1887 01 30—Salt Lake Herald—Obituary N. H. Felt

Obituary N. H. Felt

Salt Lake Herald, January 30, 1887, p. 1

Obituary

The Funeral of Elder N. H. Felt to be Held To-day.

The funeral of the late Elder Nathaniel H. Felt, who, on the 27th instant, closed what had been, until stricken with ill health, superinduced by advancing years, a useful career, will be conducted in the Seventeenth Ward meeting house to-day at 10 a.m.

The deceased was born in Salem, Massachusetts, February 8th, 1816; baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1842 and joined the body of the church at Nauvoo in 1845. When the Saints were expelled from there it was his desire and his preparations were made to that end, to press on with the van, but he was stricken with fever and ague on the frozen banks of the Missouri, and unable to proceed.

He was appointed to preside at St. Louis in 1847, and through those troublesome times, with the power of darkness poured out with fury upon the people, and during those dark days of the cholera scourge he nobly filled his calling in directing, aiding and comforting the Saints, to the satisfaction and with the commendation of the church authorities, as shown by many letters from them in his possession. He was finally released, and on the 6th day of October, 1850, he, with his family, arrived in Salt Lake Valley. In 1851 he was appointed a presiding traveling bishop. In 1854 he went to New York with President Taylor and assisted in establishing the publication known as The Mormon, and in receiving and forwarding the emigration. He returned home in 1856.

In 1865 he went to Great Britain on a mission, where he labored in the Millennial Star office, and later as pastor of the London District, returning in 1867.

In 1868 he was again called on a mission to the Eastern States, which he filled.

He was the first alderman of Salt Lake City, and served for many years in the City Council, and for some time in the Legislature. He figured prominently on numerous occasions, on civic committees appointed to receive distinguished visitors to the city.

In 1873 he passed through a very severe sickness, which left his body in a debilitated condition and has been more or less confined to the house ever since.

On January 15, 1887, he was stricken with paralysis in the leg, and though he seemed to improve and his family thought it ws but a local complaint from lack of circulation and exercise, yet on the 27th, after sitting up some time and apparently in the best of spirits, in fact better than for months past, he retired to rest and passed quietly away without realizing, as far as can be ascertained, any more than did his family, that his demise was so near.

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