Elder Frank Anderson (now in the presidency of the Mesa Temple) was his companion. Both told me soties [stories]. They were staying in a little room up in the attice [sic.] under the eves. When the police came to search for them[,] Brother Anderson (18 years old) climbed out the window and humg [sic.] on to the shingles. Father hid in the clothes closet. The police looked all over the room and felt all over it. Father said they felt all around him but could not find him. The Lord had protected him.
Another time he had to wait at a railraod [sic.] station for Brother Anderson [p. 4] to bring his luggage, somehow Brother Anderson missed the right time and father had to wait an hour or two in the busy station with the police walking all over the place. While waiting father said several people knowcked into him. They looked at him in surprise and said "Excuse me I did not see you." Father knows the Lord had made him invisible to those around him. If he had been caught he would have been sent to prison for two years. Father had contracted a cough which later turned into T. B. He could never had lived two years in prison.
Father had the gift of preaching the Gospel and explaining it. He talked with authority. He also had the gift of healing. At one time he and another elder raised a lady from the dead through the power of the priesthood. Then he had the gfit [sic.] of vision and beheld many wonder ful things. He was never well after returning from his missions, and after suffering many years he died at American Falls, Idaho on 15 Sept. 1919. He is buried there.
And some commentary:
1. Frank V. Anderson. Eda lists Frank Anderson as being Fred’s missionary companion. In this Fred’s missionary journal corresponds. According to his 12 March 1907 journal entry, a Frank V. Anderson arrived in Köln where Fred was serving to labor with him there. They stayed together as companions until 31 May 1907 when Elder Anderson was sent to work in Duisburg. The events in the mission that Frank and Fred describe must have taken place in Köln. At this time, Frank was not 18 as Eda notes, but 19 years old. I suspect Fred would have been Frank's trainer, as this was his first area. Frank was set apart in February and arrived in the field on March 9.
2. Divine providence and Police investigation: These stories by Frank and Fred are great additions to Fred’s missionary history. I do not have accounts of them anywhere else. They are completely absent from Fred’s journal and correspondence. The journal does not even attest to his being hunted by the German police. However, his correspondence does note tension around July 1907. At first there is a vague problem. Owen Nebeker writes him on 2 July and tells him that he feels very sorry “to hear what I have,” and that if Fred is bothered he should write him. Then he urges, “you had better go to Elberfeld,” suggesting that there was a reason Fred needed to leave Köln. A letter from a J. C. Boyer on 8 July is more explicit. He notes how the saints and a Bro. Fuch is waiting for Fred in Elberfeld, and adds “The police have been at [the] Busse’s again this morning, charging you with encouraging emmigration. He [the police officer] made particular mention of two years imprisonment and conviction. Bro. Busse reported [that] you [are] in America, but you know a little different story from each member may lead to your discovery. Be as careful as you can. We will do what we can to avert the storm. I wish you all success and will be glad to help you in any way.” Boyer shows how the police were a real threat for Fred, and confirms Eda’s account where she noted Fred could have been convicted for two years imprisonment. Whether such a harsh punishment actually would have occurred, or if it was rather meant to threaten and frighten Fred, is of course open to question.
Regardless, it seems to have worked in encouraging Fred to leave the country, who did so by the next month. In this he had some mission support. Boyer wrote at the end of his letter, “In fact, I question if it is good for you to remain in Germany. It may go hard with both you and Bro. Stastman.” Fred likely agreed. The day after receiving Boyer’s letter (9 July), his journal, which had been silent since 26 June, noted that he “left Duisburg for Eisenach” on the way to visiting the land of his ancestors in Stadtlengsfeld. Duisburg was where Frank Anderson had been sent to work after finishing his labor in Köln. It looks like Fred was in hiding with Elder Anderson as he tried to figure out the situation in Köln. While Fred had been considering heading home before, the active pursuit of the German police seemed to have been enough to convince him that now was the time to actually do so.
3. Coughs and TB: Fred’s missionary journal does mention him at times being ill, having coughs, and burying a man who had TB. However, knowing exactly when or how Fred got TB is hard to pin down. Family lore has assumed it was on his mission while burying the man who died with consumption. It seems rather that Fred just had bad health and weak lungs. Eda’s account earlier claimed that a doctor diagnosed Fred with consumption in his teenage years and said he would not live to see 20. Fred left Boston to work outdoors thinking it would be better for his lungs (part of the whole historical romanticism with the healing powers of being with nature). So there are multiple accounts of how/when Fred got TB. It was my impression that consumption tended to kill quickly. If so, Fred lived 12 years after returning home from his mission. I am sure that the weather and conditions in Germany and Switzerland weakened his health and immune system, but I am not sure he contracted consumption there. Eda just says that Fred contracted a cough, which later “turned into” TB, suggesting he had a cough throughout the years and then was later diagnosed with it. She also writes that he “suffer[ed] many years” before his death in 1919.
4. Spiritual gifts: Eda’s account shows again their prominence in the Kohlhepp home. While she notes Fred’s ability to preach and his rhetorical persuasion, Fred also had the gifts of healing (even raising the dead! I find no other account of this miracle in his journal or correspondence; Eda is also very vague with just stating Fred was with “another elder”) and of visions (which is interestingly a gift that seems to have run down the family line). I noted how the Legacy of Faith volume attested of Fred’s wife, Mary Ella, as prophesying in tongues. There is also the account of how Mary Ella commanded the waters to lower, so some of her family could cross a river. This place for the immanence of God in terms of spiritual gifts to both Fred and Mary Ella again shows how Annalee would have thought that she too would be given or at least could expect such gifts from God herself. Such gifts she proported to have received included healing and visions.
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