Lydia Knight's History The First Book of the Noble Women's Lives — Story, Setting & Ideas

A Child's Determination and a Family Portrait

The biography opens with a detailed description of Lydia's childhood home: a comfortable cabin on a rise of ground, with gleaming white floors, waving grain, and a vegetable garden. The forest circle gives grandeur and beauty to the view. Lydia, born in 1812 in Sutton, Massachusetts, was brought to this wild western home two years prior. Her father, Jesse Goldthwait, is described as a medium-sized, well-built New Englander, prudent, industrious, and firm-willed. Her mother, a quiet-spoken woman with an ardent temperament and natural refinement, had some scholastic advantages and was exceedingly ambitious for her children. Lydia had five sisters and six brothers, forming a very happy and peaceful family.

The narrative voice directly addresses the reader—'Shall I tell you about her father?'—creating an intimate, instructional tone consistent with the series' aim to stimulate youth. The opening scene of Lydia alone at work, refusing to join her siblings at play, establishes a motif of steadfastness that recurs throughout the excerpts.

Witnessing Martyrdom and Its Aftermath

The excerpts jump to 1844, when a little girl is born to Lydia on June 6. As she recovers, rumors intensify that blood-hounds are again seeking the Prophet's life. Joseph Smith gives himself up on June 24, and the narrative of the murder on June 27 is deemed too ghastly to give in this little story. Lydia is too weak and overcome with grief to attend the burial services. Mourning fills the city, but over all broods the spirit of Christ.

A year later, Newel and Lydia visit the jail where the murder occurred. The jailor's wife shows them the room, pointing out bloodstains that reappear after scrubbing and bullet holes that plasterers cannot fill. The woman speaks with trembling horror. Newel and Lydia leave hastily, too overcome to remain. This episode, rendered through the jailor's wife's testimony, illustrates how the biography incorporates supernatural elements—the persistent stains and scars—as evidence of the tragedy's enduring mark.

The Decision to Flee Westward

By summer 1845, mob violence escalates. Saints outside Nauvoo are abused, their houses and barns burned. Lydia wonders if she will again be driven from her comforts. One evening Newel returns from council with a sad face. He reports that Brigham Young and the council have decided to turn their faces westward and flee into the wilderness. Lydia responds, 'If it be so, Newel, it will ill become us to murmur.'

The biography here condenses complex historical events into a personal moment of acceptance. Lydia's role as caretaker is also evident: she takes in two orphan girls named Ames during the winter of 1845. The narrator notes that from Lydia's first home in Missouri until the present, her home has been a peaceful asylum for homeless children. This detail aligns with the catalog subject of Latter-day Saint biography but also reveals a pattern of hospitality that the excerpts present as a defining trait.

Readers should note that the excerpts cover only the early and middle portions of Lydia's life, ending before the westward migration is completed. The biography's structure alternates between domestic scenes and historical crises, with the narrator often addressing the audience directly. The catalog subjects accurately reflect the religious context, but the excerpts also show attention to material details—sheepskin, cabin floors, bloodstains—that ground the narrative in sensory experience. This is not a comprehensive history but a selective portrait designed for youthful edification.

That rainy afternoon, I kept returning to Lydia’s quiet endurance, the way belief carried her through snow and loss. Afterwards, I found myself wondering about other stubborn beginnings, other winters. Somehow that led me to Montreal, 1535-1914. Vol. 1. Under the French Régime, 1535-1760 — Background and Themes, where a different frontier, all river and fort, held its own trembling hopes.