Cannon in Utah

This page collects information about people with surname Cannon who were known or believed to have lived in early Utah.

First Families

• Leonora Cannon (1796-1868) married in 1833 in Toronto, Canada to John Taylor (1808-1887). At about this time they both met with Missionaries and joined the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. John, who would become and Apostle and then President of the Church, left in 1840, on a mission to England to visit with the rest of Leonora's Family, converting them to the gospel.

His parents were George Cannon (1794-1844) and Anne Quayle Cannon, both from the Isle of Man (an island between England and Ireland.) His parents were baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 11 February 1840 by his uncle, the Apostle John Taylor (1808-1887).

Two and a half years later on 17 September 1842 the family left for America on the ship, Sidney. At that time the family consisted of the parents, George and Ann and five children, George Q. (15), Mary Alice (13), Ann (10), Angus Munn (8), David Henry (4), and Leonora (almost 2). Two other children had died in childhood. David's mother, Ann, was expecting another child as they began their journey and was suffering badly with morning sickness. Her husband tried to get her to postpone the journey but she felt that uniting her family with the main body of the Church in Nauvoo, Illinois was more important than her life.

As a consequence of her pregnancy combined with her terrible seasickness, David's mother did lose her life on this journey. She was buried at sea. Four-year-old David had to be tied to the mast to be prevented from throwing himself into the sea after his mother. David remembered this devastating moment for the rest of his life.

Father George died on 17 August 1844 when he was working in St. Louis, Missouri which is about 200 miles down the Mississippi River from Nauvoo. One account says that he died of heat stroke. George Cannon's second wife, Mary, had a baby daughter, Elizabeth, a few months after the death of her husband. In 1845 Mary Alice's new husband, Charles Lambert, was appointed guardian of the three youngest orphan Cannon children: Angus, David H., and Leonora. The two older children, George Q. and Ann, were living with their Aunt Leonora and Uncle John Taylor.

The Lamberts and the Cannon children stayed in Nauvoo until they were driven out by the mobs. They were quite destitute and couldn't accompany the Saints who left in the Spring. They stayed on the west side of the Mississippi until they could obtain a team to take them on to Winter Quarters. They suffered many hardships at that time. David H. was eight years old at this time and he tells of the miracle of the quail, "...we witnessed the power of the Lord in sending great flocks of quail that fed the saints who were fairly in a state of starvation, through being driven from their homes in this inclement season of the year without shelter or sufficient food to eat. These birds were caught by thousands."

The way was opened and they were able to go on to Winter Quarters near present-day Omaha, Nebraska, where they stayed to work for a few years until they had the means to cross the plains. They arrived in the Salt Lake Valley in the middle of October in 1849 where they found that their older brother, George Q. had made about 6,000 adobe bricks for a home for them before he left on a mission. He left just three days before their arrival.

Notable Individuals

As shown below, there are three families by the name of Cannon that immigrated to early colonial Utah:

• George Quayle Cannon (1827-1901) - LDS Apostle and member of the First Presidency of the Church.
• David Henry Cannon (1838-1924) - LDS Missionary to California (1857) and England (1869), led a 1861 Wagon train leader to Utah and was part of the Dixie Mission that same year where he became originated the Sego Lily Story. Member of St. George Stake high council, stake presidency and the served nearly 30 years as president of the St. George Utah Temple.
• Wilhelmina Logan Mousley (1840-1918) - A TV episode of Death Valley Days: "Sego Lilies" (1953) tells the story of Wilhemina and her husband David (above) being called to leave Salt Lake City to settle in the Dixie territory (that would become St. George, UT). She missed the comforts of Salt Lake and grew weary of the barren desert of southern Utah. She told her husband she would be willing to stay if he could find just one beautiful thing in the area. David broke his leg while climbing a hill to gather some Sego Lilies for his wife. The Sego Lily convinced her to stay, and went on to become the Utah state flower.
  • Sego Flower Story - YouTube.
• [Leonora Cannon (1840-1924)|Leonora Cannon Gardner (1840-1924)]] - married to Robert Gardner (1819-1906), who was Dixie Mission pioneer, settler of Pine Valley, Utah and first bishop of the church in St. George, Utah.

Cannon by County

There are 20 counties in Utah.

• Cannon in Beaver County, Utah
• Cannon in Box Elder County, Utah
• Cannon in Cache County, Utah
• Cannon in Carbon County, Utah
• Cannon in Daggett County, Utah
• Cannon in Davis County, Utah
• Cannon in Duchesne County, Utah
• Cannon in Emery County, Utah
• Cannon in Garfield County, Utah
• Cannon in Grand County, Utah
• Cannon in Iron County, Utah
• Cannon in Juab County, Utah
• Cannon in Kane County, Utah
• Cannon in Millard County, Utah
• Cannon in Morgan County, Utah
• Cannon in Piute County, Utah
• Cannon in Salt Lake County, Utah
• Cannon in San Juan County, Utah
• Cannon in Sanpete County, Utah
• Cannon in Sevier County, Utah
• Cannon in Summit County, Utah
• Cannon in Tooele County, Utah
• Cannon in Uintah County, Utah
• Cannon in Utah County, Utah
• Cannon in Wasatch County, Utah
• Cannon in Washington County, Utah
• Cannon in Wayne County, Utah
• Cannon in Weber County, Utah