Happenings or Incidents, How Your Father, My Husband,
Andrew Borgeson,

Found the True Gospel
by: Necoline Emily Borgeson
(Transcribed from the original)

Andrew was the father of Emily Charlotte Borgeson Brown
who was the mother of Julia Romania Brown Peterson

Santaquin, Jan. 16, 1928

Happenings or incidents, how your father, my husband, found the true gospel preached to him by some Mormon Missionaries.

It was in the winter of 1860, with a lot of snow, and property owners had to keep the Highways clear with snowplows and shovels. So a lot of men was [sic] busy at work, and two men came along, and your Father thought that the one that spoke first was an Horticulturist being as he had a booksack over his shoulder as they used when taking orders.

His name was Peter Beckstrand and the other, Christopher Hullberg. He had never met them before, but some in the crowd had and began to ridicule them so he soon found out they were Mormons.

Well, at dinner, he (your father) took them in and he tried his best with the Bible and other books, but they explained the Gospel so plain to him that it set him to study the books and tracts that they left with him and it kept on snowing for 3 days, so the Elders was snowed in and had plenty of time to preach.

Shortly after he embraced the Gospel, which was on the 13^th of August 1860. He was called to labor as a local missionary in the Raastock branch, Goteborgs Conference, and on one occasion, he came to a place where the woman had gone to sleep setting by her Spinning Wheel. As she answered the knock at the door, she exclaimed! “Is it you Borgeson? I just now dreamt that my mother that is dead, long ago, came to me and said the one who comes in your house has got a message of good tidings to bring for both you and me, and you shall accept it.” Well, he told her the principals of the Gospel and she believed it, and was baptized and went to Utah, and lived in Grantsville. She went to the Temple and also did the work required of her for herself, and for her mother too.

He was a very zealous missionary. He preached, and baptized quite a few. At this he had a lot of opposition.

The officers of the Law with the Clergy at the head called him to appear in court and there brought false witnesses against the Mormons and so on, and in the month of August 1862, put him in the Vennersborg State Penitentiary in Sweden for the time of 28 days on a diet of water and bread for the Gospel's sake. Now, the law of the land is to let the prisoner for the time of 28 days have what is called the prisoners fare every 5^th day, but he never got any. He was a Mormon and that must have been the reason. The size of the bread was similar to our jackcakes, and one of them every day. And in the middle of the night the jailer went through the corridor calling loud the number of the cell, and the inmate in the cell had to repeat it, or if they did not, a loose piece in the door was slammed down, and the prisoner had to get up and put it right again.

In 1863, he emigrated to Utah, and at Florence (a place where the emigrants were fitted out for their further journey across the plains) they had to empty their trunks and leave most of their stuff there, empty their featherbeds, and sleep on the empty feathertick on the ground and put their little belongings in a sack, and walk the whole way, except from Salt Lake to Provo. He lots of times wished that he had not left some of the papers at Florence, such as the Court's proceedings. He had paid for them, and took them along just for curiosity.

While at Florence he bought a cow, and yoked her up beside of an ox and she did fine. Old Polly was a greatgranddaughter of her. She [Polly] was a red cow with white face and long horns. Most of you can remember Old Polly. She did not like children, but sometimes she would shake her head at them, and act like she would hook them.

Well, your father came to Provo in the fall of 1863, and came to Santaquin in the winter on the 10^th of January 1864, and lived there the rest of his life.