The Needham family traveled to the Salt Lake Valley in 1851.  Further research is needed to determine which company they traveled with.  The Needham family included John and his wife Sarah Ann Booth, and their children John Joseph, Mary Ann, and Robert Platt, who was born and died en route.  John’s father, James, and his sister, Eliza, also traveled with John. 

Around 1842-1843 John traveled to Nauvoo sailing on the “Yorkshire.”  His parents and siblings followed in 1850 sailing on the Josiah Bradlee.  John’s writings state, “My dear mother died, in coming up the Mississippi river, bound for Nauvoo.”