She would have traveled with her mother, Carolina Hertkorn Seibert, and siblings, Roman and Louisa, arriving in New York on the ship Belle Wood, on 31 May 1865. Birth date confirmed by Lehi Ward records at the time of her baptism on 1 July 1866. Church records record her last name as "Herthorn" and spell her given name as "Sophia." She later married Rowsel Gardner. They would have had to travel overland in either 1865 or 1866.