b: Nov. 1825 Switzerland
Anna Katherina Gubler was born in Mulibeim, Thurgau, Switzerland on 25 November 1825. She was the second of six children born to Joseph and Katherina Jack Gubler. She was baptized by the Mormon Elders on 12 June 1859 (according to Swiss Mission records), and that same fall she, with her six year old daughter Magdalena, her brother Heinrich and sister Magdalene, left for America. They left Liverpool, England on Saturday, 20 August 1859 on the ship "Emerald Isle" in a company of 54 Saints, 50 of whom were from the Swiss-Italian Mission, and four from England. Captain Cornish brought them safely to New York after six weeks on the water. Johannes Gubler, with his wife and four children, Anna Marie, Louise, Johannes (John), and Herman were also on this ship.
In Florence, Nebraska, they prepared for their western beck. Katherina, her daughter and sister came in their brother Heinrich's wagon, with a total of nine persons, four oxen, three cows and one heifer. Captain Jesse Murphy was in charge of their wagon train of 279 persons, 38 wagons, 164 oxen, and 39 cows. They left Florence on 19 June 1860 and, after a successful journey, arrived at the public square in Salt Lake City about noon of Thursday, 30 August 1860. There had been no deaths in the company but two children were born en route.
Katherina married Casper Gubler in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City on 9 November 1861. Casper had sent money to Switzerland to help bring the Saints to Utah, and she was one of the recipients. Though they had the same surname, they didn't know they were related, but through our genealogical research, we have found that they were both descendants of Hans Adam Gubler (about 1610). Katherina came down through his first wife, Klara Schmidt, and Casper through his second wife, Margaretha Wurt.
Casper had previously married a French girl from whom he was separated after about two weeks of marriage. He and Katherina had four children: Selina, Mary, Casper A., who died at age 13 months, and Jacob J. Gubler.
When Katherina's daughter, Magdalene, was 15 years of age, she became the plural wife of Casper, her mother's husband, Two years later she died when her first child, Henry was born. Katherina took him to her breast, weaning five month old Jacob, and reared him as her own son.
Katherina worked hard, helping her husband in the field and with the fruit. She was a very devout Latter-day Saint. Her son Jacob said that he often found her in the vineyard on her knees, praying vocally to our Heavenly Father...
Anna Katherina told my mother, Agnes, that she spoke to her boys in Swiss but they answered her in English. So they seemed to be able to communicate by using both languages. The boys had spoken only Swiss until they entered the first grade of school.
My mother taught us all how to make excellent noodles--a favorite dish of the whole family. She said that it was our grandmother, Katherina Gubler, who had shown her how to make them. The Swiss people are noted for their noodles, breads, etc., and I think of grandma when I am cutting my noodles very fine and thread-like. Compiled from life stories contributed by Rose Ann G. Hafen, Nellie M. Gubler, Laura G. Hendrix, and others.
Christian Stucki told this story which was related by his daughter, Katy: At one time in Santa Clara, flour was very scarce. They had to ship it in from Salt Lake, and many were literally starving for bread. Christian told me how sick his father (Samuel Stucki) was for the lack of food. He had been living for weeks on roots and "Pig weeds", a sort of wild spinach.
Lemuel Leavitt had flour to lend, but his father got there too late and could not get any so his mother told him to go to Casper Gubler's. He had just come back from Salt Lake with some grain for which he had traded dried peaches Christian said he can remember seeing his father going along the street, so weak he had to take hold of the fence. Casner loaned him a sack of grain, and his wife Katherina, who was just taking a batch of bread from the oven, handed him a loaf of bread which he tore to pieces and ate ravenously with trembling hands. Casper also lent him his team of oxen to take the grain to the mill over at Washington to be made into flour. Christian said it saved his father's life. [he was just a lad about nine years old when this happened.] (Told by Christian Stucki, contributed by his daughter, Katie Webb.)
Source: Gubler families in America 1857-1973, edited by Laura G. Hendrix and Donworth V. Gubler, 1973, pg 224-226.
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