Gothenborg vessels carried Swedish iron to America but emigrants frequently had to wait for weeks before they found a ship bound for New York. From Hamburg regular packet ships carried German emigrants, but these were so numerous that there was frequently a delay of from two to three weeks before they could be accommodated. In Havre the emigrant packets were also regular but there were not so many emigrants and the Norwegians could count on going on the first ship leaving port. This made Havre the most popular point of departure from Europe for the Norwegians.
Of course, a great number of letters were written by the Norwegians in America to relatives and friends in Norway and these were read by hundreds who were anxious to better their fortunes. Finally, one of the sloop passengers, Knud
Anderson Slogvig, returned to Norway in 1835 and the news that he had arrived at his old home in the Skjold district spread far and wide and created the greatest excitement. He was the hero of the day. People traveled hundreds of miles to see and talk with him. Letters from emigrants had been read with the deepest interest but here was a man who had spent ten years in the new world! Through Knud Slogvig the American fever spread beyond the limits of Stavanger Amt and Christiansand Stift. This led to the great exodus of 1836, when the two Koehler brigs, Norden and Den Norske Klippe, were fitted out for emigrants in Stavanger and left that summer loaded with about two hundred passengers for New York. On board the Norden my father and mother and my two oldest brothers were passengers. The American fever continued, calling for two ships in 1837, the Aegir from Bergen and the Enighedon from Egershund. Then there was a partial lull, until after 1840, when the American fever set in for good. It has continued to rage ever since, culminating in the year 1882, when over 29,000 Norwegians landed in the United States.
Those who came in the sloop Restaurationen settled in Kendall, Orleans County, New York, on the shores of Lake Ontario. In 1833 we find Kleng Peerson in company with a Quaker, Ingebret Larsen Narvig, who had come from Norway to Boston in 1831 and footed it from there to Kendall, on their way to the far west. Larsen parted company with Kleng and went to work for a farmer in Michigan. Kleng continued his journey westward until he reached La Salle County, Illinois, and there selected the location of the second Norwegian settlement in this country. Kendall and Fox River settlement in Illinois was his undying glory. Most of the settlers in Orleans County, New York, on the advice of Kleng, moved to the Fox River settlement. In 1836 these were joined by the 200 immigrants who came in the Norden
and the Den Norske Klippe, and in 1837 by many of those who came in the Aegir and the Enighedon.
One of the Norwegians who came in the Aegir was Ole Rynning, a name well known in the annals of Norwegian immigration. On reaching Chicago he was persuaded by a couple of Americans to go with some of his friends to inspect lands some eighty miles south of Chicago along Beaver Creek with the view of founding a Norwegian settlement there. Ole Rynning chose as his companions on this journey of inspection Niels Veste from Etne in Norway, Ingebrigt Brudvig, and Ole Nattestad from Numedal, Norway, the latter the author of the book herewith published. Ole Nattestad and his brother, Ansten, had just arrived by way of Gothenborg, Sweden, and Fall River, Massachusetts, and joining a group of other immigrants in Detroit, Michigan, had accompanied them to Chicago. The rest of the company remained in Chicago to await the result. Ole Nattestad stated that he did not like the land, it being sandy and swampy, but as the others were pleased with it, it was agreed that Nattestad and Veste should remain and put up a log house for the reception of the immigrants while Rynning and Brudvig returned to Chicago to fetch their friends.
Some of those who were left in Chicago in the meantime had gone to the Fox River settlement but the most of them went with Rynning and Brudvig to Beaver Creek. There were no settlers in the immediate vicinity and it was difficult to procure the common necessities of life, although the most of these people were well supplied with money. Many of the new settlers grumbled and were inclined to find fault with Ole Rynning and the others who were responsible for the selection of this settlement. All chose land for farms, and before winter set in a sufficient number of log houses had been built. The number of settlers here was about fifty. These people were well and happy in America during the first winter, but the next spring the whole settlement was flooded
and the swamp was turned into a veritable lake. In the summer the settlers were attacked by malarial fever. In a short time no less than fourteen or fifteen deaths occurred and among those who here found his last resting place was Ole Rynning. The survivors fled, leaving farms and houses, as there was nobody to buy land where a malarial atmosphere threatened the inhabitants with almost certain destruction. The most of those who fled found their way to the Fox River settlement, reaching there late in the summer of 1838. Only a few remained two or three years, defying the dangers to health and life, the last one to leave the colony being Mons Aadland, a brother of the well-known journalist and author, Knud Langland. He finally exchanged his farm for a small number of cows at auction and went to Racine County, Wisconsin, where he lived to a ripe old age.
Ole Rynning became particularly conspicuous and influential on account of a book which he published in Christiania, Norway, in 1838, the title of which is “Sandfaerdig Beretning on Amerika til Oplysning og Nytte for Bonde og Menigmand forfattet af en norsk, som kom derover i Juni Maaned 1837,” that is, “A Truthful Account of America for the Instruction and Help of the Peasant and Commoner Written by a Norwegian Who Came there in the Month of June, 1837.” The author’s name is given at the end of the preface where we read: “Illinois, February 13, 1838, Ole Rynning.”
This little book of only thirty-nine pages is now exceedingly scarce. I obtained a copy of it from Rev. B. J. Muus of Goodhue County, Minnesota. In the nineties I reprinted it in Amerika and struck off about two hundred copies which I had bound and placed in various libraries. A copy of it may be found in the library of the Wisconsin State Historical Society.