James Davenport

James Davenport was born May 1, 1802 in Danville, Vermont to Squire E. and Susannah Kittredge Davenport.

Early Life

The early life of James is not known. James married Almira Phelps on Sep 4, 1822 in Olean, New York. Sometime in 1834, the Davenport family was converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by Parley P. Pratt. However, the family did not immediately move to Ohio to live with the Saints but moved across the mid-east from New York, Kentucky, Indiana, and later Ohio. When the Saints moved to Nauvoo, Illinois, the Davenport family followed. 

James was an exceptional blacksmith and worked well in his trade. While in the Nauvoo, James was ordained as a member of the quorum of the Seventy on Dec 31, 1845.

Westward Journey

Soon after the death of Church President Joseph Smith, the Davenport family crossed the Missouri River in 1846 to begin the trek out west. James son John Squire remembers the events.

"the next spring, on February 5, I was sent by my father to drive a team for Heber C. Kimball (who was next in power to Brigham Young), I knew not where. We crossed the Mississippi River on the ice and camped on Sugar Creek, five miles west of the river, and remained till April 15, and then we moved slowly until we reached the Missouri River, June 25, 1846..... and after a good number had crossed, we moved north to Winter Quarter, now Florence, Nebraska. I remained there 'till December 1847, until all the Saints had either gone west or settled in Iowa, but Winter Quarters was kept as a starting point for those who went to Utah 'till 1856....I will say that the Winter of 1846 was a hard winter for the Saints. Hundreds of them died of scurvy and were buried on the hill south of Florence."1

When Brigham Young began his first wagon trek to the West in 1847, he recruited James to be the company's blacksmith. James was to go alone and had to leave his wife and 10 children behind in Winter Quarters until Brigham Young found the place they were looking for.

As the company neared today's Casper, Wyoming at the Platte River, Brigham Young had a ferry constructed to cross the river. After six days, the entire company crossed. However, Brigham Young set up a team to take watch over the ferry for other travelers who would follow along the trail. Nine men were selected, and James was one of them as the ferry's blacksmith.

After a month of work, the river subsided sufficiently, and the men who operated the ferry were let go. James went to the Salt Lake Valley and lived there for some time before making means to go retrieve his family in Winter Quarters. James traveled in a wagon train coming from Oregon going west and returned back to his family in Winter Quarters in August.

It wouldn't be until 1851 when the family finally moved west and settled in Grantsville, Utah.

Life in the Salt Lake and Cache Valley's

While in the Salt Lake Valley, James entered the practice of polygamy, marrying Catherine Vanever Geyer, a widow, on July 26, 1852 in the Endowment House, Salt Lake City, Utah.

In 1860, the Davenport family moved to Wellsville, Utah where their daughter Sarah Mariah Davenport was living with her family. They lived in Wellsville for a year before moving to Richmond. At this point in James' life, he was 61 years old. They lived in the Richmond Fort on the North side, neighbors to their son-in-law William D. Hendricks.

Epilogue