The Minor Family of Somerset

From Uintah County,Utah Pioneers http://www.lofthouse.com/USA/Ut
ah/uintah/htimothy.html
Heber Timothy, sixth of twelve children was born Apr 2, 1861 i
n Wales. When he was one year old, his Mormon parents, John Gri
ffitsh Timothy and Martha Davis Timothy, emigrated to Utah. I
n 1890 Heber married Esther Elizabeth Vernon, a Mormon conver
t from Kentucky. They had ten children. Theycame to Ashley Va
lley in 1879. Heber wrote from memory his personal accountof t
he settling of Ashley Valley because, "there were no historian
s in thecountry until S. R. Bennion and R. S. Collett came her
e in 1887. His account was published in the Vernal Express an
d excerpts follow:
In 1879 I residedin Wallsburg, Wasatch County. On the 12th o
f November, 1879, I went to Heber City with my brother John's o
x team, to assist W.G. B. Reynolds move his family and househol
d goods to Hatch Town, later known as Vernal. On the 14th of No
vember 1879, all being ready, we yoked our oxen, which consiste
d of three yokes of oxen, hitched two yoke to one wagon and on
e yoke to another. BobReynolds drove four and I drove two to t
he mouth of Daniels Canyon that night, to the residence of Marti
n Oaks. Mr. Oaks played the fiddle and we danced. In the morni
ng we started u the canyon, joined by Martin Oaks and famly, con
sisting of his wife, Abigail, sons William and Edwin and Sarah M
. (Fletcher).
In Daniels Canyon the road crossed the creek seventy-two times i
n the fifteen miles. The stream was considerably frozen, the ro
ad rough, and cold winter weather made travel very slow. We rec
hed the heave of Strawberry Valley Nov 19, with snow 15 inches d
eep. The evening I froze my toes. We were joined here by Ben a
nd Eph Green and several others, having ox teams and loosecattl
e and saddle horses. On Nov 25 we pulled up Red Creek Hill. Th
e hillwas steep, the trail icy and slick so that it required 1
4 yoke of oxen to draw one wagon up the hill. We moved abou
t a half mile that Day. We went North to the Duchesne were Tabi
ona now stands. There for the first time we got out of the snow
. We have bare ground to travel on until we got to Rock Creek
. There a snow storm came on and we had winter until Mar 20, 18
80. Dec 4 we entered Ashley Valley through a gap in the West
. Travelling down the valley, our wagons were singing on the fr
ozen snow. We arrived at Hatch Town on Dec 7th, having been o
n the road twenty two Days.
We took up our abode in a one-room lopg cabin, dirt roof and dir
t floor, which belonged to Calvin Henery, situated about one-hal
f mile West and one half mile south from the co-op corner. Ther
e were nineteen souls wintered there. They were W. G. Reynold
sand family, Martin Oaks and family, George Brown and family wh
o joined us here. Bob Reynolds, Otto Peterson, who joined us a
t the Head of Daniels Canyonand myself. We hauled a few load
s of wood for fuel to do us through the winter, then turned ou
r oxen loose to go where they would. We never saw them anymor
e until spring or late winter. This winter was known as the har
d winter. During the month of December the snow fell in the val
ley to a depth of abouyt sixteen inches, but it was not as ordin
ary snow is, the extreme cold froze the snow into crystals, som
e of them were six inches long. We would walk through it with e
ase and the crystals or sword blades as we called them wouldrat
tle like ice.
He then tells of the hard winter and of W. G. Reynolds makin
g a pair of burrs to grind flour and the trip to Green River, Wy
oming to get flour. They arrived with the flour about May 25th
. "Chopped weath becamescare, in fact the common people at th
e last of their chopped wheat for breakfast, when about three o'
clock the same Day the teams arrived from Rock Springs with flou
r. When I say that the common people lived on chopped what, tha
t is what I mean; only they added a little salt