James LAKE 7 October 1788--7 October 1874
James LAKE Jr. was born 7 October 1788 in White Creek, Van Rensselaer County, New York. He was the 4th child of James LAKE Sr. and Margaret HAGERMAN. James Sr. had served in the Revolutionary War on the side of the British and had been a prisoner of war from 24 October 1777 until 1783.
Just four months before James LAKE Jr.’s birth, the newly independent country had ratified the new Constitution of the United States of America. They had just a few years earlier won their independence from England.
When James Jr. was about 5 years old, his parents and brother and sister moved from New York to Upper Canada. His father petitioned for land due to his service in the British Army. Because he was born before 1870, James Jr. was eligible for land under his father’s rights to receive land. He was granted that land but it was very poor land and it ended up being sold in a Sheriff’s sale.
In 1809, James Jr. married his cousin Mary LAKE. They had four children, George who died when he was 10 years old, Dennis and Cyrus who were among the early elders of the church; however, they fell away during the great apostasy in Kirkland even though they had helped to build the Temple there. Their daughter Mary stayed in Canada. Later James’s wife Mary died and James Jr. married Elizabeth STOVER. They had 3 children.
While clearing land for a home and crops, he, James Lake Jr., accidentally struck his shin with the ax, tearing the flesh and splintering the bone. With each beat of his heart the blood gushed from the wound. All his wife’s efforts to stop the flow of blood were futile. It appeared that he would not survive, when suddenly a handsome gray haired gentleman came into the room. “How do you do, my good friend? You seem to be in trouble!” he said. “Yes, it looks like my moments in this life are numbered” James answered. The old gentleman took from his pocket a small bottle and handed it to James saying, “Just apply this and the bleeding will stop.” He then turned and walked out of the room. James called his wife saying, “Follow that man quickly and see where he is going.” She hurried to the door but could not see the man anywhere. James leg stopped bleeding with the first application of the medicine. James always said that this man was sent to him to help save his life. After he joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and read about the three Nephites in the Book of Mormon, he was convinced that the white haired gentleman who saved his life was one of them. James Lake Jr.’s life was spared but his leg had to be amputated. His wife died about this time leaving him with 2 broken families and in dire poverty.
On 3 September 1823, James married Philomela Smith. She was a widow with five children (one died in 1818). James Jr. and Philomela had 6 children while in Canada, the last being Lydia Ann LAKE. George LAKE, son of James Jr. and Philomela, said of his parents, “My mother was a weakly woman and my father was a cripple. Yet, they bore their trails without a murmur.”
James Jr. and Philomela joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in June of 1832, just two years after it was restored and just a month after their daughter Lydia Ann Lake was born. George writes, “In 1832 my parents, with most of their family received the Gospel as declared to them by old friends, Brigham, Joseph and Phineas Young.” Eleazer Miller baptized them. James Jr. and Philomela moved their family to Kirkland in July of 1833 with the help of Brigham Young. Brigham had stayed in their home sometime before.
James and his sons helped with the construction of the Kirtland Temple and he and Philomela were present at the dedication. When driven out of Kirtland, they intended to go to Missouri, but due to the trouble among the Saints and the Missourians. They stopped in Illinois. There they rented a farm near Springfield and remained there until the Saints assembled at Nauvoo. James and Philomela received their endowments on 31 December 1845 in the Nauvoo Temple. The temple was open around the clock with the Temple workers only getting to their homes once a week.
The Lake Family left Nauvoo in the month of February 1846. They crossed the Mississippi River on the bridge of ice with 600 wagons in their company. The family arrived in Council Bluffs, Pottawattamie, Iowa in the fall of 1846, after a very difficult trip from Nauvoo. They suffered many hardships and many trials as did other Saints. James built a log cabin for his family and they occupied it for nearly two years.
James was appointed as the Bishop of a ward in Council Bluffs Iowa to look after the wants of the widows and the fatherless. The first winter 1846-47 was the coldest and hardest winter for many years. The ice on the Missouri River was three feet thick.
In the spring of 1848, James Jr. and Philomela and 8 of their family moved to Missouri where they found work to help them get the necessary supplies for the trip to Salt Lake. James accumulated 40 cows and loose stock, over 100 sheep, 6 yoke of oxen, 3 brood mares, and 2 good wagons well laden with supplies. They were ready to move.
In 1850, James was appointed as Captain of Fifty. They were an independent company but they traveled the same route as the others. They were better prepared than most. They had 1 large wagon with 3 yoke of oxen and a small wagon with 2 yoke of oxen.
When they arrived at Ft. Laramie, Wyoming, they began to have sickness, with Barnabas and his wife Electra and George all getting the Mountain Fever. It spread from wagon to wagon and from company to company. They arrived in Salt Lake 5 September 1850. After resting for a few days and attending General Conference, they traveled the 35 miles north to Ogden in Weber County to make their home. On 26 January 1851, James Lake Jr. was called as a High Councilman of the first Weber Stake High Council. He was appointed to the City Council.
In October of 1853, James and Philomela traveled to Salt Lake to attend Conference. It was held the 6th through the 10th. During the morning session of conference on the 8th of October, James heard his name called from the pulpit to become a Patriarch. He was the first Patriarch of the Weber Stake in Ogden. Between 1855 and 1873 he recorded 264 blessings in his Patriarchal Blessing Book.
He also entered into plural marriage at this time when he married for time only the widow Ester Ann Pierce Green.
The summer and winter of 1855 was server. The people lived in Bingham’s Fort because of the Indians. They had to do their farming with their guns in their hands. The water was scare. Winter came early. It snowed in November and there were several feet on the ground for 4-5 months.
There was a special Conference in Ogden on the 7th and 8th of October in 1861. James, age 73, and Philomela age 67, were both very ill and were unable to attend these meetings. Brigham Young who attended their meeting and had Brother George Albert Smith give the closing prayer and he was asked to pray for Patriarch James Lake and his wife Philomela.
In the summer of 1872, James and Philomela moved to Oxford, Idaho so that they could be cared for by their son George and his family. James was 84 years old at the time and Philomela was 78. Philomela died on 20 March 1873 and James died on his 86th birthday, 7 October 1874.
Personal Data for James LAKE Jr. and Family
Born: October 7, 1788
Place: White Creek, Van Rensselaer County, New York
Died: October 7, 1874
Father: James LAKE Sr.
Mother: Margaret Hagerman LUCAS
Married: 1st Wife: Mary LAKE married 1801
2nd Wife: Elizabeth STOVER
3rd Wife: Philomela Smith-- 3 September 1823 (sealed in Nauvoo 31 December 1845)
4th Wife: Ester Ann Green (time only)
5th Wife: Mary McMurray (time only)
6th Wife: Polly Smith (sealed after her death)
Source: Mormon Overland Travel, 1847-1868
Source: Nauvoo Temple Register, December 31, 1845, Second Company, 5. James Lake, 6. Philomela Lake
Reference: LDS Biographical Encyclopedia. Jensen, Andrew. 1951 Volume: 2:287-388
Listed on Kirtland Zion’s Camp Record, pg. 43
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Sketch of James Lake's Life by Mary Ellen Lake
James Lake a patriarch in the Church was born October 7, 1788 at White Creek Washington, New York. The third son of James Lake and Margaret Hagerman.The family had descended from the early German Colonists in New Jersey. James Lake was a perfect type of a sturdy New England farmer and the energetic citizen who had contributed to the strength and progress of the great Republic which was yet in its infancy at thetime of his birth.
While yet a boy, his parents moved to Canada and he became accustomed to the hardships of Pioneer life.
He married at twenty one but in a few short years was bereaved of his wife and left a widower with three small children namely, Dennis, Cyrus, and Mary. His first wife was Mary Lake. His second marriage was Elizabeth (Storm). She died after bearing three children namely; Julia, Lawrence and James.
In 1823, he married Philomela Smith. This union was blessed with six more children when they became members of the Church. They were Sabra, William Bailey, Barnabas, Clara, Jane, Lydia, four more children were born to them after they joined the Church, they were Moroni, born in Kirtland, Ohio. Samantha, born in Kirtland, Ohio. George, born in Geneva, Kane County, Illinois the 15th of September 1838. Sara Amanda at Kirtland, Ohio. James Lake, with his sons helped to haul stone to build the temple at Kirtland. He received his blessings therein. Dennis and Syrus Lake were members of Zion's camp. When the Saints were expelled from Kirtland, the family when back to Kane County, Illinois where they rented land to enable them to gather with the Saints in Nauvoo, which city they helped to build, sharing with the saints all the privations and sufferings of that place.
They crossed the Mississippi on the ice in the month of Feb. 1847 with a company of about six hundred wagons. At Council Bluff, Iowa James Lake arranged a hand mill on a stump of a tree and day after day, he ground corn for the Saints who otherwise would have suffered. In 1850, he was appointed captain of fifty to cross the plains and arrived with his company in safety in Salt Lake Valley the 7th of October 1852. He settled in Ogden and subsequently chose Ogden Valley as his home.
He was later a member of the High Council of the Weber Stake. He was ordained a patriarch because of his undaunted faith amounting to great power in the exercise of his priesthood insomuch that many were healed and received blessings at his hand.
James Lake died at the age of eighty-five and was buried beside his wife Philomela at Oxford, Idaho in 1874.
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JAMES LAKE JR.
(1782-1874)
James Lake, Jr. was born in 1782 at White Creek, Albany County, New York to James Lake and Margaret Hagerman. (When the American Revolution came, James Lake Sr., like his father John Lake, and his brothers, gave their support to the British cause, was dispossessed, burned out and so lost all in the colonies and made his way to Canada West, at ErnestTown township, Lennox and Addington Counties, where he petitioned for and received land for him and his children for being Loyalists to the United Empire.) So James Jr. was raised in Canada.
James Lake Jr. first married Mary Lake (a cousin) about 1796 at ErnestTown, Upper Canada. They had four children: George (he died at age 11), Dennis, Cyrus, and Margaret Mary. Mary Lake died 11 April 1815 at ErnestTown, Upper Canada.
James Lake Jr.'s second wife was Elizabeth Stover. They were married 15 August 1815 at ErnestTown. Their children were Julia, Lawrence, and James III.
It was during this period that James Lake Jr. had the misfortune to get cut in the leg by an axe, and gangrene set in and the leg had to be amputated, without benefit of anesthetic. They just filled him with whiskey and cut the leg off. The family was desperately poor. Then when Elizabeth died in 1822 she left her husband not only crippled, desperately poor, but also with a family of six living children. James gave two of his children (Julia and James) to his sister Margaret Madson to raise, She and her husband later adopted them.
James, with his family, were living at this time at Camden, Upper Canada, on land granted him from the Crown Lands. There in 1825 Brigham Young helped him build them a log house. It was probably also through Brigham Young that he met Philomelia Smith, a widow, who had a family of five children. James Jr. and Philomelia were married 3 September 1823. Philomelia was born 13 April 1794 at Brookfield, Vermont, the daughter of Parker Smith and Sarah Loomis. Philomelia had been early left an orphan. She had been reared and trained by her grandmother, Sarah Huntington Loomis. At eighteen years she had married her first cousin Ira Smith, and was widowed, with her five children: Lyman, James Harvey, Elizabeth Boardman, Josiah William, and Esther. Not all of these children embraced the Mormon religion. We have no further record of her children.
Philomelia Smith had these five children, while James Lake Jr., had six still living, when they were married. This merging two families gave them eleven children. After their marriage they had ten more children: Sabra Lake, William Bailey Lake, Barnabas Lake, Clarrissa Lake, Jane Lake, Lydia Ann Lake, Maroni Lake, Samantha Lake, George Lake, Sarah Amanda Lake.
When they were married James Lake and Philomelia Smith Lake were living at Camden, Ontario to the north of ErnestTown. there they were visited by Latter-day Saint Elders, Brigham, Hiram, and Phineas Young in 1832. They accepted the teaching of the Mormon Church, were baptized by Elder Eleazer Miller. From this place a company of Saints were led by Brigham Young in 1833, and with this company James Lake Jr. and his family came to Kirtland, Ohio.
James Lake Jr. and his sons assisted in gathering material for and in building the first LDS Temple at Kirtland, Ohio. Later when the Saints were forced to leave Kirtland, he with his family went to Kane Co., Ill. Here at Geneva, in Kane Co., Ill,. the two youngest children were born. Here they rented land and farmed to obtain money with which to continue with the Saints. Later they came to Nauvoo, Illinois where again they helped to build a Temple and to build and beautify the city. But when the Mormons were again forced to flee with many others they crossed the Mississippi River on the ice in winter and so made their way to Council Bluffs, Iowa.
Here James Lake Jr. was appointed as a bishop of a ward to look after the wants of the widows and fatherless. It was here that he made what he called an Armstrong Mill. He split a log in two, gouged out a hole in each part, then bound the two halves together, bored a hole into the excavation he had made and pouring in corn with a pestle, pounded the corn into meal, so it could be cooked.
The boys would scurry about over the corn fields, so gathering nubbins and any ears that had been dropped or left in harvesting the corn. They spent a terrible winter there.
Not being prepared for the long journey across the plains in the spring of 1847 the family moved south into Holt County, Missouri where they rented land and farmed. There was plenty of help so they worked hard and prospered and so gathered crops as well as stock.
When in the spring of 1850 James Lake determined to take his family to Utah, they returned to Florence, Nebraska across the river from Council Bluffs where a large group was making ready for the journey across the plains. At this time they had forty cows and loose stock. Over a hundred sheep, six yoke of oxen, three brood mares and two good wagons, well- loaded with supplies.
Here at Florence the gathered families were placed in groups of fifty, each group having a leader. James Lake was appointed leader of fifty. Early in 1850 this caravan started for Utah. When they neared the Platte River [cholera?] broke out in the camp. One of James' daughters was attacked by the disease but was healed through faith and prompt attention. A daughter-in-law contracted the disease and died.
Elderly picture of
James Lake, Jr.
James Lake and family arrived at Salt Lake City October 7, 1850 after long months of grueling travel. Later at the suggestion of Brigham Young he moved on to Ogden Fort, "where there was little but sage brush and nude Indians." He located a farm and moved thereon. This was later called Harrisville. At the organization of the Weber Stake, James Lake was called to be a member of the Stake High Council, in February 1851. At the fall conference of 1855 he was set apart to the office of Patriarch and soon began to officiate in this high calling.
They later removed to Oxford, Idaho where James Lake and Philomelia Smith Lake spent the rest of their lives. She died March 20, 1873 and he died October 7, 1874 in his 85th year. Both are buried at Oxford, Idaho.
"James Lake and his wife were highly esteemed by the authorities of the Church, and the love and reverence of their posterity toward them was akin to adoration."
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Lake Family Website - this site includes the address to order a great book on James Lake and his family.