Spencer Watson Wiltbank

Spencer Watson Wiltbank and Annie Sanders

Spencer Watson Wiltbank
By Josephine W. Hamblin and some additions by Aunt Effie Butler, Rebecca Burgess and Milo Wiltbank
Added to this blog by Kathy Castleton Burton

Spencer Watson Wiltbank, son of Jonathan Osborn Wiltbank and Elizabeth Spencer, was born at Christiana, New Castle County, Delaware 22 October 1824. We think his mother died at his birth or soon after. We haven't the exact date of her death, nor do we have a death certificate. We only have Spencer Watson's birth date from his Bible. He was raised by an uncle.

New Castle Delaware

Little is known of his childhood but at an early age he took up the occupation of fisherman on the Delaware River. Later he went to the Mississippi River to work at the same trade. It was here he was approached by two missionaries of the LDS Church. He joined this church at the age of nineteen and was baptized 24 December, 1843 by Elijah T. Sheets, much against the will of his relatives and friends. His uncle tried to talk him out of it and when he could not, he sent for his father. After finding he was very determined his father took his gold watch from his pocket and gave it to him wishing him the best of luck and good wishes. He then decided to leave his native home and go to Nauvoo, Illinois, where he made his home with Newel K. Whitney, first Bishop of the church. Here he joined a group known as the Nauvoo Legion. He also donated some money to help buy the windows for the Nauvoo Temple.

Fishing on the Delaware

Nauvoo Temple, Illinois

In the spring of 1848, he started west with the saints. He traveled in the company headed by Brigham Young. There were two other companies left at the time. One headed by Heber C. Kimball and the other headed by Willard Richards. In the Heber C. Kimball company was the girl he later married, Annie Sanders and her parents. In these three combined groups were 2,400 souls, 792 wagons and immense herds of cattle and horses. They landed in Salt Lake Valley in September, 1848.

Three months later, on Christmas Day, Spencer Watson Wiltbank was married to Annie Sanders. Annie was the daughter of Ellis Mendenhall Sanders and Rachel Broom Roberts, who was a daughter of Jacob Broom, one of the signers of the Constitution of the United States of Delaware.

Jacob Broom

During the first winter in Utah, the people were put on rations of 3/4 pound per person. Roots and herbs were harvested and used for food. Their clothing was getting thin and many were glad to get clothes made from skins of animals to help keep them warm.

Spencer Watson Wiltbank was in a meeting in Salt Lake City and heard Heber C. Kimball, after referring to their strained conditions and their want, say "Brethren, it will be but a little while before you shall have food and raiment in abundance and you shall buy it cheaper than it can be bought in the city of St. Louis." This surprised many. One man, Charles C. Rich, said, "I don't believe a word of it." In less than a year, in 1849, long trains of wagons came into Salt Lake City from the Eastern States headed for California to look for gold. In their anxiety to rush on to the gold fields they sold very cheap or even gave away everything that in any way encumbered their progress. They traded good wagons and horses for lighter vehicles and mules. They hurried away leaving wagon loads of goods with the needy Mormons, thus fulfilling one of the most remarkable predictions on record. Because of his previous affiliation with the Nauvoo Legion, Spencer Watson Wiltbank was chosen to help when trouble arose because of the invasion of Johnston's Army. He was one of the 2,500 men who went to guard Echo Canyon. They were gone from their homes nearly all winter.

Echo Canyon

Nauvoo Legion

The Wiltbank family lived in the Salt Lake Valley about ten years. During the years of 1855-56, Spencer W. served on a committee to care for the handcart companies as they landed in the valley. His son Ellis Whitney, was five years old at the time and could remember how tired and worn out many of these emigrants were upon reaching their destination. Nearby was a warm spring where a mud fort was erected to shelter the emigrants until they were permanently located.

On Christmas Day 1848 he was married to Annie Sanders. They settled in the Nineteenth Ward in Salt Lake City where he remained til called with the first company to settle For Supply at which place he remained.

19th Ward Salt Lake City, Utah

Spencer Watson was also one of the men at Fort Supply who set fire to the large fields of grain to keep the U.S. Army from using it.

Upon leaving the Salt Lake area, they lived a few years at Farmington, Davis County, Utah. They were called to settle Dixie St. George, Utah. In the warm climate of Dixie, they could raise sugar cane, cotton, and grapes and many other tropical fruits. They lived here during the barter and trade days when money was almost unknown. They raised cane and made molasses, grapes and made wine, fruits and dried them. Then with their produce they would travel to settlements up north and trade for cheese, lathe, shingles, potatoes, etc.

Farmington, Davis, Utah

St. George

Spencer Watson Wiltbank remained in St. George for 21 years then decided to seek a  new home. His reasons for moving may be summed up into two main ways: one, wine was plentiful and he didn't know what effect this would have on his family of growing boys and two he was a farmer at heart and all availale farm lands were claimed. After consulting Erastus Snow, then President of the Southern Mission, Spencer W. was advised to go to Mesquite Flat or to Arizona. He chose Arizona. In the spring of 1879 he and his son, Ellis Whitney, left for Arizona.

Lee's Ferry

They crossed the Colorado River at Lee's Ferry and traveled across the desert to the head of the Little Colorado River. Here they found mesas covered with range grass tall enough to be mowed and harvested for hay, so they staked out a homestead claim at what is now the Milky Way Ranch (26 Bar Ranch in 1975). 

His wife died June 22, 1879 while he was in Arizona hunting for a home. He later  moved to Arizona with his family arriving there in Feb. 1881. He settled near Eager in Amity, where he resided till the Lord called him home May 7, 1902. He was always prompt and faithful in the performance of every duty required of him in the church and hands down to his posterity a spotless record. 

Some of the Wiltbank genealogists particularly Velda Gibbons, Amelia Haws, Effie and Alsden Wiltbank, Rebecca Burgess, Lora Parker, Atella Haws and many others compiled a Wiltbank Genealogy book about 1966. They did a tremendous job in the gathering family group sheets and pictures. they were not able to get all of the information on everyone but the sheets when printed contained the names of about 1,182 descendants of Spencer Watson Wiltbank and Annie Sanders. It has been almost 30 years since then. The number of descendants is probably somewhere between 1,500 and 2,000 in 1993. Many of them have remained in southern Apache County. The next largest contingent is certainly in the Salt River Valley.

The rest oare primarily scattered in Utah , Nevada, California and Washington. However there are now family members along the eastern seaboard from New York to Florida. You might say that the Wiltbank family has made a circle. Spencer Watson Wiltbank left Delaware about 1842, came to Utah in 1848, then Arizona in 1879. A small number of his descendants have made their way back to the eastern seaboard.