Phoebe Roseltha Wilcox was the tenth of 12 children born to Samuel Allen Wilcox and his first wife Martha Bolton Parker. She was named after her Aunt Phoebe Wilcox (Woodland). She was born at Hamburg, Fremont, Iowa, before the family moved to Cedar Fort, Utah County, Utah in 1861. They traveled across the Plains with the David H. Cannon Pioneer Company. In Cedar Fort, Phoebe finished growing up, and was courted by John Henry Berrey. They were married in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City 20 December 1875. They moved to Bear Lake County the following year and settled in Cottonwood (now Dingle), engaging in stock raising and farming.

"They were prospering nicely, having erected and were occupying a new little home, when she was stricken with typhoid fever. She had this terrible disease two weeks when her baby, a boy, was born on April 29, 1886. He was very weak and delicate and took a great deal of care, but he lived. A little daughter, Luella, three years old, took the fever and died on May 11, 1886. The father attended the funeral of their child and came home with a heavy chill. He battled the terrible disease for a short time but he lost the battle on June 10, 1886, at the age of 32, leaving his wife with three small children, the baby then six weeks old, The oldest child, a boy of six years, contracted the disease and laid between life and death for several weeks. Phebe has often said, "Had it not been for my children I could have died easier than have lived." But this thought kept up her fighting spirit and she went bravely on."

". . . on Dec. 18, 1888, she married Lewis Grant Christie. In the spring of 1892 they sold the home and land, bought more cattle and drove them to Canada. It was a long cold winter they spent there and they lost a great many of their cattle from exposure to the wind and sleet. The following spring, 1893, she and the children returned to Idaho. She bought a place in Wardboro. As soon as her husband disposed of the property in Canada and returned they bought more land and established a home where they lived until his death which occurred Dec. 22, 1915, at the age of 84."

"After the death of her husband she bought a home in Montpelier where she spent the last few years of her life. She died May 26, 1925 at the age of 68 years."

Excerpts from her life sketch written by her daughter Martha Berrey Mourtsen for the Samuel Allen Wilcox Family Bulletin # 8, 1951.



contributor Eileen Lentz