Jonathan Hoopes married to Rebecca Watts

Jonathan Hoopes married to Rebecca Watts

JONATHAN HOOPES

Jonathan Hoopes was born on September 17, 1788, in Goshen, Chester County, Pennsylvania. This is not far from the city of Philadelphia. His family had lived in Chester County for five generations. His third great grandfather Joshua, who was born in Skelton, Yorkshire, England, settled in Pennsylvania in the mid 1600's, which was during the time William Penn was encouraging the settlement of this colony in the New World by the English Quakers, who were seeking religious freedom. Historical data shows that the Hoopes’ were practicing Quakers.

Jonathan married Rebecca Watts, who was from the neighboring county of York, Pennsylvania, during 1812. They became the parents of twelve children. The first eight children of Jonathan and Rebecca were born in Pennsylvania.

With good farmland and material blessings, Jonathan Hoopes, decided to take his wife, Rebecca Watts, and family of 8 children, (he was 42 at the time), leave all of this and move out west to Ohio, which was on the frontier of America. They left their comfortable home for a log house they had to erect themselves. Jonathan and Rebecca took with them a certificate of good standing from their Quaker Meeting in Pennsylvania, leaving everything else for God only knew what.

Here in Ohio, their last four children were born.

It was also in Ohio, in 1834, that Jonathan first heard the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ from Mormon missionaries. He would not have heard it in his Pennsylvania Quaker stronghold-this is what God knew that he didn't. When Jonathan heard the Gospel in its fullness, he knew it was true and joined with those peculiar Mormons.

Because of persecution, the early Latter-day Saints were forced to move west. It was when the main body of the Saints were in Ohio and Jonathan was 46 years old, that he was baptized into the Church on January 16, 1834, less than four years after its founding. Rebecca gave birth to her twelfth and last child, a son, who they named Jonathan, Jr., on 22 Feb 1835, in Cleveland, Ohio.

Jonathan’s family were active members of the restored Church and were subjected to the persecutions of the early Saints. They were forced to move many times to escape the mob violence. By 1838, Jonathan and his family lived on Clear Creek, in Davis County, Missouri, where they were also persecuted.

The Saints were asked by the Church leaders to personally write about their problems caused by the illegal mobs, as the Prophet Joseph believed the federal government should protect these law-abiding United States citizens. (See Section 123 of the D & C.) Jonathan did as he was asked by the Church leaders, writing the following account, which was published in the book, Mormon Redress Petitions:

I was ...driven from my home together with (my) family as I was on my road moving. I was taken prisoner by 75 armed men, they plundered my wagon and swore to shoot me and burn my wagon and all that was in it. This was on the 10th day of September, 1838. They wanted me to denounce my religion and move my family from Davis County to Livingston County, with theirs and fight against my society and then they would protect me. After they found that they could not prevail with me to black my face (mobsters frequently painted their faces black to hide their identity), I told them I would suffer death before I would join with them in any such thing. Some of them cried out,>shoot him, damn him, shoot >em,’ while others cried, >let him go, we want to have fun shooting all of the damned Mormons and throwing them in a pile.

Jonathan and Rebecca took refuge from the Missourians in the new city of Nauvoo, along the banks of the Mississippi River in Illinois, along with many other Saints. They were tenants on Block 32, six blocks from the Nauvoo temple, on a city block owned by Lyman Curtis, but they also owned quite a bit of land (T7-R8, No. 16) along the Mississippi River, several miles north of the City of Nauvoo.

Jonathan and Rebecca eventually owned a fine home in Nauvoo, where they were endowed in the Nauvoo Temple on the same day that some Saints were crossing the nearby Mississippi on ice

After the Saints were forced from their beautiful Nauvoo, Jonathan and Rebecca, with everything they owned in a covered wagon, crossed the Mississippi into Iowa, and later crossed the great plains with an early company of Saints. After reaching Salt Lake City, they were called by Brother Brigham to settle in northern Utah, close to the border of Idaho. Here they made their final home, safe at last from persecution, where they could practice their religion.

Rebecca died at the age of 70 in 1863 in Mendon, Cache County, Utah. Jonathan died June 12, 1868 in Weston, Oneida County, Idaho, at the age of 79, and was buried in Mendon, Cache County, Utah.

This old former Quaker grandfather, who was a stonemason by trade, was true to the Restored Faith, to the end.