Cyrus Hubbard Wheelock was an early leader in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Among other positions he was the first president of the Northern States Mission. Wheelock was born at Henderson, Jefferson County, New York, and was baptized in 1839. Shortly afterward, he served as a missionary in Vermont. In 1856 he had just returned from a three year mission to Great Britain, and he loved the members of the Martin Company “dearer than his own life.” Cyrus Wheelock was sent out as a rescuer, and at one evening meeting after the Martin Company had been found and brought up into the cove for protection, he offered a memorable prayer so “remarkable” that Josiah Rogerson vividly remembered it 50 years later. Filled with empathy and heartfelt emotion, he raised his hands heavenward and pleaded with God to have mercy on the suffering saints. He asked God to “instantly remove him out of the way by death,” if for any reason the sins of his own life were at the root of their present plight. Wheelock settled in Mount Pleasant, Utah Territory, and wrote several hymns while living there, including Ye Elders of Israel.
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