Eliza R. Snow

An early Latter-day Saint poet, leader, and record-keeper who anchors the women’s-agency and “home literature” threads across Kyle’s Mormon-history reading. In Saints — No Unhallowed Hand she is the secretary of the Female Relief Society of Nauvoo who kept careful minutes of the meetings and preserved Joseph Smith’s teachings to the women in a record book — a discipline Kyle annotated as “note taking.” Her published charge that the Relief Society exists “to do good—to bring into requisition every capacity we possess for doing good… in saving souls,” and her counsel to “never write a line or a word that is not calculated to help and benefit this kingdom” (which Susa Young Gates tried to live by), read to Kyle as a personal note to a writer (see Stewardship, Note-taking, Writing). She also appears in the haunting divorce-dream passage (“He did not understand then… But he does now”) tied to women’s agency.

In Brigham Young — Pioneer Prophet she is Brigham Young’s wife and the “high priestess” of the Endowment House — a fixture introducing Mormon women to the church’s most sacred teachings, central to the book’s account of women’s expanding ecclesiastical roles. Young publicly praised her poems, discussed political matters with her, and seated her next to himself; he recognized her “intellectual and organizational capabilities.” In Joseph Smith Lecture 2 — Joseph’s Personality and Character she serves as a character witness for Joseph Smith — having “scrutinized his face” in the winter of 1830–31 and decided “his was an honest face,” and later describing him in private prayer with his children as “humble as a little child.”

Context: Eliza R. Snow (1804–1887) was a Latter-day Saint poet, hymn-writer, and the second general president of the Relief Society. Plural wife of both Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, she was one of the most prominent women in 19th-century Mormonism, often called “Zion’s Poetess.”

Where this appears

• Saints — No Unhallowed Hand — Relief Society secretary and record-keeper; anchors the women’s-agency / “home literature” / note-taking thread.
• Brigham Young — Pioneer Prophet — Young’s wife and “high priestess” of the Endowment House; emblem of women’s expanding ecclesiastical roles.
• Joseph Smith Lecture 2 — Joseph’s Personality and Character — character witness (“an honest face,” “humble as a little child”).