Daughter of James Dalley and Emma Wright

Emma was the first white child born in Johnson's Fort, a settlement established by a group of Mormon pioneers near present-day Cedar City.

Married Laban Drury Morrill, 6 Jan 1874, Summit, Iron, Utah

Children: Emma Phedora Morrill, Mary Permelia Morrill, Annie D. Morrill, Della Morrill, Ida Morrill, Laban Rupert Morrill, Rural D. Morrill

Emma grew up as all pioneer children did, going through the hardships, deprivations and progress of the times. A rather small child, with black hair and blue eyes, she had a disposition with which very few persons are blessed--she was kind, intelligent and had a very evenly balanced temperament. She never seemed to get excited, but every move was of a constructive nature. As a child she was taught to do anything that was required to assist in the home.

There were no stores and very little money. Since she was the second child and oldest daughter in a family of fifteen children, necessity required her mother to teach her to take much responsibility. Her mother's death after giving birth to her fifteenth child left Emma with added responsibilities for the family.

As for foods, they had no sweets except molasses they made themselves from table beets raised in their own garden. Emma learned to gather honeydew from the willows that grew along the ditch banks, a much-prized sweet. She learned early in life to wash wool, pick, card, spin and weave it into cloth to make clothing for herself and the other children. They not only made their own dresses but also the men's and boys' suits. They spun and wove cotton to make cloth for underwear, towels and sheets. In the evenings, after the night meal of bread and milk or mush and milk, possibly with onions or a little cheese added, they would wash their dishes, tidy up the house and settle down to an evening of knitting stockings from the yarn they had made--no small job for a family of fifteen children. . . .

Emma, an expert needlewoman, taught her daughter how to cut, fit and make dresses, men's suits and gloves; also to braid straw for their own hats as well as for other people along the street. Aunt Ida, nearly ninety-eight years old at this writing, tells of seeing her mother take out their last summer's hats, put them under a tub and burn sulphur to bleach them, then use damp cloths to press and shape them, making them look almost like new again.

When Emma Wright Dalley was growing up, sunbonnets were worn most of the time. They had both an everyday bonnet and one especially for Sunday. It was a real job to iron those bonnets. Some of them had cardboard slats, while others were made with a padding and starched stiff. Some would have a narrow ruffle around the front and a curtain in the back to keep the sun off their necks.

When my grandfather, Laban D. Morrill, was eight years of age, he remembers Emma, just four years old, playing outside in a little red dress and red sunbonnet. He thought she was the cutest and prettiest little girl in the world. From this early time his love grew, and he loved her all the eighty-three years of his life.

In spite of their large family and much work, they had their romances and pleasures. The young girls would get together and have their fortunes told in different ways. In the little town of Summit it was hard to keep everyone in town from finding out about their fortunes. One way the young girls found out who their future husband would be was to eat a thimble full of salt and go to bed backwards. Then, when they went to sleep, they would dream their future husband came and gave them a drink of water.

Emma and Laban were married when she was twenty years old. Her uncle, William Dalley, performed the wedding ceremony at her home in Summit. Then the young couple drove to Salt Lake City by team and wagon and were sealed in the Endowment House on February 16, 1874. On their way home from Salt Lake City, they camped at Willow Bend one night, just north of Richfield. Since it was cold and stormy, they did not make a fire and cook their supper, but ate a cold meal and went to bed as soon as Laban had taken care of his team. They had been in bed only a short time when they began to hear noises and disturbances of various kinds, which kept up all night. The horses were alarmed by the noises, and they would raise their heads and snort as if frightened. The newlyweds looked out from the wagon cover and could see Indians around a smoldering fire, and they wondered how the Indians could keep warm on such a cold night with such a small fire. They also heard a man driving cattle up the river. He was singing, and they could understand the words. They also heard the splashing of the water and the cracking of his whip as he drove the cattle.

Towards morning they heard loaded wagons cross the river and bump over the frozen ruts in the road. They could hear the teamsters calling to their teams and cracking their whips. When Laban heard the freighters drive their wagons across the river, he got up to apologize for being in the road, but when he stepped out everything vanished. There was no trace of a fire, no tracks, no signs of man or beast. They could not understand what they had watched and heard all night, but found out later that they were parked on an old Indian battleground and that night was the anniversary of one of the battles. The account of this incident was later published in the Deseret News.

Laban and Emma lived in Cedar City a short time, then moved to Summit where two of their children were born: Phedora on April 6, 1875, and Permelia on April 2, 1877. Their next two children were born at City Creek (later known as Junction), Piute County, Utah: Annie on August 26, 1879, and Della on April 19, 1883. In City Creek they were pioneering an area. One morning when Emma went out to feed her chickens she found that coyotes had killed all of them. This caused a real hardship, as they depended on the eggs for food and occasionally a chicken for dinner.

Laban and Emma worked very hard and began to get ahead. Sometime between 1883 and 1885 they moved their residence to Circleville, Piute County, Utah, where Ida, their fifth child, was born December 31, 1885. It was a very cold winter. With no doctors available, the baby was delivered by a midwife. The schoolteacher, Susie Bates, boarded with the family and she helped with the cooking until Emma was able to assume the responsibility.

Emma's responsibilities were many. She washed on a washboard, made soap, ironed with the old-fashioned irons that had to be heated on the stove, churned butter, sewed and knitted for her children, and took in boarders. They had very little fruit, but gathered red berries, service berries, ground cherries and wild fruit that grew in the mountains.

In the fall of the year men would come from Dixie to sell molasses, dried apples, peaches, plums and grapes. They also brought tomatoes, fresh fruit and honey. Sometimes the peaches were preserved with molasses, which they brought in ten-gallon kegs. Laban usually bought molasses by the ten-gallon barrel and honey by the five-gallon can. The family used honey to sweeten their fruit most of the time and molasses was used to make cake or gingerbread, and once in a while to make candy.

Laban was in the bishopric for at least thirty years. He was very strict with his family. He worked hard and expected everyone else in the family to do the same, yet he was gentle and kind. Emma worked in the Relief Society, always as a counselor. Whenever the Church authorities made their trips south, they usually stopped at the Morrill home. Emma was a very good cook, and was especially noted for her delicious buttermilk biscuits and salt-rising bread. Laban thought that every breakfast had to include biscuits and Emma catered to his desires. Later in life he was told that it was not healthy to eat hot bread; that it would shorten his life. He replied, "I'd rather die younger and enjoy my biscuits."

I remember as a girl watching Grandmother Emma make biscuits when she and Grandfather visited us, and I marveled that she didn't even use a recipe. She taught all her girls to cook, since they kept a hotel and a store in addition to family responsibilities. One day at the hotel she put breakfast on the big table in the dining room and went to call the guests. When she returned, every place at the table was filled with hungry Indians devouring the delicious food. There was nothing to do but cook another breakfast.

If a baby arrived in Circleville before its wardrobe was prepared, Emma was always there with clothing for it. If lights were dim at such times, she brought coal oil or more candles. In case of death, she rendered aid. Laban would make the coffins and Emma would cover and trim them.

The first great sorrow came to the Morrill home when their married daughter Della died and left a fourteen-month-old child. Laban made Della's coffin, shaping the boards by steaming and bending them. Emma grieved quietly but deeply and showed her great love by taking care of the granddaughter, Idella, all her life.

After Della's death, the Morrill's decided to sell out everything and move to Twin Falls, Idaho. On Emma's forty-eighth birthday (December 15, 1902) they left their friends and their beautiful red brick home and started the struggle of pioneering again.

This unsettled country, the Twin Falls tract, was opened up by the government for drawing at the land office in Milner on July 3, 1903. Laban won second choice and took up a quarter section of land one mile east of what is now Kimberly, Idaho. When he drew this land it was covered with sagebrush and there was no water for it. He moved his family to Rock Creek, a few miles south of his farm. where they lived for almost two years in a tent and log house until the land was cleared, crops were planted and material could be purchased to build a home. Laban contracted to build a portion of the canal that would carry water from Milner dam to the new landowners.

A beautiful frame home was built on their new farm, orchards were planted and their property developed from 1902 until 1918. Their second son, Rural, passed away on November 29, 1905, when he was just thirteen years of age. They buried him on the northeast corner of the farm where Laban gave a plot of land for a cemetery. It was a hard task for Laban to make the casket, but it had to be done.

Emma and Laban were growing older. Emma, after two or three minor strokes which left her less mobile, was no longer able to work so hard. Laban could not continue to run the farm alone, but they didn't want to rent it, so they sold everything again and moved to Logan, Utah, where they spent the autumn of their lives working in the temple and enjoying each other.

In Logan they rented until they were able to build their own home at 167 West Third North. They worked in the temple for ten years, then Emma had to give it up because of failing health. Laban continued for some time after that.

Laban passed away at the age of eighty-three on October 25, 1933. Emma received loving care from her children until her death December 3, 1938. ---Allez Morrill Ashmead