from Elizabeth Thompson Groesbeck's 1875-1883 journal . . .

… then I went to my sewing

Elizabeth Thompson Groesbeck’s  first journal entry is dated

 February 23^rd, 1875

It isn’t clear why Elizabeth started her journal then or if she’d been a journal keeper earlier in her life. The recent discovery and transcription of her journal for 1875 to 1883 is miraculous and it’s important for this descendant to learn some life lessons from the writings she left.

Elizabeth had been in the Salt Lake Valley since October 2, 1856 when she and her family arrived from Springfield, Illinois with the John Banks Company.  She’d been a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints since her April 6, 1841 Nauvoo, Illinois baptism. In 1854 missionaries found her and her family among the “lost sheep” of Springfield, Illinois where they taught them the truth about baptism and the principle of polygamy. Elizabeth was baptized again and she and her family prepared to immigrate to Salt Lake.

She was an early member of the Salt Lake Seventeenth Ward where she’d been called to be an “assistant to the 6^th block” the night their Relief Society was organized in 1868.  It was a calling she served in all seriousness and magnified in every sense of the word. Nine times during her less than consistent journal entries she mentioned “went around the block, visited around the block, etc.”

May, 13, 1875 went around the block in the four noon and attended the society in the afternoon had the head ack

Wednesday 41th [14^th], 1877 after breckfast I went to the store bot sum bedticking and fthers [feathers]   in the after noon I maid four pilows and eaight slips   I visited around the block

March 16, 1880, went around the block and found the people very glad to see me

During the first two years of the journal her entries about a dear friend Sister Harriett White jumped out at me. They were filled with testimony and light and illuminated their heartfelt love for one another.

1875, Tuesday 2^nd attended to the work in the morning then I went to see how Sister White was giting along

Harriet Prosser White [1819-1877] and John White [1808-1885] also lived in the Seventeenth Ward. It’s unclear if they were part of Elizabeth’s 6^th block district. They were definitely very dear friends.

March, 1875 Wednesday, 10^th don sum sewing spent about all the day with Sister White  she told me many things about the poverty she had past threw in England but that she had allways felt her trustinGod and he ben her friend

This brief account of Elizabeth's association with Sister Harriett White will be continued and appear in four parts. Links will follow here after they are posted: part 2, part 3, conclusion.

Elizabeth's journal is as she wrote it. We did not add any capitalization or punctuation, nor did we change any of her spelling. Some clarification is included in brackets.

(To be continued.)