Help with 1910 Letter from Purmo

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

I have found a letter from my great grandmother written in 1910 from Purmo and would appreciate anyone interested in translating it. Always remember, no good deed goes unpunished. I have several others I need help on as well. The first is four pages and her writing is very clear. Written by Greta Lisa Pehrsdotter (1844-1914) to her son, Viktor Peterson in Butte Montana.

[Kuhlberg Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Kuhlberg]

Hello David and greetings from Somero! Here is a quick translation of the letter:

"Purmo 10th of November, 1910

My beloved son and daughter-in-law, [I hope you] live and are well, that is my wish and may the Lord´s mercy and peace be with you.
I now wish to write a few lines to you, my beloved child, so that you don´t have to think that I have forgotten you. Even if you are far away from me you are as dear to me as are the other [children of mine] because I have felt a mother´s tenderness and have taken care of you all alike without exception but now I feel this becomes too heavy for me and it brings me great pain

<< page 2 >>
when I from your letters hear that you carry such a hatred towards both me and your brothers. You curse Anders for lying down on father´s urn but you should not think that he been allowed to lie down and rest, oh no, he has had to work. You do remember how young and childish he was when your father died and in my opinion he was so friendly towards you and always wished you well as long as you stayed at home. Now he only receives letters from you calling him names. You should not either think that all my days have been amusing here on Bäckbacka?, when you will have to try as hard as I have done and

<< page 3 >>
slave away in [all] my days then you will know what the world is about. You feel that you were pushed away like a beggar but I don´t feel that way, here were no great riches to take from but you did not have to lie down and Anders tried to run along and give you advice. I now want to know if you by now have got any [of the] money back from Henriks Alfred to whom you have lent money and hereby I stop and leave you into the hands of God, he who is almighty and makes things go as He wishes. Many dear greetings from me who is your mother until death. Good bye and live well wishes Greta Lisa Bäckbacka.

<< page 4 >>
At the same time I wish to send to you Selma, my beloved child, a few words. I miss you so much and I remember you so often when I go to sleep at nights. There would be so much to talk about with you but I don´t know how to write it down. Surely it is the most pleasant time for a bird when she can have her chicks left in the nest! I have been in Sudda? to help Herman and Anna. Now I wish to send greetings to Lovisa, it would be so nice to be able to see her and her young ones one more time. I have met with Hanna Nylund, she is planning to come over there by spring. Many dear greetings from me to all of you. Good bye and stay well wishes your mother."

Sincerely,

Göran Kuhlberg

[Tapio Rautio Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Tapio Rautio]

Touching.

Tapio

[Jaska Sarell Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Jaska Sarell]

Nice work, Göran!
A note: she has written name Bäcksbacka as Bäxbacka.

Jaska

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

Hello David and greetings from Somero! Here is a quick translation of the letter:

Ahh! What an amazing letter you have revealed. It captures family history, the animosity between brothers, motivation for leaving, and the eloquence and heart of a mother.

Thank you for such a beautiful gift.

Dave

[Kuhlberg Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Kuhlberg]

You are welcome!

I believe we now all want to know this: Were the brothers ever able to get along or did the animosity go on forever?

Göran

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

At this point, I don't know. I am in contact with the brother's descendants and will attempt to uncover more information. I still have another letter to translate from Purmo but it will have to wait a few weeks as I'm traveling. I'll post it on this string for continuity.

[Kuhlberg Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Kuhlberg]

Well, we are looking forward to hearing more!

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

Relatives in Purmo are looking for old letters from America but have not uncovered any. My grandfather's mother and older brothers all died shortly after this letter so perhaps no reconciliation was ever reached. Johan and Anders died in 1918 at age 40 and 34, Herman in 1914 at age 30 and Greta Lisa the same year at age 69.

I do have several other letters from Purmo to investigate. Following are four other pages from about the same time period but from my grandmother's farm called Kalijarvi. Her mother was also named Greta.

[Hasse Admin Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Hasse]

Help with 1910 Letter from Purmo

But David...

Aren't these pages exactly the same as you posted 25-01-11 18:12? Did you accidentally upload the wrong attachments.

Btw - at the same time a humble wish - if you have to upload the correct pages once more... Could you save the pictures as jpeg documents instead - with a resolution of approx. 800 pixels wide. (As you can see from the previous letter's picture files the quality is good enough for reading.)

If you look at the space used per page in your "new" version of the letter pages you can see that each page occupies over 1 megabyte - this in comparison with the jpeg versions I resaved for the previous version you uploaded. In principle I don't want to waste storage space unnecessarily - and since you can see the pdf documents use some 20 times more space than the jpeg documents it would be quite a saving if you store them as 800px jpegs.

Hasse

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

Correction

Thanks for the notice on the error on attachment management and size recommendations. I'll see if I can get the correct ones attached.

[Kuhlberg Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Kuhlberg]

Hello again!

Here is a quick and crude translation of the second letter:

Kaljärvi March 28th, 1921
Dearest sister, I now want to take me the liberty to reply to your letter which arrived to me some time ago. [From] it I see that you are all alive and in [good] health which is a valuable gift to possess. The same joyful message may we who are staying at home send back to you but otherwise there has been a lot of sickness here and

<< page 2 >>
a number of people here have died. Eterback Jal(?) has died a few weeks ago from an illness of long duration and the wife of Kalle’ s Anders at Lassfolk has died [whom] is well known to Maria. Also “Torpajonas” at Millasbacka has died. We have received 5 cards that you have sent but we have not written any replies to them, we were waiting for letters from you before we would reply but you wrote that you have sent [letters/cards] to Viktor too but they have not arrived.

<< page 3 >>
We thank you for them …. and from your photos I can see that you have eaten too strong food since you have become so fat, if you had stayed as the queen of home and had been eating milk with no fat in it, I believe that you then had been like other people. You [my] sister mentioned that you would send us fish(?)tails which we do not demand from you even though I think that I know how to value what I receive and especially from the church and from America be it little or much

<< page 4 >>
and so may I inform you that we have not made any cross for our mother yet because father and mother are resting very close to each other but I have thought that we should make a +++cross but I wish to mention this to …. Maria who is so strict with what type she wants to have. You must not think that I demand anything from you when I write about this but as you know mother is worth everything we can do. I don´t want to say anything more in this case when I know that I owe her for [so] many things.


As you see, some passages still need to be worked on, but I think you will get an idea of the contents!

Best regards,
Göran

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

Ahh, this detective work gets more complicated all the time. Thank you again for your generous translation. I will be off line for a few weeks as I travel. I'll pick up on my letters when I return.

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

Two last pages

The last of the letters I would appreciate a translation are attached. They are incomplete and difficult to read. Only pages 3 and 4 were found. Another short note will be attached when I figure out how to do it.

Again, these have been invaluable to aid in my research. I'm currently working on a book of my Finnish ancestors and am incorporating these translations into it. Thank you.Handwritten Letter page 4.jpgHandwritten Letter page 3.jpg

[David Bawden Registered Find all posts View Profile Close David Bawden]

Love Note?

I've tried to translate using google translate but I can't figure out enough of the handwriting to have it makes sense. Any ideas?