1918 Relief Society Service in the American Red Cross.

Helen Melvina “Mellie” Groesbeck Morgan was active in Red Cross Service in Salt Lake during World War I as posted here. I wonder if she marched in a parade like Relief Society members did in Chicago in 1918, pictured here (3^rd and 4^th pictures down)  on Keepapitchinin today.

Members of the Great Salt Lake Chapter of the American Red Cross were offered classes in first aid and home nursing. The women provided services throughout the 1918 influenza epidemic, and they shipped bandages to the front lines during the war. 

We know Mellie and her daughter Bessie Morgan Rex gathered and dried peach pits for the war effort, as their daughter and granddaughter , Helen Rex Frazier, wrote in her history.

Peach Pits were used during World War I as filter for the soldiers’ gas masks.

Thank you to cousin Karen M. for this picture of Mellie Morgan with her son John.

Brothers Double Blessing, August 9, 1894.

 

September 6, 2012 I visited the Church History Library in Salt Lake City to look at the Fourteenth Ward’s original membership records. I determined that if I could locate a blessing record for Mellie Groesbeck and John Hamilton Morgan’s youngest son I would be able to prove or dispel the notion that the baby’s name had been changed following his father’s untimely August 14, 1894 passing.

I had only a few hours to spend downtown so I went to the desk in the library and submitted my request for the microfilm of the earliest 14^th ward membership records. I was disappointed to learn that the microfilm was in use by another patron that day, and I wouldn’t be able to use it. The librarian suggested that was most unusual, and if I searched through the catalog further I might find something else I’d like to use. There was a book version of the very record I wanted, so I asked for that. The librarian apologetically explained that the book wasn’t available for patron use. I suggested that since the microfilm was in use, and the pockets of time that I can get to the library are few and far between, perhaps the “powers that be” would permit me to use the book this one time. And they did! What a thrill!

The original Fourteenth Ward Record Book was delivered to my table in the reading room. The large 18 x 14 black leather volume took up the entire table when it was opened. Gold leafed lettering in the center of the cover read

 

Nineteen beautifully penned Morgan names were written in the index-- I found what I was looking for. Each numbered member’s name is followed by their parent’s name and birth and blessing dates.

# 858, Morgan, John Hamilton

John Morgan, Helen Groesbeck

7 Feb 1894, Salt Lake City

 blessed on  Aug 9, 1894 by M. F. Cowley

 

# 859, Morgan, M. [Mathias] Cowley

John Morgan, Mary Ann Linton

24 Jan 1894, Salt Lake City

blessed on Aug 9, 1894 by M. F. Cowley

 

These entries answered more questions than I’d asked. And they raised quite a few additional ones.

Both of John Morgan’s sons were blessed by Matthias Cowley on the same day, five days prior to their father’s August 14, 1894 passing.

John Hamilton Morgan Jr.’s name was NOT changed following his father’s death. I wonder what he’d been called before he was blessed and given the name John Hamilton Morgan.

Were the babies blessed in Preston, Idaho?

Family history tells us Grandmother Mellie sent her ailing husband to Preston, Idaho to recover from his illness. She must have hoped that away from the city he would have had a better chance for recovery, his wife Mary Ann would watch over him.

At some point Mellie traveled to Preston to be with her husband, only to return to Salt Lake when she received word her own baby at home had become very ill.

The train trip between Salt Lake and Preston was routine, and the trip was familiar to the Morgans. The train for Preston departed Salt Lake City daily at 5 p.m., and arrived Preston at 11:30 p.m.  The return train to Salt Lake left the following morning at 5:30 a.m. On John Morgan’s normal visits to Preston he would remain there the second day--his journal entry usually read something like, “Read and quiet today. George C. Parkinson [a community leader] called.” The next morning John Morgan would depart Preston on the 5:30 a.m. train, and arrive home in Salt Lake at 11:00 a.m.

 



 John Hamilton Morgan, Jr.

born February 7, 1894

 

Mathias Cowley Morgan

born January 24, 1894

 

You will find further information about these children at The Ancestor Files:



Where did John Hamilton Morgan die -- Preston, Idaho home.

John Morgan's Children

And a Story of Mary Ann Linton’s cure for baby John on this blog.

Pictures of John Morgan's sons are from Special Collections, Marriott Library, University of Utah, used with permission.

Veterans Day!

John Morgan Rex marker 2009 in Memory Grove,

Salt Lake City, Utah

Family Veterans Remembered here.

John Morgan Rex, and here, and here

John Hamilton Morgan, and here

John Hamilton Morgan II

Joseph Smith Morgan

D. W. Hamilton

William Harrison Morgan, and here

Asa Frazier

Dale Brough Rex, Nov 10, 2011 Deseret News

George Benjamin Sanborn

These Gold Star Mothers markers

are across the road from the veterans markers

in Memory Grove.

Agnes Rufi Frazier is my grandmother [Emily Rufi Frazier's] sister.

Agnes' son Stephen Frazier was killed in World War II.

Helen Melvina Groesbeck and Mary Ann Linton Morgan. 1894 cure for a baby.

Two weeks ago when I met some of Great Grandfather John Hamilton Morgan’s granddaughters, I heard a very interesting story.

Our group of eight sat around a table and visited over lunch. Pat (whose given name is Helen) is John Hamilton Morgan’s (II) [1894-1982] eldest daughter.

Pat asked me if I knew her grandfather’s youngest (third) wife. I said, "yes," I knew she was Mary Ann Linton Morgan.

“She saved my father’s life!” She declared, just like that.

“He had Pyloric stenosis,“ she explained, “and Mary Ann told Grandma how to make a gruel of flour and water, which she did. Feeding my father that gruel saved his life.”

Wow! I’d never heard that miraculous story before.

I’d also never heard of Pyloric stenosis. A look through Wikipedia when I returned home enlightened me. Pyloric stenosis (or infantile hypertrophic pyloric stenosis) is a condition that causes severe vomiting in the first few months of life. There is narrowing (stenosis) of the opening from the stomach to the intestines, due to enlargement (hypertrophy) of the muscle surrounding this opening (the pylorus, meaning "gate"), which spasms when the stomach empties. It is uncertain whether there is a real congenital narrowing or whether there is a functional hypertrophy of the muscle which develops in the first few weeks of life.
1894 was an extreme year in the lives of Helen Melvina (Mellie) Groesbeck and Mary Ann Linton Morgan, wives of John Hamilton Morgan. They each gave birth to their youngest child, and their husband became extremely ill and died on August 14, 1894. Family accounts report that baby John was too ill for Mellie to remain in Preston, Idaho with her dying husband.

In 1894 Grandmother Mellie needed a miracle to save her baby’s life. Mary Ann gave Mellie the life-saving directions that spared baby John. A hundred years later John's daughter passed this miraculous story on to me.

Mary Ann Linton Morgan's autobiography is posted here on The Ancestor Files where you can also read about other faith promoting incidences in her life.

A link to John and Mellie's family group sheet is here.

Mary Ann's sons are Linton 1890, Harold 1892, Mathias Cowley 1894.

Pioneer rosebush blooming in 2009 at the side of my home. Mary Ann Linton Morgan and her sons is from the Ancestor Files link above.

John Hamilton Morgan (1842-1894) and his son, John Hamilton Morgan (1894-1982).

John Hamilton Morgan’s daughter, Bessie Morgan Rex, kept a scrapbook. Forgotten until last year, I took pictures of some of the pages. In memory, and with respect, for these men and all veterans today, Veterans day, I submit the following. Bessie Morgan Rex clipped and pasted it into her scrapbook.

Interesting Similarity In Soldier Letters of Morgans, Father and Son

An interesting and impressive similarity is brought to mind by a letter recently received by Mrs. Helen M. Morgan, 359 Bryan Avenue, from her son, John Morgan Jr., a young soldier on his way to France. The letter was almost a duplicate in context and spirit of a letter written more than 56 years ago by his father, the late John Morgan, who was a soldier in the Civil War. Both are appeals to the folks at home not to think of peace but to continue to give the army all possible support and encouragement.

A further interesting similarity lies in the number of this unit to which the respective soldiers belonged. John Morgan, was a member of the 123d regiment of Illinois mounted infantry. John Morgan Jr. is with the 123d aero squadron?

Civil War Letter
The elder Morgan’s letter was written to his mother and father from a camp near Murfreesboro, Tenn., under date of Jan 28, 1862. It is one of the treasured possessions of the family and hangs in a frame, with the old regimental flag in the office of Nicholas G. Morgan, a son. In part the letter reads as follows:

“It makes me a little riley to hear of good, staunch administration men turning from their allegiance to their government and supporting one of the most God-forsaken projects (as the present peace party claims to be) that was ever invented. Were it possible I would wish that Lincoln could assume the power of a dictator for 12 months and would hang every man that dared utter one word in favor of the rebellion or peace.

Congress and northern legisletures [sic] and northern traitors are doing more for the cause of the Rebellion than all the Southern army. They are discouraging the federal army and encouraging the rebels as much as lay in their power. We of the army are in for nothing but the subjugation or annihilation of the south, and if we cannot accomplish it in three years we can in six, but that it is to be done we are satisfied, and that we are the army to do it we are also satisfied!”

The 1918 Letter
The letter from this federal soldier’s son, more than half century later, says in part:
“America is gradually awaking to the fact that we must best Germany at her own game. No more are we relying on some wonderful achievement of an Edison or the appropriation of huge sums of money by Congress. When we outnumber Germany with better fighting men, then can we hope for victory.”

“No doubt you talk this over daily but to give you the one thought of the boys in training: We do not want the folks at home to feel that Germany is all in, that the game is over, and we can slack up now; for if this thought ever gets into the head of the American public many hundred of thousands are not coming back, who could if we strain every muscle, use every legitimate man and flight like h___ now.”

The accompanying photographs show the two Morgans in their respective uniforms, which, as may be seen, are widely different. The particular dress of the elder Morgan was worn by him in 1862 in connection with a foraging expedition, when the soldiers had to provide themselves with whatever clothes they could find. It goes without saying that the “uniforms” were numerous and varied.

Thank you, cousin Karen A., for typing this copy of the text from the newspaper clipping.

Bessie Morgan Rex and her brothers, 1905

Isn’t this a wonderful picture! That is grandmother Bessie Morgan Rex and her brothers, Nick and John (Jack) Morgan. Her biography begins here. Thanks to her brother, Nicholas Groesbeck Morgan, for saving the picture. And thank you to his granddaughter, cousin Karen M., for sending it to me.

Uncle Nick’s poem, reflections on discovering this photograph about 60 years ago, follows. Today is actually his birthday. He was born 125 years ago today, on November 9, 1884. Happy Birthday, Uncle Nick! And thank you for the family treasures you preserved.

Be sure and click on the imagine to enlarge it!