Transcripts

75th Jubilee Norsewood School 1874-1949, p96-99

Fifty-five years ago, in a little Norwegian township 42 miles from Christiania, there lived a young labourer [Edvard Andersen (Edward) LAURVIG], 25 years of age, with his wife [Caroline ("Lina") SØRENSDATTER OPSTADSORLIE] and three children [Anna, Didrik Magnus, and Maren]. He earned 2s. per day working in the forest and hard navvying. He was a typical Norwegian of little more than medium height, with strong, well-knit, muscu­lar frame, of fair skin, with flaxen hair and blue eyes. Norway on poor soil produces a thrifty, industrious, and contented people.

There came to Norway a young clergyman, the Rev. B. E. [Bror Eric] FRIBERG, a returned son of that hard climate, who had been accredited by the New Zealand Government to obtain settlers for the opening of a new land. The Rev. Mr. FRIBERG lectured in the leading towns of Norway, and the young labourer was attracted by the fascinating prospects of a promised land. He was told that in New Zealand he could earn 6s. or 7s. per day and he would be given 40 acres of land to call his own. The promise of the land decided him.

He had a little store of savings, but he had a wife and three children and a brother-in-law [Christopher FINDSEN FURDALEN (FINDSEN)] and his wife [Kari SØRENSDATTER OPSTAD], who also decided to emigrate, had no money. He undertook to provide, and the two families moved to Christiania, where they were to embark. The ship did not arrive for three weeks, and two families cannot live in Christiania on nothing. The little hoard of savings all went and the young labourer, like many a stout heart before him, found himself bound for an unknown country without a shilling in his pocket.

To-day, at the venerable age of 80 years, he lives in a little cottage at Norsewood. His sturdy frame is now a little bent and his hair is white, but few men have so faithfully served their adopted country. His name is Mr. E. A. LAURVIG — a worthy name that is growing in this country, because this Norwegian pioneer claims 12 children, 21 grandchildren, and 27 great-grandchildren. One son laid down his life in the Great War.

An “Evening News” representative recently waited on Mr. LAURVIG with the object of obtaining from him some details of the first Christmas spent by the Norwegians in Norsewood. Romance in the journalistic mind lurked somewhere behind that first Christmas. For one thing it would be the first Christmas for this little band of people with the seasons reversed. In Norway December is a hard winter month, and in the northern regions the protracted winter follows almost suddenly on the disappear­ance of the sun, when the absence of solar light is frequently compensated for by the frequent appearances of the aurora borealis, which shines with sufficient intensity to allow of the prosecution of ordinary occupations. Christmas celebrated in the Land of the Midnight Sun has a mystical allurement, and the spirit of Hans ANDERSEN or GRIMM’s Fairy Tales might have been transported to the beautiful New Zealand bush in the summer time. There was nothing like that. Santa Claus did not come down the chimney in the first Christmas at Norsewood. The hand of death touched the little Norwegian band.

The small sailing ship Hovding [Høvding] landed the first Norwegian emigrants at Napier on September 17th [sic], 1872, where they re­mained in barracks for three days and then the men moved into the unknown. The luggage was taken on waggons and the men trudged on foot from Napier to Norsewood. Mr. LAURVIG states that his party was escorted by Mr. S. McGREEVY, of Waipawa, who had two five-horse teams. The men on arrival at their des­tination set to work to erect slab whares for their womenfolk, who arrived three days after.

Like all emigration, schemes, mistakes were made in the Norwegian exodus. Just as we to-day hear of complaints regarding British immigrants not finding life in New Zealand as they anticipated, so mistakes were made 50 years ago. Mr. FRIBERG in his zeal does not appear to have discriminated in his selection, and he filled his two ships from the Norwegian and Danish towns as well as the country. Some of the people who found themselves in the heart of the New Zealand bush were tradespeople, quite inexperienced in the use of an axe. They were quickly disillusioned, and a number of them found their way back to the towns, where they readily found employment and progressed in business.

Dannevirke was settled by peaceful and hard-working conquest, with nothing calling for the dramatic qualities of the Vikings. Mr. LAURVIG is a typical example of the man who won through. As the youngest man in the community he was selected to draw the sections in the first land settlement. As luck would have it, he says he drew the poorest section for himself. He had no money and he could not speak a word of English. For two years he never saw money. What he earned was swallowed by the credit he received from the storekeeper. He picked up English from some man named Tom, who worked with him as his mate in road-making in the Wairarapa. The immigrants kept very much to themselves, pursuing an isolated and hard existence.

The First Christmas

On the first Christmas Eve Mrs. Karrie SVENSEN [sic], sister-in-law of Mr. LAURVIG, died in giving birth to a baby girl [Mary Berte FINDSEN]. No medical assistance could be obtained, and it was a case of strangers in a strange land doing what they could for each other. Mr. LAURVIG made a rough coffin out of slabs and the body of this woman pioneer was laid to rest on the edge of the bush on Boxing Day. No clergyman was available, but Mr. CHRISTOFFERSEN [Edvard (Edward) KRISTOFFERSEN (CHRISTOFFERSEN)], who after­wards became a Wesleyan minister, read a short passage from the Bible. The shadow of mourning lay over the little community during the first Christmas Day spent in New Zealand. No attempt was made to celebrate the season of goodwill, and it is doubtful if a child received a Christmas present. The children played in the bush and at times with their mothers were lost and had to be searched for.

The little girl born on that first Christmas Eve lived and was cared for. She grew into girlhood and married, and her family, New Zealand-born, has enjoyed many a Christmas in happier circumstances than that sad day in the Norsewood bush.

Old Mr. LAURVIG lives on happy and contented. His little cottage looks out over a wide landscape of cultivated land with a background of hills rugged and touched with white like his venerable frame. He has a little chuckling laugh that gladdens a life-story in which there has been hardship and grim struggle. One can imagine this quaint little chuckle being the faint echo of the rounded laugh of the young labourer who left the bleak hills of Norway 55 years ago.

“I am satisfied,” says this fine old pioneer. “This is a good country. The laws are just. If a man is honest he has nothing to fear. And the Government is good and looks after old people.”

And then that little chuckle, sounding like Father Christmas laughing up his sleeve. It echoed down the road after, with a firm grip of his rough hand, he had said good-bye.

[A photo of Mr E.A. LAURVIG and one of his great-grandsons appears on p99]