Andreas Pontus Soderborg
By his Daughter Clara M. Soderborg Carlson, November 17, 1949
Son of Carl Fredrik Soderborg and Anna Margareta Osterman Soderborg, he was born February 6, 1831 in Kristine, Goteborg, Sweden. His father, Carl Frederik, had three wives and seventeen children of whom Anders was number fifteen. Carl Frederik and his brother, John Anders, were hat makers by trade. They were very successful financially and became quite wealthy. John Anders never married, so having no heir, he asked his brother Carl Frederik if he might take one of his sons to educate and prepare to be his heir. So Anders Pontus was chosen by his uncle.
He acquired the best education possible at that time. There was a law in Sweden to the effect that every young man must learn a trade or profession. So Anders Pontus went to sea as an apprentice with a view to learning both theoretical and practical navigation. He made two prolonged voyages on which he visited the East Indies, Australia and Africa with the intention of becoming a captain and having his own ship. But he was no able to do this because of being on the sea constantly affected his eyes and he was forced to leave the sea and choose some other profession. So he attended college in Goteborg, Sweden for five years and learned five different languages after which he went to England to learn a trade.
It was while he was in England that he first met the Latter-day Saint missionaries and became a convert to Mormonism. He read the Book of Mormon through three times, after which he applied for baptism and was baptized by John Van Cott July 2, 1860. While he was an apprentice in England he met and fell in love with a beautiful young girl whose name Mary Curren. They planned to be married as soon as he finished his apprenticeship. But in the meanwhile, he joined the church and tried to convert Mary, but she could not accept Mormonism because of polygamy, so he had to choose either Mary or his religion and he said he was really converted and must always be true to that conviction. As far as we could ever learn, Mary never married, so we had her sealed to Father after they were both dead.
When Anders Pontus finished his apprenticeship, he went back to Goteborg, Sweden to try to convert his family and his Uncle John Anders, but they were very bitter because he had joined this unpopular religion called Mormonism. They said they could have forgiven anything else he might have done, but not this. They were humiliated beyond expression and again Anders Pontus must make a choice between his family and his religion. His grandfather Osterman was a Lutheran minister so his family were all staunch Lutherans.
He then labored as a traveling Elder and President of Goteborg Conference for three years, It was then that he met a widow whose name was Anna Britta Johnson and her daughter Caroline, who were converts to Mormonism. He visited them many times while traveling through the Goteborg Conference and fell in love with Augusta, the lovely young daughter of Anna Britta Johnson who later became his wife.
In 1862 Anna Britta Johnson married a man whose name was Charley Johnson and they emigrated to America bringing Augusta with them and settled in Grantsville, Utah. In 1864 Anders Pontus emigrated to America and located in Salt Lake City, Utah. A short time later, he walked to Grantsville, a distance of 40 miles, to see Anna Britta and her daughter Augusta. In January of 1866 he and Augusta were married in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City. They became the parents of eleven children.
In 1871, just before the birth of their third child, he went to Sweden on a mission laboring in the Jonkoping and Stockholm Conferences (Left Nove. 1871) He died July 12, 1890 in Salt Lake City, a true and valiant Latter-day Saint, true to the end, at the age of 59 years five months. His wife Augusta died March 2, 1919 after being a widow twenty-nine years.