Orville Southerland Cox, Pioneer of 1847

Biographical sketch of Orville Southerland Cox, Pioneer of 1847, partly from a sketch written by Adelia B. Cox Sidwell for the "Daughters of the Pioneers", Manti, Utah, 1913.

Orville S. Cox, was born in Plymouth, N.Y. November 25, 1814. He was one of a family of 12 children, ten of whom reached maturity. His father died when he was about fifteen years old. And he was then "bound out"; apprenticed to learn the trade of a blacksmith under a deacon Jones, who was considered an excellent man as he was a pillar of the church. The agreement was that he was to work obediently until twenty one and that Jones as to give him board and clothes, three months of school each winter, and teach him the trade of blacksmithing. No schooling was given or allowed, and one pair of jeans pants was all the clothing he received during the first three years of his apprenticeship, and his food was rather limited too. The women folks ran a dairy, but the boy was never allowed a drink of milk, of which he was very fond because the Mrs. said "it made too big a hole in the cheese." He was indeed a poor little bondsman, receiving plenty of abusive treatment. As to teaching him the trade, he was kept blowing the bellows and using the tongs and heavy sledge. But the deacon sometimes went to distant places and then the boy secretly used the tools and practiced doing the things his keen eyes had watched his master do. During some of these hours of freedom, he made himself a pair of skates from pieces of broken nails he gathered carefully and saved.

Also, he straightened a discarded gun barrel and made a hammer, trigger, sights, etc, to it, so that he had an effective weapon. These things he had to keep hidden from the eyes of his master and associates, but secretly he had great joy in his possessions and once in a while found a little time to use them.

Occasionally the monotony at the bellows and with the tongs and sledge--was broken in other ways;--for example--at one time oxen were brought to the shop to be shod that had extremely hard hoofs, called "glassy hoofs". Whenever Deacon undertook to drive a nail in, it bent. Cox straightened nails over and over, as nails were precious articles in those days and must not be discarded because they were bent. After a while, the boy said "let me". And he shod the oxen without a bending a single nail; And thereafter Cox shod the oxen, one and all that came to the shop.

One other pleasant duty was his: that of burning charcoal, as coal was then undiscovered. He learned much of the trade of the woodman while attending to the pits in the depth of the might New York Forests, as well as having an opportunity to use his skates and gun a little.

He acquired the cognoman of "Deek" among his associates, and when he had worked for something over three years, he came to the conclusion that was all he ever would acquire, along with harsh treatment; so during one of the Deacon's visits to a distant parish, he gathered together his few belongings and a lunch, between two days, shouldered his home made gun and "hit the trail for the tall timber", that being the route on which he was least apt to be discovered. He made his way toward the Susquehannah river. First he reached the Tioga River, which was a branch of the Susquehannah. He began reconnoitering for a means of crossing or floating down the river and soon discovered a log canoe, "dug-out" as it was called, frozen in the mud. He decided to confiscate it as "contraband of war" and pried it up, launched it, and was soon floating and paddling in it down toward the junction of the Tioga and the Susquehannah.

Shortly he felt his tired feet being submerged in cold water. Stooping to investigate, he found that the log was leaky and rapidly filling with water. He also found an old woolen firkin, a small barrel, that he at once began making use of, bailing the water, alternately paddeling, steering and bailing. He continued down the stream, keeping near the shore as possible, in case the old dug-out should get the best of him. The second day he heard "Hello, there, will you take a passenger?" from a man on shore. "Yes, if you'll help bail, steer, and row." "Barkis is willin", came the reply, so there were two in the log canoe.

Then they made better time. Nearing the confluence of the rivers, they saw a boat preparing to leave the dock for a trip up the Susquehannah, a primitive stern wheel packet of those early days (1831). He and his passenger applied themselves to their paddling, bailing and steering, signalling the boat to wait; just as she started he drew near enough to leap from the dug-out to her deck.

A free boy! For now he was sure pursuit would not overtake him. His passenger called "What shall I do with this canoe?" "Keep her or let her float" shouted Cox. (If the owner of that dug-out will send in his bill for damages, O.S. Cox's children will cheerfully settle.) As for food on this trip with the canoe, game was plentiful and he was a good shot. While on this boat, he must have worked his passage, for he had no money.

On board that boat with a Cargo of Southern Produce, he, for the first time in his life, saw an orange. He remained on this little river packet some distance up the river, then lended and found lucrative employment at lumbering and logging, and sometimes at the blacksmith's forge. Soon he had the good luck to find his two brothers, Walter and Augustus, rafting logs down the river. He was an expert at this himself.

Now he learned that his mother, and her younger children, Amos, Harriet, Mary and Jonathan had gone to Ohio under the care of his older brother, William U., via the great world famous Erie Canal; (at that time the largest canal in the world.) So by slow degrees and hard work he began to work his way toward Ohio. Usually he worked for lumber companies. His two brothers did likewise. They literally walked wall the way through the forests, the whole length of the state of New York. Finally they were united as a family in Nelson, Portage Co. Ohio, the former home of his future wife, Elvira, although she was at that time an emigrant in Missouri. The eight Cox boys continued their westward course; some of them reached California during the gold stampede. Charles B. Cox was elected Senator from Santa Rosa Company for a number of terms. William U. had put his property in a concern called the Phalanx and was defrauded by the officers of every cent and left in debt $3000.00, an enormous sum for those days. Orville's mother Lucinda, and her family went to Missouri. Walter had receive the gospel in Ohio previously. Orville heard terrible stories of the outlawry of those "awful Mormons"; but he became personally acquainted with some (Among them a Sylvester Hulet). He decided they were sinned against. He lived in Jackson County for a time, and ever after Jackson County Missouri was the goal of his ambition; He believed to his dying day that he should one day return to that favored spot.

Orville met and loved Elvira in Far West, but was not baptized. He said he didn't propose to turn Mormon to procure a wife. When the Saints were driven from Missouri, he located near Lima, Illinois, with a group of Mormons and helped build the Morley settlement.

Nearing his 24th birthday, he was a thorough frontiersman, forester, lumberman, a splendid blacksmith, a natural born engineer; in short a genius and an all around good fellow. He was six feet in his socks and heavy proportionately.

While here he won the heart of the orphan girl, Elvira P. Mills, who was living with her uncle, Sylvester Hulet. But she hesitated about marrying a gentile. October 3, 1839, however, she yielded, and they were married in Father Elisha Whiting's home, at the Morley Settlement by Elder Lyman Wight.

The two newly weds, on October 6, 1839, drove into Nauvoo twenty miles away, and Orville S. 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 woman to make a convert. He was a faithful L.D.S., full of love and zeal. He 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 from Nauvoo. His stacks of grain were burned at the Morley settlement by the robbers, and they fled to the City of Nauvoo, he with his wife and two children--the oldest child had died when an infant as a result of its mother having chills and fever, and from exposure resulting from mobbers' violence.

He 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 Browning in transforming the old rusty steamer shafts into cannons that were so effectually used by Daniel H. Wells at the Battle of Nauvoo.

Leaving Nauvoo with the last of the Mormon exiles, he crossed Iowa and settled at Pisgah, where he served as counselor to Lorenzo Snow, President at 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 Elvira had their two children, Almer and Adelia.

An incident that illustrated the pioneer life of 1845-6 is told in the story of the "Last Match." In the winter of 1845-6 Orville S. Cox and two Whiting boys, cousins of Elvira, went from Pisgah with ox teams and wagons down into Missouri with a load of chairs to sell. Whitings had a shop in which they manufactured chairs. Being successful in disposing of their chairs, and securing loads of bacon and corn, they were almost home when an Iowa blizzard, or hurricane, or cyclone, or all in one, struck them. Clouds and Egyptian darkness settled suddenly around them. They had not modern "tornado cellars" to flee into and no manner of shelter of any kind. The cold was intense; the wind came from every direction; they were all skilled backwoodsmen and knew they were very close to their homes; but they also knew that they were hopelessly lost in that swirling wind and those black clouds of snow. They and their oxen were freezing, and their only hope of life was in making a fire and camping where they were. Everything was wet and under the snow, and an arctic wind in the fierceness of unclaimed violence was raging around them. At first, they unyoked the oxen that they might find some sort of shelter for themselves. Then with frost-bitten fingers they sought in the darkness and storm for dry fuel. The best they found was damp and poor enough--and now for a match. Only three in the crowd, and no such matches as we have in these days either. Inside a large wooden bucket in which they fed grain, they carefully laid their kindling. Then turning another bucket over it to keep out of the falling snow, and hugging close over to keep the wind off, they lifted the top bucket a little and one of the Whiting boys struck a precious match. It flickered, blazed a moment against the kindling and was puffed out by a draft of wind. Another match was taken, and it died almost before it flared. Only one match remained to save three men from certain death. Their fingers were so numb they could not feel, and every minute increased their numbness. "Let Orville Try; he is steadier than we", they said. So Orville, keenly sensing his responsibility, took the tiny splinter of wood and struck the spark; it caught, it blazed and the fire lived and grew.