Peter (Pehr) Carlson

Information provided by Gretchen Lundstrom Farwell 

February 27, 2011

My great-great-grandfather was the man you call Peter Carlson and we knew as Pehr Carlson. He was born in Gonarp in the Näsum parish of Kristianstadslän of Skåne. He married Kerstin "Chastie" Svensdotter also from Näsum. With their three oldest daughters, Bengta (8), Elna (4) and my great-grandmother Inga (2) they left Näsum on July 24, 1854 and after a harrowing seven weeks on the ocean in the wooden sailing ship "Magda", came to New York on 30 Sept 1854. First settling in Batavia, Illinois, four families lived together in a log cabin while the men worked cutting cordwood for the railroad. Elna died of cholera in the Illinois epidemic, so their family and those of  Erick Johnson, Andrew Paulson, and Carl Nelson decided to journey to Minnesota where land had been opened for settling. Erick Johnson bought a team of horses, the others brought oxen, together with a few farm implements and household goods. They walked from Illinois to New Sweden, Nicollet County, Minnesota, Pehr's daughter Bengta walking with the oxen most of the way.  All four families settled in section 8, each one taking a quarter section -  and for many years to come, farmed the northwest outpost of the community. When the Bernadotte (then New Sweden) congregation was organized, the two eastern families stayed in Scandian Grove and the western families joined Bernadotte. They were Pehr Carlson and Carl Nelson. They built a log cabin and the family history records that Chastie was particularly kind to the native Americans who stopped by. That their log home was one of those spared in that area by the Dakota during the Uprising may be a testament to her kindness. At least the family saw it that way. When Pehr had gone to New Ulm the family was fleeing to Fort Ridgeway.

From: Scandian Grove; A New Look, by Emeroy Johnson. Published by the Historical Committee of Scandian Grove Lutheran Church, 1980. - From the Chapter: "The Sioux on the Warpath", pp. 30-40. -

"Much has been written about the Indian War of 1862 but as far as I know, the account of what happened in new Sweden has not been published anywhere except an article by C.C. Nelson in the "Lafayette Ledger" about 1926 and as I wrote it in my 1958 history of Scandian Grove. My research then was mainly twosources: a typed history of New Sweden by Herman Solomanson, a Scandian Grove native, and some letters written by P.A. Cederstam to T.N. Hasselquist in Illinois in 1862. ... Solomonson, born in New Sweden in 1873, had obtained his information from Carl Nelson who had come to Nicollet County in 1858. The two were near neighbors for many years.

A new and important source of information has come to my attention. I have obtained a photocopy of a letter written by Erik Johnson in March, 1863 to relatives in Sweden. This letter corrects the Solomonson account in some significant details. However, Solomonson's story is undoubtedly the best that is available for other details. It reads in part as follows:

      The settlers in the western part of Scandian Grove were: In section 8 (of the present town of New Sweden) were five families, all living close together, Erik Johnson on the northeast, Pehr Carlson on the west, Carl Nelson southwest, and Goran Johnson on the southeast. John Ecklund also lived in a cabin on the Pehr Carlson homestead." .... "Pehr Carlson, Ecklund, and Goran Johnson had gone to defend New Ulm, thus leaving very few men in the neighborhood. ...From the church [Scandian Grove] to the farthest settlers northwest was about seven or eight miles.

The war reached New Sweden Township on August 23, 1862. A band of Sioux warriors moved from south to north through the township, through the farms of many Swedes and directly to the Norwegians at Norwegian Grove. Sections 18, 8, and 4 saw the most destruction. Before the approaching Indians, the Larson and Carlson families fled in terror in a horse-drawn wagon. As they approached a curve in the road at Norwegian Grove, they appeared to be doomed. The Sioux warriors took a short cut across the prairie to get ahead of the Larson team. They would have succeeded if it had not been for a strong built rail fence.  My great-grandmother Inga remembered for the rest of her life the terror-stricken ride in the wagon being chased by the Dakota. A bullet was lodged into the back of the wagon, but the families escaped.

Pehr died at the age of 72 after a long illness on May 8, 1896. In his Swedish language obituary, it was said, "He was a man of peace, a faithful Lutheran, and permitted the God of love to hallow his thoughts and his attitude and kept to the means of Grace. He was one of those who are called the quiet in the land, lived in peace and unity with people in his community, and was therefore loved of all. This showed itself at his funeral when about 40 rigs were present. ..."

Inga's son Rev. Albert Loreen was my grandfather.