Miriam Angeline Works

1806–1832

Civil marriage to Brigham Young 8 Oct 1824 — she was 18, he was 23.

Before polygamy

Who she was, and what happened

His first wife, married when he was a 23-year-old carpenter in New York. She contracted tuberculosis and was an invalid for years; Brigham carried her to her chair each morning, cooked and kept house around her, and she died in 1832, months after both were baptized. She never saw Nauvoo, never knew polygamy. In the Nauvoo temple in January 1846 he was resealed to her by proxy, with Mary Ann Angell standing in her place - and then thirty-one couples and his own children were sealed to Brigham AND Miriam, making a dead woman the ritual mother of his entire adopted kingdom.

Key dates

1824 Civil marriage 8 Oct 1824
1832 Died Sept 1832
no date Temple sealing confirmed Resealed to him BY PROXY in the Nauvoo temple, Jan 1846, fourteen years after she died - Mary Ann Angell stood in her place. 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

Nothing from her, and no life of her written by anyone else.

None of her own. She died in 1832, before Nauvoo, and is known only through his history.

'History of Brigham Young,' Deseret News, 10 Feb 1858

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: 1806
Died: Sept 1832
Died at: Mendon, New York (his farm)
Outlived Brigham Young?: No - died before him
Marriage or sealing: 8 Oct 1824
Her age at the marriage: 18
His age at the marriage: 23
Age gap: 5 years
Phase of his life: Legal wife (pre-polygamy)
Type of sealing: Time & eternity (resealed 1846 by proxy) ?
Already married to another man?: No ?
Her other husbands: -
Widow of Joseph Smith?: No
Sexual relationship?: Yes - children
Children by Brigham Young: 2
Lived with him?: Yes - his first household
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?: n/a - died 1832
Remarried after Brigham Young?: n/a - died 1832
Her later husband(s): None recorded

Source and confidence: Johnson Table 1; Turner p.134

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.