Lucy Lavinia Sackett

Some sixteen years after his marriage to Lucy, John Van Cott espoused the Mormon faith, and the same year (1847) sold his farm and all his belongings in Dutchess County, and with his faithful wife and their family of children, joined one of the pioneer bands that had resolved to migrate to Salt Lake City, Utah, which place they reached Sept. 15, of that year. In the course of a few years John Van Cott had taken to himself four additional wives, named respectively, Jemima, Caroline, Laura L. and Lena, who became the mothers of 22 of his sons and daughters. Several of these sons became men of prominence in the Mormon church and others in the professional and business life of Salt Lake City, while the daughters are said to have married "the best citizens of the state."

—Sacketts of America

Ed Young came to Clintonville [WI] in the year I did [1878]. He built the first house the Sacketts lived in. He had a family of children, pretty well grown. Our special interest in him began with learning that he was a half brother of Brigham Young. Father [Daniel] Sackett's youngest sister, Lucy, married a man by the name of Van Cott in New York State. Later they moved to Illinois and while there adopted the Mormon faith. They joined that famous trek from Nauvoo, Illinois to Salt Lake City in July 1846. Van Cott never subscribed to the polygamy part of Mormonism. Aunt Lucy remained his only wife, but Aunt Lucy's daughter [Mary] married Brigham Young, I believe she was his last and 16th wife—supposed to have been beautiful as a young woman and a talented musician. She had received training in Europe. Aunt Lucy was father's favorite sister and he kept in touch with her through the years. He had practically disowned her and she suffered grief and homesickness for years because of the estrangement. It was sometimes reflected in her letters. Maud and I, on a trip west by way of Salt Lake City, went to see Aunt Lucy. She was an elderly woman then and in her younger days must have been quite beautiful in her own right. We found her very serene and happy and surrounded by every comfort. She was pathetically happy that "Daniel's daughter" had come to see her.