Additional Families
Beginning a Second Family.
On May 17, 1862, I took another wife in the House of the Lord whose name was Susan Dean.
In February 23 she had a daughter named Martha Eliza.
She had a son born September 28, 1864, who was named Lewis Edgar,
and on November 23, 1866, she gave birth to another daughter that we named Effie Elzina.
In 1868, September 21, she had another son whom we named George Francis.
A Family Operation.
My first wife, Ruth, had another son born November 7, 1863, whom we named Oscar Newell.
She had a daughter born June 24, 1866, whom we named Clara Louisa.
In 1868 I and the boys got us a small mill in operation and sawed some sixty thousand shingles.
[His daughter Ella helped to bind many a bunch of shingles in this mill.]
In the same year I was ordained into the High Priests under the hands of President Miller.
I also started to attend the School of the Prophets.24
On September 21, 1868 my second wife had another son whom we named George Francis.
Then Anna Laura, was born on September 1, 1871, another son Charles Leroy was born November 5, 1873 [died March 9, 1900].
Then came DeBart September 17, 1875,
on September 2, 1878, Frank Parley was born,
and on December 22, 1880, Angus Ray.
Another daughter was born December 12, 1883, named Ida E.
Susan Dean Despain was born November 15, 1843.
[Martha Eliza died in March 1899.]
[It appears that a daughter Ella Eugenia (Despain) Boyce is responsible for the remainder of this biography]
Difficulties of Age and Ill Health.
Solomon Joseph was 57 years old by the year 1880.
Age had begun to take its toll.
He had contracted a disease in his lungs, probably emphysema or consumption [tuberculosis].
Also Ruth Amelia and Susan Dean had families of their own.
Fortune Dictates a Third Family.
Charlotta Lundstedt, a convert form Sweden, had been admonished by missionaries to go to Utah and marry a good man and raise up a family unto the Lord.
Since polygamy was an established institution on the Church at that time, there was no prohibition against a man having more than one wife.
Consequently, when Charlotta and Solomon met, it seemed the natural thing to get married, even though there was a great difference in age.
Solomon was a good man who had become sickly and needed help.
Charlotta was in need of a husband to father her family.
Courtship was carried on largely through an interpreter because Charlotta could not speak English and Solomon could not speak Swedish.
They were married on March 24, 1881, in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City.