Article published Tuesday, July 21, 1959 in a Salt Lake newspaper, B Section:

Two Pioneers Cite Rigors Of Frontier Life In Utah

A close brush with marauding Indians and a birth on board the ship Paris were the outstanding pioneer experiences of Mrs. Josephine Erickson Halverson and Mrs. Harriet Paris Sweeting Clawson.

Both residents of Salt Lake City are among the seven surviving Utah pioneers still living in the stats. The arrived here prior to 1869, the year the transcontinental railroad was completed. Both were infants at the time.

Cites Experience With 2 Indians

Mrs. Halverson's experience with the Indians came during the summer of 1865, when she was only a few months old.
A young mother was walking alongside a wagon up ahead of ours when two Indians galloped up to the train, picked her up and carried her away, Mrs. Halverson said. They stunned her husband with a tomahawk and left him lying on the ground.
She related that the seven-year-old son of the couple came running back to her parents' wagon to tell them about the tragedy. The mother was never returned, she said.*
When her family arrived in the valley, they were sent to Gunnison by Brigham Young.
"Father was a mason," she said, "and was sent to build houses down there," Mrs. Halverson recalled.
She remembered living in a dugout after she was married while waiting for her home to be completed. That was in 1881 when she became the wife of Oliver Henry Halverson.
She also recalled going out with the rest of the towns-people of Gunnison to watch Brigham Young arrive in town.
Mrs. Halverson will be 95 on Dec. 27, having been born in 1864 in Norway.
She had six children and estimates that she has about 35 grandchildren as well as several great-grandchildren.
Mr. Halverson died in 1936.

* "Brother Frederick Grundvig came into camp with an arrow fastened in his right hip. He and his wife Jenssine were about a quarter of a mile from camp, she being very tired, when a band of Indians came towards them and with a blood-curdling yell started shooting, while some of them took Jenssine, put her on a horse and took her away, her beautiful blond hair flowing in the breeze. Their little son Severin, who had been riding in the wagon, came sobbing to Martha, saying that the Indians had stolen his mother. Her fate was never known. Soldiers came from the Fort and joined in the search but to no avail. Everyone in the wagon train was saddened by this, but especially so was Martha and Erick. These were the dear friends who had come with them from Norway. All the rest of her life Martha wondered and prayed for this dear friend. Now she comforted little Severin as best she could." – Found in DUP Museum, History of Erick Erickson, written in 1956 by Eva Ericksen Chatelain

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Obituary:
Josephine Erickson Halverson, 94, 474 Westminster Ave., (1910 South) died Monday, 7 a.m. in a Salt Lake hospital of causes incident to age.
Born Norway, Dec. 27, 1864, to Eric and Martha Anderson Erickson. Came to United States and crossed the plains to Utah by ox-cart in 1865.

Married to Oliver Henry Halverson, Gunnison, Sanpete County. Feb. 17, 1881. He died in 1936.

Survivors: sons and daughters: George H., William Hugh Halverson, Mrs. Allie H. Metcalf, all Salt Lake City; Harold C. Halverson, Phoenix, Ariz., 19 grandchildren, 39 great -grandchildren, 2 great-great- grandchildren.

Funeral Thursday, 10 a.m., 260 E. South Temple, where friends may call Wednesday, 6-8 p.m., Thursday prior. Graveside services, burial 3:30 p.m. Gunnison City Cemetery.
-- Bio researched and posted by Nadine D Sharpe, Grand-Neice of Josephine E Halverson