Alexander H. Loveridge
Alexander H. Loveridge, his personal and family background, and his involvement in the Mountain Meadows Massacre
Alexander Hamilton Loveridge
1828-1905
Biographical Sketch
Alexander Hamilton Loveridge was an American frontiersman and pioneer to southern Utah. A native of rural Ontario County in western New York, he followed the westering arc of Americans in general and Mormons in particular, first to Michigan, then to western Illinois, and finally to frontier Utah.
Early Life: Moving West From New York
Loveridge was born in 1828 in Bristol Hollow, Ontario County, which then adjoined Lake Ontario in western New York. Loveridge came from old New England stock. All of his known ancestors through his 3rd-great grandparents were born in Massachusetts or Connecticut. His earliest American ancestors where religious dissenters from the Church of England who immigrated to North America.
By 1841, the family had moved to Pleasant Valley, Michigan. In 1844, Loveridge and his mother, continuing a long family tradition of religious dissent, joined the Mormon Church and made their way to Illinois.
Migration to Utah
In 1846, the Loveridge family departed Illinois as part of the Mormon migration. In 1849, Loveridge married Malinda Stillwell Thomas (1832-1870) in Pantamant, Nebraska. She was a native of Tennessee. In 1850, they immigrated to Utah.
An Early Pioneer in Utah Valley
In 1851, Alex Loveridge moved south to a promising new region north of Utah Lake in Utah County. Originally called Evansville, it was later named Lehi. It was located thirty miles south of Great Salt Lake City and a mile north of Utah Lake. Loveridge and his group was among the second influx to Lehi. The initial group had included Charles Hopkins, William Riggs, and Joel W. White with his brothers John and Samuel, all of whom Loveridge would know several years later in Cedar City. Loveridge and the others pioneered the new colony of Lehi, building cabins, planting crops and digging irrigation ditches to keep their crops alive.
There had been some conflict between Timpanogas Ute Indians, who claimed Utah Lake as traditional territory, and white settlers in 1849-50 and there would be more beginning in 1853. The Walker War erupted in summer 1853 and the conflict was particularly intense in Utah County. The pioneering settlers abandoned exposed settlements, made fortifications, guarded settlements and livestock and after their stock had been raided by Ute Indians, went in pursuit of it. Loveridge would have played some part in these events.
To Cedar City and the Ironworks
By 1854, the Loveridge family had resettled in Cedar City where their son Alexander, Jr. was born in March. While establishing themselves in Cedar City, they shared a dugout with another family, that of John Jacobs and his wife. In 1854 or 1855, Loveridge was sealed to his first wife.
Loveridge was listed as a lot owner in the early Cedar City land records, both in Plat A and Plat B. Plat A was the area of temporary relocation after moving from the site of the original fort. Plat B was a larger section of land located southeast of Plat A, at the base of the foothills. Modern Cedar City occupies all of Plat B and extends beyond it.
Between 1855 and 1858, there are a number of references to Alexander Loveridge in the Deseret Iron Company account book. For instance, on April 30, 1855, a day of intense activity at the ironworks, Loveridge and dozens of other men were credited for two days work with his team and wagon during a sustained run of the furnace. In February 1856, his and other accounts were debited for the expense of herding his livestock in the community herd, presumably charges incurred over the winter. In June and July 1856, Loveridge was credited for hauling coal with his team and wagon for the ironworks.
In May 1857, he hauled adobes probably used in construction of the engine house of the ironworks. He hauled coal the next month. On August 17, 1857, while James Williamson and his crew dug coal in the canyon, Loveridge, Samuel McMurdie, Ezra Curtis, Elias Morris, John Jacobs, Ira Allen, John Higbee, Joseph H. Smith, Isaac Haight, Philip Klingensmith, Nephi Johnson, William Bateman and several others hauled coal with their teams to the ironworks in preparation for another sustained run of the furnace. On Tuesday, September 1, james Williamson's coal crews continuing digging coal up the canyon.
On Thursday, September 3rd, Loveridge and many others including Ben Arthur, Isaac Haight, Swen Jacobs, Philip Klingensmith, Samuel Jewkes, John Higbee, Ezra Curtis, Samuel Bateman, William McMurdie were credited for hauling more coal. However, men like Samuel jewkes were also credited with up to 8 3/4 days of work on the furnace, indicating that they had been running the smelter non-stop for many days and the entries on September 3 are cumulative for those long days of effort.
There are no entries between September 4 and 28. The entries on September 29 were brief and cursory. In the next entries, for October 1, they were "melting down the furnace." This indicates that the days-long run they made in late August and early September had ended in another failure and it had probably failed by September 3. Thus, the ironworkers had experienced yet another painful failure while rumors continued to swirl of the U.S Army invading them through the eastern mountains just as the Arkansas emigrant company appeared in Cedar City and sparked a crisis.
In the Iron Military District: Sergeant Alexander Loveridge, Company F, John M. Higbee's 3rd Battalion, Cedar City
In September 1857, Loveridge, 29, was elected sergeant of his platoon in Company F of Major John M. Higbee's 3rd Battalion. It was probably Monday, September 7, when Cedar City herdsman Henry Higgins observed Loveridge among a militia detachment leaving Cedar City for Mountain Meadows. John D. Lee maintained that Loveridge was present at military council at the Meadows on Thursday the 10th and for the massacre on Friday the 11th. In 1859, Loveridge was named in Judge John Cradlebaugh's arrest warrant.
Later Life
Late in 1857, Loveridge, his wife and their family returned to Lehi where they remained for the rest of their lives. Loveridge helped build the first meetinghouse in Lehi and he worked on the Salt Lake Temple. In late 1870, his wife Malinda died from complications of childbirth. In 1874, he married Mary Finn Reynolds; she died in 1877.
The 1880 census lists Loveridge (age 52) living with his wife, Caroline, age 60. He seems to have married his deceased wife’s mother who cared for his children. He may have married a Mrs. Harvey in later life. Loveridge died in Lehi in 1905, survived by seven children.
Many thanks to Craig Dalley for his generosity in providing biographical information on Alexander Hamilton Loveridge.
References
Cradlebaugh arrest warrent, Speech of John J. Cradlebaugh, in Bigler and Bagley, Innocent Blood: Essential Narratives, 235; Higgins affidavit, Speech of John J. Cradlebaugh; Family history research in the possession of Craig Dalley; FamilySearch.org; Gardner, History of Lehi, 66 (photo); Jenson, Encyclopedic History of the Church, "Lehi," 423-24; Lee, Mormonism Unveiled 232, 380; Lee Trial transcripts; Shirts and Shirts, A Trial Furnace, 331, 477, 484, 496; Van Wagoner, Lehi: Portraits of a Utah Town, 3; Walker, et al, Massacre at Mountain Meadows, Appendix C, 260.
External Links
For further information on Alexander Loveridge, see:
- http://mountainmeadowsmassacre.org/appendices/appendix-c-the-militiamen
- Deseret Iron Company Account Book, 1854-1867: http://www.footnote.com/document/241905844/
- http://www.geni.com/people/Alexander-Loveridge/6000000002134742663
For excerpts from the history of Alexander Hamilton Loveridge, see:
Further information and confirmation needed. Please contact editor@1857ironcountymilitia.com.
