OUR JOURNEY HOME Archibald McPhail emigrated from Scotland to America with his wife and two daughters in 1856. Their overland travel with the Willie Handcart Company also meant sharing a tent which housed about 20 fellow emigrants. Archibald was the captain of this...
MY ONLY SON VISIT THE ARTWORK On October 23 was a day of heartbreak for Jens and Elsie Nielson. A blizzard and the long trek over Rocky Ridge challenged them every step of the way. Tragically, both young Niels Nielson and Bodil Mortensen (a friend traveling with the...
MY ARMS FLEW UP Jacob Hawn was one of the first settlers along Shoal Creek in northwestern Missouri. He built a mill and called the settlement Hawn’s Mill; it was about a day’s walk from the large Latter-day Saint center in Far West. Hawn was not a member of the...
MOTHER’S BACK Margery Smith was a 51-year-old widow from Dundee, Scotland, who was emigrating with five children, May (22), Jane (17), Mary (15), Betsey (13), and Alex(6); and a close friend of the family, Euphemia Mitchell (22). Margery’s oldest son,...
MORMON BOY (GEORGE CUNNINGHAM) “We are now in the desert, or wilderness, a wave-like country without woods, only a few trees,” wrote Peter Madsen, a Danish member of the Willie company, on August 17, 1856. It was George Cunningham’s 16th birthday and...
MINISTERING James G. Willie was diligent in caring for the Saints on the ship, who had many needs. “I believe there has never before been a company with so many old and young, halt, blind, and lame, from so many nations, that crossed the sea,” wrote Anna...
