We have had yet another fantastic day today. The weather this week has been unbelievable and has just added to my love for Denmark even more. I think I'm going to have to call my favourite country a three way tie between Switzerland, Norway and Denmark. What can I say, apparently I have expensive taste!!
Today we woke at about 5.30am unfortunately because our room gets so hot in the morning that we have to sleep with the curtains and windows wide open. Never mind!
We caught the 7.28am train to Korsør, originally a fishing town and now a port on the western coast of Zealand, right near the bridge to Fyn (the island where Odense from the other day is). Today was a really special day for us, as my great great grandpa (Mum's great grandpa) grew up in this town and then moved to Melbourne. So we came on a mission, armed with lots of maps and paperwork provided by my uncle (thanks Ian!) to try and find the house he grew up in and possibly some gravestones.
We arrived in Korsør, where the train station is 3km out of town. So we got a bus into town and then set off. Firstly we walked to where we thought the house would be, but the numbers didn't correspond and we were really confused. So we had a look in the church right there which as it turns out is where my great great great grandpa Jens Hansen's funeral was on October 24, 1896. And this would have been the church the family attended.
We wandered around the streets enjoying the beautiful coloured houses but had no luck finding 146 Algade which we were looking for. But at 10am we headed for the local archives office. Mum had been emailing a really kind lady called Jytte who was aware we would be coming today (it's only open Monday, Wednesday, Friday 10-2) and when we arrived, her and two volunteers were busy searching for information for us! They were so friendly and helpful, Jytte was the only one who spoke English, and as we can't speak Danish we felt a bit silly standing around while they searched, so it was nice when they found something and she would come over and explain it to us. If I write all the details I'll confuse myself, but don't fret Nan, Pa, Ian and Robyn, we have lots of photocopies of family trees and information from books which we are bringing home! And Jytte would like us to email her information we have so she can add us to the archives!
But basically what they found was a book about the Thers family and also some death notices, as well as the phone number of a distant relative but Jytte called it and no one was home (we were a tiny bit glad, what on earth would we have said? "Hi I'm some random Australian you're distantly related to!"??) My great great great grandpa Jens Hansen married Anne Cathrine Thers and they had a son, Lauritz Hansen who is my Pa's grandpa. The book had information (in Danish though!!) saying how Lauritz had moved to Melbourne in Australia and made money there. For anyone reading who isn't Nan, Pa, Ian and Robyn, Lauritz moved to Melbourne and then began the building company Hansen & Yuncken which still exists today but is no longer in our family. However Lauritz's name still exists, as ever since him, a few generations of boys in our family have been called Laurits. So there was Lauritz Hansen (my great great grandpa), Laurits Vernon Hansen (my great grandpa), Laurits Alexander Hansen (my Pa), Laurits Ian Hansen (my uncle) and Laurits Christopher James Hansen (my cousin).
I have a lot to thank Lauritz Hansen for. He gave us all the gift of football, and for those of you who know me well you know how much going and watching Collingwood with my family every week means to me. Lauritz's building company built one of the stands at Victoria Park, Collingwood's old home ground. During this time he spent time at the club and began to support Collingwood, and this tradition has been passed down in our family!!
We also found out that the house they lived in had changed street name, so while Jytte kept searching, we walked to the site where their house once stood. Today it's a shop front which is a hearing aid clinic!! It is right opposite the church. Then we walked to the cemetery to try our luck finding some graves. We looked for a while without any luck, and then a gardener came up and spoke Danish to me. I explained I couldn't understand him and why we were there, and he said 'one moment!', pulled out his phone and made a call. He asked someone to search the names we had which was so nice of him, but he said the cemetery records didn't go back that far. He did find us a family grave of a Thers family who may be some connection, and we did see a LOT of Hansens, but he thinks Jens' gravestone may have been removed with a lot of other old ones. We still looked around the cemetery which by the way was very well looked after, it seemed a lovely place to be put to rest.
We walked back via a path along the beach, and took in the beautiful blue water and bridge leading to Fyn. Then we headed back to the archive office, had a quick walk around the adjoining fortress, and were again met by Jytte. She had been looking for an article that had been written about Lauritz when he came back to visit Korsør called 'The Millionaire from Australia!' but had no luck. She has assured us she will keep looking and email it to us! What she did find though was some church records (which she has shown us how to look up online) and found the address that Jens was living in when he died. So we thanked everyone at the archives and left with a lot of photocopies! We went past 24 Algade where Jens was living when he died and then headed back to the bus station. A really nice man helped us to find the right bus and we went back to the station. It was funny, after going to the archive office I found myself looking at every person in the street thinking "are we distantly related?".
Next we caught a train to Roskilde. This was the capital of Denmark before Copenhagen and was a huge Viking town in the late 8th century to late 11th century. We walked through the pretty streets firstly to the cathedral, which has the graves of 39 royal family members. The interior was really beautiful and we saw the royal graves including Christian X, Christian IX and a few others we learned about yesterday! What we found creepy is that they are currently digging out a chapel to make room for Queen Margerethe II and her husband! They're still very much alive!!
Next we walked through a beautiful park to the Viking Ship Museum which Roskilde is famous for. Inside are five Viking ships that were found in the fjord here. It is believed they were sunk to the bottom of the fjord opening to create a sort of blockade to prevent the norwegian Vikings from invading! Replicas have been made but are out sailing at this time of year. In 2007, one even sailed from Roskilde to Dublin which took 6 weeks!
We had a look around outside in the boat sheds and the harbour where the reconstructed boats usually are. You can go for a sail in a Viking boat but we had missed all the times - think we were too tired anyway! So instead we walked to a little neighbourhood called Sankt Jørgensbjerg which has houses with straw roofs.
We walked back to the station and on the way did a bit of shopping (mum got two tops and me a dress!) and then enjoyed a beautiful dinner at a cafe in the shade. Mum had a chicken salad and I had a club sandwich, and we each had a fruit smoothie. We caught a train back to Copenhagen and I've been so busy typing this post while mum was sleeping that we have just missed the Copenhagen stop and are now accidentally heading to the airport - oops! Oh well, we were just heading back for the night anyway. What's an extra 40 minutes??
Last day in Copenhagen tmro before we have 2 and a bit days in Dubai, we are having dinner at my friend Nina's house who I met on my tour of Asia in January!!
Love to all
Claire
Xoxox
PS: Guide to Korsør photos...
- the green domed church is where Jens Hansen's funeral was
- on the right hand side of the black and white photo is the house the Hansens lived in. The building standing there today is in the photo of me throwing my arms up!
- at the cemetery I am standing next to the Thers family grave
- the grey building I'm standing in front of is where Jens was living when he died
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