ROBINSON, Ebenezer

BROWN, ROBINSON, MOORE, COWDERY, WILLIAMS, SMITH, WORKS, RIGDON, GURLEY

Posted By: Sharon R Becker (email)
Date: 9/7/2015 at 22:27:53

Biography ~ Ebenezer Robinson
May 25 1816 ~ March 11, 1891
from The Return, Pp. 220-22. Davis City IA.

Ebenezer Robinson, the seventh and last child of Nathan and Mary Brown Robinson, was born in Floyd, New York, May 25, 1816. His mother died when he was ten-years-old and his father remarried. Ebenezer lived with his father and stepmother, Lydia Moore, until he was 16 years old. In 1832, he traveled to Utica to learn the printers trade and, by 1833, he was printing newpapers in both Ravenna and Hudson, Ohio. He moved to Krtland and was printer for the LDS Church’s newpaper, the Messenger and Advocate. F. G. Williams was the publisher of Oliver Cowdery was editor. While living in Kirtland, he boarded 2 months with Oliver Cowdery, 2 months with F. G. Williams, and 2 months with the Prophet Joseph Smith. Ebenezer said that he “found them all very pious good Christian people, asking a blessing at the table and all attending to family worship morning and evening.” This he was glad to see, as he “had been accustomed to it from our earlisest childhood in our father's home.”

Ebenezer was not a member of the LDS Church then, but as he said, found to his “. . . surprise, they taught the Gospel, with all its gifts and blessings, as set forth in the New Testament scriptures and that the Book of Mormon taught the same and came convinced in his own mind of the truth as taught by them.”

On October 16, 1835, in Kirtland, Ebenezer was baptized by the Prophet Joseph Smith, who, on December 13, married Ebenezer to Angeline Eliza Works. [She was the sister of Brigham Young’s 1st wife.]

In 1836-37, Ebenezer printed the 2nd edition of the Book of Mormon, and assisted in printing the 1st edition of the Book of Doctrine and Covenants.

Ebenezer continued to move with the Church through all its persecutuions. After being forced to leave Kirkland, Ohio, he moved to Missouri, where he published the paper, Elders Journal, in 1837 at Far West, Calwell County, Missouri. After being driven from the state of Missouri in 1838, Ebenezer eventually wound up in Navoo, Illinois, in 1839. Ebenezer was faithful through all the early persecutions of LDS Church members.

In Nauvoo, he and Don Carlos Smith, the brother of the Prophet, published a newspaper, The Times and Seasons. In August 1841, his partner died and Ebenezer purchased the entire paper.

He built a large two-story brick house; his family lived on the top floor and his press and vindery occupied the first floor. Here Ebenezer joined with his fellow religionists in creating a beautiful and prosperous city, Nauvoo. During a period of comparative peace, homes were built, farms and businesses were established, and an orderly government was begun.

As the LDS people began to prosper, once again persecution began to grow. There were those among the Church memebership, who having weathered the earlier hardships of starting over again. Some of these, like Ebenezer, had moved and rebuilt time and again, only to see what they had struggled so hard for, lost to mob action. After the martyrdom of the Prophet Joseph and his brother Hyrum, on June 27, 1844, followed by the mobs ordering the LDS to leave Illinois, most of the Church members chose to find a place free from oppression, even if it required them to make a long and ardorous trek across the plains and mountains to the Utah Basin. Those members who chose to remain behind instead of joining that exodus usually left the church.

In the late spring of 1844, as the enemies of the LDS Church were becoming more active, Ebenezer sold his printing establishment to his brother-in-law Brigham Young. On June 18, 1844, his family, in company with Sidney Rigdon and his family, left Nauvoo for Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In his publication, The Return, Ebenezer said that he and “. . . President Sidney Rigdon were appointed by the authorities of the church to go to Pittsburgh. . . to build up the church in that city.” They arrived at their destination the 27th, the same day that the Prophet, Joseph Smith, was slain. Ebenezer, who was drawn to the polished Sidney Rigdon, ". . . remained with him until [Sidney’s] organization failed.”

He moved from Greencastle, Pennsylvania, to Decatur County, Iowa, in 1855. He “. . . united with the Reorganized church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in April of 1863.”

Ebenezer and Angeline, along with their daughter Grace, moved to a farm near Pleasanton, Iowa. Upon retiring from the farm, Ebenezer and Angeline moved to Davis City, Iowa. Grace and her husband remained on the farmstead.

Ebenezer died March 11, 1891, Davis City, Iowa, where he was interred at Old Davis City Cemetery. Elder Zenas H. Gurley, his son-in-law, delivered the funeral sermon.

Transcription & compilation by Sharon R. Becker, September of 2015