JEDEDIAH WOODARD

            Jedediah Woodard was born 2 January 1863 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah Territory to Charles Northrop and Margaret Ann Malin Woodard.  He was baptized on 1 January 1871 at the age of seven.              His father, Charles Northrop, joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints along with his father’s family and they moved to Kirtland, Ohio to be with the saints.  His father was a farmer and a blacksmith.  His father was personally acquainted with the Prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum.  His father was one of the guards over the bodies of Joseph and Hyrum, while the caskets, supposedly filled with rocks were buried.  He remembered the night the bodies were buried, it thundered and there was a great show of lightning.  The rain poured down blotting out every trace of the real burial.              One afternoon a mob rode up to his father’s blacksmith shop door, drunken, and yelled, “If you and your family will denounce Mormonism and stay and blacksmith for us, we will protect you and yours and pay you well for your work.”  But he told them no he would go with the rest.  They gave them two and a half hours to clear out.  In two hours the family was on their way to the banks of the Mississippi River.  He wife had been preparing for the forced move for month and had personal belongings, clothes, valuables, and food saved for weeks.  That night they sat and watched many buildings, their home among them, burned to ashes.             They struggled with the rest of the Saints and made it to Winter Quarters after much suffering.  They spent the winter there.              They left with the Jedediah M. Grant/Joseph B. Noble Company on 19 June 1847.  The family consisted of his father, Jedediah Stark Woodard, mother Emily Jane Northrop Woodard, Charles Northrop Woodard, age 19, Joseph Henry Woodard age 16, Emily Jane Woodard age 3, and Martha Ann Woodard an infant.  There were 171 individuals in the company when it began its journey from the outfitting post on the Elkhorn River about 27 miles west of Winter Quarters, Nebraska.              Captain Snow had several cattle come up missing and they hunted for them several days.  When they got to Fort Laramie they found the cattle in a corral with an old Frenchman.  They tried to bargain with him for his services in stopping the cattle, but he was very hard hearted and couldn’t be persuaded.  He picked out two of the finest and best oxen in the drove and let them take the rest.              Several wagon trains traveled together within hours of each other.  One day the cattle stampeded and then they broke two wagon wheel and one axel tree, killed one cow and broke the leg of a two year old colt.  From then on they left them mostly on the range with herdsmen with them.              They crossed the Platte River at what was called the last crossing and had to go twenty miles to a place called the Poison Springs, so called because a great number of cattle had died there.  It was supposed that they were poisoned from drinking the water but most likely it was going without water for nearly two days from the Platte River to the next camping place.              After reaching the main Platte, they encountered great herds of buffalo.  They were coming over the bluffs and making straight for the train.  They got so close and the men sprang from the wagon and began to fire at them.  The teamsters began to whip and slash and hurry up their teams to move faster to cross the river before they stampeded through the wagon train.              Eliza R.Snow wrote in her journal that “much of the time we journeyed on untrod ground,but occasionally we struck the tracks of the Pioneers and read the date of their presence, with an ‘All well’ accompaniment inscribed on a bleached buffalo skull and we had a general time of rejoicing.  Those skulls were duly appreciated.              On 4 August 1847 they met several of the Mormon Battalion, husbands and sons of women in the wagon train, beaming with the glow of exquisite joy for a happy reunion.  On 17 August a letter brought by brethren returning to Winter Quarters for their families, was publicly read,confirming the cheering report of the first arrivals, telling how the Pioneers had found a location in the Great Salt Lake Valley, and a city site was being surveyed.                By 30 August they had passed Independence Rock and crossed the Sweetwater.  They had snow on the ground on 7 September.  They had crossed the Green River on 16 September and by 21 September passed by Fort Bridger.  They cross the Weber River by 28 September               They had camped in Emigration Canyon for noon lunch. One man took his little boy for a walk. He hadn’t gone far from the wagon when he heard a very unusual sound.  He looked back across the canyon and the mountain seemed to be coming down the road.  The roar was deafening.  In a short time water was upon him.  It was already to his waist.  He had his young son in his arms.  He found a stump and put the baby on the stump and held him from being swept away in the current.              An old gentleman saw them and ran to help.  They took them to their wagon.  By that time water was running into his wagon box and logs. Stones and other debris were hurled in every direction.  He wagon had been loaded with mill irons that were to be put into the first mill erected in the Utah Territory.  Those irons anchored the wagon and kept it from oversetting.  After the flood had passed, they had no road left.  They had to stay two days until the road was made safe, and on the evening of 5 October 1847, they arrived in the Salt Lake Valley and camped in an area called the North Fort.             His father and mother were married in the Endowment House on 27 April 1856 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah Territory.  His mother, Margaret Ann, was born 14 February 1835 in West Nantmeal, Chester,Pennsylvania to Elijah and Sarah McGuckin Malin.  She was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 15 October 1843 at the age of eight.    She was 16 when she came with an Unknown Company along with her mother, Sarah age 47, brothers John M. age 17 and James Elijah age 11.  Her father had died 5 May 1849 in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri.              In 1851 almost the entire country was flooded with water; consequently, they had to go around the Elk Horn River and explore an entirely new route, traveling North so far that they got into the Bluffs and hills of deep sand, sagebrush, and greasewood.  They encountered enormous herds of wild buffalo.  They had to send men ahead to disperse then in order that they might drive through with their teams.  They arrived in Salt Lake City on 15 September 1851.               Jedediah had eight brothers and sisters.  Charles Northrop Jr. was born 3 August 1857 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah Territory; Margaret Ann was born 19 February 1859; John Franklin was born 11 April 1861; Jedediah was born 2 January 1863; and Sarah Emily was born 5 March 1865.              On 1 June 1869 they moved to Rhodes Valley (now called Kamas, Summit, Utah).  Four more children were born after they moved to Kamas. Catherine Eliza was born 10 January 1869; Emma was born 24 February 1871; James Elijah Malin was born 29 August 1875; and Anna Laura was born 15 September 1877.   For the first few years much time was spend in cutting wood and cedar post which her father hauled to Salt Lake City in exchange for food and clothing for his family.  In later years he accumulated sheep and cattle and plenty of land.             For twenty years he took his own produce and that of other farmers to Park City and exchanged it for freight which he brought back to Kamas.  His wife was always sickly so it made it hard for him to work alone.  He never left ona trip without saying, “Girls, take care of mother,” and his first words when he returned were, “How’s mother?”             Jedediah married Evelyn Vilate Russell on 9 February 1880 in Rockport, Summit, Utah Territory.  Evelyn Vilate was born 6 September 1863 in Kamas, Summit, Utah Territory to Charles Lyman and Samantha Jane Buckland Russell.  She was 16 years old when they married.              They had twelve children, three girls and nine boys. A baby boy was born and died on 14 February 1880 in Rockport, Summit,Utah Territory.  The next two children were born in Kamas, Summit, Utah Territory. Jedediah was born 24 March 1881 and Calvin was born 22 September 1882.  They moved to Woodland, Summit,Utah Territory where the next six children were born.  William Wallace was born 3 October 1884;Leroy was born 17 December 1886; Pearl Vilate was born 1 October 1888 and died 9 October 1888; Lillie Gertrude was born 3 September 1889; Charles Alford was born 21 August 1891; Edith May was born 18 December 1892; and James Clifford was born 16 September 1894.             Jedediah served a mission to the Southern States from 1901-1903.  He was a high priest, and second counselor to bishop of the Park city Ward.  He was a high councilor in the Summit Stake.  He was also a County Commissioner for Summit County, Utah.  Walter Fay was born 5 May 1904 in Francis,Summit, Utah and died 15 August 1904, and a son was born in 1905 and died in Park City, Summit, Utah.                He was excommunicated from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 9 November 1921 and reinstated by baptism on 14 September 1977.              This was given as a possible reason for his excommunication:  Deseret Semi-Weekley News, 3 May 1917, p 5. "Bullet Wound is Fatal to Alfred Woodard Victim's Father, Who Fired Shot, Will Probably Face Charge of Murder(From Thursdays Daily.) "Alfred Woodard, 25 years old, died at Holy Cross Hospital at 8:55 last night. the 22 caliber bullet, fired by his father,Jedediah Woodard, yesterday afternoon proved to have penetrated the brain. The father, held in the city jail to await the outcome of the son's injuries was informed of the death through some of the channels that carry news to the prisoners in th institution.              When Detective Joseph C. Sharp this morning visited him, accompanied by Bishop E. S. Woodruff, Woodard said that he had heard the news already.   The slayer declared that he regretted the affair but that he could not help his act. The son, he said had attacked him, and forced him to use the weapon in self-defense. He denied the story, told by witnesses of the affray, that he clubbed his son with the butt of the rifle, after the latter had fallen to the ground. A post mortem examination showed that the top of the skull was blackened, as if bruised, but Dr. David Andrew said that it was impossible to say whether the blackening resulted from blows, or from congestion of  blood about the wound.               Chief of Detectives Sharp today is questioning all witnesses, in an effort to determine exactly the circumstances of the shooting. It is thought that it may prove that there were mitigating circumstances which would warrant the filling of a charge of murder in the second, instead of the first degree. Woodard's story is that his son and himself had quarreled over a settlement of their affairs, following a dissolution of partnership in the teaming business. The partnership, the father said, proved unprofitable. The son asserted that the father owed him some money. This the father denied. The son said that he would take one of the teams in payment of the alleged debt, and, when the father interfered to prevent the taking of the team, the son struck him, according to the father's story.             Then, he said, he went into the house, secured the rifle, and fired a shot, intending to shoot close to his son' head and frighten him. Mrs. May Taylor, and Jedediah Woodard's wife were the chief witnesses of the tragedy. It is understood that their accounts do not corroborate Woodard's story in some details, and that one or two other witnesses who have not yet been questioned at headquarters likewise contradict the story in some particulars. The wife of the dead man was in Eureka visiting with her mother,Mrs. Alice Alcock. She wrote to her husband Wednesday morning, asking that he send her $50.             It is supposed that this led to the son's demand for money, and thus, indirectly, to the tragedy. The young wife is expected to return to the city today. The body is at the undertaking parlors of S.M. Taylor and company. The tragedy has aroused universal sympathy at police headquarters for Officer J.E. Woodard,brother of Jedediah Woodard. He is known as a most efficient officer, and a man of unfailing kindness and courtesy. His position in having to perform the duty of arresting his own brother on such a charge is one that might be paralleled in fiction, but seldom in real life. And the officials who have to prosecute the charge against the brother of their friend and fellow worker are in a position almost as painful."              This was probably most painful for Jedediah.  He died 22 September 1924 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California at the age of 61.  He was buried 27 September 1924 in the Wasatch Lawn Cemetery, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah.   His wife, Evelyn died 30 December 1928 in Ballard, Uintah, Utah at the age of 65 and was buried 3 January 1929 in the Wasatch Lawn Cemetery in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. 

After I found out about Jedediah shooting his son in the head and killing him, I asked my grandpa, Jerald Crittenden, about him. Jedediah is my grandfather's great-grandpa. My grandfather said when my grandma and him had their first son (Cliff Crittenden) they wanted to name him Jed. Jerald's mother, Ruth Frazier Crittenden, told him absolutely not. She said his great-grandfather, Jedediah Woodard, had a tremendous temper and continued to tell him a story of Jedediah milking cows one day and when the cow wouldn't do what he wanted him to do, he took an ax to the cows legs.

            Jedediah Woodard was born 2 January 1863 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah Territory to Charles Northrop and Margaret Ann Malin Woodard.  He was baptized on 1 January 1871 at the age of seven.              His father, Charles Northrop, joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints along with his father’s family and they moved to Kirtland, Ohio to be with the saints.  His father was a farmer and a blacksmith.  His father was personally acquainted with the Prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum.  His father was one of the guards over the bodies of Joseph and Hyrum, while the caskets, supposedly filled with rocks were buried.  He remembered the night the bodies were buried, it thundered and there was a great show of lightning.  The rain poured down blotting out every trace of the real burial.              One afternoon a mob rode up to his father’s blacksmith shop door, drunken, and yelled, “If you and your family will denounce Mormonism and stay and blacksmith for us, we will protect you and yours and pay you well for your work.”  But he told them no he would go with the rest.  They gave them two and a half hours to clear out.  In two hours the family was on their way to the banks of the Mississippi River.  He wife had been preparing for the forced move for month and had personal belongings, clothes, valuables, and food saved for weeks.  That night they sat and watched many buildings, their home among them, burned to ashes.             They struggled with the rest of the Saints and made it to Winter Quarters after much suffering.  They spent the winter there.              They left with the Jedediah M. Grant/Joseph B. Noble Company on 19 June 1847.  The family consisted of his father, Jedediah Stark Woodard, mother Emily Jane Northrop Woodard, Charles Northrop Woodard, age 19, Joseph Henry Woodard age 16, Emily Jane Woodard age 3, and Martha Ann Woodard an infant.  There were 171 individuals in the company when it began its journey from the outfitting post on the Elkhorn River about 27 miles west of Winter Quarters, Nebraska.              Captain Snow had several cattle come up missing and they hunted for them several days.  When they got to Fort Laramie they found the cattle in a corral with an old Frenchman.  They tried to bargain with him for his services in stopping the cattle, but he was very hard hearted and couldn’t be persuaded.  He picked out two of the finest and best oxen in the drove and let them take the rest.              Several wagon trains traveled together within hours of each other.  One day the cattle stampeded and then they broke two wagon wheel and one axel tree, killed one cow and broke the leg of a two year old colt.  From then on they left them mostly on the range with herdsmen with them.              They crossed the Platte River at what was called the last crossing and had to go twenty miles to a place called the Poison Springs, so called because a great number of cattle had died there.  It was supposed that they were poisoned from drinking the water but most likely it was going without water for nearly two days from the Platte River to the next camping place.              After reaching the main Platte, they encountered great herds of buffalo.  They were coming over the bluffs and making straight for the train.  They got so close and the men sprang from the wagon and began to fire at them.  The teamsters began to whip and slash and hurry up their teams to move faster to cross the river before they stampeded through the wagon train.              Eliza R.Snow wrote in her journal that “much of the time we journeyed on untrod ground,but occasionally we struck the tracks of the Pioneers and read the date of their presence, with an ‘All well’ accompaniment inscribed on a bleached buffalo skull and we had a general time of rejoicing.  Those skulls were duly appreciated.              On 4 August 1847 they met several of the Mormon Battalion, husbands and sons of women in the wagon train, beaming with the glow of exquisite joy for a happy reunion.  On 17 August a letter brought by brethren returning to Winter Quarters for their families, was publicly read,confirming the cheering report of the first arrivals, telling how the Pioneers had found a location in the Great Salt Lake Valley, and a city site was being surveyed.                By 30 August they had passed Independence Rock and crossed the Sweetwater.  They had snow on the ground on 7 September.  They had crossed the Green River on 16 September and by 21 September passed by Fort Bridger.  They cross the Weber River by 28 September               They had camped in Emigration Canyon for noon lunch. One man took his little boy for a walk. He hadn’t gone far from the wagon when he heard a very unusual sound.  He looked back across the canyon and the mountain seemed to be coming down the road.  The roar was deafening.  In a short time water was upon him.  It was already to his waist.  He had his young son in his arms.  He found a stump and put the baby on the stump and held him from being swept away in the current.              An old gentleman saw them and ran to help.  They took them to their wagon.  By that time water was running into his wagon box and logs. Stones and other debris were hurled in every direction.  He wagon had been loaded with mill irons that were to be put into the first mill erected in the Utah Territory.  Those irons anchored the wagon and kept it from oversetting.  After the flood had passed, they had no road left.  They had to stay two days until the road was made safe, and on the evening of 5 October 1847, they arrived in the Salt Lake Valley and camped in an area called the North Fort.             His father and mother were married in the Endowment House on 27 April 1856 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah Territory.  His mother, Margaret Ann, was born 14 February 1835 in West Nantmeal, Chester,Pennsylvania to Elijah and Sarah McGuckin Malin.  She was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 15 October 1843 at the age of eight.    She was 16 when she came with an Unknown Company along with her mother, Sarah age 47, brothers John M. age 17 and James Elijah age 11.  Her father had died 5 May 1849 in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri.              In 1851 almost the entire country was flooded with water; consequently, they had to go around the Elk Horn River and explore an entirely new route, traveling North so far that they got into the Bluffs and hills of deep sand, sagebrush, and greasewood.  They encountered enormous herds of wild buffalo.  They had to send men ahead to disperse then in order that they might drive through with their teams.  They arrived in Salt Lake City on 15 September 1851.               Jedediah had eight brothers and sisters.  Charles Northrop Jr. was born 3 August 1857 in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah Territory; Margaret Ann was born 19 February 1859; John Franklin was born 11 April 1861; Jedediah was born 2 January 1863; and Sarah Emily was born 5 March 1865.              On 1 June 1869 they moved to Rhodes Valley (now called Kamas, Summit, Utah).  Four more children were born after they moved to Kamas. Catherine Eliza was born 10 January 1869; Emma was born 24 February 1871; James Elijah Malin was born 29 August 1875; and Anna Laura was born 15 September 1877.   For the first few years much time was spend in cutting wood and cedar post which her father hauled to Salt Lake City in exchange for food and clothing for his family.  In later years he accumulated sheep and cattle and plenty of land.             For twenty years he took his own produce and that of other farmers to Park City and exchanged it for freight which he brought back to Kamas.  His wife was always sickly so it made it hard for him to work alone.  He never left ona trip without saying, “Girls, take care of mother,” and his first words when he returned were, “How’s mother?”             Jedediah married Evelyn Vilate Russell on 9 February 1880 in Rockport, Summit, Utah Territory.  Evelyn Vilate was born 6 September 1863 in Kamas, Summit, Utah Territory to Charles Lyman and Samantha Jane Buckland Russell.  She was 16 years old when they married.              They had twelve children, three girls and nine boys. A baby boy was born and died on 14 February 1880 in Rockport, Summit,Utah Territory.  The next two children were born in Kamas, Summit, Utah Territory. Jedediah was born 24 March 1881 and Calvin was born 22 September 1882.  They moved to Woodland, Summit,Utah Territory where the next six children were born.  William Wallace was born 3 October 1884;Leroy was born 17 December 1886; Pearl Vilate was born 1 October 1888 and died 9 October 1888; Lillie Gertrude was born 3 September 1889; Charles Alford was born 21 August 1891; Edith May was born 18 December 1892; and James Clifford was born 16 September 1894.             Jedediah served a mission to the Southern States from 1901-1903.  He was a high priest, and second counselor to bishop of the Park city Ward.  He was a high councilor in the Summit Stake.  He was also a County Commissioner for Summit County, Utah.  Walter Fay was born 5 May 1904 in Francis,Summit, Utah and died 15 August 1904, and a son was born in 1905 and died in Park City, Summit, Utah.                He was excommunicated from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 9 November 1921 and reinstated by baptism on 14 September 1977.              This was given as a possible reason for his excommunication:  Deseret Semi-Weekley News, 3 May 1917, p 5. "Bullet Wound is Fatal to Alfred Woodard Victim's Father, Who Fired Shot, Will Probably Face Charge of Murder(From Thursdays Daily.) "Alfred Woodard, 25 years old, died at Holy Cross Hospital at 8:55 last night. the 22 caliber bullet, fired by his father,Jedediah Woodard, yesterday afternoon proved to have penetrated the brain. The father, held in the city jail to await the outcome of the son's injuries was informed of the death through some of the channels that carry news to the prisoners in th institution.              When Detective Joseph C. Sharp this morning visited him, accompanied by Bishop E. S. Woodruff, Woodard said that he had heard the news already.   The slayer declared that he regretted the affair but that he could not help his act. The son, he said had attacked him, and forced him to use the weapon in self-defense. He denied the story, told by witnesses of the affray, that he clubbed his son with the butt of the rifle, after the latter had fallen to the ground. A post mortem examination showed that the top of the skull was blackened, as if bruised, but Dr. David Andrew said that it was impossible to say whether the blackening resulted from blows, or from congestion of  blood about the wound.               Chief of Detectives Sharp today is questioning all witnesses, in an effort to determine exactly the circumstances of the shooting. It is thought that it may prove that there were mitigating circumstances which would warrant the filling of a charge of murder in the second, instead of the first degree. Woodard's story is that his son and himself had quarreled over a settlement of their affairs, following a dissolution of partnership in the teaming business. The partnership, the father said, proved unprofitable. The son asserted that the father owed him some money. This the father denied. The son said that he would take one of the teams in payment of the alleged debt, and, when the father interfered to prevent the taking of the team, the son struck him, according to the father's story.             Then, he said, he went into the house, secured the rifle, and fired a shot, intending to shoot close to his son' head and frighten him. Mrs. May Taylor, and Jedediah Woodard's wife were the chief witnesses of the tragedy. It is understood that their accounts do not corroborate Woodard's story in some details, and that one or two other witnesses who have not yet been questioned at headquarters likewise contradict the story in some particulars. The wife of the dead man was in Eureka visiting with her mother,Mrs. Alice Alcock. She wrote to her husband Wednesday morning, asking that he send her $50.             It is supposed that this led to the son's demand for money, and thus, indirectly, to the tragedy. The young wife is expected to return to the city today. The body is at the undertaking parlors of S.M. Taylor and company. The tragedy has aroused universal sympathy at police headquarters for Officer J.E. Woodard,brother of Jedediah Woodard. He is known as a most efficient officer, and a man of unfailing kindness and courtesy. His position in having to perform the duty of arresting his own brother on such a charge is one that might be paralleled in fiction, but seldom in real life. And the officials who have to prosecute the charge against the brother of their friend and fellow worker are in a position almost as painful."              This was probably most painful for Jedediah.  He died 22 September 1924 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California at the age of 61.  He was buried 27 September 1924 in the Wasatch Lawn Cemetery, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah.   His wife, Evelyn died 30 December 1928 in Ballard, Uintah, Utah at the age of 65 and was buried 3 January 1929 in the Wasatch Lawn Cemetery in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah. 

After I found out about Jedediah shooting his son in the head and killing him, I asked my grandpa, Jerald Crittenden, about him. Jedediah is my grandfather's great-grandpa. My grandfather said when my grandma and him had their first son (Cliff Crittenden) they wanted to name him Jed. Jerald's mother, Ruth Frazier Crittenden, told him absolutely not. She said his great-grandfather, Jedediah Woodard, had a tremendous temper and continued to tell him a story of Jedediah milking cows one day and when the cow wouldn't do what he wanted him to do, he took an ax to the cows legs.