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Anon Kjelesvig

15th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry
The Scandinavian Regiment
Anon  Kjelesvig Profile Image
Wisconsin Historical Society, Iconography, ID 81101

Database Record Change Request

Name at Enlist

Anon Kjelesvig

Birth Name

Aanen Johannesen Opheim

Other Names

Amund, Anan, Anson;

Lived

26 Nov 1840 – 1919

Birth Place

Opheim, Fjelberg, Hordaland fylke

Birth Country

Norway

Resident of Muster-In

York, Green County, WI

Company at Enlistment

E

Rank at Enlistment

Private

Muster Date

8 Dec 1861

Death Location

York, Green County, WI

Burial Location

Old York Lutheran Cemetery, York, Green, WI

Mother

Anne Olsdatter

Mother Lived

1800- 12 May 1873

Father

Johannes Rasmussen

Immigration

1857

Spouse

Turina (Turi) Halvorsdatter Rensvigen

Spouse Lived

1839- Apr 1920

Married On

1868

Marriage Location

Wisconsin

Anon Johannesen was born on the Opheim farm, Fjelberg parish, Hordaland, Norway. The family moved to the Kjellesvig farm by 1855. He and his widowed mother, Anne Olsdatter Kjellesvig left the parish for America March 17th, 1857.

He joined the WI 15th Infantry, Company E. The men of the company called themselves “Odin’s Rifles.” The army listed him as living in York, Green County, WI, age 22, and unmarried. He enlisted on November 29, 1861, and mustered on December 8, 1861 at Madison, WI as a Private (Menig). Kjelesvig was left sick in hospital at Iuka, MS on August 20, 1862. On December 30, 1862, he was wounded and taken prisoner at the Battle of Stones River near Murfreesboro, TN. He was paroled and sent to hospital at Annapolis, MD and moved to the Benton Barracks in St. Louis, MO on June 9, 1863. Kjelesvig was restored to service on June 9, 1863. He was wounded in his ankle at Chickamauga, GA on September 19, 1863 and sent to the hospital at Chattanooga where he was on November 20, 1863. He was in Nashville on December 11, 1863. On December 20, 1864, he was wounded accidentally in his right hand at Atlanta. He was mustered out the same day with his Company in Chattanooga, TN.

After the war, Anon married Turina (Turi) Halvorsdtr Rensvigen in 1868 in WI. They lived in York, Green County, WI. He worked as a farmer. Together, they had at least eight children, including one before marriage: Anna M. (1865), Anna Hellen (1869), Johan/John (1871), Halvor (1873), Olaus (1874), Carl/Karl (1878), Rasmus Theodore (1879), and Amanda (1882). Anon died in 1919 and Turi in April 1920. They are both buried in Old York Lutheran Cemetery in York, Green County, WI.

 

Sources: Series 1200: Records of Civil War Regiments, 1861-1900, Wisconsin Adjutant General’s Office, box 76-7; Regimental muster and descriptive rolls, 1861-1865, Wisconsin; Adjutant General’s Office, vol.20, p.76; Payroll muster rolls of WI 15th Co E, saved by Captain T. A. Rossing; Det Femtende Regiment, Wisconsin Frivillige [The Fifteenth Regiment, Wisconsin Volunteers], Ole A. Buslett (Decorah, Iowa, 1894), p.484; Nordmaendene i Amerika, Martin Ulvestad, 1907, History Book Co., Minneapolis, MN, p.301; Oberst Heg og hans gutter, Waldemar Ager, 1916, Fremad Pub. Co., Eau Claire, WI, p.192, photo, p.30; The Military History of Wisconsin in the War for the Union, Edwin B. Quiner, 1866, Clarke & Co., Chicago p.621, 625; Wisconsin Cemetery Records; “Pensioners on the Roll as of January 1, 1883 living in Wisconsin”, Park Genealogical Books, Roseville, Minnesota, pub. 1998; findagrave.com; 1870 Census, Roll: M593_1715, Page: 292A, Image: 593, Family History Library Film: 553214; 1880 Census, Roll: 1428, Family History Film: 1255428, Page: 239A, Enumeration District: 147; 1890 Veterans Schedules, Roll: 113, Page: 2, Enumeration District: 114; 1900 Census, Roll: 1789, Page: 3B, Enumeration District: 0132, FHL microfilm: 1241789; 1910 Census, Roll: T624_1704, Page: 1B, Enumeration District: 0019, FHL microfilm: 1375717; Fjelberg parish register #A6, born and baptised, p. 54, #A7, out-migrated, p. 353, digitalarkivet.no.