Jane Elizabeth Manning, black Mormon pioneer

Jane Elizabeth Manning didn’t have an easy start in life. She was an African American when slavery was still legal. She had never been a slave, but she was sent away from home to work for a wealthy white family when she was only six years old. She lived in the home of her employer and the adult daughter in the home raised her—as a servant, not a daughter. Can you imagine being sent to live away from home and to work full-time when you’re so little?

When Jane was fourteen years old, she wanted to join a church. She chose the Presbyterian Church, but somehow felt it still wasn’t quite what she was looking for. One day, about a year and a half later, she heard that some Mormon missionaries were going to be preaching in the area. She mentioned it to her pastor, who ordered her not to go hear them, but she went anyway. As soon as she heard the things they taught, she knew it was exactly what she’d been searching for and she asked if she could be baptized. After her baptism, she went to work and helped many members of her family to join the church as well. Even though she was only a teenager, she was already showing that she had great leadership skills.

Today, Mormons stay wherever they lived before they were baptized. They live all over the world. But then, when the church was new, it was different. There weren’t that many Mormons and it was hard to communicate with them if they were spread all over the world. Since the church was new, everyone needed a lot of education to really understand what their church taught. It was easier to keep them all in one place. When people joined the church, they usually moved to wherever the church was in those days. Since Joseph Smith officially opposed slavery, black Mormons were welcome to live among the Mormons.

Jane had helped bring eight other members of her family to join the Mormon Church. There weren’t many Black Mormons then—they might have been the only ones in their area, since they were the only ones who traveled to the Mormons in their group. They started out in a racially mixed group, but when they reached the ferry, the company wanted the black Mormons to pay up front instead of at the other end as the rest did. Apparently, they expected to have money for the ferry at the other end of the trip—perhaps Mormons there paid it—and so they didn’t have the money to go on. Although the white Mormons were allowed on the ferry, the black Mormons were forced to walk the rest of the way. It was an eight hundred mile journey. Without question, that was a difficult trip, although, since Jane would later join the trek to Utah, it was probably good practice.

They had not come prepared to walk so far. They didn’t have enough supplies or the right clothing. Still, they never thought to turn back. They were determined to get to the Mormons. It was Jane, still a teenager, who led the group, even though many of the people in the group—including her mother—were adults. Since she began the trip about a year after her baptism, I’m guessing she was about sixteen when she led eight other people on a long journey.

It was October and very cold. Their feet starting bleeding so badly they could make a complete footprint in the snow that was covered in blood. They stopped and prayed until the feet healed. They didn’t have warm enough clothing and they were often very hungry. Instead of complaining about the conditions or the way they had been treated, they sang hymns as they walked.

They ran into a very scary and dangerous situation in Peoria, Illinois. When the officials saw a group of black people in ragged clothing traveling on foot together, they decided the people were runaway slaves. They demanded to see their freedom papers, proof that they had been freed from slavery by their masters. However, none of them had ever been slaves, so they didn’t have those papers. They tried to explain they were black Mormons traveling to Nauvoo, but it took a long time before anyone believed them and they were allowed to go.

Now they were scared. Every day they worried that they would be arrested again, maybe even made slaves, but they kept right on going, singing and praying. Finally they reached Nauvoo, the Mormon city. The little group of black Mormons was exhausted and hungry. The first person they saw told them to go right to Joseph Smith’s house. When they got to the house, his wife Emma was at the doorway. She saw them coming and asked them to come into the house. Joseph Smith was home and quickly added chairs to his dinner table and made sure they were fed their first good meal in a very long time. He moved his own chair to sit by Jane, because he had learned she was their leader. He asked her to tell him the story of how the group arrived there and what had happened to them.

Joseph and Emma invited the group to stay as guests in their home until they’d found jobs and homes of their own. It only took a week for everyone to find a job and a home—except for Jane. There seemed to be no jobs available for this teenager with so much courage and leadership. When she realized she was the only one left without a home or job, she began to cry. Joseph found her crying and reassured her she wouldn’t be put out on the street. Then he and his wife offered her a job with them. Emma asked her what she could do and she listed all her homemaking skills. (Remember she had been a household servant since she was six. It was her career.) She offered to start right away, but Emma insisted she rest and start in the morning. Since Jane liked doing laundry, that was what she was assigned to do first. In later years, when she found herself having to support herself and her children, she would take in laundry to earn money.

Jane continued to live with Joseph Smith and his family. When Joseph was murdered, the black Mormon woman moved into the home of Brigham Young and worked for him. Her brother would end up working for both Mormon prophets as well. When the Mormons went to Utah, Jane traveled in a lead group with Brigham Young’s household and would be one of the first people in the state. Her child would be the first Black Mormon born there.

Jane Elizabeth Manning was an amazing woman. She was always giving to help with special church projects, and when her friend had no food, Jane insisted on giving the woman half of her own, even though she herself had very little to feed her family. She became such an important person that she and her brother were given reserved seats at the front and center of the tabernacle for all important meetings. When she died, the prophet himself spoke at her funeral.

But it all started because Jane Elizabeth Manning was a teenager with courage, faith, and leadership skills. She stayed active in her church all her life and said at the end of it that her testimony was as strong as it had been when she was baptized. She was proud to be black, to be Mormon, and to be a black Mormon…a Mormon who has become a treasured part of Mormon history.

The Martin Handcart company had more problems than many of the companies. They were so desperate to reach Salt Lake set out too late in the year and storms came early. They had been advised to wait, but they were anxious to get started in a safe new home. They ended up traveling in the cold of winter, when it was hard to find food or to stay warm.

In October 1856, Brigham Young learned they were in deep trouble. The semi-annual conference was about to begin, so during the conference, he asked for volunteers to form a rescue party. The rescuers found them, bringing food and help. However, by the time they reached the Sweetwater River, the people in the Martin Handcart Company were very weak from having been hungry and cold for so long. The very deep, wide, and icy cold river was more than they could handle and they were afraid their journey would end right there, because they weren’t strong enough to cross it. Three teenage boys from the rescue party, George W. Grant, David P. Kimball, and C. Allen Huntington, took matters into their own hands and decided to carry people across. Those three boys carried almost every member of the handcart company themselves. However, this came with a price, as heroism often does. They became quite ill themselves from the strain and the challenges of spending so much time in icy water with heavy loads. Eventually—years after their heroic actions—they all died from complications of that day of heroism. Brigham Young was moved by their sacrifice and cried when he learned what they’d done.

Mary Goble was a teenager in the Cluff Wagon Company, which was to follow the Martin Handcart company in order to help them as needed. Because they had wagons and not handcarts, they had better supplies and more options open to them. Her heroism came in the form of helping her mother. Her mother became very sick during the journey and the company was traveling in an area with no water. They’d been able to melt snow sometimes to have something to drink, but Mary’s mother longed for water from the freshwater spring a few miles away. Mary set out to get it for her, traveling with a woman from the company. As they were walking, they found a very sick man. He was old and unable to move. They knew he would die of frostbite soon if they didn’t get help. Mary continued on to get the water and the other women went back to the camp to get help for the man.

Mary was naturally frightened to find herself all alone in the woods. The travelers were afraid of the native people and Mary was so busy watching for them she lost track of where she was. Soon she realized she was completely lost in the wilderness. The snow was all the way up to her knees and it was almost midnight before search teams found her. They tried to treat her frostbite.

Mary’s mother died just as they entered the Valley and they carried her body in the wagon the rest of the way. Already, three of Mary’s younger siblings had died during the five month journey. When they arrived that evening, they were quickly given shelter and food. Brigham Young himself came to greet them the next morning. Tears filled his eyes when he saw Mary’s frozen feet and learned her mother was dead. A doctor was sent for who had to amputate her toes because they were unable to be saved from the frostbite. Naturally, this was traumatic for her, but Brigham Young made a prophetic promise to her the rest of her feet and her legs would heal. It didn’t seem at first like this was going to be true. She continued to get worse and the doctor told her he needed to amputate her feet. She refused, remembering Brigham’s promise and having faith in him. The doctor was amazed, a few months later, that she was completely healed.

Sometimes a hero is just someone who keeps on going, doing what needs to be done even when their hearts are breaking and their bodies are weak. This was the case with Maggie, age thirteen, and Ellen, age nine, who left their home in England to come to be with the Mormons, whose religion they had just joined. The Pucell family immigrated to the United States on the same ship that brought Mary Goble.

They found, when they arrived, their wagons and handcarts weren’t ready and it was July before they could begin their journey. They traveled to Winter Quarters in Missouri and then set out for Salt Lake. They had to cross the Platte River several times, and the last time there were chunks of ice floating in the water. Some were too weak to even attempt to cross a deep icy river and sat down, where they died. Others, including the Pucells, braved the water. However, the girls’ mother became very ill from doing this and had to be placed in the wagon. Their father, although weak and thin from lack of food, tried to pull the wagon up the steep hills himself, with the girls pushing the back of the wagon.

When it came time to cross another stream, again icy, the father fell. He managed to get back up but died on the other side of the stream. Now there were only the girls to care for their mother and manage the journey. Their mother soon died also and the girls were orphaned. Despite their broken hearts and the fear they must have felt, they kept right on going, managing as best they could with whatever help was available, until rescuers came. Then they continued on, still struggling in the icy cold, although at least with a little food and warmer clothing to help them. Everyone had been hungry for so long they were dangerously thin and weak.

The girls had frozen arms and legs. Ellen had to have her legs amputated at the knees—and because the Saints were newly arrived, they didn’t have proper tools or even anesthesia. Can you imagine having your knees amputated while you’re still awake and without pain killers? This didn’t stop Ellen, though. She went on to marry and have a large family. She spent her life in pain, because her legs never healed properly, but was never heard to complain. Without the wheelchair she might have had in modern times, she learned to get around on her stumps and to devote her life to helping others.

Life can be hard. A lot of times, our trials are not our own fault, but we still have a responsibility to follow the examples of these teenagers and make something of our lives. We can learn to endure our trials and to find our proper place in whatever life we’re given.

July 24 is Pioneer Day. For Mormon teenagers, this is a day of fireworks and parades, but it’s also a day to remember the Mormon pioneers. Can you imagine spending your teen years walking across the country, helping to pull a handcart because you can’t afford a covered wagon, maybe watching your friends, siblings, or even your parents die along the way? That’s how it was for a lot of teenagers. There were dances, but they were held after a really long day of walking. They had friends, but they talked as they worked or walked. These teens had to be adults long before a modern teenager might have to, just because they had so much responsibility and they’d already had hard lives. Many had lost parents or watched their homes destroyed. Some had even been attacked and every day they faced serious dangers from people who had forgotten our country believes in religious freedom. That kind of life makes you grow up fast.

The teenagers in the early church had interesting lives and many of them recorded their experiences in journals or later wrote their life stories. One boy, Henry Sanderson, became a Mormon when he was thirteen. He lived in Connecticut and when his parents converted, he had to endure a lot of teasing and bullying from people who didn’t like Mormons. He was relieved when his parents decided to move to Nauvoo to live with the Mormons, so he could escape the persecution. There, he became friends with the sons of Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet, who lived two houses from him. Every tenth day, Henry helped to build the church’s temple, a special building used for sacred ordinances.

Joseph Smith was murdered when Henry was fifteen. He had watched as Joseph was arrested and taken to prison on false charges, which allowed him to be killed without protection from his own people. For a while, people weren’t sure what would happen to the church. The murderers hoped the church would die with Joseph, but it didn’t. Brigham Young took over and life went on, but not exactly as before. Things became very hard for the Saints, as the Mormons called themselves, and Henry’s family needed income. He and his father went to St. Louis to find work and Henry was hired to work for shoemakers. At fifteen, he worked full-time.

In 1845, the family moved to a farm, where his father was hired to work. However, an illness, probably malaria, struck and Henry’s father died. In those days, that meant the oldest son, Henry, was now responsible for making sure the family survived. However, Henry himself was also ill with the same disease. Despite this, the family returned to Nauvoo, the city where the Mormons lived. One sister stayed behind to work for a bit, so Henry, still sick, returned to bring her back when her job ended. He worked for his passage as an assistant fireman one way and a cook and dishwasher the other way.

At age seventeen, Henry joined the Nauvoo Legion. The Saints were in a lot of danger. Joseph Smith’s murder hadn’t ended their persecution and the Saints knew they could all be killed at any time. He had a gun and helped patrol the city, watching for enemy mobs.

When the Saints finally decided they were going to have to leave Nauvoo, Henry and his family joined them on the trek west. Henry worked for another family to help pay the costs. However, the United States government stopped the travelers and asked for volunteer soldiers to help fight the Mexican War. Henry was sure Brigham Young would refuse, because the government had refused to protect the Saints in their time of danger. To his surprise, Brigham Young agreed and Henry became a soldier. When his time ended, he entered the Salt Lake Valley, but he wanted to be with his family, so he traveled with Brigham Young’s company to Winter Quarters, where many of the pioneers were preparing for the journey. He returned to Utah in three years.

Henry’s life was unusual compared to teens today. By the time he was an adult, he had lost his father, been a soldier, led a family, worked full-time, and become a pioneer. His teen years weren’t filled with the fun of a typical teenager, but he never complained about it. He was proud of what he had accomplished at such a young age.

This story is retold from William G. Hartley, “Nauvoo Teenager: Henry Sanderson,” New Era, Oct 1989, 44. Read the story to learn more about his teenage years.