John Van Cott
John Van Cott served as one of the First Seven Presidents of Seventies, which was also designated as the First Council of the Seventy at that time. Later it would be called the Presidency of the Seventy.[1] He was ordained a Seventy by Joseph Young on February 25, 1847, and was sustained to the First Council of the Seventy in 1862. He served until his death on February 18, 1883.
Van Cott also presided over the Scandinavian Mission twice: from 1853 to 1856, and from 1859 to 1862. He had been serving as a missionary to England since August 1852 and was chosen to serve as president of the Scandinavian Mission upon the unexpected death of the president.
Van Cott left Copenhagen on 15 January 1856 and guided a group of immigrants to Iowa City, Iowa, where they organized into handcart companies and journeyed to Utah. After arriving in Utah, he immediately left for Wyoming to assist in rescuing the last two of these, the Willie and Martin Handcart Companies. After the conclusion of his second mission as president, he presided over a large group of Saints immigrating to Utah, first sailing to New York and then traveling to Florence, Nebraska. On the subsequent journey across the plains, he divided the immigrants into two groups headed by Christian A. Madsen and Ola N. Liljenquist. They departed from Florence on 12 July 1862 and arrived at Salt Lake City on September 23.
Van Cott was born on September 7, 1814, in Canaan, New York, to Losee Van Cott and Lavina Pratt (uncle and aunt of Parley P. and Orson Pratt. Van Cott was taught the gospel by Parley P. Pratt and was baptized in September 1843. His father died when he was ten years old.
He married Lucy Sachett on September 15, 1835. He and his wife and mother moved to Nauvoo, where they stayed temporarily with Parley Pratt and donated generously to the Nauvoo Temple. He left Nauvoo for Winter Quarters in the fall of 1846, where he became acquainted with Brigham Young.
His family came to Utah Territory in late September 1847. He served as Salt Lake City’s first city marshal and two years later was elected to the city council.
Van Cott practiced plural marriage and had five wives and twenty-eight children.
Van Cott’s ancestors were among the nobility of Holland. He descended from some of the first settlers of Long Island, New York, who came from Holland in 1640. (The Van Cott line can be traced back from Claes to the first Lord Giselbert Van Welle, Lord Van Cats, who was born about the year 1060.)[2]
