John Jacobs
John Jacobs, his personal and family background, and his involvement in the Mountain Meadows Massacre
John Jacobs
1825-1919
Biographical Sketch
Early Years in Norway
John Jacobs was born in 1825, in Byglandsfjord, Berjnisley, Norway, the son of Sven Jacobsen and Johanna Johnsen. In the 1840s, he accepted the message of the Mormon missionaries and converted to Mormonism.
Immigration to America and onto Utah
Like many mid-19th century Europeans Mormons, Jacobs decided to immigrate to American to Utah Territory. He and his mother traveled to Utah in 1849. One account states that Jacobs was among the first to pass through the future site of Lehi on his way to California. In 1852, Jacobs had returned to Evansville (now Lehi), purchased a lot there and took of residence.
To Cedar City and the Iron Mission
Two years later, he moved to the new settlement of Cedar City in southern Utah. He married Elizabeth Coleman, the daughter of Prime Coleman and Sarah Thornton. Between 1856 and 1869, they had ten children, six of whom survived to marriageable age.
In moving to Cedar City, John Jacobs was settling in an area dominated by the Deseret Iron Company, known more familiarly as the Ironworks. Here is a brief summary of how it developed. After iron ore and coal deposits were discovered in the region, Cedar City was founded. In the first years of 1851-52, they investigated whether the region had the necessary raw materials – iron ore, limestone, wood, coal, and waterpower – to support smelting on a large scale. After confirming the presence of the necessary materials and relying heavily on the British Isles immigrants who had worked in iron-related industries in Great Britain, they set to building an iron manufacturing plant. They sited the ironworks at the mouth of Coal Creek near the present location of Cedar City. They mined the coal up canyon and transported it by team and wagon to the furnace located on the stream bank below the mouth of the canyon. The iron ore was transported from nearby Iron Springs by wagon. In 1852, after a small test furnace produced a low quality pig iron, they set about building a full-scale blast furnace.
Progress was impeded, however, in 1853-54 during the Walker War. They shifted their energies from iron making to “forting up” to increase their safety. After a peace treaty was reached with the Ute chief Wakara in 1854, they returned to improving the ironworks. By 1855, they had achieved their greatest success with a sustained run of the furnace producing several tons of pig iron. But most of the runs both before and after failed to achieve a sustained run producing good quality iron. One problem was the fickle nature of Coal Creek, which continued to alternate between flooding and droughts. They determined to develop a more dependable source of power.
In April 1857, the delivery of a new steam engine from Great Salt Lake City seemed to provide the answer. After its arrival, they built a new room to house the engine, connected its boiler to a steady water supply and modified the furnace to accommodate the engine.
In early June they started an iron run using the steam engine. However, the new machinery created its own set of problems. Through the end of July, they experimented with different configurations of furnace, engine and piping, attempting to optimize the blast furnace.
From late April through July, those working up the canyon in mining or hauling wood, coal, limestone, rock, sand or “adobies” to the ironworks were Isaac C. Haight, James Williamson, George Hunter, Joseph H. Smith, Ira Allen, Ellott Wilden, Swen Jacobs, Alex Loveridge, Joel White, Ezra Curtis, Samuel McMurdie, Samuel Pollock, John Jacobs, John M. Higbee, John M. Macfarlane, Samuel Jewkes, Nephi Johnson, Thomas Cartwright, William Bateman, Elias Morris, Benjamin Arthur, Joseph H. Smith, Robert Wiley, and Philip Klingensmith. Those working at the ironworks on the furnace, engine, coke ovens or blacksmith shop included Elias Morris, John Humphries, Ira Allen, John Urie, Benjamin Arthur, James Williamson, Joseph H. Smith, Samuel Jewkes, Joseph Clews, Richard Harrison, William C. Stewart, William Bateman, John M Macfarlane, John M. Higbee, John Jacobs, George Hunter, Samuel Pollock, William S. Riggs, Alex Loveridge, Ellott Wilden, Ezra Curtis, Eliezar Edwards, Swen Jacobs, Joel White, and Thomas Cartwright. (The two lists overlap because some worked both in the canyon and at the Ironworks.) Other prominent figures at the ironworks who were not later involved at Mountain Meadows were Samuel Leigh, George Horton, James H. Haslem, Laban Morrell, John Chatterley, Thomas Gower, Thomas Crowther and others.
By the time reports reached them in early August of a threatened “invasion” of U.S. troops into Utah, they had decided on further changes to the ironworks. They determined that a reservoir was necessary so as to provide a steady supply of filtered water to the steam engine. Immediately, they set to work, digging, lining and filling the reservoir. From late August to early September, shortly before the crisis involving the passing Arkansas emigrant company, they began a new furnace run. But it, too, ended in failure, probably around the time that a dispute arose between some community members and several of those in the passing Arkansas wagon train.
During this period in 1857, John Jacob's specific role was as a teamster, hauling lumber and "adobies" to the ironworks. In early August when constructing a reservoir became a pressing concern, Jacobs was in the large crew who built the reservoir. In mid-August, to sustain the pending iron run, Jacobs again acted as a teamster and hauled more than a ton of coal from the coal mine down the canyon to the ironworks. He hauled another ton of coal around the beginning of September to sustain the iron run.
The majority of the southern Utah militiamen at Mountain Meadows were from Cedar City. Of these, nearly all of them had worked at the Ironworks or supplied raw materials to it. Indeed, in the weeks before the Mountain Meadows Massacre, they had worked intensely together, hauling materials, building a new water reservoir, and making the latest run of the blast furnace. One perennial mystery of the massacre has been why the militiamen mustered to Mountain Meadows in “broken” militia units; that is, from different platoons and companies, none of which had a full compliment of its members. Perhaps the reason lies with the Ironworks. Those in the Ironworks knew each other and had worked alongside one another. Not only did John Jacobs knew those who mustered from Cedar City to Mountain Meadows, he had worked with them at the Ironworks as recently as the week before. Perhaps the answer is that the men of the Ironworks were on hand and available and Isaac Haight, who himself had worked closely with them, assigned them to muster to Mountain Meadows.
In the Iron Military District: Private John Jacobs, Company E, Isaac Haight's 2nd Battalion, Cedar City
In 1857, Jacobs, 31, was a private in one of the militia platoons in Cedar City. He was one of those in the ad hoc detachments formed in Cedar City that rode to the Mountain Meadows during the week of September 7. See A Basic Account for a full description of the massacre.
According to John D. Lee, John Jacobs was at the fateful militia council on Thursday evening, September 10, at the Meadows.
On Friday, September 11, many members of the militia contingent from Cedar City acted as guards alongside the emigrant men as they marched northward from their fortified position inside the wagon circle. As the massacre commenced, the duty of the guards was to wheel and fire on the emigrant men, quickly dispatching them. Yet during the actual massacre, reactions varied among the guards. Some shrank from their duty, others fired over the heads of their victims, while others still undertook their bloody duty with zeal. Within minutes, members of the Cedar City unit had killed all but three of the emigrant men. However, whether John Jacobs was in this guard unit and if so, how he acted during the massacre will probably never be known with any certainty.
Jacobs was not listed in Judge Cradlebaugh's arrest warrant, perhaps because he had already left southern Utah.
Abandoning Cedar City for Central Utah
In 1858, the Jacobs family moved back to Lehi and resettled there. In 1856, following the municipal elections in Lehi, John Jacobs was appointed a city policeman in Lehi. At different times, he and his brother Swen were on the police force. In the mid-1860s, John Jacobs was also in the militia that patrolled and scouted during the Black Hawk War. In 1867, Jacob married Harriet Austin, the daughter of John Austin and Emma Grace. They had eleven children but many of them did not survive to adulthood. His last child of his second marriage was born when he was 63.
Final Years
John Jacobs spent the remainder of his life in Lehi, Utah where he passed away in 1919 at the age of 93. His was survived by his many children from his two marriages. There were only a few militiamen at Mountain Meadows who lived longer than did Jacobs.
References
Carter, ed., Heart Throbs of the West, 10:458; 11:423; FamilySearch.org; Fieldings, ed., The Tribune Reports of the Trials of John D. Lee, ; Esshom, Pioneers and Prominent Men of Utah, 956-957; Gardner, History of Lehi, 8 (photo), 52, 161, 165; Lee, Mormonism Unveiled, 232, 380; Lee Trial transcripts; Walker, et al, Massacre at Mountain Meadows, Appendix C.
For full bibliographic information see Bibliography.
External Links
For additional information on John Jacobs, see:
- http://mountainmeadowsmassacre.org/appendices/appendix-c-the-militiamen
- Deseret Iron Company Account Book, 1854-1867: http://www.footnote.com/document/241905844/
Further information and confirmation needed. Please contact editor@1857ironcountymilitia.com.
