Ove And Ragnhild -- More Than “Kissing Cousins”: 52 Ancestors 2025 Prompt “Cousins”

 

My Great-Grandparents Were First Cousins: Ove and Ragnild Syverson’s Mothers Were Sisters

Randi Olsdatter Ve: 1804-1869 (Paternal 2^nd Great-Grandmother)
Ragnhild Olsdatter Ve: 1806-Unknown (Paternal 2^nd Great-Grandmother)
Ove Sjurson/Syverson: 1840-1882 (Paternal Great-Grandfather)
Ragnhild Olsdatter Ve: 1848-1933 (Paternal Great-Grandmother)

I often struggle with Norwegian genealogical records due to the language difference and the confusing patronymic and geographical surnaming tradition. As a result, it took me a shockingly long time before I realized my great-grandparents were actually first cousins, sharing a set of grandparents.

I had been tracing a DNA match that led back to my great-grandfather Ove Syverson’s brother Tollief, making our shared ancestor Ove and Tollief’s parents, Sjur Tomasson Hestetun and Randi Olsdatter Ve. In the past, I had focused more on Sjur Tomasson Hestetun than on his wife since the Hestetun surname gave me geographical information. But this time, I looked more carefully at Randi and her parents, Ole Johannesen Wee and Gjorond Mogensdatter Ve Nundal. I suddenly realized those names seemed extraordinarily familiar. I checked Randi’s siblings and found a name I knew all too well:  Ragnhild Olsdatter Ve. She was my other second-great-grandmother. How had I never realized my second great-grandmothers were sisters?

Ragnhild Olsdatter Ve

Ole Johannesen Wee, my third great-grandfather, was born in Ardal, Norway on March 13, 1780. Ole married Gjorond Mogensdatter Ve Nundal on March 27, 1804. Gjorond was the “older woman”— she was twenty-eight and Ole was twenty-four.  They had three children over the next four years. Randi was born in 1894, Ragnhild was born December 31, 1806, and son Johannes Olsson Ve was born September 22, 1808.

Ole Johannesen Wee died at age thirty-three on January 18, 1810. Gjorond remarried in 1813, and had two more children, only one of which survived.

Despite being two years younger than her sister Randi, Ragnhild was the first to marry. She married Ole Gulbrandsen Geithus on April 1, 1825. Ragnhild was eighteen, and Ole was twenty-four. Interestingly, Ole and Ragnhild’s first child, son Gulbrand Olessen, had been born February 28^th of that year, and baptized on March 13, about two weeks before their wedding.

Ole and Ragnhild went on to have five more living children (there also seem to have been some stillbirths or infant deaths, but the records are unclear): Gjoran Olsdatter, born in 1826; Anna Olsdatter, born in 1828; Ola Olsen, born in 1834; Kari Olsdatter, born in 1839; and my great-grandmother Ragnhild Olsdatter, born in 1848.

Ragnhild’s sister Randi married Sjur Tomasson Hestetun on December 5, 1830. They had six children over a ten-year span. Tollief Sjursen was born in 1835; Maritha Sjursdatter was born in 1837;  Johannes Sjursen was born in 1838; Ove Sjurson, my great-grandfather, was born in 1840, Anfind Sjurson was born in 1842; and Sjur Sjursen was born in 1845.

While the two sisters and their families lived on separate “farms” in Norway, they were both still in the Ardal/Sogn og Fjordane area. The two families probably gathered together several times a year, so Randi’s son Ove would have grown up knowing Ragnhild’s daughter Ragnhild. Ragnhild was eight years younger than Ove, so he probably originally thought of her as an annoying little cousin. However, by the mid-1860s, Ove must have started to view her differently. She became more than a “kissing cousin”—she was the cousin he wanted to marry.

I have been unable to locate Ove and Ragnhild’s marriage record, but by the time of their first child, Ragnhild’s, birth on January 9, 1868, they were already married. Their future in Norway must have seemed difficult, because they made the difficult decision to emigrate to the United States shortly after Ragnhild was born. They seem to have arrived in America in early 1869, and their second child, a little boy named Sjur/Syver, was born in Wisconsin on October, 23, 1869. By 1872, they had moved to Linden Township in Brown County, Minnesota and were homesteading a farm there. My grandmother was born on that farm on March 1, 1872.

Discovering that my great-grandparents were first cousins was enlightening and enriched my understanding of their lives and those of their parents in nineteenth century Norway. I look forward to learning more about this close family connection.

 

Sources:

"Norway, Church Books, 1797-1958", FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6876-TD6N : Sun Jan 19 16:51:40 UTC 2025), Entry for Ole Guldbrandsen Geedhuus and Guldbrand Olsen Geedhuus, 1 Apr 1825.

"Norway, Baptisms, 1634-1927", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:NHT8-YVC : 23 June 2020), Ragnilda, 1807.

Guldbrand Olessen birth "Norway, Baptisms, 1634-1927", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:NWRR-TW5 : 23 June 2020), Guldbrand, 1825.

Ragnilde Osdr Marriage. Norway, Select Marriags, 1660-1926. https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/60095/records/1850704?tid=46986934&pid=322178148228&ssrc=pt