Life Sketch of MARY BENSON LARSEN

Mary Benson Larsen was born in a little log cabin in Salt Lake City,
Utah 27 February 1856. Her parents, Metta Christina Erickson and
Peter Benson, had emigrated from Bornholm, Denmark, for the gospel.
Her father was an expert wheelwright.
Her family was very poor and the year before Mary was born the
grasshoppers destroyed most of the crops. Just prior to her birth
her mother was very ill. She craved some white bread and there was
none to be had until the wife of Bishop Wooley sent her some which
was much appreciated.
As a child she suffered the hardships of pioneer life. She, with her


brothers and sisters, would go to the fields and glean the grain left


by the harvesters and took it home and threshed it. Her mother would


spin the wool, weave the cloth and make it into the family clothing.


As the children grew, they helped also.
She was a very intelligent child, quick to learn and had a remarkable


memory. Before she was eighteen months old, her mother left her lying


in the crib, locked the door and ran to the neighbors on an errand.


While she was gone serveral indians came, tried the door but finding
it locked raised a window and reached in and took a white shirt of
her father's from a chest near the window. Although Mary was so very
young, she remembered how the dark faces of the indians frightened
her and how they mimiked her as she lay crying at the top of her
voice.
When she was eighteen months old, her parents moved from Salt Lake
City to Lehi where another sister, Martha, was born. There they
lived in a fort as the indians were very troublesome. One day when
she was three years old she ran away to American Fork, a distance of
five miles. Her parents were terrified until they found her. At the


age of nine, while playing with a group of children, a larger girl
coaxed them to go swimming. As they got out to dress they saw a
number of indians coming toward them and they ran for home. When the


parents heard the story they were frightened and also very cross at
the children.
Mary was baptized in the Lehi mill race by Israel Evans and confirmed


by John Woodhouse in 1866. Her first school teacher was Charles D.
Evans. She loved school and would do anything to get to go. She
went to the first Sunday School organized in Lehi and won a hymn book


as a reward for punctuallity and attendance.
It 1868, when she was twelve, the family moved to Clarkston. They
lived in the old fort east of where Clarkston is now. Her father had


married Kersten Erickson, her mother's sister, while in Lehi, so
there were two families at thihs time.
She was vacinated for small pox in 1896 by sister Quiqley. The
operation was crude but effective. Sister Quiqley first scratched
her arm with a needle to make it bleed, then spit on the wound and
rubbed some small pox virus into it. The virus was obtained from the
scab taken from a small pox patient and brought to Clarkston from
Farmington. She was very ill from the vaccination, but survived to
nurse many people afflicted with that dread disease without ever
becoming a victim of it herself.
The family lived in Clarkston for a year and a half. Then father
helped to survey the town of Newton, where he plowed ground and
planted grain, built a house and moved the family. Mary helped
prepare sugar cane to be hauled to the molasses mill in Smithfield.
She was extremely quick and expert with her hands. At the age of
twelve she would go to her grand-mother's, spin four skeins, twelve
knots to a skein, four threads to a knot and be through at four
o'clock ready to go back home.
She was a person of great faith. At the age of fourteen she had such


a wonderful testimony given her, that lived with her all through her
life.
The incident, as told by her to her children and grand-children, is
as follows: "one evening the family had all retired before me and
were asleep. I blew out the light and undressed. We had just one
room and I slept on the floor, in the south west corner. My father
and Aunt were sleeping in a bed in the North east corner. Aunt had a


small baby. I sat down on the bed, leaned on my elbows but couldn't
lie down for some unknown reason. My eyes just seemed to be glued to


the door. The moonlight was streaming in through the window east of
the door which was in the south wall of the room at the foot of my
bed. I lay there watching for sometime. All at once, a white
personage stood in the doorway. It was beautiful. It remained there


for quite awhile, long enough for me to get a good view of it. At
lenght it began to move into the room, across to father and Aunt's
bed. It moved so slowly and smooth. Its feet did not seem to touch
the floor. You can imagine how my eyes would stare then, at seeing
the personage move to father's bed. It moved so slowly and when it
reached his bed it slowly bent down over him for some time. At
length it straightened up and began to ascend toward the ceiling.
There was a hole in the ceiling leading to the attic. As it reached
the opening, it remained still for a few minutes and then a white
cloud seemed to envelope it, remaining for some time and then
disappeared. I sat transfixed during the whole time. I could not
move or speak. I was not afraid. It was a peaceful, wonderful
feeling. I have often thought of it since, when I have been alone at


night, but always had a peaceful feeling about it. I have wondered
if I should have spoken, but I feel I was permitted to see that for
my personal testimony.
She was married to Hans Peter Larson 12 June 1871, at the age of
fifteen, in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City. She had three
children: Nephi, Joseph and Loretta.
She was active in the church. She was a choir member, sunday school
teacher, counselor in primary, when it was first organized, and later


president. She helped clean the Logan Temple. She was a relief
society teacher during an epidemic of typhoid fever, and in
recognition of her work, at that time the Bishop asked her to be
President of Relief Society when she was 28 years old, but she felt
she was too young and would rather teach. She washed and laid out
the dead, and made burial robes for them for may years.
She had the only sewing machine in Newton. Dr. Elizabeth Shipp gave
lectures to the mutual girls at her house. She took a dress making
course from Dr. Shipp and used to sew and help other people with
their sewing. Her mother thought she was so good in sickness, her
hands so small and efficient, that she always wanted her to take a
nursing course. She was quite sickly for awhile and was baptized for


her health, which was restored.
Her mother died with her tenth child in 1876. Mary was twenty years
old then, and missed her mother very much, as they were close
companions.
On 11 November 1879, her father married Christina Neilsen of Newton.


Her father, Jens Peter, had twenty four children.
She took a course in nursing and midwifery from Dr. Shipp and
practiced under Dr. Parkinson. She was very ill with typhoid fever
at one time, but on recovery she went on nursing. She would go any
time of night, when called to nurse, hail, rain or shine. One time
she was going to Smithfield with a man in a snowstorm. He had a high


spirited horse and they tipped over and the man said: "Sister Larsen,


I think more than ever of you now. If you had made a wimper the
horse would have run". She drove a horse and buggy alone, anytime of


night or day. At one time when she was nursing a woman with a baby,
the patient was very ill and the husband annointed her with oil and
asked Mary to seal the annointing. Knowing that she had not the
authority to seal, she asked the Lord to accept the annointing and
heal the woman. When she went home, she asked the Bishop if she had
done right and he told her that she had.
She was in more than a thousand homes nursing the sick but she lost
the count of the number of babies she brought into the world. One
woman, whom she nursed many times said: "It always seemed like an
angel of mercy had come when she stepped on the porch, everything
seemed alright".
Her eldest son died 12 December 1894 while attending college.

This story of Mary Benson Larsen was never completed due to her
death.