Sarah Ann was taught the gospel by Haden Wells Church and was baptized on October 25, 1843. Haden was serving his first mission to Alabama at the time.
Sarah Ann married Haden Wells Church on December 19, 1844, in Perry County. The newly-weds were in Nauvoo on August 27, 1845 as Sarah Ann received a Patriarchal Blessing there on that date. They were each endowed in the Nauvoo Temple on January 9, 1846, and were sealed there on January 21, 1846 by "Prest. B. Young" with W. Richards and A.M. Lyman as witnesses.
Haden and Sarah Ann's first baby, Hyrum Smith Church was born in or near Nauvoo. At that time the Saints were being expelled and driven from their homes by mobs.
Haden enlisted in the Mormon Battalion and left his beloved wife and five-month old son to fare for themselves. Little is known about Sarah Ann and her baby, Hyrum, during their year of separation. Sarah Ann and her baby were members of the A.O. Smoot Wagon Company. The Smoot Company arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on September 25, 1847, and it is assumed that Haden, Sarah Ann, and Hyrum spent the winter there together.
Sarah's husband was called on a mission to Great Britain from 1850-1852. The usual procedure was for the wife of the missionary to use her own ingenuity to provide for the needs of the family and to help support her husband while he was serving on his mission. Membership records of the Salt Lake Fourteenth Ward show that the Church family resided there from 1852 to 1860.
Haden served his third mission beginning in 1854. He returned around 1856. The 1860 Census listed Haden Wells Church as living in Salt Lake City with a household of eight with a real wealth of $600 and a personal wealth of $400. The eight living in the household would include Haden and Sarah Ann with their three children who were born before his third mission (Hyrum Smith, Haden Wells Jr., and Abraham Arterbury). Two more children had been added to the family following the third mission. Their only daughter, Paralee Amanda was born July 8, 1857, and the fourth son and final child, Robert Robbins, was born October 29, 1859. (The eighth member of the household was Catherine Gardner Church, a plural wife)
The next mission that Haden Wells Church and his family were called on to serve was to southern Utah. Because of the Civil War, President Brigham Young was worried that the sources for cotton supplies would be cut-off so he was determined to establish a "cotton mission" in St. George to make the Utah pioneers more self-sufficient. The prophet called 300 families to the Dixie Mission in St. George to promote the cotton industry. The Saints found out about this "call" as their names were read from the pulpit. Sarah Ann and her family had been living in the Salt Lake Valley for a period of 14 years and were quite comfortably settled.
President Young had seen the Dixie country in June and seemed to sense the problems that would arise from its settlement. So he called men and women who had already proven their dependability. Haden and Sara Ann Church filled this criteria. They and the rest of the Company were advised by their leaders "not to go on this mission unless they could go with whole hearts." The missionaries were told that their mission to raise cotton should be considered as important to them as if they were preaching the gospel among the nations of the earth. The wives were to go with their husbands "in the spirit of joy, cheerfulness and feel pleasure in going."
They arrived in St. George in December of 1861. By late February, 1862, the pioneers were able to move onto their selected lots to build permanent homes. The original plat map of St. George shows the Church Family Home to be Block 11 Plat A. The present address of this site is 35 West 100 South. This is one block south and about one-half block west of the St. George Tabernacle in downtown St. George.
Sarah Ann is fondly remembered in pioneer Dixie as one of the special mid-wife doctors. Her skills and services in this critically needed specialty are mentioned many times in the early historical records.
Haden Wells was called on another mission to Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia in 1969-1870. He was again called on another mission, his fifth in April of 1875, during General Conference. Six months later while faithfully fulfilling his missionary responsibilities, he died of typhoid fever at his former home in Shady Grove, Tennessee.
Sara Ann was described as a large woman, good-natured and a hard worker. She was a reliable woman, with great faith and charity. Her skills as a mid-wife sustained the family during her husband's missions.
Sarah Ann continued to live in St. George where she performed many unselfish labors of love and service for her family, her community, the Church and the Lord. The St. George Temple was dedicated in April 6, 1877, and she spent much of the remainder of her life laboring there. She died on July 29, 1889.
Part of her obituary read: "She was a faithful worker in the Lord's cause, and by means of her noble example, her kind and generous disposition and faithfulness in the discharge of her labors, she accomplished a great work both for the living and the dead. Sister Church was a woman of great force of character. She was a genuine Southerner, and possessed some of the best traits of character peculiar to that people, conspicuous among these were hospitality and self-denial. She died in the hope of a glorious resurrection together with her husband, having kept the commandments of God as made known to her."
(Biography taken from Haden Wells Church history compiled in 1991 by Hyrum B. Ipson)
Children of Sarah A. and Haden Wells Church:
Hyrum Smith Church (1846-1908)
Haden Wells Church (1848-1922)
Abraham Arterbury Church (1854-1916)
Paralee Amanda Church Miles (1857-1929)
Robert Robbins Church (1859-1915)
Her granddaughter, Sarah Ann is buried next to her.
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