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Show • • • JOSEPH DURRANT In the year 1851 in a little village called Deanshanger, Northamphire, England lived my great grandfather and great grandmother, William and Phoebe Hoar Durrant, on June 29th 1851, the 8th child was born, a son, Joseph Durrant. He had odd eyes, one blue and one brown, this was my grandfather. He was 5 1/2 years old when he started school. He was taught by Mrs. Baily at her home. When he was 6 years old he went to the district school, he learned to read and write quite well. He got him a job scarring crows from William Reins garden. He used a pair of wooden clackers to scare the crows with. He had to go to work early because the crows got out very early. He worked seven days a week for 5 pence. For two or three years, he herded and fed sheep. From the time he was fourteen until he came to Utah he worked on the London North Western Railways as a plumbers helper. He and his brother Thomas 19, had saved up enough money to come to Utah and it was decided to let his older sisters Jane and Eliza come ahead. Then they would start saving again. On June 29, 1868 on his seventeenth birthday he and his brother Thomas 19, left their family and started in the early morning to the train and rode 110 miles to Liverpool. They got on board the ship that night and in the early morning left on the steamship Minnesota, this was the first steamship that came to carry the Mormon Immigrants. It was under the direction of John Parry. There was 534 saints that came on that vessel. Grandpa was sick all the way. They were 13 days on the water. They reached New York July 12, 1868. They reached Laramie, Wyoming, July 22 the same year. When the train of immigrants reached Morgan County, the crops had been planted, but it looked more like a desert for the grasshoppers had eaten everything that was all green. The boys got a job on the Union Pacific railroad at the tunnels just above Round Valley. In the spring of 1869 they bought some wheat seed and planted on the bench in Porterville. They paid $4.00 a bushel. The wheat came up pretty, just as it came in head the grasshoppers ate it. They were so thick they nearly darkened the sun; after their crops failed they got a job on the Central Railway, while working on the railroad and farm he and his brother saved enough money to send for the rest of the family. In 1872 he and his brother rented a farm in Round Valley and raised a little wheat, but had to stack it until March, before they could get it thrashed, then they had to beat it out with stick. In Nov. 1872 in the town ofRound Valley, Morgan County, the trustees came around and got each one to sign a paper that wanted to go to school. Grandpa was 21, but he signed for three months of school. The teacher was a boy of 18, he had a widowed Mother with five children to look after. So grandfather paid him 100 lbs. Of flour, 10 lbs. Of pork, and a load of wood for teaching him. The school started Dec. 1. He was in the fourth reader. He and a girl were the only two to study the fourth reader. The teacher • • • agreed to give a prize for the record and neither of them missed a day of school until about a week before school was out. Grandpa had a colt in the hills, he had to go get it so he missed a half day of school and the girl got the prize, the book was "The Pilgrims Progress". The girls name was Miss Annie Geary. In 1874 he manied Miss Geary, so won the girl and the book. They were manied in July 1874 in a little log house in Round Valley of Miss Geary' parents, there was a dance and supper. They had two custard pies and some chicken. There was about 20 present with the two families. When they were first married grandpa went to work and made a bed and three stools and a butter paddle, because they had to make butter, her father gave them a cow for a wedding present and Grandpa bought one. They lived in a little log house. He worked cutting cedar poles and loading them in cars. That winter he bought three small chairs and a rocker. They lived very happily, but quite poorly until 1881 when she died. She left a young husband and three small boys. The youngest followed her in death. With his young family and caring for them, he saved enough money to (assist the immigrants) one young girl by the name of Margaret Cottom, my grandmother, wanted to come from England and her father ..... had asked grandpa ifhe would pay for the immigration and if when she got here, and he cared to marry her it would pay him for the immigration, but if they didn't like each other enough to be manied her father would pay grandpa back in due time. In 1883 grandpa married this young girl from England and they lived in a little log house on a 6 acre farm, Margaret's health was poorly from the time she was a young girl. Seven children were born to them, Margaret my grandmother was called home following child birth. Grandpa's sister Jane took the 2 week old baby. He kept the 4 boys home with him, Anne's 2 boys and Margaret's 2 boys. The girls were cared for by other members of the family. His baby daughter lived just six months then she was laid to rest by her angel mother. Grandpa plodded along trying to be both father and mother and earning a living while was still alone, he still found time to serve his maker, spending much time with the sick and those in need. From the time Porterville was settled it was customary to have the July 24, (celebration) in a grove, on 24th of July he got his four boys ready to go to the grove. He stayed behind to wash his dishes and straighten up a bit before going to the grove. He was lonely and weary, there was to be a new bishop chosen that day, when he entered the grove poorly clad, Apostle Teasdale from Salt Lake City was there and as grandpa walked by he said there goes your next bishop. It was a great shock and grandpa couldn't see how he could possible assume his responsibility of taking care of his family without a help mate, but his knowledge of the importance to serve when a call came he accepted it and with the help of his Heavenly Father he did the job. He was confronted with the great task of consolidating the east and • • • west Porterville wards, which was rather difficult because of the different opinions of the members of each ward. The new ward house was built while he was bishop and he devoted much of his time and means to its growth. On Aug. 9, 1900 he married Hattie Carter in the Salt Lake Temple. To them was born seven children all being spared to grow to manhood and womanhood. My mother Eliza Katherine Durrant Porter helped raise the children. After her (Hattie's) seven children were born Hattie was stricken with appendicitis and was operated on at home, because it was to far to travel to the hospital in Ogden. Grandpa wondered as he watched his seven little children leave home to go to their aunts for a while if he should be left again with seven small children. Hattie lingered at death's door for three weeks, but through the elders and her great faith and that of grandpa's she was spared to raise her family. Twenty five years of Grandpa's life was spent in the Bishopric of the Porterville ward, He sent two boys on Missions and contributed to the Missionary fund. He walked to Salt Lake 11 times to conference. He enjoyed good health all his life and in has 78th year Feb. 6, 1930 he was called home. His illness was brief, stricken with acute cancer of the throat. He was survived by his wife and 13 children, four preceding him in death. He was buried in the Porterville Cemetery the town he loved. Written by granddaughter of Joseph and Margaret Cottom Durrant, Resa Porter Waller |
