Knud (Helgeson) Nelson (1842 - 1923)

Born 2 Feb 1842 in Kvilekvål, Evanger, Hordaland. Norway

Ancestors

Died 28 Apr 1923 at age 81 in Timonium, Maryland

Problems/Questions Profile managers: Aksel Horvei [send private message] and Caryl Ruckert [send private message]

Preceded by 11th Governor William Rush Merriam Preceded by William D. Washburn

Knute Nelson 12th Governor of Minnesota 1893—1895 US Senator (Class 2) from Minnesota[1] 1895—1923

Succeeded by 13th Governor David Marston Clough Succeeded by Magnus Johnson

Biography

Knute (Helgeson) Nelson is Notable.

Knute (Helgeson) Nelson was a Minnesotan.

Private Knute (Helgeson) Nelson served in the United States Civil War.
Enlisted: May 1861
Mustered out: 14 October 1865
Side: USA
Regiment(s): 4th Regiment Wisconsin Infantry

Senator Knute (Helgeson) Nelson was Wounded in Action during the United States Civil War.

Civil War Veteran, Prisoner of War Category:4th_Regiment,_Wisconsin_Infantry,_United_States_Civil_War

United States Senator

Governor of Minnesota 1893-1895

According to his baptism record Knud Heljesen (or Knut Helgeson, in normal spelling) was born 2 Feb 1842 (NOT in 1843 as written on his gravestone) as the illegitimate son of Helge Knutson from Styve and Ingeborg Haldorsdotter from Kvilekvål - both in Evanger, Hordaland. His baptism at home, which had been performed by his mother's brother Jon, was confirmed in Evanger church 28 Mar same year.^[2] His alleged father emigrated 9 May 1844^[3] It should be noted that it has been challenged whether Helge Knutson indeed was Knut's father, but the son was still called Knud Helgesen Qvileqval when he and his mother emigrated from Evanger 16 Apr 1849,^[4] so, until proven otherwise, WikiTree should follow official church records.

In 1843, Ingebjørg's brother Jon Haldorsson sold the farm where she and Knud lived, as he could not make a living, and emigrated to Chicago and settled as as carpenter. Ingebjørg took her boy with her to Bergen, where she took work as a domestic servant. [They were registered as emigrated from Voss!] Having borrowed money for the passage, she and seven-year-old Knud emigrated to the United States,[3] arriving in Castle Garden in New York City on July 4, 1849. The holiday fireworks made a lasting impression on the seven-year-old Knud, who was listed in immigration records as Knud Helgeson Kvilekval. Ingebjørg Haldorsdatter claimed to be a widow (a story she held until 1923). She and Knud traveled by the Hudson River to Albany, New York, and then via the Erie Canal to Buffalo. They continued across the Great Lakes to Chicago.[3] There her brother Jon, now working as a carpenter, took them in.[4] While with him, Haldorsdatter worked as a domestic servant and paid off her debt for passage in less than a year. Knud also worked, first as a house servant, then as a paper boy for the Chicago Free Press,[3] which gave him an early education, both because he read the paper and because he learned street profanity. In the fall of 1850, Ingebjørg married Nils Olson Grotland, also from Voss. The family of three moved to Skoponong, a Norwegian settlement in Palmyra, Wisconsin. Knud was given the surname Nelson after his stepfather, which eliminated the stigma of being fatherless. By then 17 years old, Nelson was street-smart and rebellious, with a proclivity toward profanity. He was accepted to the school held by Mary Blackwell Dillon, an Irish immigrant with linguistic talents. Nelson proved himself an apt student although undisciplined; he later recalled being whipped as many as three times a day. Still in his teens, Nelson joined the Democratic Party out of admiration for Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois. The family moved to the Koshkonong settlement, which by 1850 had more than half of the Norwegian population of 5,000 in the state.[5] Nils Olson had bad luck with land purchases and became sickly. Nelson picked up most of the work of the farm, but maintained his commitment to education. His stepfather was not supportive and Nelson often had to scrounge to find money for schoolbooks. Nelson's academic interests led him to enroll in Albion Academy in Albion in Dane County, Wisconsin, in the fall of 1858.[3] The school was founded by the Seventh-day Adventist Church to provide for education to children who could not afford private school; Nelson was deemed "very deserving." To earn his keep he did various jobs around the school. After two years, Nelson took a job as a country teacher in Pleasant Springs near Stoughton. Teaching mostly other Norwegian immigrants, he was an agent of Americanization. Nelson returned to Albion in the spring of 1861, when the American Civil War had started. By then, he had developed his position as a "low-tariff, anti-slavery, pro-Union Democrat," but was in the minority in a pro-Abraham Lincoln region. In May 1861, he and eighteen other Albion students enlisted in a state militia company, known as the Black Hawk Rifles of Racine, to fight with the Union Army in the war. Appalled by the debauchery of this company, the young men refused to be sworn into the army under this militia, and eventually succeeded in being transferred to the Fourth Wisconsin Volunteers. This was an "all-American" regiment, made up generally of native-born men. Nelson's parents opposed his volunteering, but he saw it as a patriotic duty. He sent half his soldier's pay to his parents to help retire the debt on the farm. He seems to have enjoyed army life, noting that the food was better than at home. He shared the frustration of his fellow soldiers over not being put into battle soon enough. His unit moved from Racine to Camp Dix near Baltimore, Maryland. From there they moved to combat operations in Louisiana. On May 27, 1863, after the 4th Wisconsin had become a cavalry unit, Nelson was wounded in the Battle of Port Hudson, captured and made a prisoner of war. He was released when the siege ended. He served as an adjutant, was promoted to corporal, and briefly considered applying for a lieutenant's commission. Military service sharpened Nelson's identity as an American and his patriotism. He was deeply concerned about what he considered the ambivalent attitude among Norwegian-American Lutheran clergy toward slavery, and thought that too few of his fellow Norwegian Americans from Koshkonong had volunteered. He read the Norwegian translation of Esaias Tegnér's Friðþjófs saga ins frœkna and found it enthralling. Its unsentimental depiction of character and virtue he found to be a synthesis of his Norwegian heritage and American home.

Within two years after he mustered out, Nelson acquired his United States citizenship. His disdain for the Copperheads contributed to his becoming a Republican after the war. Knute Nelson was an American attorney and politician active in both Wisconsin and Minnesota. A Republican, he served in state and national positions: he was elected to the Wisconsin and Minnesota legislatures, was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and the United States Senate from Minnesota, and he served as the 12th Governor of Minnesota from 1893–1895.

He is known for promoting the Nelson Act of 1889 to consolidate the Ojibwe/Chippewa in Minnesota on a western reservation in the state, and require the breakup of their communal land by allotting it to individual households, with sales of the remainder to anyone, including non-natives. This was similar to the Dawes Act of 1887, which had applied to Native American lands in the Indian Territory.

Progressive men of Minnesota. (Shutter, Marion Daniel, 1853-ed.) Minneapolis, The Minneapolis Journal (1897) :

Knute Nelson

Senator Knute Nelson, of Minnesota, is a native of Norway. He was born at Voss, near Bergen, Norway, on February 2, 1843 [should read 1842]. For generations his ancestors had lived in that vicinity as farmers. When three years old Knute lost his father [This was something his unmarried mother claimed. His father had emigrated when Knut was 2 years old], and when six [should read seven], he came to this country with his mother. When they arrived in Chicago in July, 1849, the cholera epidemic was raging in that city. The young boy contracted the disease, but his rugged constitution successfully resisted its attacks. During the succeeding year his mother moved to Walworth County, Wisconsin, and soon after to Dane County, where young Nelson grew up. His common school education was obtained with difficulty, but after encountering many obstacles he was able, in 1858, to enter Albion Academy. But three years of his course there had expired when the war broke out, and Nelson entered the army in May, 1861, with a group of his fellow students. They became members of the Fourth Wisconsin Infantry. The young soldier served with his regiment until the fall of 1864. He participated in the capture of New Orleans, in the first siege of Vicksburg, the battle of Baton Rouge and Camp Bisland, and was at the siege of Port Hudson. In the great charge at this siege, on June 14, 1863, he was wounded and captured, and remained a prisoner until the fort was surrendered on July 9. At the close of the war Mr. Nelson returned to Albion, finished his course, and after graduation became a law student in the office of Senator William F. Vilas, at Madison. He was admitted to the bar in the spring of 1867, and immediately commenced practice. In the fall of the same year he was elected to the state assembly, and was reelected in the following year. Soon after the close of his second term he moved to Alexandria, Douglas County, Minnesota, where he has since made his home. In Douglas County Mr. Nelson found many people from his native country and from Sweden. In fact, those nationalities predominate in Northwestern Minnesota. As a strong man, and one whose characteristics fitted him to become a leader, he naturally took a prominent place from his first settlement in the region. He entered a United States homestead and opened a farm near Alexandria, and commenced farming and practicing law. In 1872, 1873 and 1874 he was county attorney of Douglas County. In 1875, 1876, 1877 and 1878 he served the Thirty-ninth Legislative District as state senator. By this time he had attained great prominence and influence in the northern portion of the state, and his name was placed on the Garfield electoral ticket in 1880. Two years later he secured the Republican nomination for congress, for the then Fifth District of Minnesota. The campaign was an extremely bitter one, but he was elected by a plurality of four thousand five hundred votes. Re-election followed in 1884 by over ten thousand plurality, and in 1886 he received for his third term forty three thousand nine hundred and thirty-seven votes to one thousand two hundred and thirty-nine cast for a Prohibitionist, his only opponent. Mr. Nelson's record in congress was that of a hard worker, and an independence and fearless voter. He favored tariff reform, and even went so far as to vote for the Mills bill, as well as introducing a measure looking to the entire abolition of the tariff on several articles. He was instrumental in securing the passage of bills opening the Indian reservations and making permanent disposition of the red men of Minnesota. With no material opposition to him he nevertheless declined a renomination in 1888, and the following spring resumed his law business and farming at Alexandria, but in 1892 he was unanimously nominated as the party candidate for governor, and was elected by a plurality of fourteen thousand six hundred and twenty votes. A renomination and election by sixty thousand plurality followed in 1894. He had hardly entered upon his second term, however, when he was elected to the United States senate and resigned as governor to accept the higher office, which he now fills with great ability. Mr. Nelson's career has been of the kind that romance are made of, and his success stands as a living refutation of the complaint that there is not longer any change for the poor boy in this country. Nelson was certainly poor enough and sufficiently dependent on his merits and his own efforts which have advanced him from the station which he occupied as a lad in 1849, with all its discouraging conditions, to the honorable office which he now fills with credit to himself and to the profit of the state. [Source: Progressive men of Minnesota. (Shutter, Marion Daniel, 1853-ed.) Minneapolis, The Minneapolis Journal (1897) Submitted by Diana Heser Morse]

Governor of Minnesota

Knute Nelson was born in Evanger, Voss, Norway, in 1843 [2 Feb 1842]. In 1849 he and his "claimed to be" widowed mother emigrated to the United States, settling first in Chicago (1849–1850) and then in Wisconsin, where he enlisted in the Fourth Wisconsin Infantry Regiment (1861–1864) during the Civil War. Following the war he graduated from the Albion Academy and studied law in a Madison, Wisconsin law office, being admitted to the bar in 1867. He served as a representative in the Wisconsin assembly from 1868 to 1869.

In 1871 he moved with his family to Alexandria, Minnesota, where he practiced law while farming a homestead tract. A Republican, he served as Douglas County attorney (1872–1874), Minnesota state senator (1875–1878), presidential elector (1880), University of Minnesota regent (1882–1893), and fifth district representative to Congress (1883–1889). He was elected governor of Minnesota in 1892 and 1894, resigning that post in 1895 to run successfully for the U.S. Senate, where he remained until 1923.

Legislation passed during his term as governor included the creation of the Board of State Capitol Commissioners to oversee the construction of the new Capitol; a law that allowed companies other than railroads to build warehouses and elevators along right-of-ways; and a law that prevented the discrimination of employees on religious or political grounds. He also advocated for school districts to supply textbooks to students free of charge.

In Washington, Nelson was chairman of the Senate judiciary committee and the Senate committee on public lands. He was also active on the commerce and Indian affairs committees and in the establishment of the Interstate Commerce Commission. His most notable legislative measures included the Nelson Bankruptcy Act (1898) and the act creating the Department of Commerce and Labor (1902). Nelson supported a low tariff, a federal income tax, Prohibition, the Sherman Act, and the League of Nations.

Knute Nelson died in 1923, during his fifth senatorial term. He is buried in Alexandria, Minnesota.^[5]

The Tomahawk

Alexandria —The will of the late Senator Knute Nelson, which, besides giving his Alexandria home and adjacent farmlands surrounding it to the Norwegian Luthern church of America to be used as a home for the aged at the death of his daughter, Ida G. Nelson, names a number of other beneficiaries, was filed before Probate Judge O. J. Berg. The estate Is variously estimated at from SIOO,OOO to $500,000.^[6]

Children of Knute and Nicoline :

Ida G Nelson 1867–1942

Henry Knute Nelson 1871–1908

Bertha H. Nelson 1873–1877

Maria Theresa Nelson 1875–1877

Catharine Louisa Nelson 1876–1877

Find A Grave: Memorial #12628 Knute Nelson

Reseach Notes

His published date of birth is obviously based on his mother's claims, but contradicts the official church record for Voss. He certanly was not born about 10 months AFTER his private baptism had been confirmed in church^[7]

Sources

1. ↑ Died in office, vacant April 28, 1923 – July 16, 1923 when successor elected.
2. ↑ SAB, Voss Sokneprestembete, H/Haa: Parish register (official) no. A 13, 1836-1851, p. 63 Quick link: https://www.digitalarkivet.no/kb20070524640570
3. ↑ SAB, Voss Sokneprestembete, H/Haa: Parish register (official) no. A 14, 1837-1847, p. 133 Quick link: https://www.digitalarkivet.no/kb20070524650201
4. ↑ SAB, Voss Sokneprestembete, H/Haa: Parish register (official) no. A 15, 1845-1855, p. 76 Quick link: https://www.digitalarkivet.no/kb20070524650280
5. ↑ Governor of Minnesota: "Governor of Minnesota, http://collections.mnhs.org/governors/index.php/10004139
6. ↑ The estate of Knute Nelson: "The Tomahawk" newspaper, May 17, 1923, page 3: https://newspapers.mnhs.org/jsp/PsImageViewer.jsp?doc_id=a535ba9d-8652-4a9f-9fd5-10f89fae5ad1%2Fmnhi0031%2F1H0YRB5C%2F23051701
7. ↑ SAB, Voss Sokneprestembete, H/Haa: Parish register (official) no. A 13, 1836-1851, p. 63 Quick link: https://www.digitalarkivet.no/kb20070524640570

• Skjærven, Lars & Gjerdåker, Johannes: ”Evangerboka, Gards- og ættesoga", Band II, 1984, p. 19

• Skjærven, Lars & Gjerdåker, Johannes: ”Evangerboka, Gards- og ættesoga", Band II, 1984, p. 189

Find A Grave Memorial# 12628

Knute Nelson on Wikipedia

Biographical Directory of the United States Congress

http://genealogytrails.com/wis/walworth/bios_pg3.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knute_Nelson