Isaac Burrus Hatch (Born February 14, 1823)

ISAAC BURRES HATCH, Sr.

[Part of a history in progress by Kaye Hooley, Orem, Utah.]

As posted on the web

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maureenbryson/id106.htm#isaac_burres_hatch_sr___hist

Isaac Burres Hatch was born on Saint Valentine’s Day, February 14, 1823 in LeRay, Jefferson County, New York. It was probably a very cold and snowy day, with the creeks frozen over, icy roads and travel by horse drawn sleigh.

     In parts of Isaac’s records it shows LeRoy and in other parts, LeRay. In New York State there is a LeRoy, Genesee County, as well as LeRay, Jefferson County. I have proven to my own satisfaction, through my own research, that the correct birthplace of Isaac Burres Hatch Sr. is LeRay, Jefferson County, New York.

          Isaac Burres was the eighth child of eleven children born to Jacob and Elizabeth “Betsy” Wilde Hatch. He was described as having a fair completion, blue green eyes, and reddish brown hair.

It was a year-round job to raise and obtain food and supplies for large families such as the one Isaac was raised in and the large task became a family project.

According to Franklin B. Bough and John J. Kenny, LeRay, in 1823, was a village which had its first Post Office within that year. LeRay was made up of two Inns; three stores, two grocery and one hardware; three black-smith shops; one grist mill; one saw mill; the usual variety of mechanics; four physicians; about sixty dwellings; and from 300 to 400 people. At this time the town had three churches: Presbyterian, Baptist, and Methodist. The Catholic Church came a few years later.

The life of Isaac parallels the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The year Isaac was born was the year that the Angel Moroni made his first visit to Joseph Smith in the same state, not far from LeRay. When Isaac was four, Joseph obtained the Plates of the Book of Mormon. Isaac was six when the Priesthood was restored and seven when the Book of Mormon was published.

If we were living at that time, I wonder how this startling news would have reached us for the first time? Probably with many varied versions passed from one neighbor to the other.

It wasn’t long until they had the true story brought to them through the first missionary movement. The missionary activity for the L.D.S. Church, also known as “Mormons,” spread all throughout New York State from 1830 to 1834.

The Hatch family moved West to gather with the Saints and settled on the west side of the Mississippi River in Charleston, Lee County, Iowa. Here Isaac met Mary Jane Garlic, the daughter of David and Elizabeth Buck Garlick. Isaac and Mary Jane were married 10 September 1845. Isaac also married her sister Hannah, as a second wife one year later.

Isaac’s first child was a son Hyrum, born March 6,1847, to Hannah at Charleston, Lee County, Iowa. Isaac next moved his family across the state of Iowa and settled at Council Bluffs, Pottawattamie, Iowa. They built their first home here, a log cabin built in the creek beds of Little Keg Creek. It was here on December 15, 1848, that Mary Jane gave birth to a boy, George Andrew.

In 1849, Isaac, with his wife Mary Jane and young son George Andrew, left Council Bluffs to continue westward in a wagon drawn by an ox team. Hannah stayed behind with her mother and gave birth to her second child, another boy, Thaddeus Theodore, January 1, 1850, at Council Bluffs, Iowa. She and her mother came westward two years later in Captain Allen Week’s Company with her mother Elizabeth driving the team. They arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in 1852, toil weary but happy travelers.

The immigrant saints in 1849 came in five companies of about 500 wagons and 1400 people lead by Orson Spencer, Allen Taylor, Silas Richards, and Ezra T. Benson. Many others came in independent companies as well as some members of the Mormon Battalion. Isaac was not identified with any special leader, which leads me to believe he may have been in one of the independent groups.

When Salt Lake City was first settled, City Creek ran down the east side of main street. Here, near the present City and County Building, they camped in their wagons until they could get their land and start building their homes. Isaac’s first home was located close to City Creek, now the 18th Ward area.

Soon after Isaac and his family arrived he was called along with 49 other men, under Parley P. Pratt to explore southern Utah. There were five groups of ten and Isaac was in group five. Capt. John Brown was voted in charge and they gathered together at his home November 23, 1849 in Cottonwood to make their plans to leave.

Parley P. Pratt’s diary states that during their exploring expedition they encountered severe weather, deep snow, and many hardships and toils incident to such undertakings. They explored the portions of the country south from Great Salt Lake to the mouth of Santa Clara, on the Rio Virgin, which is a branch of the Rio Colorado. They were instructed to document the best places for settling. Their distance going and returning was between seven and eight hundred miles as mapped out today. On most of the journey they made the first road as they went along. The parts which had been penetrated by wagon were so completely snowed under that they seldom found the trails.

The singers in the camp would sing around the camp fires to help pass the long winter evenings.

By January 1850, they were on their way home again. On January 21st many were sick and it was snowing severely. A council was held and it was found there was food to feed about half of the company until Spring. Traveling in a wagon was impossible. It was decided to leave half the company until spring to winter there with the cattle and wagons. The other half with some of the strongest mules and horses would attempt to reach Provo, the southern part of the frontier. The distance was about one hundred miles to the north from where they were.

On noon the next day January 23, 1850 Isaac left with Parley P. Pratt and a group of twenty men and animals. Brother Pratt states that he was very ill and they made about nine miles the first day. The snow was from one to four feet deep along the route. The men walked leading their horses and all followed in a single track. The first person breaking trail would soon tire out and then move to the rear and so on. The first night they camped in a cedar thicket, the second day they made nine or ten miles and camped in a mountain pass, thirteen miles south of the Sevier River. It would be night when they made camp after wallowing in snow sometimes waist deep. Shoveling away the snow, they would build campfires and spread out their blankets completely exhausted. The animals were tied to cedar trees or wallowing up the hill in search of bare spots of bunch grass.

Friday, January 25th, 1850 they were camped four miles south of Sevier county. It was still snowing and several of their animals had given out and had to be left behind. They called this resurrection camp because when they awoke the next morning they were completely covered with snow. When brother Pratt commanded them to arise, the graves of snow were opened and they all came forth. They forded the Sevier River and camped on the heights six or seven miles north that night. There was much less snow here.

On Sunday the 27th of January they still had some fifty miles to get to Provo and their supplies were very low. Brother Pratt and Chauncy West decided to take the strongest animals and push on, while the rest moved more slowly. They could send supplies back.

The group left behind pushed on very slowly and had reached the southern part of Utah County, about twenty miles south of Provo, when the relief company met them with fresh supplies. They were entirely out of food and very faint and weary. They reached home in Salt Lake City the first part of February, 1850.

In the spring of 1850, Isaac was called with a body of men to join a Provo militia at Battle Creek where the Utes were attacking the settlers. The battle was over two days later and they returned to their homes.

On April 3rd, 1850, Mary Jane gave birth to their second son, John William. About this same time, Isaac and Mary Jane cleared their land and built a humble home in Cottonwood.

In the LDS Church Encyclopedia it is stated that the first settler in Parleys Canyon was a Mr. Hatch, who located on Big Mountain Creek about two miles north of Harley’s Station. This very possibly was our Isaac Burres. There was another mountain creek known as Hatch Creek.

A tragic story has been related to me many times by various members of the Hatch family telling of the death of Isaac Burres Sr. One account is that on  a spring day of 1853, Bill Hickman, who was considered a friend, arrived on horseback and invited Isaac to join him and ride into Salt Lake City. On-the way to Salt Lake a friend of Hickman’s joined them. When they came to the Cottonwood Canyon stream it was necessary to travel in single file along the trail to cross the stream. The friend Bill Wooley led out, Isaac and then Bill Hickman followed. Just as Isaac’s horse was coming out of the water, Bill Hickman shot him in the back. He was taken home, where he died three weeks later. Hickman reported that Isaac had been shot with a stray bullet, but before Isaac died he regained consciousness and reported Hickman had shot him. Bill Hickman was an enigma in early Utah history. He was known murder who was never brought to trial, a known friend of Brigham Young and other Church leaders, apparently at time when it suited him to be such. He had many wives, and one theory has been advanced that Bill Hickman was in love with Isaac’s wife Mary Jane, and wanted her for himself.

The only reliable contemporary account of the incident is from the Journal History which recorded: “ March 11, 1853: During the past night, the notorious Ike Hatch was shot through the bowels while riding in the Big Field, by William A. Hickman.” This indicates that they knew from the start who shot Isaac. He had reportedly been involved in some less than legal matters involving horse trading with Bill Hickman.

The truth of this matter is likely never to be known in this lifetime. Whether Isaac was having second doubts about his association with Bill Hickman, leading to his death; whether Bill Hickman did want him out of the way to take Mary Jane as a wife; and ignoring all the speculation regarding Bill Hickman himself, his life and illegal activities.

Isaac left two young widows, the sisters Mary Jane and Hannah, and four young sons; George Andrew, John William, Hyrum Isaac, and Thaddeus Theodore. His youngest son, Isaac Burres Hatch, Jr. was born the August after his death. The sisters were each married two times after Isaac’s death.