The Church Historian’s Press

Native SaintsNative Saints

    James Joshua
    (ca. 1850–1920)

    James Joshua, sometimes known as James Tyboats, was a Shoshone of mixed parentage who joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the mid-1880s.1 He subsequently served a mission to the Wind River Reservation and became one of the first Native counselors in the Washakie Ward bishopric. James was born around 1850 in either the Salt Lake Valley or Weber Valley.2 His mother, Che-Nah or So-Zena (meaning “many potatoes”), was an Eastern Shoshone from Wyoming.3 His father was purportedly a Euro-American mountaineer. James’s Shoshone name, Tyboats, means “white man.”4 However, Che-Nah married a Ute named Toa-wah-cha shortly before James’s birth, and they lived in the Uinta Basin for several years. When James was three, his Ute stepfather died. An oral history reports that James and Che-Nah traveled to northern Utah to live with the Northwestern Shoshone before finally returning to her people in the vicinity of Wind River, though they regularly visited friends and relations in Utah.5

    Between 1871 and 1874, James served as an Indian scout for the United States Army.6 This was a period in which the Lakota, Cheyenne, and Northern Arapaho aggressively raided Shoshone communities in the Wind River country. As a result, the Shoshone entered a strategic alliance with the United States. Native scouts and auxiliaries were a vital part of military operations, and men of mixed ancestry who had knowledge of English were particularly valuable.7 James’s service provided him with an opportunity to earn a regular salary from the government and to defend his people against their traditional enemies. He was probably attached to a unit at Camp Brown, a small Army post on the Wind River Reservation intended to defend the Shoshone from marauders. James may have participated in significant engagements with the Arapaho at Trout Creek in 1872 and at Bates Creek during the summer of 1874. In 1876, Shoshone scouts would play a vital role at the Battle of the Rosebud during the Great Sioux War.8 But James left the Army and married an Eastern Shoshone woman named Zo-Chena-Mah. In April 1875, they had a daughter named Sarah, who died after ten days. This started a pattern for James, whose seven children all died young.9

    A few months after Sarah died, many Eastern Shoshone were baptized as Latter-day Saints and moved to a church farm near Bear River City in Utah. In August, most were forced to return to the Wind River Reservation after the “Corinne Scare.” Between 1875 and the early 1880s, James and Zo-Chena-Mah traveled between Wind River and the Shoshone farms in Utah.10 James was probably in Wyoming in 1880 when Amos Wright came to the reservation as a missionary, though church records indicate that James was not baptized until 1885.11 Within a short period, Wright baptized the esteemed dai’gwahni, or paramount chief, Washakie and several hundred Shoshone. Latter-day Saint missionaries including Wright, apostle Moses Thatcher, and an English-speaking Shoshone named James Brown returned to Wind River throughout the decade. By 1883, James and Zo-Chena-Mah had permanently settled at the Shoshone farm near Portage, Utah, that would become known as Washakie. James’s mother also lived in the community.12

    For the next several years, James probably farmed at Washakie. Even though he could not read or write, he was also appointed as the sawyer in the mission lumber mill, a position of great importance in the community.13 But in October 1890, Zo-Chena-Mah died, possibly in childbirth.14 Two years later, James’s mother also died.15 That same year he married Hitope Ankegee, a widow who lived at Washakie and had several children of her own.16 Hitope was originally from the Wind River area and moved to Washakie after the death of her husband. Several of her family members, including her only brother, had been killed in Arapaho raids in Wyoming. Her favorite name for herself was So-Da-Ko-Nee, meaning “surrounded by many.” This was in reference to her father, who was once surrounded by Arapaho raiders and escaped by holding on to the tail of a horse.17 Only a few days before marrying Hitope, James applied for a federal land patent so that he could farm his own property.18

    In December 1901, James and Hitope were asked to serve a mission to the Wind River Reservation and aid Amos Wright. They left Washakie on horseback in the dead of winter and had a very difficult trip across the mountains. After losing a packhorse, the couple finally arrived at Wind River on Christmas Eve and served until the following June.19 The local Indian agent wrote several letters to James reporting that his “work as a missionary there had brought more satisfaction to the Indians than anything that had ever been done in a religious way among them.”20 James later spoke proudly of the “great work what he did when he went on a mission among the Lamanites.”21

    Upon his return to Washakie, James was an active member of the Latter-day Saint congregation and a successful farmer. Beginning in 1905, he was called as an assistant in the Washakie Ward Sunday School superintendency, first to Superintendent Ammon Pubigee and later to Superintendent Moroni Timbimboo.22 In April 1908, he was ordained second counselor to George M. Ward, the fourth Euro-American bishop of the ward; James and first counselor Yeager Timbimboo were the first Shoshone bishopric counselors in the Washakie Ward’s history.23 This was no doubt due to his faithful service as well as his knowledge of English. James served in these callings until his death.24 In March 1912, James and Hitope received their endowments and were sealed in the Logan Temple. James was also sealed to his deceased wife, Zo-Chena-Mah, and performed proxy baptisms and sealings for his deceased children.25

    During the last years of his life, James exhibited an unusual physical transformation: His complexion began to lighten significantly. According to a newspaper report in 1915, James had become “as white as any Caucasian.”26 This was probably the result of a pigmentation disorder.27 However, many Euro-American and Native Latter-day Saints interpreted this process in the context of the Book of Mormon, which records how in ancient America, God cursed the wicked Lamanites to be cut off from his presence. Moreover, “a skin of blackness” came over the Lamanites to differentiate them from their righteous Nephite relatives.28 The 1830 edition of the book also contained a promise that righteous Lamanites would ultimately become a “white and a delightsome people.” Joseph Smith later revised the text to read a “pure and a delightsome people.” Since 1981, the Book of Mormon has followed this adjustment. But prior to that time, most editions of the Book of Mormon kept the original rendering. This would have been the phrase familiar to James Joshua and his contemporaries.29

    In the early twentieth century, some church leaders taught that Native Americans—whom Latter-day Saints believed to be descendants of the Lamanites—would become “white and . . . delightsome” upon accepting the gospel.30 At the time, it was common to interpret the process of becoming “white” as a physical change.31 This explanation was accepted by many Native Saints who viewed James’s condition as a fulfillment of this Book of Mormon prophecy. According to the non-Latter-day Saint Salt Lake Telegram, at least some Shoshone at Washakie believed that James had become white “because he has lived a Christian life . . . [and] any Indian who obeys the white man’s God will eventually become the [same as] the white men.”32 Indeed, James was seen as the personification of the “righteous Lamanite.”33 Unfortunately, there is no record of how James himself understood his physical change or the meanings associated with it.

    Later church leaders moved away from ascribing skin color to iniquity or curses. In 1960, President Joseph Fielding Smith of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles wrote in Answers to Gospel Questions that “the dark skin of those who have come into the Church is no longer to be considered a sign of the curse. Many of these converts are delightsome and have the Spirit of the Lord.”34 Although the possibility of physically becoming white upon accepting the gospel was at times still presented as desirable, by the 1970s church publications highlighted the perspectives of faithful Indigenous Latter-day Saints who saw no need for such a change.35 The church today emphasizes that the curse on the Lamanites involved alienation from God based on personal unrighteousness and it “did no more follow them” once they repented and accepted Christ (Alma 23:18). Church curriculum further clarifies that we do not fully understand the meaning or nature of the “skin of blackness” associated with this curse.36 Instead, Latter-day Saint leaders continue to underline the foundational Book of Mormon teaching that God “denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; . . . all are alike unto God” (2 Nephi 26:33).37

    James Joshua died on 1 October 1920 at Dee Hospital in Ogden, Utah. His funeral was held at the Washakie schoolhouse and was attended by the Malad Stake president and his counselors. He was buried in the Washakie cemetery.38 Willie Ottogary, a Shoshone member of the ward, wrote that James was “our best man here at Washakie.”39 The Washakie Ward history similarly records that “Brother Joshua, as he was familiarly called, was a most excellent man and of a good family of Indians. He was 70 years of age when he died, and left a widow but no children.”40 Sadly, all of James’s children had died decades before. Hitope Joshua continued to live at Washakie for another two decades before she died in 1942.41

    Cite this page

    James Joshua(ca. 1850–1920), Native Saints, accessed May 28, 2026 https://www.churchhistorianspress.org/native-saints/biographies/james-joshua

      Footnotes

      1. [1]“James Joshua,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      2. [2]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 155, Record of Members Collection, 1836–1970, Church History Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City (Church History Library hereafter cited as CHL); Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178053, vol. B, p. 239, 7 Mar. 1912, FamilySearch Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City (FamilySearch Library hereafter cited as FSL). Records indicate that James was born on 10 April 1850 or 10 April 1856. Based on the available evidence, the 1850 date seems more likely. For instance, members of the Washakie Ward asserted that James was 70 years old when he died in 1920. (Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, 1847, 1874–1965, image 49, CHL.) A later oral tradition suggests that James was born on the Ute Reservation in the Uinta Valley. However, this does not match any contemporary records. It is possible that when James was born, his mother was associated with a band that came to be known among Latter-day Saints as the Weber Utes. This was a mixed band of Shoshone–Ute origins that typically ranged between Salt Lake Valley and the Weber River. Many members of this band died in a measles epidemic during the late winter of 1850. James and his mother may have moved to Ute territory after this occurred. (“James Joshua,” Life Sketches, ca. 1990–95, image 49, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, ca. 1880–1990, CHL; Brigham Young to Luke Lea, 13 Aug. 1851, Brigham Young Office Files, 1832–78, CHL; Oliver Boardman Huntington, Journal, vol. 10, pp. 89–90, Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT; James Linforth, Route from Liverpool to Great Salt Lake Valley [. . .] (Franklin D. Richards, 1855), 105; Ronald W. Walker and Dean C. Jesse, “The Historians’ Corner,” BYU Studies 32, no. 4 (1992): 125n32; Historical Department Office Journal, 1844–2023, vol. 13, p. 39, 23 Mar. 1850, CHL; see also Christopher C. Smith, “Mormon Conquest: Whites and Natives in the Intermountain West, 1847–1851” (PhD. diss., Claremont Graduate University, 2016): 84–85, ProQuest (10250123).

      3. [3]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 155, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178053, vol. B, p. 239, 7 Mar. 1912, FSL; “James Joshua,” Life Sketches, image 49, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, CHL; “Che-Na Joshua,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      4. [4]“James Joshua,” Life Sketches, image 49, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 155, Record of Members Collection, CHL; 1910 U.S. Census, Washakie, Box Elder Co., UT, enumeration dist. 12, p. 15A; Matthew E. Kreitzer, ed., The Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary: Northwestern Shoshone Journalist and Leader, 1906–1929 (Utah State University Press, 2000), 316; Shoshoni Dictionary, “taipo,” last updated 1 Apr. 2026, https://shoshoniproject.utah.edu/language-materials/shoshoni-dictionary/dictionary.php.

      5. [5]“James Joshua,” Life Sketches, image 49, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 155, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178053, vol. B, p. 239, 7 Mar. 1912, FSL.

      6. [6]“James Tiboats,” 21 Nov. 1933, in Utah, U.S., Civil War Pension Index: General Index to Pension Files, 1861–1934, National Archives, Washington, DC, ancestry.com.

      7. [7]Thomas W. Dunlay, Wolves for the Blue Soldiers: Indian Scouts and Auxiliaries with the United States Army, 1860–90 (University of Nebraska Press, 1982), 8-9, 69–90.

      8. [8]Anthony McGinnis, Counting Coup and Cutting Horses: Intertribal Warfare on the Northern Plains (Cordillera, 1990), 121, 134–35; Henry E. Stamm IV, People of the Wind River: The Eastern Shoshones, 1825–1900 (University of Oklahoma Press, 1999), 54–57, 110–11; “The Arapaho Arrive: Two Nations on One Reservation,” WYOHistory.org, 23 June 2018, https://www.wyohistory.org/encyclopedia/arapaho-arrive-two-nations-one-reservation#_ftnref13.

      9. [9]Logan Temple Sealings for the Dead, Couples (Includes Some Living Spouses), 1884–1943, microfilm 178066, vol. G, p. 433, 15 Mar. 1912, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings of Children to Parents, 1884–1943, microfilm 178090, vol. D, p. 339, 14–15 Mar. 1912, FSL; “Zo-Chena-Mah Joshua,” “Johnny Joshua,” “Alamira Joshua,” “Danny Joshua,” and “Kinneship Joshua,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      10. [10]“The Northwestern Shoshone Mission”; Logan Temple Sealings of Children to Parents, 1884–1943, microfilm 178090, vol. D, p. 339, 15 Mar. 1912, FSL.

      11. [11]Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178053, vol. B, p. 239, 7 Mar. 1912, FSL; “Amos Russell Wright,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      12. [12]Biography of James Brown Sr.; Washakie Ward Record Book, 1887–1909, image 14, CHL; “Moses Thatcher,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      13. [13]George M. Ward, interview by Charles Dibble, 1 Aug. 1945, transcript, p. 9, CHL.

      14. [14]Washakie Ward Record Book, image 16, CHL.

      15. [15]Washakie Ward Record Book, image 14, CHL.

      16. [16]Box Elder Co., UT, Marriage Licenses, 1887–1966, DGS 4540840, p. 103, 12 May 1892, familysearch.org; “Hitope Ankegee” and “Awkwass Ahguite,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      17. [17]“James Joshua,” Life Sketches, image 49, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, CHL.https://catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/d7b053f9-32ee-4ad3-b5e8-516aa6d9f7fe/0/48?lang=eng

      18. [18]Utah Tract Books, DGS 7115138, vol. 23, p. 47, familysearch.org.

      19. [19]Moroni Ward to Joseph F. Smith and “Counsil,” 14 Dec. 1901, Joseph F. Smith Stake Correspondence, 1901–18, CHL; Amos Wright to “My Dear Loell,” 24 Dec. 1901, Amos R. Wright Letters, 1885–86, 1901–1902, 1914–15, 1918, CHL; Amos Wright to Joseph F. Smith, 31 Dec. 1901, Joseph F. Smith Stake Correspondence, CHL; Moroni Ward to Joseph F. Smith, 16 July 1902, Joseph F. Smith Correspondence, CHL.

      20. [20]Ward, interview, 1 Aug. 1945, p. 16.

      21. [21]Washakie Ward General Minutes, 1902–33, 1943–62, vol. 6, p. 21, 24 Mar. 1918, CHL. “Lamanite” is a term for Native Americans derived from the Book of Mormon. See “Lamanite Identity,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history.topics.

      22. [22]Washakie Ward Sunday School Minutes, 1905–10, 15 Oct. 1905, p. 9, 15 Oct. 1905, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 245, Record of Members Collection, CHL; biographies of Ammon Pubigee and Moroni Timbimboo.

      23. [23]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, p. 25, 12 Apr. 1908, CHL; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 49, CHL; “George M. Ward,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org; biography of Yeager Timbimboo.

      24. [24]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 245, Record of Members Collection, CHL.

      25. [25]Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178053, vol. B, p. 239, 7 Mar. 1912, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings of Living Couples, 1884–1957, microfilm 178138, vol. A, p. 59, 7 Mar. 1912, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings for the Dead, Couples (Includes Some Living Spouses), 1884–1943, microfilm 178066, vol. G, p. 433, 15 Mar. 1912, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings of Children to Parents, Logan Temple, 1884–1943, vol. D, p. 339, 14–15 Mar. 1912, FSL.

      26. [26]“Indian Becomes ‘Paleface’: Religious Movement Grows,” Salt Lake Evening Telegram, 1 Feb. 1915, 14.

      27. [27]Edward Gibbs, interview by Charles Dibble, July 1945, transcript, p. 13, CHL.

      28. [28]2 Nephi 5:21. Other relevant Book of Mormon passages include 1 Nephi 2:21–23; 2 Nephi 26:33; 2 Nephi 30:6; Jacob 3:5–9; Alma 3:6–10; Alma 23:6, 18; Alma 53:20–21; Helaman 6:1–9; 3 Nephi 2:14–16; and 4 Nephi 1:2, 17, 20, 36–38. For additional perspectives concerning the “skin of blackness,” see “Race and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Topics and Questions, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics.

      29. [29]The Book of Mormon: An Account Written by the Hand of Mormon, upon Plates Taken from the Plates of Nephi (Palmyra, NY, 1830), 117 [2 Nephi 30:6; emphasis added]. See also Royal Skousen, Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, vol. 2, 2 Nephi 11–Mosiah 16 (Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 2005), 895–99; “Lamanite Identity,” Church History Topics, Church History, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, churchofjesuschrist.org; and Kyle R. Walker, “‘As Fire Shut Up in My Bones’: Ebenezer Robinson, Don Carlos Smith, and the 1840 Edition of the Book of Mormon,” Journal of Mormon History 36, no. 1 (2010): 1–40.

      30. [30]See Heber J. Grant, Ninety-Sixth Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; Held in the Tabernacle and Assembly Hall, Salt Lake City, Utah, April 4, 5, and 6, 1926, with a Full Report of All the Discourses (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1926), 138; “Effective Works of Sunday School Shown at Meet,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 10 Oct. 1927, 2.

      31. [31]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, p. 189, 14 June 1914, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 6, p. 21, 24 Mar. 1918, CHL; see also Papago Ward General Minutes, 1891–1976, vol. 4, p. 45, [25] Nov. 1907, CHL; Papago Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, pp. 4–5, 28 Jan. 1912, CHL.

      32. [32]“Indian Becomes ‘Paleface,’” 14; Papago Ward General Minutes, vol. 10, p. 344, 17 Nov. 1935, CHL; Gibbs, interview, July 1945, p. 13; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 49, CHL.

      33. [33]Papago Ward General Minutes, vol. 10, p. 344, 17 Nov. 1935, CHL; Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 96.

      34. [34]Joseph Fielding Smith, Answers to Gospel Questions (Deseret Book, 1960), 3:122–23; Russell M. Nelson, “Let God Prevail,” Ensign or Liahona, Oct. 2020, 92–95; “Race and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Topics and Questions, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics.

      35. [35]Spencer W. Kimball, One Hundred Thirtieth Semi-Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; Held in the Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, Utah, October 7, 8, and 9, 1960, with Report of Discourses (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1960), 34; Larry EchoHawk, “Someone’s Concerned about Me,” Ensign, Dec. 1975, 29–30.

      36. [36]“Race and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Topics and Questions, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics.

      37. [37]Historian W. Paul Reeve contends that in the 1830s and 1840s, Latter-day Saints were commonly viewed as being too inclusive in matters of race. Critics focused on the universalist message of the Book of Mormon, including the assertion that “all are alike unto God.” (W. Paul Reeve, Religion of a Different Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness [Oxford University Press, 2015], 23.)

      38. [38]Utah Death Certificates, 1904–51, DGS 4122550, file no. 420, 1 Oct. 1920, familysearch.org; “Deaths and Funerals,” Ogden (UT) Standard-Examiner, 3 Oct. 1920, 10; Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 96.

      39. [39]Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 96; biography of Willie Ottogary.

      40. [40]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 49, CHL.

      41. [41]“Oldest Resident of Malad Valley Dies,” Ogden Standard-Examiner, 5 Feb. 1942, 15.