Personal history of Ella Gilbert Nielson
Ella on right with unknown young lady.
I was born Oct 21 1885, in Gillespie, Fayette,Pennsylvania. My father's name was John Gilbert who came from Scotland on June 9 1874. He landed in America and settled in Pennsylvania. Julia Ann Federer became his wife the 27th of May 1879...(Ella writes that they had three children, Greenland, Chrstina and herself, however, another child was listed on family records as Andrew and in mortality records of Gillespie, Pennsylvania, I found a record of a Elexander Gilbert who died in Jan 1880 who is linked to John and Julia as his parents on census record. Julia was a twin, so the question arrises as to whether she gave birth to one or two children that passed away, one may of been stillborn or died shortly after birth, and one a little later. Julia Corry)
After mother died, father let my Grandmother (Christina Aikman) Gilbert take us. She did what she could to take care of us , but she was not well, so father let me go to his one aunt's place to live and then later to another aunts.
Christine Gilbert Ramage Robertson
Then there was a dear lady that tried to adopt Christine, but she would not consent to be separated from her daddy, and she cried out most of the time. The lady gave her everything to make her happy, but she refused to be her little girl, and father had to take her back home. He also had to hire help to care for us children.
Then when I was 4 years of age my father married again. My stepmother, (Annie Givens Gardiner Gilbert), was a good housekeeper and kept us children clean and well clothed. She was Scotch and taught me her language or her scotch twang which was a terrible embarrassment to me. When I started school it was such a handicap that I did not learn my own language, and would have welcomed a mouse's hole to crawl into to get away from the fun I created in the school room among the students.So my education was hampered from the start. I rebelled about going to school to face that uproar, but it didn't seem anyone cared whether I went to school or not so I was out of school most of the time.
We did not have order when women taught school. There were big boys who were almost grown (compared) to us small first graders all in one room. And the teacher who taught was a woman related to the rich farmers so the poor didn't get much attention. We changed to different schools.
My brother never attended the country school where I mostly attended. I had to walk about two and a half miles to school over high snowdrifts in the winter so I rarely went in bad weather. The other school was called the Troy Town school. We had a man teacher, and when he had trouble with the children, he would send one out to get a willow.
He never used it that I remember. Another threat or story he told the children was there was a graveyard up on the hill, and that seemed to make them think. I was in the first grade when I went to his school.I can still remember a big chart with our lessons, we had the alphabet on our page with all its forms and other patees with beginners' reading and spelling and also numbers. Books were scare. We had a slate and pencil to write with and a wet rag to erase with.
The Steamboats passed up and down the river; we had our schoolhouse built high upon the hillside, I mean at a safe distance from the high water. The school house was on the opposite side of the hill from my home so this hill I am talking about separated my home from the river.
The river was the Monongalia River which at that time was the main transport by steam shipment of coal and commerce and passengers, by steamboats, tugboats, barges, and all such commercial purposes. There were locks spaced to level off the swiftness of the force of water so that it could be used safely. The river generally froze over completely in the winter.
This usually closed the mines and until the ice broke up we walked across it many times. Otherwise we went in what we called a rowboat or skiff. When the river was clear of ice we could go across the river in this manner to visit relatives that lived on the opposite side of the river or go on excursions on different occasions.
Our relatives came to us from West Virginia by passenger boat. They lived in Gladsville, (Gladesville?), and we went down the river to Pittsburgh by boat. Since we left there, a new railroad was put clear through our side of the river to Brownsville, Pa.
My father worked the coal mines from the time he was eight years old. His father would take him to work with him. They would go down into the mines before it was light and stay until after dark. So when his father and brother came to America, coal mining was their occupation here in America too.
Father bought nine acres of land and on this piece of land built our home. We, as I remember, had lots of vines on the hillside, a big raspberry patch, a large garden plot and some bees at the end of the house; there were about fourteen stands. They were gentle bees because they did not sting him when he took the honey. There were a few fruit trees. We kept a cow. We went to a farm and bought butter and milk.
We would go up into the hills and away out in the country to pick fruit; fruits in their seasons. We alway had plenty of jams, jellies, and bottled fruits, and we had our own honey--and we always had a fat pig to kill.
We went to the Presbyterian Church to Sunday School once in a great while, also to their picnics. They invited us to go in the summertime. We did not belong to any church.
In Scotland my step-mother was a member of the Protestant Church. I suppose my father was too. My mother belonged to the Baptist Church, and all her people did, (1) but one uncle was a Methodist. I was, my father was too.
Mother's father was training to become a Catholic Priest in Switzerland... The Priest that was over him continually drained him for all the money he could give him, either to borrow or otherwise. His mother died about this time, and he was about to bury her, and the priest demanded more money from him. So he quit the Catholic Church there and then and got another minister to finish the funeral for her.
My father (John Gilbert) joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. My Uncle Andrew Gilbert joined too, and moved to Richfield, Utah. But he had asthma there so he moved to Winterquarters, Utah, because the coal mine was a help if not a complete cure.
It was because of Uncle Andrew that father joined the Church and moved to Winterquarters, Utah. Many other converts did too. It was there that my sister (Christine)(2) met her husband and my brother (2) (Greenland) met his wife, and I met your father Niels Nielson. I married your father (Niels Nielson) in 1903. We loved each other very much.
His father's family lived there (James (Jens) and Christine Marie Smith Nielson).
The altitude was 9,900 feet above sea level, and in our times the Doctor said I would have to leave the high altitude on account of my heart.
In July 18, 1905 Julia was born. We named her after my mother (her name was Julia Ann Federer). People were always telling about my mother whom they loved very much. Julia, my daughter was like her for every one loved her.
My next child was James Clifford, he was born on Aug 3 1908. He was very fair complexioned and such a sweet contented baby. He died when he was 10 months old lacking 7 days. He died 28th of May 1909. Our next baby was a girl.
We named her Elva Christine. She was born January 9th, 1910. She was dark complected like Julia. Then came Thora Ella, she was born Nov 3, 1911. She had dark hair at first, but later it turned a very pretty blonde. John came next. We named him John Gilbert, after his Grandfather Gilbert, and he was like James and had a very fair complexion and white hair. After a short time we came to a strong desire to move on the farm which your daddy had bought about two years before in Cedar View, Duchesne County, Utah. I had never seen the place, but anything was better than raising my children in a mining camp, and it was beautiful to us. Your fathers family tried to persuade him not to make the move, but we had the homeland and we both were anxious to get on the land, which we did in 1916.
We didn't have much to start with, just a team and a wagon and what we could put in the wagon. We started with a real pioneering job the moment we left our home in Winterquarters, Carbon Co. Utah, but I never could be sorry, in the move the Spring of 1916, although, we went through such a lot of hardships.
Leroy was born 24th of March 1918, and there wasn't even a floor in the one room home. But we thought we were rich with such a nice black-headed addition to our other lovely family of 3.(Elva had also died.) When you don't know what the hardships are before you, you keep trusting in Him from whom all blessings flow; and Father in Heaven blessed us with his own measuring stick. Glen Edward was our next lovely son, but he was very delicate and he was born Aug 7 1920. After he was out of his babyhood he just didn;t seem to get along good and gave me a lot of care and worries. We had a lot of sickness with all of them, tonsilitis, measles and mumps, all children's diseases. John was sick for a long time. Leroy had a sickness we feared also.
Stanley was our 8th child, 5th son. He was a big healthy baby and was never sick or if he was at all he came out of it in a hurry. Stanley was born Nov, 29, 1922.
Irene came after Stanley. She had enlarged tonsils, earache, a lot of sick spells. She was born Nov, 6 1924. Calvin came next, he was a very even tempered and completely contented if he was taken care of properly, and a good baby like Stanley. And then if some unavoidable neglect he was still wonderful. When he was six months old, Jules had to share Calvin's attention from Mama. Julia died 5th June 1927, and the doctor said I would have to nurse him to save his life, which I did. But it wasn't long until those two babies were sitting side by side holding their bottles with their fat chubby hands, hardly giving anyone trouble. Calvin was born Nov 12 1926, And Jules Clifford Perry was born June 4 1927. Their was six months difference in their ages, Julia, his mother died shortly after he was born, and he spent his life with us for a little while, or until he was 4 years old.
The came Joseph Federer. He was born 23 Sept 1931. He was our seventh son, a strong healthy baby boy, except he was born with (enlarged) adenoids and he got worse as he grew older. While he slept foam would work out of his mouth. I thought it was snuffles and I kept vicks in his nostrils until the doctor examined him. He said he had enlarged tonsils. He never got over his troubles until both tonsils and Adenoids were taken out.
Jules and Calvin were very much attached to each other. His father remarried and took him home, and the separation from me and Calvin was very hard on Jules. (Loyal Perry married Thora, Julia's sister and Ella's daughter. Ella was very unhappy when Jules was taken from her).
Now I will give a sketch of my husband Niels Nielson.
Niels Nielson was born in Richfield, Sevier Co. Utah, June 8 1883 to James and Christina Smith Nielson. He attended school in Richfield. When he was 16, his father moved to spring Glen, Carbon Co, Utah, on his brother's (Cris Nielson's )farm. They farmed their farm a short time, and then moved to Winter Quarters. This was the first time I ever saw him when they visited the Gilberts. They had settled in Richfield and had been neighbors and good friends at Richfield. So Naturally they stopped for a few days to visit as they passed so close to them.
Grandfather Nielson had worked in Winter Quarters previous to this, but had not moved his family there. He had been seriously injured in the mine when he first worked there and was in a Salt Lake Hospital for sometime. They moved there when Niels was old enough to work in the mine. We got better acquainted and soon after we started to go out together. We were married June 17 1903. We loved each other very much and our married life was very happy. He worked at a great many jobs. Finally to get along better he took a Scranton School Course. After that he was able to get paying jobs. So from common jobs he began to climb up- better jobs-first fireman, then engineer, then mechanical job and technician. He learned mechanical work from William Stevenson. They became good friends. Also this man was an Englishman who later sent for his family to come from England and they made their home in Winter Quarters.
We moved from Winter Quarters to Sunnyside in 1905. We lived there 18 months and moved back to Winter Quarters. Shortly after that move we lost first James Clifford. He was born Aug 3 1908 and died 28th of May 1909,
and then Elva Christina was born Jan 9 1910 and died April 9 1910.
After that Niels quit Winter Quarters work and went on the railroad.
We were about to move to Scofield where we moved after he took the railroad job to Richfield or some other farming settlement when he got bumped off his job. Because of a slump in his work the board was down past him so he was without a job so he went back to Winter Quarters as a yard foremen. From this job they put him on the boxcar loaded, and from then on remained steady until 1916 when we moved to Cedar View, Duchesne, Utah. He went back to Winter Quarters to work to pay his taxes during the terrible siege of flu that hit the country and got the flu. But he was fortunate to recover while a great many died. We did not have the flu at home on the farm.
Later on he went to Castle Gate, Carbon Co. to work and there he had pneumonia and almost died. He had gone five months without coming home to see his family, and John and LeRoy did not know him. So he decided he would never go away and stay that long again. But he still had to go after that many times to keep things going until we got a dry herd of cows. He tried to get me to move back, but I refused to move my family to a mining camp. (While we lived in Sunnyside his mother wrote him and asked him to get me to come and stay with her. So he sent me back to Winter Quarters for a visit. I was there for a while and then he came and stayed as long as his work would allow, and we went home. We got a message to come at once, that she was dying, but before we could get on the way, we got another wire that she had passed away.
She died July 18 1906 on Julia's first birthday. She was buried in Richfield, Utah).
On the farm in Cedar View, Utah, it was very nice. The children seemed to enjoy it in spite of our hardships. We always had plenty to eat after the first two years. Church was about a mile away. We knew all the people. We had a school in Cedar View for the first few years, and then they began to centralize schools and put on buses to take the children to school. This destroyed the growth of Cedar View, and it never amounted to much after that.
Julia died while we were in Cedar View just after the birth of her first child. She died with Albumin, and I took care of the baby and raised him until his father remarried. Julia married Loyal Perry and then he married Thora four years after her death.
We had five children born in Winter Quarters, Utah, and six were born in Cedar View, Utah.
1. (George Andrew Federer who was born in Greensboro, Greene, Pennsylvania, worked as a miner and later as a preacher in Morgantown, Monongalia, West Virginia. I have done extensive research on Ella's mother's mother's people who appear to have also been of the Methodist faith-Thompson Line "Preston County, West Virginia Online History Book" Julia Corry).
2. Christine was married to Tom Ramage April 4, 1900, he died on May 1, 1900 in a Coal Mining explosion. She had a child named Thomas John Ramage, b. Jan 12, 1901, later she married Oscar Robertson and had more children.
3. Greenland F Gilbert married Margaret Jane Jenkins b. August 12, 1883, they had three children; Joseph Howard, John Hughie, Greenland Hollie. Greenland died on Nov 14 1907. He is buried in Scofield, Carbon, Utah.
