Chester Loveland, my third-great-grandfather, was born December 30, 1817 in Madison, Ohio. He was the second child of Chauncey Loveland and Nancy Graham. He was raised on a farm and educated as much as a pioneer school could. He was baptized in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Kirkland, Ohio on June 27, 1837.
While attending school, he met Fanny Call. They married February 15, 1838 in Madison when he was 20 and she was 21. In 1840, they moved to Carthage, Illinois where they purchased a farm.
Chester was an intimidating figure at six feet, two inches tall and weighing 240 pounds. He had blue eyes, a high forehead, and brown, curly hair and was no stranger to peril.
On Sunday, June 16, 1844, a gang of determined men headed by a constable of Hancock County, went to Chester's home four miles southeast of Warsaw. As he was a captain in the state militia, they ordered him to call out his company of volunteers to join a posse to go to Nauvoo to arrest the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith along with the city council. Chester refused.
The group returned the next day with an order that they claimed to be from the governor, but Chester was certain it was a forgery. There was no possible means by which orders from the governor could have been obtained, as he was far away. Once again, he refused. The more the constable insisted, the more angry Chester got until he rushed the posse. The riders and their horses quickly left.
The men reported his defiance to Colonel Levi Williams of the Carthage Greys, a division of the militia from a nearby town. Insisting that the uncooperative captain must be "dealt with," Williams appointed a committee of 12 to tar, feather, and lynch Chester. They arrived at his home at around midnight. Chester had heard they were coming and kept watch. When he saw the tar buckets, bags of feathers, rope, and firearms, he blew out his light and placed himself in a position to defend the locked door and window.
The committee went around the house several times, tried the door, rapped on the window, called him by name, and talked together. Finally, their courage failed them and they left, yelling to him that if he were in there, he was to leave the country immediately.
A few days later, on June 27, 1844, this same committee and rest of the posse broke into Carthage Jail where Joseph Smith and his brother, Hyrum, were incarcerated. They killed them both, Chester being witness to the removal of their bodies.
Carthage Jail in Nauvoo, Illinois
Mormons continued to be persecuted in the area and, in 1845, Chester and his family, who were all ill at the time, were driven from their home at midnight. Their home and all their possessions were burned.
Chester wouldn't let mobs take control, even within the legal system. In his own words…
"I was on the jury when some of our brethren who had been falsely accused were brought to trial before eleven mobocratic jurors, and I held that jury thirty-six hours, until they were nearly starved. Two bills were before us - one guilty, the other, not guilty. The eleven signed the guilty verdict and insisted that I should follow suit. I said, 'No, gentlemen, before I will sign that paper, I will die here on this floor, and the red ants may pack me out through that keyhole.' The result was, every man signed the verdict of 'not guilty,' and the innocent went free."
In the fall of 1845, his family moved to Nauvoo, Illinois and Chester was appointed Captain of the Nauvoo Legion. He had several hair-breadth escapes. In one instance a lead ball, designed to take his life, came so close it grazed the side of his face, scorching it sufficiently to cause the skin to peel off.
Rosannah Elvira Winters
On January 15, 1846, he entered into plural marriage. He was sealed to Rosannah Elvira Winters (my ancestor) in the Nauvoo Temple when she was 20 and he was 28. The following spring, he went west with the Saints and took up a farm at Council Bluffs, Iowa, which he cultivated until 1849, when he was employed by the U.S. government to assist in building Fort Kearny on the Platte River.
In June of 1850, Chester was appointed a captain of 10 of 540 people and 104 wagons in Captain Warren Foote's company journeying to the Salt Lake Valley. On this trip, he buried his fifth child with Fanny, Levi Cyril, who died of cholera. After a three-month trek across the plains, they arrived in Salt Lake City. He settled in Bountiful, where he built a log cabin to shelter his family through the winter.
To obtain food for his wives and children, he burned charcoal on the Weber River, which he sold and delivered to local blacksmiths. In 1853, he was appointed lieutenant colonel by Governor Brigham Young, with instructions to organize a regiment in the northern part of the territory. He was later commissioned colonel by Governor Cummings, a position which he held until his death.
On January 21, 1854, he married his third wife, Celia Simmons, when he was 36 and she was 18. The next year, he went to Carson Valley (then a part of Utah, but now Nevada) to assist in locating a colony of Latter-day Saints. During one of the explorations at Walker's Lake, they were overcome with thirst so intense that it seemed they couldn't continue. A group of Indians saved their lives by giving them fresh water. They presented the Indians with new suits for their act of kindness.
Carson Valley
He moved his family the next spring to Carson Valley. The Carson Stake was organized September 28, 1855 with Chester as president of the high council and shortly after, the stake president, replacing Orson Hyde. Because of contention with California miners, he advised his congregation not to work in Gold Canyon, allowing the Californians undisputed claim to the area. The saints were instructed to live their religion and to mind their own business.
He and his associates organized the county into four school districts to promote education. In December 1856, they built a schoolhouse in Franktown, where Chester's family lived. Some 25 students attended classes there.
In the early morning of September 5, 1857, Chester answered a knock at his door. Peter W. Conover, Oliver B. Huntington, and Samuel Dalton were on his doorstep. At Brigham Young's urging, they had made the trip in 18 days, almost dying of thirst and starvation. They brought the message that the United States Army was invading Utah and the Salt Lake Valley needed manpower and weapons of defense. He asked the community of the western territory to return immediately with all the guns and bullets they could buy.
Chester had intended to travel to Salt Lake in October for the general conference of the LDS Church. He had $5000 in tithing money to deliver to church headquarters. Instead, he turned over the money to Conover and told him to use it to buy powder, lead, and caps. He gathered the branches together and collected $12,000 in gold, which he gave to Bob Walker to purchase guns and ammunition in San Francisco.
The members of the LDS Church in Carson Valley sold their property, packed their wagons, and were ready to leave for Salt Lake City in two weeks. Chester captained the company of 450 people and 200 wagons. They left September 26, 1857 and all arrived by November 3, spending roughly five weeks on the trail. During the trip, six babies were born and three children died.
During the defensive operations in Echo Canyon, Chester acted as commissary against the arrival of Johnston's Army. The following spring, he and his family went south with other church members to Provo, but returned the same year to Bountiful.
Albert Sidney Johnston
In 1860, he moved to Call's Fort, a community just a few miles north of Brigham City started by Anson Call, Chester's brother-in-law. Chester purchased his farm from Anson and, while living there, kept a hotel for transient miners and emigrants. For some time, his only neighbor was his son, Sheriff C.C. Loveland and his family. The next year, on December 16, 1861, Chester married Elizabeth White when he was 44 and she was 48.
In 1865, he moved south to Brigham City where he was elected as the first mayor. He held that position for four years. Afterward, he was assessor and county collector for several years. The following year, he married Rosetta Adeline Snow, daughter of Lorenzo Snow, November 17, 1866. She was 20 and he was 48.
Two years later, he was appointed captain of a company to go to the boundary of the Union Pacific Railroad on the Platte River for a company of Latter-day Saints on their way to Utah. On the Sweetwater River, they were attacked by Indians, who stole their teams. They were able to recover their animals after a struggle where four of the Indians were killed. The company arrived to Salt Lake Valley safely under Chester's management.
The following year, he married Louisa Faulkner on September 5, 1868 when she was 20 and he was 50. With his six wives, he had a total of 32 children, 27 of which lived beyond their first birthday. Though he acquired considerable wealth in his life, he was too generous to become rich. He was a friend to the poor and no one ever left his home hungry. Chester Loveland passed away on March 5, 1886 in Calls Fort, Utah at the age of 68.