COPENHAGEN, Denmark — On June 14, 1850, the first Latter-day Saint missionaries landed in the Copenhagen harbor to begin their labors in Denmark.
The small group led by Apostle Erastus Snow were the first missionaries sent by the Church to preach the gospel in continental Europe. Their arrival signaled the beginning of an important era for the Church and the eventual conversion of thousands of European saints who faithfully heeded the call of the prophet Brigham Young to go to Utah and build Zion.
Between the years of 1850 and 1900, more than 18,000 Danes emigrated from Denmark to Utah. Together with their fellow saints from the British Isles and other European countries, these new converts became the backbone of the young Church.
During the first week of July 2000, the 150th anniversary of these historical events, Danish members celebrated the anniversary with a series of firesides, dances, reunions, and the unveiling of two special statues given to Denmark as monuments of the early Danish emigrants.
Elder Russell M. Nelson of the Quorum of the Twelve was invited by the Danish Rebild Association to come to Denmark and be the main American speaker at its annual Fourth of July festivities. This gathering is held in the hills of Rebild, Denmark's only national park, which is located about 20 miles south of the city of Aalborg. The Danes have gathered here since 1912 in the largest observance of the American Independence Day anywhere outside of the United States. More than 15,000 attended this year in celebration of the great bonds of friendship that exist between Denmark and the United States.
Elder Nelson admonished those assembled to incorporate the virtues of love, gratitude, integrity, wisdom and courageous optimism into their lives. He praised the brotherly love that was displayed by the Danes during World War II when they courageously evacuated more than 8,000 Danish Jews to Sweden to escape deportation to Nazi death camps. He encouraged the building of strong homes and families and emphasized to all assembled that the most important work anyone would ever do was in the home.
At the park, Elder Nelson presented to the people of Denmark a statue called "The Family." This work, commissioned and financed by a private, nonprofit foundation, Descendants and Friends of Denmark, was sculpted by Dennis Smith of Alpine, Utah. Brother Smith is of Danish ancestry, and his great-grandmother, Christine Beck, who immigrated to Utah as a 16-year-old girl, became the inspiration for the family statue.
More than 1,000 local Latter-day Saints, invited guests and Danish dignitaries gathered in the hills of Rebild prior to the day's main event to participate in the unveiling of "The Family" statue. A choir made up of members of the Aarhus Denmark Stake provided the music for the unveiling. It was a beautiful, sunny day in Denmark and the sounds of the choir singing "Come, Come, Ye Saints," "Faith in Every Footstep" and "I Am a Child of God" echoed throughout the lush, green surroundings.
After the festivities had ended hundreds of interested onlookers gathered around the statue. Many read the plaque explaining the Mormon emigration to Utah and others wanted to be photographed next to the statue. "The Family" statue, which is placed at the entrance to the park, symbolizes a Mormon family as they prepared to make the long voyage to Utah in the late 1800s. The statues have been received by the Danes with great enthusiasm. They are great lovers of art and seem to be attracted by the artist's talent of capturing and portraying in bronze the deep emotions the early emigrants must have felt as they left their beloved home land, never to return.
Enthusiasm for the statues grew as a result of a regional television program shown in northern Denmark where the Rebild National Park is located. The TV station sent a film crew to Utah in May of this year to shoot footage for the program, which included an interview with Elder Nelson and footage of the final stages of creating the statues. The program was a moving portrayal of the Mormon immigration to Utah from Denmark. According to members of the Church, the program is one of the more positive portrayals yet of the Church and its immigration history to be portrayed by Danish television.
The week's activities in Denmark concluded in Copenhagen on Thursday, July 6, with clear, sunny weather. There a second statue, "Kristina," was unveiled in the harbor area of Copenhagen, known as the America Harbor. It is from that location that many of the saints boarded the sailing ships for the journey to their new homes on the American frontier. The audience, estimated to be about 600 people, far exceeded the expectations of the local organizing committee. Many were not members of the Church. They had read about the unveiling in the newspaper and came because of their interest in the Mormon emigration. Uffe Ellemann-Jensen, Denmark's former Foreign Minister, was the master of ceremonies for the Kristina statue unveiling.
He had visited Utah in 1995 and met President Gordon B. Hinckley and the First Presidency. He recounted an experience from that trip when he and his wife traveled to Sanpete Valley. They visited the old Pioneer Cemetery in Spring City and discovered a monument to three early pioneers killed in the Black Hawk Indian War. One of those was a Dane, Lars Alexander Justesen, who was also on the first boatload of saints to depart Copenhagen for Utah in December of 1852. The experiences of his visit had left a deep impression on the former foreign minister and he came to realize how strong the ties were between Denmark and Utah.
Richard Swett, the American ambassador to Denmark who is LDS, spoke along with President Johann Koch, president of the Copenhagen Denmark Stake. The statue was presented to the city by Elder Nelson who invited all present to search their family's past by visiting LDS family history centers located throughout Denmark. As the program concluded, the statue of Kristina was received by Mayor Soren Pind of the City of Copenhagen and all of the speakers on the program walked to the statue and pulled the cord that unveiled the statue to an enthusiastic audience.
Barbara Madsen, executive director of public affairs for the event in Copenhagen, reported that many came to her after the ceremony to express gratitude and share heartfelt impressions. One man, the husband of a Church member, putting his hand to his chest, said: "I felt something special today, here. I don't know what it was; I have never thought about emigrants. . . . But today I did think about them and how they must have felt and why they went." He said the couple, who interrupted their vacation to attend the unveiling, brought their 10-year-old son, who also thought it was a special occasion. The father said that the family would start a scrapbook for him with the first item in it being the program from that day's event.
Sister Madsen said a non-LDS tour guide hired by a Utah group that came for the sesquicentennial found herself wiping away tears as the Kristina statue was unveiled. "At the end, she confessed she had never felt this special feeling before, and she could not explain what was happening," Sister Madsen related.
An old sailing ship set a historical backdrop to the program. After the statue had been presented to the city many members of the Church from the Copenhagen stake, who came dressed as emigrants from the 1800s boarded the ship. As those on the dock sang the traditional hymn "God Be With You Till We Meet Again" the ship sailed from the harbor and out into the open sea. This re-enactment of a group of saints leaving Denmark created a fitting, very emotional conclusion to the program. There were few dry eyes in the audience.
The celebration of the Church's sesquicentennial in Denmark comes at a time when there is growing interest in Denmark about those Danes who left for the United States in the 1800s The two statues have already become symbolic emotional bridges for those who are reaching out to connect with those who left Denmark so many years ago. For members of the Church in the United States whose ancestors came from Denmark, the statues have come to represent a coming home and a bonding with a country that has been so beloved in the histories of their families. There was extensive media coverage of the activities on television, radio and in the newspapers throughout Denmark.
Both statues will in time be surrounded by cobble-stones with the names of LDS Danish emigrants who went to Utah inscribed upon the stones. Individuals who are interested in having the names of Danish family members who immigrated memorialized at the statues should contact Descendants and Friends of Denmark at (801) 378-6433.
Elder Nelson also spoke at two firesides which were overflowing with local members who had come to hear the apostle who himself has Danish ancestry. His great-great-grandfather, Niels Christensen, joined the Church in Denmark and left for Utah in May of 1861. Elder Nelson spoke with great emotion of his love for Denmark and his gratitude for the great sacrifices his ancestors and so many of those early saints made in making the long trek to Utah. The first fireside was held in the stake center in Copenhagen on Saturday, July 1, and the second was held in the Aarhus Stake Center on Sunday. Many members gathered more than two hours before the beginning of the firesides in anticipation of the opportunity of hearing from a member of the Quorum of the Twelve.
