Lydia Ann Beckstead

Lydia Ann Beckstead – Charles Lorenzo Jenkins– Ilene Jenkins – Shirley Ann McConkie – Lyrad Kelly Riley

Born:  Nov. 24, 1853 / Married David Jenkins:  Sept. 11, 1871 / Died:  Jan. 25, 1938

Lydia Ann Beckstead Jenkins (grandmother of Grandma Ilene)When Lydia Ann was but a small girl, she learned to knit stockings and comforters.  She also learned to pick wool and wash it and prepare the wool for further use, and she learned to use the spinning wheel to make yarn.  She learned to weave cloth on a loom when she was about 10 years old, then she helped to make it into clothes for the family to wear. Lydia  Ann  married  David  Jenkins  and  had  15 children.   Five  of  their children died of diphtheria and whooping cough.  The Jenkins family was in quarantine, meaning no one was allowed to go near the house for fear they might catch diphtheria.  No funeral was held for the children for fear the  germ would  still  spread.   So  Lydia  Ann  washed  her  children  and prepared them for burial by herself.

When Lydia was a young girl, she learned an unforgettable lesson about prayer while she was tending three younger siblings and had been warned by her mother to keep them away from the nearby streams.  After the baby fell into a stream, Lydia jumped in after her and brought her out,unconscious.  Thinking the baby was dead, Lydia knelt down and prayed to the Lord to give them back their baby sister.  About the time their mother arrived, the baby was miraculously waking up. 

Lydia’s grandfather, Alexander Beckstead, was asked to help guard Joseph Smith.  After two ugly men rode up to take the prophet away,Alexander witnessed the shooting and killing of Joseph and Hyrum Smith.While Alexander was gone, two more ugly men rode up to the Beckstead home and told Alexander’s wife, Catherine, that she had until morning to be  gone;  otherwise they  would  burn  the  house  and  kill  the  children.Catherine worked all night packing their wagon, and at sunrise Alexander arrived home to flee with the family.   Looking back as they went into hiding, they heard a terrible noise and saw a large group of men going in a rage toward their home, with burning torches, and soon the house was completely gone.  The men were singing and shouting, "We burned ole Joe’s guard up, and his family are sizzling in that heap of fire.  We’ve got them now…”  But the Becksteads were safe and sound in their hiding place, thanking the Lord for their protection.

At age 7, Lydia was asked to recite a poem in church one Sunday while Brigham Young was visiting.  She didn’t have any nice dress and no shoes whatsoever, so her mother made her a cute little dress out of an old white curtain dressed up with bows and ruffles.  For shoes, they made moccasins out of her father’s old felt hat. 

Lydia  always helped the  sick  and needy,  often riding in  sleds  or buggies in the middle of the night to care for the sick or lay out the dead.Lydia remarked a few days before her death in 1938 in Vernal, UT, “If only I could leave with my posterity a knowledge that there is a God.  Then I think I could leave the greatest gift of all.”

Source:  Lydia Ann Beckstead Jenkins’ life story, written by Grandma Ilene’s cousin