Mystery Monday, Where is Ann

Ann Pearsall Jackson

I could not find my grandmother Ann Pearsall Jackson.  I did not get to kneel at her grave...  I found her daughter Ellen Jackson and Christopher Weaver's grave...  and then  I searched for her story.  

Ann Pearsall Jackson, was my grandfather Max Dickson Weaver's great grandmother.  She was born in Birmingham, Warwickshire, England on October 20, 1819. she married Joseph Avery in 1838.  24 year old Joseph was gifted glass maker.  They were blessed with a son in February 1840.  They named him James after Ann's father.  Within the next two years, Ann lost her father, James, husband, Joseph, and son, little James.  Ann was only twenty-three years old.

   She married  William Jackson in  April 1842.  They made their home in Stourbridge.  They were the parents of five daughters: Emily, Maria, Mary Ann, Sarah Ann and Ellen.  

William was a factory worker.  Most likely he worked in one of the famous pottery or glass factories for which Stourbridge was known.  Ann's heart must have nearly broken when she lost both Maria and Mary Ann at age 2.  The plan of Salvation which Mormon Missionaries shared with she and her husband must have comforted her mourning heart( 1849).  They made plans to go to Zion.

However, William would never live to see Zion.  He died of what was termed as a "brain disease" in January 1858.  Their youngest daughter Ellen was only four years old.  

Ann was a gifted maker of mother of pearl buttons.  So with her limited income making craft and with the help of the Latter Day Saint Community in Stourbridge, she sought to care for her three young daughters ages 14, 9, and 4.  Emily and Sarah must have carefully polished the buttons for her mother as well as helped with other household chores.

Ann saved her "pearl pennies" for seven years until she had enough money to book passage with a company of saints from the Birmingham area.  She joined a group of six hundred Mormon immigrants on April 29, aboard the ship Belle Wood.  It was upon the voyage that the friendship between the Jackson and Weaver families developed. 

Ann settled near Nebraska City with daughters Emily and Sarah Ann and their English convert husbands for 8 years. Life on the prairie was most difficult, but they managed and in 1873 when they had finally established some sort of life of comfort and security when they once again exercised their faith and pulled  up stakes  and boarded a train bound for Zion around 1873.  Ellen and Christopher Weaver made their home in Layton on "Easy Street."  After years of living in a dugout (no much more than an cave) and after much  hard work and toil, they built a comfortable home in 1878.

At age 54, Ann made her way to Cedar City choosing not to live with any of her daughters.  Instead, she made her way to Cedar City where she was given a beautiful patriarchal blessing(November 23, 1874) and was sealed to her husband William in the St George Temple on June 2,  1880.
During her Cedar City Years, Ann worked as a servant in the Henry Lunt Home.  Lunt was the founder of Cedar City. He held prolific  civic and church positions for 30 years.  Under his employ, Ann sought to manage the care of his four wives and 13 children.(side note- the plot thickens here- Henry Lunt is the grandfather of my husband's grandmother, Zina Lunt- WOW!)  Her bouts with Asthma became worse and returned her to the care of her daughter.

  In 1880, Ann joined daughter Ellen and husband Christopher as her health was failing.  She passed away in September 1881.  She is buried in the Kaysville cemetery-somewhere in the family plot near her grandson George Weaver, the infant  son of Ellen and Christopher.

Ann, I didn't find your grave, but I found your story.  What an example of faith you share. You were truly one who exercised faith and had it strengthened through years of hard work and heart break.  Thank you Ann for coming to Zion!

I express my deepest gratitude to the Shelley Dawson Davies family for their extensive research and compilation of histories!