On May 25, 1856, the ship Horizon sailed out of Liverpool, England, for the United States. On board were 856 newly converted Mormon passengers including 21-year-old Emma Louise Batchelor who was leaving her Uckfield, Sussex County home.

By July 8, she was in Iowa City, Iowa, ready to start the long trek to Salt Lake City, Utah. The Mormon Church provided passengers with a handcart to carry their belongings on the 1,400-mile walk. In return, each member would owe the church one-yearโ€™s labor.

Emma set out on foot with the Willie Company as it departed Iowa City.

By the time the travelers arrived in Fort Laramie, Wyoming, many of the handcarts were in disrepair. The company captain ordered everyone to remove most of their belongings to lighten their loads, but Emma refused to part with her few possessions and stayed at Fort Laramie to await the Martin Company.

While waiting to leave Fort Laramie, Emma was called on to serve as midwife, a role she would perform throughout her life. Once on the road, she carried mother and baby in her handcart for 2 days.

As the weather turned cold, the travelers struggled through snowy crossings over the Rocky Mountains. Frostbite took its toll. More than 150 never made it to the land of Zion.

Owing the church a yearโ€™s service for surviving the march, Emma worked for Brother Kippen and his wife. Kippen expected Emma to become another of his wives, but Emma had other ideas and left as soon as her obligatory duty was fulfilled.

In December 1857 Emma heard John D. Lee speak at a meeting. She was so captivated by his intelligence and good looks, and apparently John was just as delighted with the fair-haired young woman, that on Jan. 7, 1858, just two weeks after they met, Brigham Young presided over the marriage of John Lee and Emma Batchelor. Emma was Johnโ€™s 17th wife.

The newlyweds settled in New Harmony, Utah, where Emma cooked for seven of Johnโ€™s other wives and their children. She bore five of her own children here.

Several years earlier, Brigham Young had imposed martial law against all who entered Utah Territory. On Sept. 11, 1857, emigrants traveling from Arkansas to California were confronted by a band of Mormon men, along with a contingent of Paiutes, as they camped in Utahโ€™s Mountain Meadows Valley. Without warning, the Arkansas families were attacked โ€“ 120 men, women and children died in one of the worst bloodbaths in Utah history. John Lee was named as one of the leaders of the Mountain Meadows Massacre.

John managed to stay out of harmโ€™s way until October 1870 when the Mormon Church excommunicated him for his actions. He was sent to live along the banks of the Colorado River bordering Utah and Arizona territories with orders to build a ferryboat and establish a crossing for Utah settlers coming into Arizona. He took Emma with him, arriving just before Christmas. Emma surveyed her new surroundings and immediately named the spot Lonely Dell, as it was the most desolate places she had ever seen. Years later, the site was renamed Lees Ferry.

On this rough, desolate patch of land, Emma and John built a home fashioned out of rock. The following year, Emma gave birth to Fanny Dell, named after the loneliest spot in the world.

John was often gone for long periods, leaving Emma alone to handle the ferryboat and feed travelers crossing the river. She raised vegetables and fruit trees along the sandy riverbed, but the crops were often destroyed when storms blew in uprooting the newly planted trees and flooding the gardens. In June 1873, a fierce gale loosened the ropes of the ferryboat and sent it downriver where it smashed against the shoreline.

When word reached Lonely Dell that a contingent of soldiers were headed toward the river, John once again fled leaving a very pregnant Emma to manage on her own.

As her due date approached and no sign of John, Emma realized she would have to give birth alone. She sent her children outside to play and delivered a healthy baby girl she called Victoria Elizabeth after her English homeland.

In 1874 John titled the ferryboat and land in Emmaโ€™s name. That November he was arrested for his part in the Mountain Meadows massacre. Found guilty, John was taken to Mountain Meadows and executed on March 23, 1877.

Emma and the children continued to live at Lonely Dell until May 1879 when, at the insistence of the Mormon Church, she sold the boat and land for 100 head of cattle, although she only received 14 cows in payment.

An old friend, Frank French, agreed to accompany Emma and the children as they left Lonely Dell. When the family arrived in Snowflake that August, Emma and Frank were married.

The family lived in the White Mountain area until 1882 when their house burned to the ground during an Indian uprising. By 1887 they were living in Winslow where Emma ran a restaurant to serve railroad workers who were constructing a depot at Hardyโ€™s Station.

Through the years, Emma had learned how to handle just about any medical emergency, and knew the curative properties of numerous plants and herbs. Since she had served as a midwife many times and having delivered her own child, she was now called upon to care for the expectant mothers of railroad workers. She set up a room in her house where women could come before they were due to give birth and where they could stay afterward as long as they wished. If a woman could not get to Emmaโ€™s โ€œhospital,โ€ the railroad supplied an engine and car to take โ€œDoctor French,โ€ as she was now called, to the expectant mother.

Emma continued to serve the Winslow community until her death on Nov. 16, 1897 at age 61.

The people of Winslow turned out threefold to pay their respects. Trains coming in and out of Winslow that day silenced their whistles in deference to the woman who had seen more than her share of tragedy but continued to serve her community.

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Jan Cleere is the author of several historical nonfiction books about the early people of the Southwest. Email her at Jan@JanCleere.com.

Website: www.JanCleere.com.