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George Washington Brimhall

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George Washington Brimhall is my 3rd great grandpa. He was born in New York in 1814 to Sylvanus and Lydia de Guitteau Brimhall. He was child number four of a total of eleven children.  In 1825, Sylvanus built a raft (they nicknamed, “Noah’s Ark”) for his family and him to sail from New York south on the Allegheny River and then other connecting waterways. When they set sail in the Spring of 1826, after the ice melted, the family consisted of Sylvanus, his wife Lydia, and their ten children (which included George who was ten years old at the time). An eleventh child was born after the voyage.  The perils associated with this dangerous trip were made manifest nearly from the very beginning; the family had to traverse the great falls of the Allegheny River. After successfully descending the falls without injury or damage to the raft, Sylvanus and family continued their voyage with optimism.   Initially, the plan was to sail down to St. Louis. But, after months and months of river life wit
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Christian denominations and sects not treated equally in the 19th century

Notwithstanding what people say today, the United States of America was founded on Christian principles. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution  “prevents the government from making laws … that prohibit the free exercise of religion.” It was clear that the First Amendment applied to the federal government, but the individual states were not bound by the bill of rights until the ratification bill the Fourteenth Amendment, which made the bill of right enforceable to all governmental entities in the United States, including the states.   Until the Fourteenth Amendment, the states were unkind to, and at times downright, evil in their treatment of Christian denominations and sects that were in the minority of Christianity. Missouri’s treatment of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a prime example. The Latter-day Saints began moving into Jackson county, Missouri, in 1831, just one year after the church’s founding in New York.   Based on religious int
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