Photo Day at Bolton

The William Ogden family had been saving every farthing they could towards the cost of the voyage across the Atlantic and to Utah. It took nearly 20 years to earn sufficient funds, but by working together they accomplished the task. They were also aided to some degree from the perpetual immigration fund. Prior to leaving their home country they posed for a portrait in a local studio. Several family accounts indicate that they gave copies of this picture to friends and relatives who asked them for one, feeling that they would not again meet in this life. They gave out all that they had and people still wanted more.

I would suppose that after the photo sitting they went home to pack their travelling trunk, change into their boating clothes and climb aboard the sailing ship Emerald Isle for an adventuresome oceanic trek. However they may have had serious second thoughts if they knew in advance that this particular voyage would be remembered by church historians as the worst voyage of any that any of the saints had to endure during the pioneer migration. The culinary water was bad and serious bouts of measles and other malady's claimed the lives of no less than 37 people, mostly children, before the ship finally arrived at the New York Harbor after an 8 week journey.

What makes the above photo even more interesting is that another English family, the Edward Gledhill family, apparently also had their photo shoot in the same studio prior to their departure on the same ship. Coincidentally they would also settle in Richfield Utah (or in Vermilion to be absolutely precise). To stir the

pot of coincidence a bit more, their sons Joseph Ogden and Elder Gledhill, were called to return to England as missionaries leaving and also returning together. And just one more little connection; Thomas Ogden's daughter Jane would one day marry Thomas Gledhill's son Ivo in 1910. Can there be more??? Yes... William Ogden and Edward Gledhill each died in 1888 just 3 months apart.