Mary Ann Hale

Out of Benjamin Franklin Johnson's seven wives, I found Mary Ann Hale's history to be the most interesting.  I would like to cut and paste a few of the paragraphs found on the BF Johnson family website.  

The Gospel entered the lives of the Hale family, and they possibly joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as early as 1832. About 1836, Samuel Hale and Mary Ann Cook gathered to Kirtland with the Saints and lived there until 1838. Because of the persecution, Joseph Smith directed members of the Church to leave Kirtland in the fall of 1838. Mary Ann was about 10 years old when the Hale family joined the Kirtland Camp leaving for Missouri.

The best guess as to when Mary Ann was born is 11 August 1827 in Whitestown, Oneida, New York.  If her family joined the church in 1832, she would have been about 5 years old.

Kirtland Camp was the last large group to leave Kirtland. The mile-long caravan began with about 525 men, women, and children in 59 wagons with 33 large tents. It was a group of the most destitute and hard-pressed Saints. None of them could leave earlier, and only by journeying together and pooling expenses could they begin the 870 mile trek to Far West, Missouri. They suffered epidemics along the way, and many of them died on the road to Missouri. 

Among the names that subscribed to the Constitution of the Kirtland Camp were Samuel Hale and his household of three, Julia Johnson and her household of eight, and Joel H. Johnson and his household of six. The Camp traveled through Dayton, Ohio, onward into western Ohio, into Illinois, and arrived near Springfield, Illinois, about the 1st of October 1838. Here part of the Camp stopped.

Upon arriving in Springfield, Illinois, Samuel Hale and his wife were both sick and died of typhoid fever. The family of Julia (Hills) Johnson remained at Springfield, along with several other families. Julia (Hills) Johnson took the young orphan girl, Mary Ann, into her family circle. Eventually, after the Johnsons regained their health, the group proceeded on to Ramus, which was a short distance from Nauvoo.

These paragraphs tells how Mary Ann Hale came into contact with the Johnson family.  Julia Hills Johnson is the wife of Ezekiel Johnson, the parents of Benjamin Franklin (BF) Johnson.  Joel Hills Johnson is the oldest son of Ezekiel and Julia Hills Johnson and older brother to BF Johnson.  Mary Ann Hale became a orphan and thus taken into the Johnson family.

Benjamin Franklin Johnson recorded in his autobiography, MyLife‘s Review, the following: About the first of October arrived near Springfield, Illinois, where Samuel Hale and wife (parents of Mary Ann, who afterwards became my second wife) were taken sick, and Brother Hale soon died. It was deemed best that my elder brothers, Joel and Joseph, my Mother and their families should remain there until the following season. Here Sister Hale also died, leaving Mary Ann, their only child, then some 10 years old with my mother (MLR 26). The orphan girl—Mary Ann Hale—that my Mother had raised from a child, was now living with us, of nearly the same age as my sister, and I asked him (Joseph Smith), if he would not like her, as well as Almira. He said, ―No, but she is for you. You keep her and take her for your wife and you will be blessed. This seemed like hurrying up my blessings pretty fast, but the spirit of it came upon me, and from that hour I thought of her as a wife that the Lord had given me (MLR 85). Six years later, 14 November 1844, Mary Ann Hale, given to me by the Prophet, was sealed to me as a plural wife by Father John Smith, as directed by Pres. Brigham Young(MLR 92).

Almira is BF Johnson's sister.  She was the first plural wife to the prophet Joseph Smith.  Joseph Smith explained the law of polygamy to Joel Hill and BF Johnson and then, had them explain it to their sister ,Almira.  Another one of BF Johnson's sisters almost became another one of the Joseph Smith's wives but she had already been promised by Joel Hill Johnson to another individual.  Almira was older than BF by 6 years.  Mary Ann Hale was 17 at the time she married BF Johnson and became his second wife.  Mary Ann Hale was the same age of Esther Malita Johnson.  Knowing this helps explain why two of BF's daughters married sons of Esther Malita Johnson.

When Benjamin received word that a Carthage mob was on its way to arrest him for crimes committed in Missouri, he fled Nauvoo in the middle of the night with Mary Ann and his third wife, Flora Clarinda Gleason.  Benjamin took both of these wives because they both were expecting babies, and he didn‘t want to leave them to face an angry mob.

Mary Ann‘s first child was born 25 July 1846 in Garden Grove, Iowa, and was named Emma Jane. As Mary Ann journeyed west, little Emma Jane declined in health. When BFJ arrived at Pisgah, he found that his daughter, Emma, had died.

BFJ with wives, Melissa Bloomfield, Mary Ann, Flora Clarinda and families crossed the plains in the Willard Richards Company. Traveling with them was Joel Hills Johnson and his family. They left 
Winter Quarters on 30 June 1848 with 526 people and arrived in thethe Great Salt Lake Valley on 19 October 1848.

There were problems between Benjamin and Mary Ann, and she took her children and left Benjamin in 1864. During the time they were separated, Mary Ann signed a bill requesting a divorce. However, in 1869, reconciliation was made, and she returned to live with Benjamin.

BFJ recognized that his fretful and over-sensitive temper was the main cause of much of his family troubles. Although his children seemed to grow up with a love for their father, Benjamin‘s wives tended to withdraw from his confidence, and much of the remainder of his life was spent with anxieties because of their withdrawal.

Benjamin was asked to colonize Arizona. He gathered his family around and asked if one of his wives would accompany him. All five declined for various reasons. Mary Ann, the eldest wife, was too infirm and broken for so arduous a journey (MLR 252), so he went without a wife at this time.

In 1882, when the Johnson clan pulled out of Spring Lake for Arizona, Mary Ann went with them. She spent the rest of her life in Arizona, first settling in Tempe and then in Nephi, which later became part of Mesa.

I come through the Mary Ann Hale line of BF's wives.
Her son, Benjamin Samuel would be my great-great-grandfather.

In a letter from BFJ to Mr. Gibbs, dated 1903, BFJ mentioned that he (Joseph Smith) sealed to me my first wife for eternity, and gave to me my first plural wife, Mary Ann Hale, an orphan girl raised by my mother then living with us, who is still with me, and is probably the only wife still living with the man to whom she was given by the Prophet (Zimmerman 44).

Mary Ann died in Mesa, Arizona, of pneumonia on 17 December 1910, five years after Benjamin‘s death. She is buried in the Mesa City Cemetery. She was 83 years old. She had 5 children, and 41 grandchildren.

• Daughter of Samuel Hale and Mary Ann Cook
• Born 11 August 1827, Whitestown, Oneida, New York
• Died 17 December 1910, Mesa, Maricopa, Arizona
• Pre-temple sealing to BFJ: 14 November 1844, Nauvoo, Illinois, by John Smith
• Temple sealing to BFJ: 3 February 1846, Nauvoo Illinois, by Amasa M. Lyman

Children of BFJ and Mary Ann Hale:

1. Emma Jane Johnson. b 25 July 1846; d 19 Ocober 1847
2. Joseph Ezekiel Johnson. b 12 January 1850; d 20 June 1909
3. Benjamin Samuel Johnson. b 20 April 1853; d 4 May 1939 - Our line of ancestors
4. Mary Ann Johnson. b 26 June 1856; d 27 July 1896
5. Vilate Elizabeth Johnson. b 7 March 1859; d II August 1939