Nathan And Sanford Porter Family Information

Copied from the journal of nathan t porter from Larry Cragun

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Bertha Cragun writes about her Great Great Grandparents Sanford Porter and Nancy Warriner

My mother, Bertha Cragun left us boxes of family history information and stories. They need to come out of the boxes and be shared.

One such story in bound in booklet form. I am going to share a few items from it. It is found in the Morgan County Library, Historical Records section, for you to be able to read.

Bertha introduces the book as follows; "One of the most precious memories I have is of my Grandma Porter (Electa Elizabeth). When I was a young girl she told me many precious memories she had of her Grandma Porter (Nancy Warriner), and of those dear hearts and gentle people who founded my hometown."

Please know that I spent two years researching and verifying their lives and this is factual and true.

Nancy Warriner spent her early childhood years in Vermont. She lived a half mile down the road from the Nathan Porter family and their son Sanford was her age.

Even though Sanfords grandfather West had been a Baptist minister for over 30 years, neither Sanford nor his father, Nathan had joined any organized religion.  Nathan believed the Bible to be the word of God, but did not believe any church on earth was actually following the signs and laws that Christ laid out.

Nancy loved the way Sanford could confound the evangelist, preacher, or layman when it came to proving things from the Bible.

She tells of their courtship which is very interesting.

They were married and moved to New York.  Sanford built their first home in one day, by himself. She was astonished. Shortly after the war of 1812 broke out. His militia had to furnish eight men. They cast lots to see which were the eight. Sanford with his new wife pregnant was one of them. 

As I write this, this story is interesting, the book is too. If you want a copy leave me a comment and we will figure out a way to get you a copy. It's about 70 pages in total.

There are miracles in their story.

Sanford was a visionary man. They had endured financial problems which troubled him. One experience was he prayed to God to show him the way to go that he might support his family. Almost immediately a messenger came from the spirit world. He told Sanford to sell their place and go to the state of Illinois. He was told to go there to a place called Fort Clark. This move was complicated and a story book adventure. 

In May of 1828 Nancy gave birth to their 11th child, Justin Theodore. 

Sanford farmed in Illinois, then saw the opportunity to build a saw mill.  He ran it with his boys. It was there he had the experiences that led him to join the Mormon church. He experienced many spiritual things, special things. One of them caused Sanford to sell his mill and move abruptly, in the winter to Missouri. He was the leader of 500 families in this trek, many were people Sanford had taught the gospel.  They crossed rivers and ice. This was begun in December 1831 and the journey required they exercise great faith. This was a four month journey.

One of my grandfathers is Lyman Wight Porter, a younger son of Sanford. He was named after one of the missionaries who converted them. Lyman was born 5 May 1833. Nancy was 43 years old. This was 13 months after they moved to Independence, Missouri. 

The book covers their concerns about the mobbery taking place. Finally, at threat of being murdered they had to quickly, in November, load what they could into their wagon, and leave Missouri. More miracles and heavenly experiences are written about this adventure.

"The trials of the Porters were much like being reduced to the lowest poverty level, making a living by day labor, jobbing, building, or woodcutting." The violence and turmoil extended on for years.

Their faith was sorely tried.

This story is so interesting I have decided to find a way to put it online for you to read it in it's entirety.

Nancy lost four sons. She was later comforted listening to The Prophet Joseph Smith teach , "all mothers who have lost infant children, who died before the age of accountability, who were too pure, too lovely to live on earth; therefore, they are delivered from evil, and we shall have them again, and mothers will have their children in eternity. 

The last 3rd of the book discussed the journeys to Porterville and issues they had to deal with. I'm going to end here, I may add another post later. I'm glad mother wrote it, I am sorry it took me years to read it. I wonder what else I have missed.

Porter Family Migration To America

Some information on the Porters is here in a continuing research story by William Arthur Porter Sr. It is an example of what it took to cross the Pond.

A Cragun grandfather, Patrick Cragun is said to have been a 17 year old runaway from Ireland, traveling at a similar age. He too was in danger of capture into servitude by the ships Captain. He too had issues on the sea. His was different in that his ship was a sailing ship and went 40 days with no wind. They ran out of food and water.

It appears the Porters had a lot in common one family to another, the thirst for freedom being one, the spiritual inclination being another.

I have found no connection to Sanford Porter and Peter Porter, but with some extra research may just find a common ancestor. More effort on that later, or you can do that. If you find the common ancestor, please report back.

From Mr Arthur Porter Sr.:

Many Porters immigrated to America before the revolutionary war. The U S Government census report of 1790 gives the first names of 575 heads of Porter families. Moreover, since several volumes of this census were destroyed by the British in the War of 1812, there are many names missing. No doubt there were many more than 575 Porter families in America by 1790.

Today there are tens of thousands of Porters in America. Many descended from the families that were here in 1790; many from those that have since come from England. The lives as led in the early day by those by those Porters were very similar: I have gathered data about the life of the First Porter immigrant. I refer tot he life data of Peter Porter, the family's first American Immigrant. 

Peter Porter landed in Virginia in January, 1622. He was an English youth and, at the time, was just turning seventeen years of age. Peter had left England on September 21st, 1621, and so, had spent four months on the voyage. The trip across the ocean had been made in a small 40 ton vessel name "Tiger". On board the "Tiger" were 40 persons including several maidens for wives: the boat was in the charge of Captain Nicholas Elford.

His voyage across the ocean "was rough and beset with many dangers." As stated above, the "Tiger" had left England in  September. She sailed in consort with a larger ship named "Warwick", a vessel with 160 ton capacity.

Copeland says, "the Tiger" became separated from the Warick and was driven by ill weather so far as the North Cape, fell into the hands of the Turks on her way, who took most of her supplies, and ll of her serviceable sails, out of their power, so as she escaped that danger, and arrived safely in Virginia with all of her people, two English boys excepted,for which the Turks g  ave them two others, a French youth and an Irish. Copeland goes on to say, "Was not here the presence of God printed, as it were, in Folio, on Royale Crowne paper, and in Capital Letter? She arrived in January prior to the departure of "George". I have never been able to find out the nature of the strange accident that delivered them from the hands of the Turks.

Sanford Porter, An Example of A Legacy.

Origonal Portervile Church -It is for sale

As I spend time researching ancestors I have become totally aware of the importance of having at least a small life history or special experiences of our ancestors.

When Sanford Porter, who joined the Mormons right after the church was organized, took the time to dictate pages and pages of his lifes experiences he created a legacy.

His devotion to the Bible, his concern about his own being after being totally rebuffed by the local Christian ministers, and the miracle of his prayers being answered - how they were answered is a treasure to we his multi generation grandchildren.  Not being miraculous but also important to me is discovering in a library a several page story of his son John President Porter. John President was my great great grandfather Porter. What I gleaned from John President's story was a similarity in his personality to mine. He provided for his family but always lived with the believe there was gold in the Hardscrabble hills of Morgan County.  He stuck to that belief until days before he died. That's my nature.

What about you. Yesterday Kathleen and I joined about 100 people at the Riverton Family History Library. What a neat day. Glen Rawson of the Joseph Smith Papers T V Show spoke about family stories. He shared a few pioneer stories that were brief but inspiring.

I had never heard of some of the people he read us about. That was one of the points. If I were a descendant of any of those people, I would have treasured the story.

We are building a legacy for our grandchildren and great great grandchildren to feed upon. We too may not be historic figures, but to our descendants we are part of them. They will want to know us. Just as Sanford or John President, or any of my ancestors and their stories are treasures, so will our stories as we write them down.

Truly Sanford Porter is an example of a legacy. Join me in the commitment to leave mine.