Another Lost Pioneer: Found!

Elizabeth Bourne Thompson (1822-1878)

I'll just cut and paste my submission to the LDS Church History Library and their response. The important thing is that her descendants will now know that she was with her family in the Ellsworth Handcart Company.

I have been doing some indepth research on the Ellsworth Handcart Co. of 1856 in preparation for writing about my ancestors who were in the Company (Eleanor Jenkins Vaughan, her daughter, Jane Vaughan Lewis, Jane's husband, John Lewis, and their son, John Samuel Lewis). I found evidence to place a pioneer in the company who is not listed with the rest of her family in the company's lists and is identified in the overland travel database now reflected on Family Search as coming to Utah in "unknown companies."

John Oakley's journal [included in the overland travel database as: Oakley, John, Journal excerpt 1856 June-Aug.] for Thursday, 19 June 1856 records "I baptised 7 persons[.] Betsy Bourne for remission of sins. . . ." This was in Skunk Creek, near Green Castle, Iowa. I could not find a "Betsy" or "Elizabeth" Bourne in the Ellsworth or McArthur Companies (which were together at this point). But there is a large family of Thomas Bourne included with Ellsworth so I went to Family Search, Family Tree. Elizabeth Bourne, likely known as "Betsy" was the daughter of Thomas Bradford Bourne by his first wife, Susannah Lane, who died in 1829. Thomas is listed in the Ellsworth Co. with his second wife and their children who would have been step-siblings to Elizabeth. I don't know why "Betsy" was left off the Company rosters. She is not on the ship manifest with the family on Mormon Migration database either. But the fact that she is mentioned in Oakley's diary as part of the handcart companies travelling through Iowa, gives some evidence that she came with the rest of the family in 1856 (of course she could have stayed in Florence, but as she's not recorded in any other company from Florence on, it's more likely she was left out of the Ellsworth list where the rest of her family appears). I hope this is of some help in tying down when Elizabeth Bourne came to Utah.
Thank you for your attention and good work!
[edited to remove Family Search ID numbers]

Church History Library

Response to submission number: [blank]

Our response is: Elizabeth has now been listed as traveling with her family in the 1856 Ellsworth Company. You will note that I have linked the family together, added photographs, and sources. Thank you for your submission.

I love History!  :)