Sophia Larsen Andersen ~ Index
I was born on 7 February 1853 at Egesborg, Præstø, Denmark. In the spring of 1862 I was baptized into the Latter-day Saint church by Christopher Jensen, a missionary of the church then laboring in Denmark.
The same year, in April 1862, in company with my father's family (Magnus Larsen, Sr.), we left our home and journeyed to Copenhagen by boat. After remaining in Copenhagen for two weeks making preparations to sail for America, we left on a German sailing ship. Our ocean voyage lasted six weeks. During the trip, the youngest member of the family, a baby girl, (Bolette Larsen) age one and one-half years died and was buried at sea.
The ship's company furnished our food, which was very poor and hardly fit for human beings to eat. The drinking water was bad and thirty-two of the passengers died on the voyage. In June 1862, we landed at Castle Gardens in the state of New York. After resting here for a few days, the entire company of emigrants left for Florence, Nebraska. The first part of our journey was made by train until we reached the Missouri River. There we were taken by riverboat the rest of the way to Florence.
On our arrival at Florence, we were met by ox-teams sent from Utah by the church (P.E.F.). Our trip across the plains lasted about six weeks. The company of emigrants walked the entire distance from Florence to Great Salt Lake City. The wagons being used to haul provisions and a few other necessities. The days were long and were used to good advantage in travel. The evenings were spent in resting, singing and prayer.
We arrived in Great Salt Lake City, 1 October 1862. After spending a day or so there we left for Brigham City. On arriving there my father and family stayed a month trying to find work. Little was accomplished and so we left for Mendon. On arriving here, father went to work helping harvest. My mother helped in starting a home by knitting and spinning for people. Our family was contented to settle and make their home in Mendon. The children spending their time gleaning wheat, helping with housework and other tasks to help make a living.
In November 1871, I married Andrew Andersen. Our first home being in the old Bigler lot in the southwest part of town. Later we moved to our present home and have lived here for fifty-seven years this coming summer. I have had ten children seven are now living. My husband having died in 1922. I am seventy-nine years of age. I read without glasses and hope I shall live to enjoy the years to come.
Life Sketch
Sophia Larsen was born in Egesborg, Præstø, Denmark, February 7th, 1853 to Magnus Larsen and Mary Hansen. She attended school in Denmark, was baptized April 1st, 1862 by Christopher Jensen, who was a missionary to that part of the country. They left Denmark in 1862. After crossing the ocean in a sailing vessel, they landed in America at New York. (…at Florence) where they were met by ox-teams. She walked all the way across the plains, arriving at Great Salt Lake City, October 1st, 1862 in the Captain Joseph Horne company.
They came to Mendon the same year, where she spent her girlhood days. She was active in the ward. It was very hard for the Danish people, as they could not talk or understand the English language. She attended school and her first teacher was Adam C. Smyth. She learned to spin and knit, also to weave cloth. She said she could take the wool from the sheep and make clothes for herself. She could remember the wounded soldiers being at the church house, after the fight at Battle Creek with the Indians and P.E. Connor's Army. On the 13th, of November, 1871 she was married to Andrew Andersen by Daniel H. Wells in the Endowment House at Salt Lake City.
To this union was born three daughters and seven sons. Catherine, Otto, John, Magnus, Ezra, Mary, George, William, Anna and Walderman. William died in infancy, the rest grew to be men and women. Mary died leaving a little daughter, Hilda who father and mother adopted, adding one more to the Andersen family.
She endured many hardships as there was no doctor to care for these poor mothers or relieve their suffering when they needed care. Their courage was endless. Always thinking there was something better that was in store for those who were faithful. In 1873 father had completed a new comfortable home. The family had lived in this about a year when father was called to settle in St. George. He sold everything and was ready to go when a call came for him to remain in Mendon. So father bought the place where we are now.
After moving, Auntie (Father's first wife, as we were two families.) suffered a paralytic stroke and was helpless most of the time for four years. And during this time the wind blew the roof off the old shack, so once again we were crowded into two rooms. Mother cared for my Auntie, so faithfully. So people have said, along with her own family, she was a hard worker and could manage well. She wasn't a public worker, but in later years she served as a Relief Society teacher.
As years went by, better times came and the latter part of her life she had plenty, at least all the comforts that could be given her. After she became ill, which was a number of years, she was well taken care of. All she needed for comfort and the little pleasures she was able to take for two and one-half years. She was unable to be up much of the time. She died the 6th of May, 1939.
It is my wish each and every pioneer could have the care and comforts that this wonderful mother of mine received.
Notes…
Sophia Larsen Andersen does not tell us here the name of her sailing ship here, but from reading the accounts of the four different sailing vessels from this time period, the Athena comes the closest to matching her experience. This ocean passage was one of the most difficult of all the sailings of the Latter-day Saints. Her family seems to have been in the Joseph Horne company, with which they traveled from Florence, Nebraska across the plains to Great Salt Lake City in the fall of 1862.
Sophia Larsen was a plural wife to Andrew Andersen. Katherine Sophie Sorensen, a daughter of Nicolai Sorensen and Magdelena Olsen Sorensen was his first wife. They were married in Denmark prior to coming to Utah in October 1858. She bore her first and only child, Lydia Ann Alvira Andersen, in the back of a covered wagon coming down either Echo, or Emigration Canyon. This unfortunate and untimely event partially paralyzed and affected her for the rest of her life. She passed away 10 May 1882. Sophia Larsen helped to take care of her all the time she remained with us. She performed a very nurturing, kind, loving act for her sister wife and husband. Our family has always thought very kindly of Sophia Larsen Andersen and her family.
The top, self penned history was written sometime in 1932. It was most likely created for the Mendon Camp of the Daughters of Utah Pioneers and would have been presented at a monthly meeting by her. The second life sketch was given in late 1939. Sophia Larsen Andersen would pass from this life on 6 May 1939 and is buried in the Mendon cemetery, near her husband.