CARLISLE, Richard & Jane Field

Members of the family were baptized at various times in 1849 and 1850. Richard became the Presiding Elder of their branch. In 1851, on the “Good Ship Ellen,” they emigrated to America, except for their oldest son, Thomas, who came a year later. On their way up the Mississippi River, Jane died in St. Louis on 24 June 1851. She had done the washing for a woman afflicted with the dreaded cholera, so common among emigrants on that river. Jane caught the disease and died almost immediately. It must have been very difficult for Richard to manage his large family during the years following Jane’s death. First he had to get the whole family across the Plains, then provide a home for them in a new land. The bereft father and his motherless brood stayed to work in St. Louis during the remainder of the first year. The youngest son, Richard, hired out to a Mormon family and came west with them, the first of his own family to arrive in the Valley. The oldest son, Thomas, had by then joined the rest of the family in St. Louis.
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FREESTONE, Thomas and Ann Fall: Perseverance!

Their journey across the plains was an arduous one, but late in 1853 they arrived in American Fork. One year later the family moved to “Mountainville” (later named Alpine) where they lived in the fort for protection against the Indians, while they began to re-establish their affairs. Exerting all their efforts, they partially overcame their hunger by eating roots, pigweed and wild onions, and beat back enough crickets to raise a full crop of grain. In spite of their many trials the hardy family hung on to their testimonies and endured.
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MAUGHAN, John Harrison & Sarah Mariah Davenport

Mariah learned midwifery from her mother-in-law, Mary Ann Weston, the second wife of colonizer, Peter Maughan. She was set apart for her midwifery duty by Peter Maughan and spent many successful years in this service. She earned little pay except hearty thanks, and brought almost all her patients safely through their ordeal. It was expected that a midwife might be available for other medical service. During a winter epidemic of boils, which seriously afflicted both children and adults, Sarah Mariah had a dream one night in which she saw a blue mold under rose bushes. The next day she and John went to an area where wild roses grew abundantly, scraped away the snow and found the blue mold. They collected a quantity of the substance, brought it home and made poultices which, when applied, completely cured the boils. Later, people wondered if this might have been a form of penicillin. But without question, it was a giftof Divine Providence.
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FERRELL, Maggie Anna: A life history

At Pueblo they laid over for a day and a half to wait for another train to come through the mountains. The mountains were so steep that the only way to get the trains up over them was to put one engine on front and the other on back (one to push and one to pull) up the steep hills and then to hold them back as they went down the steep grades. Maggie was very frightened of the mountains and very homesick. When they were on the high ridges where Maggie could look down into the canyons she was very sure that they would fall down into them. The high mountains did not look very beautiful to the little fifteen year old from the low rolling hills of the Bluegrass country of Kentucky, and Tennessee and Illinois. She was very thankful when they reached Salt Lake City and the long trip was over.
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