Histories

BY DARYL JAMES

FROM 'JAMES/HATCH ONE MINUTE HISTORIES' (1994)

Mary Eliza Bloomfield was born Jan. 21, 1863 or 1864, at Hyde Park, Cache County, Utah, to John Bloomfield and Harriet Wilkinson. Mary usually went by her middle name, Eliza. She was the third of four children.
When Eliza was 11 years old, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints called her parents to help establish a branch of the United Order at Sunset, Ariz. At this settlement Eliza's sister, Elizabeth, met Joseph Henry James and married him July 12, 1877, in the St. George Temple in Utah. About 18 months later, when Joseph was 23, Eliza became his second wife. Eliza and Joseph were married in the St. George Temple on Jan. 10, 1879, about two weeks before Eliza turned 16.
The trip to St. George took Eliza and Joseph about two weeks. When the couple arrived at Lee's Ferry on the Colorado River, the ferry was across the river with no one to bring it back to them. Joseph decided there was nothing else to do except to swim across the river and bring the ferry back. He left his bride-to-be standing on the bank full of fear that he might not make it across. The river was wide at that point, so in order to come out where the ferry was launched, Joseph waded a mile up river, knowing the current would carry him at least a mile downstream. Eliza said she never prayed harder in her life than she did as she watched the tiny speck as it battled the swift current, visible one minute and out of sight the next.
About three-and-a-half years after Joseph married Eliza, he married a third woman, Orpha Amelia Rogers, in the St. George Temple. Joseph moved in 1883 with his wives and other Mormons to an unsettled area in Chihuahua, Mexico. Eliza was 20 at this time and already had three children.
The travelers settled at Colonia Diaz, about 70 miles from the United States border, and lived in dugouts for the first few years.
Eliza had 11 children in Mexico, giving her 14 total. Her husband operated a sawmill in the Sierra Madre Mountains but died in a logging accident in 1908.
In 1912, after spending nearly 30 years in Mexico, Eliza and most of the other Mormons evacuated during the Mexican Revolution. Eliza left behind a home, cattle, and 15,000 acres of land. She arrived in El Paso, Texas, with just the clothes on her back and a few blankets for bedding. Housing was scarce in El Paso and she spent the first two months sleeping at a lumberyard with 300 others waiting for news of whether or not it was safe to return to their homes in Mexico.
When Eliza decided it was not safe to return, she moved with eight children to Ramah, New Mexico.
Besides her remaining children, Eliza helped raise six orphaned grandchildren. One of these grandchildren built her a home in Ramah, where she stayed the remainder of her life. She died Feb. 8, 1957, at age 93.
Eliza was a small woman and weighed only 90 pounds at her death. She was industrious and energetic. She never missed a square dance, rodeo, or Indian festival. Many times thoughtful neighbors would come to visit her, thinking to cheer her up, but after they were with her a short time, she had them laughing and cheerful.

-- Sources: 1. "Joseph Henry James." Stalwarts South of the Border, pps. 321-323 (On record at Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah). 2. "Mrs. Eliza B. James" (three-page, unsigned history, including poem by Catherine E. Berry.)