Lilian Stowell (March 10, 1970)

              Voices From the Past
The Mormon Travail in the Colonies of Mexico
By Lilian Ada Helquest Stowell
March 10, 1970
Tape # 112
Oral Interview conducted by Harold Forbush
Transcribed by Violetta Surkova March 2006
Edited by Niccole Franc January 2008
Brigham Young University- Idaho
Harold Forbush: It’s my privilege to have here in my office this afternoon Brother and Sister Eugene Stowell whose residence is at Rigby, Jefferson county, Idaho, and who are here on this tenth day of March, 1970, to be interviewed pertaining to their residence and living experiences in and about colonial Juarez, Mexico where they live for a few years and from which place they were expelled when the rebels moved in and they were forced out of old Mexico, and other data concerning the history of the Stowell family.
It’s privilege to have you people here with us today. We tried to ascertain some of the pertinent facts about those that are going to narrate their story and be interviewed. And with that in mind, Mrs. Stowell, I should like to ask you, if you will state your full name, this will include your maiden name, and the date and the place where you were born.
Lilian Stowell: My name is Lilian Ada Helquest. I was born in Koosharem, Utah in 1893, oh— September 14th 1893.
HF: Could you tell me a little bit about your mother and father, their background just briefly as you’d like to present it.
LS: My father was born in Sweden and he left there— came with his parents— when he was three years old. They came first to Ogden and then a missionary, a former missionary had converted my grandparents, took them over into Sevier County, near Richfield, Utah. There is where he’d met my mother, Maelynn Hatch Helquest.
HF: And there your parents are reared or commenced to rear your family in Sevier County?
LS: Yes, they were married in 1891 and I was born in 1893 in Sevier County. And they had three children, two girls and a boy.
HF: At the time of your birth was your father, at that time, living and practicing— did he have plural wives in other words?
LS: No, my parents never had lived in polygamy neither did my grandparents or my great- grandparents that went to Mexico with us.
HF: But I understand that when you were a small child, five years old I think, you went to old Mexico?
LS: I was five. My great- grandparents, William Carol McClellan, was called down to the colonies and helped colonize these Mormon colonies, and after year or two they sent for their daughter, which was my grandmother and grandfather, John Hatch, Mrs. And Mr. John Hatch, and they, of cause, then they wanted their daughter— my mother being the old daughter, they only married in their family, they wanted them to go with them. So, they packed up everything they could get just in wagons and left for Mexico in October… about 1897 is when they went to Mexico.
HF: That’s very interesting. Now, we have a story in bringing you and your husband together down in Mexico and to get at the background of his side of this, I’d like to inquire first of him, his full name, and date and place of his birth.
Eugene Stowell: Well, I’m Eugene Stowell. I was born in old Mexico, on March 1, 1893, the third child and the first son of Roda Bybee Stowell and Brigham Stowell and lived there until 1912 when the exodus from Mexico took place.
HF: Now, Mr. Stowell, how do you spell your name and how has it been spelled on your line, as your knowledge?
ES: Going back through research that has been done on the Stowell line we find that there has been various spellings of the Stowell name. It’s pronounced Stowell and is spelled S- T- O- W- E- L- L. However, back through the research we find that it has been spelled S- T- H- O- L, S- T- O- L- E and various other— one or two other forms. But through research we find S- T- O- W- E- L- L is the correct way that it was spelled the first Stowell’s came over to this country.
HF: According to your understanding, when was the, and who was the first Stowell in the Church, first convert to the Church in this modern dispensation?
ES: The first convert to this Church, after the Church was organized in 1830, was 1833. My great- grandfather, Augustus Oliver Artimus Stowell, joined the church. This is recorded in my grandfather’s history and ensuing months or within the year several of his family had joined the Church. However, my grandfather didn’t immediately join the Church, but due to the persecution that was brought upon the Saints and the attitude that some people portrayed that the Saints were exhibiting toward the government, Augustus Oliver Artimus Stowell thought that they were rebelling against the government and he withdrew from the Church and never did rejoin. However my grandfather, William Rufus Roger Stowell, joined the Church and he remained faithful until his death. He raised three families, plural marriage, in Utah and eventually went to Mexico and there he died.
HF: Now, there is the story in the Church, Brother Stowell, about Josiah Stowell for whom the Prophet Joseph, as the young man, worked in mining silver. Now this, I think, was in the state of New York, Chenango County. Do you suppose this was an ancestor or a branch off your ancestor line?
ES: I think this was probably right from Augustus Oliver Artimus Stowell, maybe one of his brothers. About that generation of time, I think it was, when this happened. I’ve never been able, or never have, connected up to relationship with Josiah Stowell to my direct line so I couldn’t say other than that.
HF: Now, was the Stowell family on your ancestry line in New York and did they get started coming into the Church in the state of New York or perhaps was it . . . ?
ES: In the state of Connecticut was where my father… Well, my father, he was born in New York, in Oneida County, New York— my grandfather. So, they originated in New York. My grandfather and my great- grandfather, they originated in New York.
HF: Well now, do you know about what time your grandfather who was faithful in the Church came west? Did he come with one of the handcarts or under what circumstances did he come to the territory of Utah?
ES: He came with some of the Saints. I don’t recall just which company he came with but Brigham Stowell was born April 24, 1854 in Fillmore and he was a third child of my grandpa. So, grandfather must have came with one of the first emigrant parties that came, first pioneers that came across the plains between 47 and about 50.
HF: Let see, your father was born in, did you say in….?
ES: Fillmore, Millard County, Utah.
HF: Fillmore was named after the President at that time, wasn’t it?
ES: At that time it was a prudential capital of the state in territory of Utah.
HF: Now, what are some of the characteristics— physical characteristics of the Stowell people? Are they tall, short, heavy set, skinny?
ES: Physical characteristics of the Stowell, in going back through all the pictures that we have, they have quite a family resemblance. They are around six feet tall, weighing in the neighborhood of at maturity from 170 maybe to 200 pounds. Very seldom find any of them in the past that were heavy set or that were overly heavy or overly tall. I’d say that they were very representative stature of the American people.
HF: Does there seem to be any particular characteristic or trait of the Stowell family with respect to, say, talents, maybe in music, or art, or enjoying outdoors or something in this nature?
ES: We find that going back to the history that we have a lot of lawyers, a lot of doctors, a lot of educated men especially in the later generations. And so, we feel that they have been a rather industrious people, eager to get a certain amount of education, happy, worthy and loyally supporting the communities where they live and the laws of the land. This seems to be born out through studies of the history of the Stowells.
HF: Now, Brother Stowell, you mentioned that your father— no, your grandfather— entered into a plural marriage practice. Could you give us a little background on this? Did he have large families from these additional wives and where were they located, that is, the families?
ES: When my grandfather came out he located in Ogden, in Provo first then they moved up to Ogden. And at that time Johnson’s Army was threatening march into Salt Lake. Grandfather was the leader of the battalion there and he was called out to see if they could stop the Johnson’s Army. One day when he was out on a scouting trip he was captured by the army and was held prisoner all through that winter, leaving his family in Ogden to provide for themselves, or at the mercy of the Church, and he didn’t get back until the spring. And before this, before my father was born, Grandfather was called to go down to Fillmore. There was a lot of men called to go down and help strengthen the towns and settlements down there, to protect them form the Indians to help them start getting crops growing. Father was one of them and fulfilled the mission down there for two years. During this time their State Capital was being built at the Fillmore. I think the government appropriated $ 25,000 to build this capital and help those people greatly. And my father was in business as a butcher— my grandfather was in business as a butcher at that time and they did pretty good. When he came back to Ogden they had some hard times and finally they got moved to Ogden. But after he was released as a prisoner and Johnson’s Army had been satisfied, they decided that the Saints were not rebellious, Father moved up onto the east bench of Ogden up there and he acquired some ponies up there and some farm and his son, William Rufus Rogers, my grandfather, who acquired this property and Brigham Stowell and him worked together as a father and son team, and they acquired quite a bit property.
HF: And it was between his years in the Fillmore area when he practiced polygamy?
ES: When he was in Fillmore, before that, he entered into polygamy, before he went to Fillmore. All of his wives didn’t go to Fillmore with him, one of them I think stayed in Provo. But this was the things that after, a few years after the Johnson Army at Salt Lake, my father married, and he took two wives, and then the United States Marshall began to harass these polygamists men, these polygamist families, and they were after these men who were in polygamy. So, my father and my grandfather, both been having polygamist families, they decided that they would go Mexico. And this was the thing that instilled within in them this idea that going down there they can live their religion as they wanted to and be unmolested form the marshals.
HF: Let see, Brother Stowell, your father was born to which marriage? That is, Brigham Stowell was your father and he was born to his second wife?
ES: He was born to William Rufus Roger Stowell and Cynthia Jane Park.
HF: And what year was this?
ES: When he was born was 1854.
HF: He was born, your father, was born in 1854?
ES: At Fillmore.
HF: And he, in turn, married more than one wife.
ES: He married two sisters.
HF: Two sisters, and you were the offspring of the second wife and her name . . .?
ES: Her name was Roda Bybee.
HF: Your mother is Roda Bybee. All right, well, this is interesting. Then your father and your grandfather both decided, in order to avoid being persecuted by the marshals, decided to go to old Mexico. What year was this?
ES: 1889. Just before this, Grandfather Stowell had been down and looked over this with the idea going down and setting up a mill there. These colonists had been down there approximately four years and were getting started but they had no mill So, they bought a mill and took it down there and this was their adventure in Mexico as a livelihood.
HF: Now who, according to recollection and understanding, who was it or which group, that decided on the place in Mexico to go? And with that question, were the individuals who went to this place, did they go as the kind of a body or did they just kind of filter down there from all over Utah?
ES: My understanding is that the Church sent a scouting party down there to look for land that would be suitable for colonization. They came back and reported that this land in northern part of the state of Chihuahua was a very likely place. It wasn’t very heavily populated with Mexican people, very a few small towns, and there was some good lands. And there was a river there that would supply water, of course. So, the Church, my understanding is that the Church bought this tract of land and then sold it to these people that desired to go down there. When they first went down, I think, there was quite a group of them that went. I don’t know just how many families but I think in the book by Nells Pillsbury Hatch— she went into this research quite intensively, and she tells about this. And we use to have one of those books but I couldn’t to go over this. But this was how it came about. This was how it was decided where these colonies should be built because the Mexican government had sold the Church a certain tract of land.
HF: Now, are we talking about a Colonial Juarez?
ES: That’s right.
HF: And weren’t there other two or three communities in the same general area that were settled?
ES: Yes, there was Colonial Dublan, Colonial Diaz, which was a bout seventy five miles away, Dublan was about fifteen miles away and up in the mountain area. However, these didn’t come until later, two years later, about 1890, somewhere in that area that they were established, or maybe right about the time that my grandfather and my father went down there. So, after the one colony got established it looked like it was an adventure so others wanted to go down. So, the church, I think the Church helped them get a foot hole down there.
HF: The colonists who went down to colonial Juarez, individuals pretty much from one region in Utah or were they pretty well scattered from various precincts or communities?
ES: Well, that I couldn’t say exactly but I think they were from the central, from Ogden, Salt Lake, Provo, Richfield and the area. Some of the parts went from Logan to Ogden. And so, I think it was more a matter of men who were practicing polygamy that wanted to go, no matter where they were they probably decided to go.
HF: And now, Mrs. Stowell, you mentioned that your parents went down there but your father or grandfather did not practiced polygamy. What would be the inducing factors and circumstances that prompted them to go to colonial Juarez?
LS: Well, this great- grandfather, Harold C, McClellan was called down there by the Church to help colonize. They had been down there for several years, for two or three, and they liked it so well, the climate was so wonderful and it was such a nice place to raise family and such a lovely environment for fruit and vegetables raise, everything they needed, that they encouraged their daughter, which was my grandmother to come down and in turn, my grandmother encouraged my mother and father to go down.
HF: What are some of the very earliest images and reflections and reminiscences that you can recall of this community of the colonial Juarez?
LS: We were six weeks in covered wagons going down— a long old trip for a bunch of kids. And after a few days staying with my great- grandparents and other relatives down there, my father rented a little house just across the street from Roda Stowell, Eugene’s mother. So, since we were five years old, well, perhaps, five and a half, six may be, we have played together.
HF: It was only natural that you should eventually marry then.
LS: Well, yes, we had found crowds, we go out on picnics, we had to make our own entertainment. We would go on picnics and boat rides and have our own home theaters, show, and plays, and gradually as we grew up we started dating, not necessarily any certain one, we just go with the different boys and girls. And finally, after we left Mexico, we left in 1912 and we kept in touch. Some of our grand children said, “ How did you court? What did you do when you were courting?” Dad said, “ We courted through Uncle Sam.” So, most of our courting was just in the mail after we left the Mexico from 1912 till 1917, when we were married.
HF: I see. Now, did your . . . what type of occupation did your father and your parents follow when they were in colonial Juarez? LS: My father was mostly a freighter. He worked at the saw mills and freighted timber from the mountain and worked on railroads and roads with his big teams.
HF: Now, were these little colonies, little communities, established in sort of valleys surrounded by mountains?
LS: Oh yes, definitely. The mountains were close and there was lots of hunting, wild turkey and deer and everything. We would go into the mountains for our trips and enjoy the mountains a lot.
HF: You know, we talk about the Rocky Mountains as a eternal fortress of hills and mountains extending literally from north, up in Alaska, clear to the tip of South America. Now, is colonial Juarez , this area where the Latter- day Saints settled, would this be in the portion of the Rocky mountain area?
ES: This is in the portion of the Rocky Mountain chain. It’s down there. It’s called the Sierra Nevada Mountains— Sierra Madre mountains, the Mother Mountains, in English. This is the same chain of mountains that extend down through California and to Mexico down the west coast.
HF: It really isn’t the Rocky Mountain Range then, actually?
ES: Not the main part. Just in correction here, the colonial Juarez was in a secluded little valley but Dublan was out in the big prairie, out in the big flat. The colonial Diaz was also out in the flat. The colonies in the mountains were generally in valleys in the mountains. The Sierra Madres, we were right at the base of them where we lived in colonial Juarez and so whenever we spoke of the colonies of the mountain we always spoke of going up to colonies in the mountains so we just distinguished between them.
HF: Would this be maybe a higher elevation than, say, Fillmore, or would you have way of comparing?
ES: Yes, this would be a higher elevation than Fillmore, that is the mountain colonies would. Colonial Juarez not. Dublan and Diaz were. I think they were around four and five thousand elevation. Quite long.
HF: Now, being in the mountains of course a lot of industry, I guess, was more or less based on what could be developed form the mountains such as timbering and mining, could you have some comments on that?
ES: There was some saw mills that were established in the mountains and they produced some very nice lumber. Of course, this was several years after the colony was established. This lumber was freighted down with teams and it was used to build homes, they had shingles and so forth. Down in the valleys our main product was fruit and cattle. Of course they had a lot of cattle in the mountains too. But the fruit industry down there was the main thing. People from the mountains would come down every year and buy fruit, and probably stay for a week and can fruit, peaches and apples and berries and so forth. And they would take it back to the mountain all canned so it would save spoilage and labor that way.
HF: Could you grow two or three crops a year down in that area? Say, two or three crops of hay, for example?
ES: Well, we would always get three crops of hay sometimes, four crops of hay. We could plant and then harvest it, plow it up and then raise a crop of potatoes in some of the areas. We could grow beans. We didn’t try to do intensive agricultural work there. There were a few crops that we could raise two year on outside of the hay but alfalfa was very prolific there and we could get three to four crops of alfalfa each year.
HF: Now, in the winter months, so called, would you ever receive snow?
ES: Very seldom down in the valley. Once in a great while we would have a snow storm. Once, not very often in regular winters but a kind of freak snow storm would come in. Of course, we always thought that was wonderful because we could get out and throw snow balls. But up in the mountains they always had snow each winter and summer each summer. It was very distinctive. They were noted for that.
HF: Approximately how far would you be from the west coast on the ocean?
ES: From the west coast on the ocean we would probably be a 150- 200 miles.
HF: Brother Stowell, was there very much contact with the United States Government or the church, as the matter of fact, by the colonies once they pretty much established themselves?
ES: The colony in touch with head quarters of the church. They would establish there, these various colonies, were all organized into wards. Their bishops, and their auxiliary organizations were fully set. And as far as the United States’ government we were not involved with them in any way. The Mexican government, we were not involved with them. They more ore less left us alone other than that when any civil misdemeanors occurred we had to contend with Mexican blood. There were several of the men there who went to Mexico City and studied the law, so that they were able to defend because there was always a little thieving going on, and once in a while a murder here or there. But the Mormons were seldom involved in murders or in the thief other then that they’re losers. And so, when the colonists brought action again some of the natives there, it created a little antagonism. But it was soon forgotten at that particular time. So, we were pretty much under supervision of the Church, you might say. We abided by the Church counsel from Salt Lake so, we always had that. The apostles would come down to our conference. President Joseph F. Smith was down there when he was president and Apostle Tisdale and John Taylor. John Taylor, he lived down there, Wilfred Woodruff, he had a home down there. Cally, he came down and married a girl down there, but they never established a home and the Romneys, they lived there. In fact, two of the Romney boys down there married to my sisters: one half sister and one full sister. Well, they were sons of Miles P. Romney, Jonas Romney and Erasmus Romney.
HF: Those were directly cousins to Marion G. or George S.?
ES: They would be cousins to Marion and their father, George S. Romney, and Miles Jr. and Erasmus were brothers, half brothers.
HF: Now, as I understand it, the area commenced to be colonized by Latter- day Saints who were living in polygamy and others who wanted just to be down there, about 1885, and, when the group was pretty well expelled by the government and encouraged to be brought back by the Church, which was in 1912, some 20- 25 years or so had lapsed. Surely, during that period of time there must have been quite a development in industry and otherwise. Would you comment along this line, Brother Stowell?
ES: Well, we of course, who lived there had never, the most of us had never known anything else. By this time we had electric lights, we had telephones, we had nice homes and mail set up for industry and for the economy. We had the Academy Church sponsored school, Foyer High School and we had a cleaning set up, for finished lumber for finishing of houses, making doors, door frames, all of these things were locally made and so the colonies were well sustaining. Some men have to change work for various commodities to supply their livings and their needs but this was readily available and was encouraged by the stake president and the bishops of the wards to do this thing. And for those who had industry to let them work for the things they needed as much as they could. These towns were laid off, I think in about eight acre blocks, somewhere near may be ten. They divided in to quarters and generally a house was on each corner. They had vineyards and orchards and garden spots, corrals and barns for their stock, now on these city blocks. This was very convenient and it was very healthy livlihood of the people. They made their own butter, a lot of them made their cheese. My father entered into a cheese making project on the ranch each summer and he’d make cheese and some of these cheese were shipped to the city of Mexico to fare there. One, I think weighed about 300 pounds and I think they took the prize for the cheese making in Mexico City. These colonists were being recognized by the President of Mexico at that time who was Profirio Diaz, who was a President of Mexico at that time that the rebellion broke out against them. But he was very compatable with the colonists there and encouraged people to follow after the pattern that they were setting for a better life, for a good life. These are the things that encouraged and kept the colonists together, and kept them moving and motivated. And they were always encouraged by the church to be thrifty, to be honest, to be diligent in their work, to live their religion and this I think they did very well while colonists were intact there, before the revolution and before they had to leave.
HF: What were some of the circumstances and the factors that brought about their expulsion or the exodus of the Latter Day Saints from Mexico?
ES: Well, these revolutionists, when they started out they were very poor. The first one to start out was the man with the name of Francisco E. Molero, who had been educated in the United States, who lived in the area of Monterey. And he saw the commission of the poor people of Mexico, how they were enslaved, or, as we call them, P. O.’ s to their masters. And all the rich would gather around them in enormous holdings and have these people to work for them for long periods of time.
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