Benjamin Franklin Grouard

1819– 1894

Born in Rockingham County, New Hampshire; sailed to sea at age fourteen; called by Joseph Smith along with Addison Pratt and two others on mission to the Sandwich Islands in 1843; decided to labor with companions in the Society Islands after 1844 arrival; remained in Society Islands until 1852; after visit to Salt Lake City settled in San Bernardino, California, in 1853; called on mission to Los Angeles in September 1854; became a spiritualist by 1856; later lived in Los Angeles and Santa Ana, California, where he died. (See Jenson, BE, 3:639; Britsch, Unto the Islands of the Sea, 569–70; Lyman, San Bernardino, 454; Ellsworth, History of Louisa Barnes Pratt, 409–10; Ellsworth, Journals of Addison Pratt, 589–90; Lyman, Payne, and Ellsworth, No Place to Call Home, 559; “Minutes,” Deseret News, Apr. 18, 1855; “B. F. Grouard’s Death,” Deseret Evening News, Mar. 19, 1894; GQC journal, Nov. 27, 1852; Mar. 20, 1854.)