Bertha Marie Hansen
Bertha Marie Hansen is my great-great grandmother.
She is an incredible woman. She was born in Denmark is 1862 and was raised by
her strong Lutheran parents. They were kind to her and her siblings, but
Denmark was in an era of war and poverty. Times were very hard for them. The
boys in her family went off to earn their keep at the age of seven, and the
girls were raised to learn homemaking skills like cooking, baking, knitting,
weaving, spinning, and needlework, as well as clothing construction as an early
age. When Bertha was fourteen she heard the message of the restored gospel from
the Elders in Denmark and became converted.
Upon discovering this, her parents and family
disowned her and kicked her out. When talking to my grandmother, she remembers
Bertha talking about the disgrace she had felt and the sorrow. She never saw
them again. She lived with her sister and was there baptized and confirmed a
member. She moved to Copenhagen where she rented a room and set up a
dressmaking business in order to earn passage to America. She traveled by sea
with a twelve-year-old companion named Wilhelmina Maria Dreyer in 1883. They
boarded the train going west to the Utah Territory. They were picked up in the
city of Nephi by Parley Rogers Young who was headed to Fairview. When they got
there, Parley took them to the home of L.P. Anderson. Bertha was supposed to
marry him, but found him married with his wife dying of tuberculosis and him
living in a horrible condition.
During the next year Parley hired Bertha to help out
at his home where his wife was dying of cancer. They eventually were married in
1884 in the Salt Lake Temple. Parley built their own little stone home. A year
into their marriage, Bertha had a dream that Parley was going to marry Eliza
Jane Briggs as a plural wife. Eliza was a crippled young woman from England.
They were married just as Bertha has her first child, Parley Absalom. Later in
the next year Bertha had another son, Jesse Leroy who is my great-grandfather,
at the same time that Eliza had her first daughter Hannah.
Parley was sent to jail a few years later for
unlawful cohabitation, which was rough for the two families. After he returned,
one of his daughters from his previous marriage died of typhoid fever. During
the next five years Bertha gave birth to five more children and Eliza had two.
When I was interviewing my grandmother, she
remembered her father, Jesse Leroy, talking about Bertha. He fondly remembered
her as a good woman who made a good home for her family. She was very capable
and talented. She would sing and dance and talk in Danish. She loved to gather
wildflowers and put them in vases to beautify her home. She was a woman of
short stature and full figure. She wore her light brown hair parted in the
middle and pulled back in a bun. She had a quiet, calm disposition.
In the summer of 1895 Bertha was expecting her
seventh child. She worked very hard that year, helping Parley lift heavy grain
sacks. The night before her baby was born she scrubbed the floors on her hands
and knees. This particular birth was very difficult for her, although the rest
had always been difficult, but Bertha died from the ordeal as did her infant
son. Parley named and blessed him that very day. None of the children heard
Bertha die that night. Some contributed the death to the hard work she did
prior to delivering, but others suspect it was a breech birth. She was only 33.
My grandmother recalled Jesse telling them the story of her death. He had said
that the light went out in their world when Mother died. They were left with
Eliza. She was not nearly as kind, generous, calm, talented, and capable as
Bertha. It was difficult for all of the children to lose her. Even though she
died when my great-grandfather was young, he remembered her for her valiance
and her kindness despite the many difficult things she went through. She was a
good woman and a great mother.
Works Cited:
-
Personal phone call interview with my
Grandmother
-
The Ancestors and Pioneers of Jesse Leroy Young
and Alice Dorthea Tucker
Compiled by: Ruth
Young Baum
George James Tucker
George James Tucker is my
great-great-great-grandfather. He was born December 1, 1861 in Mt. Pleasant in
Utah. He was the son of George Tucker and Jorgine Dorthea Svendsen who had
traveled over from Denmark. The Tucker home was a happy one, though it had been
full of trials. Each parent had endured the trials of crossing the plains. They
finally settled in their home in Mt. Pleasant. George James was their first
born child, and sadly their only child to grow to maturity.
Soon after George came his younger
sister Sophia. When George was only six, his mother died after giving birth to
two beautiful twin boys, Amasa and Louis. The twins lived only a few short
months after her because they were so tiny and immature. They were difficult to
feed and take care of. Not long after, Sophia followed them in death at only
fourteen months old. This was a very trying time for George and his father, who
were left to carry on alone.
Some beloved relatives of the
Tucker’s, the P.M. Peels, invited George and his father to live with them. They
lived there until 1868, when George Sr. married his second wife Emma Hurst.
When George was eight years old, his step-mother gave birth to a boy named
Travers. Although they were several years apart, a close bond grew between the
two. They had many travels together. My grandmother can remember her relatives
talking about George James. She remembered them describing him as being very
mild natured, of an affectionate disposition, and very easy to get along with.
Many people, especially his family, looked up to him with pride.
In 1880 George James began
courting a beautiful young woman by the name of Sarah Jane Brady. After a year
or so of courting, they were married on April 28, 1881 by George’s uncle. They
began a very happy home in Mt. Pleasant. They were later sealed in the Salt
Lake Temple. A year later in 1882, George’s step-mother Emma Tucker died. Travers
came to live with George and his wife, and Sarah Jane took the baby of Emma,
Charles, to care for. She also had her own baby, George Warren Tucker, to care
for. My grandmother remembers the stories of the two boys who were raised like
twins.
George took over the 180-acre
farm in Oak Creek. My grandmother and grandfather told of the hard times in
those days, especially for farmers. Crops were harvested the difficult way. They
eventually moved to Fairview to a one-room log house. After they were situated
George went to work at the Temple Sawmill in the canyon.
That next year, in December of
183, George and Sarah had another baby girl whom they named Sarah Jane. She
sadly passed away only a month or two later. At that time, George Sr. married
again and took his young boy, Charles, to live with him. It is understandable
that the family felt a double loss at the time. The next year they tried again,
and were blessed with a baby boy they named Amasa in November of 1884. He lived
only a short time and died. This was one of the roughest trials for the family.
Their grandmother Nancy also passed away that November, and their Uncle passed
away from a saw mill accident. That made four deaths within a year in the
family. My grandparents talked about the strength of the family’s love for each
other despite these challenges. They knew for certain where they would go, and
when they would all see each other again.
In March of 1885, George James
came home from the Sawmill seriously ill. He suffered from a kidney ailment
that killed him on March 24, 1885. He didn’t suffer long, but the family was
crushed to lose him. It added a death to the four already suffered through.
George James was only 24 years old. He was buried in the Fairview Cemetery on
the third birthday of his little son. My
grandmother talked about Sarah Jane after George’s death. It seemed as though
the life had gone out of her. She felt crushing sorrow, but always said she was
grateful for the faith and trust she had in the Lord. He sustained her through
her trials.
Works Cited:
- Personal phone call interview with
my Grandmother
- The Ancestors and Pioneers of
Jesse Leroy Young and Alice Dorthea Tucker
Compiled by: Ruth Young Baum
