Mette Jensen Johnsen/Johnson

Mette's mother died when she was sixteen years old.  At an early age, Mette learned to do all the duties of housework and helped to provide for her siblings in all the ways she could.  She became an expert weaver.

At the age of thirty-two, she sailed to America.  Her father purchased a team, two cows and supplies for their journey to Utah.  Mette walked and led the cows all the way across the Plains.  They arrived in Salt Lake City on September 9, 1855 with the Cosgrove Wagon Company.  Cholera broke out in their company and many of the Saints died on the Plains.

They went to Ephraim, Utah, where her siblings Niels and Mary had gone.  That winter, Mette went to Spanish Fork to do weaving and housekeeping.  When she returned to Ephraim the following spring, she had earned a sheep and some flour for her winter's work.  While she was gone, her father had built a house and she started housekeeping for him again.

At the age of thirty four, on February 13, 1857, Mette married Rasmus Johnsen in President Brigham Young's office in Salt Lake City, Utah.  They settled in Ephraim, Utah.

Inasmuch as she was already an expert weaver, that is how she spent a majority of her time.  Her services were much in demand because of her ability.  she wove for ten cents a yard.  She helped her family survive in the times of depravation by cooking roots.  She could make molasses out of beets and soap out of sage brush ashes.  She was very retiring in nature and loved to help people.

Children: 

Martha Kirstine, 19 May 1858

Rasmus, 8 April 1860

Matilde Marie, 6 February 1865

(Source: Pioneer Women of Faith and Fortitude, Volume II F to L, International Society Daughters of Utah Pioneers, p. 1593)