John Henderson Bankhead

John Henderson Bankhead was born in 1814 in Rutherford County, Tennessee, to John and Jane Bankhead. By the time his younger brother George W. was born in 1819, the Bankhead family lived on the Alabama border. In 1842, John married Nancy Crosby, who lived just across the state border in Mississippi. Their fathers, John Bankhead and John Crosby Jr., both died about the same time. The young couple inherited land, cash, and enslaved people. The Bankhead estate file was burned in an 1880s courthouse fire, but the extensive Crosby estate files still exist and should be transcribed by the family to collect historical and family information. John H. Bankhead probably inherited Thomas Coleman, Nathan Bankhead, Miram or Mary Elmira Bankhead Johnson, and Samuel Smith. George W. appears to have inherited Nancy Bankhead Wales Valentine, her children, and Alexander Bankhead. Nancy Crosby inherited Malinda, Martha Flake, Benjamin, and Jacob, who later died at Winter Quarters. Malinda and Benjamin did not go west with the family, so may have been sold. John H. and his brother George W. joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the early 1840s. They arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in 1848. They and their enslaved workers were efficient farmers, so they produced great amounts of cheese and butter from the cattle they took to the Salt Lake Valley. George W. went to California to mine for gold, leaving John H. to care for his business in Utah. After a few years, John H. and his family moved north to Box Elder County. During the Utah War, they evacuated their household south to Utah County and lived with their cousins, the William T. and Talitha Bankhead Dennis family. Eventually, perhaps due to a scandal involving John H. and the enslaved young woman Miram or Mary Elmira, the family moved north to Wellsville. They lived there for the rest of their lives, running an efficient farm and building wealth. Evidence from community histories and the 1850 and 1860 census show that they kept their enslaved people in bondage at least through 1862 and perhaps through the end of the Civil War. Of the enslaved people they took to Utah, Thomas Coleman was murdered in 1866 on the grounds of the Utah State Capitol. Nathan Bankhead married first, Miram, and later Susan. He and Susan eventually moved to Los Angeles. His descendants live in Utah and California and should be consulted on any family history efforts involving the enslaved pioneers. Miram or Mary Elmira appears to have been sold out of the territory after she gave birth to her daughter Mary. She had a second family in Nebraska. Samuel Smith moved to Spanish Fork to live with his relative Nancy Lines Smith. They are both buried in Spanish Fork. Martha Flake married Green Flake and was freed by Brigham Young along with her husband and other relatives including Rose and Violet Litchford. Martha's descendants live throughout the Western US and should also be consulted for family history efforts. The Bankhead history includes much of the complexity of American history, including stories of faith, cross-continental moves, slavery and bondage, and the heritage created among American families. Sources: 1830–1910 federal censuses; 1850, 1860 census agricultural schedule; 1850 slave schedule; tax records; John Crosby Sr estate; John Crosby Jr estate; Winter Quarters sextons record; collections of the Church History Library, Salt Lake City including wagon rosters; interview with Martha's granddaughter Bertha Udell, John Fretwell collection; autobiography of Charles Nibley; historical newspapers; land records; Los Angeles vital records; Thiriot, Slavery in Zion (University of Utah Press, 2023); and cemetery records from Wellsville, Spanish Fork, and Los Angeles. (Amy Tanner Thiriot, February 2024.)