Biography of Janetta Berntine Ingmann Dahle 1846-1929

Located at the top of the fat lower third of Norway is the busy port of Trondheim. It sits on a peninsula between the Trondheim Fjord and the Nidelva River. At one time Trondheim was Norway’s capital and "the cathedral city" where the coronation of Norwegian kings took place. Many old buildings still remain, but others have been rebuilt after having been destroyed by fire. Janetta Berntine Ingmann’s birth occurred in Trondheim, and her christening took place in an ancient chapel there, the Lutheran Church of Vor Frue (Our Lady). The parish of Vor Frue is sometimes listed with the other places of her birth—Trondheim, Sør-Trøndelag, Norway.

Janetta Ingmann’s birth on February 17, 1846, undoubtedly a cold winter day, is recorded in the Trondheim, Norway Church Records. She is listed as Jonetta Berntine daughter of Johan Henrik Gabrielsen Ingmann and Anna Bergitha Ingmann. All three of Janetta’s names have variant spellings in different records. One reason for the diverse orthography could be due to various pronunciations in different languages. Another might be the phonetic spelling used by many during those years of immigrant assimilation.*

Janetta and her sister, Laura, born eighteen months before Janetta, were the oldest children in the Ingmann family. These two sisters undoubtedly helped with household chores as the family increased by three more children—John, Maria, and Anna—in the next five years. The last child, a son, to come to this family was stillborn, and six days later Janetta’s mother died on March 7, 1854. Later in life Janetta would retell this tragic tale to her children and grandchildren.

When my baby brother was born and did not live, my mother died.
Papa was out fishing, and when he returned, he found his wife dead and
already buried. He was sad and went out fishing again, and was drowned
in the deep, deep sea.

In retelling this painful experience to her children, it is not known if Janetta merely shortened the time between the deaths of her mother and father or if the story changed in the retelling from parents to grandchildren. Records show that her father, John, actually lived nearly six years after his wife’s death. When he died in 1860 at sea, his oldest daughter, Laura, was fifteen, and Janetta was just a few days short of her fourteenth birthday.

The following twenty-four months of Janetta’s teenage years are not documented. She and her siblings were separated and lived with different relatives, but it is unknown exactly where they stayed. Family tradition indicates that Janetta went to school to learn to be a seamstress. Whether this training took place before or after her father’s death is uncertain, but family members and others whose clothing she sewed knew her to be an excellent seamstress. A niece of Janetta once commented that Aunt Janetta’s children’s clothes were outstanding. Pictures taken of the family verify this cherished statement. The girls’ dresses have pleats and ruffles with lace peeking from petticoats and pantaloons. The boys wore suits with matching vests.

Janetta’s clothes were most often a dark color, each dress having something special to set it off such as tucks or pleats, ruching or ruffles, buttons or bows. In her later years she preferred her dresses to be black which she wore with her black cape when she went out. In her old age when she no longer sewed, she was still particular about her appearance and was considered "fussy" regarding how her clothes fit and how they were sewn recounted daughter-in-law Vilate* who sewed for her as she aged.

An important date in Janetta’s life was her conversion to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. By 1851 Mormon missionaries had begun proselytizing in Norway, having some success gaining converts to their new American religion. This success was increased as young, freshly baptized Norwegian men became elders and were called to serve ‘home missions.’ Interestingly enough, Janetta’s future husband, John Dahle, was one such young Norwegian missionary.

One year after John’s baptism in the fall of 1858, he was ordained an elder and called on a mission in his native Norway. Among other places, his mission took him to Trondheim. In Trondheim, Elder John Dahle met the Ingmann girls and taught them the gospel. He baptized Laura, who was nearly sixteen, on August 13, 1860. Two weeks later, on August 27, he baptized Janetta, age fourteen.

The Norwegian government did not consider Mormonism to be a Christian religion, and, needless to say, the Mormons found themselves persecuted by zealous anti-Mormon mobs. It was difficult to admit openly to being a Mormon. Often mobs disrupted the meetings the missionaries were holding with members and investigators in their homes where members tried not to attract the attention of others who might frighten them. Those attending even took the precaution of reading the words to the hymns, rather than singing, to prevent anyone from hearing and possibly breaking up their services. The young missionaries often found themselves in jail for preaching a "heathen religion."

As Janetta continued her activity with the Mormons in Norway, she found that even teenage girls were not immune to religious persecution. Later in her life she wrote about her incarceration for being a Mormon.

I was arrested for my belief in the Gospel and was taken by
two city officers to a large farm house far out in the country
where I was told I would have to remain until I became of
age. Six months later I was released by the mayor.

It seems absurd to think of arresting a fifteen-year-old girl for her belief in Christ. To the Norwegians in the mid-1800’s Mormonism was a pagan religious sect, attempting to harm their youth. Worse still, missionaries were believed to be actively convincing their daughters to leave Norway after they had joined this strange church. The false rumors abounded about young girls needed for the polygamous Mormon men, and town officials reacted swiftly to this apparent threat.

A few months after her release from imprisonment, Janetta immigrated to America with a group of Scandinavian Saints. Her sister, Laura, had moved there during the previous year with a group of Church members. Janetta and Laura longed to meet again in Zion.

The various groups of Saints emigrating from Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, were given directions by church leaders regarding the cost for their voyage to America and schedules indicating where and when to meet. From their home countries they traveled by train, ferry, and steamer, adding more LDS emigrants to their groups the farther they went. Their final destination before boarding a ship for the trans-Atlantic trip was near Hamburg, Germany, on the Elbe River. There seaworthy ships had been engaged by the missionary leaders to ‘gather’ the Scandinavians to America.

Conway B. Sonne writes of the emotions involved for the emigrant converts when they left their homes for America:
In responding to the call, new converts left their homes, families,
and native lands for an unknown future in an untamed country. Between
1840 and 1890, at least eighty-five thousand LDS emigrants braved the
treacherous oceans, surviving the dangers of wind, wave, and disease.
Some fifty thousand of them crossed the water in sailing vessels.
This religious impulse among believers was described by one LDS
emigrant in these words: "I believed in the principle of the gathering and
felt it my duty to go…my heart was fixed." Thousands followed that same
gospel star to Zion.

Janetta had no family with whom to travel and became one of those thousands when she quickly boarded her assigned ship, the Electric, in the early spring of 1862. Apparently the Dahle brothers and their mother took her under their care. The church leader of the Scandinavian emigrants was returning missionary, Elder Soren Christofferson of Manti who was 43. Other LDS men took care of the travelers’ needs such as exchanging their money and other such business affairs.

The Electric was a medium clipper ship and served mainly the trans-Atlantic trade. Accommodations on the ship’s two decks included a row of built-in single bunks along each side with a double row of bunks down the center. "The young unmarried men were assigned to the bow of the ship while the unmarried women were settled in the stern."

When all the travelers were on board, Elder Christofferson called a meeting for the immigrants. There he "exhorted them" to be diligent and faithful in living the commandments. He also encouraged them to be patient while on board ship and how to act after they arrived in America.

The long hours at sea were filled with work, cleaning and maintaining their living quarters and attending scheduled meetings, but not all was solemnity on board. The immigrants enjoyed "singing praises to the Lord, playing, dancing," and other such forms of entertainment until they reached New York harbor six weeks later on June 5. The travelers were not allowed to disembark until a doctor had come "on board to inspect [them] to be sure no contagious diseases were among them." Having passed the doctor’s inspection the next day, the group proceeded to Castle Garden where they waited for the Saints to disembark from the Athena which arrived on June 6.

At this point in Janetta’s travels a new and unexpected development occurred—she was to be married. Recalling her marriage years later, Janetta would always include the part that she and John Dahle "were prevailed upon by the Elders to be married." Apparently this was the case, as Elder Soren Christofferson, the presiding church leader, performed their marriage the evening of June 8 while they were at Castle Garden, New York. There are strong and moral reasons why he may have preferred having a married couple rather than two single people under his care for the trip across the plains, especially when one was a lovely sixteen-year-old girl with no family support.

Most immigrants upon arriving in New York were left to their own devices as soon as they left Castle Garden, but not so for the Mormon travelers who had prearranged their trip. The program for gathering the Saints by 1862 was so well organized that incoming people were passed along from post to post by caring individuals until they reached their final destination. So it was with Janetta and her new husband John.

John Hansen Dahle & Janetta Berntine Ingmann Dahle
in their middle years circa 1895.