A New Faith

Missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints arrived in Chester County in 1839, preaching the gospel when Robert was age twenty-three. Elders Sagers, Edwin Woolly, Elisha Davis, and Lorenzo Barnes had come to preach to Elder Woolly’s friends and acquaintances. Lorenzo Barnes left an account of their experience in a letter to D.C. Smith dated September 8, 1839. He related in the letter that doors opened all around and soon “whole neighborhoods were in an uproar, on account of the strange doctrine, as they called it, which had come to their ears…the dust was brushed from many a bible...”.[1] Elders Barnes and Woolly visited West Chester, the county seat with a population of about 2,000 and held several meetings there. The Methodists became very much alarmed but had no answer to the missionaries’ doctrine. At this time, Elder Barnes stated that the church in Chester County consisted of 30 members and thought that many more would be baptized soon. See pages 27-29. http://www.centerplace.org/history/ts/v1n02.htm

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[1] Times and Seasons, Vol. 1 No. 2 (December 1839): 27- 29; digital images (http://www.centerplace.org/history/ts/v1n02.htm: 22 January 2013)

Beginnings

Robert Wright was born in Oxford Village, East Nottingham Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania, to Alexander and Sarah Wright on February 10, 1816.[1] He never knew his older sister, Leah, who died about six weeks after her January 8, 1814 birth.[2] Unfortunately, his little brother Peter who was born on October 18, 1819[3] died sometime before 1828.[4] Robert grew up, probably in Chester County with his younger sister, Elizabeth Ann, who was six years younger.

 Robert’s father, Alexander, died after the conception of his youngest daughter, Elizabeth, between late 1827 and May 1828. In May 1828 his wife, Sarah, requested the court for a guardian for her two children, Robert and Eliza.[5] My records give a death date for Alexander on April 18, 1825, when Robert was nine years old and Elizabeth Ann was three but the date is unsubstantiated at this time. Sarah Wright was left to care for her two children alone. She lived long enough to raise them to maturity. Then, she too, passed away on January 18, 1837[6] before either Robert or Elizabeth was married. Robert was now twenty years old and Elizabeth was fourteen.

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[1] “Book of Memoranda,” 1845, a journal belonging to Robert Wright, a copy of ‘Record of Robert Wright’ pages from this workbook in possession of Margaret Murphy [address for private use] Provo, Utah, USA, 2013.

[2]  Ibid.

[3]  Ibid.

[4] Chester County, Pennsylvania, Orphans’ Court Record Book 15:309, Petition for Guardian for Robert and Eliza Write, 1828; Clerk of Orphans’ Court, West Chester, Pennsylvania. Peter was not listed as a surviving child of Alexander’s in this 1828 petition for guardianship of his children.

[5] Ibid.
[6] “Book of Memoranda,”1845, Record of Robert Wright, Murphy family papers.