Index of Labels

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Dealing with Multiple Marriages


John Dodds Telford is shown as having multiple wives.

“The many wives of John Dodds Telford”
Charlot Angeline Baker, Dolly Ann Coultrin, Maria Coltrino, Emeline Seely Baker, Sarah Ann Barker, Deborah Elizabeth Walker, Hannah Richmon, Nancy Coltrin, Clara W Tilbetts , Anna Walker,  Georgia Bradley Curry,  Lucinda Sproat Rosanna Tebbets, Thankful Cotton  Marinda Colton  and Caroline Colton.

I wrote this in the notes on John’s record in my database.

“The history that I have of John Dodds Telford lists only his wife Sarah Matilda Coltrin. He was not married to any of these other women while they were living. All were sealed to him posthumously. There have been disputes placed on these marriages, but they fall into the same category as the sealings of the Cotton girls to Brigham Heber Telford and Erastus Rowe Gee. We will have to wait for the millennium to get the parties involved to come to an agreement. From NFS Support is this explanation: 'For this period of time, this was not an unusual practice. We have records of men in the early church sealing as many as 200 women to them. It was from their point of view to provide the blessings of exaltation to those persons.'”

I removed the marriage relationship to the following women.
Georgia Bradley Curry
Maria Coltrino
Dolly Ann Coultrin
Hannah Richmon
Deborah Elizabeth Walker
Sarah Ann Barker
Emeline Seely Baker
Rosanna Tebbets
Marinda Colton
Thankful Cotton
Caroline Colton
Charlot Angeline Baker
Lucinda Sproat
Anna Walker
Nancy Coltrin

These women still show up in the sealings to spouse information in the Family Tree data, but are not visible to non-members of the church.

I added a death date and place to John Dodds Telford’s Record in Family Tree to replace deceased.

The next record that I addressed was that of Brigham Heber Telford.

He had two wives sealed to him posthumously.
Thankful Cotton and Hanna Cotton

These were removed in a similar manner

Now Brigham Heber Telford has only one wife Emma Gee, Lysander’s daughter.



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