by Adell Harvey
A beatific look of pure bliss shone on Anne Marie’s wan face as she cuddled her child. “Her name’s Ammie… Ammie Margaret Jorgensen,” she whispered drowsily.
Ingrid turned, blinking with bewilderment. “Ammie Margaret Jorgensen?” she questioned, her mouth twisting in confusion, unwilling to let the name come out.
“Ammie – that’s what my little brothers always called me because they couldn’t say Anne Marie.” She smiled and looked down at her darling new baby, a madonna-like expression on her face. “Margaret Jorgensen is for her grandmother, my real Ma, the one who sent me away from Copenhagen.” Her voice trailed off, and Ingrid couldn’t determine if it was sadness or weariness that had stopped her conversation.
Ingrid was stunned, a gamut of perplexing emotions washing over her. Anne Marie was the Ammie Jorgensen she had promised to find in Salt Lake? Margaret Jorgensen was this baby’s grandmother? The locket was for her? All this time and she never realized!
Anne Marie moaned and tried to sit up, a tear trailing a path down her wind-reddened cheek. “I never knew how much you could love somebody else ‘til now. My real Ma couldn’t have loved me this much, or she’d have never sent me away!”
Ingrid fell to her knees, hugging Anne Marie, the tears falling freely from her own eyes. “Oh, Ammie, Ammie. I’ve so much to tell you! The locket I had to give up in Fort Laramie was for you, from your Ma. I had no idea you were the Ammie Jorgensen I was looking for!”
“You were looking for me?” It was Anne Marie’s turn to be confused.
“Yes, oh yes. Your Pa and Ma were so good to me in Copenhagen. I lived with them for a while. But how was I to know Anne Marie Christiansen was the Ammie Jorgensen I was looking for? Besides, you said your Ma and Pa were dead.”
“Ma and Pa Christiansen are dead. I took their name when they adopted me back in Nauvoo. But why did Ma let me go? How could she let me go? And my baby brothers, too. Frightful dreams wake me up sometimes, dreams of me and my brothers clutching a woman, crying and begging her to keep us.”
Ingrid drew her friend closer, hugging her tightly. “Your Ma and Pa loved you more than life itself,” she began. “But because of your Pa’s boating accident, they knew they could never bring you to the Promised Land, and they wanted it for you. They still grieve over all of you, and not a day goes by that Margaret and Lars don’t pray for you.”
“They loved me? They really loved me?” The news seemed almost more than Anne Marie could bear. In a drastic mood swing, she said angrily, “Then they’re also victims of that dirty, lying prophet! Imagine giving up your own children that you love because of some wicked man’s lies!”
Agitated by her outburst, Andy attempted to quiet her. “They did what they thought was best, darling. Try to get some rest.”
Her eyes blazed. “They did what they thought the prophet wanted them to do, you mean! How long are you going to defend this rotten man? How many more people are going to die before you realize that man is not from God!?” Her emotions spent, she fell back onto the bed of mailbags, exhausted.
“You’ll feel better and think more clearly when you’ve had some rest,” Andy said, slipping from the room.
A few moments later he returned, handing his sacred underwear, the garments of the holy priesthood, to Ingrid. “Wrap the baby in these to keep her warm and safe,” he said gruffly and went back outside.
The days and nights merged into one long, bitter cold vigil, with Anne Marie growing constantly weaker. Ingrid and Andy took turns at the bedside, with only short snatches of rest, cuddling Ammie close to their own breasts to keep the baby warm. Ingrid went without food herself, giving whatever she could find to Anne Marie to rebuild her strength and provide milk for Ammie. Andy, too, did without, and between them, they managed to keep the baby from starving.
With the end of October came the end of hope. Soon Anne Marie will die. Then the baby, Andy, and me, Ingrid thought. Curse that wretched man who had enticed her into this with his false promises of a special land!
Abruptly, with the passing of hope, Ingrid’s strength also passed. She sank to her knees, laid her head on Anne Marie’s chest, and took hold of her hand.
Anne Marie motioned for Andy to join Ingrid at her bedside. “I know I’m not going to make it,” she began, “and I want you both to hear this.”
Ingrid tried to shush her, “Don’t talk like that. Of course you’re going to make it.”
Anne Marie slowly shook her head. “No, I’m not. But I want you to promise to be a mother to my precious Ammie, to look after her like she was your own.”
Ingrid bowed her head, trying to avert Anne Marie’s eyes. “But I’m not going to Salt Lake, you know that.”
Andy looked as if she had hit him. “What do you mean, not going to Salt Lake? Just where do you propose to go?”
“Anywhere… as far away from the Mormons as I can get.” She looked at him defiantly. “And you’d best not try to stop me!”
“I’ll take little Ammie,” Andy offered. “I’ll bring her up like a good little Saint.”
“Oh, no you won’t!” Anne Marie cried, her weak voice seeming to fight with every vestige of strength she could summon. “That’s exactly why I want Ingrid to take her. I want to get my baby away from this evil!” Pulling Andy down close to her, she pleaded, “Andy, you know I love you. I’ll always love you. But please promise me you’ll let Ingrid take Ammie away from all this.”
The silence in the room loomed like a heavy mist as Andy fought the battle of his soul. “But what about Pa? This little one is his baby, too.”
“Your Pa didn’t care that you loved me or that I loved you. He didn’t care how much unhappiness he caused. Do you want him marrying my precious Ammie off to some old man when she’s thirteen?”
Andy winced, and the tension increased with frightening intensity. He seemed to flounder in an agonizing maelstrom, his expression one of mute wretchedness. He finally spoke. “All right, I’ll promise, though it may cost me my eternal soul.” He turned and fled from the room, looking like he’d just sold his soul to Satan himself.
Anne Marie turned to Ingrid. “I’m so tired. Please tell me more about Ma and Pa while I go to sleep.”
Only too happy to oblige, Ingrid spoke on and on, describing Lars and Margaret in vivid detail, often mentioning how much they had loved their children. “It wounds me that you didn’t get to see the locket,” she apologized. “Your Ma was so eager for you to have it. It had a lock of your grandmother’s hair in it and a drawing of her when she was about your age. Margaret said you looked just like her.” She pushed the hair back from Anne Marie’s face and smiled. “You do look a lot like the picture.”
“But the best thing about the locket was the inscription on the back,” she continued. “It said ‘May God be with you always’ and was such a comfort to me during the long trip on the Enoch Train and across the plains.”
Anne Marie smiled wanly. “I won’t need the locket where I’m going, and somehow, I know God is with me. I’ve been thinking on all those things you told me about Jesus being the only way, and I believe it.” Her voice grew weaker, and the last words barely came out in a whisper. “I think I’ll go to sleep now.”
Ingrid continued to sit by her side, listening to her breathing grow fainter and fainter until no breath could be heard at all. Ingrid felt her breast and wrist but found no sign of life. Jesus had come and taken Anne Marie to the real Promised Land.
Chapter 11
INGRID SAT THERE, clasping Anne Marie’s cold, hard hand in her own. The world and reality fast slipped away, sinking her into an inescapable blackness. Somewhere in the distance, she heard the faint cry of a baby and Andy’s voice calling her back to reality.
“Ingrid, Ingrid, please wake up. Ammie needs you.” Andy’s voice came as if from a cavern, but his face was there, right in front of her eyes, swimming crazily.
Ingrid closed her eyes and began to sink back into the black despair, but something in her subconscio
us mind fought to get out. “Ammie doesn’t need me,” she whispered into the blackness. “Ammie’s dead.”
Andy fell to his knees beside her, and slowly recognition came. “Anne Marie is dead,” he agreed, “but Ammie, her baby, needs you.”
Ingrid turned to him with a sob, the full impact of the past several days finally sinking in. Andy dropped one arm around her shoulder and with the other cradled Anne Marie’s dead body, which still had the crying baby snuggled against its breast. The three of them cried together… the baby from hunger… Ingrid and Andy for what might have been, what never could be.
A loud shout from outside the stockade broke into their mourning. “Is anybody in there? We’ve come from Salt Lake with help!”
Andy and Ingrid glanced at each other from hollow, unbelieving eyes. Was this a mirage, a common hallucination caused from weakness?
“As soon as the prophet learned of your plight, he took up donations at conference and sent relief wagons,” one of the voices explained. Soon Ingrid felt the warmth of something hot tantalizing her throat, warm blankets being spread around her, and caring arms lifting her to a wagon bed.
Her strength returning, she watched with dismay as the relief party used their mules to dig a long trench in which to bury the dead. As they lowered Anne Marie’s lifeless body into the ground, Ingrid felt a strangely bitter wind chill through her. She hoped the prophet would rot in Hell forever for the pain he had caused, for snuffing out a life as precious and promising as Anne Marie’s, for the dozens who had been placed in that cold trench. She clenched her fists. She would honor Anne Marie’s last request and get Ammie away from this evil, even if it cost her own life. The terrible system would not get a chance to do to Ammie what it had done to Anne Marie.
She clutched the baby tightly to her breast. Her first concern was how to keep the infant fed. There were no wet nurses in the relief trains from Salt Lake, nor any milk available. The provisions brought by the sixteen mule wagons were woefully inadequate for the starving masses now that the grim winter had begun in earnest.
Tearing clean cloths from the clothing she had been given, she rolled them tightly and soaked them in warm gruel, then gave them to Ammie to suck on. “A poor substitute for your mama, little one,” she whispered, “but maybe it’ll keep you alive till we get to Fort Bridger.”
Another foot of snow had fallen during the night, making the way unsafe even for the relief wagons. The desperately ill and children were allowed to ride in the wagons; all others were given something to eat to renew their strength, then made to endure more forced marches. To save room in the wagons, twenty of the strongest men stayed behind in the mail stockade and cabin at Devil’s Gate to watch over the emigrants’ meager duffle and carts.
Ingrid was filled with mixed emotions to learn that Andy was one of the men picked to stay behind. She needed his help with the baby, but escaping at Fort Bridger would be easier without his presence. He had promised to let her take Ammie away from the Saints, but could he be trusted to keep his word?
Huddled under the meager shelter of canvas, Ingrid felt the wheels lurch. The last leg of the trip had begun. In one final look back at the stockade, she saw Andy’s thin frame, kneeling at the burial trench. He had rolled a large stone over it and was chiseling something with a sharp rock.
Ingrid drew in breath. “He’s making a gravestone for your mama,” she breathed to Ammie. “He must’ve loved her an awful lot.”
The wagon wheels sank and climbed over the snow-blanketed road, the creaking dryaxled wagons groaning with their loads. Ingrid glanced in despair at her fellow travelers: women so gaunt they looked like skeletons in baggy dresses, children whose arms were as thin as wooden spoon handles. Their once chubby legs were now no bigger than iron pokers, and everyone seemed to look out from hollow, empty eyes.
There was no energy for conversation; only endless miles to plot and plan a hoped-for future. But there was no future for many of the travelers, as each evening’s campsites became graveyards for more emigrants. The walkers and stragglers often arrived at the campsites several hours later than the wagons, sometimes not arriving at the site until after midnight.
Ingrid was amazed at the stamina of baby Ammie, who gobbled the gruel hungrily from the rags. Her constant prayer was simple, Please let her live. Help me take good care of her for Anne Marie’s sake.
She tried to make mental notes of the baby’s progress, intending to write to Margaret Jorgensen and tell her everything she could about this precious new granddaughter as soon as she got somewhere civilized enough to post a letter.
They passed Split Rock, Burnt Ranch, Cottonwood Creek, the Ice Slough, and other points of interest to previous travelers on the Oregon Trail, but none of the emigrants exhibited any interest in these wonders. They had but one goal in mind… survival.
Chances of survival appeared slim as Ingrid surveyed the stark, desolate landscape that stretched out into vast white nothingness as far as her eyes could see. From horizon to horizon, the cold landscape was broken only by the interminable mounds of granite, huge hunks of rock that looked like refuse of the world thrown up in the utmost confusion.
The swirling snow finally stopped, revealing nothing but bleak, forlorn wilderness; it was the most desolate landscape Ingrid had ever witnessed. An occasional gnarled, wind-twisted tree broke the foreboding bleakness.
Ingrid squinted against the sun that was rapidly dropping below the western horizon. Faint bluish outlines mingled with the gray clouds – more mountains! Would there always be more mountains to cross?
Following a torturous climb over the wide saddle of South Pass, Ingrid gazed at the panoramic view before her. Straddling the Continental Divide, a range of mountains stood to the north. To her right were a huge butte and a series of lower hills. In between was a great saddle through which they would travel. Over that slope, she hoped against hope, was where all the threads of her life would come together. Looking out over the vast emptiness, she wondered, could a woman and a baby survive out there alone?
But she wouldn’t be alone. Hadn’t Major Crawford told her that Jim Bridger would help her? A warm flush spread through her. Major Crawford. Now there was a man she could trust. Couldn’t she? She shivered, remembering that she had trusted her very life to another man she felt was worthy of that trust. And that misplaced trust had brought her to this. Maybe no man deserved to be trusted. Maybe she would be better off to put her life and Ammie’s in her own hands.
Despite her resolve, smiling images of Major Crawford’s handsome face, memories of their happy conversations, recollections of his kindness brought a light into her eyes and entertained her for many long, arduous miles.
On November 21, they forded the Green River on a makeshift Mormon ferry, a craft built upon five flimsy canoes. The crossing was precarious and risky, but Ingrid counted it as one final obstacle before she would be free of the Mormons at last.
As they drew ever closer to Salt Lake Valley, the spirits of the emigrants seemed to lift considerably, and a few indulged in light-hearted conversation. From them, she surmised that Fort Bridger was only two days away, and Salt Lake just a week away from there. This was it. If Jim Bridger refused to give her sanctuary in the fort, she had no choice but to go on to the city of the Saints. He had to help her. He had to!
For two days she plotted and dreamed and hoped, then hoped some more. Jim Bridger was her last chance to be free of the Mormons.
As the wagons lumbered toward the fort, Ingrid’s hopes dashed. Built of pickets daubed over with adobe mud, the fort was a dejecting experience. Outside the walls were some thirty to forty tepees. Inside were a couple of disreputable cabins that bore faint resemblance to habitable houses.
The travelers were heartened upon entering the rudely constructed log cabins. For the first time in many weeks, they actually felt warmth. Bridger had heated the long, narrow structures with coal he had found in the vicinity. Ingrid sighed, letting the heat seep into her bones, which seemed
chilled to their very depths.
She looked around the shabby fort, deciding for all its defects, it was sited magnificently. Against the majestic backdrop of mountains to the south and the west, it seemed to be abundantly supplied with water, timber, and milder weather. But then, anything would look good after what she had just been through.
She wrinkled her nose in distaste. The filthy adobe floors could use a good scrubbing, somebody needed to take a broom to those cobwebs, and a little dusting wouldn’t hurt, either. This place could use a woman’s touch, and she was just the woman to offer. Surely Mister Bridger couldn’t refuse her willingness to stay and help, could he?
One look at the famous mountain man left Ingrid quivering. He didn’t look like he would help anybody! He stood staring at her from under a shabby hat, his eyes squinting in his leathery face, his mouth lost in a long, bushy beard. He cradled a long rifle in his arms, his buckskin jacket bulged over the pistol he carried on one hip, and he had a big bowie knife stuck in his belt.
“Ya wanted ta talk ta me?” Ingrid jumped, feeling herself go numb with fear. A wide grin split the beard, making the giant of a man seem almost human. Her original plan to offer to stay to clean up the cabins wouldn’t work with this man – he looked like he hadn’t had a bath in months and would be quite comfortable with dirt. Throwing caution to the winds, she blurted, “Major Crawford at Fort Laramie said you might help me.”
“Hep ya do what?”
She glanced around, making certain none of the Mormons were within hearing distance. “I need to get away from the Mormons before we get to Salt Lake, and Major Crawford thought you might let me stay here.”
Bridger threw back his head and laughed, a roar that started in his belly and shook his huge frame. “I’d hep any woman who wanted to get away from them darned Mormonites, I guess.” His voice turned to scorn. “They’re no account, and it’s the meanest kind of action to haul their women critters and their young’uns to sech a starving country as Utah Territory.”
