The Sacred Name of Reeves

If I were to start over writing our family history I would start with the women.

The wives, mothers and grandmothers are difficult to research because their names are missing from a lot of vital records.

As women, they were counted more by surviving stories than by census records, marriage, birth and death records.

In many cases they came to be remembered because their names were passed down in one form or another.

What follows is another such story – a story of a remarkable woman whose history has had to be pieced together by the records of the men in her life.

Today, not even a marker survives to remember that she was ever here.

But her name lives on.

And ironically, that name – Reeves – was given to men who were her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Like Frances Long Reeves, the men who after her would bear the name Reeves, were and are great people.

But the name Reeves needs some explanation to understand why it has been so faithfully passed down.

~ Five Generations Named Reeves ~

I have a younger cousin named Reeves. He’s about the same age as several of my children. I contacted his father – my Uncle Keith – and asked why he and Julia chose the name Reeves for their son.

He said it was to honor his mother – my grandmother – who had a brother named Reeves. That Reeves was Grandma’s bosom buddy while they were growing up. As siblings they competed and Grandma was known to say that her brother Reeves made a tomboy out of her.

Sadly, Reeves Jay Riggs died while a young man of 23 years due to tuberculosis.

Reeves Jay Riggs was the third child and the first son of William Reeves Riggs, Jr. and Muriel Snow Riggs.

Will Riggs, my great-grandfather, got his name from his father, William Reeves Riggs, Sr.

William Reeves Riggs Sr. was born in 1865 in Cedar City, Utah, the sixth child but first son of William Sears Riggs and Sarah Reeves.

It was not uncommon in those days for a first-born son to bear his mother’s maiden name as a middle name.

Sarah Reeves was born in England in 1837 and came to the USA as a child with her parents. She was about six years old.

Her parents were William and Frances Reeves, both around the age of 40.

William Reeves III was a cobbler and Frances was a nurse, having received professional training in England and working as a nurse prior to marrying William.
They arrived in Nauvoo after sailing across on the ship Swanton and coming up the Mississippi with a group of saints led by Lorenzo Snow.

The Nauvoo experience of the Reeves family was somewhat typical.

They lived on a farm outside of town and were close enough to walk into Nauvoo for meetings.

There they became acquainted with the Prophet and many other known individuals central to Church history there. For the rest of her life Frances would share stories of their time in Nauvoo.

William and Frances Reeves were parents of five children.

Their 2nd child, a boy named Samuel, died at the age of 2 when he was gored by a pig.

Their surviving children – Elizabeth, Josiah, Sarah and Frances – would go on to live pioneer lives in Utah.

But they would have to live that experience in Utah without William Reeves.

He was a rather sickly man – stricken at a young age with “consumption” – an early 19th century word for tuberculosis.

~ The Pioneer Experience of Frances Reeves ~

William Reeves would not live long enough to do his ordinance work in Nauvoo.

In August 1845 he died, months before the Nauvoo temple was finished enough for ordinance work to be done. There are no records of Frances making it there either.

At this time Grandmother Frances was 43 years old with three surviving children to care for: Elizabeth was 16, Josiah 10 and Sarah just 9 years old.

With the Saints being driven from Nauvoo and no male partner for Frances to rely on, you have to wonder how she viewed her options.

The record shows that many families were on the move out of Nauvoo in the Spring of 1846. We can only assume that Frances and her family were likely included in that move in some way.

In 1850 her name appears linked to a man named John Sweat.

While no “official” marriage record exists several histories show that Frances was wed to “Father Sweat” in Mt. Pisgah around 1849.

John Sweat was a man about 25 years older than Frances.

He was given responsibility in building up the encampment at Mt. Pisgah to grow crops and sustain a community of transient saints heading towards Utah.

Sweat’s children were all older than Frances’ children. Yet the record shows that she cared for them.

This was all likely an arrangement made by Church leadership based on needs at the time.

Both John and Frances were recently widowed and both had children.

The arrangement was made to fit the needs.

Perhaps no marriage record exists because it didn’t last long.

John died in the outbreak of cholera at the encampment that took many lives and Frances was once again widowed.

She came west caring for all of those children.

The arranged marriages of widows and widowers was common among pioneer families. As Jacob Hamblin said, upon taking on another wife who was a widow, “love can come later” so that immediate needs could be met.

Frances arrived in Salt Lake and with most of the William Snow/Joseph Young Company settled at least temporarily in Big Cottonwood.

The continual stream of pioneers coming into Utah included the family of William Wesley Willis, another man of pioneer experience, an officer in the Mormon Battalion, and a father of 9.

He was aided with his wife’s illness, as well as the critical care of a newborn daughter, by Frances Reeves, who nursed them all.

Willis’ journal accounts for the kind work Frances put in for their family. Again, considering needs, they were wed in 1852 and for a few years Frances lived and moved with the Willis family.

William Willis was a man of both means and considerable responsibilities.

He was involved in many enterprises between Cedar City and Provo.

With her own children getting married and bringing grandchildren into the world for Frances, she settled with her son Josiah, who had married and lived in Kanarraville, Utah, located just south of Cedar City.

This would be the place where Frances would spend the rest of her life.

As a nurse and a midwife, she became embedded over the entire region because many came to her for help.

Her son Josiah married and had a large family in Kanarraville.

He ran a “camphouse” and livery stable, where teams coming from Silver Reef hauling silver ingots would stop over to stay the night and change out horses.

The Reeves house in Kanarraville became known as a place of rest, food and healing for anyone on the trail or in trouble.

Josiah would care for the livestock and the travelers, Frances would care for the women expecting children, the sick and the injured.

~ Grandma Frances ~

For years I have blown by the town of Kanarraville on Interstate 15 not knowing I had family there.

Later, after learning Grandma Frances was there, I failed to visit as I would pass through.

After another recent trip where I didn’t have the time to stop occurred, I felt prompted to make time.

I went there this morning on a return trip from St. George.

Her record is so well documented that I assumed it would be easy to find her grave. Imagine my shock when I could not find her.

The picture shown on Family Search of a little fenced area is the family plot of Josiah and his wife Sarah. There is no marker for Grandma Frances anywhere.

It’s a small, neat cemetery, like so many others I have visited in Utah.

Kanarraville is still a little nowhere town and the cemetery is filled with families with the same names – Williams, and Pollocks, and Davis and, yes, Reeves, dominate.

But Frances Long Reeves Sweat Willis is not there – or, at least a marker is not there for her.

Perhaps there was at one time.

Or maybe hers is among the many weathered sandstone markers that have not aged well in over a century of weather.

Grandma Frances, however, was not forgotten or ignored by her children or grandchildren.

Daughter Elizabeth, who married in Nauvoo in 1846, named her first son Hyrum Reeves. Josiah’s 12 children all carried the Reeves name, of course.

Sarah (her daughter and my 4th great grandmother), named her first son William Reeves.

And her daughter and namesake, Frances Reeves, also carried on the Reeves name through a son named Ira Reeves.

Sprinkled among her grandchildren is the name Frances or Francis, as well.

Very clearly Grandma Frances was an influence for good.

Her grandson and my 3rd great grandfather, William Reeves Riggs, Sr, spent much of his childhood in Kanarraville.

His Grandma Frances was first introduced to his father, William Sears Riggs, when she nursed him to health in Palmyra (which later came to be called Spanish Fork).

William Wesley Willis was mayor at the time and Grandma Frances was the local nurse.

It was while caring for William Sears Riggs that he met Frances’ daughter Sarah.

William Wesley Willis would live until 1872, passing away in Beaver.

It is not known how often he saw Frances or just what the nature of their relationship was over the years of their marriage. His family history and records of family reunions remember Frances Reeves Willis very kindly.

Grandma Frances would live until 1885, passing away at the home of her son Josiah in Kanarraville.

As I ventured through that little cemetery this morning I felt an urgent anxiety.

It was a new feeling for me and the trip all the way home for the next several hours left me pondering its meaning.

Since coming home I’ve studied all of her histories, and those of her children, and those of her husbands.

I’ve looked at ordinance work to see if anything is undone. Everything appears to be complete.

And yet the feeling that something is “off” just persists.

At this point, I think it’s that Grandma Frances, like so many stalwart women in our pioneer heritage, maybe isn’t properly remembered.

She should have a marker. Her histories could be more complete.

I am thankful for the families that have made the name Reeves remembered.

It needs to continue. These stories need to be told. And we need to continue to research.

I think there will be much more good to be found.