The Golden Lion
submitted by: Kennedy White
SUP CC Chapter 4th Grade Ancestor Awards |
White 2 Golden-Lion |
White 4 Older-Mary |
White 3 Recovering Golden-Lion from Ashes |
White 5 Mary-Mothers-Home-Paragonah |
White 6 Mary-William-6-children |
by Kennedy White
Teacher: Mrs. Ruhr
Three Peaks Elementary 3rd Place
23 February 2023
Mary Williamson was born on the 13th of March in 1839, in Swinton, Lancashire, England. Her father James Williamson was 35 and her mother Ann Polit Alred was 31. Her father left the family and came to Utah when Mary was 15 years old. The whole family wanted to come to Sion and all worked very hard to meet this goal. It took the family about two whole years to save enough money. The children who came with Ann were Ellen, Ann, Mary, John, and Betsy. They were able to sail to America on a ship called the Horizon. It carried 856 Saints and the voyage took 8 weeks.
After traveling to Iowa City this family discovered that they had to wait for handcarts to be made. The reason they had to wait for the handcarts to be made is because they were struggling with carrying all of their stuff. So they decided to have some Handcarts made. Finally they joined the Martin Handcart Company and Ann and her children began the trek west. Little Betsy was only 3 years old and they hung a little cow bell around her neck to keep track of her.
One night Martin made inspections of the carts and the needed to get rid of everything they felt the owners could do without. He threw out a little iron lion, which was a toy very dear to Mary Williamson that she has brought with he all the way from England. Mary did not want to give up the little iron lion. (Later we discover rather than a toy the lion was actually a piggy bank). As they were burning all the things that had been thrown out Mary watched closely. That night she slipped out of bed and quietly but quickly went to the pile of ashes and got the golden lion out from under all of the ashes. (My grandmother Mary Albrecht who is now 92 has a painting hanging in her living room of this event.)
Mary put a string on the little lion and hung it underneath her clothing on her back. The reason she put it under her clothing and on her back is so that no one saw that she had the golden lion. She carried it this way the rest of her journey. The weight of the lion on her skin and on her back gave her a scar on the back of her neck the whole rest of her life.
Mary's family were fortunate enough to survive Wyoming. At this point they were so hungry and cold. They had to watch many of their friends freeze and starve to death.
Finally they reached the Salt Lake Valley. Her father James was there when they arrived. The family joined James in Paragonah, Utah. It must have been quite a shock for Mary's mother Ann to find that her husband had already married two other women and was soon going to marry another lady. For whatever reason she decided to not live with her husband after this. Mary's brother John, built a wonderful home for his mother in Paragonah.
Soon after Marry married William Barton at age 18. She had 10 children, 2 sons and 8 daughters and they lived in Beaver, Utah. Mary lived to the age of 84 and is burried in Parowan, Utah.
I enjoyed learning about my great great great great Grandma Mary Williamson-Barton. She is a great example to me on getting through challenges and hard times. I think it would be neat to try to find where the lion is today.