FROM CANAAN TO THE PROMISED LAND : Pioneer Migration from Hommedal Parish (Landvik and Eide Sub-Parishes), Southern Norway, to St. Joseph, Missouri and East Norway, Kansas

TO

THE PROMISED LAND

Pioneer Migration from Hommedal Parish

(Landvik and Eide Sub-Parishes), Southern Norway, to St. Joseph, Missouri and East Norway, Kansas by

Erik Aalvik Evensen

A Dissertation Presented to the Department of Literature, Area Studies and European Languages

University of Oslo

in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

2008

© Erik Aalvik Evensen, 2009

Series of dissertations submitted to the Faculty of Humanities,University of Oslo No. 383

ISSN 0806-3222

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reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission.

Cover: Inger Sandved Anfinsen.

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Present-day photograph of the Igland homestead, Landvik Parish, in winter. By courtesy of Anna Igland Bendixen.

Front page: Moray (formerly East Norway), Doniphan County, Kansas.Own photo, 2006.

Roubidoux’s Landing in St. Joseph, MO. Own photo, 2006.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thanks are due to a number of people who have pushed me along and acted as the good helpers in the long haul towards finishing this project. It has been a solitary work and a marathon run, but a particularly demanding race since I have been in a freelance position, basically outside academia and a university environment, and forced to use vacations and short and irregular periods of spare time to research and write this dissertation.

In the little township of Grimstad, several kind and helpful natives have joined me in my search for material concerning the “Landvik-group” of 1846: Anne Møretrø who is still in contact with the descendants of the Igland tribe in Missouri and has an ocean of experience from her work at the County Archives; Anna Igland Bendixen who has willingly shared information about her own family with me; the members ofLandvik Historielag/Historical Society; the Public Library in Grimstad, represented by Odd Johnsen who has worked miracles in obtaining often rather obscure books and articles; and in the neighbouring town of Arendal, the adept staff at Aust-Agder Arkivet/ County Archives. Also in my quaint little hometown on the seaside, former Associate Professor at Agder College, Bob Baehr, has for years been a pillar of support and encouragement in my academic endeavours. His steady hand on finances inThe American Studies Association in Norwaygave me the opportunity to travel to Missouri and Kansas in 2006, and spend the summer in St. Joseph and Troy. It was inASANORthat I met Associate Professor David Mauk who agreed to give me advice, and who has been a constructive critic of my work from his base in ILOSat the University of Oslo.

I should also mention the great inspiration obtained through participation in a seminar on “Learning Migration” in Oldenburg, Germany, in 2005. Associate Professor Dan D.

Daatland from the University in Stavanger patiently listened to my plans for having a try at a dissertation on migration, and put me on course with accurate guidance.

Once in St. Joseph, Missouri, I was overwhelmed by the friendly reception given me by the Nelson family, descendants of the pioneers of 1846. Mort Nelson, Jane Nelson Thompson, and Catherine MacAdams opened their arms, homes, and hidden genealogical treasures, and guided me into the nooks of family history. Co-ordinating my search of contacts and material all the time was Jackie Lewin of theSt. Joseph Museum.

The moment I ventured into the open spaces of Kansas, other helpers took over, and Pete Duncan of theDoniphan County Historical Societyput me in contact with people who were of Norwegian origin. My headquarters was in the Public Library in Troy, and indeed the

whole town seemed to be at my disposal. On my return to Norway, Seth Smith of the Missouri State Historical Societyand the friendly members of the staff at theKansas State Historical Societyhave carried on the valuable assistance.

I have for a rather long period been involved in the kind of work which devours time and mind. Members of my family have showed me great patience and encouragement. My two sons have expressed faith in my progress, and Magnus has offered me precise and intelligent readings of the many pages. Ingeborg, my dear, has stood by my side, and lovingly accepted my many dimly-lit hours alone with my computer. I thank you all!

Grimstad, July 29, 2008 Erik Aalvik Evensen

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 5

PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 The Context 23

1.2 On a Different Course 33

1.3 A Series of Limitations 35

1.4 A Modest Place in the History of Norwegian

Emigration 36

1.5 Uprooted or Transplanted? 39

1.6 A Model: A Multidisciplinary Approach 48 1.7 Three Levels: Macro, Meso, Micro 50

1.8 Decision vs. Process 51

1.9 A Migration System 53

1.10 A Comprehensive Concept 53

PART ONE: EMIGRANTS

Chapter I: A Passage to America, 1846-1847

Chapter II: The Leaders and Their Families

2.1 Family Sketches 70

2.2 Peder Nielsen Dolholt Kalvehaven 71

2.3 Osul Nielsen Enge 74

2.4 Anders Nielsen Igland Holte 75

2.5 Maren Nilsdatter Løvaasen 76

Chapter III: A Family Exodus

3.1 A Family Migration 80

3.2 The Family Web 86

Chapter IV: The Emergence of Modern

Norway, 1800-1850

4.1 Introduction 94

4.2 A New-Born Nation 94

4.3 A Troublesome Freedom – the Aftermath

of 1814 96

4.4 King – Government – National Assembly 97

4.5 The Power of the Bureaucracy 99

4.6 Economic Development 101

4.7 The Rise of Peasant Power 103

4.8 Into Modern Times – the Growth of

the Population 104

4.9 Life Expectancy 105

4.10 The Metamorphosis of the Countryside 106 4.11 The Safety-Valve: Emigration 108

Chapter V: Main Features of Nedenes

County, 1800-1850

5.1 Introduction 118

5.2 Administrative Organization 118

5.3 Demographic Development 118

5.4 Detached Views? 122

5.5 The Five-Year-Reports 123

5.6 Political Development 125

5.7 Political, Religious and Idealistic Challenges 127

5.8 Kristian Lofthus 130

5.9 Hans Nielsen Hauge 135

5.10 Marcus Thrane 137

5.11 Farming 139

5.12 Industry 145

5.13 Shipping 146

5.14 Communications 149

5.15 Education 150

5.16 Emigration 152

5.17 Reliability of Sources 153

5.18 The Course of Emigration 154

5.19 Inland Communities vs. Coastal Communities 156

5.20 Volume and Destination 156

5.21 Statistical Analysis 158

5.22 Occupations 161

5.23 Transportation 163

5.24 Summing up 165

Chapter VI: The Development of Hommedal Parish (Landvik and Eide Sub-Parishes),

1800-1850

6.1 Introduction 170

6.2 Demographic Development, 1801-1855 172

6.3 Visitors from Abroad 174

6.4 Summing up 180

6.5 Schools and Education 181

6.6 Recollections of a Teacher 181

6.7 School Commission Protocols 184

6.8 “Public Libraries” and Private Book Collections 187

6.9 Religion 191

6.10 Summing up 193

6.11 A Report from the Parish Council in Landvik 194 6.12 A Report from Neighbouring Eide Parish 200 6.13 Census Returns, 1845: Occupations 204

6.14 Age-Groups 206

6.15 Farm Production 209

6.16 A Comparison with Other Parishes:

Froland and Tromøy 212

6.17 A Further Comparison: Dovre and Tinn Parishes 214

6.18 Fishing 215

6.19 Forestry 218

6.20 The Hub: The Igland Farm 220

6.21 Shipbuilding and Seafaring 222

6.22 The Economic Base: The Emigrants and Their Farms 228

6.23 The Emigrant Farms 234

6.24 Agricultural Change 237

6.25 A Parallel Case? Early Emigration from the

West Coast 241

6.26 Paving the Way for Emigration? 245

Chapter VII: Forerunners and a Pathfinder

7.1 A Sponsored Pathfinder 254

7.2 Johan Reinert Reiersen 258

7.3 Christiansandsposten(1839-1843) 261 7.4 A Scouting Expedition (1843-1844) 268 7.5 Pathfinder for Norwegian Emigrants 277 7.6 “To My Sponsors in Eide, and Adjacent Parishes” 281 7.7 Preparations in Hommedal Parish 282

7.8 The Texas Settlement 284

7.9 Elise Wærenskjold 286

PART TWO: IMMIGRANTS

Chapter VIII: Heading North

8.1 At a Cross-Roads 293

8.2 Heading for Missouri 294

8.2.1 A German Bait? 296

8.2.2 Victorious Missourians 297

8.2.3 A Jeffersonian Arcadia 298

8.2.4 The Mysterious Weddles 301

Chapter IX: The Settlement in St. Joseph, Missouri

9.1 Roubidoux’s Landing 306

9.2 The Settlers 309

9.3 A Chain Migration 312

9.4 Statistical Surveys 318

9.5 Celebrating the Exodus 324

9.6 The Hunger for Land 327

9.7 The Agricultural Schedules, 1850 331 9.8 A Case Study: Peder Nelson – the Farmer 340

9.8.1 Peder Nelson’s Will 351

9.8.2 The Nelson Cemetery 356

9.9 School 359

9.10 Immigrant Churches 362 9.10.1 Congregations in Buchanan and

Doniphan Counties 365

9.10.2 Peter Laurentius Larsen – Their

First Pastor 374

9.11 The St. Joseph Settlement: Summing up 377

Chapter X: The Settlement in East Norway, Kansas

10.1 Across the River 385

10.2 Doniphan County 389

10.2.1 Communications 394

10.2.2 Wolf River Township 394

10.3 East Norway 395

10.4 New Homes – New Possibilities 399

10.5 School 401

10.6 Church 403

10.7 A Case Study: Osul Nelson – an Aging

Farmer 411

10.8 N.O. Nelson – Capitalist and Philanthropist 423 10.9 TheEast NorwaySettlement: Summing up 426

Chapter XI: Hard Times – Civil War and Guerrilla

Warfare

11.1 Introduction 430

11.2 Bleeding Kansas 431

11.3 Soldiers in the War 433

11.4 A State Divided 436

11.5 A Norwegian Slave-Owner 443

11.6 Protestants and Capitalists 446

Chapter XII: E Pluribus Unum

12.1 New Citizens 452

12.2 Acculturation, Assimilation, Ethnic Identity 457

12.3 At Their Journey’s End 461

Chapter XIII: Conclusion

PART THREE: LETTERS FROM THE PIONEERS

PART FOUR: INDEX – EMIGRATION FROM

HOMMEDAL PARISH, 1840-1930

A.

Landvik Parish

B.

Eide Parish

PART FIVE: BIBLIOGRAPHY

ILLUSTRATIONS AND TABLES Illustrations

1. Moray, formerlyEast Norway front page

2. The Igland Homestead, Landvik Parish 3

3. Roubidoux’s Landing, St, Joseph, Missouri 4

4. Grimstad Township and surrounding parishes 18

5. Nedenes County, ca. 1800 19

6. Emigration from Norway, 1840-1930 22

7. Emigration from Landvik and Eide Parishes, 1840-1930 22

8. Passport issued to Lars Haaversen Stensvand 66

9. Passport issued to Karen Marthea Olsdatter Bjerke 67 10. Distribution of age-groups, Landvik and Eide Parishes 208

11. Foreclosures, Nedenes Fogderi, 1840-1850 229

12. Landvik Parish Church 252

13.Vestre Haave, Peder Kalvehaven’s house 270

14. Map of the United States, 1823-1845 277

15. St. Joseph in the 1850s 292

16. St. Joseph from the Missouri River 292

17. The Missouri Counties 299

18. The Pettis-Nelson Homestead 337

19. The Pettis-Nelson Homestead 339

20. Peder Nelson’s first house in Buchanan County 353

21. Peder Nelson (Kalvehaven) 354

22. Original plats, Township 57N, Range 35W 355

23. The First Lutheran Church, St. Joseph 370

24. Headstones in the Nelson Cemetery 381

25.East Norway, later known as Moray 384

26. The Kansas Counties 385

27. Doniphan County, 1882 389

28. Railroads in Doniphan County 394

29. Osul and Gunnhild Nelson, ca. 1865 411

30. Battles in Missouri – Civil War 442

31. Page from the Census Returns, Buchanan County, 1850 600

Tables

1. Emigration pr. 1000 of mean population; five-year-periods 26 2. Table 5.1: Demographic development in Nedenes County, 1801-1865 120 3. Table 5.2: Demographic development in selected parishes in

Nedenes Fogderi, 1801-1865 120 4. Table 5.3: Number of vessels crossing the Skagerrak, 1844 128 5. Table 5.4: The County Governor’s assessment of population, livestock

and agricultural production, 1835 140

6. Table 5.5: Increase in livestock/ agricultural production; 1845

compared to 1835 (in %) 141

7. Table 5.6: Ships built in Nedenes Fogderi, 1836-1865;

“kommerselester” and number of vessels; from the “five-year-reports” 149 8. Table 5.7: Official figures of emigration, 1836-65; selected counties

and country 152

9. Table 5.8: Emigration from selected parishes in Nedenes Fogderi,

1843-60; based on own research and material from Tveiten and Naeseth 154 10. Table 5.9: Destinations in America; selected parishes in Nedenes County;

emigration before 1851 157

11. Table 5.10: Proportion of male and female emigrants in selected parishes in Nedenes Fogderi, 1840-60; sources are church records, passport protocols, and additional information from letters in the “Igland

archive” 159

12. Table 5.11: Proportion of male and female emigrants in Nedenes Fogderi, 1840-60; differences between coastal and inland communities;

same sources 159

13. Table 5.12: Civilian status; adult emigrants (+20 years old) from

Nedenes Fogderi, 1843-60 160

14. Table 5.13: Month of emigration; emigrants from Nedenes Fogderi,

1843-60 161

15. Table 5.14: Occupations in the emigrant group, Nedenes Fogderi,

1843-60 162

16. Table 5.15: Changes in some occupations, Holt Parish, 1843-55;

main persons and family members 162

17. Table 5.16: Emigrant ships before 1850; passengers from Nedenes

Fogderi 163

18. Table 6.1: Demographic development, Eide and Landvik Parishes;

Nedenes Fogderi, 1801-1855; numerical and increase/ decrease in % 164 172 19. Table 6.2: Organization of ambulatory school districts, Landvik

Parish, 1847 186

20. Table 6.3: Growth of the population, Landvik and Eide Parishes,

1835-1855; printed statistics/ census returns 197

21. Table 6.4: Yearly agricultural production (yearly sown or planted), figures in “tønder” (1 “tønde” = ca. four bushels), Landvik Parish,

1840-1850; reports from the County Governor 197

22. Table 6.5: Yearly agricultural production (yearly harvested), figures

in “tønder”, Landvik Parish, 1840-1850; reports to the County Governor 197 23. Table 6.6: Livestock farming, number of animals, Landvik Parish,

1840-1850; reports to the County Governor 197

24. Table 6.7: Agricultural production (yearly sown or planted), figures in

“tønder”, Eide Parish, 1845; report to the County Governor 202 25. Table 6.8: Agricultural production (yearly harvested), figures in

“tønder”, Eide Parish, 1845; figures based upon a “normal” harvest 203 26. Table 6.9: Livestock farming, number of animals, Eide Parish, 1845;

report to the County Governor 203

27. Table 6.10: Distribution of occupations, Landvik and Eide Parishes;

main persons, Census Returns, 1845 204

28. Table 6.11: Distribution of occupations, main persons, in % of total number of men in the parish; Landvik and Eide Parishes; Census

Returns, 1845 205

29. Table 6.12: Distribution of selected occupations, main persons, in % of total number of men, Tromøy and Froland Parishes; Census Returns,

1845 206

30. Table 6.13: Distribution of age-groups, number of males/ females,

Eide and Landvik Parishes; Census Returns, 1845 207 31. Table 6.14: Distribution of age-groups, % of total population, Eide

and Landvik Parishes; Census Returns, 1845 207

32. Table 6.15: Agricultural production, sown grains and potatoes/ harvest,

figures in “tønder”, Eide Parish; Census Returns, 1845 209 33. Table 6.16: Livestock farming, number of animals, Eide Parish;

Census Returns, 1845 209

34. Table 6.17: Agricultural production per capita, sown grains and potatoes;

transferred into “equivalent value of barley”, figures in “tønder”; Eide

Parish; Census Returns, 1845 210

35. Table 6.18: Livestock production per capita; transferred into “equivalent value of cattle”; Eide Parish; Census Returns, 1845 210 36. Table 6.19: Agricultural production, sown grains and potatoes/ harvest,

figures in “tønder”; Landvik Parish; Census Returns, 1845 210 37. Table 6.20: Livestock farming, number of animals, Landvik Parish;

Census Returns, 1845 210

38. Table 6.21: Agricultural production per capita; harvested grains and potatoes; transferred into “equivalent value of barley”; figures in “tønder”;

Landvik Parish; Census Returns, 1845 211

39. Table 6.22: Livestock production per capita; transferred into “equivalent value of cattle”; Landvik Parish; Census Returns, 1845 211 40. Table 6.23: Agricultural produce and livestock production; per capita;

Dovre and Tinn Parishes 215

41. Table 6.24: Foreclosures, Nedenes Fogderi, 1840-1850 229 42. Table 6.25: Survey: the landowning emigrants and their farms 230 43. Table 6.26: Agricultural produce and livestock farming; harvest/ number

of animals per capita in selected number of farming units (“emigrant

farms”); Census Returns, 1845 (manuscript) 232

44. Table 6.27: Agricultural produce, sown/ planted grains/ potatoes;

selected number of farming units (“emigrant farms”); Census Returns,

1845 (manuscript); amount in “tønder” 233

45. Table 6.28: Livestock farming in selected number of farming units (“emigrant farms”); number of animals; Census Returns, 1845

(manuscript) 234

46. Table 9.1: Population in St. Joseph, Missouri, 1843-1869 306 50. Table 9.2: Estimated migration towards the Pacific Territories,

1841-1866 307

51. Table 9.3: Norwegian settlers in Washington and Centre Townships, compared to the number of Norwegians in the state of Missouri; based

upon “Index” (Part Four), and Federal Census Returns, 1850 and 1860 318 52. Table 9.4: Distribution of males and females; Buchanan County, MO,

1847 and 1850; based upon material from “Index” (Part Four), and

Federal Census Returns, 1850 319

53. Table 9.5: Distribution of age-groups; Norwegian settlers in Buchanan

County, MO, 1847 and 1850; Landvik and Eide Parishes, 1845; in % 320 54. Table 9.6: Marriage patterns; marriages in the United States, choice of

spouse among the pioneers and their children (first and second

generation), 1847-1850; statistical basis, “Index” (Part Four) 323 55. Table 9.7: Recorded movement to other locations than Buchanan County,

MO, and Doniphan County, KS; the pioneers and their children (first and second generation); statistical basis: “Index” (Part Four) 324 56. Table 9.8: Agricultural production of Germans and Americans

(St. Charles and Warren Counties, 1850), and Norwegians (Buchanan County, 1850); median values per farm. Source: Agricultural Schedules

Missouri, 1850 and W. D. Kamphoefner, op. cit.: 127-130 333 58. Table 9.9: “Productions of agriculture”, Buchanan County, MO, 1850;

Agricultural Schedules, Census Returns, Missouri, 1850 338 59. Table 10.1: Norwegian population in Doniphan County, KS (settlers

born in Norway, or children with at least one parent born in Norway) 390 60. Table 10.2: Acreage of field crops, Doniphan County, KS, 1872-1878 391 61. Table 10.3: Agricultural and livestock production, the State of Kansas

and Doniphan County, KS, 1860. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Population of States and Counties of the United States, 1790-1990;

Census Returns, Census of Agriculture, Kansas, 1860 392 62. Table 10.4: Norwegian farms, Doniphan County; Tax Assessors Records

(1863) as part of Probate Index, Doniphan County, KS (1882); Troy

Public Library, Troy, KS 400

63. Table 10.5: A comparison of the estates of Peder Nelson and Osul Nelson. Source: the Census Returns for Buchanan County, MO and Doniphan County, KS, 1850, 1860, 1870; paper editions, Public

Libraries in St. Joseph, MO and Troy, KS 415

64. Table 10.6: Development of real estate and personal estate of the Osul Nelson family and Lewis Nelson, 1860 and 1865; Wolf River Township, Doniphan County, KS; Census Returns, 1860, 1865 416 65. Table Four.1: Emigrants from Landvik Parish to America; men, women

and children: 1840-1930; compared 1840-1859 to Tveiten’s findings 633 66. Table Four. 2: Emigrants from Eide Parish to America; men, women and

children: 1840-1930 645

PREFACE

I want to know why

I had travelled down the Last Chance Road near Troy in Kansas, equipped with a less than detailed map, but with ample assurances from at least one local helper that there was a Norwegian cemetery some miles to the west of the town.

About an hour later I was in the middle of what seemed to me an endless, undulating plain of Indian corn and grassy patches interspersed with bright red Indian paint-brushes. There was not a house in sight, but on a little windswept hillock an iron railing with a heavy double gate had been erected. Inside the railing the grass was brown and dry with the summer heat. Some twenty headstones were arranged in four or five rows, some of them slanting, and most of them worn and stained by the sun and the wind and the rain. I touched the uneven surfaces, and read familiar names: Nelson, Erikson, Steanson. Some of the inscriptions were hard to read, but all were in Norwegian and told of lives begun in Norway at the beginning of the 19^th century.

Two days earlier I had been in a similar situation in the Nelson Cemetery in St. Joseph, Missouri. The family names on the headstones were largely the same, but the surroundings had a different colour: the grass was lush, and several little brooks found their way between the low hills. Looking across the Missouri River, I saw the sun setting over the Kansas plains, with bluish thunderstorms building up in the summer heat.

I was deeply touched on both occasions. I had come a long way from my home in Southern Norway, following in the footsteps of some 80 Norwegians who burnt their bridges around 1846 in the hope of finding a better life in America. With soft winds touching my hair, memories of childhood awoke from deep slumber, and I was brought back to the strawberry fields near old and venerable Landvik Parish Church. A brother and his sister lived on the little farm. They were my own kinsfolk, and in my mature age I seemed to remember that hazy and lazy summers were spent among the tempting berries, and sometimes in the attic where I would search a huge “Amerika-trunk”. The country store was a short distance off, they sold “Pin-up” ice-cream, and to get there, I had to walk past the cemetery where also members of my own family had been laid to rest. An “uncle” was sometimes there with pockets full of Wrigley’s spearmint. He was a restless soul who kept travelling back and forth

between Norway and America. Once in a while he would talk with funny r’s of the land “over there”.

Many years later I bought one of the quaint, wooden houses in Grimstad. Inside the walls of the little house there was a treasure. Two young postal thieves had hidden 67 unopened letters, evidently in the hope of returning and finding money and other valuables. All the letters were written in Brooklyn in 1896, and the story eventually became a book. And I was hooked on migration.

I was in a triangle of three cemeteries, and experiencing that places, people and events are connected, and that blurred faces on old photographs, frozen in time, and found in boxes in attics, may raise the disturbing question: who was I? Who were the people who migrated from Landvik and surrounding parishes in 1846, and started a new life on another continent? What motivated them to build their new homes on the prairie where the horizon is endless and the soil is deep – so different from their sheltered little home valley? What did become of them?

I want to know why.

Satellite-photo of present-day Grimstad Township and surrounding districts. Landvik (top) and Eide (bottom) Parishes are situated to left/ west in the highlighted area (yellow boundaries).

http://www.norgeibilder.no

Map of “Nedenes County” and “Lister og Mandal County”, ca. 1800. Parish boundaries are marked in a thin red line. Numbers refer to modern “communes”. “Grømstad” is an obsolete spelling for “Grimstad”.

http://digitalarkivet.uib.no/norkart/agder.htm

INTRODUCTION

Emigration from Norway, 1840 - 1930

0 5000 10000 15000 20000 25000 30000

1840 1843 1846 1849 1852 1855 1858 1861 1864 1867 1870 1873 1876 1879 1882 1885 1888 1891 1894 1897 1900 1903 1906 1909 1912 1915 1918 1921 1924 1927 1930

year

number

Emigration from Landvik and Eide Parishes, 1840 - 1930

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50

1840 1843 1846 1849 1852 1855 1858 1861 1864 1867 1870 1873 1876 1879 1882 1885 1888 1891 1894 1897 1900 1903 1906 1909 1912 1915 1918 1921 1924 1927 1930

year

number

Red - Landvik Green - Eide

Sources:Utvandrerliv, Utvandrermuséet (Hamar, 1981) andPart Four: Index,1840 -1930.

1.1 THE CONTEXT

The graphic representation on the preceding page shows the fluctuations in emigration from Norway to America, on a national and a local level. In many respects, local emigration from Landvik and Eide Parishes mirrors national movements, with crests in the emigration waves about 1885 and 1905. But there are at the same time striking differences.

After a considerable number of people had left their native parishes in the period 1845 -1855, emigration from Nedenes County came to a rather abrupt stop in 1855, and the standstill lasted until the 1880s.

During the period 1856-1865 only 255 emigrants left the county, whereas corresponding figures from the period 1846-1855 show 2,480 emigrants.¹This development has its local parallel: 131 persons emigrated from Landvik Parish between 1845 and 1855, and only nine persons went to America in the period 1856-1870. In the case of Eide Parish, 34 people emigrated in the years 1845-1855, but there are no records of emigration from this parish in the period from 1856 to 1880.² TheIndexinPart Fourgives the details of officially recorded emigration from Hommedal Parish to America in the period 1840-1930. This survey serves as a frame and a backcloth for the more restricted story of emigration in 1846, and further into the 1850s.

The characteristics of mass-emigration in the period 1875-1900 are certainly different from those of the pioneering years before 1850. About mid-century, seafaring and related industries picked up an increasing momentum, and became in a short time the dominant and all-embracing industry. Shipping activities flourished, not only in the little port of Grimstad, but also in the surrounding rural parishes of Landvik, Eide and Fjære, where the demand for boards and planks in the shipyards coupled with a rich trade in provisions for the many ships in the district, and a satisfactory and even ample job market. Those were the golden years of the tall ships, a period when initiative and skill might readily amass wealth. It is small surprise that emigration to America became a less tempting option in such a situation.

It was, however, a precarious situation. In general, ownership in the local vessels was spread among many hands. Any captain would have an interest in the ship he commanded, and many small and land-bound share-holders gave the industry more than a hint of economic

1Helge Ove Tveiten.En utvandring blusser opp – og slokner hen. Sørlandsk emigrasjon på 1800-tallet(Major thesis, University of Oslo, 1974).

2Based on material fromIndexinPart Four.

democracy, but it was a vulnerable system with scanty access to the necessary amount of financial support. It was certainly a giant on clay feet.

As technical and economic development made the tall ships obsolete, they were replaced by faster steam-powered iron-ships, and it became evident that new times required a kind of ready capital not found in the old and small-scale and humanely sympathetic system.

In addition, it might be argued that people on the southern coastline were too slow and too reluctant in adjusting to modern times.³

In recent years, Harry Jerome’s theory of push and pull factors connected to business cycles and migration has received some well-founded criticism. Certainly, it seems to be an approach which is somewhat unbalanced in its insistence upon economic forces alone enticing migration.⁴ If the economic factors behind emigration are isolated, it seems that the central assumption must be that the emigrants possessed “total rationality and complete information”.

One must realize that “a number of both rational and irrational reasons contributed to the emigration decisions of individuals.”⁵ It is, however, an approach which highlights the basic sides of the rather unique emigration which took place from Nedenes County in the latter part of the 19^thcentury, and lasted well into the first years of the World War One.

In a wide perspective there is little reason to doubt Jerome’s thesis as regards the general economic situation and its repercussions upon migration movements. The balance between pull and push factors may, however, be disturbed and economic factors must be supplemented by cultural, social, and religious influences. An example of a fairly clear-cut relationship between business cycles and emigration is found inSørlandetduring the crisis which followed the collapse of the tall-ship-industries. In Southern Norway economic conditions around 1880 literally pushed people out to find a livelihood across the seas. Their motivation to seek The Promised Land was in other words largely based upon massive unemployment in their local community, combined with the promises of America. For the individual emigrant his discontent and his expectations were really two sides of the same matter. In any case, the result was departure.

3The downfall of the shipping industries onSørlandethas been fully treated by Berit Eide Johnsen in Rederstrategi i endringstid(Kristiansand: Høyskoleforlaget, 2001).

It is tempting to see this as an early example of the much bespoken laid-back attitude of Norwegian Southerners;

a native myself, I must profess that I have often wondered why we are so meek and humble and slanting towards mañana. But of course, this is a totally unfounded and unscientific observation.

4Harry Jerome.Migration and Business Cycles(New York, NY: National Bureau of Statistical Research, 1927):

205-208.

5Hans Norman and Harald Runblom.Transatlantic Connections: Nordic Migration to the New World after 1800 (Oslo: Norwegian University Press, 1987): 112.

The central idea of the push and pull perspective seems to ignore the fact that people often move over shorter or longer distances. In other words, they are not residents in a static condition. Also, the approach does not deal with the influence on migration by personal contacts and social networks in migration systems. In summary, a decision to migrate is not a totally “individual affair nor a completely voluntary act, but often a collective and strongly conditioned or constrained decision”.⁶

Setting aside personal and group-inspired motivation for emigration, one might argue that the economic situation in Sørlandet in the mentioned period was founded on and dominated by larger and international factors. There is perhaps an unusually clear-cut parallel between the one-sided local economy and international business cycles. When the shipping industry collapsed, the economic repercussions hit nearly all spheres of life in the region. For a lot of people the consequence was unemployment, with small chances of finding alternative work. Also for the farmers in the district this meant hard times: they were not dependent upon paid jobs, but their agricultural products and timber from their forests were no longer in usual demand. For town people and rural population alike the prospect of emigrating became a realistic possibility, even necessity for supporting a family.

When emigration from Nedenes County resumed its course in the late 1870s, it soon became a massive wave which strongly influenced the sending communities, and in a long- term perspective changed the cultural and spiritual foundations among Norwegians on both sides of the Atlantic. Many of the motives for emigrating are of course the same for all Norwegian regions, but Nedenes County had a rhythm of its own, showing fluctuations which are unique. At the same time, the overall picture of emigration fromSørlandetfalls into the larger category of European emigration to America – a mass movement involving nearly 33 million people, of which three million came from the Nordic countries. About 20% of those emigrants would later return to their country of origin.⁷

Official records from the Grimstad-area state that 2,377 people left for America in the period 1875-1900. The population in the four communities in 1890 was 3,172 in Grimstad,

6Gunnar Malmberg. ”Time and Space in International Migration”, Thomas Hammar, Grete Brockmann, Kristof Hamas and Thomas Faist. International Migration, Immobility and Development(Oxford/ New York: Berg Publishers Ltd., 1997): 29-30.

7Hans Norman and Harald Runblom.Transatlantic Connections: Nordic Migration to the New World after 1800: 3.

4,971 in Fjære, 2,401 in Landvik, and 774 in Eide. During the same 25 years, the number of emigrants reached 1,438, 674, 195, and 70 respectively.⁸ A comparison with other districts in Norway, based on the number of emigrants pr. 1000 of mean population, shows that the southern districts – and Grimstad in particular - were as heavily affected as districts to the north, often regarded as the early, main emigration centres in Norway.

Emigration per 1000 of median population; five-year-periods:⁹

Location 1875-80 1881-85 1886-90 1891-95 1896-1900

Grimstad Fjære Landvik Eide Tinn Ringsaker Dovre Norway

1.8 0 0.5 0 5.5 7.6 8.5 4.25

20.5 1.1 0.9 1.8 21.2 19.3 18.8 10.98

34.0 7.6 4.3 5.9 13.5 8.4 13.5 8.2

23.7 9.3 4.6 8.4 11.6 5.4 11.5 6.0

17.5 8.6 6.4 2.1 6.4 - 4.0 3.1

In those years, Grimstad served as an important stepping-stone for prospective emigrants, who had made the little harbour the starting point for the final leg to America.

There was a steady flow of people coming from inner and rural communities, making the town their base for a time, and waiting for transport to the New World. The effect of the large number of people moving out was balanced by the influx of e.g. Swedish workers who took part in road-works and railroad constructions. At the crest of the wave, astonishing numbers of people crossed the Atlantic: in 1887, 53.2‰ of the population emigrated from Grimstad, and in the following year, Eide Parish saw 17.9‰ of its inhabitants leave for America.¹⁰

It is a striking feature of mass-emigration fromSørlandetthat New York became the unquestioned and favourite destination.¹¹ In the years from 1885 to 1900, 1,740 emigrants from the Grimstad district named the metropolis as their end-goal, and in reality narrowed their choice even further by crossing the East River and settling in the Red Hook, Park Slope

8Erik Aalvik Evensen.Amerikabrevene(Grimstad: Selskapet for Grimstad Bys Vel, 1996): 138.

9Ibid.: 140. Additional information from Andres Svalestuen.Tinns emigrasjonshistorie 1837 – 1907(Oslo:

Universitetsforlaget, 1972), and Arnfinn Engen, ed.Utvandringa – det store oppbrotet(Oslo:

Universitetsforlaget, 1978).

10Evensen, op.cit.: 141.

11See e.g. David C. Mauk.The Colony that Rose from the Sea: The Norwegians in the Red Hook Section of Brooklyn, 1850-1910(Doctoral dissertation, New York University, 1991).

and Bay Ridge areas in Brooklyn.¹² 85.6% of the emigrants from Grimstad headed for New York, 87.4% from Fjære Parish had made the same choice, as had 85.5% from Eide Parish.

Landvik Parish is atypical in this connection: only 72.7% followed their neighbours to New York. On the other hand, Landvik Parish confirms its position as an agricultural area, and the vast majority of a continued migration to the Middle West came from this parish. It is important in this connection to note that in those 25 years only four local emigrants went on to Missouri and St. Joseph. Kansas was more of a magnet in the same period with 21 newcomers.¹³

The typical emigrant in the 1890s from the Grimstad area was an unemployed seaman, unmarried, 26 years old, on his way to New York on a ship from theThingvalla-line – and quite possibly with a return to the native country in his mind. After the turn of the century, America developed into an extended job-market, where people worked as carpenters and day- workers in the docks for shorter periods, returned to Norway with well-earned dollars, and continued their repetitive voyages across the Atlantic for some years.¹⁴

It is therefore clear that emigration from the Grimstad-area falls into two distinct and different categories. As already mentioned, mass-emigration from the district near the turn of the century bears the mark of an extended job-market, made viable and even natural in the troublesome aftermath of the golden years of the tall ships. At the prospect of widespread unemployment, traditional attitudes along the coast, shaped by old shipping contacts with countries on the continent and in Britain, paved the way for an increasingly smooth transfer of labour.

For the emigration pioneers in the 1840s the situation was far more difficult. The communities along the southern coast had been hit hard by the war with England (1807-1814) and the ensuing blockade. The English men-of-war hindered effectively provisions from reaching Norway, and there are tragic stories of lone men trying desperately to row to Denmark in small boats in the hope of bringing back food for their families. In fact, 4-5,000 Norwegians were caught by the English Navy, and sent to prison in England.¹⁵

Even in the 1840s, the hardships of the war lingered, and the country was still groping to find its way back to what seemed more affluent and happy pre-war years. The golden years

12Evensen, op. cit.: 141.

13Ibid.

14Ibid.: 146.

15www.digitalarkivet.uib.no/DaDoc/fa22001807.htm (Accessed July 25, 2007).

of the tall ships were only a dawning possibility for people with economic foresight, and the break-through of modern times had just started on a laborious process. In such a time, it would take both courage and stamina to decide on an action which at its core meant burning your bridges and in most cases leaving the fatherland for good.

Put simply and squarely, the goal of this dissertation is therefore to conduct an in- depth and comparative study of a limited number of related people (about 80 persons), and the motives and general background for their exodus from Hommedal Parish to America in 1846, to follow the destinies of the first two generations on American soil, and see if, how quickly, and to what extent they became assimilated or even “Americanized”. The scope of the project may be narrow, in time, space, and group-selection, but it gives the opportunity for a close and comparative scrutiny of migration movements in linked communities (even on an individual level) on either side of the Atlantic in a time of pioneering initiative.

In any research on early emigration, the first intriguing question is nearly always: what motivated the migrants to carry through such a decision? Or to use another term to summarize the causes of migration: what was their “migratory space”?

The development of local communities like Landvik and Eide Parishes is of course linked to broader national and even international changes. It has therefore been natural to adopt a structure in the first part of this project which reflects the inter-dependency between three concentric circles of interest (national – regional – local), or, on a parallel structure, the interplay of a macro-level, a meso-level, and a micro-level. A macro-survey of important 19^th century political and social trends, especially in the rural population in Norway, is followed by a narrowing circle, focusing on the development of rural areas in particular in Nedenes County, and reaching a micro-level in a study of political, cultural, social and economic features in the Landvik and Eide sub-Parishes between 1800 and 1850. This detailed study is brought even further, highlighting the state of affairs on “emigrant-farms” in the 1840s. The background study is addressed inPart One, chapters IV-VI.

The 1846 exodus marks the beginning of the first phase of an amazing story of mass emigration from Sørlandet to America. Unlike people from the valleys and inner regions, people from the coastal area in the south were by tradition often open-minded travellers of the seas, having a long-established culture of commercial and social contacts with countries like Holland, France, Germany, England, and Denmark. Even so, their decision to migrate must

have been a difficult one to reach. It is true that pathfinders had reported back the wonders of the new world, but in the last analysis theirs was a journey into the unknown.

It is a main hypothesis in this work that the exodus from Hommedal Parish in 1846 was not the result solely of economic factors, not to mention international business cycles. It is of course true that economic considerations were at the base of the deliberations that went on in the early 1840s, and after all, it was an essential goal for the migrants to secure a future for their children. However, the decision to leave the native shores for good was of such a radical and brave nature that it is of paramount interest to establish the cultural and spiritual factors which helped bring about the dismantling of age-old traditions and cemented political and social bonds. In other words, emigration to America in 1846 was not a question of only arranging practical and personal affairs, raising money for the voyage, bracing oneself for the unknown, and exploiting favourable trade winds; it was a courageous act, defying the leading powers of the realm, and required both stamina and self-reliance to welcome modern times and take advantage of a new freedom. Although economic factors were certainly in the balance, so were feelings and even acts of opposition and outright animosity directed towards the dominant class of civil servants.¹⁶ It is consequently fair to assume that emigration from Hommedal Parish in 1846 was the result of the interaction of complex and multifaceted economic, cultural, social, spiritual, political, and personal motives. Such local factors are addressed in chapter VI. In addition, one should add the triggering role of Johan R. Reiersen, who was sponsored by the “well-read” men of Eide Parish, and whosePathfinder certainly tipped the balance in favour of emigration. The activities of the two local pioneers, Johan R.

Reiersen and his companion Elise Wærenskjold are discussed inPart One, chapter VII.

In one sense, the exodus in 1846 came as a result of the emergence of liberating forces in the old society. These new thoughts were of course brought to America as a form of cultural ballast among the emigrants. In the process of settling on American soil, the emigrants must have been influenced by their newly-won view-points, and the question arises to what extent the new settlement bore the characteristics of the old Norwegian culture, the rebellious culture of the 1840s, or the welcoming culture of the receiving country. These are

16The emigrants of 1846 must have found themselves in a situation where two alternatives presented themselves.

A geographicalexitmight be one form of expressed dissatisfaction, another would bevoice,implying political expression and action in their home parish. Hirschmann’s classical concepts point of course to the variety of strategies available to potential migrants. In the case of the emigrants from Hommedal Parish, they very seldom vented their criticism openly, but let their act of migration be their voice, and also wrote out some frustrations in their letters from America. See also 12.1.

central questions in an assessment of the key concepts of integration and assimilation to be addressed throughoutPart Two, and concluded on a more theoretical basis in chapter XII.

The pioneers of 1846 were nearly all members of the same clan or family. TheIgland family and their home base in Landvik Parish was undoubtedly at the hub of what took place in the mid 1840s. The developments in agriculture, the gathering forces leading the country towards a modern society, and the growth of the population, had, however, already in the 1830s pushed sons and daughters away from their ancestral farm in search of a new livelihood. They had settled in the neighbouring parishes of Eide, Fjære, Birkenes, Herefoss, and Øyestad, but were in most respects satellites in the web revolving around Hommedal Parish, of which Landvik and Eide constituted the twin sub-parishes. It is both logical and natural that this dissertation is centred on Hommedal Parish, since this remained the foundation and the starting point of the pioneers’ cultural and spiritual identity and aspirations. The role and function of the family and the cultural bonds holding the network or the group together then becomes another crucial factor behind the decision to emigrate. In Thomas Faist’s model these are elements of the “meso-level”, complementing and extending the traditional factors included in the so-called “macro-“ and “micro-levels”.¹⁷ The role of the family and social relations are treated inPart One, chapter III.

The title of this dissertation plays with the seemingly synonymous meaning ofCanaan andthe Promised Land.In a strict sense it is Eide Parish which carries the sobriquetCanaan.

In this connection, the term is used, however, to signify the cluster of neighbouring parishes.

They were mostly blessed with favourable natural conditions, not least as regards climate, but even so their resources became too restricted and unsatisfactory near the middle of the 19^th century. They were also solidly planted in what is known as the Norwegian “Bible-belt”.

God-fearing and staunch, they ventured on a quest to findthe Promised Land, attempting to break new ground for themselves and their children. But was their brave act in essence a circular journey? Was the strenuous expedition to Missouri in reality a move which brought them nowhere – from one tolerable life to another tolerable life? Were the expenses of such a nature that they spent the rest of their lives regretting the decision to migrate, and at the same time knowing that there was no return? Was it a destiny to be likened to Kristina’s in Moberg’sUtvandrerne– longing for the home country until her dying day, but at the same

17Thomas Faist. ”From Common Questions to Common Concepts” Thomas Hammar, Grete Brockmann, Kristof Tamas and Thomas Faist.International Migration, Immobility and Development. Multidisciplinary Perspectives: 247-276.

time accepting the situation and realizing that her children were better off in America? Or is it possible to demonstrate that their new life in America turned out to be the fulfilment of their aspirations and dreams for themselves and the next generation? In his first letter from America in 1848, Osul Enge hints at such initial conclusions:

To me it really seems that this land was destined to be the home of men, which is not Norway. I should wish that the whole population in Norway were here, particularly the lowly part thereof, they did not have to lack food if only they could and would work a bit, and not so much. Here is room for everybody. I am not thinking of only this place, but around the country, though certainly if my property was cultivated and planted, it would feed the whole population in Eide Parish.¹⁸

To answer these questions, it is necessary to conduct a comparative study of the sending and receiving communities, heeding Jon Gjerde’s call for precisely such studies. In his excellent study of the Balestrand emigrants, he echoes the contention made by Frank Thistletwaite and Birgitta Odén to take into consideration both the country of emigration and the country of immigration, thereby adopting a method that is “feasible only if individuals are followed from their places of birth to their places of death.”¹⁹The ideals presented by Frank Thistletwaite in 1960, called for more studies that attempted to cover the whole migration experience, not just the European or American end of the story. He invited researchers to regard the Atlantic migrations as “a complete sequence of experiences whereby the individual moves from one social identity to another.”²⁰ In accordance with this view, the migrants from Hommedal Parish are followed up to the moment they finally chose Missouri (Part Two, chapter VII), and further into the process of actual settlement (chapters IX, X, XI).

This is then the goal ofPart One: in a broad perspective, what were the basic and motivating factors behind the decision to emigrate from Landvik, Eide and neighbouring parishes? The answer is certainly a complex one, and it seems natural to seek a structural model which meets this wish to take into account an array of possible approaches, and look beyond a logical, yet narrow push and pull perspective. Such a multidisciplinary approach, advocated by Thomas Faist, is presented later in this introduction.

18Osul (Enge) Nelson, 1848,Letters from the Pioneers, no. 1

19Jon Gjerde.From Peasants to Farmers: The Migration from Balestrand, Norway, to the Upper Middle West (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1985): 1.

20Birgitta Odén. “Ekonomiska emigrationsmodeller och historisk forskning: Ett diskussionsinnlägg”Scandia (1971):1-70; and Frank Thistletwaite. ”Migration from Europe Overseas in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries”XIe. Congrès International des Sciences Historiques. Rapports V: Histoire Contemporaine (Stockholm, 1960): 32-60.

In Part Two, the aim is to follow the company to their settlement in St. Joseph, Missouri, and about ten years later to an alternative “daughter colony” in Doniphan County, Kansas. As the two settlements struck roots, it became evident that two men established themselves as heads of the two communities: Peder Nelson (Peder Nielsen Kalvehaven) in Missouri, and his cousin Osul Nelson (Osul Nielsen Enge) in Kansas. Their lives serve as exemplars of the rest of the migrants, and together with the exploits of N.O. Nelson from the second generation three case studies explore in some detail the destinies of these exceptional men.

What were their motives to seek a new life on the frontier? Did the lure of American freedom and prosperity pull them? What kind of society did they establish in Missouri and Kansas? Was it a replica of old Landvik and Eide Parishes? Were their traditional ways simply transplanted into American soil? Did they willingly and eagerly go through a process of integration and assimilation? Did they soon become Americanized? What kind of identity did they retain or develop? Was it possible for such a small company to preserve their Norwegian ways, or were they simply swallowed by the surrounding American culture? How does the first generation, the pioneers, compare with the second generation, their children?

This is a handful of the questions which form the nucleus and concluding remarks of chapter XII in Part Two. As mentioned, in this chapter the main interest is directed towards the central concepts of integration and assimilation, but also the broader issues of identity and ethnicity. The concept of the so-called meso-level plays an important role in the discussion of the cultural factors which helped bring about the downfall of the old order and opened the way to emigration. It has been a rewarding viewpoint also to bring this concept to bear on the factors at work in the actual settlement in Missouri and Kansas. It is likely that the assets found in the tightly-woven family-group in Hommedal Parish, facilitated the transfer into American soil. The smooth transfer to American ways and methods in farming is logically linked to the immigrants’ education and reading and their experience with political and social issues in the home country. Their cultural and intellectual ballast had in other words an important function in both the process of breaking loose from their home parish, and settling in the New World.

The Norwegians in St. Joseph never became part of the Norwegian-American sub- culture which flourished in the Midwest between the Civil War and World War II. Even from the beginning they were largely isolated from other Norwegian settlements, and apart from some few strays, they received no reinforcements from Norway after 1855. To be sure, in the

late 1870s and 1880s a fair number of Norwegians and some Swedes and Danes settled in North-Eastern Kansas and South-Eastern Nebraska. Many of these late-coming Scandinavians drifted towards the area closer to St. Joseph, and were happy to find people there who understood their language. They occasionally took jobs as farm-hands or hired girls with the older settlers, or otherwise temporarily associated themselves with them. But they never really made an integral part of the group which had come before the Civil War and was already well on the way to complete cultural assimilation.

1.2 ON A DIFFERENT COURSE

In September 1846 a company of about 80 people left their native grounds in Landvik and surrounding parishes in Southern Norway, crossed the North Sea with difficulty, spent two weeks in France, and finally reached New Orleans on board the Izette. Three years earlier, Peder Nielsen Kalvehaven, Osul Nielsen Enge, and Anders Nielsen Holthe had sponsored the well-known editor Johan R. Reiersen on a scouting expedition to America. On his return, Reiersen publishedThe Pathfinder, and reported to his sponsors in Eide Parish that ample opportunities were waiting for them in America. Reiersen himself gathered his family, and they eventually founded a colony inThree-Mile-Prairiein Texas. Anxious to extend and solidify his settlement, Reiersen eagerly waited for the arrival of the good men of Hommedal Parish, but had to accept the bitter disappointment that the farmers and their families had decided on a different course, not even informing him about their change of plans.

After a two-month stay in the Mississippi estuary, the immigrants proceeded on a riverboat to St. Louis, found new transportation there, and theOld Hickorybrought them to theRoubidoux Landingin St. Joseph, Missouri. They landed in this new town on the frontier in April, 1847. Twelve people had died in New Orleans, and when others had travelled north to Wisconsin,²¹the Missouri-group was reduced to about 50 people. At that time they were probably the only Norwegians in Missouri. Cleng Peerson had led a group of settlers to Shelby County not far from Hannibal in 1837, but the settlement proved to be a short-lived disaster, although some of the pioneers praised the beauty of the landscape before they left for better locations.²²

21Robert A. Bjerke has published several books and articles on the Manitowoc settlement, e.g.Manitowoc- skogen: a biographical and genealogical directory of the residents of Norwegian birth and descent in Manitowoc and Kenauee counties in Wisconsin from the first settlement to 1900(Manitowoc, WI: Dobbs, 1994).

22“No other Norwegian settlement had a better appearance or a better location”. Quoted in: “Knud Anderson Slovig”, http://wheelerfolk.org/norweb/knudpage.htm (Accessed August, 2007).

There are several unanswered questions connected to the turn of events in 1847. Why did the immigrants fail to join Johan R. Reiersen in Texas? Were there unknown tensions between the pathfinder and his sponsors? Why did they fail to inform him about their new course? Why did the settlers choose to travel to Missouri? Had events in New Orleans swayed their conviction and Missouri was to be preferred? Did Peder Nelson have a sort of hidden agenda, taking his fellows to a place where he had an unknown friend, a Dane who had been expelled from the Danish Court? It is definitely difficult to find clear-cut and well-founded answers to these questions, but a family tradition and circumstantial evidence are available and shall be used inPart Two, chapter VIII.

In Buchanan County they claimed or bought land, established a closely-knit community, but in the late 1850s many of the company moved from Missouri (a slave state) across the Missouri River into Kansas (a free state) in search of cheaper and better land. The move to Kansas raises another question: was the lure of cheap land the only reason for leaving St. Joseph? The letters from the pioneers contain passages which give the impression that certain feelings of bitterness and disappointment existed between Peder Nelson and Osul Nelson; was Osul Nelson’s move to Kansas also motivated by his opposition to slavery?

The great majority of Norwegian settlers were opposed to slavery; Peder Nelson owned eight slaves. In family tradition he is pictured as a benign master who bought and held slaves because it was deemed necessary and customary in his district. But did the question of slavery contribute in souring the relations between the cousins? Again, circumstantial evidence might suggest an answer inPart Two, chapters IX and X.

Letters from the pioneers have been collected and translated into English. Both Norwegian originals and their translations constitute an authentic backcloth, and are a great source of information of daily life in the settlements up till about 1870. The annotated letters are included inPart Three.

In the late 1840s the settlement in St. Joseph was perhaps one of the most successful colonies between Texas and Wisconsin. It prospered in a modest way, the first generation pioneers were in a position to give land away to their children, and they may have seen their expectations and hopes fulfilled. They were certainly afflicted by death and diseases, but none of the original 52 settlers returned to Norway. They had made their choice, and became American citizens as soon as the law permitted them to take the oath. A major goal of this dissertation is to delve deeper into the destinies of the first two generations of settlers, and weigh their possible “success”.

They had taken a route different from most other Norwegian settlers. It is perhaps one of the striking characteristics of the group from Hommedal Parish that they reached decisions and embarked upon courses marked by individualistic preferences, and thereby setting themselves apart from the mighty flow of settlers who stuck to a course to the north and west.

Awareness of the very existence of a relatively large group of Norwegians in Missouri quickly faded among their countrymen on both sides of the Atlantic. Those immigration historians who have noticed it at all, have usually dismissed it in passing as a curious aberration from the main pattern of settlement, and of little relevance to the larger story.

Nevertheless, the people of the St. Joseph settlement were deeply involved in an interplay of individuals and movements which in the 1840s and 1850s were transforming Norwegian emigration from a haphazard and disorganized affair into a more orderly movement.

1.3 A SERIES OF LIMITATIONS

The study of the exodus of emigrants from Hommedal and neighbouring parishes in 1846 and the following decade is characterized by a series of limitations compared to many other works on Norwegian migration.

In the first place, we are dealing with a very restricted number of emigrants from a little cluster of parishes in Southern Norway. The group of pioneers consisted originally of 79 people, and by the time they reached St. Joseph the company had dwindled to about 50 people. A number of new immigrants followed in 1849 and the first part of the 1850s, but the flow dried out in 1855. The Census Returns of 1850 state that there were 155 Norwegians in Missouri, and the number of Norwegian settlers showed little growth in the following decades. One of the implications is that we have a meagre basis for statistical comparisons. It is therefore difficult to follow for instance Jon Gjerde and Robert Ostergren in their respective studies of Balestrand and Rättvik,²³ simply because they had at their disposal a larger group of people who were part of a prolonged and continuous movement from Norway or Sweden to America. By contrast, the migration from Hommedal Parish to Missouri/ Kansas was short- lived and interrupted. In a longer perspective, the study of migration from this district is complicated because of two basic shifts in character: when emigration resumed its course around 1880, it was tied to the crisis in the shipping industries, and the typical migrant was no longer a peasant dreaming of ample and cheap land, but an unemployed seaman desperate to

23Robert C. Ostergren.A Community Transplanted: The Trans-Atlantic Experience of a Swedish Immigrant Settlement in the Upper Middle West, 1835-1915(Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988).

secure a livelihood to support himself and possibly a family. Secondly, there was also a marked difference in the choice of destination. The pioneers chose the Mid-West because they were basically peasants who had deep ties to the cultivation of the soil, while the unemployed seamen and hopeful young women of the 1880s went to Brooklyn to find jobs as dockworkers, carpenters, day-workers or house-maids.

Also, this study moves in a restricted circle of time and space. It deals with the pioneers of 1846, their children, and ends with the death of the central leaders of the first generation around 1885. Once they had settled in Buchanan County, Missouri, the immigrants from Hommedal Parish only allowed themselves to move to a second location. This happened in the late 1850s when Osul Nelson established himself as an unofficial leader of the group of Norwegians who crossed the Missouri and founded a daughter colony in East Norway, Doniphan County, Kansas. Their children were surprisingly loyal to this bifurcation: there are only a very few examples of them moving further out - to Nebraska and St. Louis. Generally speaking, about 25% of Norwegian immigrants would return to their native country after some time. This is not the case with the settlers in Missouri and Kansas. In fact, none of the first generation of pioneers returned home, except for some short and rare visits.

Lastly, the limitations apply to occupations and family connections. The core of the pioneer group consisted of peasants accompanied by their families, one shoemaker with a family, one or two farm-maids, and some few bachelors who were either sons on farms or employed as farm-workers. Essentially, they were all part of - or closely connected to - the powerful Igland tribe, cultivators of the soil and pillars of culture and religion in Landvik Parish since the 16^thcentury.

1.4 A MODEST PLACE IN THE HISTORY OF NORWEGIAN EMIGRATION In July, 1825, theRestaurationsailed from Stavanger, carrying emigrants mostly from the Quaker and Haugean flocks. In the fall, the first Norwegian settlement was founded at Kendall, New York. In 1833, Cleng Peerson broke out from this colony, headed west, and found his way to Fox River in Illinois. During the following year most of the settlers in Kendall followed his example and made their way to Illinois. From Fox River, Gjert Hovland wrote home, describing the vast prairies, and praising both religious and economic freedom.

You must come to America, he concluded, here is room for all of you.