Ellsworth, S. George (Samuel George), 1916-1997

Samuel Claridge was born on 5 December 1828 in Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshaire, England. As a young man he ran a bakery in Hemel Hempstead. On 9 December 1849 he married Charlotte Joy (born 28 September 1819). Claridge joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in June 1851 and emigrated to Utah in 1853. He established a farm and home in Nephi, Utah. He married his second wife, Rebecca Hughes, in 1865. At a conference in 1868 he was called by Brigham Young to settle the Moapa Valley in Nevada. He and some of his family lived there from 1868 until February 1871 but returned to Utah following prosecution for polygamy. They lived in Mount Carmel before joining the United Order at Orderville. He was an officer, a leader, and supporting member for nearly ten years. During those years he went to England on a proselyting mission for the LDS Church. During the fall of 1883 he moved his family to the Gila Valley, Graham County, Arizona. His tent was one of the first staked at the site of the village of Thatcher. At Thatcher he continued farming and raised his numerous children. Claridge served as bishop of Thatcher for thirteen years before he was ordained a patriarch, a position he held until his death twenty-two years later.

From the guide to the Claridge family photograph collection, 1807-1989, 1870-1949, (Utah State University. Special Collections and Archives)

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