Erastus Snow

Family Background

1818. November 9: Born Erastus Fairbanks Snow in Saint Johnsbury, Vermont. He was a distant cousin to Lorenzo and Eliza R. Snow. He was father-in-law to Apostles Anthony W. Ivins and Moses Thatcher, and to President Spencer W. Kimball's maternal grandfather, Bishop Edwin D. Woolley.

He married Artimesia Beaman (or Beman), sister of Joseph Smith's first plural wife, in 1837, and later married Minerva White (1844), Elizabeth Rebecca Ashby (1847), and Julia Josephine Spencer (1856). He fathered thirty-five children.

Missionary

1832. Converted by Orson Pratt and Lyman Johnson, Erastus was baptized by his brother William. Two years later, at sixteen, Erastus and his uncle James Snow served a brief mission in Ohio.

1835. Ordained a seventy during the Kirtland School of Prophets, and endowed in the Kirtland Temple with 360 others: "Then we all, like as did Israel when they surrounded Jericho, with one united voice gave shout of Hosannah, Hosannah, Hosannah to God and the Lamb; Amen, Amen, Amen. When this was done the Holy Ghost was shed forth upon us; some received visions of the Judgments that were to be poured out upon this generation; some spoke in tongues, some interpreted; others prophesied; others saw Zion in her glory, and the angels came and worshipped with us, and some saw them, yea, even twelve legions of them, the chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof."

Snow served missions in Pennsylvania (1836)—"I left Kirtland on foot and alone with a small valise containing a few Church works and a pair of socks, with five cents in my pocket"; Ohio (1837); Pennsylvania-Maryland (1836)—a crowd "combined against me to abuse me and after disturbing the meeting considerably, lay in wait for me as I was going home with one of the brethren about a quarter of a mile, and besmeared me with rotten eggs"; Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Massachusetts (1841); and Denmark (1849), where he opened Scandanavia to missionary work.

Pioneer

1847. A member of the Council of Fifty, Snow went to Utah with the pioneer company. En route, Brigham Young chided him for failing to prevent company cattle from mixing with a buffalo herd: "It is a regular built dressing which I got from him this morning. … In attempting to exonerate myself from blame, I drew from him a severer chastisement; it is the first I have had since I have been in this Church, which is nearly fifteen years, and I hope it may last me fifteen years to come."

July 21: Erastus Snow and Orson Pratt became the first Mormons to enter the Salt Lake Valley. "We involuntarily, both at the same instant, uttered a shout of joy at finding it to be the very place of our Destination and the Broad Bosom of the Salt Lake spreading itself before us."

Apostle

1849. February 12: Snow's ordination filled the Quorum of the Twelve for the first time since Joseph Smith's death. Heber J. Grant, who served in the Quorum with him, declared, "My ideal of an apostle was Erastus Snow. When I was called to be an apostle, I prayed that the same spirit of self-sacrifice might inspire me."

Utah's Iron Works

1852. Returning from a mission to Denmark, Snow stopped in England to organize and raise capital for Utah's Deseret Iron Company. Plagued by poor coal, low grade iron ore, and the lack of railroad transportation, the southern Utah industry soon failed.

1854. Called to preside over the Saints in Saint Louis and to establish a Church periodical. In its November 22 prospectus the Luminary promised "Science, Religion, General Intelligence and news of the day …. To those who delight in the filth and slander of the age, whose natural cravings are only satisfied with those upheavings and excitements of society which terminate in blood, to all such appetites the Luminary will furnish no provender."

Having endured his long absences without complaint, Snow's first wife, Artimesia, wrote in 1855, "I… hope all will be well with you while absent from us, but I can hardly reconcile myself to the thought of your staying two years and a half. The time looks long very long. But if even this would suffice for a few years that you might be permitted to stay at home and take a little rest and enjoy each others society I would reconcile myself to that. But I have about made up my mind that nothing will suffice but go go til you get so old that you cannot go any longer …. As it seems to be my lot to almost always live alone I will try to be content therewith." Artimesia died while he was on an exploring mission to Arizona in 1882.

Cotton Mission

1861. When the Civil War cut off the North's supply of cotton, Brigham Young called Erastus Snow and Orson Pratt to preside over a "Cotton Mission" in the Rio Virgin and Santa Clara Valleys of southern Utah. The two apostles did not work well together.

According to Orson Pratt, Jr., "My father had not been down here long, when he found that there was a secret influence working against him …. The person would not come out like a man against him, but would keep himself in the dark and work against him like a snake in the grass. … He would even meet my wife in the dark and try to make her divide against me, by saying to her that 'Your husband is not in the right way, he is in the dark.' … I will tell you who it was. The individual is Erastus Snow."

Snow presided over the Dixie Mission until his death twenty-seven years later.

Mexico

1882. John Taylor called Snow to locate sites on both sides of the Mexican border where colonies could be established to conceal Mormon polygamists on the underground. Three years later he helped purchase Mexican land on which the Mormon colonies were built.

"The Late Erastus Snow"

Despite his busy schedule, Snow never pleaded the "excuse that he must hurry or he would be late for meeting; he listened patiently, then made his comments. … All this made him late for most of his meetings, whether business, civic, or church, and so earned the sobriquet, 'the late Erastus Snow,' which he carried all his life."

This habit caused difficulties between him and the punctual Brigham Young. When a carriage accident delayed Snow's arrival at a meeting in Cedar City, "Brigham Young was much annoyed, no doubt charging his tardiness to failure to start soon enough on the journey. 'Erastus,' he said crossly, 'get up and preach the people to sleep.' Apostle John Henry Smith, who was there, stated that Apostle Snow arose and 'without reference to President Young's unkind remark or his trouble with the buggy, delivered one of the most wonderful sermons he had ever heard in his life.'"

Elder Snow bore President Young's tongue-lashings without complaint. But his son Edward H. Snow recalled that once in Saint George, his father checked his "rising resentment by walking the floor all night long, repeating to himself the scripture, 'Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.'"

Snow's absentmindedness was so thorough that "he often removed meat or bread from the plate of the person seated on either side of him at the table, entirely unconscious … that he wasn't helping himself from the main platter."

Death

1888. May 27: Died at sixty-nine of Bright's disease (uremic poisoning) at his 217 Canyon Road home in Salt Lake City. Despite his desire to be buried in the red soil of Saint George, he was interred in the Salt Lake City Cemetery.

Sources
Larson, Andrew Karl. Erastus Snow: The Life of a Missionary and Pioneer for the Early Mormon Church. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1971.
Salt Lake City, Utah. LDS Church Archives. Erastus Snow Journal.
Snow, Bess. "History of Levi and Lucina Streeter Snow Family." Unpublished manuscript of Erastus Snow Family Organization.

	A Book of Mormons Richard S. Van Wagoner and Steven C. Walker Copyright 1982, Signature Books Salt Lake City, Utah Contents


	Erastus Snow (1818-1888)

				Erastus Snow was an apostle and colonizer, often called "the late Erastus Snow." —Photograph courtesy LDS Church Archives.


	Family Background 1818. November 9: Born Erastus Fairbanks Snow in Saint Johnsbury, Vermont. He was a distant cousin to Lorenzo and Eliza R. Snow. He was father-in-law to Apostles Anthony W. Ivins and Moses Thatcher, and to President Spencer W. Kimball's maternal grandfather, Bishop Edwin D. Woolley. He married Artimesia Beaman (or Beman), sister of Joseph Smith's first plural wife, in 1837, and later married Minerva White (1844), Elizabeth Rebecca Ashby (1847), and Julia Josephine Spencer (1856). He fathered thirty-five children. Missionary 1832. Converted by Orson Pratt and Lyman Johnson, Erastus was baptized by his brother William. Two years later, at sixteen, Erastus and his uncle James Snow served a brief mission in Ohio. 1835. Ordained a seventy during the Kirtland School of Prophets, and endowed in the Kirtland Temple with 360 others: "Then we all, like as did Israel when they surrounded Jericho, with one united voice gave shout of Hosannah, Hosannah, Hosannah to God and the Lamb; Amen, Amen, Amen. When this was done the Holy Ghost was shed forth upon us; some received visions of the Judgments that were to be poured out upon this generation; some spoke in tongues, some interpreted; others prophesied; others saw Zion in her glory, and the angels came and worshipped with us, and some saw them, yea, even twelve legions of them, the chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof." Snow served missions in Pennsylvania (1836)—"I left Kirtland on foot and alone with a small valise containing a few Church works and a pair of socks, with five cents in my pocket"; Ohio (1837); Pennsylvania-Maryland (1836)—a crowd "combined against me to abuse me and after disturbing the meeting considerably, lay in wait for me as I was going home with one of the brethren about a quarter of a mile, and besmeared me with rotten eggs"; Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Massachusetts (1841); and Denmark (1849), where he opened Scandanavia to missionary work. Pioneer 1847. A member of the Council of Fifty, Snow went to Utah with the pioneer company. En route, Brigham Young chided him for failing to prevent company cattle from mixing with a buffalo herd: "It is a regular built dressing which I got from him this morning. … In attempting to exonerate myself from blame, I drew from him a severer chastisement; it is the first I have had since I have been in this Church, which is nearly fifteen years, and I hope it may last me fifteen years to come." July 21: Erastus Snow and Orson Pratt became the first Mormons to enter the Salt Lake Valley. "We involuntarily, both at the same instant, uttered a shout of joy at finding it to be the very place of our Destination and the Broad Bosom of the Salt Lake spreading itself before us." Apostle 1849. February 12: Snow's ordination filled the Quorum of the Twelve for the first time since Joseph Smith's death. Heber J. Grant, who served in the Quorum with him, declared, "My ideal of an apostle was Erastus Snow. When I was called to be an apostle, I prayed that the same spirit of self-sacrifice might inspire me." Utah's Iron Works 1852. Returning from a mission to Denmark, Snow stopped in England to organize and raise capital for Utah's Deseret Iron Company. Plagued by poor coal, low grade iron ore, and the lack of railroad transportation, the southern Utah industry soon failed. 1854. Called to preside over the Saints in Saint Louis and to establish a Church periodical. In its November 22 prospectus the Luminary promised "Science, Religion, General Intelligence and news of the day …. To those who delight in the filth and slander of the age, whose natural cravings are only satisfied with those upheavings and excitements of society which terminate in blood, to all such appetites the Luminary will furnish no provender." Having endured his long absences without complaint, Snow's first wife, Artimesia, wrote in 1855, "I… hope all will be well with you while absent from us, but I can hardly reconcile myself to the thought of your staying two years and a half. The time looks long very long. But if even this would suffice for a few years that you might be permitted to stay at home and take a little rest and enjoy each others society I would reconcile myself to that. But I have about made up my mind that nothing will suffice but go go til you get so old that you cannot go any longer …. As it seems to be my lot to almost always live alone I will try to be content therewith." Artimesia died while he was on an exploring mission to Arizona in 1882. Cotton Mission 1861. When the Civil War cut off the North's supply of cotton, Brigham Young called Erastus Snow and Orson Pratt to preside over a "Cotton Mission" in the Rio Virgin and Santa Clara Valleys of southern Utah. The two apostles did not work well together. According to Orson Pratt, Jr., "My father had not been down here long, when he found that there was a secret influence working against him …. The person would not come out like a man against him, but would keep himself in the dark and work against him like a snake in the grass. … He would even meet my wife in the dark and try to make her divide against me, by saying to her that 'Your husband is not in the right way, he is in the dark.' … I will tell you who it was. The individual is Erastus Snow." Snow presided over the Dixie Mission until his death twenty-seven years later. Mexico 1882. John Taylor called Snow to locate sites on both sides of the Mexican border where colonies could be established to conceal Mormon polygamists on the underground. Three years later he helped purchase Mexican land on which the Mormon colonies were built. "The Late Erastus Snow" Despite his busy schedule, Snow never pleaded the "excuse that he must hurry or he would be late for meeting; he listened patiently, then made his comments. … All this made him late for most of his meetings, whether business, civic, or church, and so earned the sobriquet, 'the late Erastus Snow,' which he carried all his life." This habit caused difficulties between him and the punctual Brigham Young. When a carriage accident delayed Snow's arrival at a meeting in Cedar City, "Brigham Young was much annoyed, no doubt charging his tardiness to failure to start soon enough on the journey. 'Erastus,' he said crossly, 'get up and preach the people to sleep.' Apostle John Henry Smith, who was there, stated that Apostle Snow arose and 'without reference to President Young's unkind remark or his trouble with the buggy, delivered one of the most wonderful sermons he had ever heard in his life.'" Elder Snow bore President Young's tongue-lashings without complaint. But his son Edward H. Snow recalled that once in Saint George, his father checked his "rising resentment by walking the floor all night long, repeating to himself the scripture, 'Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.'" Snow's absentmindedness was so thorough that "he often removed meat or bread from the plate of the person seated on either side of him at the table, entirely unconscious … that he wasn't helping himself from the main platter." Death 1888. May 27: Died at sixty-nine of Bright's disease (uremic poisoning) at his 217 Canyon Road home in Salt Lake City. Despite his desire to be buried in the red soil of Saint George, he was interred in the Salt Lake City Cemetery. Sources Larson, Andrew Karl. Erastus Snow: The Life of a Missionary and Pioneer for the Early Mormon Church. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1971. Salt Lake City, Utah. LDS Church Archives. Erastus Snow Journal. Snow, Bess. "History of Levi and Lucina Streeter Snow Family." Unpublished manuscript of Erastus Snow Family Organization.