Lucina Streeter Snow

By
Nathan H. Gardner
Additions and Editing by
Donna Woodward

Lucina Streeter was 16 of October 1785 at Chesterfield, Cheshire Co., New Hampshire the oldest child of 

William Streeter and Hannah Mason. Her parents were both born at Cumberland, Providence Co., Rhode 

Island. William and Hannah had gone from Cumberland to Chesterfield soon after marriage and their first five children were born there. About 1797 they moved back to Rhode Island, where they had seven more children. The deaths of three of these children were recorded at Smithfield, Rhode Island in 1820.

Lucina was just 16 years old when she married 19 year old Levi Snow on 26 November 1801 at Chesterfield. The marriage was performed by Abraham Wood, Town Clerk. Levi and Lucina’s first child, Levi Mason was born 15 July 1803 at Chesterfield, New Hampshire.

Many of the neighbors were moving north where new lands were being opened up. Levi and Lucina 

wished to be to themselves and to acquire their own home and farmland. Because the home and sawmill in Chesterfield, Levi had inherited, along with his brother John, Levi sold his half to John. Soon Levi and Lucina with baby Levi Mason, set out for Lunenburg, Essex Co., Vermont, a hundred and twenty-five miles north, up the Connecticut River Valley, on the Vermont side of the river. While in Lunenburg, Vermont Lucina’s second child was born on the 26th August 1804 and given the name Lucina. This farm they were swindled out of.

Lucina and Levi then move to St. Johnsburg, Caledonia, Vermont in the northeast section of the township, known as the Chesterfield district. Levi and Lucina, though heartsick and homeless, poor of material things, began anew, and with the help from old friends they had met again, they cleared there ground, made a home and settled among kind, helpful neighbors. While living here a third child, William was added to the family on the 14th of December 1806.

Through typical Vermont frugality, hard work, and untiring energy, the farm was expanded, the home 

furnished and added to as needed. Eight more children were born here: Zerubbabel, 29 Mar 1809; Willard, 6 November 1811; Mary Minerva, 30 July 1813; Shipley Wilson, 5 Feb 1816; Erastus, 9 

Novermer1818; Charles Van Rensaeler, 20 August 1821; Lydia Mason, 7 December; Melissa Diantha, 20 

August 1826. All eleven children were healthy, robust Vermont stock and lived to marry and raise families of their own.

Lucina was a very industrious wife and mother. She owned her own loom and spinning wheel and one can only imagine the labors that were required to use these important household items in those days. Lucina studied and knew the stars and constellations. Education was primitive, but not neglected. Schools only functioned two or three months of the year. The three “Rs”, Reading, Riting, and Rithmatic, were the principal subjects. Schools were free but the parents furnish wood for heating and board for the teacher.

By the spring of 1826 a fine new barn had been constructed and was in use. During the hot summer 

their house caught fire and was burned. The fire started in a pile of firewood stacked on the north side

of the house. All of the men were out in the fields working. They were able to save only a few pieces of 

the furniture and a box of books. The fine new barn became their home for several months. With the 

help of the neighbors a new house was built. Lucina is quoted as saying, “since the barn was built 

between plantings, a house could be built between harvestings” and it was done.

There was a strong religious conviction among all of the Vermonters at St. Johnsbury. By 1809 a church 

house was built and services were held regularly. For only two years was it headed by an ordained minister. The Snows were regular in attendance. Lucina joined the Wesleyan Methodist Episcopal Church and was very active in it’s affairs. The others, including Levi, were living good Christian lives but felt that it was not necessary to join any church.  Erastus, at the age of nine, wished to join with his mother but Levi insisted that he wait until he was fully ready before joining.

On the 4th of May 1832, Orson Pratt and Lyman E. Johnson came to Charleston, Vermont and held a meeting. They explained that a new Prophet had been called by God and that the Gospel had been restored. They talked about a new book, “the Book of Mormon” and other important truths. Lucina’s sons William and Zerubbabel were working in the neighborhood and attended the meeting. They were favorably impressed and sincerely interested. The conclusive testimony came when they witnessed the miraculous healing of Olive Farr, wife of Winslow Farr. William was baptized 19th of May 1832 and Zerubbabel soon after.

These Mormon missionaries went about the area preaching and visiting. William joined forces with them and many converts were made. On the 3rd of February 1833, William baptized his younger brother Erastus, age 14. On the 18th of June 1833, Lucina and three more children were baptized. Soon the whole family except Levi Mason, Shipley Wilson and father Levi were members of the Restored Gospel. These three never joined.

The Levi Snow barn became the Mormon meeting house and regular meetings were held. Lucina was 

overjoyed with the truths of the Gospel and did everything in her power to bring it’s blessings to all she knew. Levi was really converted but couldn’t bring himself to accept the discipline of a church so was never baptized.

As the Snow children grew older they began to leave home. Levi Mason and Shipley Wilson married and 

moved away from the family, but they always defended the Mormon Church, but never joined them. Two of Lucina’s sons, Zerubbabel and Willard and one son-in-law, Jacob Gates (Mary Minerva) went with 

“Zion’s Camp” to Missouri with the prophet Joseph Smith.

Lucina and Levi left St. Johnsbury in the summer of 1836 and went to Kirtland, Ohio. They were accompanied by their daughter Lucina and her husband and three children. By the fall of 1836, Levi and 

Lucina had gone on ahead of their family and were in Far West, Caldwell Co, Missouri. They took up land 

½ mile north of Far West, built a home and prepared to stay.

Prior to the coming of the Snows in Missouri the Saints had been driven out of Independence. They were 

gathering in Clay County where they had been befriended. Some took up land and built homes. As their numbers increased the older settlers of Clay County became somewhat alarmed and by mutual agreement were asking that the Mormons move to the north where there was enough unoccupied territory to support a large influx of settlers. As this was new territory, unorganized, the Saints were permitted to organize the area as Caldwell County in December of 1836. During the winter of 1836-37, Far West was founded and laid out as a city. The Levi and Lucina Snow family were early settlers of the area.

Persecution became rampant in all of Missouri and the Saints suffered mobbings, burnings, and all of the inexplicable indignities heaped on them by the depraved society among whom they lived. While the Snows were still in Far West the engagement known as the Battle of Crooked River took place. Captain David W. Patten led his forces against the mobsters’ forces on the 25th of October 1838, and was mortally wounded. He died during the night. At the funeral Lucina reports the words of the Prophet, “There lies a man who has done just what he said he would. He has laid down his life for his friends.”

Finally the infamous “Extermination Order” of Governor Lilburn W. Boggs was issued on the 27th October 1838. The Snow families were among the last to leave Far West they left on 15th of April 1839 and arrived in Quincy, Illinois in the 27th. At this same time Joseph Smith had escaped his captors and arrived in Quincy on the 22nd of April.

The Saints were now homeless and anxiously searching for a place to settle. The hamlet of Commerce in 

Illinois was purchased which later became Nauvoo, and permission granted to take up land on the HalfBreed Tract, across the Mississippi River at Montrose, Iowa. There were some old unused Army Barracks at Montrose which were used for some time as shelter. Levi and Lucina then moved on north to Lima, Illinois for a short stay and by June they were in Montrose, Iowa where they built a home.

On the 2nd of November 1841, Levi Snow died of Pleurisy at Montrose, Iowa at the age of fifty-nine as a 

result of hardships he had undergone, and he was buried there. Lucina was left with her three unmarried children still at home.Little is known about Lucina during the Montrose and Nauvoo period of her life. She cared for William's 3 ½ year old daughter, Abigail while William was away serving on a mission. Abigail’s mother had died, leaving William alone to care for her. Lucina made a trip to Rhode Island to visit Levi Mason where she remained until after the Martyrdom of the Prophet Joseph Smith.

After the death of the Prophet, Joseph Smith, in 1844 the Saints rallied and with increased effort finished the Nauvoo Temple. It was opened in December 1845 for ordinance work. During this time all of the Faithful Saints received their Endowments. Lucina received her endowments on Saturday the 17th of January 1846.

By February 1846 the Saints living outside the city of Nauvoo in Illinois were almost completely driven into the city, their homes and crops burned and their cattle stampeded. The mobs were threatening the city to complete destruction. It was decided to evacuate and move to the west. On the 16th of February, Lucina’s son Erastus took part of his family across the river on a ferry boat. Through carelessness the boat capsized and he lost much of his goods. He went west as far as Garden Grove with his family and then returned alone to Nauvoo in and effort to sell his property and settle his affairs. He succeeded in trading it for about one fourth its’ value. On the 5th of July he again set out for the west accompanied by his mother, Lucina, William and Willard and their families and others. They overtook the earlier group at Mt. Pisgah where they remained a few days before proceeding on to the gathering place at the Missouri River.

Lucina’s son William was asked by Brigham Young to remain at the river for two years and grow crops and to assist those who would outfit there for the trip further west. Consequently he took up land at Council Point and built a log cabin. Most of the Snows remained here on the east side of the Missouri River for the winter of 1846-47. All of the Snow families that were heading west were together for Christmas along the Missouri River.

On the 30th of June 1848, Erastus, Lucina’s son, with his family left Winter Quarters in the Willard Richards Company. He was a captain of ten in the 5th company. His family arrived in the Salt Lake Valley the 19th of October 1848 and spent the first winter in the fort. It is reasonably certain that his mother, Lucina, and Melissa and Jeter Clinton were also in this group, but in a company arriving a few days earlier.

After leaving the fort Willard Snow and Jeter Clinton were assigned lots in the thirteenth ward in the vicinity of First South and Second East Streets. When William came in 1850 he also had his lot in the Thirteenth Ward. When the 1850 Census was taken in the spring of 1851, Lucina was living with Jeter and Melissa. As Melissa taught the first school outside of the fort in the Salt Lake Valley and her husband was called on a mission to the States, it is only logical that Lucina should make her home with her youngest daughter and care for the Clintion children. Later when her son Willard was called to go on his mission to England and Denmark she was saddened by his death on the North Sea.

As stated before it is not known where Lucina lived when she arrived in the Salt Lake Valley, but it is likely that she lived in her children’s homes. We know that she live with her son, Zerubbabel sometime between 1851-1852 and she was living with her son, William in 1855.

Lucina died at the home of her daughter in Salt Lake City of pneumonia the 9th of November 1858. Her 

obituary was published in the Deseret News of Wednesday November 24, 1858, Vol. VIII No 38: Died, From cold and lung complaint at Dr. J. Clinton’s in this city on the 9th inst., LUCINA SNOW, widow of Levi Snow and mother of Erastus Snow, on of the Twelve Apostles, age 74 years and 24 days. She was the oldest daughter of William and Hannah Streeter. Her mother died in the vicinity of Woonsocket, Rhode Island, in the fall of 1854, near which place also died many of her ancestors of the Mason family at very advanced ages. They were remarkable for their activity of mind and body up to the last. She was born in Cumberland, Rhode Island, October 16, 1784 and married to Levi Snow, November 29, 1801 by whom she raised seven sons and four daughters, Viz: Levi Mason, born Feb 15, 1803; Lucina, Aug 20, 1804; William, Dec 14, 1806; Zerubbabel, March 29, 1809;Willard, May 6, 1811;Mary Minerva, July 30, 1813; Shipley Wilson, April 7, 1815; Erastus, Nov 9, 1818; Charles Van Rensaeler, Aug 21, 1820; Lydia, Dec 7, 1823; Mellisa, Aug 20, 1826.

When their first two were yet only babes, they were swindled out of their farm and hard earned possessions in Lunenburg, New Hampshire and removed to St. Johnsbury, Vermont where they opened a new farm and reared the balance of their family being among the first settlers in that part of the state. Deceased was a prominent and active member of the Methodist Episcopal Church for many years previous and at the time of hearing the fullness of the Gospel.

In the summer of 1832, when Elders Orson Pratt and Lyman E. Johnson bore the glad tidings to that 

people, she welcomed them as Angels of the Lord. She was baptized by Orson Pratt in June 1833 and removed with her family to Kirtland, Ohio in the spring of 1836 and the same fall proceeded to Far West, Missouri, where she shared the persecutions of the Saints and sacrificed another comfortable home for the Gospels sake.


She was next located temporarily in Lima, Illinois and afterwards at Montrose, opposite Nauvoo where her husband died in Oct 1841, and where she continued to live until the exodus of the Church in 1846, where she moved with her children and sojourned near two years at Winter Quarters and finally arrived in this city in Sep. 1848, where her soul rested happy and continued in the sweet enjoyment of the spirit of the Gospel, 

surrounded by her numerous friends, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, to all of whom she was a bright example of industry, economy, frugality, and faith. May they be able to emulate her 

virtue and rejoin her in celestial glory.

Lucina was buried in the Salt Lake City cemetery between her grandson Erastus, son of William, and the spot where later her son Erastus was buried. Several others of the Snow family are buried nearby.

Source: http://woodifer.blogspot.com/2007/04/lucina-streeter-snow.html

Willard Trowbridge Snow & Melvina Harvey

Willard Trowbridge Snow

Willard's early life was spent on a farm where no doubt  Willard worked to clear rocks and trees from the farming land as he grew old enough to help in the fields. The Snow children were taught to work, each child had his daily jobs from the time they could carry a pail of water.

Willard's father and mother saw to it that their children obtained an education.  Both Levi and Lucina loved books and learning, they were avid readers and natural teachers which affected their children in future years as several of the Snow children taught school as they became older.

There was a strong religious atmosphere in the home were Willard was raised.This strong religious atmosphere has been said to have come from the Streeter side of the family and not the Snows. This same atmosphere seemed to prevail in the community. As soon as the homes were built, a church was erected for the community. The people in the community didn't seem to belong to any certain church, but the all lived by the Ten Commandments and were called "Seeker after God's Truths."

When Willard was a young man his family home caught fire and burn down. Neighbors came to assist the family in saving all that they could. His mother made sure all the books they had were saved. The family lived in the large new barn that they had just finished that summer and after the fall harvest was over the family built a new home. This barn is where the missionaries came and taught the gospel to the many individuals that joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

After hearing the gospel message that Orson Pratt was teaching in his father's barn, which was the largest building in St. Johnsbury at the time, Willard was baptized. He was baptized June 18, 1833 by Orson Pratt. After Willard and most of his family were baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, he spent the better part of the next four years with his brothers, Zerubbabel, William and Erastus laboring as part time missionaries in Vermont and New Hampshire.

In the spring of 1834, at the age of 23, Willard left St. Johnsbury for Kirtland, Ohio with his brother Zerubbabel. That same year Willard and Zerubbabel joined Zion's Camp in Missouri. There he had a narrow escape from death, being among the number which, while the camp rested in Clay County, Missouri, was attacked by cholera. Early in 1835, Willard returned to Kirtland and then went to serve several other missions in the United States preaching in various parts of the country. Willard was ordained to the First Quorum of Seventies on February 28, 1835 by the Prophet Joseph Smith Jr.

Melvina Harvey

In 1836, Willard went through the Kirtland Temple, and shortly after moved to Missouri with his father's family who had come from St. Johnsbury to join the main body of the saints and be with their four sons. In Missouri, Willard's parents settled in Far West about one and a half miles north of the town. Here they endured the sufferings and persecutions of the saints, including the chills and fever which remained with them for many years. While living in Far West, Willard married Melvina Harvey, who he had known in Vermont. They were married May 14, 1837. Melvina was born December 16, 1811 at Barnett, Vermont. Willard had known Melvina and probably her family before coming to Missouri.

Willard and Melvina's first child, Amanda Melvina, was born March 18, 1838 at Far West, Caldwell County, Missouri. June 13, 1845. After moving with the family to Garden Grove, Willard and the Snow families were among the first group of saints to leave their beloved Nauvoo and head westward. It was not safe for any leaders of the church or their families to stay in Nauvoo unless absolutely necessary. Before leaving, Willard and Melvina took out their Endowments in the Nauvoo Temple on December 12, 1845 and were sealed together one month later on January 12, 1846. While living in Nauvoo, Willard was one of the agents to help build the Temple.

On May 14, 1846, Willard married a second wife, Susan Harvey, Melvina's sister. Not much is known about Susan except that she had some kind of deformity. This information was found in Patty Sessions records as a midwife.

September 1847, Willard with his families, came to Utah in Jedidah Grant's company of 100 wagons. He was captain of the second 50 wagons in this company.  Willard arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on October 4, 1847. When he arrived in Salt Lake, he settled with his families on the north side of the Old Fort.

Many things happened in the life of Willard between October 1847 when he arrived in the Salt Lake Valley and September 1851. In these four years he was a judge at the first election held to form a territorial government. He was also a member of the territorial legislature and speaker of the House in 1849. He served on the judiciary committee in the new Territorial Legislature and he was the first Justice of the Peace appointed in Utah. While serving in the legislature he served on the judiciary, counties and on military and civil laws committees.He was a councilor to Daniel Spencer in the first organization of the town of Salt Lake. Willard was also a member of the Perpetual Emigration Fund Committee that had been organized by Brigham Young to help finance the western migration of the saints.

Willard's family life was very eventful at the same time. On February 8, 1848, about four months after his family arrived in the valley, Melvina gave birth to a pair of twins, the first pair of white twins born in the state of Utah. Susan, Willard's second wife gave birth to a daughter named, Susan, and the mother, Susan died soon after.
Two years after reaching Salt Lake, Willard married a third wife, Mary Bingham, a girl from St. Johnsbury, Vermont (1849).

At General Conference in Salt Lake City, September 7, 1851, Willard was called on a mission to Europe. Soon after, he left his wives and four children and arrived in England, December 29, 1851. Willard was appointed president of the Scandinavia Mission to succeed his brother Erastus. On April 21st, Willard took the steamer at Hull, England and arrived at Copenhagen, Denmark on the 26th. He set to work with a will to learn the Danish language in which he was very successful. He mastered the Danish language so well that he translated many books into Danish, one being the L.D.S. Hymn Book.

In 1852, while Willard was in Denmark, serving as the Mission President, he was mobbed and treated with contempt and was driven into the swamp where he contracted malaria or swamp fever. This fever was eventually what would take his life.

While addressing a council of Elders on the evening of August 15, 1853 in Copenhagen, he was so violently attacked with an illness that he was unable to proceed. Later he seemed a little better, and decided to go to England for treatment of his illness. On the 18th of 1853, he took passage on board the ship "Transit," but while on board he was again prostrated. He soon became unconscious, and continued to sink, gradually until the evening of the 21st, when he expired. Elder P.O. Hansen and H.P. Jenson were with him, but not withstanding their earnest pleading, the captain insisted that the body be sunk in the sea. So he was wrapped in canvass and sunk about 80 miles north of Hull, England in the North Sea. He was just 41 years of age.

Willard Trowbridge Snow was the first American Elder to die abroad while on his mission.
Willard Trowbridge Snow was known as a friend of the Prophet Joseph and faithful in all of the calling that he was asked to do.