The Miraculous Healing of Thomas Briggs’s Withered Leg

Thomas Briggs (born 1832) was an early Latter-day Saint convert from Hull, England, who later immigrated to Utah and settled in Bountiful, becoming known as a prolific journal writer whose writings record numerous instances of healing through faith. His first recorded healing was his own. From early childhood — possibly from birth — one of his legs was afflicted as a “withered limb” that had stopped growing and was very painful. His parents consulted many physicians, but nothing could be done. In 1848, while the family was living in Hull, yet another doctor was consulted; his diagnosis was that nothing medically could save the limb and that the boy would not live much longer. That same year the Briggs family had been baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and their home served as a gathering place for local Church meetings. Upon hearing the hopeless prognosis, Thomas resolved to seek divine healing: he asked the Latter-day Saint elders to join him in prayer, determining that if his prayer was not answered he would resign himself to death. A special prayer was offered on his behalf at one of these gatherings in the Briggs home. The next morning he awoke to find his withered left leg the same length as his right, and within a few weeks it was equally strong. The story, first carried as family lore, is also recorded in biographical writings about Thomas Briggs and is consistent with the prominent place healing by faith occupies throughout his own journal. Note: this account concerns Thomas Briggs, the adult pioneer and journal writer born in 1832 — not the thirteen-year-old handcart boy Thomas Briggs of the Edward Martin Company (1843–1856), who is memorialized separately at the Pioneer Children’s Memorial.