was at the first session, and during that first temple season, she was only absent twice. She was ordained a worker on 2 October 1927, and for ten years she performed her work faithfully and well, being late only three times.
When she got so she couldn't do temple work any more, Olive took care of her for a while. When Olive got sick and couldn't care for her she. went back to Virden where her children Fenly, Ernest, Orson and Douglas were living at that time. Orson's wife Lue, and Fenly's wife, Cora, cared for her through her last illness. At Orson's home, on the 26th of June 1939, she passed peacefully away, leaving a large posterity
to revere her memory and honor her good name.
All of her eleven living children attended the funeral services, also a number of grandchildren and great grandchildren. Sister Bertha Clyman wrote a wonderful letter and some poetry in appreciation of the works of her life.
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