We could not find a photograph of her. If you hold one — a descendant's album, a county archive, a gravestone portrait — it would fill this space permanently. Write to mormonstories@gmail.com.
No. 12 on Johnson's list — but this page is hers
Clarissa Blake
1796–?
Sealed to Brigham Young 8 Oct 1844 — she was 48, he was 43.
This was a sealing, not a marriage in law — plural marriage had no legal standing. What that meant.
Nauvoo, after the martyrdom
Who she was, and what happened
She wrote Brigham an ACROSTIC POEM and a love letter shortly after the sealing - one of the very few documents in which a plural wife describes her own feeling at the moment of marriage: 'my heart is like a bird let lo[o]se from a long and close confinement and soars aloof on joyful pinions.' On his role: 'Onward to guide us, to celestial joys... Upward thou will rise, and we will follow on.' Johnson's table gives her birth year as 1796, making her five years older than Brigham - exactly as his prose says. SOURCES DISAGREE: Turner lists her among the fifteen women with living husbands; Johnson says her previous marital status - and her death date - are unknown.
Key dates
- 1844 Sealed to him 8 Oct 1844 A sealing, not a marriage in law: plural marriage had no legal standing.
- no date Temple sealing confirmed Confirmed in the Nauvoo temple, Jan-Feb 1846. Documented, but Johnson gives no date
Nothing here is inferred. Johnson's Table 1 has one date column, so where an event is documented but undated it is shown as "no date" rather than given a spurious one — the missing date is itself a fact about how these records were kept. Only two of the fifty-five have a civil marriage date; for the other fifty-three the single date records a sealing, because plural marriage had no standing in law.
What survives in her own words
She left words of her own.
ONE LETTER AND AN ACROSTIC POEM in her own hand, written to Brigham just after the sealing - and essentially nothing else.
Turner pp. 134-35
15 of the fifty-five left words of their own. The rest are known only through other people's papers. What that silence means.
The record
- Born
- 1796
- Died
- ?
- Died at
- Not established here
- Outlived Brigham Young?
- Unknown - no death year recorded
- Marriage or sealing
- 8 Oct 1844
- Her age at the marriage
- 48
- His age at the marriage
- 43
- Age gap
- -5 years
- Phase of his life
- Post-martyrdom, pre-temple
- Type of sealing
- Not recorded ?
- Already married to another man?
- Yes (Turner n. 56) ?
- Her other husbands
- (1) Lyman Homiston
- Widow of Joseph Smith?
- No
- Sexual relationship?
- Not documented here
- Children by Brigham Young
- 0
- Lived with him?
- Unknown
- Divorce or separation
- None recorded
- Named in his will?
- Not applicable or not recorded
- Sealed to him as an adopted daughter first?
- No ?
- Kin tie to him or another wife
- None recorded
- Left the church?
- Not documented here
- Remarried after Brigham Young?
- Not established here
- Her later husband(s)
- None recorded
Source and confidence: Johnson Table 1 entry 12 and n. 12 (p. 66) - POSITION, DATE AND BIRTH YEAR NOW CONFIRMED from the printed table; Turner pp. 134-35 and n. 56; Johnson p. 63. PRIOR MARITAL STATUS CONTESTED
A blank or “not established here” means the fact was not documented in the sources behind this table. It does not mean zero, and it does not mean no. We leave it empty rather than guessing, because inventing a detail of her life would be another way of not listening to her. The size of that gap is the argument for the book she never got.