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Oslo, Norway
13/11-96Dear Martha Solsness.
As a close friend of Gudrun og Jan Croeger I must say that to day November 12 was indeed a very memorable day for all of us here in Oslo and Bergen. This evening I spoke to Gudrun on the phone and we agreed that she should try to call you on the phone and ask about your true identity. We guessed a lot and got it right! Gudrun called back, told me that she had spoken to you and that you were the wife of the late Egil (Eagle) Solsness, son of Agnes Huitfeldt Devold and Lars Porsenna Solsness. And thank Goodness for that!
As you might have understood the grandfather of Gudrun and Jan Croeger, Jonas Wessel Croeger was a brother of the mother of Agnes, Helle Margrethe Croeger Devold Mengshoel and your mother in law. The cradle so to speak of your nearest family was Bergen and Hitterdal, Telemark. The father of Helle Margrethe Croeger Devold Mengshoel, the minister Jonas Wessel Croeger (1807-1867) (enclosed copy of a not too good photography) had a very famous and legendary sister, Olea Styhr Croeger (1801-1855), who was the very first to collect Norwegian folk ballads in Telemark.
The copy of the enclosed silhouett-clipping depicts the (and at that time very young) grandmother of Helle Margrethe Croeger Devold Mengshoel, Helle Margrethe Neumann Croeger (died 1849), married to minister Johannes Croeger (1774-1830). The lady with the white cap on the Xerox-copy of a photograph is a sister of Helle Margrethe Neumann Croeger, Anne Karine Rynning (died 1865).
Enclosed too is a copy of one of more than one hundred letters, hidden away in the archive of the Norwegian Laubor Party and addressed to Norwegian socialist leaders in Christiania 1907-1925, written by Helle Margrethe Mengshoel in 1917 when Olaf Andreas became senator. In a few words and in a very clever and intelligent way (!) Helle establishes a line backwards to the forefathers of Olaf A. Devold by fremhever their particular "Spirit of Freedom".
As I told you in my last letter I am working on a series of books (biographies in 3 volumes) about the Croeger-Dynasty and especially those of the family who immigrated to USA. Some of the members of this Croeger family, Brian Croger (Mark the spelling of the sumame), ended up in Tasmania. He and his wife visited Bergen a few weeks ago and he wanted me to track down his specific ancestors who also came from Bergen.
I have among others enclosed a listing of several of the ancestors of the Croeger family who originally came to Norway from Mecklenburg, the northern part of Germany. Most of them were ministers, military people and sea-merchants.
If you are interested we could later on suply you with copies of the original photograhies of members of the Croeger-family.
Do you recognize some of the women on the enclosed xerox-copies of photograpies some of them taken in USA?
HER MANGLER EN ELLER FLERE SIDER!