Brewster, Zephaniah H.

Born: 1797-XX-XX New York

Flourished: 1838 to 1850 Springfield, Illinois

Zephaniah H. Brewster, carpenter, served as a private in the New York State Militia in 1814 during the War of 1812. He married Jane J. Higby in the village of Black Rock, New York, in 1823. Three years later, he was an insolvent debtor in neighboring Buffalo. Brewster and his wife joined the Mormon Church while living in Chautauqua County, New York. The Brewsters’ young son, James Colin Brewster, claimed to receive visions from God and eventually became the leader of one faction of Mormons. The Brewsters moved west with the church to Kirtland, Ohio, where Zephaniah helped build the church’s first temple. In July 1838, they followed Joseph Smith west from Kirtland to Dayton, Ohio. In September 1838, Brewster moved his family to Springfield, Illinois. They soon followed the Mormon migration west to Independence, Missouri, and in 1850 they departed for New Mexico Territory. After they helped to establish a Mormon colony in New Mexico, Zephaniah and Jane returned to Illinois.

Roger D. Launius and Linda Thatcher, eds., Differing Visions: Dissenters in Mormon History (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994), 120-22, 124, 131-32, 134; New York, U.S., War of 1812 Payroll Abstracts for New York State Militia, 1812-1815 (Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2013); Black Rock Beacon (Black Rock, NY), 17 April 1823, 3:2; Black Rock Gazette (Black Rock, NY), 23 December 1826, 3:6; U.S. Census Office, Fifth Census of the United States (1830), Westfield, Chautauqua County, NY, 485; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850), Socorro, Valencia County, NM Terr., 321; U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census of the United States (1860), Montgomery County, IL, 141.