Bellum Vita--Vita Bellum.
War is Life and Life is War.
Der, hvorom intet er at stride, er
heller ingen seir at vinde.

Adopting the conventional form of autobiography, I will begin by saying that I was born in the town of Albion, Dane county, Wisconsin, January 12, 1846. My father was Bjorn Anderson Kvelve, born in Vikedal, Norway, June 3, 1801; died in the town of Albion, Dane county, Wisconsin, August 10, 1850. My mother's maiden name was von Krogh, her full name before her marriage being Abel Catherine yon Krogh. She was born in Sandeid, near Vikedal, Norway, October 8, 1809. She died October 31, 1885, at the home of her daughter, Mrs. T. A. Torgerson, near Bristol, Worth county, Iowa, where she had made her home for the eighteen years previous to her death. My father was of the peasant class, a man of great energy and ambition, and before coming to this country owned a small farm in Vikedal, a short distance north of Stavanger. The farm name was Kvelve.

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My mother was of a prominent military family which by various intermarriages had been connected with many other of the more prominent families of the country, including royalty. The von Kroghs had come into Denmark from Germany about 1640 and the military annals of Denmark and Norway from that time on show many officers bearing that name. My mother's grand uncle, General George Frederick von Krogh (born 1732, died 1816), was commander in chief of the Norwegian army. He lived in Trondhjem where he owned the magnificent house at which King Haakon stopped when he came to Trondhjem to be crowned. This house was built by his son's mother-in-law, Mrs. Scholler. The son went to Denmark and gave the house to his father. I have now in my possession General von Krogh's cane which bears part of the coat-of-arms of the family. Later a cousin of my mother commanded the Danish army at Isted, the chief battle in the first war with Prussia in the '40s. Her father, who had been an officer in the war with Sweden in 1808--9, had been wounded. On being retired and pensioned he had bought a farm at Westbo, in Sandeid, and it is probable that my father and mother first met at church there. My mother's decision to marry a peasant was an offense in the eyes of her more aristocratic family, so their marriage was somewhat in the nature of a misalliance. They were married in July, 1831.

But she had further offended by marrying a dissenter from the established church. My father belonged to the Society of the Friends. During the Napoleonic wars a Norwegian ship was captured and taken to England, the Danes and Norwegians at this period being friendly to Napoleon. In England the captives fell in with the sect of Quakers, who treated them with the greatest kindness. Eventually the prisoners accepted the faith of the Friends.

After the battle of Waterloo they were returned to Norway. Most of these captives were from Stavanger and on their return

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they organized a Quaker congregation in that city. Religious freedom had not yet been established in Norway, so the little society had much trouble with the government. It was not until in the '40s that the harsh laws then prevailing were abrogated, thus giving full religious freedom. A large book was written in English on the persecutions to which these Norwegian Quakers were subjected.

My father had become acquainted with these Quakers. He owned a small coasting vessel and in addition to attending to his farm he carried on a coasting trade, carrying fish, produce, etc., to Stavanger and bringing back goods. At Stavanger he met the Quakers and eventually identified himself with them, thus becoming a dissenter. This was in the middle of the '20s.

My father was a born agitator and frequently stirred up trouble by urging his views, and this fact combined with the displeasure my mother had created in her family by her marriage, made their life less agreeable than they had hoped it would be. My father sought to cheer his wife by telling her of the land beyond the seas where they might freely hold whatever views they chose and where class distinctions were not so pronounced and offensive. If necessary to their peace, he said, they could go there.

Finding the persecutions and ostracisms to which they were subjected unendurable, the Norwegian Quakers in 182l determined to raise a fund and send two men to America to find them land and homes in the new world. The men sent out were Kleng Peerson and Knut Fide. Fide died while in America on this journey, but after three years Kleng Peerson returned (1824) and gave a glowing account of what he had seen and heard in America. He had met a party of Friends in New York and these had proposed to find homes for the Norwegian Quakers in Orleans county, New York. on the shores of Lake Ontario, north of Rochester. Accordingly these Quakers in 1825 combined and purchased a small sloop

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which they ballasted with iron and on July 4, 1825, the first little Norwegian emigrant party sailed out of the harbor of Stavanger, bound for New York, where they landed October 9, having been a little over three months at sea. Their vessel was "Restaurationen", which may thus appropriately be called the Norwegian Mayflower. There were 52 members in the party which set sail, but 53 in the party that landed, a girl baby having been born at sea. This sloop baby is Mrs. Margaret Atwater of Western Springs, III, still living at a hale old age, the only other survivor of the sloop party at the last reports being Mrs. Hulda Olson of Sheridan, LaSalle county, III., who came as a child on that eventful voyage.*

* Since this was published in "Amerika" Mrs. Hulda Olson has passed away.

After adjusting some trouble they had with the American authorities because of the overloading of their boat, the immigrants landed and were received by the Quakers of New York, who helped them to their destination in Orleans county. They settled at Kendall and there descendants of members of this sloop party may yet be found.

In 1833 Kleng Peerson left the Kendall settlement and went west. About 80 miles west of Chicago he located what has since become known as the Fox River settlement. He found a desirable tract of land in LaSalle county and on his recommendation many of the settlers at Kendall moved with their families in 1834 to the new home and founded the first Norwegian settlement west of the lakes and the second in this country. It is still a flourishing Norwegian community.

My father had kept in touch with the sloopers which developed in him the resolution to emigrate, and on the basis of the reports received from America he began to agitate emigration in the community. He found a number of neighbors willing to go and then went to Stavanger and persuaded a ship company to equip a vessel to take a load of emigrants to New

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York. However, before they were ready to embark so many others wanted to go that it was necessary to fit out a second ship. Accordingly, two Kohler brigs, "Norden" and "Den Norske Klippe", left Stavanger in the spring of 1836 loaded with emigrants bound for New York. My father was generally regarded as the leader of the party.

My father and mother and their two sons, Andrew and Bruun, were passengers on the "Norden". There were about 150 passengers on the two vessels. These were all bound for the Fox River settlement in LaSalle county, Illinois, but my father and his family left the party at Rochester, N.Y., where they spent the summer and the following winter, my father obtaining employment in the city as a cooper.

The next year, 1837, my father and his family moved to the Fox River settlement, where they remained for the next three years. However, not liking the conditions there, my father, in 1840, went northwards with three companions and crossed the Rock river into what is now the town of Albion, Dane county, Wisconsin. There he found such conditions as he liked and June 22, 1840, bought 80 acres of government land, being thus among the very first of Norwegians to enter land in Dane county. His entry was the west half of the southeast quarter of Section l. The township had then no name, but with the arrival of a colony of English Primitive Methodists in 1844 it was given the name of Albion.

My father built a log cabin and the next year, 1841, brought his family to its new home. My mother was the first white woman to live in the town, and my sister Martha was the first white child born there. At that time the Indians had a camp on my father's land and the nearest white woman that my mother could visit was at Milton, twelve miles away.

My father was greatly interested in education. Besides spending much time in teaching his children himself he twice employed private teachers for that purpose. One of these by

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name Corneliuson later became register of deeds of Dane county. Me spent one winter at my father's house and taught the children for his board. The other tutor employed was Gabriel Bjornson, who also later became a county official. Neither of them was then married. Also while the settlers were discussing the building of a school house my father cut logs and hauled them to the roadside and built the first school house largely at his own expense. It was donated to the district. Here was the only district school that I ever attended. The school house was used for many years, after which my mother bought it and had it moved on the old home farm where it is still standing.

My parents had the usual experiences of pioneer life, my father raising wheat and hauling it to Milwaukee and my mother making all the clothes for her children, besides meeting her many other household duties. They had begun to prosper and my father had purchased more land and all looked very encouraging for the future when he was suddenly cut off by cholera. This dreadful scourge swept through the settlement in the summer of 1850 and for a time it was feared it would wipe out the community. Practically every home was turned into a house of mourning. In one nearby family all the members died except two little girls. One of these girls later became Mrs. Ole Melaas of Stoughton, Wis. All of us in our family also came down with the disease, but my father and my second eldest brother Bruun, then sixteen years old, were the only ones to die. My brother died August 6 and four days later my father passed away. As I was only four years old at the time of my father's death, I have only a faint recollection of him, but I remember sitting by his sickbed and fanning him to drive away the flies. A neighbor, Ole Teigen, father of Dr. K. M. Teigen, the well known Norwegian-American writer, made coffins for my father and my brother and buried them. My father had set aside a corner of his farm for a private

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cemetery and here he and my brother were buried. There also is buried my mother, my stepfather and my own first child and there I expect to be laid to rest.A monument and an iron fence mark the little burial ground.

My mother was left a widow with eight children, but bravely remained on the farm and held her family together until the older members were able to go out and make their own way in the world. In 1854 she was again married, her second husband being Ingebright Amundson from near Stavanger, Norway. He died in 1860, leaving one son, now Dr. A. C. Amundson of Cambridge. Of the children in our family a few words may here be said:

My oldest brother, Andrew, was born in Norway in 1832, so he was eighteen years old when our father died. Being ambitious, he left horne and became a sailor on the great lakes, becoming in time chief steward on a propellor running between Milwaukee and Buffalo. After some years he became tired of sailing and when the railroad was built to Edgerton, Wis., near our home, he opened a general store at that place. Not prospering here, he went to Milwaukee and became a clerk in the large drygoods house of Candee, Dibble & Co. After clerking some years he married a Swedish lady of that city and in 1861 opened a store of his own in Milwaukee. He was nearly ruined by the war which then broke out and tried to enlist, but as he had once frozen his feet while out hunting and had thus lost a toe he was rejected. Soon afterwards he removed to Goodhue county, Minnesota, where he is still living and where he has become a prosperous farmer and raised a large family.

Elizabeth, my oldest sister, was born in LaSalle county, Ill., in 1837. She married a pioneer farmer of Goodhue county, Minn., named Hans Danielson. He served in the Indian war in Minnesota in 1862 and lost a leg. He died three years ago leaving a large family. My sister is still living.

Cecilia, who was also born in LaSalle county, Ill., was married

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to Rev. S.S. Reque, who died some years ago while pastor at Spring Grove, Minn. My sister died about a dozen years ago. They also had a large family.

Martha, while on a visit ta our sister Elizabeth in Minnesota, was married to a Dane named Lewis Johnson, who is a leading farmer there.

Dina was married to Rev. T. A. Torgerson, who died a half dozen years ago in Worth county, Iowa, having been for many years president of the so-called Iowa district of the Norwegian Synod. She is now living with her son, August, who succeeded his father as pastor.

I was the next in the family and then came Abel, who is now a Lutheran minister at Montevideo, Minn. He was educated at Albion academy, the University of Wisconsin, Decorah and St. Louis.

Bruun, now known as Brown, is a prosperous merchant at Spring Grove, Minn.

Dr. A. C. Aroundson, the youngest of the family, is a physician and bank president at Cambridge, Wis.

All of us except Andrew attended Norwegian parochial school and were prepared for confirmation. If my father had lived we would probably all have been brought up as Quakers. The children who had been born in Norway had been baptised there according to law. When my father died the other six children had not been baptised.

It is interesting to note here that the first Scandinavian Methodist was a Dane named Christian Willerup. He had been ordained as a Methodist minister and became active in promoting the faith. He came to Cambridge, Wis., in the early '40s and went among the Norwegians in and around Cambridge making proselytes and there he organized the first Scandinavian Methodist society in the world. Here he and his congregation built a stone church, which in remodeled form is still standing.

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Jenny Lind, the famous Swedish songstress, contributed $200 to this church.

Willerup came to our home and succeeded in persuading my mother that the children ought to be baptised, so the whole flock received baptism on the same day.

After founding the church at Cambridge, Willerup returned to the old world to promote the cause of Methodism in Denmark and Norway. He was very successful in his efforts and was made superintendent of the Methodist church in the countries of Denmark, Norway and Sweden. After he had baptised us I did not see him again until I went to Copenhagen as United States minister in 1885, when one of the first things I did was to look him up. He was then old and crippled and had largely lost his memory. His wife was younger and more vigorous and tried to have him recall the occasion when he baptised a whole family of children in America, but we received only a smile in return. Soon afterwards he died.

The church founded by Willerup at Cambridge became the nucleus of Methodist work among the Scandinavians which has grown to large proportions among the Danes, Norwegians and Swedes on both sides of the Atlantic. Norwegian Methodist congregations now exist at Cambridge, Stoughton, Milwaukee, Chicago and various other points in the northwest. The Norwegian-Danish Methodist church has a professorship at the Northwestern university at Evanston, Ill., and also publishes a church paper in Norwegian. The name of the paper is "Den Christelige Talsmand".

Having been baptised by Willerup it would have been natural to expect that we should join the Methodist church and this might have happened had not my mother been connected by marriage with the wife of Rev. A. C. Preus.

As has been indicated, the sloopers of 1825 were nearly all Quakers. A few of the immigrants who came in 1836 were also Quakers. Those who remained in Kendall had regular

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Quaker worship, but those who came westward were too scattered and not numerous enough to organize a Quaker church. Many of the Norwegians of the LaSalle county settlement were also influenced by Mormon missionaries and one of the sloopers named Haukaas became a high priest of Melchisedec in the Mormon church. Lay preachers of various kinds traveled through the settlements, each holding services in his own way.

Most of the Norwegian settlers of this period, however, were known as Haugianere or followers of Hans Nilsen Hauge. Early in 1839 Elling Eielsen carne to America from Voss and exercised a great influence. He had been a lay preacher before leaving Norway and after coming to America he gave all his time and energy to preaching the gospel among his countrymen. In 1842 he built a meeting house in the town of Norway, LaSalle county, Ill., and this was the first building put up for church purposes among the Norwegians in this country. Eielsen had himself ordained by a Rev. F. A. Hoffman, at Duncan's Grove, twenty miles north of Chicago, October 3, 1843, and in that way he became the first ordained Norwegian Lutheran minister in this country.

Eielsen founded a church of his own which grew into a large organization, but in the '70s a rupture occurred in this body and the majority then assumed the name of the Hauge Synod, with headquarters at Red Wing, Minn., where it has a large school. A small minority remained loyal to Eielsen, claiming to be the original Eielsen organization. This body still exists, having about a dozen ministers, but more than twice as many congregations. The president of the body, Rev. S. M. Stenby, lives in Clear Lake, Iowa.

The first work toward establishing what is now known as the Synod of the Norwegian Evangelical Lutheran church of America was clone by C. L. Clausen.

Claus Lauritz Clausen was a Dane. He was born November

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3, 1820, on the island of Ærö, Fyen Stilt, in Denmark, and he died in Paulsbo, Washington, in 1892.

In 1841 he came to Norway to seek work in the missionary field in South Africa, but he found that there did not seem to be an opening for him in that direction. Tollef O. Bache, a merchant in Drammen, whose son Soren, with Johannes Johannesen, had settled in Muskego, Wis., and was anxious to send a teacher to America in order that his own grandchildren and other children growing up there might be properly instructed in the religion and language of their fathers. Tollef Bache's attention had been called to this young man, Clausen. A proposition was made and Clausen accepted. He first went to Denmark, and married Martha F. Rasmussen, and then proceeded to his new field of work in Muskego, where he arrived with his young wife in August, 1843.

After arriving in Muskego it seemed to him and to the people of Muskego that his services were more needed as a preacher than as a teacher, and accordingly he was called as preacher, duly examined by a German Lutheran minister by name L. F. E. Krause and ordained by him on the 18th of October, 1843, just fifteen days after Elling Eielsen had been ordained. Clausen at once began to preach in Even Heg's barn, in the houses of the settlers and in school houses. On the second Sunday after Easter, 1844, he confirmed the first class of children in Even Heg's barn. This was the first Norwegian Lutheran confirmation in America. In the fall of 1843 the congregation (sit venia verbo) decided to build a church. Heg gave the ground on the so-called Indian Mound, and here the church was built. Tollef Bache in Drammen contributed $400 to the church, and the building of it was begun early in 1844. The dedication took place March 13, 1845. It was the first Norwegian church built in America.

Clausen was a strong and interesting character. He was a

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leading figure in the Norwegian Synod for years and president of that body, but in the '60s he became involved in a bitter controversy with his brethren over the slavery question. The Norwegian pastors, influenced by the German Missouri Synod with headquarters at St. Louis, had taken up the defense of slavery which led Clausen to sever his connection with the Synod in 1868. From that time on he was connected with the Norwegian-Danish conference, another Lutheran body. He was also instrumental in founding the second newspaper among the Norwegians of this country at Immansville, Rock county, Wis., where he was pastor for a time. The paper was known as "Emigranten".

In the early '50s he moved to Mitchell county, Iowa, where he founded a new Norwegian settlement and the town of St. Ansgar. Here also he built churches. He served as a member of the Iowa legislature and during the civil war was chaplain for a time of the Fifteenth Wisconsin regiment, known as the Norwegian regiment. After the war he was particularly active in the controversy over the doctrine of slavery which had not yet Been repudiated by the Norwegian Synod and for that matter has not yet been definitely disavowed. Its practical defense of slavery did the Synod much harm. When the question came up for the last time at the Synod meeting in Chicago in 1868 and where it was again practically endorsed Mr. Clausen and I and a couple of other delegates walked out of the meeting and Clausen was never afterward connected with the Synod.

It was known in Norway that a considerable number of Norwegians had located in the southeastern part of Dane county in what is still called in church parlance East Koshkonong, West Koshkonong and Liberty Prairie, so a number of persons in Norway raised a fund and induced Rev. J. W. C. Dietrichson, a minister known to them, to go to America to organize the Lutheran church there. He left Norway in the brig Washington

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May 16, 1844, and landed in New York July 9. After preaching twice to the Norwegians, Swedes and Danes of New York he came westward to the Muskego settlement where he stopped a short time with Rev. Mr. Clausen, whose ordination he recognized as regular in every respect. Late in August he proceeded to Koshkonong where he at once began preaching and organizing congregations. On October 10 he organized the so-called East Church in the town of Christiana and on October 13, the so-called West Church, in the present town of Pleasant Springs. The following year he returned to Norway where he remained for a year and during his absence his congregations at Koshkonong were served by Mr. Clausen. In 1846 he came back to Wisconsin and remained until 1850 when he returned to Norway to remain.

During his last four years in this country, besides serving his two congregations at Koshkonong, he visited the various localities where Norwegian settlements had been established, such as Blue Mounds, Primrose, Wiota, Rock county, Fox River (Ill.) and Chicago, preaching to the settlers and making efforts to gather them into organized congregations.

In 1850 he was succeeded by Rev. A. C. Preus, who was also a regular graduate in theology of the University of Norway and had been ordained by a Norwegian bishop. Other ministers also soon came from Norway to serve the congregations partially organized by Mr. Dietrichson in the newer settlements. By 1853 these ministers and congregations felt strong enough to get together and organize what is known as the Norwegian Synod, at present divided into five districts. A meeting for that purpose had been held in 1852 at the parsonage on Koshkonong and the next year (1853) another meeting was held at Immansville, on Rock Prairie, where organization was effected.

Now it so happened that Rev. A. C. Preus was married to a granddaughter of the distinguished Norwegian bishop and

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poet in Bergen, Johan Nordahl Brun, one of the most eminent preachers and poets of his day. My mother's aunt was married to a son of Bishop Brun, a minister at Fjeldberg, near Bergen, a parsonage where my mother was an occasional visitor before her marriage. It will be seen, therefore, that my mother and Mrs. Preus were quite closely connected by marriage, and the further fact that they were many thousands of miles from Norway brought them together as if they were sisters. As our home was only three miles from the Preus parsonage they were able to see each other frequently. While my father had not only refused to take part in organizing the Norwegian congregation, but, being a born agitator, had done all in his power to throw obstacles in Mr. Dietrichson's way, it was nevertheless perfectly natural that my mother, who had never become devoted to the religion of the Friends and who had now had her children baptised by a Methodist, should find it easy to become a member of Mr. Preus' congregation.

Mr. Dietrichson was highly educated and scholarly and was considered a very able minister. At the same time he was strict and overbearing. He was also thought to be avaricious. In regard to this charge made against this distinguished pioneer preacher, the late John A. Johnson, founder of the Gisholt Machine company, frequently told the following story:

As a boy preparing for confirmation he lived at the Dietrichson parsonage doing chores for his board. One clay an American stopped at the parsonage to call on the pastor and requested young Jens (Jens Shipnes, later changed to John A. Johnson) to hold his horse for him. When the American left he handed the boy a dime. This was observed by the pastor, who promptly took it from the boy and kept it.

The following story illustrates his severity and strictness as a pastor:

In building the East Koshkonong church it was agreed among the members that each one should furnish his share of

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logs hewn ready to put into the walls, and each one should contribute a number of days work. In this way the church was built and roofed. It had no seats, however, so it was further agreed that each father of a household should bring two benches, one for the men's side of the church and one for the women's side. Among the settlers then living on the banks of Koshkonong creek was one Peter Funkeli. His conduct was not above reproach in the eyes of his pastor, who had now and then found it necessary to discipline him. When persuasion no longer served the purpose Mr. Dietrichson determined to exercise his authority in accordance with the rules of the church of Norway. He decreed that for a number of services Mr. Funkeli should occupy a seat on a bench next to the entrance door. This was to be his punishment. The next Sunday Mr. Funkeli came late to church and disregarding the order of the pastor took his seat on the bench which he himself had furnished and which was the first one in front of the pulpit, suspended on the south wall. Mr. Dietrichson stopped preaching, spoke to Funkeli and requested him to go back and take his seat near the door. Funkeli paid no attention to the order. The pastor insisted on obedience. Funkeli replied that the seat on which he was sitting belonged to him and he refused to leave it. Dietrichson then left the pulpit and called the wardens to come to his assistance in putting the rebellious member out of the church by force. Dietrichson, who was a powerful man, assisted the wardens and Funkeli was finally ejected although he resisted vigorously. Funkeli then went to my father and laid the matter before him. My father told Funkeli that he could prosecute Dietrichson for assault and battery. This suited Funkeli. An attorney in Cambridge named Isaac Brown was engaged and my father having by that time acquired considerable proficiency inthe English language served as interpreter for the witnesses. The case was tried before Justice Stillman at Albion Center. Funkeli won his case and Dietrichson was

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fined $10 and costs, a large sum in those days, and in accordance with what has been stated above an amount that must have looked quite large to the pastor. This happened on Dietrichson's first visit to America, in 1845, just before his first return to Norway. While in Norway in 1845--46 Dietrichson wrote a book of considerable size giving an account of his experiences and his work among his countrymen in America. This book was published in Stavanger in 1846. In the '90s I reedited and reprinted it. The last pages of this book are devoted entirely to this Funkeli episode and Dietrichson tells that he had appealed the case to the circuit court at Madison, but that his attorney had neglected to attend to the case on time. The attorney, he said, arrived one day too late. Of course we know that the law abounds in technicalities.

Without going into the niceties of theology we might say that Dietrichson represented the church of Norway, the Norwegian Lutheran; but he was known to be somewhat influenced by Grundtvigianism. As poet, historian, theologian, Grundtvig was probably the greatest mind Denmark ever produced. He held the view that the only parts of the Scriptures that were inspired were the words instituting the sacraments, the Lord's prayer and the Decalogue, the remainder he considered as merely so much church history. With the Passages of the Bible which he held to be inspired he also included the apostolic creed or three articles of faith, which are not found in the Bible. Dietrichson was inclined toward somewhat the same views.