Sunday, January 29, 2017 – Sunday Services, Heber C Kimball, Exodus Commemoration Sociable, Orville Sutherland Cox

Another beautiful Sabbath Day in Illinois. When we left for church at 7:30 it was 26 degrees and by the end of the day it was all the way up to a balmy 35 degrees. Just a beautiful day for a beautiful Sunday sacrament service.

Usually Sis. Johnson & I are assigned to be tour guides at one of the historic sites in Nauvoo on Sunday afternoons. Today our assigned site was the historic home of the Apostle, Heber C. Kimball and his family. We enjoy these Sunday assignments because Sis. Johnson and I get to meet and teach visitors as well as learn new things about the early members of the church. In this case, an Apostle, his family, his home and the eight missions he was called by the Lord to serve.

Tonight we had the first of several programs commemorating the Pioneer Exodus that took place the first week of February in 1846.  Tonight’s program was titled “Faith of Our Fathers” and featured twelve stories submitted by the Elders and Sisters of our mission about their own ancestors that lived here. They were all great stories that told of the faith, hard work, sacrifice and dedication of those beloved pioneers.

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I submitted the story about my Great-Great Grandfather, Orville Sutherland Cox. Elder Swain coordinated the project and was hoping to get a dozen or so stories submitted. But, instead there were over thirty stories turned in. I wish we could have heard all of them but there wasn’t enough time for everyone’s stories to be told. Over twenty of the submissions couldn’t be used, including my story about Sutherland Orville Cox. 

I submitted the story about my Great-Great Grandfather, Orville Sutherland Cox. Elder Swain coordinated the project and was hoping to get a dozen or so stories submitted. But, instead there were over thirty stories turned in. I wish we could have heard all of them but there wasn’t enough time for everyone’s stories to be told. Over twenty of the submissions couldn’t be used, including my story about Sutherland Orville Cox. 

Sooo. . . . Here is the story of my Great-Great Grandfather, Orville Sutherland Cox:

Nearing his 24^th birthday, Orville Sutherland Cox was a thorough frontiersman, forester, lumberman, a splendid blacksmith. Orville fought with the Texans in the Mexican war and was returning the by way of Missouri when he met the Mormons in Far West.

While there he won the heart of the orphan girl, Elvira Pamela Mills, who was living with her uncle, Sylvester Hulet. He asked Elvira to marry him and become his partner for life. She answered that if he would be baptized into her church, she would be glad to do so.  To that proposition he did not react as she expected he would. Instead of complying with her suggestion, he said “I don’t propose to join any religion, including yours . . .  to buy a wife.”  Elvira hesitated to marry a gentile. Months later on October 3, 1839, however, she yielded, and they were married in Father Elisha Whiting’s home at the Morley settlement by Elder Lyman Wight.

Three days later, October 6, 1839, the two newlyweds drove into Nauvoo twenty miles away, and Orville Sutherland Cox was baptized, by the Prophet Joseph Smith. He went a gentile and returned a full-fledged Mormon, so short a time it takes a good woman to make a convert.

Orville and his wife lived in Adams County, ILL and help build the Morley settlement. His stacks of grain were burned at the Morley settlement by the mobbers, and they fled to the City of Nauvoo, he with his wife and two children – the oldest child died as a result of chills and fever, and from exposure resulting from mobber’s violence.

Orville was a faithful Latter-day Saint, full of love and zeal – He played the fife and was a member of the famous brass band of the Nauvoo Legion. When the Prophet and his brother were killed, none mourned more sincerely than he. He assisted those more helpless or destitute in the migration west from Nauvoo.

Orville attended the meeting where Sidney Rigdon asked the Saints to appoint him as guardian, and where Brigham Young claimed that the Twelve Apostles were the ordained leaders; and many times thereafter he testified that he saw Brigham Young changed to appear like Joseph and heard his voice take on the Prophet’s tone. And after that manifestation he never doubted for a moment that the rightful leadership of the Church was vested in the twelve, with Brigham Young at their head.

He remained in Nauvoo till almost the last departed. He assisted Jonathan Browning in transforming the old rusty steamer shafts into cannon that were so effectively used by Daniel H. Wells at the battle of Nauvoo.

Leaving Nauvoo with the last of the Mormon exiles, Orville and his family crossed Iowa and settled at Pisgah, where he served as counselor to Lorenzo Snow, President of Mt. Pisgah. In his devoted attachment to Lorenzo Snow, he was an enthusiast; also to Father Morley and he would follow their leadership anywhere.

Orville and his family arrived with the pioneers of the Bryant Jolley Company in Salt Lake City Sept. 9, 1852. He was the first Bishop of Bountiful, Utah. He helped “Pioneer” (Settle) six communities in Utah and Nevada.

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This is a very abbreviated and condensed version of the life story Orville Sutherland Cox. My rendition of his life story was taken from the pages of a 539 page book written about seven intertwined pioneer families, the Coxes being one of the principal families. All of the credit for my story goes to Clare B. Christensen, author of “Before & After Mt. Pisgah.”