Agnes Steele Hill Baker ~ Index
Agnes Steel Hill Baker, daughter of Hamilton and Jane Morton Steele was born 25 December 1833 at Galston, Ayrshire, Scotland. At the age of thirteen her mother died. Being the youngest in the family and her brothers and sisters all married, she was her father's only housekeeper for many years.
At the age of seventeen she was converted by Mormon Elders and became a member of the Mormon Church on 15 June 1851. Her father and family were bitterly opposed to her joining the Mormon Church and when told that she was going to America, her father's grief was touching. Her coming to America was the cause however, in later years of her father, two brothers, two sisters, and their families joining the Mormon faith and coming to Salt Lake City, Utah to live.
She sailed from Liverpool for America on 19 November 1856 on the sailing ship Columbua, landing in New York, on 1 January 1857. The journey took six weeks and she was seasick all the way. After landing in New York, she went directly to Lawrence, Massachusetts, making her home with her brother Alexander Steele and working in the steam loom factory until the spring of 1859, when she made the trip across the plains with a company of Mormon immigrants. She traveled with a family by the name of Piper, doing the family's cooking to pay her way. She arrived in Great Salt Lake City in the early fall.
On 16 November 1859 she married John Currie Hill, a widower with five children. 1 March 1860 they moved to Wellsville, Cache County, where her husband and one of his brothers built and operated a gristmill the following fall. On 23 September 1860, her first child, a girl (Jane) was born. January 1862, twins were born, a boy (Archibald) and a girl (Jennette). 30 June 1863 another girl (Frances) was born.
30 August 1863, her husband in company with other men were hunting a bear, that had been killing their cattle between Hyrum and Wellsville. He was mistaken for a bear by a party of men from Hyrum, who were hunting bear also and was shot and instantly killed. This left his wife in very sad circumstances, with four babies of her own, the oldest not yet three years old and five stepchildren to care for.
She married Amenzo White Baker on 19 November 1864, and moved with her four babies and one stepchild to his home in Mendon. She had eight children by him, five girls and three boys, making twelve children she brought into this world. In the early days of Mendon she used to gather straw, braid it and make hats for her husband and boys and used to help one of her neighbors weave cloth, taking her pay in cloth which she made into clothing for her family.
During her life, she was called to part by death with four of her children; a little girl, two and one half years old, a son seventeen, a daughter eighteen and a married daughter twenty-eight years of age. She endured all the poverty, hardships and privations the early settlers of Utah had to endure.
She was a member and a teacher in the Mendon Relief Society for many years and a faithful member of the church. One of her greatest pleasures was attending her meetings. She was good to the poor, needy and sick. She was a true and faithful wife, mother, friend and neighbor. In all her trials, hardships and sufferings, she never once lost faith in her religion and God. On 11 November 1904, at the age of seventy-one years, she died at her comfortable home in Mendon, surrounded by her husband, eight children and many friends. Thus ended the career of a faithful and noble woman.
Agnes Speaks…
Agnes Steele, daughter of Hamilton and Jane (Morton) Steele, born at Galston Ayrshire Scotland December 25th, 1833 and was baptised into they Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on June 15th, 1851, and sailed from Liverpool on November 19th, 1855 on the ship Columbia, and landed at New York January 1st, 1857 and went to Lawrence, Massachusetts where my brother Alexander lived, and stayed with him and worked at the steam looms till the spring of 1859. And then with my brother and family we bid good bye to Lawrence and started on our way to the home of the Saints where we landed all safe in the early fall.
I was married to John Hill November 26th, 1859. He was a widower with five children and on March the first 1860 my husband moved his family to Wellsville, Cache County where he along with his brother and Nephue were getting material together to bulid a grist mill which was in running order in they fall. And on August 30th, 1863 my husband was took for a bear and killed, the blow fill and wounded deep, five men that done the deed brought him home to my house. One ventured to open the door and ask me how many children I had, I told him nine. On November 19th, 1864 I was married to Amenzo W. Baker. His home was at Mendon, Cache County where I have lived ever since. And since then I have had eight children.
As I Remember…
My mother was born in a log cabin near the little village of Wellsville, Utah, September 23rd, 1860. She was her mother's first child and her father's sixth. Her mother, Agnes Steel, had come from far away Scotland, alone, at age sixteen— this was adventure for a young girl in those times. Her brother, Alexander, the only other member of her family to join the church, had come earlier and lived in Salt Lake City.
As a matter of economy and necessity in building up the community and the church, girls were expected to marry early and take up the responsibilities of a home and family. My grandmother married my grandfather, a windower with five children, the oldest about her own age. He, too, came from Scotland where he was born January 14th, 1814. His family emigrated to Canada when he was a boy. The lived in Toronto, and there the entire family was converted to the Church by Parley P. Pratt. Grandfather and his wife were baptized in April, 1840, and began planning to go to Nauvoo, where they arrived in 1842. Grandfather worked for a short time on the temple there. He was a carpenter-cooper by trade. In 1852 they crossed the plains to Utah.
Grandfather and his brother Daniel went north to Cache Valley where they built the first grist mill in the valley and ground wheat into flour for the neighborhood. Grandfather's wife Margaret had died and he married grandmother and brought her with his children to this new home. To them were born four children: mother was called Jane Morton Hill, the Morton being a family name; twins the next year, Jannet and Archibald; and Frances the following year. And then when mother was not yet three, tragedy stuck the family.
Bears had been coming into the settlement and destroying the carrots and corn needed for winter food. So on a Sunday night, August 30th, 1863, grandfather and his nephew Robert Hill went out to hunt them down. They hid in the sugar cane next to the corn field and waited. In Hyrum, about five miles away, five young men had come up with the same idea. They set forth and coming to the edge of the corn field, they crept silently along. On seeing a movement in the sugar cane and supposing it to be a bear, they fired their guns. Grandfather received the five bullets and died and once. They carried him sorrowfully back home and asked grandmother how many children she had. She answered nine. The children of the first family were parceled out among their father's family, and grandmother was left with her four tiny little ones. In November of the next year, she married the man whom I remember dimly as Grandfather Baker (his name was Amonzo Baker, Sr.), and they became the parents of five more children. I used to be much amused with the fact that half of mother's brothers and sisters were not related to the other half.
In this new country, life was not easy for anyone. Everyone had to work long hard hours, even the children doing what tasks they could do. All their necessities must be either made or raised, and usually both. They knitted their stockings, sweaters and mittens, using yarn which they had spun from wool that had been sheared from sheep which they had herded on the hillside and meadows. For their clothes they needed first to spin and then to weave the cloth made from flax, cotton or wool which they had raised and prepared. It was then dyed, using plants or other sources. Soap was made from fat rendered from meat, using lye obtained from wood ashes. Lard came from the fat of hogs which were killed in winter when the meat would not spoil. Hams and bacon were cured and sausage made. They made their bread, churned their butter, and wove their carpets. They invented and improvised. Their hands were never idle. After a long day of working in the field or scrubbing clothes on the washboard, they knitted or sewed in the evening. Exquisite handwork has been preserved from this period. They loved beautiful things, and even the poorest homes had their tidies and lovely pieced quilts. They were mindful, too, of their neighbors' needs and shared readily in substance and service.
Eventually someone started a store in each village and customers traded butter and eggs for shoes and calico. Doctors were few and usually far apart, covering large territory and coming only in grave emergencies. Midwives presided at births, and many mothers and babies died. Doctors, midwives and other helpers took their pay mostly in produce and often in gratitude and affection. Help was traded on the farm or in the home. Being people, of course, some were more diligent or had more native ability, but since everyone was dependent, it was to the general interest to see that no one was neglected.
This was the environment in which my mother grew up, and knowing her as I did, I am sure she always went the second mile. Life was difficult and one had little pleasure that he didn't make for himself. No one had time to worry about his rights.
What he wanted from life he had to earn. Being the oldest child, much must have been expected of mother. She was efficient, industrious and generous.