Achsah Mae Decker

A Primary class visited Louis and Achsah Mae Hatch Decker in the l950s. Achsah Mae told them this story:

When I was a little girl,my parents were pioneers and they were settling in a new part of the country (Woodruff). Their house was not finished enough to live in when winter came along, so we had to live in a dugout -- a cave with a board front. The crops had not done well and some of the children had been sick.

We had been saving one nice pumpkin that they were going to have for Thanksgiving. Since we had to eat mostly cornmeal for our main diet, we were really looking forward to Thanksgiving so we could eat some nice pumpkin.

Thanksgiving morning, my mother was busy cooking the pumpkin and Daddy had gone to a nearby ranch to help someone else. He was to be home about noon. Mmmm,that pumpkin smelled so good! We could hardly wait until dinner time.

We heard a noise outside and thought it was Father returning home. But no! It was three Indian men! They frightened us terribly because we didn't know if they were friendly or no. But we thought if we acted very brave and tried to be friendly, maybe they wouldn't hurt us.

One of the Indians made signs that they were hungry and wanted to eat some of the pumpkin. So Mother fixed them each a dish and gave it to them to eat. The Indians really liked it and kept eating until it was all gone! Then they rode away.

You can imagine how we felt seeing all the good pumpkin eaten up when we had looked forward to it so much, but we were grateful that they hadn't harmed any of us. We knelt down and thanked Heavenly Father.

When Father got home, we excitedly told him about the Indians. Mother fixed some more corn meal porridge and we ate a very quiet and thoughtful dinner.

That evening much to our surprise, the same three Indians rode up to the door and guess what they had? They had killed a nice big deer and gave it to our family. Oh, how happy we were! Now we had meat enough to last a long time.

We learned the lesson -- if we are truly willing to help others, we will receive blessing in return.

(taken from a letter from the un-named Primary teacher to J. Smith Decker)

Achsah May Hatch Decker

PIONEER MOTHERS by Vilate Raile

They cut desire into short lengths,

And fed it to the hungry fires of courage.

Years after, when the flames had died,

Molten gold gleamed in the ashes.

This they gathered into bruised palms

And handed it to their children

And to their children’s children.

ACHSAH MAY HATCH AUTOBIOGRAPHY

I WAS BORN AT 4:30 P.M., SUNDAY August 29th, 1875 in Franklin, Idaho, the tenth child and the seventh daughter of Lorenzo Hill and Catherine Karen Hatch. When my older sisters and brothers came home from church, to their great surprise they found a new baby sister all wrapped in the soft, downy, wool shawl Father had sent to my mother from England when he was on a mission there so many years ago. They all had to take a look at the new baby who had brought so much love into their home. After Uncle Jeremiah hatch took a look at me, he said in a very firm voice, “Lorenzo, you should name this baby girl Achsah for her great, great grandmother. From that time, I was called Achsah May. (She alternately spelled her own name Mae and May)

When I was just three months old, Father was released as bishop for the Franklin Ward, and we began pioneering in earnest. By the time I was three years old, I had lived in Saint George, Utah, Savoria, New Mexico and Woodruff, Arizona. Father was called to be President of the United Order in Woodruff. The women worked hard doing their part in the big kitchen, and we all ate together at two big tables. The Dean family sat opposite us. Joe Dean, who was three, as I was, had a pretty blue plate. Every meal I cried for Joe Dean’s blue plate until my dear sister Nora would take me outside.

When I was eight years old, Kate Clawson came to our place as Mother was combing my hair. She said, ”Do you mean that’s Achsah May and she’s not bawling? Whoever knew she’d get so big?” Years later, when I was married, Grandma Walker remarked, “Do you mean that girl who used to bawl at the big table ever grew up?” You can see what a reputation I got for myself during the two or three years the United Order was in effect in Woodruff.

We lived in the old fort at Woodruff. It was built right on the [Little] Colorado River out of red clay adobes. The river banks dropped almost straight down 10 or 12 feet. We used to climb up and down the banks to get water for drinking and washing. After a flood the water would be red mud.

One day when we had first moved to Woodruff, Mother had the washing on the lines, when a terrible, quick, thundering rain came. Mother and the big girls ran for the clothes and got their arms full, but the rest were blown, pins, line and all, down the flooding, muddy river. Mother never again washed on a rainy day. She had to replace the things she lost, one at a time, by thrifty management. She made her own dyes and sewed by hand for a family of eleven children until I was seven or eight years old, when my brother Thomas bought Mother her first sewing machine.

We had a sod roof on our house at first and when it rained hard, frogs would come out of the roof so it looked as if it were raining frogs. We used to haul wagon loads of earth to reinforce our roof.

During the summer, before I was 4, Father, who was in the Stake Presidency was going to Lone Pine to hold a meeting. He took Mother and Baby Wilford and me with him. At Taylor he picked up Brother Noah Brimhall. He and Father rode in the front spring seat of the white top buggy with sheep skin cushions. Mother and Wilford and Sister Brimhall sat in the back. I sat up with Father and Brother Brimhall until I got tired and slipped to sit on the floor. My brother Hezzy (Hezekiah) had sent me the prettiest red kid button shoes. The buttonhole side was scalloped and they had red tassels. I loved them and was proud of them. My attention was divided between my new shoes and watching the trotting horses. Their hind feet just missed their front as they stepped along and I couldn’t watch them enough. Father was so busy talking to Brother Brimhall that he hadn’t noticed that the Showlow River had flooded, and that the banks at the crossing had been cut out by the high water. Father tapped the horses with the buggy whip and they plunged into the river on their knees. The buggy lurched onto the horses and everything and everybody in the buggy was thrown into the water. Mother held onto Wilford with one hand and the buggy wheel with the other. Father was trying to get the horses up and to right the buggy, when Mother started screaming for little Achsah May. “What, Catherine”, said Father, “don’t you have her?”

“Why no, Lorenzo, you know she was kneeling right there in the front with you.”

“So she was”, said Father, and he stopped fussing with the buggy and started looking for Achsah. Brother Brimhall looked down between the single trees. He saw something that looked a little different; he reached for it and pulled me up by one foot. I was filled with water for I had been standing on my head in the water. Brother Brimhall rubbed and patted me. When I said, “Are my shoes ruined?” they knew I was all right and Father put me on the sheepskin cushion and told me to be a good girl while he and Brother Brimhall got Mother, Sister Brimhall, the buggy and horses out of the water. We went home as soon as we had dried out, with no meeting that day.

We children grew up and celebrated our meager Christmases together. They usually consisted of a few raising, molasses candy, pop-corn, an occasional nut and sometimes an apple. As a special treat we had a rag doll. But it was always a happy time to wake up to our stockings filled with treats.

Our first Christmas after the Co-op Store came to Woodruff was most exciting. I was 7 and Chloe was 10. Chloe kept waking me up whispering, “Let’s get up and see what Santa Claus brought us. But be quiet so Mother won’t hear us.” We slipped out of bed quietly, uncovered the coals, and we could see by the flickering light that we each had in our stockings something beautiful, made of sparkling glass. Trembling with joy, we hung the stockings back up and got back into bed. When morning came, our joy was complete, for we each had a little china pitcher about 5” high. Mine was straight and blue and Chloe’s had a bulge at the bottom and was pink. I insisted that mine was the prettier, but Chloe said hers was, because it had a bulge at the bottom, and “anyhow’, she said, “I like pink better than blue.” All day long we two happy little girls carried pitchers of water and had play dinners by the dozen with water and a little bit of sorghum.

The next year we each got a string of beads in a box. They were sort of a shell bead with a small colored bead in between, and had a pretty clasp. Mine was blue and Chloe’s pink. They were so pretty. How thrilled we were! No one had ever seen such a wonderful gift---certainly we had never.

When I was 9 years old Santa Claus came to Woodruff with gifts for all the children in town packed in a little red wagon. I fairly shook with fright at the sight of Santa’s masked face. When my name was called, I had to gather my courage together to go up to get my gift. It was a lovely set of doll dishes, and my best friend, Mabel Cluff, got a beautiful wax doll. While the older children were dancing, Mabel and I went back to her house, blew up the coals and looked at our dishes and doll again. Mabel was so nice to me. She said, “We’ll take turns. You can play with my doll and I will play with your dishes.” So we spent many happy days playing with our doll and dishes. I don’t know why Mother didn’t have Santa Claus bring me a doll. I took good care of my dishes until Catherine was 3 years old. Then she made short work of them.

I had very poor health as a child, and for years I suffered from a chronic earache. On my 8th birthday, Mother was steaming my ears when Father came in and said, “Achsah May is 8 today, isn’t she?”

“Yes,” replied Mother.

“Well, bundle her up and send her down to the river to be baptized. Have her go by Nora’s (Leonora Savage, an older, married sister) house. She can act as witness.”

“Why, Lorenzo,” Mother said, “she can’t be baptized. I’ve been up all night with her.”

“Send her down,” urged Father, “it will cure her.”

So Mother sent me down to the river. I stopped at sister Nora’s and we climbed down that steep clay bank to the river which was red with the recent floods. Father could see I was timid and he encouraged me, “come right along. It won’t hurt you. It will make you well.”

And there my father baptized me, and as he had promised me, my ears were well and remained so for many years.

Clark Owens and George Jarvis ran the Co-op Store in Woodruff. Brother Jarvis kept the store books and pulled teeth for money. Some cowboys by the name of Lawksberry were not very good men. They, as did ranchers for 100 miles around, traded at the Co-op. They saw how easy it would be to rob the store. And one day, in broad daylight, they came dressed up with black handkerchiefs over their faces. Brother Owens recognized them and laughed. “What are you fellows doing here in such a garb?” They soon showed him they meant business by pulling their six shooters and saying, “Up with your hands!” One man held a gun to the storekeeper’s head, while the other looted the store. The money had been sent to the bank at Holbrook, but the robbers filled 2 pairs of overall, including the legs, with canned goods, pocket knives and ammunition. Then they jumped on their horses and raced out of town. We children heard the sound of the racing horses, and when the alarm was given, knew the thieves had passed close by us. All the men in town scurried out to catch the robbers, but night soon fell, and the townsfolk lost the trail. How Mother rejoiced when her boys came home safely!

When I was 10 years old, Father moved Mother’s family back to Idaho. Chloe told me that she and Ella heard Father and Mother discussing the move. Father said that he would give Aunt Alice (his other wife in Arizona) the first chance to go, but if she refused, and Mother was willing, she could go. Mother said, “Why Lorenzo, if you want me to break up my home, I will move every 2 years.” How Chloe and Ella prayed that Aunt Alice would not want to move to Idaho, for they had always heard of the wonders of that fertile land. They danced with joy when Aunt Alice said, “I do not want to break up my home once more.”

At Franklin we had a nice garden spot and orchard. We raised such good potatoes and Mother sold crab apples to pay for the weaving of her dining room carpet. I milked cows and we sold butter for 10cents a pound. Our years in Franklin were happy ones. After the death of Aunt Alice, Father sent for Mother to come back to Arizona. I was 16 and Wilford 14. All of Mother’s older children were married and settled down. My brother Hyrum told us, “Eat as many potatoes as you can now, because that’s the last you will ever see of them. In ten years there won’t be such a thing as Woodruff left. It will be blown to pieces.” Hyrum was nearly right about the wind and the sand, but he was wrong about our starving. We always had plenty of milk and eggs, as well as all the potatoes we could eat.

Ten years later, when Hyrum and his wife were visiting us in Arizona, we had a real dust storm. We don’t have those kinds of storms as much anymore, regardless of how the wind whistles and howls. I have seen sand come through the walls and ceilings like flour through a sieve. I have lived to see the weather change completely. No longer do we have those fierce sand storms. The Lord has blessed us.

We came back to Arizona by train early in April of 1892. Holbrook looked just the way Hyrum said it did—desolate and windswept. The few houses were bare and unpainted, and the only green things we could see were cottonwoods, bent and twisted from the winds that blew so unceasingly. We walked to Father’s buckboard through 8 inches of sand. I rode the 12 miles to Woodruff on the spring seat. I had on my new brown dress and my little brown turban with its pretty veil. I got to Woodruff with a sunburned nose and chapped lips.

Before we came back to Arizona Father had written to Mother describing the flowers he had planted on each side of the walk. He wrote, “I am sure you will like them.” But when we got to Woodruff we found that they were very common. However, the people were good and we made friends and were happy.

I will never forget my first sight of my sister Lulu when we got back to Woodruff. Abbie’s twins were tiny and Lulu was helping her with the washing. There she stood over the scrub board. She was wearing ruffled pantaloons, and as she scrubbed the pantaloons bounced and danced behind her. Dear Lulu was hardly 16 and the baby of her mother’s (Alice) family. She was so happy to see me, and together we laughed and then cried with the grief of her mother’s death. She liked my brown dress so much. Nothing would do but that she should have one like it. So she worked for 50cents a day scrubbing clothes, to earn enough money to buy the material and Aunt Salina Smithson made her a lovely new brown dress very much like mine. With her little round face and the bright freckles on her face, she made a darling picture in her new dress.

When we came back to Woodruff, there were no screen doors or windows in the town. I said to Father, “We can’t live this way. We must have a screen door.” Father got the screening, but he was so busy with his farming and his church responsibilities that he let the screen door wait. So I decided to make my own screen door. I took some rough boards and planed them with my father’s plane. I didn’t know how to dovetail the corners, so I just spliced the boards at the corners and made my frame. It fit, and I tacked the wire on it with one board through the middle. I took lathing, and planed it and tacked it all around the wire. When Father came home that night, I had the door ready to hang. He said, “What have you done? Have you been using my tools?” “Yes, I have,” I admitted. Father said, “I don’t let anyone use my plane.” “Well,” I said, “you didn’t get around to making the screen and I couldn’t wait any longer.”

So we hung the screen door on the north door of the kitchen. There it hung for as long as the house stood. It was the first screen door built in Woodruff, and in Navajo County. Father soon flew to work and built screens for all the doors and windows. When President Smith (Jesse N.) was visiting at our place, he noticed the screen doors, and he said, “Brother Htch, these screen doors surely beat a door-board for keeping out the skunks, and they let the air in and keep the flies out. I think I’ll have some built for my house.” And he did.

When I was a school girl in Woodruff, in the fall of 1892, we used to play in the road after school. Sister Lucy White’s house was right on the corner by the school. She gave meals to travelers, and did quite a bit of business. A fellow came for a meal. He was very pleasant and after he ate his dinner, he said he would like to stay. She told him she had no room for rent but if he would be satisfied, he could sleep in the barn. He stayed. He cut wood for Sister White, and would often be chopping wood during our recess. He followed our play with enthusiasm, urging us on and encouraging us. Often times, when the ball would land in Sister White’s yard, he would toss it back with a joke.

He stayed there for a month or two, then moved on to Snowflake and stayed at Sister Minerly’s rooming house. He was a sociable fellow, joshing with the men and buying candy for the children. It had been a year since a big bank had been robbed in Oklahoma, and the officers traced the desperado west. His description was circulated in all the western sheriff’s offices. Charley and Jim Flake were crony with the sheriff; he deputized them to arrest the robber, whose description the recognized. He had been in their store many times, trading for candy and knick-knacks and making jokes. They decided to arrest him right after dinner. Charley Flake ate his dinner one noon then got up to leave. He came back and tweaked his wife’s nose and kissed her saying he would soon be back. The Flakes had been advised that the man was dangerous, that he could shoot equally well with either hand, and that “Dead or Alive” his capture was worth $500.

Both Uncle Jim and Charley had hand arms and figured that the two of them could handle any kind of a desperado. They planned for one of them to hold a gun on the robber while the other grabbed his wrists. The desperado was calmly eating his dinner, when he looked up and saw his friends heavily armed. “We’re here to arrest you”, they said, and Charley grabbed his wrists. Like lightning the robber pulled his gun and shot. The bullet grazed Uncle Jim’s left ear and shot Charley through the neck. The second shot came from Jim’s gun, and the desperado and Jim’s brother Charley both lay dead at his feel. Uncle Jim bore the ear mark of the desperado all his life. At her home, across the street, Charley’s wife heard the shot that made her a widow. The $500 could not begin to dry her tears. The money the robber took from the bank was never found, although the officers searched his room in Snowflake and ransacked Sister White’s barn in Woodruff.

In those days in Woodruff, there were very few young folks, so Lulu and I were always the Belles of the Balls. We worked hard, but we played too. We had candy pulls, swimming parties (I sat on the bank and watched), fished, went horseback riding and danced. When Carrie DeWitt and her family moved to Woodruff, she taught me to dance “Coming Through the Rye”. We danced and danced on our porch after our work was done. When Carrie was married, I made and decorated her wedding cake.

I used to sing soprano in the choir. Grandfather Gardiner was a wonderful musician and a fine man. When our singing pleased him, he would say, ”When we all get up there in Heaven, I will be the choir leader and you can sing in my choir.”

My mother was a very particular housekeeper. She always taught us girls, “Keep the corners clean and the middle of the room will take care of itself. She insisted on airing all the bedding every week without fail, and the feather tick had to be put on the line and beaten every morning. I hated to carry all those heavy quilts to the line, and I would complain, “When I get married, I shall never air my bedding.” Mother always laughed and said, “Well then, Achsah, you will have a very smelly house.” In spite of my resolve, during my 62 years of married life, I have found that I often have had occasion to air my bedding. Whenever I have done so, I have thought of my dear mother and the stories that she used to tell us of how she saw and heard the Prophet Joseph Smith. She said that no one who saw him could help knowing that he was a Prophet. My father always bore the same strong testimony.

Lulu and I almost always went with Father on his church trips. If he went alone he was likely to get lost. One Sunday evening, Louis Decker from Taylor sang on the Mutual Program. I don’t remember the song he sang, but he pitched his song too high, and had a hard time getting through the song. I couldn’t help giggling a little, and Sister Lucy Eager nudged me and said, “Don’t laugh at him, you will probably marry that boy.” And I did!

When I was 21, Jim Flake, a young widower invited Matty Smith and me to go to the “Edison Show” in Joseph City. They were displaying a new record player and tickets were 25 cents each. He took us out first for ice cream, lemonade and other treats, then we went to the show. After we got there we found that by paying an extra dime we could rent a tube to give special reception. Matty and I were with a man with his pockets full of money. He seated us on the front row and rented tubes for us for the evening.

Louis was at the same show. He had invited two Lewis girls from Taylor to be his partners, but while he was paying their tickets they sat down where there was no room for him. He had to go to a different place in the house, and he found an empty seat right by me. I don’t recall his sitting by me, but he does, and Uncle Silas Smith does and always mentions this occasion as the beginning of our romance. At least it was the end of my romance with Uncle Jim Flake, because that fall he married Matty. Years later, on his 81st birthday, he told Louis that he had a hard time deciding between Matty and me.

I became acquainted with Louis’ sister Constance, and soon he was taking me to all the dances and we were having a fine time together. Then he asked me to marry him. When I told my sister Lulu, she laughed and said, “Good. How will it sound: Achsah May hatched into a Decker?”

When Louis asked Father for his permission to marry me, he gave it freely, and Mother and I were busy getting ready for my fall wedding. We sent to New York City for 5 yards of Japanese silk and 3 yards of chiffon lace. Aunt Salina Smithson made my wedding dress. It was very pretty. I had a nice white underskirt that we bleached for a week on the lucerne (grass) until it was snow white, and a new linsey underskirt. I also had a new lady’s cloth dress. It was maroon with a blue thread. Aunt Salina made it too. We made 4 nice sheets from unbleached muslin, and a bolster with four pillow cases. Mother gave me my white bedspread and a feather tick. I had one woolen quilt, one wool blanket, 2 pieced blocked quilts and I was to buy a hat in Salt Lake.

Louis and I set out by team and wagon, with his sister Connie as chaperone (she was going to BY Academy in Provo), to be married in the new temple at Salt Lake City. Mother and I had made cakes and a seamless sack full of cookies. We fried two chickens and had two more stuffed with dressing and roasted. We also made bread and a few pies. Louis brought a sack of nice eating apples, a cheese, canned sardines, salmon, pears, peaches and grapes, potatoes and a side of bacon. He got grain for the horses and a new water barrel. A Mr. Day traveled most of the way with us by horseback. He played the clarinet and every night we had such beautiful music. He would play and the coyotes would howl every night before we went to sleep.

We jogged along for seventeen days until we reached Parowan, Utah, where Louis was born and his grandparents [Z.B. Sr. and Nancy Bean Decker] still lived. They were happy to see us, and Grandma Nancy told us many interesting experiences of her active and wonderful life. Grandfather ZB was an old man, and he kept very much to his bedroom. We hardly knew he was there. We stayed with them for three days, then we went on to Salt Lake by train and on October 8, 1897, Louis and I were married in the Salt Lake Temple.

Mother had given me a Twenty Dollar gold piece before we left Woodruff, and I bought a new hat in Parowan. It was black. We called the material chiffon. It was like pipe cleaner material, wound around and around the crown, with a black velvet ribbon and two feathers. It was a nifty hat, and I was always well satisfied with it. It cost me $2.50 and was well worth the price. In Salt Lake City Louis bought himself a new suit for $7.50. It was black broadcloth and very good looking, with a nice coat, vest and trousers. He also got a black bow tie and a celluloid collar. In his nice white shirt and his new clothes, he was very handsome. He wore his wedding suit until 1908, when he went on his mission to California. He always looked nice in it.

Our expenses in Utah were more than we had figured on, and Louis borrowed $20 from Uncle Oscar in Parowan to get grain for our trip home. He carried the mail on horseback from Heber to Pleasant Valley for one month in winter weather to repay this debt and get us a start. He cleared 50 cents a day.

Once he carried ten gallons of honey by packhorse for a Christmas gift. I stayed in Woodruff while Louis was carrying the mail. He came to see me during the Christmas holidays on a little pony of his father’s. He planned on taking a short cut across the [Little] Colorado. There was just a trickle of water in the river, with a few standing puddles. Louis didn’t know that the Colorado at that point had so much quicksand, but when he got half way across, the horse stepped into quicksand up to its ribs. He took the saddle off to lighten the load, and tried to pull the horse out. He worked for hours. He even wore out his wedding shoes in the slush, but he lost the horse. He walked over to the regular freight crossing, carrying his saddle.

The freighters were eating supper on the flat rock ledge when Louis walked in. They had a good fire going. Louis was wet, chilled, barefooted and worn out. As he say by their fire to get warm, he fainted away, but he continued walking the six miles further to Woodruff, and came to our back door. I went to answer it. There was Louis standing pale and wet and cold. I put my arms right around him and drew him into the house. I said, “Louis, is it really you?”

“Yes” he said, “what’s left of me!” He stayed over an extra day to get revived, and then he went back to his mail route. He felt so badly about losing his father’s horse, and he had to pay for it and get himself a new pair of shoes besides. He paid dearly for his shortcut.

We moved to Taylor in February, and Louis and I fixed up the little house of hewed logs that was on the lot Grandfather Decker gave us, and we rented the farm. Later on we bought thirteen acres for $800. The money was hard to raise but we owned our own farm by the time Lorenzo was our baby. We had very little but beans, flour and dried fruit until the crop came in.

I papered the walls with newspapers and we whitewashed the living room. Louis refitted the floor, and I brought the cupboard, tables and washstand Father made for me. Grandma Decker gave us a bed, and we made it comfortable with springs, a straw tick, our feather bed and nice warm quilts. Grandma Decker had got a new Home Comforter stove and she gave us her old kitchen stove, the black bean pot and frying pan and an iron teakettle. We had my nice new organ, two chairs that Father made me and our bed in our front room. I had a rag carpet bee and we made thirty-five yards of carpet. I bound each thirty-six inch strip of warp with blue denim and sewed them together. For years it looked brand new, until I had a flock of little children, and they wet on the carpet and wore it out.

We had a good crop of apples our first summer. Louis took a wagon load of them to Fort Apache and he bought a set of dishes, one of which I still have, a set of reed bottomed chairs, a pretty floor lamp, some books, my writing desk and ten pounds of butter.

Louie Ison was with me when Louis brought in the load of new things. She almost bubbled over. She sat right down with the catalog and cut out a picture of the lamp and chairs, and wrote to her mother about Aunt May’s lovely new things. Shortly afterwards, her mother wrote to her, telling her to come home. She was sure she didn’t want to go, but she did. A few weeks later she heard that Aunt May had a lovely baby boy, Francis. She said, “I knew that I shouldn’t have come home. I should have stayed right there. Then I’d have got to see the baby.” Louie gave her mother no rest until she got to come to Taylor to see little Francis. What a beautiful baby he was! We all loved him so much.

Sister Standifird took care of me for all my children except Freda. She delivered the babies and bathed and cleaned the baby and me, cleaned my bed with a clean draw sheet under me each day for ten days. He price was $5.00 until the last few children when she raised her price to $10. After ten days of care I had to do the best I could. I always had a hired girl for two weeks. She washed and ironed and cooked for us for $2.50 a week.

When Francis was a baby I made him a dress from scraps of my wedding dress, and Louis helped me make him a hood. I had some pretty pink material and had made Francis a coat. I was trying to make him a hood, but I couldn’t get it right. I was trying to fit a pattern out of an old sheet, but was having trouble. Louis said, “I can do better than that.” And he cut out a pattern that fit nicely. He liked to brag that he made the bonnet, and he did help. If Louis had been a girl, he would have made a fine seamstress, because he knows how to fit patterns and can cut straight.

Francis was 28 months old when Catherine was born. He could sing most any song, at that age. Louis told him, “Well Francis, you have a little sister.” When he went to play with Edwin and Jesse, Uncle Nathaniel said to him, “Francis, I hear that you have a new baby at your house. Is it a boy?” “No” said Francis. “Well, is it a girl then,” asked Uncle Nathaniel. “No” answered Francis. “Then what is it?” asked his amused uncle. “It’s a little sister”, said little Francis.

I have always been grateful to my Heavenly Father for giving me my wonderful Catharine. She helped raise all her brothers and her two sisters. I hope she knows how grateful we are to her for her goodness and the help she has always so well and willingly given. Catherine has known how to do a woman’s work since she was 8 years old, and I have depended on her to do it. She has been another mother to her brothers and sisters. She has cared for them, bossed them, put them through school and loved them as her own.

Lorenzo was a lovely baby, two years younger than Catharine and for years, her shadow. When he was thirteen I left him in charge of Alma, Don and Smith. The boys were in school at the ranch, and I went to Snowflake to wait for my last child to be born. I left them all fixed with good underwear and new shirts, clean and warm beds. It was December weather, and very cold.

One night they had piled an extra amount of wood in the kitchen wood box. The boys walked one and a half miles to school. The next morning as Lorenzo was crawling through the fence to go to school, he was prompted to look at the fire. He went back to the house, even though his brothers were yelling, “Come on Ren, we’ll be late for school.” In the kitchen he found that two sticks of wood were leaning against the stove and had caught fire. He put the burning sticks in the stove, made sure no more sticks were near, and sprinkled water all around. The boys were glad that night, to have a home to come to. Lorenzo has saved more than the ranch house; he has saved the ranch. Because of his help, Louis and I are now free from debt, and more comfortable than we have ever been before.

Alma was the biggest baby I ever had. By my good scales he weighed twelve pounds. When Aunt Connie saw him she said, “Well, I guess that is the prettiest little baby I ever saw.” When Alma was ten, he had typhoid. We were at the old ranch house that summer. I moved all the children out of the house and into a tent. I cared for him at day and Louis by night. I was careful to keep the germs away from the other children, and none of the others got sick, but Alma ran a fever for twenty-one days. Very, very slowly we could start feeding him again. A week after his temperature was normal, we fumigated the house and moved back into it. During all this time, Catharine and Lorenzo did the washing and cared for the house. How glad they were to have a mother to take care of them again.

Our son Don was born in 1906. Sister Standiford said, “I’d know he was your baby anywhere, because they always have such big noses.” The Mexican lady who lived up the hill from our place, came down one Sunday when Don was little. She brought her two little sparklingly clean girls with her to see the baby. I couldn’t understand a word she said, but she bent over little Don and kissed him, then gave him a pair of black patent leather shoes. All the children after Don wore them too, until they finally wore out. The children always said that Don’s nose turned up because the Mexican woman kissed him.

Don did not go to school when he was six. He waited an extra year so that he could stay home and help me care for Joy. Because of it, he was always especially tender of Joy.

When I was married I had a short brown cape, but after I married and had children I wanted a longer one. Louis bought one in Holbrook. It was very pretty, but it was too short, too. I asked him to take it back and give me the money, so I could send off for a long one. Louis was offended, but he did give me the money and I got a black cape, not as pretty as the one Louis gave me, but longer. I wore it for years. People in Taylor always knew when I was coming, as far as they could see my cape.

Our sixth child was also a boy, Smith, a patient, good baby. He has grown to be a patient, good man. When he could sit alone in the cradle, Louis was called on a mission to California. He got all of us new clothes, borrowed money from the bank and went on his mission. We at home just lived for Louis’ letters, and how eagerly the children and I wrote to him. I worked hard while he was gone, caring for my six children and taking orders for material and dishes. Louis had a wonderful experience while on his mission. When he came home, we were threshing wheat. He really looked spruce and well dressed as he came into our humble home. Baby Smith did not know the handsome stranger.

Smith gave us a bad scare once, when he failed to come home with the cows until far into the night. He had got lost and wandered about for hours before thinking to give his horse the reins. As soon as he came to the fence around the lower pasture, he knew where he was, and soon came home safely, but not soon enough to save me several anxious hours.

My dear Joy was born on May 16, 1911. Louis was busy working at the ranch, and my baby was two months premature. I was sure he would not live. He was born such a pretty baby with thick black hair and lovely brown eyes. For the first six hours after he was born, he groaned with every breath, and I expected each breath to be his last. He cried constantly. When he was five or six months old Alvin took me out to the ranch. Joy cried every step of the way. Alvin said, “Well he’s not much of a joy to you, is he?” “Of course he is,” I answered. We had hard times with him, but we loved him. Catharine would jump up a dozen times a night to look after him. He cried day and night for four years. During that time I never left my home and had the constant care of a sick, screaming child.

I was always sure that special treatments would help my afflicted by and he took treatments from time to time. In May of 1922 I took him to Ogden and stayed several months. On my way to Utah with Joy, I stopped at Dr. Brown’s office in Winslow. I wanted a medical certificate from him, indicating the type of treatments he thought would benefit my child. He examined Joy and said, “Mrs. Decker, it is useless to treat this child. He is a hopeless idiot.” He refused to give me any type of certificate, but I knew that my boy was not an idiot. The light of intelligence shown in his beautiful eyes. I was always sure that if a doctor could but find the key, a marvelous thing would be opened to the world. We didn’t ever solve the problem of Joy’s affliction, although he was teachable and learned to read and write a legible hand. He wrote me such a sweet letter when I was in Gallup with my broken arm. He said, “I know that your arm will be all right this time. The love I have for you, alone, is strong enough to make your arm well.” And it was well.

Joy learned to be a wonderful little mechanic. He made such nice tables and chairs, and doll beds. Had he have lived he would have had a regular toy shop. He wanted a power saw very much. I would have had to be the manager. He and I worked together and it took so much of my time. One day I said, “I will never help you another year.” I didn’t; before another year came, Joy was dead. He fell just before I was to take the bus to meet Smith and family in Globe for a trip to Chicago (to see Don’s family). He told me how his throat hurt, but I had no idea it hurt to death. At one o’clock I took the bus, and at 2:30 he died. I got the message at Showlow to come home. At 5:00 I got off the bus and walked home. As I came over the hill, I knew that my boy was dead. Life had been a struggle for him, and so was death. He wanted his mother so badly, but Mother couldn’t get there in time. Louis wept,” He’ll be so lonesome tonight with none of his own family with him.” I have never been able to dream a happy dream about Joy. I feel as if I had failed him somehow. He would be so pleased to see how his cattle have grown. His are the major part of our cattle today.

When Carl was born I almost died from pneumonia, and I was very sick for many weeks. My sister Nora and Aunt Emma Smith took care of Joy and Carl during the weeks I lay all but a dead woman. Aunt Em was good to Joy and she was good to me. I thought one day that I could sit up for a while, and I tried to do it. But I had been too still for too long. As I tried to sit up, death struck me. She said, “May, I know that death has hit you, but you must pray to the Lord to spare your life until Louis comes home. I cannot bear that burden alone.”

Sister Cooper ran to the Post Office and called Uncle Samuel (Smith) in Snowflake to come and administer to me. He asked Uncle Locie Rogers to come with him. They came in Uncle Locie’s buggy, and he galloped his horses all the way. “Aren’t you going a little fast?” asked Uncle Samuel. “We’ve got to,” answered Uncle Locie, “if we’re going to save that woman’s life.” When they got to our house, Uncle Locie jumped over the step and ran into the house. He and Uncle Samuel blessed me with life to be able to take care of Joy. And here I have lived all these twenty-one years since Joy has passed away, and I am now an old woman. I even had two more girls, and I should never complain, for the Lord has blessed me bountifully. Uncle Samuel prayed that a part of his strength might be taken from him and given to me. And that strength did enter my body with an abundant peace. Death left our house that night and spared me. Those violent spells from my heart stopped coming. The power of the priesthood healed me. The testimony that I want to leave with my children is that the Lord really healed me when I was sick with pneumonia.

Our family and friends helped us so much during those bad times. We all survived. Carl was a busy little child, full of life and anxious to be doing things. He used to sit in the little rocking chair, with his legs through the back, and rock and rock until he fell asleep many a time. He was always building things – corrals, dams, and everything he could figure to build. Now he builds beautiful homes for people. His first teacher was Lydia Peterson. She was a very fine teacher. Carl made me a button bag for Christmas. He also learned to spell by sounding out words, and spelled “mug-a-pot” for us at the supper table. We thought he was very clever.

We were very happy that our 9th child was a beautiful little girl with long black hair. She was a good, fat baby. Jess Pierce went out to the ranch and called on Alvin and Mabel. He said, “I have good news for you. Louis and May have a girl.” Aunt Mabel screamed and jumped up into the air. “I don’t believe it. It would have to be a boy.” “No,” said Jess, ”Louis was down at Palmer’s store and he told us all that he had a girl. He was smiling from ear to ear.” Catharine could hardly wait to make a dress for her little sister. I well remember the little blue voile dress with a lace collar we made from scraps. Glena just danced with joy when we stood her on the table to try on the dress. She grew up to be a talented woman and now has her PhD in English.

Our last child was born in December of 1916. Aunt Emma Smith was supposed to deliver her. I was waiting out my time at Aunt Em’s , when she went out on another case. Freda was born before she returned.

Freda married Don Christenson who likes to come to our home here in Snowflake. Louis and I are glad that their children love our home and look forward to visiting us here every summer.

I have always been grateful for my family. My children have been a source of joy to me, and I am happy that I was able to raise them all to manhood and womanhood.

I look back on almost 83 years of life, and nearly 61 years of marriage with my dear Louis. He is such a good man, honest with himself and with everyone with whom he has had dealing throughout his life. We honor him as a patriarch to his family. His hands are so dear to me, for they have worked so hard and so unceasingly for his family. Truly, he has worked his fingers to the bone.

Sometimes I have felt that my life has been hard. I have had, it seems, more than my share of sickness, but when I consider how the Lord has blessed me, I know that I would be ungrateful to complain. I have great faith in the Lord, and I know that if I am honest and true, I will again be restored to all my loved ones and dwell again in the presence of my Heavenly Father.

OBITUARY OF ACHSAH MAY HATCH DECKER by J. Smith Decker

Achsah May Hatch was born in Franklin, Idaho to Lorenzo Hill Hatch and Catharine Karren on 29 Aug 1875. When she was just a baby in arms her father was called by Brigham Young to go to St. Gorge, Utah to work as a carpenter on the St. George Temple. They did not stay long however, and returned to Idaho for a short time before her father was called to fill a mission to the Indians in Savoia, New Mexico. Soon after the mission was completed, the family moved to Woodruff, Arizona.

They lived there until May was about nine. Achsah May was baptized in the Little Colorado River by her father when she was eight and about a year later the family returned again to Idaho. They lived there until she was 16, when the again returned to Woodruff.

She loved helping her father in his carpenter shop and claims she made the first screen door to be used in Woodruff.

Her father was in the Stake Presidency with Jesse N. Smith and often took his family with him to meetings and conferences in Snowflake. On one of these trips, she met her husband-to-be, Louis Decker.

In order to be married in the Salt Lake Temple, Louis and May left Snowflake by team in company with Aunt Connie Decker. They traveled 17 days over the barren country of Northern Arizona and Southern Utah to reach Parowan. From there, they took the train to Salt Lake City. After their marriage they visited Logan and Franklin, returning to Parowan. After two days of fast travel in their wagon, they overtook Clark Gardner and his recent bride and the return trip was more pleasant and not so dangerous. One of the outstanding memories she often told was crossing the Colorado River on a raft at Lee’s Ferry.

To this marriage was born ten children, seven boys and three girls. They are all living now with the exception of Joy, who was crippled from birth and passed away when he was 26. The others are Louis Francis, a retired CPA of Flagstaff, Arizona; Catharine Bartholomew of Gunnison, Utah; Lorenzo Bruyn of Snowflake, Arizona; Alma Virgil of Salt Lake City, Utah; Don Zechariah, Chicago, Illinois; Jesse Smith of Mesa, Arizona; Carl Hatch, now serving a work mission for the Church is Airdire, Scotland; Glena Wood on the faculty of BYU in Provo, Utah; and Freda Christenson of Porterville, California.

At the time of her death, 3 September 1964 her descendants numbered 35 grandchildren and 26 great-grandchildren.

Mae’s life was a hard one. She and Louis had many financial setbacks, but never denied any of their debts, and the family always had enough to eat, even though it may have been only bread and milk and beans. The spirit of kindness and tolerance was in our home and the Gospel was the guiding principle. Louis was often at his wits’ end because he could not provide what he wanted to give to his family, but kindness and love were always showered on the sick and those in need.

May was always able to see the bright and often the humorous side of many of her troubles, but always wished she could do more for her children. She always wanted them to have a better education than she had had, but little family finances ever could go in this direction because of the demands of creditors and the immediate needs of the large family. However her desire spurred her sons and daughters to go on to universities and on missions and to help each other financially. As a result, five of the children filled honorable missions for the church and most of her grandsons who are old enough and two granddaughter have also done missionary service.

In the field of education, all of her children, except Joy, attended college and there have been 8 bachelor’s degrees, four master’s and two PhD degrees. This has carried on in the next generation and practically all of her grandchildren who are now old enough have attended college with most of them achieving degrees, including Dan and Wayne Decker who both have doctorate degrees (as of 1964) The husbands and wives of these children and grandchildren show the same love of the Gospel and higher education.

When May’s eighth child was born, she almost died with pneumonia and since that time she has been frail and subject to flu and lung trouble. Few people felt that she would outlive her husband, but she lived in almost perfect health for more than four years after his death 6 April 1960.

On her 89th birthday last August, her children and grandchildren who lived close to her, had a party for her at which she expressed appreciation and happiness for her long life. The next day she fell and broke her hip. The physician operated, but she lived only four more days. Funeral services were held in Snowflake on 7 Sep 1964.

Her family will miss her deeply ad their feelings can probably be expressed in a tribute written in a letter by her granddaughter, Mary. “I feel like a little part of me went with her. So many of the special things from my childhood of which she was a part, will always remain in my memory. When we lose pioneers life Grandmother, who is going to be here to show us how to push on even when it doesn’t feel good, and how not to gripe when a job has to be done. I can see where she is undoubtedly happier now. I hope Grandpa smiled as she came…. That will be heaven for her at once.”

WHY WERE THE SAINTS, SAINTS? BECAUSE THEY WERE CHEERFUL WHEN IT WAS DIFFICULT TO BE CHEERFUL:

PATIENT WHEN IT WAS DIFFICULT TO BE PATIENT;

AND BECAUSE THEY PUSHED ON WHEN THEY WANTED TO STAND STILL

AND KEPT SILENT WHEN THEY WANTED TO TALK,

AND WERE AGREEABLE WHEN THEY WANTED TO BE DISAGREEABLE.

THAT WAS ALL. IT WAS QUITE SIMPLE AND ALWAYS WILL BE.

   Grandfather Thomas Karren

   Grandmother Anne Ratcliffe Karren

   Mother Catharine Karren

   Grandfather Thomas Karren

   Father Lorenzo H. Hatch

   Father Lorenzo Hill Hatch

   Father Lorenzo Hill Hatch

   Husband-Louis Addison Decker

Mary Safsten I am the oldest daughter of J. Smith and Helen Ellsworth Decker

Source: http://achsahmayhatch.blogspot.com/

FROM ANOTHER SOURCE: In Our Own Words: The Lives of Arizona Pioneer Women, by Barbara Marriott:

Achsah May Hatch was born August 29, 1875, at Franklin, Idaho, the daughter of Lorenzo Hill and Catherine Karren Hatch. she came from a long line of Vermont Hatches and at least one English Ratcliff who jumped out of a two story building in order to marry the man she lived. Her parents were among the first Arizona pioneers. In fact, at the early age of three months Achsah May found herself a completely initiated and active pioneer.

Strange to say "twas written in the stars that Louis Addison Decker and Achsah May would someday meet and wed. both of them had been saved from drowning when young children. When Achsah May first met Louis, he was singing at an annual M.I.A. convention entertainment. She thought Louis was slightly off key and laughed at him, but a few months later when he sang, "I love you truly", she thought he was definitely in tune. On October 1, 1897, they were married in the Temple in Salt Lake City, Utah. They settled in a snug and neat log cabin in Taylor, Arizona. There the stork stopped by at intervals until he had left them ten children.