Lewis James Petty Sr.

Lewis James Petty was born January 11, 1846 to Robert and Margaret Jefferson Wells Petty in Nashville, Tennessee.  Lewis is a Founder of Richmond. Lewis was a veteran of the Indian Wars.

History

When Lewis was young, his father and mother were converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In 1850, the Lewis family began their journey to Utah by joining the Wilford Woodruff Company on June 16 and arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on Oct 14. They made their home in Harriman, Utah. After the passing of his father, Lewis went with his mother to live in Richmond in 1859.

Lewis was a timber worker, stone dresser, farmer, railroad contractor, and did some freighting between the years of 1866 - 1877. One experience he tells: 

"We crossed the Snake River on the ice with heavily loaded wagons March 15, 1866. At that time we bought flour in Richmond at $15 a sack, freighted it to Virginia City, Montana at a cost of $12.50 per sack, expecting to sell it in Virginia city for $120 a sack. But before we arrived there with our shipment another had been received from Fort Bent on an the price had dropped to $18 a sack."1

Lewis James first married Alvira Lavona Hendricks on Feb 8, 1870 in Salt Lake City, Utah. On May 10, 1892, Alvira passed away. On Dec 16, 1903, Lewis James married Rosa Belle Pace Fisher, a widow with 9 children, and they together had one child, a son named Harold Petty.

Lewis' daughter Elsie Mary Petty writes:

"Lewis James Petty was deprived of a formal education. The only books he ever took into the schoolroom were a reader and spelling book. But he was well educated in the School of Experience. His was a life of hard work in the timber business, freighting, and on the farm. He had many thrilling experiences with the [Native Americans] in the early days in Utah. He never used liquor or tobacco. He retained his strong testimony of the Gospel his entire life."2

Indian Wars Service

After the construction of the Richmond Fort in 1860 and other forts in Cache Valley, the Territory of Utah created the Cache Military District on Oct 15, 1861 with Church Apostle Ezra T. Benson as Colonel. Richmond was organized as the 5th Battalion Infantry, with Thomas L. Whittle as Major, David P. Rainy as Adjutant, and Robert M. Kerr and Dana Walton as Captains. Lewis was appointed as a Private.

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