Sorensen Family Life in Utah—
History of the Nicolai Sorensen family in Utah. Settling first in Mill Creek and then moving to Pondtown in Utah County, (now known as Salem, Utah) during the 1858 "Utah War," the Sorensen family finally made its way to Mendon, Utah in the early spring of 1859 with Peter and Isaac Sorensen laying out the first claims for the family. Nicolai and the younger children came in the early winter of 1859. This page and links will be used to detail the story of the Nicolai Sorensen in Utah, with strong ties to their new home in the Cache Valley and Mendon.
The painting above by William Hill, a descendant of Nicolai Sorensen's daughter Christena Sorensen Hill, shows a wagon and team of oxen moving north just above Mendon, as it is today. The 'hogs' backs shown as the two smaller mountains in the mid-background. I still plant the garden when the snows are gone from the top of the "hogs backs."
The wonderful muzzle loading rifle pictured above is thought to have belonged to one of Nicolai's sons — Peter Sorensen, it is reported to have production markings from the mid-1850's and has been in the loving, succesive care of Phillip N. Sorensen, Phillip Virgil Sorensen, Maurice Owen Sorensen and the current owner and care taker Kenneth Sorensen. We thank him for the photo and history of this very interesting part of the Sorensen family history.
