The Settlers

by Vilhelm Moberg

  The cause of lightning is a peculiar power called Electricity. Lightning emanates from clouds up in the sky which have become electric. How the clouds have become such is not known. But if a lightning-cloud comes close to an object on earth, an electric spark passes with lightning and thunder from the cloud to the object, and then we say that lightning strikes. It is entirely unfounded, as some people say, that a wedge hits the earth when lightning strikes.

  Lightning had once struck and burned a hay-filled barn belonging to Karl Oskar and he therefore felt great respect for electricity. When it was loosed it was much more dangerous than fire: in a single second it could shake a person to death. The paper related that a farmer in Indiana had brought suit against his wife for attempted murder with the new discovery: she had put electricity in her husband’s underwear so that it had shot into his body and almost killed him.

  In the paper’s editorial on electricity, the question was raised as to whether or not Benjamin Franklin had broken God’s ordinances by inventing the lightning rod whereby man neutralized the bolts. It seemed self-evident that God must cause hurricanes, floods, and other natural disasters—catastrophes to kill those people he originally had intended to kill by lightning. Mr. Franklin had thus with his rod interfered in the business of the Almighty and caused him unnecessary trouble.

  Pastor Hasselquist’s paper fought for the true Evangelical Lutheran religion, the world’s only right religion, and condemned sectarianism. He lauded highly the new law passed by the Swedish Riksdag, which condemned the Baptist and prescribed high fines for any layman distributing the sacrament. Of the sects in America, the Mormons were described as the most horrible; they preached the rawest gospel of the flesh since Mohammed descended to Hell. Utah, their place of habitation in the Union, had grown like a festering boil on the American nation. The Mormons had recently made a great conquest in Sweden: one hundred and fifty foolish young women had gone to Utah and had been divided ten to each man; in the new land, they now satisfied men’s carnal lusts.

  The paper printed a list of Brigham Young’s wives, thirty-nine in number at that moment. The wives were numbered from one to twenty-seven and a few also had a name, but after twenty-seven they had neither name nor number. Number one was called Lucy Decker, and she would be raised to queen at the resurrection. Those wives who had been given only a number Brigham Young had married for this life only, but those named he had joined for eternity as well. When he held his Sabbath he retired to some lonely place for peace and quiet, taking with him six or seven deeply beloved wives with low numbers.

  The Hemlandet’s editor warned his countrymen not only against spiritual dangers but also against worldly snares and perils, especially those connected with the confusing money matters of North America. Every issue had a column headed Bank Swindles, enumerating the banks especially started to cheat people. It was useful for Swedes in the wilderness to know which bills were phony, or worth only half of their face value. And it was emphasized to the readers that neither in the Old World nor in the New did a single bank exist which gave its depositors full security. But there was one Bank, with no human directors, and no earthly safe—the Bank of Grace—which, because of its inexhaustible capital resources—Christ’s Blood and the Forgiveness of Sins—always and everywhere was in a position to redeem its bills at their full value: the promise of eternal joy in the Heavenly Chambers. Readers were advised to make their deposits in that bank.

  —4—

  And so Hemlandet came to Karl Oskar and Kristina with news of the world outside the Territory. They had little knowledge of the broad, changing country which had become their home; now they read many amazing things about it. And with the aid of this paper in their native tongue they were also able to educate their children; they used the paper in place of the missing ABC book. In the Hemlandet Johan and Lill-Marta learned to recognize Swedish letters, both small and capital letters, and by and by the children began to form syllables and words from them.

  Inquiries was the headline of one column in Hemlandet; where readers made inquiries about relatives living at unknown places in America. Parents were looking for their children, brother for sister, and sister for brother, engaged couples who had lost touch sought to find one another, friends asked the addresses of friends. Here inquiries were made for relatives who had lost their way on the journey and had not arrived at their destination. Many Swedes apparently were wandering about in North America, vainly looking for family connections.

  Inquiries was the narrative of peoples hopeless quest for each other. Kristina felt great compassion for these unhappy beings who couldn’t find their dear ones. Somewhere, hands were stretched out to them, but they didn’t know where; they fumbled in a great darkness in the broad land. Kristina had seen this land, she knew how broad it was. The world was entirely too vast for a poor lost person.

  Now she wanted Karl Oskar to write an inquiry to Hemlandet and ask about Robert. They hadn’t heard from him in a year and a half, and Karl Oskar was almost sure his brother was dead. Moreover, he felt an inquiry in the little Swedish paper would be useless, since he doubted it reached as far away as California. But to please Kristina he sat down one evening and wrote an inquiry and sent it in. With some changes in the spelling, the piece was printed in Hemlandet:

  Brother Sought.

  Axel Robert Nilsson from Ljuder parish, Sweden, who left for California in the spring of 1851, in the company of Arvid Pettersson from same parish, has not been heard from since January, 1853. He is 21 years of age and tall. If anyone knows where Nilsson is, or has seen him, please notify his brother, Karl Oskar Nilsson at the address of Taylors Falls Post Office, Minnesota Territory.

  They waited a long time, but no answer came. Theirs was a message lost in the wilderness.

  —5—

  “Timberrim, timberram, timberrammaram . . .”

  On Ki-Chi-Saga’s shores the timberman’s song was heard again. Karl Oskar Nilsson was building his third American house this summer.

  His first house had been a simple shed, or shanty, of boards nailed together; his second house had been built of logs; but this third house would be one of hewn timbers—a true, sturdy main house on a farmer’s land. A main house. Until now Karl Oskar had lived as a squatter, but when he moved into a main house he would feel he had become a farmer on his own land. Then he could stand erect; the well-timbered building would be the sign of his independence.

  The board hut, the log cabin, the timbered main house to these are the three chapters in the story of a settler’s progress.

  But Karl Oskar had been forced to shorten his foundation by one third in order to get the new house roofed this year. He would eventually build a larger house than this one, but as yet he didn’t have the necessary cash. He had to give in to those who had warned him and said that he was attempting too big a house. It irked him sorely that he had to cut down on its size. A man makes an estimate and figures out what he would like to do—he puts in the foundation of a new house—and then his strength is not sufficient to raise it. This had happened to him before with other projects, now it happened again. He felt as if he would never have the time to accomplish what he intended. He managed a part, a good part, but when would he be able to accomplish the whole?

  And in the evenings his fatigue was greater than before, lasting even till morning and the new day of labor. At times Karl Oskar felt his strength was beginning to wane. Yet, he was only in his thirty-first year, maturity was still between him and old age. He could build once more, he could raise a fourth house, this time the one he had in mind, the great big house he had promised his wife their first year out here. And he said to Kristina: “Next time! Wait till I build next time!”

  They had lived in the wretched shanty for two months, for four years they had had their home in the log cabin; how long would the timbered main house be their home?

  The roof must be up before the new crop was ripe. They were three timber-men, as Danjel and Jonas Petter were helping hi
m. The walls grew a little bit each day, while Jonas Petter sang the timberman’s song. They were building higher than they had before—this main house would have two stories.

  And the three ax hammers fell heavily against the solid timbers, in rhythm to the song:

  What’s your daughter doing tonight?

  What’s your daughter doing tonight?

  What’s your timberman’s daughter doing tonight?

  Four years had passed since the building song last was heard on this homestead. In the log cabin they had timbered them, two new human lives had been lit. Karl Oskar’s hands had changed the contours of the ground; many things had happened to them. For those who began life anew in Minnesota Territory, a span of four years equaled more than eight had they stayed in the old, quiet, unchanging home village.

  It was the log cabin’s last summer as a home. One period was coming to an end in the lives of the immigrant family; their log-cabin days were ending.

  X

  SURVEYING THE FOREST

  —1—

  On the twenty-fourth day of May that year, the immigrants from Sweden met in Petrus Olausson’s barn and formed the first Lutheran parish in the St. Croix Valley.

  Fifty-eight grown persons were registered as members of the congregation, and forty children. Pastor Erland Törner was chosen as minister, and Petrus Olausson as warden. It was agreed eventually to construct a church, but until it could be built, a smaller building was to be erected and used for a school, parish meeting hall, and church.

  In the sermon which Pastor Törner preached in the barn on the day of the founding of the parish, he said that the immigrants of the Territory were in the same situation as the first Christians were after the Master’s ascension: the disciples had also been without a temple in which to worship their God and had therefore met under the open skies, or in caves, or in shepherds’ huts. Here the immigrant Swedes were holding their meeting in a barn, which had been built for the storage of crops from the fields. But when Christ’s Church was founded today, ninety-eight sheaves of that nobler crop of human souls had been gathered.

  The founder of Christianity was born in a stable. It was utterly fitting that the first Christian congregation in the wilderness be founded in a barn.

  —2—

  May 24, 1854, was a great day for the Swedes in the St. Croix Valley; in joining together in this first congregation, they laid the foundation for a new community.

  During the first years their most urgent needs had been for food and shelter for themselves and their animals. Not until these needs had been met could they make preparations to fill their spiritual needs. This order had been in effect for Man since the beginning of time.

  These people came from the same land and they were already united in a common language, and by similar customs and usages. But the life of the Swedish village had provided an anchorage which they missed here; the church and the church green had been the community center, intimately involved with life’s great happenings. In their new land they were parishioners without parish or church. And so they now strove for a new center to replace the one they had lost when they emigrated.

  In the home village the church and the church green had been the gathering place where both spiritual and worldly needs had been satisfied. From the pulpit they had heard both the Holy Word and important announcements concerning animals for studs, auctions, farms for sale. From the pulpit prayers were read for parishioners seriously sick, or lately deceased; the banns of matrimony were proclaimed. Everything of importance that had happened in the parish from Sunday to Sunday was announced from the pulpit. On the church green they met every Sunday relatives and friends and were made aware that they belonged to a group greater than the family.

  The immigrants would now build a church and a church green and found a new parish for themselves.

  They would have to begin—as with everything here—from the very beginning. They must find a teacher and a house for their children’s schooling; they must elect a governing board for their parish and school; they must establish a mediation board where disagreements could be settled in their own language; they must organize a district and elect representatives who could speak for them in the territorial government.

  In the homeland they had been subjects of the Crown and its authority; here they were their own temporal and church authority. There were no laws laid down by authorities they had not helped to elect. Their new parish was a free parish; no bishops or deans had power over them; they themselves were the church power.

  In their new situation, however, demands were made on them unknown in the homeland. There was no oppressive authority but by the same token they were without aid from any authority. They alone were responsible for their parish and could expect no help from others. Whether a church would be built where they could enjoy God’s Word, whether a schoolhouse were to be erected, if a parish hall were to be constructed for social gatherings depended on them entirely. They alone must decide and order, but they alone must also carry out their decisions and be responsible for them.

  When immigrants established a new community, a price for their liberty was exacted of them. From the irresponsible, responsibility was demanded; from the selfish, a will to unified effort; from the arbitrary, willingness to listen to the opinions of others. From each of the settlers was required his ability to use his newfound liberty: in North America they were all faced with the tests of free citizens.

  Because of the new country’s demands on the immigrants, capabilities would be developed for which they had had no use in the homeland. They changed America—and America changed them.

  —3—

  Four of the Swedish-born settlers met early one June morning and walked together through the wilderness. They had set out to choose a place where their community could bury its dead; these four men had accepted the responsibility of selecting the cemetery site for the new congregation.

  Once before they had walked in company through the forest. Then they had been seekers of land. They had gone out to choose the ground where they would settle down and live out the rest of their lives. Today they were selecting the ground where they were to be buried.

  It was a calm and bright morning; the St. Croix Valley spread out under a clear sky. A heavy dew had nourished the earth during the night—grass, herbs, and leaves were still moist and exuded a fragrance as after rain. To the west the Indian cliff had doffed its night shawl of fog and vapor and turned its brown-gleaming brow toward the eastern morn. The fertile ground was beginning to warm itself in the suns fire. The oppressive summer heat had not yet begun but the earth was already in the cycle of fertility: growth had begun, fresh—green and potent, and the thickets were full and lush. The fields displayed their promise of crops in shoots and stalks, in buds and boughs, in blades and blooms, in grass and growth—in all the clear, shining verdure of the earth.

  The four men walked southeast, through a deep valley with thick stands of leaf trees. They passed through groves of red oak and black oak, black and white walnut, elm, and linden trees. They penetrated thickets of raspberries and wild roses, blackberries and sloe-berries—huge, thorny bushes. Here wild plum trees stood in full bloom, here grew black cherries, the biggest of all the cherry trees, their smooth, thick trunks much taller than a man. Round and about the men was all the summer’s wild splendor, soon to bring forth berries and fruit. Today the valley displayed to them its greenery and glitter of blossoming light as if it would bud and bloom and gleam forever.

  The men had gone out to select a resting place for the dead, but this June day the earth seemed a paradigm of life eternal.

  As they walked silently, facing todays errand, along paths that had been cleared, they were more than ever reminded of the irrevocability of their emigration. In this country they would not only live out their lives, here they would also rest forever. At the time of their emigration they had not thought through to its conclusion: that their graves would be dug far from those of their forefathers.
Now as they walked, surveying the ground, they meditated on this final discovery—that their emigration had been not only for this life, but for all eternity.

  The forest thickened, the tree crowns rose taller and taller. The men had reached the dense forest. They followed the Indian path which meandered round sand cliffs and over ravines. They crossed streams with water cascading from the rocks. Then they reached an open spot with a few mounds, overgrown with tall grass. The mounds were shaped like overturned bowls, rising in the glade like green-furred, shaggy, evil animals.

  These were Indian mounds; under the tangle of weeds the former rulers of this land decayed. The settlers had come upon one of the old burying places of the nomads.

  The tillers stopped to inspect the hillocks. At times they had happened to plow too close to a similar mound, and skulls, human bones, and food bowls had been brought to the surface. Then they had hurried to rebury the human remnants and refill the hole. The Indians supplied their dead with food and drink—the ungodly beliefs of the savages penetrated even the earth. White people, born in Christian lands, avoided the graves of the heathens. No Christian settler would wish to lie after his death in earth besmirched by heathendom and idolatry. The cemetery of the new parish must not be placed in the vicinity of these mounds which memorialized a heathen race; bones of Christians and heathens could not rest side by side.

  The searchers continued their walk until they reached Ki-Chi-Saga. They followed the shores of the lake in a wide arc round a bay which cut deep into a grove of maple, oak, elm, and walnut trees of lush beauty. Now and then they stopped, exchanged a few words, deliberated. Wasn’t this a suitable piece of ground? The cemetery site must be in beautiful surroundings where survivors would be able to see objects that would minimize their sorrow and invoke comforting thoughts. It would be fine if roses and lilies grew on such ground. It was a consolation when flowers grew on a grave, even before it was dug. The resting place of the dead should also lie on high ground, on a knoll or gentle slope; it must have elevation so that it could be seen. And the rising ground would, as it were, point out the road to Heaven—the road the dead ones had taken before the survivors.