Rachel Jennings Stiff-Neville: Her Stewardship

By Janet Stacey Porter

For those left in Woodruff life didn’t change very much. Rachel Stiff now had one son William, two daughters Elizabeth Smith and Annie Cox, and many grandchildren living in Woodruff. Her daughter Rachel lived in Montpelier, Idaho, Joseph in Byron, Wyoming and James in Bountiful. Living in John and Annie Cox’s home, in 1900 she was 91 years old. Family members remember her in her later years as being stooped over, perhaps with Osteoporosis. Yet in spite of her discomfort and age, Rachel didn’t like to be useless. She helped as much as she could and remained active in the church to the very end of her life. When the new church was finished and the ward held a clean-up day in 1899, Rachel was there at the dinner in the old adobe church house with most of the ward. We know because she is in the picture that they took of the event.

The great tragedy of her life was that three sons and a daughter chose not to come to Zion. Eventually they lost contact with the family and with the heritage of the Gospel. Sarah, her second child married John Christopher Hopkins, lived in Penkridge, Staffordshire, and had two children. She died there in 1899.

Their sixth child, just younger than Annie, was Charles Neville. He and his wife Kezia remained in Basingstoke where their 7 children were born. He followed the engineering abilities of his American brothers and his Jennings relatives, and was listed on the census as “Engine Driver for mill and Waterworks.”

Their seventh child was George who retained the surname Stiff. He moved from Rotherwick to Odiham. He also was involved in machinery. On the 1881 census he was a “Driver to traction Engine.”

John Stiff was their 8th child. He married Emma and possibly another woman later named Annie Clift. They moved from Hampshire to Wiltshire, back to Hampshire and finally to Berkshire County where in the 1881 census he was a “Road Engine Driver.”

Rachel had been devoted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ from the moment she heard it almost half a century before Bradley, England. She had spent the first fourteen years of her church membership preparing to come to Zion, two years completing the task, and the next 32 years providing her growing family with the inspiration to remain as active in the church as they were in their civic and professional affairs. To her goes much of the credit for a family of high achievers, fine citizens, good family members. It was no accident. Rachel had sacrificed a lot in her lifetime.

The Family Tools

Everything William and Rachel owned is gone. Of the world’s good they had but little. In fact, is is quite likely that at the end of their lives they lived with the Cox’s and literally owned nothing of their own. Their lives were tied up in their children’s lives and they wanted nothing more than to know that their large posterity was firmly settled in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They only thing that remains as a tangible memorial to the family is their tools.

The family brought tools with them from England, hauled them across the plains, and employed them well in building up Rich County. For a long time those tools resided in a museum in Evanston, but when it was discovered what a contribution had been made by the family in Rich County, the tools were returned to Randolph where they are currently on display at the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers Museum.

Some families leave a great legacy of hard work and integrity. If the generations which follow them understand at what price that great heritage of integrity was purchased, perhaps they will cherish and nurture it all the more.

At the age of 92, Rachel became very ill. The family gathered to comfort and love her. Ty Tingey’s journal provides a glimpse into the family’s feelings of great love and respect.

“September 14, 1901: Oh how I hated to come home tonight. Grandmother Stiff in not expected to live. She is 93 years old.”

“September 22, 1901: Grandmother Stiff died this morning at 3:00.”

“September 25, 1901: “I went to the funeral of Grandmother Stiff.”

Most histories would end here, but this one does not. Rachel was still not finished even though she was buried beside her husband in the windy Woodruff Cemetery. She had spent her life devoted to the family. Apparently that stewardship did not end with her death.

In 1917, Merrill Neville, nineteen year old grandson of William and Elizabeth Fisher Neville and great grandson of William and Rachel Stiff became so ill he died. The family tells that he summoned his sister Mary into the spirit world with him and them he sent her back with a warning for the family and with the story of what he had seen.

“It was always springtime over there,” May reported. “When Merrill died, Grandfather and Grandmother Stiff met him, and his is with them now. They have a beautiful home, and were preparing a beautiful home for Mother and the family.”

High time William and Rachel had a fine place to live. But there’s even more. William and Rachel apparently aren’t just sitting around in their celestial abode.

“May (who was 15) put her finger on each of the family present and told them of their failing, which they must endeavor to overcome if they would go to that beautiful home which was being prepared for them. She said that all must go to Sunday School and to meeting; they should attend to their prayers, and pay their tithing. She said impressively to all present, ‘Give to the poor, the more you give the more you will have to give.”

May continued to fail until she was hospitalized. Her mother watched at her bedside as her daughter appeared to be dying.

“While in the hospital with her daughter, Sister Neville prepared to rest, on one occasion, in a reclining position, while also making it possible to watch her daughter’s every move from across the room. Suddenly she was overcome by a sensation that was entirely new to her and she saw her husband’s grandmother standing at the foot of the bed, who looked exactly as sister Neville remembered her in life, her boding being bent from old age and much stooping. She seemed in a great hurry.

Sister Neville exclaimed, “Why, there’s Grandmother Stiff! Whatever does she want?”
At that time the grandmother walked up to the side of the bed, stood perfectly straight, her face shone and her hands were as white as pearl, and as she spoke, she kept rubbing them together. “Tell them to hurry,: tell them to hurry; they have got the work to do they have got the work to do-none can do the wok for those who have had the privilege of doing it for themselves her-it’s got to be done on this earth-it can’t be done hereafter.”

“She was silent a moment and Sister Neville said; “Whatever does she mean?”
“Finally the grandmother replied, “William and Elizabeth have never had their children sealed to them. There must be a perfect link back to their father Adam and if they neglect their work there will be a missing link.”

“She seemed in such a hurry, Sister Neville said: ‘Do they have to hurry and worry on the other side like this?”

“Grandmother said: ‘Look!”

“As sister Neville looked she saw masses of people and it appeared that Grandmother Stiff had something to do for them, which accounted for her being in such a hurry. Striking the palm of her hand with the forefinger of the other, she said, “Now I put this work on you to do for you to see that this duty is done. Then she disappeared.”

She is still working, still inspiring and still doing the Lord’s work. Her witness would be that if one is not anxiously engaged in a good cause-in the Lord’s cause-one is missing the whole point of life. For Rachel Stiff, that means serving both the living and the dead. Apparently, she never stopped.”
Gordon B. Hinckley said it best:
“Do no become a weak link in the chain of your generation. You come to the world with a marvelous inheritance. You come to great men and women…Never let the down. Never do anything which would weaken the chain of which you are a fundamental part.”