12 September 1863 – 14 November 1937

daughter of

Thomas and Jane Griffiths Davis

Mary Davis was born Saturday 12 September 1863 in Moseley Hole, Staffordshire, England, the sixth child born to Thomas and Jane Griffiths Davis. She had four older sisters and one older brother. Siblings are as follows:

I don’t know much of my great-grandma’s history in England. When she was nineteen years old she moved to America. Her father and brother Bill, and brother-in-law, Jack Ward (Alice’s husband) had left the previous year to America. At first she flatly refused to move and threatened to stay in England. She had a sweetheart there. They left England following their conversion to the Mormon Church. Although great-grandma herself didn’t join the church until years later. They sailed on the steamship "Wisconsin" arriving October 27, 1883 one year and one week following that of her father on the "Abyssinia." I’ve been told that she traveled in steerage.

Three of the children died and were buried in England. They were 14 year old Sarah Ann, one month old Elizabeth and one month old Emma.

The family located to Scofield, Emery, (now Carbon) Utah following a brief stay in Payson, Utah. The men in the family worked in the coal mine in Scofield. It was in Scofield at a dance that she met Robert D. Whitehead in January. On 21 September 1884 she married him just 11 months following her arrival in America. Their first child, Jane Ellen (Nellie) Whitehead was born 26 August 1888 in Scofield. She died 16 November 1890 and is buried in Scofield (although a grave has never been located). Great-grandma and grandpa moved to Cleveland, Emery, Utah in 1891 and their second child, William Robert Whitehead was born in Cleveland on 2 December 1892.

Great-grandma worshipped great-grandpa and would get up first in the dead of winter so that she could get the fire going and warm his clothes on the oven door.

I have heard from several people what a good person great-grandma was. She always had her cookie jar filled and no one was denied. She’d fill her lard bucket and walk from the farm into town to visit the sick. She was known by many as "Aunt Mary." While she only had two natural children, with one growing to adulthood, she raised the Marshall boys as foster children. Their father needed help with them following the death of his wife. They were Albert, Henry and Joe. It seems like I’ve been told that she also helped out with her sister Eliza Ann’s children, the Clausens. Elva Wayne tells me that great-grandma’s nephew, William Albert (Bert) Davis died in great-grandma’s bed. She was caring for him. Following his return from World War I in France, he got the flu and died on 25 Feb 1920.

Great-grandma taught herself to read and could recite poetry beautifully. She read the Book of Mormon and was baptized 1 October 1911 at age 48 years. She was a devout member. She went to the Manti Temple following great-grandpa’s death and was sealed to him and to their little daughter on 15 July 1931.

My mother has told me that her grandma has often said, "there’s one guy I’d like to live long enough to be good to." Meaning the man that my mother would marry. Then Fiddler Tom would mutter, "Astifidity, tut, tut, tut, you’ll make some man wish he’d never been born." I guess they thought she’d not make a very good wife. Well, great-grandma did know my dad, she just didn't know that he was the one that my mother would marry eleven months following her death. She missed out on knowing that my mother did many of the same things for my dad that she did for my great-grandpa; getting up first, warming his clothes was just one of many.

The blue plum trees that line the east fence of the yard in Cleveland (Easterbrook yard) were started by great-grandma when she threw away her pits after canning.

Great-grandma moved from the farm into town to the house where I eventually lived. It was just a two-room adobe house at that time. My grandpa provided the home for his parents. She died in Cleveland, Emery, Utah on Wednesday 14 Nov. 1937. She was buried in Cleveland, Emery, Utah.