Sina Pedersen Christensen
SINA PEDERSEN
Handed down in family
Date written, by whom, unknown
Sina was born 17 March 1838 at Gerup, Viborg, Denmark; to Peter Sorensen and Anna Elizabeth Winkler.
At age 8 she had to knit a stocking a day to help her mother who knitted for a living. She also worked on a dairy farm and was eventually hired as head cook.
Sina was petite (5' tall) and had dark hair and gray eyes. She was baptized at age 24 on 18 October 1862; she was very devout and faithful. She had to walk 4 Danish miles to attend Church.
When Sina and a girlfriend left Denmark for Utah, the railroad had been completed, but there were still many hardships to a trip of this kind. She went directly to Moroni, Sanpete, Utah as she knew others who had gone there to settle. Shortly she met Rasmus Peter Christensen and they married at the Endowment House in Salt Lake City on 28 April 1873. He already had one wife, Maria, so Sina was his wife in polygamy. He had had two wives' in Denmark, but both had died.
Sina had four children: one little girl drown in an irrigation ditch.
When polygamy was stopped, Sina and Peter and their family moved to Sanford, Colorado for a few years.
She had her right hand amputated after having it mangled in a small grist mill, when she tried to retrieve a rock from the mill. Doctors were unskilled in those days and Sina lingered between life and death for many days. The family and many friends prayed and fasted for her recovery. She did get better and even learned to do her housework left handed. She even learned to knit again; she would wrap a handkerchief tightly around her wrist and fasten the knitting needles into it.
When it was safe they returned to Moroni, but due to the law prohibiting polygamy, they were no longer man and wife. Peter now lived with Maria, but would visit Sina every day to see to it that she had everything she needed.
On 26 May 1905, Sina died at the age of 67. She had gone to Salt Lake earlier, but when they found she had cancer of the stomach, they sent her home because there was nothing they could do at the time.
Peter lived to be 92 years old, he died in 1913.
Submitted by Vickie
© 2001 Vickie L Nielsen and family