Ann Arnell

Wm West & Ann Arnold, bio.

The spirit of adventure eventually led William West to Utah. He had years earlier decided to “fight Mormonism" by educating himself as a Methodist minister, but found the Mormons to be a peaceful, kind, and agreeable people. William joined the Church on 5 February 1865 at thirty-five years of age (William West, short bio). That same year he moved to St. Charles, Idaho where he met and married Ann (Arnold) Sanderson, in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City, 14 November 1868. William West was born in Hopkins County, Kentucky on 6 June 1829, the oldest of ten children of Hardin West and Catherine Williams. An unusually hardy man, “He never lost but one tooth from childhood and that was knocked out by an ox, ’shorn while crossing the plains”. When two years old, William moved with his parents to Missouri, where he later assisted on farms, having but very little formal education (William West, bio). He departed his home, eight or ten miles from Dixon, Missouri in 1853 at the age of twenty-four years, “leaving behind a wife and small son who refused to go with him.” He travelled with homesteaders who were heading for the Grand Ronde region of northwestern Oregon. Upon arriving in Oregon, the local Indians were deemed too numerous and hostile, so many settlers went south to seek gold in California. There William, alternatively a gold hunter and business man, “made and lost several fortunes.” He eventually tired of gold hunting and trading and after buying a number of mules and horses, returned to Oregon to run a pack train business between 'The Dalles' area along the northern border of the state and down into Boise City, Idaho, 300 miles away. “He made money but finally sold out and settled in Boise... where he built the first eating-house in the town.” Ann Arnold was born 17 December 1837 in Newton, Cambridgeshire, England. There, her mother, Elizabeth Rule, coming from a wealthy class, fell in love with the gardener, Richard Arnold, and was disinherited. The couple moved to Australia when Ann was about six years old (History of Eliza Jane West Rich, 4 pp), where she grew to adulthood. He father worked on a large sheep station where her mother was the head housekeeper. They were introduced to the gospel and joined the Church. The Arnold family next gathered with the ‘warm-climate Saints’ in San Bernardino, California. Shortly thereafter (1857) Ann married her first husband, James Sanderson. But the Church was soon forced by apostasy within and other factors to abandon the San Bernardino settlement and Ann and her husband moved to Utah. Within three years, while attempting to help colonize Franklin, Idaho, James Sanderson died of hardship and exposure. Thus at twenty-three years of age, Ann was left a widow, with two small children, an invalid mother and aging father—and her deep faith in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. Four years later (1864), Ann and her parents were called to help settle St. Charles, Idaho in the Bear Lake Valley where she met and married William West. The West’s were called to help settle a new community at Randolph, Rich County, Utah where William’s skill in carpentry helped build homes, there and in nearby Evanston, Wyoming (William West, short bio). In 1874 William moved his family from Randolph to St. Charles, Bear Lake County, Idaho. He carved an irrigated farm from the virgin land, requiring long hours of grubbing out sage brush by hand. He was among the irrigation pioneers of the district, helping to build ditches from the canyon to carry waters east onto the bench land where his farm ran down to the edge of Bear Lake. William became a prosperous farmer, serving in the Church as a Sunday school worker. Eight children were born to William and Ann West, half dying in childhood. The loss of these children grieved Ann greatly and she prayed to the Lord for confirmation that they were well off. She was particularly distraught at the passing of her four year-old son Mark, an otherwise sturdy ...