Infant Girl Nelson, (1894-1894)

Headstone GPS Coordinates: 

Birth: 12 April 1894, Crosby, Kitsap County, Washington

Death: 12 April 1894, Crosby, Kitsap County, Washington

Relatives in Seabeck Cemetery: Andrew Nelson, Malina Nelson, Infant Girl Nelson, Bertha Nelson

American Revolutionary War Patriots*: None

An infant daughter of Malina and Anders (Andrew) Nelson was born on April 12, 1894, in Crosby, Kitsap County, Washington. She was the eleventh child in a large Norwegian immigrant family that had settled near Dyes Inlet in Silverdale. Her parents had journeyed from Sogn og Fjordane, Norway, to America in 1888, establishing a farm and building a new life in the Pacific Northwest.

Her birth came during a difficult season for the Nelson family. On that same day, April 12, 1894, her mother, Malina, died as a result of childbirth complications. The infant did not survive the delivery. She lived only moments, never appearing in census records or other official documents, and her given name—if one was chosen—has not been preserved in surviving records.

She was buried in Seabeck Cemetery beside her mother. Malina’s headstone reads:

“Malina Nelson: Beloved wife of Andrew Nelson, born in Norway July 3, 1853. Died April 12, 1894. At Rest.”

In recent years, while clearing brush and debris around Malina’s grave, volunteers discovered the base of a small, broken headstone nearby. Based on its size and style, it is believed to have belonged to this infant girl or possibly her sister Bertha who died in 1897.