On Oct. 10, 1911 The San Francisco Call published names of people who had recently applied for marriage licenses in San Francisco. Among them, MAGNISON – HEMMING. That’s Swan Magnuson and and his niece Ebba Nathalia Hemming(sson). They’re in California from Alaska and staying at the Palace Hotel for the occasion.
The Palace Hotel had been severely damaged during the 1906 earthquake, but according to the ad from 1911 it was now ‘entirely rebuilt’.
This is Carl Victor Nilsson, the father of my grandmother Herta. I don’t know much about Carl Victor, but I do know that he was a sea captain, and that he kicked his own son off the boat (more than once) for being drunk. It looks to me as if you wouldn’t want to have messed with Captain Nilsson, but according to a his great grandson, my cousin, he let the drunken son back on the ship pretty quickly.
Both of Carl Victor’s parents had deep roots in Kristdala north of Oskarshamn. Many of his relatives were related to each other in several ways, and as a result I have a disproportionally high number of DNA matches with Carl Victor’s line. Many of his emigrant relatives settled in the mid-west, in Kansas, Illinois, and Nebraska. But I also have mysterious matches on the Northeast coast of England, in the area of West Hartlepool, where Carl Victor apparently spent some time.
From the Iowa State Memorial Union:
Private William Atle Nelson was born in Gary, Indiana on August 11, 1925 to Forrest A. Nelson and Virginia K. Kelly. He later lived in Galesburg, Illinois. William entered service on October 1, 1943 at Camp Dodge, Iowa. He served with Company K, 397th Infantry, 100th Division, Seventh Army. He had been in service one year, two months and four days before he was declared missing in action in France on January (should be Dec.) 5, 1944. After several months, the war department declared him to be killed in action.
From the WW2 Army Enlistment Record:
Term of Enlistment: Enlistment for the duration of the War or other emergency, plus six months, subject to the discretion of the President or otherwise according to law.
The dates are unclear, but William is said to have died during the Battle of the Bulge, Adolf Hitler’s “last major offensive in World War II against the Western Front”.
We will never know what happened to William, or how he died. He was just a kid. Had he lived until he was 20 he would have seen the war in Europe end in May, 1945. But, he didn’t. He died at 19, in all likelihood cold and scared.
William was my seventh cousin. We are related through two brothers, Carl Månsson born 1720, and Nils Månsson born 1727. William’s grandmother Hilma Charlotta Nilsdotter emigrated from Döderhult in Kalmar county to Galesburg, Illinois in 1868. She was three years old. Hilma was the great great great granddaughter of Carl Månsson. My grandmother Herta Viktoria Nilsson was born in Döderhult, Kalmar, in 1884. She was the great great great granddaughter of Nils Månsson.
Through Carl’s and Nils’ great great grandfather, Carl Jönsson Sabelskjöld, William and I have a known shared history going back to the early 1500s.
The Sabelskjöld family website provides more information about Carl and Nils Månsson, and their family history.
This is my grandmother’s second cousin Esther. She was born in Martin Co., Minnesota, in 1892. Esther married her husband Ed Golden, who is standing next to her, in 1922. She died in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1997, almost 105 years old.
Relatives to Esther have posted photos of her on ancestry.com. When I saw them I realized that Esther looks quite a bit like my aunt, who lived until she was almost 102. I can also see myself, and other relatives, in her.