Microfilm of Jesse Bigler Martin's 1857 diary, kept while he was leading his own company overland to Utah following a mission to England. The diary begins on July 30, when Martin was near Scott's Bluffs, Nebraska. It includes entries on distances traveled, members of his company, and notes on supplies. Martin arrived back in Salt Lake City on September 13, and brief diary entries recount his attention to home matters, attendance of a prayer circle, and his departure from the city on November 10 with his "brethren" to "stop the soldiers from coming into the city." He fell ill and returned to Salt Lake City two weeks later. The final entry recounts his marriage to Ann Clark in December. Additional notes in the diary include a list of Martin's plural wives and children, genealogy, a list of debts and credits, lyrics for the Missionaries Hand Card Song, the Crystal Spring, and the Carrier Dove, and a newspaper obituary for Ann Clark Martin. The diary (frames 2-40) is on the same reel as the autobiography of Mary Brown Pulsipher and the diary of Thomas Sirls Terry. All inquries about this item should be directed to the H. Russell Smith Foundation Curator of Western Historical Manuscripts at the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA. Microfilm. San Marino, Calif. : Huntington Library Photographic Dept., 1948. 1 microfilm reel : negative 35 mm. Forms part of the Manuscripts Department's Mormon file, c.1805-1995. Jesse Bigler Martin (1825-1908) was born in Harrison, West Virginia. His family moved to Illinois following their conversion to Mormonism and Martin was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1839. He lived in Illinois and Council Bluffs before joining the Mormon Battalion in 1846. He marched to California and worked at Sutter's Mill before arriving in Salt Lake City in 1848. He married Sophronia Moore in 1848. Martin served on a mission to England from 1853 and returned to Utah in 1857. He moved to Lehi in 1860 and was called by Brigham Young to Millard County in 1863. Martin was made patriarch of the Millard Stake in 1875. He died in Provo, Utah, in 1908.
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