Black Americans were among the first pioneer settlers to arrive in Utah, coming to the Great Basin as enslaved people. Although many lived in Utah long enough to become free, their enslaved status and later position on the fringe of Utah society have left us with incomplete versions of their stories. Secondary sources are often the only available records that tell the stories of early Black Utahns. While these accounts can be helpful in clueing us into the existence of Utah pioneers, secondary sources, especially those written about enslaved Black Utahns, can often convey inaccuracies. Usually, they are written from faulty memories or contain stories that fictitiously portray exaggerated ideals. As such, second-hand accounts may obscure uncomfortable truths about pioneer society and life in Utah in the late 1800s. Primary sources created when events occurred or during a person’s life can help provide context to secondary sources and supply additional details which allow us to interpret what life may have been like in the past. Because information about early Black Utahns can be scarce, any primary sources about them can be valuable in filling out their story.
One example is Alexander “Alex” Bankhead, an early pioneer who came to Utah as an enslaved person in 1848. Much of what we know about Alex Bankhead is gleaned through second-hand accounts in short snippets from newspapers and a handful of pioneer histories. Primary source records held in the Utah Division of Archives’ collection provide details of Alex Bankhead’s life between 1870 and his death in 1902. We can gain insights into Alex’s life in Spanish Fork, Utah, through tax records collected about his home and farm and in probate records that settled his estate upon his death.
Alex Bankhead arrived in Utah from Tennessee in September of 1848, traveling with his enslaver John H. Bankhead and ten other enslaved people traveling with the John and George Bankhead families. A compilation of histories by the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers indicates the family settled for a time in the southeast area of the Salt Lake Valley before relocating to the Cache Valley in the 1860s.
The Broad Ax, a black-owned Utah newspaper, briefly described Alex Bankhead’s enslavement in a March 25, 1899 feature called Slavery in Utah, stating that “in time Alex Bankhead became the property of Bishop Smoot.” Abraham Smoot was an early mayor of Salt Lake and later Provo City. This change in enslavers could account for how Alex would come to live in Utah County when most of the Bankhead’s relocated to northern Utah. No currently available primary sources confirm or describe Alex Bankhead’s time with Abraham Smoot. Few pre-1870s primary sources about Alex’s life in Utah have surfaced, including his life in the immediate years after the abolition of slavery in the American territories in the 1860s. However, we have primary sources beginning in the 1870s, including the 1870 U.S. census, showing Alex Bankhead living with his wife Marinda, another formerly enslaved person, and her son David William in Spanish Fork, Utah.
City Tax Assessment records for Spanish Fork found at the State Archives (series 30451) help provide a few details about the property Alex Bankhead owned and farmed while living there. The 1881 tax assessment entry indicates that he had a small home near the town center and seven acres of farmland just outside the city. Additional details from the records tell us he had a few farm animals, including two horses, two cows, and a vehicle used for farming.
With help from the primary source records, researchers can locate the Bankhead’s Spanish Fork home using the plot and block numbers in the assessment rolls. An 1890 Sanborn map from Spanish Fork depicts the Bankhead property, detailing the family’s home on the northwest corner of 300 South and 100 East. The map shows the Bankhead home in brown and notes it as “old” when the map was drawn in 1890, suggesting that they lived in a small adobe structure likely built decades earlier when pioneer families first settled Spanish Fork. The house had an adjacent granary and a shed.
The 1899 Broad Ax article noted that Alex Bankhead owned 20 acres of property. Although it may be possible that when the Broad Ax featured the article, Alex owned as much as 20 acres, city tax assessment records from the 1870s-1890s note he owned between six or seven acres within Spanish Fork, and probate records settling Alex Bankhead’s estate after his death in 1902, show that he held a total of eight acres of land. The same probate records also show that upon his death, in addition to the eight acres of land, Alex Bankhead was able to leave his wife Marinda and his stepson David William, a home in Spanish Fork, and eight shares in the Spanish Fork South East Irrigating company. His modest estate would have helped provide crucial financial support for his wife and stepson’s future endeavors.
Sources Cited
- “Bankhead, Marinda – Biography.” Century of black mormons. J. Willard Marriott Library Exhibits. Accessed February 23, 2023.
- Carter, Kate B. The Negro Pioneer. May 1965. Daughters of Utah Pioneers, Salt Lake City. Accessed via FamilySearch February 2, 2022
- Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Camp of Israel schedules and reports, 1845-1849, Heber C. Kimball’s 1848 emigration division, First 100, schedules. July 1848. MS 14290 Church History Library. Salt Lake City, Utah
- Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Utah Territorial census, 1851 / CENSUS RETURNS (ORIGINAL) / Great Salt Lake County, schedules 2-6. MS 2672. Church History Library. Salt Lake City, Utah
- District Court, 4th District, Utah County. Probate Case Files. Series 14437. Utah Division of Archives and Records Services.
- Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps, Spanish Fork, 1890: Sheet 05. Special Collection, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah
- Spanish Fork, Utah. Tax Assessment Rolls. 1875-1879. Series 30451. Utah Division of Archives and Records Services.
- Taylor, Julius. “Slavery in Utah.” Broad Ax, 25 March 1899. Digitized by J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah