| + | 2696 | i. | Amos Wilson8 Bemis, born 03 Jan 1828 in Ellisburg, Jefferson, New York; died 01 May 1905 in San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California. | |
| + | 2697 | ii. | Nancy Agusta Bemis, born 14 Jun 1829 in Ellisburg, Jefferson, New York; died 16 Jun 1908 in San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California. | |
| 2698 | iii. | Samuel Nines Bemis6885, born 02 Dec 1830 in Pierreport Manor, Jefferson Co., NY; died 14 Aug 1868 in Cajon, San Bernardino, California. |
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Notes for Samuel Nines Bemis: [The Mormons in San Bernadino:470] Samuel N. Bemis was another member of this pioneer family to meet a tragic death. One day he went into the mountains near San Bernadino with his brothers, Charles and Edwin. They camped not far from Talmadge's sawmill, in Little Bear Valley, now covered by the waters of Lake Arrowhead. Sam took his gun and left camp, saying he would return before night. The other boys continued to load their wagon with lumber and after waiting several hours for Sam's return decided to go on home. Becoming worried when they found he was not there, Charles and Harrison Bemis, Joseph Hancock and son Alvin started for the mountains. They made camp near a mill and then began searching. Charles followed his brother's tracks until he came upon the body of Sam who had been killed by a she bear defending her two cubs. The members of the party wrapped Sam's body in blankets and carried it down to the wagon. His remains were then taken to San Bernadino where he was laid to rest beside his brother Nephi who had been killed by Indians two years before. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thought this may be of interest to the list. Following is a verbatim copy of a story told by Jerusha Hancock Tyler. (Daughter of Joseph Hancock and Nancy Augusta Bemis (1829-1908). It was told to and written by her daughter, Mary Tyler Bright in 1951. Enjoy.........Katy .................................................QUOTE.............................................................. THE DEATH OF SAMUEL BEMIS This story was told to her children, Mollie Tyler-Bright and Don Charles Tyler, by Mrs. Jerusha Hancock-Tyler (Mrs. Charles H. Tyler). Uncle Sam Bemis came to my Father's, Joseph Hancock Sr.'s home, and said: "Joe, are the tires tight on your little wagon, so that Alvin, Sol and I can go up to Devil's Canyon and get a deer?" (Alvin and Solomon Hancock were Sam's nephews). He felt the tires, but they were not tight enough, so he did not take the wagon. Later, Sam went to the San Bernardino mountains with his brothers, Charley and Ed. They camped not far from the Talmadge's saw mill, in Little Bear Valley. (Now covered by the water of Lake Arrowhead). Sam took his gun and left, saying, "I may go and see Mr. Armstalk, and I'll be back to camp with you tonight." The Bemis brothers proceeded to load their wagon with lumber. Sam did not return that night, so the brothers said: "oh, Sam must have gotten tired of waiting for us, and has gone home to the Valley, " (San Bernardino) so they took their load of lumber to the Valley. When they arrived home, Grandmother Jerusha Gurnsey Bemis said: "Where is Sam?" The boys replied, "Why Sam is here, isn't he?" Grandma Bemis exclaimed, "No, Ill never see Sam again -- only his hat." Nora Hancock made dozens of fresh biscuits and put them in a cloth bag, and Alvin Hancock (age 17 or 18 years), Charles and Harrison Bemis and Joseph Hancock Senior, started for the mountains. My father, Joseph Hancock, was not home at the time, as he was out on the plains looking for his cattle, but joined the party when they came for him. They made their camp near the Talmadge saw mill, then set out to look for Sam. Charles Bemis found Sam's tracks and followed them until he found his brother who had been killed by a female grizzly bear that had two cubs (according to the bear tracks). Sam had gone down a small canyon to get a drink of water when he was attacked. His gun was cocked, but the bear had grabbed the gun, bit it, and threw it to the ground, then struck the fatal blow causing Sam's death. She did not mutilate the body. The crown of his black felt hat was torn, either by the teeth or the claws of the ferocious beast, but lay some distance from the body that had lain in the hot August sun for two or three days. (The hat was returned to Grandmother Bemis). The Bemis family hired Steve St. John to drive up the Cajon Pass to the desert side of the San Bernardino mountains. The rest of the party (Hancocks and Bemises) wrapped Sam's body in blankets, hung it on a pole, and it was carried to the desert where Mr. St. John's wagon awaited them. Then on to San Bernardino where Sam was laid to rest in the Pioneer Cemetery, near his brother Nephi, who had been killed by Indians two years before. Samuel Bemis was born at Pierpont Manor, Jefferson County, New York, December 2, 1830 and died August 14, 1868. Aunt Julia McCullough-Bemis, wife of Uncle Amos Bemis wrote the following epitaph: Here lied poor Samuel, Deprived of life so soon, As o'er the mountains he did roam A grizzly bears his life did take As he was all alone. ........................................End quote............................................................... |
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More About Samuel Nines Bemis: Date born 2: 02 Dec 1830, Pierpont Manor, Jefferson, New York6886 Burial: Pioneer Memorial Cemetery, San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California6887 |
| + | 2699 | iv. | Edwin Bemis, born 03 Jun 1832 in Pierreport Manor, Jefferson Co., NY; died 06 Jun 1884. | |
| + | 2700 | v. | William Wallace Bemis, born 02 Nov 1834 in Pierreport Manor, Jffrsn, NY; died 30 Mar 1899 in Oro Grande, San Bernardino, California. | |
| + | 2701 | vi. | Clarissa Ann Bemis, born 28 Mar 1836 in Pierrepont Manor, Jefferson, New York; died 03 Mar 1909 in Imbler, Union, Oregon. | |
| 2702 | vii. | Henry Harrison Bemis6888, born 28 Mar 1836 in Pierreport Manor, Jffrsn, NY; died 19 Mar 1917 in San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California. |
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More About Henry Harrison Bemis: Date born 2: 28 Mar 1836, Pierpont Manor, Jefferson, New York6889 |
| 2703 | viii. | Harriet B Bemis6890, born 03 Apr 1838 in Kirkland, Ohio6891; died 28 Apr 1918. She married Thomas Richard Roberds6892 23 Jan 1859 in San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California; born 03 Apr 1837 in Monroe county, Mississippi6893; died 15 May 1915. |
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Notes for Harriet B Bemis: [The Mormons in San Bernadino:470] Harriet Bemis became the wife of R. Thomas Roberds, January 23, 1859 in San Bernadino, California. He was born April 3, 1837 in Monroe county, Mississippi, the son of John and Martha T. Roberds. In 1846 the family with other Latter-day Saint converts traveled northwest spending the winter at Pueblo, Colorado, where they remained until the fall of 1847 when they moved to a fort called Hardscrabble in Utah. Here they spent another winter and the following spring started for Salt Lake Valley in a part of twelve wagons and driving two hundred head of loose stock. They reached Salt Lake City in the fall of 1848, built log cabins, and spent the winter among the Mormons. In the spring John Roberds put in crops and raised grain. The next year he decided to go to California with his family. En route the Roberds and others found a spring in the vicinity of Hangtown California, which they reached in July. This spring was later known as Diamond Spring because of the sparkling white crystal that surrounded it. After several years mining in the northern part of the state the Roberds went to Southern California settling near San Bernadino. After the marriage of Thomas and Harriet Bemis, the young couple established a home in San Bernadino. They became the parents of eight children. An accomplished violinist, Thomas played for many of the pioneer dances. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Keeping past alive Daughters of the Utah Pioneers preserves history of Mormons. (http://www.pe.com/lifestyles/stories/10025460_PE_LIV_ndup.html) By SYBEL ALGER, THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE- 02/07/2002 Joanne Bartley has an old picture of her great-great-grandmother, sitting proudly on her front porch in San Bernardino, surrounded by family members. And the Riverside woman knows the story of how Harriet Roberds, whose maiden name was Harriet Bemis, traveled from Salt Lake City to San Bernardino in the middle of the 19th century. Bartley's fascination with history and desire to learn about her relatives is what brought her to the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, a 101-year-old group that preserves the history of the people who settled Utah. Organized like the wagon trains that followed the Mormon Trail from Nebraska to the Salt Lake Valley, "camps" or chapters of women gather monthly to share stories of the pioneers. The camps belong to "companies," regional groups. There are 13 camps in Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Even though its emphasis is on Utah, the organization has members worldwide. Potential members must prove that their ancestors made it to Utah before May 10, 1869, the date that the Transcontinental Railroad was joined at Promontory, Utah. Nearly 70,000 members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints rode covered wagons, pulled handcarts or walked the plains from Nauvoo, Ill., to Utah from 1847 to 1867. Commonly known as Mormons, they were fleeing persecution after church founder Joseph Smith Jr. was murdered in Carthage, Ill. Brigham Young took over leadership of the church and ordered an exodus to a barren land where he hoped to establish the state of Deseret, the word for honeybee in the Book of Mormon, a book of church scripture. Mormon men were assured their place in history, but the women who came with them were often overlooked. "What about all those sweet sisters who worked so hard as they crossed the plains?" asked Wilma Reaser, 75, a longtime DUP member who lives in San Jacinto. "Some stories are so heart-wrenching. It makes us appreciate what we have." Many pioneers kept diaries and journals of the long trek. Daughters of the Utah Pioneers records those stories and publishes some of them in multivolume collections. It also places markers at historical sites, like the San Bernardino County Courthouse, where Mormons who founded the city built a fort in 1851. Migration of settlers The Bemis family started out in the 1847 migration to Utah. Harriet walked across the plains, keeping a detailed journal of the trek. She told of eating dirt to stave off hunger. A brother who often carried her when she tired died at Ft. Laramie, Wyo. Her father died in Iowa. Her mother eventually got the remaining 10 children to Ogden, Utah. Brigham Young sent colonizers into Southern Utah, Nevada, Arizona and California. The first company that left for San Bernardino arrived in 1851 with about 500 Mormons and two dozen African-Americans. They bought the 35,000-acre San Bernardino Rancho from the Antonio Lugo family. A fort, a 12-foot-high stockade of cottonwood and willow logs, was built at what are now Third Street and Arrowhead Avenue. A DUP marker tells the fort's history and lists the first settlers. San Bernardino County, including a large part of what is now Riverside County, was formed in 1853. The Bemis family arrived in 1857, settling on 240 acres near Lytle Creek and what became Route 66. Harriet Bemis met R.T. (Richard Thomas) Roberds in her new community. They married in 1859 and had 12 children, Bartley said. They and many of their descendants are buried in the Pioneer Memorial Cemetery in San Bernardino. In 1857, Young called back the settlers to fight off a feared attack by the U.S. Army, reportedly moving west to bring an end to territorial government. About two-thirds of the Mormons in San Bernardino returned to Utah. Following family lineage Such pioneer stories are treasured by families. Several of Bartley's grandchildren have written school reports based on Roberds' journal. A granddaughter named her first daughter Harriet after Roberds. Family lineage is important to Mormons because they do proxy marriages and baptisms for people who have died. They believe that those people can choose whether to accept those rituals in the next life. Possessions that survived the trail are now cherished heirlooms, like the plaid shawl that Adele Lambert, DUP company leader for Riverside County, carefully stores in her cedar chest. Her great-grandfather bought it for his first wife while serving a church mission in England in 1863. He had a total of five wives. Polygamy, one of the touchiest subjects in the Mormon church today, can't be avoided in genealogical research. Bartley said that none of her relatives were polygamists, but many pioneers were. They believed that men needed to take multiple wives to qualify for eternal life. Sorting out the various wives and children makes research challenging. The LDS church disavowed polygamy in 1890, but it teaches that worthy men will have many wives in the next life. It excommunicates anyone who participates in polygamy. Various fundamentalist groups in Utah and Arizona keep the practice alive, but are not associated with the church. DUP members wish that younger women would join their camps. Derelene Spencer, a 66-year-old who is active in Colton, said the youngest woman in that group is 46. Spencer has tried to enlist her 18-year-old granddaughter. Most women wait until their children are grown before they start doing genealogy, said Barbara Istre, 75, another Colton member. "You get more involved as you get older. It takes a lot of time to do research. Working moms with children just don't have the time," she said. Reach Sybel Alger at (909) 487-5257 or salger@pe.com |
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More About Thomas Richard Roberds: Date born 2: 09 Apr 1837, , Monroe, MS |
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More About Thomas Roberds and Harriet Bemis: Marriage: 23 Jan 1859, San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California Sealed to spouse (LDS): 06 Feb 1976, MANTI |
| + | 2704 | ix. | Charles Franklin Bemis, born 25 Dec 1839 in Kirkland, Ohio; died 01 May 1920 in San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California. | |
| 2705 | x. | Nephi Bemis6894, born 25 Apr 1842 in Kirkland, Ohio6895; died 25 Mar 1866 in the Mojave Desert (the site of the Las Flores Ranch), at the hads of Indians6896. He married Annie McGinnis6897; born in Kirkland, Ohio. |
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Notes for Nephi Bemis: [The Mormons in San Bernadino:471] Nephi Bemis, son of Alvin and Jerusha Gurnsey Bemis, married Annie McGinnis. He met a tragic death at the hands of the Indians on the site of the present Las Flores Ranch, March 25, 1866. Together with his brother Samuel, H. E. Parish and Pratt Whiteside, accompanied by other men, Nephi went to the Mojave desert to round up cattle. Sam returned to camp after a time while some of the others went on. Later in the afternoon the Indians opened an attack on Nephi, Mr. Parish and Mr. Whiteside, killing the last two named after their ammunition was gone. Nephi, critically wounded, clung to the side of his saddle until so weak from the loss of blood he fell from his horse. He was killed, clothing stripped from his body and his boots taken. Nephi's body was found shortly after he was killed but the other bodies were not recovered until the following day. The three men were brought to San Bernadino for burial. A joint service was held and all were laid to rest in the Pioneer Cemetery. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thought this may be of interest to the list. Following is a verbatim copy of a story told by Jerusha Hancock Tyler. (Daughter of Joseph Hancock and Nancy Augusta Bemis (1829-1908). It was told to and written by her daughter, Mary Tyler Bright in 1951. Enjoy.........Katy .................................................QUOTE.............................................................. THE DEATH OF NEPHI BEMIS (An Uncle of Mrs. Jerusha Hancock-Tyler) This story was told by Mrs. Tyler to her children, Mollie Tyler-Bright and Charles Tyler February 28, 1951, when she was 96 years of age. Nephi Bemis, Sam Bemis, Mr. Parish and Mr. Whiteside, with several other men, went to the Mojave Desert to round up their cattle. Some of the cattle had strayed, so the two Bemis brothers, Messrs. Parish and Whiteside started after them. Sam Bemis' mule was too slow to keep up with the horses, so he said, "Nephi, my mule is too slow, and I am only holding you back, so I'll go back to camp." Nephi said, "Sam, I have a five dollar gold piece in my pocket, and there is a hole in the pocket and I am afraid I'll lose it--you take it and keep it for me." Sam returned to camp and the others went on. Later in the afternoon the Indians set upon Nephi Bemis, Mr. Parish and Mr. Whiteside, and all three were killed by arrows shot from bows. Nephi was shot through the jugular vein. His horse turned and headed for camp. Bemis clung to the saddle until weak from loss of blood. He then fell from the horse, leaving bloody finger marks upon the saddle. The Indians stript him of his clothing, using a dull knife to slit the leather boots, looking for socks which the Indians could wear. The boots were not taken, as their feet were too large to wear them. Parish and Whiteside fought until their ammunition was gone. Parish was killed and Whiteside retreated to a clump of wild squaw-plum-bush, shooting until all loads were exhausted, then fought by throwing rocks. He fell dead while trying to defend himself. Nephi Bemis' body was found shortly after he was killed, but, as darkness was approaching, the bodies of Mr. Parish and Mr. Whiteside were not found until the following day. The three men were brought to San Bernardino, a joint funeral was held and the three were laid to rest in Pioneer Cemetery. Nephi Bemis left a young wife, Annie McGinnis-Bemis, and later she gave birth to a baby boy who was born dead. Jurusha and Lucina Hancock and their cousin, Frances Bemis, went with Joseph Hancock, Senior, several years later to Holton's Ranch and visited the spot where the three men were killed. Mrs. Holton acted as a guide. Holton's Ranch is now known as Las Flores Ranch. Nephi Bemis was born at Kirkland, Ohio, April 25, 1842, and was killed by the Indians on the sight of the present Las Flores Ranch, March 25, 1866, age 23 years, 11 months." |
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More About Nephi Bemis: Burial: Pioneer Memorial Cemetery, San Bernardino, San Bernardino, California6898 |
| 2706 | xi. | Jerusha Bemis6899, born 24 Sep 1844 in Kirkland, Ohio; died 1847 in infancy. |
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More About Jerusha Bemis: Date born 2: Sep 1844, Michigan6900 |
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