Endowment House, Salt Lake City

The institution of marriage should have been difficult enough without introducing the pressures and demands of polygamy to it.  So far it is not known how Nathaniel Henry Felt actually viewed being married to three wives, but consider the following:  In the first place, NHF married his 2nd Cousin, Eliza Ann Preston, in Salem (she was about 18 and Nathaniel was 22).  Nathaniel and Eliza Ann shared musical interests, scholarly discussions and both had good family backgrounds.  In about 1855, Nathaniel met Polly Pyle, a vivacious emigrant girl from England who worked in the same New York mission headquarters.  By 1856 (NHF was 40 years old and Polly was barely in her 20s) they were married in the Endowment House, but not before Nathaniel married Sarah Strange.  By 1868, the capable Polly Pyle Felt received a "release" from her plural marriage and soon became the 8th wife of William J. Silver.  In 1875, Nathaniel's  beloved Eliza Ann died from complications resulting from an accident (she was only 55).  By 1882 NHF was stripped of his voting rights in the Territory because he said he believed in the doctrine of plural marriage.  His son Joseph was hunted for 8 years by federal marshals before Joseph's former missionary companion arrested him for unlawful cohabitation 3 years after Nathaniel Henry Felt died.