Mary Ann Price Hyde
MS 6415; LDS Church Archives, 1880
Note that a copy of this document with variations of spelling and punctuation, but not of
content, appears in the "Utah and Mormons" collection, Bancroft Library, UC Berkeley,
microfilm copy in LDS Church Archives, under call number MS 8305, Reel 1, Item 9,
under the title "Autobiography, Mrs. M. A. P. Hyde, Spring City (Utah), 1880,"
Note that the author's identification of the year of her marriage as 1842 may be incorrect.
I believe Orson Hyde returned from his mission only after the spring of 1842, and Emily
Partridge (a witness to the marriage) does not appear to have been involved in plural
marriage until 1843.
___________________________________________________________
Autobiographical statement
[She was converted in England, and then gathered to Nauvoo.]
[page 2]
On the return of Orson Hyde from his mission to Palestine he carried letters of
introduction to me and invited me to visit his wife. I was there met by Joseph Smith, the
Prophet, who, after an interesting conversation introduced the subject of plural marriage
and endeavoured to teach me that principle. I resisted it with every argument I could
command for, with my tradition, it was most repulsive to my feelings [page 3] and
rendered me very unhappy as I could not reconcile it with the purity of the gospel of
Christ.
Mr. Hyde took me home in a carriage and asked me what I thought of it and if I
would consent to enter his family? I replied that I could not think of it for a moment.
Thus it rested for awhile and Mr. Hyde married another young lady. In the mean
time I was trying to learn the character of the leading men, for I sincerely hoped they
were men of God. But, in my mind, plurality of wives a serious question.
I soon learned to my satisfaction, that Mr Orson Hyde was a conscientious,
upright and noble man and became his third wife. Mrs. Hyde had two sweet little girls
and I soon learned to love them and their dear mother who in the spring of 1842 received
me into her house as her husbands wife. \sealed to him by Joseph the Prophet in her
presence/
We lived happily together until our exodus from Nauvoo, when circumstances
seperated us for a season.
[***]
[page 4]
I will here state that since my first trial in receiving the principle of plural or
celestial marriage I have never doubted this being the work of God and know that it is the
most "glorious dispensation of the fulness of times" destined to ushe ir the Millennium,
when peace shall reign on the earth. […]
Respectfully,
Mary Ann P. Hyde
Spring City
San Pete Co.
________________________________________________________________________
[Statement on separate scrap of paper:]
Mary Ann Price was married to Orson Hyde on 23rd day of April 1842 in Nauvoo by
Joseph Smith at his residence in presence of Brigham Young and Emily Partridge.
---------------------Mary Ann Price Hyde, MS 6415; LDS Church Archives, 1880