• John was a Power Loom Weaver from England. He was a teamster in the John A. Hunt company and was among the small group of men who remained behind at Devil's Gate until spring to guard the personal belongings of the emigrants who had been rescued that winter.

  In some sources his surname is spelled "Whittaker," but it is spelled "Whitaker" on the original Hunt Company roster, in a newspaper article preserved in the Journal History at the Church History Library in Salt Lake City.  It is also spelled "Whitaker" in the 1880 Utah census, as well as various death records and his christening record.

John A. Hunt Company (1856)

• Age at Departure: 23

Sources

• 1870 Utah Census.
• 1880 Utah Census, Utah County.
• Cooper, John. Statement, 10 October 1916.
• Daniel W. Jones, Forty Years Among the Indians (Salt Lake City: Juvenile Instructor Office, 1890), 62-75.
• England and Wales Non-Conformist Record Indexes (RG4-8), 1588-1977.
• Find a Grave
• Handcart Veterans Association. Handcart Veterans Association scrapbook, 1906-1914, folder 7. 
• "Immigration to Utah," Deseret News, 15 October 1856, 254.
• Jaques, John, [Minutes of meeting at Devil's Gate, 9 November 1856], in John Jaques, Collection, 1846-1920.
• John A. Hunt Company report, 1856, Brigham Young office emigrating companies reports, 1850-1862.
• Josiah Rogerson, "Strong Men, Brave Women and Sturdy Children Crossed the Wilderness Afoot," Salt Lake Tribune, 4 January 1914.
• Journal History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 15 October 1856, 2.
• Loader, Patience, [Reminiscences], in Kenneth W. Godfrey, Audrey M. Godfrey, and Jill Mulvay Derr, ed., Women's Voices: An Untold History of the Latter-day Saints, 1830-1900 [1982], 224-41.
• Perpetual Emigrating Fund, Financial Accounts 1849-1886, Ledger B, 274.
• Utah Cemetery Inventory
• Utah County, Utah Cemetery Index.
• Utah State History Cemeteries and Burials Database.