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 | Family Group Sheet |
Henry
Leigh was the second of five children born to Samuel Leigh and Ann
David. He was born on December 31, 1843, at Llannelly, South
Wales. His parents were baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints in 1848.
Henry,
with his parents and brothers William and John and sister Sophia, left
Wales in 1849 and immigrated to the United States on the Buena Vista.
They arrived at New Orleans and traveled by boat up the Mississippi
River to St. Louis. They changed boats and traveled to St. Joseph,
Missouri.
While en
route to "St. Joe", the boat was ravaged with the cholera, and
Henry's mother, and a newborn babe, Samuel, died. Henry's father was
weakened by his bout with cholera, but he made plans to travel west
to Salt Lake City. He made it as far as Council Bluffs and then had to
stop and recover from his illness. He was in Council Bluffs for three
years.
Conditions
at Council Bluffs were severe. While Henry's father was still ill, his
cabin caught fire. The children wrapped blankets around their father and
dragged him out of the cabin. They stood on the banks of the Missouri
River and watched their cabin burn down.
The family
made plans to go west, and in June, 1852, with only five cents in their
possession, they had their wagon ferried across the river, and they left
for Salt Lake City. After three weeks in Salt Lake, Henry's father was
called to move to Cedar City and help develop the Iron Works.
As a young
man, Henry Leigh attended the University of Deseret in Salt Lake for
parts of two years. From 1873 to 1874, he fulfilled a LDS mission to
Great Britain, and he presided over the Liverpool Conference during the
latter part of his mission.
Henry
courted
Amy Elizabeth Webster, and
they were married in the St. George Temple on May 22, 1879. They had 10
children: Ann Elizabeth, Samuel and Francis (twins), Amy Jane, Sophia,
Violet, Henry Webster, Winifred, Wilford Webster (Dick), and Zelma.
Henry
served as the County Superintendent of Schools. It is said that when he
would visit a school, the Principal would hear his buggy coming and
would add a lot of fuel to the fire. Henry would come in, sit down,
become sleepy and doze off.
After the
Branch Normal School (now the Southern Utah University) was
established, Henry was secretary of the Branch Normal
School Committee.
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Cedar City with the Branch
Normal School in the background |
He was one of the men who mortgaged their homes to buy desks and equipment and pay the teachers so that the Branch Normal School could be held in the new building. Henry and Amy had boarders and roomers in their home.
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Henry Leigh's House |
Henry
Leigh served on the Cedar City Council, and he was Mayor of Cedar City from 1892 - 1894.
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Members of the City Council. Starting with back row (L-R),
Ed Parry, Henry
Leigh, Sam Leigh,
William Leigh, |
One
of the older buildings in the historic section of Main Street in Cedar City is
the Leigh building.
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The Leigh Building |
I don't know the history of the building, but during the time I lived in Cedar City and for about two decades afterwards, the building was owned by our family. I'm guessing that it was built by Henry Leigh. I don't think it was built by Samuel Leigh, because that would have meant that it was owned by all of his descendants. I remember that while I was in college, my dad had us go down and help clean the building and get it ready for a new tenant. Our family sold the building some time after I was married, probably in the mid 1970s.
At the
time of his death on December 2, 1920, of cancer of the liver, the Iron
County Record printed the following about Henry Leigh.
Of the deceased's seventy-seven years of usefulness on earth, sixty-nine were spent in Cedar, and the name of Henry Leigh is so closely interwoven with the life of the community that a history of the city of Cedar would be incomplete without it. In the business of the community he was connected with the Co-op store, the oldest surviving business house here, for twenty-one years, a good share of the time as manager. At the time of his death he was president of the Cedar Sheep Association, one of the strongest institutions of the town.
But his most-useful contribution to the public welfare was in his record as a public official. He has at various times been mayor, treasurer, and councilman of the city corporation, was county superintendent of schools...and was counselor to Stake President Uriah T. Jones.
Henry's vocations in life were those of farmer, stockraiser, and merchant. He is buried in the Cedar City Cemetery.
Henry Leigh's Mountain Ranch
Photograph courtesy Special Collections, Sherratt Library, SUU
Click Photograph for a larger view
For more about the life of Henry
Leigh, see the three sections on his father’s life Samuel Leigh,
Samuel and Ann
David, and Samuel and Mary Treharne.
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© Copyright Allen W. Leigh 1999, 2008
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