Biography of Andrew Vinson Gibbons, (1849-1932) Part 2—Santa Clara

Sketch of the fort at Santa Clara as it may have appeared in 1856 to 1861
Source: Washington County Historical Society

Biography of Andrew Vinson Gibbons (1849-1932)

Part 1—Childhood
Part 2—Santa Clara
Part 3--St. George and the Muddy Mission
Part 4--Glendale and Marriage
Part 5--Arizona
Part 6--St. Johns

By Andrew Smith Gibbons, III, Ph.D.

SANTA CLARA 

Events moved quickly, however, to change the scene for the Gibbons family. By the Spring of 1858, as Rizpah's health allowed, the family made the move to Santa Clara. On this move, A.V., by now nine must have shouldered a good deal of the responsibility for the heavier work, as would his younger brother William, now seven. 

Rizpah Knight Gibbons

The new home in Santa Clara was a stone fort with three-foot thick walls. One room within the fort served as home for the Gibbons family of six. The dry, hot climate of Santa Clara, and the new host of people in the fort were most certainly currents of experience which young A.V. felt pulling him into a new kind of life. Some of the old experiences which did not change were the work attendant to helping his father keep a family fed and clothed, and the birth of new family members. Richard, born on October 22, 1858, was the next child, and he lived. 

Great excitement was being experienced in Santa Clara at this time over the impending trip of a group of Indian missionaries, A.S. Gibbons included, south into the Arizona Territory, across the Colorado River to find the "Moqui" Indians, reputed to be much more civilized than the Indians in Utah. Six days after the birth of Richard, young A.V. Gibbons and his brothers and sisters watched their father, whom they had spent so little time, leave with the group planning to reach not only the Moquis but the Navajos, the latter not having the same reputation for peacefulness. 

Only two months passed before A.S. Gibbons returned home in a fever, nearly dead. Imagine the effects of pride and awe and fear upon nine-year-old A.V. after his father recovered and recounted a visit to the Hopi (not Moqui) Indians, their acceptance of the missionaries as being sent by the Great Spirit, the living in Indian surroundings, the experience of hunger, and Finally the arduous, near-fatal trip of 350 miles in the dead of winter back to home. This association with courage and great accomplishments must have inspired in the Gibbons children a confidence in their own powers to achieve difficult things, which would have been the force in later years that led them to deal with their own problems as a new generation, their generation, grew into maturity. 

Phoebe Maria Dart

July of 1859 brought still another new type of experience to the Gibbons family. Though it was a comparatively common experience in the society in which they lived, it must have added greatly to the already bulging store of experience the young Gibbons boys and girls were accumulating. Their father took a second wife. Phoebe Maria Dart Gillespie was her name, and she had been married and divorced once before so that she came with a ready-made family of children. Absorbing the new family members no doubt posed a real challenge to the young Gibbonses. A.V., being the oldest, was no doubt reminded that it was his responsibility to lead the way in accepting the new family members and making them welcome. One benefit which the marriage brought with it, which must have been a welcome change, was moving into a private house (since the room at the Fort had suddenly grown too small).

One year after the marriage, on July 7, 1860, Rizpah bore a son, James Albert, who died quite soon thereafter. The baby was buried in a spot near the creek. This spot was significant to A.V. over a year later when rains falling steadily for four weeks flooded the creek. Before the flood waters could wash the grave away, A.V. was asked to hold a torch to give his father light as he retrieved James Albert's body so that it could be reburied in a more secure place. 

To be continued . . .