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Our Trip To America From Sweden - 1916<insert name=__subtitle> Our Trip To America From Sweden - 1916 (the s.c.nordic FAQ) Our Trip To America From Sweden - 1916 About : culture, history, places of interest and other things. This page is a part of the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) file for the newsgroup soc.culture.nordic. Its purpose is to provide some general information about the Nordic countries (Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark and Iceland), to cover some of the topics frequently discussed in the group and to introduce new readers to the group. 1 1 1 1 1 1 > > >

In 1912, my Great-Grandfather Claus Emil Peterson came to Minnesota from Sweden, leaving behind his wife and eight children until he became well established enough to send for them. In 1916, my great-grandmother made the trip from their farm in the Swedish countryside to Minneapolis. In 1957, my Great-Grandmother Hulda relayed the story of the crossing, and it was written down by another relative. C. Emil and Hulda now have about 100 descendants living all over the United States.

What follows is the story my Great-Grandmother told. I have divided it into sections and given those sections titles, but it is otherwise her exact story in her own words. Hopefully the story will be of interest to those studying Scandinavia or immigration, as well as to my other relatives who may not know the story yet. If you have any comments, please email them to me at <gwichman@best.com>.

 

1. Preparing to leave

Our large family decide to make a change and leave Sweden to join my husband in America. he had been here three and a half years and wrote to me if I thought I and the children can make the long trip to come over here we should make plans to do that. We all thought it over. I had not been out much before and had had no experience in traveling. I wondered how it would go. We had eight children, the oldest fourteen and a half, and the youngest four years old. There were six boys and two girls, one girl nine and the youngest four. The seven-year-old boy said, "I have one kronor in Swedish money. I put it now in a small envelope. You can take that. Let us start to get ready right now." I said to my boy, "We can't be ready so quick, first we have to think it over. We have the farm to sell, and we had four cows, pigs, chickens, and sheep, and all the other stuff we had accumulated in the sixteen years we had lived there."

The first thing we did was to have an auction and sold our home and all other things we could not take with us. I was much afraid of the auction as there was usually much drinking there. I have been against drinking all of my life and with my eight children there I was a little afraid. It turned out to be not so bad. Only one man got drunk and he bought the pigs and paid a high price for them. After he had bought them he forgot them and left them there. After I had had them for a few days I got in touch I got in touch with him and asked him, "Why didn't you take the pigs?" He said, "Did I buy your pigs?" And I said, "You did and I don't know what to do. I haven't any food for them, and I can't take them with me." "Well," he said, "if I have bought them, I will have to take them." So he came after them, and all went fine. We had sold everything, and now I had to get clothes for my children and myself and get ready.

 

2. From the farm in Småland to Malmö, then to Copenhagen

And now it was hard to say goodbye to my husband's father and four sisters, thinking we would never see them again. We had to get ready as fast as we could. Finally, the day came for us to leave. With tearful eyes and praying for God's help, that I always depended upon, our friends came to say goodbye. That was hard. My closest neighbor came and made our breakfast. She was my best friend that I had there. Our neighbors took us to the first railroad station. They had three wagons and three horses, and the wagons were open so we could not protect ourselves from the rain. We came now to the first railroad station. The small boys were very curious. They had never seen a train before. The station man said, "Where are you going with all those children? Is there a picnic someplace?" "No," I said. Then he said, "Where is your husband?" I said, "He is in America, and we are going to join him there. I hope it will go all right." I had an old uncle who was going to visit his daughter in Copenhagen and he would help us get to the boat, but he was worse than the children. He was so nervous and he said this trip would be a hard job for me. He wondered if I could make it. We arrived in the next station at Alvasta. We had to stay there before we took that train to Malmö. It was still raining. The children, hungry and still wet, wanted to see all the trains coming and going. I had a hard job making them mind me and we had a big lunch the neighbors had sent with us. After we finished our lunch and settled down a little, we had to take the train to Malmö. I had to take care of the two girls and one big satchel. John, the oldest of the boys, was to take care of the youngest boy, Eric, and one satchel. Carl, next to the oldest, was to take care of Ingle and one small satchel. Walfrid and Henry were always to go ahead of us and I learned to count to eight children on the way. It was most important not to lose any of them.

Now we arrived in Malmö late in the afternoon, and here we were to buy our tickets for the boat. So I had to tell them how old the children were. Before we left, Walfrid had just had his twelfth birthday and our friends thought he would go for half price. I was foolish and asked them, and they said he would have to pay full price if his birthday was that day. I said I was sorry that I asked them but I thought I should get a little commission when I bought so many tickets. Then I said, "You give me the tickets then," and they gave me four full tickets and five half tickets. I paid for the tickets and then they told me to go over to Copenhagen that night and take the boat there the next day. So now we had to rent a room and sleep overnight and I counted to see that we were all together again. We arrived there in the evening and rented a room for the night. We had to get a ride to the boat and the people who sold us the tickets sent a Ford to take us there and that was the first automobile we had seen. We wondered if we could get room in the Ford, but they put us close together and we came now to the big ship which was to take us to America.

My uncle and his daughter came to say goodbye to us. We had had a nice dinner in their apartment in Copenhagen. She had a bakery there so she brought a lot of good things to eat. We had to say goodbye to them there, never to see them again. Uncle said that was the worst job he had done -- to see me with all those children alone and hard for me to leave the land we loved so much, where we had had the happiest time of our life and just a loving memory of our home, mother and father, and the love they always gave to me. That memory I will never forget. They were not there anymore. They had left this world many years before. Three of my sisters were in America and I left one sister in Sweden who was to come to America in six months. So we were anxious to get to America to see my husband and sisters so we should be together again.

 

3. By Ship from Copenhagen to New York

Before we got on the boat I made one of my first mistakes. The children were hungry and wanted bread, so I went into what I thought was a bakery. It turned out to be a barber shop, so I bought some hair oil, which we didn't need , but it saved me from being embarrassed. We found a bakery so we bought some bread. Then we went to the boat. Now, I thought I wouldn't have to worry for a long time with everyone aboard. We got the largest room with four beds. The three oldest boys got seasick right away, and I prayed I would not get sick so I could take care of the children and they told me the best thing to do was to go up on the first deck for fresh air. I did that but one day I got sick too. We were all on the first deck laying on cots and the children were all vomiting and I told Walfrid it would be better if he moved to another spot so he wouldn't get all the blame. Here I thought all my worries were over when we all got on the boat but I soon found out different. They had many long step ladders and the boys wanted to climb all the time so I was afraid they would fall in the ocean. I had to watch them closely.

We had a good time too on the boat. There were some Swedish people who had been in Sweden for a visit and going back again, and I asked if some of the children I saw on the boat were from America. She said they were from America, and I said, "We think in Sweden that they do not get dirty in America," and she said, "They have dirt there too," which I soon found out after we arrived here. We were on the boat eleven days so now we started to look for land. I went to the oldest boys now and told them we all had to look good when we had the examination or else they would send us back. Then they all got up from their beds and tried to look good and watched eagerly for the land where we were to make our home for the rest of our lives. We saw land in the morning so now we had to leave the boat. That was the worst day of the whole trip. I got all eight of them together and gave them strict orders to stay together. "If you don't you'll get lost and we'll never find you anymore!"

 

4. Ellis Island/Castlegarden

Now we had to go through an examination again we kept our fingers crossed while we all had a thorough examination. The children had mental tests too. They passed all the tests fine. We had never seen American money. The children wanted to buy some candy and they gave twice as much for a dime than a nickel so the children couldn't understand that as the nickel was bigger than the dime. The learned quickly how to handle the money if only they had enough of it.

After the boat we were sent to Castlegarden where we had another examination. There were two boats coming in the same day so there was standing room only and we were sent to different places there for examination. If they were not all right they were sent to a different place. I realized I could not speak English, only "yes" and "no". They knew that so they helped me along. Then a man came and wanted to take our railroad tickets and that took a long time before he came back, so I thought maybe he had taken them for himself. I understood they had some other doing in the other room so I tried to have the other children stay there and I carried the four-year-old. There was not any room to let her down. Then a man came while I was holding her and tried to say something to me. I couldn't understand him and I had been told to look our for strange men. I made him understand I wouldn't speak to him. I didn't even say "no" to him -- not anything. He did not give up but came back again and then he pointed to a man in a corner who had a chair and he told him to give up his chair for me and the baby. He kept pointing to the chair so I understood what he meant and was glad to get a chair, as I felt I couldn't stand it much longer. I was so tired of standing. One of the boys came to me while I was sitting and he became sick with all the people around. I never saw the man again who gave me his chair, but I will never forget him as long as I live for his kindness. Finally the man came back who had taken our railroad tickets and now I had to answer some questions and explain in Swedish. I said I had a little money left after buying the tickets and had a husband and three sisters in Minneapolis, and we had the whole trip paid for. Now we were ready to take the train from New York to Minneapolis.

 

5. New York to Minneapolis by Train

I bought some lunch in New York and then thought we could get food on the train. We bought bananas and peaches, which we had never seen before. They thought the peaches were rotten apples so threw them away. The lunch was soon gone and we found they did not serve any food on the train where we were to spend the next four days. They did make a short stop and I gave John a dollar to buy some food and he came back quickly with four biscuits. I divided them into four pieces and gave them to the children. Then they made a second stop and said we would have time to get off to get a cup of coffee. That was the only word I understood, and I told the children to stay on the train and I would go in that liuttle place to get some coffee. So I followed the rest of the people in there. I was surprised to see two big negroes, which I had never seen before. They were supposed to have white uniforms, but we could hardly see the white on them. I was waiting for my turn, and then I asaw they did not wash the cups after they were used. They just kept filling them with coffee. I tried to show them they did not have clean cups they said they didn't have any time to wash them. I went out from there a little downhearted, as I couldn't drink the coffee I had longed for.

I got back on the train and noticed two of the boys were missing and thought I saw them outside of the train as it was leaving. I looked and looked for them. It was Carl and Henry who were missing. Finally when I had looked a long time I decided they may have gone to see the engineer so I went to the first car and looked in the seat. I saw a little red hair sticking up on the first seat which I was sure belonged to Henry, and sure enough there they both were. they had decided they wanted to see how they drove the train. I was so upset I could not drink the coffee, and then I thought I had lost two boys. After all, when I had found the boys I had to thank God and I forgot all about not having the coffee. We went vack to our place on the train and were all content.

Now we had arrived in Chicago. We had to change trains here. The oldest boys had to carry the heavy suitcases and they started to complain because they were so heavy. They were so short and the tall men leaned their suitcases on the top of the boys' suitcases so they were much heavier. "Well," I said, "you have to work hard and not give up." We had a long time yet to be on the train. Finally we came to the other train and when we got there they said they didn't have room for us, and we had to take another train. So we had to pick up the heavy suitcases again and go to the other train. We were all overtired and I said, "Why didn't we stay in Sweden," like Israel's people said "Why didn't we stay in Egypt," after they had left there. We had more hard days ahead of us and we believed God would help us the rest of the way.

The children were hungry as well as tired and we were short of food but a lot of people got off the train in Chicago and they had so much left of the food they had bought in New York and they had seen all the children. Now they finally got good hearted and gave all the bread left over to me. John had fallen asleep in the seat and they gave so much bread we could not take care of it all. I awoke John and he couldn't understand how we could get so much bread. We had to put it up on the shelves and every place we could find room for it. I wondered what I was going to do with it in the morning when we would leave the train. We had to leave most of it. We had had so little food for the past few days and now we had so much we couldn't handle it all. A young boy who was going to Minneapolis saw some bottles he thought were pop. It turned out to be maple syrup. He gave it to me and said we could use it on all the bread we had. The children opened the bottle and the syrup got all over. That was an awful mess.

We kept riding and I turned the seats around to make a bed for the small boys. I thought they were alright there and I looked a little later and found only one of the boys sleeping on the seat. I looked for the other and he had fallen under one of the seats, still sleeping. I was glad nothing had happened to him. I toook them all to a tank where they had some ice and used the water that dripped from it to wipe their faces as best I could. Now we would soon be in Minneapolis and I thought our worries would soon be over and we would soon see our loved ones in the new land.

 

6. Minneapolis

We arrived at Great Northern station and thought it was the nicest place we had seen sincewe left Sweden. I really forgot I could not speak one word of English. I first looked for my husband. He was not there. And I thought I had gone through so much that I sitll must have patience. I stood there with all the children and looked at all the men who came in (not the tall ones, just the others). Finally he came. "I did not think you came yet. The train came before I expected it. Now we are all invited to your sister Agda's." My brother-in-law came with two cars to take us to their home. We were most happy to arrive at their house and to use their bathroom after our long trip. We were most welcome. Now my husband had his responsibility to help take care of the children. My other sister, Anna, had helped him rent a house and buy furniture. After a week wehad to send six of the children to school, where they all started in the first grade. They larned English fast and were soon in their proper grades. We joined the Lutheran church. There the minister talked much Swedish; I was glad for that as I thought I would never learn English.

 

7. 1957

We have now been here over forty years. I cannot talk about all that has happened in that time. We lost one of our boys when he was twenty-four years old. He died from pneumonia. That was the first sad happening. One son was born here so we still have eight children. They had had good luck here so far. They all have nice homes and are successful in business. They all have nice wives, and two son-in-laws. We are still ingood health buy are gettingh quite old. Papa will be eighty-three in August, and I am seventy-six. Now we are in this country which we think is the best and has shown the most progress in the whole world. We will thank God for this place that has given help to so many people all over the world. I will close this story about our trip here over forty years ago. If we had had that trip now, we would have had it so much better, God help us all. That is my prayer.


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