Doug Webb of Preston stands in front of the old Web Funeral home that had a secret passage to a tunnel used to help polygamists escape from being arrested.

PRESTON – The era of polygamy was a colorful time in Franklin County from the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Plural marriage or polygamy was practiced by early leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for nearly half of the 19th century. The practice of polygamy was halted in 1890 by church President Wilford Woodruff in what is commonly called the Manifesto.

Annie Scarborough Hatch operated the telegraph in Franklin and would warn people when the U.S. Marshall was coming so the polygamists could hide.

There are a few remnants that give a glimpse of what plural marriage was like in the southeast Idaho area.

Susan Hawkes, site coordinator for the Franklin Relic Hall, says polygamists from Utah sent their wives and their children to Franklin County to get them out of state.

There are some early prominent Utah pioneers who had wives living in Franklin and Preston,” she says. “Annie Scarborough Hatch was the telegrapher in Franklin after learning and becoming proficient in Morris Code in Salt Lake City. She would send and receive messages for polygamists.”

Hawkes says a history written by Hatch’s daughter Blanch Woodland gave an idea of what it was like during the early years in Franklin while her mother operated the local telegraph office.

“Several of the General Authorities living in Salt Lake City moved their plural wives up to Franklin, as it was only one mile over the Utah state line into Idaho,” Woodland says in her mother’s history. “It was my privilege to go to their homes with telegrams from their husbands.”

When Hatch learned the sheriff was coming, she used her Morris Code skills to warn all the polygamists so they could stay away until he was gone.

A vintage telegraph key on display at the Franklin Relic Hall is similar to the key used by Annie Hatch to warn the polygamists to avoid being arrested.

Doug Webb, 84, of Preston has lived in the old Webb Funeral Home located at 109 East Oneida for over 75 years. The home held secrets passed down for over a century that he is now bringing to light. The original building was constructed at about 1890 for George C. Parkinson, an educator and businessman.

Parkinson graduated from Brigham Young College in Logan and taught school after graduation. He later became a successful businessman in Franklin County.

He was called to be the Stake President of the Oneida Stake of the LDS Church in 1887.

The elegant brick home built by Parkinson after his call to be a Stake President also had measures to help protect the early polygamists from being accosted by the law. The home had a secret passageway. It was purchased in 1925 by Willis Hendricks and turned into the Hendricks funeral home.

The George C. Parkinson family stands in front of their Preston home in 1891.

In 1945, Webb’s father Sherwin bought the business from his uncle Willis and changed the name to Webb Funeral Home and the Webb family continued to run the funeral business out of the home.

“There was a false wall that led to a tunnel that allowed polygamists to escape when the Sheriff was looking for them,” Webb says. “The story goes, Jim McQueen owned a barn with horses in a field where the hospital parking lot is now. He would saddle up a pony and take whoever came out of the tunnel north of town where there would be another saddled pony waiting.”

The ponies took the women to Riverdale where they could stay until the coast was clear.

I remember for years the Parkinson family would come to the house on Memorial Day and bring family members and children to see the false wall that led to a tunnel,” Webb adds. “The tunnel I’m sure has collapsed over the years, and they dug up part of the tunnel when they put a coal bin at the time they installed a coal furnace in the house.”

Webb says they have rebricked and remodeled the house several times over the years and have added rooms and changed some of the walls, so it doesn’t resemble the home it once was. The false wall is no longer there.

Some of the walls on the inside of the old home are the same, however. Webb can point where the old house was, and the added rooms are.

Doug Webb of Preston stands in the living room of the old Parkinson home now used as a home teaching room for his family.

Church leaders ended the practice of plural marriage and taught church members to abide the law of the land, at the time forbidding plural marriage.

Although some plural marriages were performed outside of the United States until 1904, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has since prohibited all members from entering into such practices.

Today, the LDS church will not let anyone practicing plural marriage to be a member of their church.



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