. . . I will now give a brief account of our experiences in emigrating in the year 1860 compared to now.

My parents, wishing to be well prepared with good clothing and bedding when they arrived at their destination, had enough new clothing and bedding made to fill two large boxes which my Father made extra strong. These boxes were about the size of a large trunk. These they packed solid with good clothing and bedding besides what we could carry in our grips.

They were just beginning to build the first railroad ever known in Switzerland, and I remember well that instead of nice cushioned seats and backs like they have now, they were flat, thick plank seats without any backs to them. They surely did get hard and tiresome in the long run. Other than this we got along fairly well until we came to what they called the North Sea.

There we were hurried down a step ladder into a tightly enclosed box ship covered on the bottom with straw. The stench that met us, coming up out of the hole where we had to go down, was enough to turn anyone sick.

The ship did not much more than get started till a severe storm came and sailors had to put a lid over the hole tightened with some kind of pitch. This closed out all the fresh air and the ship seemed as though going over waves like high hills. The people soon got awfully sick to their stomachs, and there was no light in the ship all night. That was a terrible night for all the company and never to be forgotten, but in the morning when the sea had calmed and we could get out into the fresh air and the beautiful sunshine it seemed to me almost like a resurrection from the dead. [p.40]

While going across England to Liverpool it was quite interesting to see herds of cattle and sheep and quite large herds of swine now and then.

Our company was told to buy some cooking kettles and coffee cans to use on the ship. This we did, after which we were all hurried down into the sailing ship. After the ship started the people got their food, such as potatoes; beans and peas, apportioned to them raw. In the ship there was a kitchen with a large stove and Negro cooks, to whom they could bring the cooking kettles with the raw food to cook. I remember one time when father got his kettle on the stove and came back to be with us, when he thought the food had plenty of time to be well cooked he found that his kettle had been taken off of the stove without being cooked at all. Afterwards he thought it better to stay and see that it would not be set to one side as there seemed to be far too many passengers for the room on the cookstove when they would like to get their food cooked.

We never had bread to eat, but some awfully hard "tack" that we could not eat without soaking in hot coffee for a long while first. I remember well, one time when we were all very hungry after father had been gone nearly all the forenoon trying to get our food cooked. At last he came back with it uncooked. He said that the kitchen was so crowded with people all the time that the Negroes got mad and drove the people out with sticks of wood. So we had to go hungry lots of the time during the two months and three days (if I remember right) it took to cross the ocean, as the winds were against us a good part of the time and drove the ship backwards sometimes for a few days. It seemed like there was no end to being on the water. We sure felt to rejoice when we got to see land again. . . . [p.41]

BIB: Stucki, John S., Family History Journal of John S. Stucki (Salt Lake City: Pyramid Press, 1932) pp. 40-41 (CHL)
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