THE REBERS of Southern Utah, Arizona and Nevada
The Reber family had lived in a valley at the base of the Alps, in a town called Shangnau, Canton Bern, Switzerland, for eight generations of which we have record, and perhaps for many more. Most of them were tradesmen and farmers, who tended their fields carefully with the primitive tools then in use. Our immediate ancestor, Christian Reber, born in 1800, had a large family, but we will be concerned here only with the three who joined the Mormon Church and came to Utah. These were Johannes, Samuel, and Fredrick.
In 1859 the first Mormon Elders, Jabez Woodward and a companion whose name we have not yet found, arrived in this part of Switzerland, preaching of a new Gospel which had been restored in far-away America, a gospel which had all the gifts and blessings which had attended Jesus and his Apostles in olden times. Amoung the first converts were Johannes and his wife Barbara Stucki Reber, and the circumstances attending the baptism were so very unusual that they had a profound effect upon all the people who knew him.
Although he was still a young man, being only thirty years old, Johannes had become afflicted with a type of rheumatism or arthritis, which attacked the upper part of his spine until it became misshapen and twisted. As the disease progressed, a large lump appeared on his shoulder, his body bent and his hands became gnarled and stiff. In the midst of his suffering he often prayed for God’s help that he might be cured of this painful disease. One night he dreamed that he saw a clear stream of water falling from a cliff. He was so thirsty and the water looked so inviting that he thought in his dream that if he could only drink of that stream, all his suffering would be over. Then it seemed that the stream moved toward him, and he drank and was satisfied. So when he heard of the Elders in that neighborhood, he had two reasons for wanting to hear them.
Both John S. Stucki and his sister, Mary Ann Stucki Hafen tell the story of what followed and tell it in much the same way. The following is taken from John S. Stucki’s story:
“My father’s sister Barbara had married a young man by he name of John Reber, who afterwards became afflicted with rheumatism. My parents used to send me to their place from time to time,…thus I had a chance to see Mr. Reber. I saw he was getting crippled hands and his back was pushed up into a high lump. It seemed to me the hump of his back was higher than his head and he could scarcely go from the bed to the table. This he managed to do with the aid of two short sticks, and then he would groan out loud…Soon after the seventh doctor had given him up my parents sent me there again on an errand. Then it was my aunt said they had sold everything they had and had to even sell their last cow to pay doctor bills…Not long after that an old school friend of Rebers came from another town to visit him. He told Mr. Reber that a man had passed through his town who claimed that the true Gospel had been revealed from Heaven and that same Power and Authority had been bestowed…as in the days of the Apostles of the olden times…The Elder was just such a man of God as their mother had told them they would live to see, so it did not take them long to believe and become converted.
“The Elder set the time when they could be baptized, which happened to be a very cold, clear December night. They had to take axes with them to chop through the thick ice.
“They first gathered at Reber’s place where the Elder talked to them for a while. They had about a mile and a half to go from Reber’s house to where the water was deep enough to be immersed in, so my father and his brother each took turns carrying Mr. Reber until they had reached the place of baptism. After my parents and all the others were baptized, the Elder also baptized the crippled-up Reber in that icy water. He laid hands on him quickly and blessed him for the restoration of his health. Father and his brother took hold under his shoulders again to help him home, but Mr. Reber said he believed that he could walk home without help and would not need their help any more. He then threw away his two short sticks, which he had used for years, and walked home without any help.
“Two or three days later my parents sent me to their place on an errand again. While I was still quite a way off I saw a straight man come out and walk around the house. Having seen Reber walk nearly doubled up and hardly able to get from his bed to the table, I thought it was some other man. My Aunt said that it was on the very same night when he was baptized that his crippled up hands and back were all made as straight as any man’s.”
This miracle caused many to investigate Mormonism, and quite a number of people joined the church because of it. Perhaps the Stucki family was more easily converted than most others, because six years earlier their grandmother, Elisabetha Schenk Stucki, had told them that men would come from the West and would carry the true Gospel to them. She would not live to accept it herself, she said, but she hoped that all her children would. Thus Johannes’ wife, Barbara Stucki Rebr, was, from the very first, eager to welcome the Elders, and the miracle at the baptism affected the families of both.
Johannes’ younger brother Samuel (always called Sammy) was among these. He was a lively, restless youth who had spent his summers herding goats on the sloes of the Alps. The message of the Elders, delivered in broken German, appealed to him; the idea of a promised land far across the sea appealed to him also. So he was soon ready to join the church and come to America.
Christian Reber and his wife evidently felt that if Johannes wished to take the great risks of crossing the ocean and going to a strange land where people did not even speak their language, that was their own business. They were married people and on their own. But Sammy was different. He was not of age, and he should have no doings with these strangers from America. Evidently there was much bitterness in their opposition, for Sammy left home and got work to earn his passage on the boat. In all his life he never saw his family again, nor did he ever write to any of them.
Many, many years later when Sammy’s son Frank returned to Switzerland on a mission for the Church, he visited the homestead. Only an unmarried brother, Peter, was there, by this time old and bitter. He said that Sammy was dead, killed by the Indians or the Mormons in America. He must have been killed or he would certainly have written to his parents or some of his friends. Frank said, “No, he was not killed. He is my father, and is alive and well. He lives in Utah and has a large family, a large farm, and many horses and cattle.”
At this Peter became so angry that he ordered him out of the house, slammed the door, and locked it behind him.
The other two Reber brothers, Christian and Fredrick, though they did not join the church at the time, were not so antagonistic. Both were married and had families; both were established in their homes and business, so they could see no reason to take the great risk of uprooting themselves and following strange men to strange lands.
This first group of converts were very eager to gather to Zion, but the problems of selling their homes and disposing of furniture and property made them consider carefully. They knew so little of the strange land to which they were going; to them it was only the Promised Land, where the Prophets of God were living and where the true church of God had been established. Saints from all parts of the world were gathering there; they would join them at any cost. So while they viewed their loved mountains and green valleys with sorrow at the thought of leaving, they looked ahead with joyful anticipation.
They sailed down the Rhine River, crossed the English Channel, and landed at London, where they joined a group of converts from Scandinavia and England. They sailed on the ship “Underwriter”, leaving on January 30, 1860, and arriving at New York City May 1, 1860, having been on the water 13 weeks, at the mercy of the wind and waves. At one time they came within sight of the shores of New York, but a storm arose which blew them far back out to sea.
At this time Johannes Reber was 31 years old. He had with him his wife Barbara, aged 30 and daughter, Rosina. He had also a son John Jr. (Honnas, as he was later called), whose mother had been a first wife and had died. With them also was the younger brother Sammy. In her later life the daughter Rosina used to tell how good her uncle Sammy was to her on this ocean trip, how when her mother was too sea-sick to care for her, Sammy carried her about on his shoulder and entertained her.
How excited the weary pilgrims were when they landed in New York harbor! How they shouted and waved their hats at the sight of the Statue of Liberty! Some fell on their knees in thanksgiving and wept for joy.
From New York the company, under the leadership of James D. Ross, came to Florence, Nebraska, by train. George Q. Cannon was in charge of all emigration this year, and he helped them get ready to cross the plains. It seems that they traveled in the first group of the season, Captain Warren Walling’s train, which left Florence on May 30th with 160 persons and 30 wagons, mostly drawn by oxen. They arrived in Salt Lake City on August 9th, 1860. Though they had to walk most of the way, their goods were hauled in the wagons, and the trip was not attended by as much suffering as were the treks of most of their Swiss neighbors who came later on the “William Tapscott” and pulled hand carts across the great plains.
They stayed in Salt Lake City until the next fall, when President Brigham Young called them, along with some 19 other families, to go to southern Utah and plant grapes for wine. The cotton mission had been set up with St. George to be its center, and 300 families were called to go there at about the same time the Swiss group was called south.
Before the call, George Staheli, a fine musician, had been offered work in Salt Lake City, so that he might play his trumpet in the musical organizations there. He refused, however, saying that he would prefer to remain with his own people and share the lot of his neighbors. President Young also suggested that the unmarried ones of marriageable age should select their partners and have the ceremony performed before they left the city. Many of them did this, but young Sammy Reber saw no one who appealed to him especially, and he preferred to wait until he did.
The Swiss group came south under the direction of Daniel Bonelli, who spoke both English and German. They had little idea of the country to which they were coming, but they accepted their assignment cheerfully. George A. Smith reported: “We met a company of 14 wagons led by Daniel Bonelli, at Kanarra Creak. They excited much curiosity through the country by their singing and good cheer. They expected to settle at Santa Clara village where there is a reservation of land selected for them that is considered highly adaptable to grape culture. Six of their wagons were furnished by the Church.”
They were just one month on the road, arriving on November 28, 1861, about four days ahead of the first large group to come in to St. George. At Santa Clara they found a small colony of families of the Indian missionaries who had been sent here in 1854, some of them moved up the creek to Gunlock and some still living in the old fort.
How different was this land from their home in Switzerland! There were no green hillsides thick with lush growth. There was desert, barren and forbidding, desert of salmon-pink sand and sterile rock, with both plant and animal life strange.
They early surveyed the town site and marked out the lots. Then they placed numbers in a hat, which Daniel Bonelli held while each man came forward and drew the slip which designated his future home. Later they went to each place in a group, sang a hymn and dedicated the land for the use of each family, and dugouts and temporary shelters soon took shape on each.
Since they could not plant crops without water, and water meant ditches and dams, they set to work at once. Spring comes early in this land and they must get their seed in. All hands joined in the task, a twelve-hour day for a credit on the books of $2.00. By Christmas Eve they had it finished, a dam and a ditch, which had cost them $1030.00 in labor. Now they could celebrate!
Then the rain began, such a rain as none in this area had ever seen before. Their dugouts oozed mud, their clothing was soaked, their bedding damp and musty. It was hard to keep a fire, next to impossible to dry anything out. Finally on February 2, 1862, the flood began. The creek, which had been scarcely more than a trickle now became a raging torrent. The old rock fort, set back on higher ground, had been considered safe, but the stream began cutting away the banks until, as night approached, the people could see that it was no longer safe.
The night of horror has been the basis of many stories. First, they must move the precious grain that was stored there to another safe place. They could not afford to lose that wheat. Bu,t how to move it, and where? They had but few sacks, so they organized, having two people at the bin to fill the sacks, others to carry it to one of the Swiss dugouts which was high against the hill. Here the wheat was poured out onto a wagon cover upon the floor, and the man returned for another load. When the water came nearer, women and children helped, carrying wheat in buckets or pans or willow baskets, like a bed of ants moving their winter store.
Darkness had fallen before this task was finished. Suddenly there was a new danger, for fallen trees and debris had lodged higher up the stream, and water was flooding between the fort and the hill. In the darkness, it was impossible to gauge the depth, so a long rope was tied from the fort to a tree on higher ground, and the women and children of the fort organized in a solid line, one hand on the rope, the other holding to the person in front.
Someone had pitched a rude shelter on top of the hill, but it could not cover them all, and it hardly kept out the drizzle. A fire of boards and logs sizzled and sputtered in the falling rain, giving out little heat, but providing light to guide those working at the rescue of bedding and goods. Wet, shivering children whimpered. Old folks talked ominously of the End of the World. Some doubted that morning would ever come, this darkness seemed so thick. Above it all the river growled and roared, and the sound of falling banks re-echoed like distant cannonading.
Just before daylight the clouds broke and the sun rose clear, upon a scene of devastation. Only one corner of the fort was left; the flour mill, the threshing machine, the molasses mill, the young orchard –everything was gone, buried somewhere down stream under tons of silt. The dam was scooped out, the ditch along the hill almost completely erased. Now the old settlers and the new were equally destitute.
Urgent as other things were, the dam and ditch must first be replaced. Work began of February 17th and lasted until March 16h, completed finally at a cost in labor of $4000.
Those first years were a time of near starvation for them all, yet they persisted. They worked hard and lived frugally, and in 1873, just eleven years after they had arrived, James G. Bleak reported:
The Santa Clara settlement, consisting of twenty families, twelve of whom are Swiss and were sent there by the Perpetual Emigration Fund without a dollar, now have got houses, land, vineyards, horses, wagons, and cattle, and are sending 100 children to school, besides having a number too small to go. The donations they handed in to Bishop Bunker he sent to St. George, their being no poor in Santa Clara.
These people, homesick for their native land, tried to preserve their own speech and folkways. Though their children went to American schools in the daytime, they had a German school at night. Their Swiss singing school met twice a week, so that they might learn the songs of their parents. The yodels would not echo and re-echo here as they did among the high Alpine peaks, but were lost in the desert wastes. Still they practiced them. And the Staheli Band, with scores written by the conductor, became famous through out the state.
The Reber families were a part of the community and shared alike in the hardships and successes. They knew what it was to work with few tools, to struggle with alkali soil, and to see their crops devoured by grasshoppers. They also gathered pit weed greens, ego onions, and pout berries, and gleaned in the fields at St. George and Harmony.