Annie Hicks Free
For They Had Faith Lesson Booklet (December) written by
Lenore M. Ruesch
As an example of great faith, "Grandma Fee" has
always appealed to me as a very special, worthy person. She was a handcart pioneer, and she met many
tests of faith throughout her life. To
her dying day, at the age of 89, she was strong in the faith, never wavering, "enduring
unto the end"
Her life has always been an inspiration to me. I have cherished the memory of one who was so
strong in her convictions; and I am proud that I knew her well when I was
young. Her strength had been a guide to
me specially when my own faith was not as strong as it is now. I have told my children so many stories about
Grandma Free that they too revere her memory.
My daughter (Marilyn Ruesch Schneider) a talented artist, has made a pencil
portrait in our home from the only photo I have of Grandma Free, and guests in
our home are introduced to Grandma via this framed artistic reproduction. Of all my pioneer ancestors, she stands out
above all the rest for her faithfulness.
Grandma Free, Annie Hicks Free, was really my great-great
grandmother, mother of my mother's mother.
My grandmother Louesa Free Rock, in writing of her said "It gives
me a great deal of pride of write this brief history because I was always proud
of my mother."
She (Louesa Eve Free) wrote the following history:
"My mother, Annie Hicks Free, was born January 8th 1837
in Barking Essex, England, the younger daughter of Daniel Hicks and Hannah
Wenlock Hicks. Her only sister Louesa
Hicks, was two years her senior.
Her father, being a sailor, was away from home much of the
time. He was captain of a ship which
left England a few months before mother was born. One of the first things that she could remember
was looking forward to the return of her father, She would say many times a day, when she saw
a man that she didn't know, 'Is that my father?'
Her mother laughingly said, ' No, be off with you, your
father's a black man'. When he came he
was unshaven and very rough looking with long black hair and black beard, and
mustache.
Her mother was very anxious for her to be nice but when she
was her father she said, crying, 'Oh my father is a black man. She was four years old when he returned,
never having seen him before.
On his last sea voyage he became very sick and from then on
was a confirmed invalid thus making it necessary for her mother to secure work
in the work shop. While yet a small
child, my mother was taken to the work shop with her mother. She was so small that she sat on a stool and
learned to knit. At a very early age she
says, 'As a child I was very devout, praying and asking God for guidance and
firmly believing that He would protect me from all wrong. And surly I have been
saved many times from most certain evil'.
The only schools available at that time were private schools
which were very expensive so her mother taught her to read and write. However, she was very studious and learned
very rapidly.
We have no record of any of her youthful experiences and
amusements.
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Annie Hicks Free:
On the twenty-third day of May, 1856 I sailed for America on
the ship Horizon, beginning my journey to Zion.
I crossed the plains with the belated Handcart Company of Edward
Martin. We underwent numerous hardships
and lost many of our good and faithful band along the way.
I have been asked to relate an incident or two that might be
of interest to you. One which I recall very clearly occurred as we crossed the
Platte River. The stream was very strong
and the water bitter cold making it very hard to cross. In the company was a window with her
family. Her oldest son, a fine young chap,
had started across the river with his handcart but the current was so strong
that he was borne downstream. Seeing the
boy's condition I ran down the bank of the river and went out into it in time
to catch the boy and his hand cart. I
helped him to short but he was almost frozen.
In the evening when the company made camp the boy's mother was going out
to gather chips of wood but the boy insisted upon going himself. When he was been gone quite a long time a
search was made for him and he was found frozen to death with sticks in his
arms.
Lousea Eve Free:
Another incident which I well remember hearing my mother
related I will give briefly; One bitter
cold day they were forced to make camp early because it was impossible to go farther
without help. A prayer meeting was
called and they prayed to the Lord for relief.
Immediately when they arose from their knees a young man shouted, 'Looks:
A horse-man is coming'. The company
looked off in the distance but could see no one.
The young man persisted and in a short time they could all
see a speck in the distances. They
watched patiently as he came nearer and nearer.
When he arrived he brought the good news that relief was near...
Mother reached the Valley on the last day of November with
not one friend to meet her. She was
taken to the home of a brother Ellerbeck where she did housework for which she
was paid 75 cents per week. She also did
their knitting, sewing and embroidery work.
On March 5th 1857 she was married to my father, Absalom
Pennington Free, who was a Patriarch of the Church. She was the mother of seven children, all
whom grew to man and womanhood, and survived her.
Mother was a women of rare ability. She was possessed of a power of discernment
that she could foretell things to come.
She was a great lover of good books, Charles Dickens being her favorite
writer, She could remember so many
places that he wrote about in England and she knew well that he did not
exaggerate. His descriptions were so
clear.
She was a gifted writer and wrote many beautiful poems. For many years she was secretary of the
Farmers Ward Relief Society and her records were kept beautifully.
Mother was a dignified women who was noticed wherever she
went. Her later life was devoted to
reading and needle work. She lived very
comfortably on her income from the farm where she lived by fifty-six
years. Her death came at the age of
eighty-nine years and seven months, dying on August 27, 1926 at her home, 370
East 21st South, Salt Lake City, Utah."
My Mother, Gertrude Tan Rock McFarlane, wrote the following
comments about her grandmother:
"When I was a small child, I remember Grandmother Free
sewing a great deal and ladies coming to her home to be fitted. At that time I didn't realize she was doing it
to make her living, but later I did. I
knew that while she sewed I could sit beside her and she would tell me stories,
recite poetry, or tell me her own life's story.
She told me much about the Gospel and how she knew for herself that it
was true, and then instructed me how I could find out for myself. As I look back now I realize that she was
very sorry for me when Winnie (Gertrude's older sister) died because she told
me many times that Winnie was our binding link to Heaven and that I would see
her again. I dearly loved to visit with
Grandma and to her dying day I ever missed going over there each time I went
home.
In the Old Farmers Ward Relief Society Grandma was a secretary
of many years and on those meeting days I waited at school and walked home with
her . We had no sidewalks but walked
right down the middle of the road. She
had a beautiful voice and she would sing familiar songs. She was tall and slim and had a dignified walk. As we came home one afternoon I was embarrassed
when the Nowel boys called out after
her, "there goes Mrs. Free--walking on her dignity!". When I told her to go to their mother and
tell her to punish them, she said, "Let's rise above it."
At her knee I learned much about the Gospel and I am
thankful to her for her wonderful teaching.
Many times when she was having Sunday morning sacred hour I went to join
her. She played the organ very well and
sang many songs.
Mother (Gertrude Tan Rock McFarlane) in her written message
which was addressed "To my Children" talked of the influence of her
grandmother's faith on her own life, she says:
"I was born of honorable and upright parents and
through them was born under the true and everlasting covenant. From them and Grandma Free I was first taught
'that the Gospel was true', that it was the 'Gospel of Jesus Christ, that our Prophet
Joseph has restored to the earth'. When
I was just a tiny tot, I can remember Grandma telling me to 'get the stool'
that I always sat on and she would tell me about her life. It seems that I can almost hear her now as
she would say, and I quote, " My Father was a Sea Captain and would be
away for a very long time. I never saw
him until I was four years old and then when I did see him I was afraid of him,
because I thought he was a black man' (Her mother had told her that he was a
black man when she kept asking if her father was like different men she saw on
the street). He was of a very dark
complexion and had a heavy beard and mustache which he always wore.
When we ate our dinner they asked him how he enjoyed it, and
this is what he said " thank the Lord for this meal although it was but
small, I could eat some more if I had some more, but thank the Lord for all'. And mother said blame the man'.
My mother was a Wenlock; her uncle was the Earl of
Wenlock. Father went away again and
Mother took me with her to the 'work house' where she earned her living. It was there I learned to knit as I sat on
the stool by Mother's side. My life was
uneventful until I heard two missionaries preaching the Gospel in the streets
of London. I loved it the first time I
hear it; it seemed so quiet and peaceful.
I embraced the Gospel and was baptized on January 17, 1855 in the White
Chapel Branch in London England.. shortly after my baptism and before I was
confirmed by relatives sent me a terrible book against the Mormons, marking it
in many places for me to read...."
When I heard Grandma's testimony I knew she told the truth
and I had faith in her. She taught me
that the Lord heard and answered prayers.
She always said the Lord is close by and will protect you in time of
danger.
She always held a sacred hour in her home on Sunday and we
Grandchildren were always welcome. She
dressed up in her best dress and then put on a white apron, then would go to
the organ and play and sing religious songs.
Then she read the scriptures.
Those were wonderful experiences to me as a child and it was then I
learned to love and read the Bible."
Lenore McFarlane Ruesch:
Grandma Free influenced my faith too. When I was a child I remember visiting Grandma Free often. She always greeted us with a smile and often
would tell us pioneer stories and sing with us as she played her little foot
pedal organ. Especially do I remember her
singing the old pioneer song, whose word still echo in my memory:
For some must push and some must pull
As we go marching up the hill,
And merrily on the way we go
Until we reach the Valley- "O"
Grandma Free was truly a person of much faith. Even as a Child she believed strongly that
God would protect her. When she first
came in contact with the gospel she "loved it", and was promptly
called upon to prove her faith. Her
relatives all tried to talk her out of joining the church. Her own story tells of this. A marvelous manifestation came to her because
of her faith in God. She received a
direct answer to prayer and she never doubted after that. In later life when others pointed the
failings of even some of those high in the Church, she didn't let that affect
her faith. She said "People and
principles; People sometimes change, but principles never do."
Once she had joined the Church, she gave it a full lifetime
devotion. She proved her faith when she
set out along without a relative or friend to come to Utah from her beloved
England. She broke up with a young man
she had planned to marry because he didn't approve of her joining the
Church. She was among those sturdy folks
, who, lacking funds for wagons, pushed handcarts all across the plains. She belonged to the ill-fated Edward Martin
Company which was the last to reach Utah in 1856. After a rescue group out to food to those who
survived (of the 575 persons who started out 135 died en-route) she and the
other survivors arrived in Salt Lake City on November 30th 1856.
She tells in her brief writings how she along with others
almost froze to death on the journey.
She claimed her life was saved only because a women chided her into
getting some water, asking her if she was going to shirk her responsibility and
let "an old women get it".
Even that experience didn't diminish her faith.
When she reached Deseret, alone and friendless, she was
given a job at 75 cents a week. She
worked at that until she married by great-grandfather, Absalom Pennington Free,
a patriarch of the Church and a member of Brigham Young's second company, which
arrived in Utah in 1848. He had children
older than she was. One daughter
Emeline, was the wife of Brigham Young; and two daughters married Daniel H
Wells (Louisa and Hannah). Grandfather
Free was almost 61 years and grandma Free just 20 when they were married.
Once again her faith was tested when she had been married
only a short time. The young man who had been her sweetheart in England came across
the ocean and over the plains to tell her that now he too, had joined the Church
and they could be married. When she told
him she was married, both were sad.
Grandma would not even consider a divorce. She had given her vow. She told him to go away. She still loved him; so the decision was
hard; but once again her faith in the Church guided her in her actions. Her vow, to her, meant what it said and could
not be broken. She had faith that all
principles of the Gospel were right, and had had made a decision when she was baptized
to follow all of them.
Grandma Fee had a hard life. As a child, she worked at the
London Work Shop at the side of her mother.
She was poor all her life, suffering the
privation such as all pioneers suffered, and the extra suffering that
was typical of handcart pioneers. She
was a polygamist wife (one of 3 living at the time) and was left a widow at the
age of 40 with seven children to provide for and only a small farm as her share
of her husband's property. She had to
sew for a living. Yet when wealth and power and social prestige were offered
her, she proved her faith once again and rejected all those things in order
that she could live in Zion, be among the Saints, free to practice her religion
as she believed it and to raise her children in the Church.
Her mother was a Wenlock and her Uncle was the Earl of
Wenlock. Her mother had been
disinherited by the family because she married a sea captain. Proudly and defiantly she went to work in a
work shop rather than ask her family for help when her husband was away for
years at a time and their money was gone.
However, her brother, Earl of Wenlock, died without issue
and Grandma Free received official word that she was inherited the family
estates, title and wealth, but she must come to England to claim it. According to English law, it was also
necessary that she also live in England.
She would have the title of Lady, English equivalent of the European
Countess. Had she been a male, she would
have been an Earl.
Grandma Free surely must have been tempted to accept this wonderful
offer of wealth and power, but made her decision to stay in Utah and leave her
estate unclaimed. Seven after she became
a widow and had to sew for a living, she still did not claim her
inheritance. She was proud of her family
connections in a way. She named one of
her sons Wenlock. I have heard my mother
say that Granma Free often said, "When, oh when will I ever be the great
lady I'm supposed to be?"
To me she was a great lady, one of the greatest I have ever
been privileged to know. Her faith made
her great.
