Some Latter-day Saints have pioneer ancestors going back almost 200 years. Other Church members are themselves the pioneers in their families. In the weeks surrounding Pioneer Day July 24 — the annual celebration of the first wagon company entering the Salt Lake Valley — Church News staff members share stories of pioneers in their families, some from the 1800s and some from the 1900s. This is the 18th in the series.
My great-great grandparents Mary Parry Rowberry and her husband, William Jenkins, were among some 600 members of the United Brethren Church in England who were taught by Apostle Wilford Woodruff. They were baptized in March 1840.
Mary was a person of great faith. She was often asked by Elder Woodruff to sing at meetings where he preached. On one occasion, she had a very sore throat and sent for him to give her a blessing. He couldn’t go, but he sent his silk handkerchief for her to wear around her throat and promised she would be made well if she wore it. She did, and her faith healed her. She was able to go with him the next day to sing.
Her family left England on the ship Isaac Newton. They sailed to New Orleans, Louisiana, then up the Mississippi River to Nauvoo, Illinois. She helped collect pennies to purchase window glass for the building of the Nauvoo Temple. She performed baptisms for the dead in the Mississippi River. She received her patriarchal blessing from Hyrum Smith.
Before being forced west from Nauvoo in winter 1846, she and her husband received their temple endowments in the Nauvoo Temple. They had been endowed from on high with the temple ordinance, and these covenants fueled their faith and gave them courage for the journey to cross the Plains. They arrived in Salt Lake City in October 1850 and lived a full life faithful to the teachings of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
I, too, celebrate and pay tribute to the incredible sacrifices of each pioneer of each generation who continues to influence and bless us as members of the restored Church of Jesus Christ. As we strive to move forward each day, the pioneers’ remarkable journey of faith reminds us of God’s eternal plan of happiness and of the ultimate sacrifice made for each of us by Jesus Christ.
— Dale Jones is the director of Church Newsroom.
