Fanny Fry Meets the Sister She Feared Lost — Sarah Recognizes Her Riding in Rags Over Big Mountain (1859)

The day the George Rowley Handcart Company crossed Big Mountain in 1859, sixteen-year-old Fanny Fry — barefoot in rags, in a torn sunbonnet — was riding horseback in advance of the entire company, having just learned to ride. A wagon carrying well-dressed ladies passed her, and one of them cried out, "There goes my sister." It was her sister Sarah, from whom Fanny had been separated at Florence, Nebraska when they joined different companies. Sarah had already reached Salt Lake City and had come out with Brother and Sister Eddington prepared to camp overnight with the handcart company and fetch some of them, bringing a quarter of young beef, half a lamb, and pies and cakes for Fanny to divide among her friends. Fanny arrived in Salt Lake City on September 6, 1859 — her seventeenth birthday — after months of fearing her family scattered across an ocean and a continent.