How do we measure the full legacy of a figure like Heber C. Kimball? We often focus on the man himself—his loyalty to Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, his mission to England, or his role as First Counselor. But a fascinating new interview at From the Desk with biographer Andrew Kimball argues for a much broader, more complex answer. Discussing his book, The Blood in Their Veins, Kimball posits that Heber’s true story is inseparable from the sprawling, multi-generational family he created. The interview is remarkable for its scope, tracing the “Kimball legacy” across three generations: starting with Heber C. Kimball and his wife Vilate’s prayerful struggling to accept polygamy, moving to the rich records and personal tragedies of their daughter Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, and following the enduring influence down to their grandson, the prominent apostle Orson F. Whitney. This multi-generational lens shifts the focus from a single icon to the lived, human, and often fractious reality of a foundational Latter-day Saint family.

Insights From Andrew Kimball on Heber C. Kimball’s Life and Family

Polygamy is at the heart of Heber C. Kimball’s story. Andrew Kimball notes that “I believe Heber C. Kimball had 43 wives, although there are varying counts. Heber had children with 17 of his 43 wives. Others were past child-bearing age, with whom there was probably no physical intimacy.” From these unions, he had many children: “There were 64 of them by my count. Several were stillborn. Nineteen died before the age of 10. The 42 children who reached the age of 20 provide a cross-section of much Utah Latter-day Saint experience.”

With that in mind, the story of Heber C. Kimball’s introduction to plural marriage becomes more striking, since he initially considered resisting the principle. Andrew Kimball explained:

In 1866, Heber told a congregation of saints that “I can recollect well when Joseph Smith the prophet received” a revelation for me “in the presence of President Brigham Young and Willard Richards. They had not been home from a mission in England “over six days before Joseph called us together and laid these things before us, the first time we knew of them.”

Joseph gave his revelation as “Thus saith the Lord for my servant Willard and Brigham and Heber to take more wives for this is pleasing in my God’s sight.”

Heber described his astonishment:

I wept days, but I would not weep before the people. I would go and wash my face and anoint my head. . . . I was sorrowful. I had a good wife. I was satisfied.

Heber C. Kimball had been married to Vilate for nineteen years, and it took considerable cajoling by Joseph Smith and the acquiescence of Vilate before he would obey. He finally did, with typical whole-heartedness.

This acceptance resulted in one of the largest families in Latter-day Saint history.

Heber and Vilate’s daughter, Helen Mar Kimball, likewise faced her own struggles with plural marriage. First was her youthful marriage to Joseph Smith:

In June 1843, when Helen was 14, her father asked “if I would believe him if he told me that it was right for married men to take other wives” and went on to explain polygamy and how it had been taught in the scriptures.

Helen reacted with disbelief and repugnance. Joseph Smith stopped in the next day and taught the principle himself in company with her father and mother.

As Helen later recalled it, Joseph assured her that “if you will take this step, it will ensure your eternal salvation and exaltation & that of your father’s household & all of your kindred,” a promise so great, recalled Helen, “that I willingly gave myself to purchase so glorious a reward.”

She later saw this acquiescence as a “generous sacrifice” by a girl who “dids’t not weigh the cost nor know the bitter price.”

While Smith was killed about a year after their marriage, it was something that haunted her: “For years, Helen Mar Kimball would struggle with the fact that she had been led into polygamy at such an early age, writing evocatively 13 years after Heber C. Kimball’s death that “my father had but one Ewe Lamb, but willingly laid her upon the altar.” … Although there is no reason to think there was a sexual component to the marriage, it was clearly a difficult episode for Helen, maybe traumatic.”

Still, Helen’s life went forward, with many other challenging experiences along the way:

Helen Mar Kimball married her sweetheart, Horace Whitney. That marriage was also soon complicated by polygamy. Horace would take two more wives, with Helen’s consent, though unintentionally upsetting her when she happened upon his love letter to one of them.

Helen experienced a succession of hard shocks. She lost her first three children in infancy. Another died at four. Another at 16. Another at 21. The second baby died as they crossed the plains by wagon in 1848. Helen was so distraught it seemed to unhinge her. … As they continued west, Helen lost her reason altogether. She became convinced that she was in the power of Satanic beings. The family had to forcibly feed her. It took months to recover.

These were also difficult challenges, but she did lead a rich and meaningful life. Among other things, Andrew Kimball noted that: “Though intelligent and strongly opinionated, Helen was a private woman, preoccupied with household and children and susceptible to anxiety and sometimes depression. She was familiar with the leading women in the church and gained some attention in later years with her writing for the Woman’s Exponent.”

Among her several children, Orson F. Whitney is the best known. He “was one of the most celebrated public speakers in the church and was eventually called to the Quorum of the Twelve in 1906.” As the son of one of Heber’s children from his first wife, Orson’s birth was before Heber C. Kimball’s death, and “as a boy, he had known his grandfather, Heber Kimball, and recounts several colorful anecdotes in a later autobiography.” (It’s interesting to note that while J. Golden Kimball was his half-uncle, J. Golden was only two years older than Orson.) A descendant of multiple prominent families in the Church, “The grafting of stocks flowered in Orson, born in 1855 to Helen and Horace, blending the practical bent of the Kimballs and the more expressive nature of the Whitneys.” An example of his expressive nature is the epic poem he wrote:

After a lifetime of occasional poems, articles, and sermons, Orson took up the project of a lengthy epic in 1900, Elias – An Epic of the Ages, which he expected to “be the crowning effort of my life.”

Whitney’s poem recounts the grand sweep of time, from pre-mortal existence to the restoration of priesthood authority in nineteenth-century America under Joseph Smith and Brigham Young’s exodus to the western desert.

He dedicated the 90-page poem to Joseph F. Smith, sixth president of the church. For a time, it was taught in Utah schools.

A friend who heard Orson read the work in its entirety in 1910 thought it stood well beside Milton’s Paradise Lost and contained “some very advanced ideas on religious subjects.”

While the poem doesn’t actually stand well next to Milton’s Paradise Lost, Elias is still one of the most notable works in Mormon literature.

 

For more on Heber C. Kimball, Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, and Orson F. Whitney, head on over to the Latter-day Saint history blog, From the Desk, to read the full interview with Andrew Kimball. It’s a lengthy discussion, so there’s a lot to explore. While you’re there, check out the new D. Todd Christofferson quotes page, compiled in honor of his recent call to the First Presidency.