Faces and Places of the Past: Ane Catherine Jensen Hunsaker

Ane Catherine Jensen Hunsaker (1843-1927)

As told by her daughter, Margaret Hunsaker Hawks or Maggie,
"My mother, Katherine Jensen was a beautiful dainty woman with a proud carriage, kind and generous especially to the poor and unfortunate. She was born in Norlundy, Galand, Denmark February 12, 1843 to her parents Hans Peter Jensen and Ane Marie Clawsen and died September 15, 1927 in Honeyville, Utah. She was about 10 years old when she sailed across the Atlantic Ocean with her Aunt Julia Jensen (her father's, Hans Peter Jensen, sister). Catherine's mother had died shortly after the birth of her fourth child, leaving her and her three other siblings motherless. After sailing to America on the Forest Monarch 1853, Katherine Jensen crossed the plains with her uncle Jensen in the John E Forsgren company." The company left May 21, 1853 and arrived in Utah September 29, 1853. They said the progress was slow with the roads being muddy and bad, but still averaged about 15 miles a day.

We know back in Denmark, Catherine was baptized February 12, 1851 as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints with her father and mother in attendance. Also there in Denmark, before joining The Church, Catherine's father, Hans Peter was a iron foundry or steel mill factory owner and a preacher for a group of three hundred or so Baptists. Once the family joined The Church, the family experienced persecution for their religious beliefs with a hostile mob breaking windows to their home and camping outside their home trying to kill Hans Peter. For these four small children, those events must have been so unsettling.

By 1852, Hans Peter and family were selling all they owned in preparation for journey to America. Catherine's aunt Julia (her father's sister) was taking care of the her and her siblings as Hans Peter was about preaching the gospel and gathering saints. Hans Peter came to America's Salt Lake City later than his first four children in October 1854 with a new wife, Sarah Josephine Clausen. This new step mother, Sarah Josephine, would be the one to take care of the first four Jensen motherless children, but was never very good to them. After she had children of her own, she was very partial to her own children and unfair to her stepchildren, including our Ane Catherine.

Later, Anna Mariah Clawsen's children received some of their mother's inheritance, but Sarah took this money to build a house for herself and her sister. Catherine's brother, John, said that he had to learn to read and write by himself while herding sheep on the hills near Mantua, Utah. Frederic, the youngest brother, died of the measles while sleeping outside in a granary in the middle of winter. Catherine and her sister Anna had to go out to work when they were very young.

Catherine was 13 years old when she went to work for Eliza Collins Hunsaker, the first wife of Abraham Hunsaker. Eliza felt sorry for Catherine and employed her mainly to help her and to give her a place to live. Catherine, who always loved Eliza, appreciated her kindness and called her "Aunt Eliza."
Where was Hans Peter Jensen to advocate and meet the needs of these first four children? I have a hard time processing and accepting his treatment and neglect of these children and even the malnutrition they experienced in their youth.

Catherine married Abraham Hunsaker on 15 November 1858, just before she was 16 years old. She became the mother of 10 children, all of whom lived to maturity except two. For the first part of her married life she lived in the Big House in Brigham City.

When Abraham moved to Honeyville, she went there to live in about 1874. For many years she lived in the house by Salt Creek, west of Honeyville. She moved into Honeyville later. While in Honeyville she cooked for the older boys who farmed and herded livestock.

She had many experiences with stray Indians who came begging for food. She was always afraid of the Indians, and one time took her small children and hid out in a cornfield for several hours until some Indians had gone away from her home.

Catherine was called "little grandma" as she only weighed 90 pounds. According to her brother John, this was no joke, however, as she had had to contend with hunger much of her life. Catherine never had very good health, although she lived to be 84 years old. She had a nervous condition, probably brought on by malnutrition in her early life. She was a faithful little lady and expected all of her children and grandchildren to be ladies and gentlemen.