On 22 June 1833 at Perkins Settlement in Fountain Green Township, Hancock County, Illinois, Absalom and Nancy Martin Perkins welcomed their eleventh child a son, Francis Marion. He would be called Marion, and had a happy childhood growing up in this settlement surrounded by cousins and siblings.

When Marion was six-years-of age, events began to happen which would have far reaching consequences upon the Perkins families. Joel Hills Johnson, who was leading a late company of Kirtland Saints west to Missouri, found that the Saints were not welcome there as Governor Lilburn W. Boggs had issued his unjust exterminating order. Johnson, after spending a short time in Springfield, Illinois, moved to Carthage, Illinois, erected a saw mill and “commenced preaching in Carthage and vicinity. I soon baptized many and organized a branch of the church of about fifty members called the Crooked Creek Branch.” The Perkins and Merrill families in 1839 were among the first to join this startling new religion. They with members of the Johnson family were the three numerically largest families of the branch. For the next five years Marion participated with his parents and other relatives in the historical events of the branch which would become the Ramus Stake in 1840, the Ramus Branch in 1841, and in 1843 the Macedonia Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

On 6 March 1844, Marion’s grandfather, Ute Perkins, a Revolutionary War veteran now in his eighty-third year, passed away. His passing broke an important unifying tie between the Mormons and the old-time residents of Fountain Green Township who were strongly opposed to Mormonism. Ute was the oldest resident in the area and had lived there since 1826. He frequented the store in nearby Fountain Green and was known and respected by everyone.

A date indelibly stamped upon the minds of the Marion and all Latter-day Saints, was 27 June 1844 for on this date the martyrdom of their beloved prophet, Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum occurred. From that time forward, Marion’s youth was plagued by turmoil and confusion brought on by the relentless persecution of non-Mormons in
this area which resulted in the Mormon’s forced evacuation of Nauvoo and surrounding settlements.

In Macedonia, Marion and his family and other Saints did not participate in the initial February exodus of 1846 but waited until May when they left in the spring with a much larger group. Under the leadership of Marion’s cousin, Andrew H. Perkins, the Macedonia Saints caught up with Brigham Young and others and arrived at Council
Bluffs, Iowa, in July. They then back-tracked 20 miles east and settled at Perkins Macedonia encampment and Pleasant Valley. It was at the latter place that Marion lived with his father, Absalom, who became the branch president of this small community. Hardly settled, Marion would bid goodbye to his older brothers, David Martin and John Calvin on 16 July when they departed for Mormon Battalion service.

Marion lived in Pleasant Valley where he helped with the planting and harvesting of crops until 1849 when his father Absalom and family departed for the west. They were in the Allen Taylor Company in which his cousin, Andrew H. Perkins, was president and his father, Absalom, his counselor and captain of fifty, which arrived in Great Salt Lake City on 19 October 1849. Marion with his father’s family settled in the Nineteenth Ward presided over by Bishop James Hendricks. Barely settled in this ward, the family was shocked and devastated when in January, Absalom, only 52, succumbed to consumption or tuberculosis. Marion was only 17 years of age at his passing.

Unsettled and seeking a new life, Francis, joined a group of Saints who were to settle San Bernardino under the direction of Apostles Amasa M. Lyman and Charles C. Rich. This group of 500 souls left Payson on 24 March 1851 and arrived at San Bernardino in June. Here Marion was joined by fellow Macedonia, Illinois, members Justus Morse, Hardin Yager, Weedon Haikes and Charles Crismon. Also in this group was Francis’s cousin, James Madison Welch (son of James Fleming Welch who had married Absalom’s sister Elizabeth) with his wife Lucy Taylor Perkins. Madison had served in the Mormon Battalion with Marion’s brothers David Martin and John Calvin, the latter dying in Pueblo, now Colorado, on Jan 19, 1847.

In San Bernardino on “Sunday 26th (November) 1852 – Marion Perkins and Ann Matthews were married this afternoon at three o’clock at the home of her father [Joseph Lazarus Matthews] by Brother Lyman [Amasa].” Marion was 19 and Ann was not quite 14. The marriage was short lived and it is doubtful that it was ever consummated. We do not know why the marriage ended. Three-and-a-half years later Ann married Thomas Wiley Middleton Holladay on 1 April 1956 and ten children resulted from this marriage.

One month after being married Marion visited with his cousins William Job (son of Ephraim Perkins, a brother of Absalom) and Patty Perkins Perkins (daughter of William G. Perkins, another brother of Absalom), who were retuning early from a mission to the Sandwich Islands due to Patty’s health problems. Marion would undoubtedly send word by these two cousins to his mother Nancy in Great Salt Lake City informing her of his recent marriage and of his good health.

On the San Bernardino tithing records from 1852 to 1859, there are three entries pertaining to Marion, indicating that he was paying his tithing. In the San Bernardino history of 22 October 1854, the following entry is recorded: “Marion Perkins and John Matthews started from the Mojave [Mohave] to bring in a mule belonging to Gen. Charles C. Rich.” There is an additional tragic entry relating to Marion dated Saturday, 27 June 1857: “Our quiet village was thrown into excitement at the close of the meeting by a report that one of our citizens had just been murdered, which report proved too true. It appears that a young man by the name of Francis Marion Perkins had been drinking
and while intoxicated had a quarrel with a man by the name of William McDonald. After a few words McDonald went home and armed himself with a Bowie knife and returned to Whiskey Point where Perkins was and then they got to blows and clinched. During the scuffle McDonald stabbed him three times, one to the heart, which caused death instantly. Perkins was a single man and generally liked. McDonald was a married man and a strong anti or apostate Mormon. The affair has created great excitement. Members were in favor of hanging McDonald but discretion prevailed.”

Thus ended the life of Francis Marion Perkins, a pioneer of 1849. It is fortunate that both of his parents, Absalom and Nancy, had passed away before his untimely death, thus sparing them the sorrow of one who died tragically and so early in life, just five days after his twenty-fourth birthday.

Eugene H. Perkins, 2351North 850 East, Provo, Utah 84604 (801) 377-8809
[email protected]
Waldo C. Perkins, 2556 Sherwood Drive, Salt Lake City, Utah 84108 (801) 582-2383
[email protected]