Sophia Scott née Fredel, (1849-1918)
Headstone GPS Coordinates: Burial location unknown.
Birth: 03 June 1849, Lommaryd, Jönköping, Sweden
Death: 14 March 1918, Coyle, Jefferson County, Washington
Relatives in Seabeck Cemetery: Gustaf Scott
American Revolutionary War Patriots*: None.
Disclaimer: These lines have not been officially proven by NSDAR standards
Sophia Susanna Eriksdotter Fredel was born on June 3, 1849, in Lommaryd, Jönköping, Sweden. She was the first of three children born to Erik Johan Fredel (1822–1890) and Anna Stina Johansdotter (1822–1855). Her father worked as a carpenter, and her mother died when Sophia was just five years old. After her father remarried, she gained eleven half-siblings, growing up in a large and blended household shaped by both loss and change.
On November 6, 1870, Sophia married Gustaf Emil Adolfsson Skott in Marbäck, Östergötland, Sweden. Gustaf had been born there on August 22, 1841, the second oldest of eight children born to Adolf Mård Pettersson and Maja Christina “Stina” Larsdotter. Together, Sophia and Gustaf began building their family in Marbäck.
Their first five children were all born in Marbäck: Gustaf Emil Jr. (1871–1964), Sophia Olivia “Olive” (1873–1948), Carl Oscar (1876–1961), Maria Lovisa “Mary Louise” (1878–1953), and Johan Aron “John Aaron” (1881–1930). During these years, Gustaf traveled alone to the United States and back twice before the family made the decision to immigrate permanently. On August 5, 1881, Sophia departed from the port of Göteborg with her husband and five small children—including a newborn—aboard the SS Romeo. After a stop in Hull, England, they continued on to America, landing in Philadelphia before making their way to Cass County, North Dakota. The journey, both by sea and land, must surely have been arduous with so many young children in her care.
Sophia arrived in North Dakota during the height of the Dakota Boom, when the Dakota Territory was rapidly filling with settlers and becoming a center of farming. Most of those arriving were recent European immigrants. Many lived in sod houses and formed close-knit colonies, including a large Norwegian settlement around Fargo in Cass County. While living there, Sophia gave birth to her sixth child, Edith Mable (1884–1978), in 1884.
By 1887 the boom had ended. Drought and declining wheat prices strained homesteaders, and many families moved on. By 1885, Sophia and her family had relocated to Marsh Grove in Marshall County, Minnesota, becoming one of the area’s first pioneer families. The region—named for its marshes and poplar groves—was being homesteaded largely by Norwegian immigrants. Settlers cleared trees, planted crops, and harvested by hand. In Marshall County, Sophia welcomed three more children: Albert T. (1886–1979), Edith Wilhelmina (1890–1992), and Hulda Clara (1891–1991).
After seven years in Minnesota, Sophia journeyed west again with her family, arriving in Seattle in 1892. Around this time, her husband became a naturalized United States citizen and the family began using the spelling “Scott” instead of “Skott.”
The family homesteaded near the Norton precinct in Coyle, Jefferson County, on the southern tip of the Toandos Peninsula along Hood Canal. The rural community was then known as “Fisherman’s Harbor,” a fitting name, as Gustaf worked as a fisherman. Residents could travel by mailboat between Seabeck, Coyle, and Brinnon. In 1908, when the first post office was established, the town was renamed Coyle after its first postmaster.
In 1893, Sophia gave birth to her tenth and final child, Otilia Matilda Dorothy “Tillie” (1893–1984), in Coyle. By 1900, six of her children were grown and living throughout the Puget Sound region, most with families of their own. The younger children attended the town’s one-room log schoolhouse with about fifteen other students. In 1910, only Tillie remained at home, along with two young boarders, eight-year-old Ida Holten and four-year-old Samuel Holten. Despite their young ages, they do not appear to have been related to the family, and how they came to live there remains unclear.
Two of Sophia’s sons, Albert and John, remained in Norton. Albert worked as an engineer operating a “steam donkey,” a steam-powered winch used in logging and maritime work. John owned and operated the town’s general store by 1909 and also served as the town barber by 1911.
In early 1918, the Flu Pandemic began sweeping across the United States and Europe. After eleven days of illness, Sophia died of broncho-pneumonia in Coyle on March 14, 1918, at the age of 68. Two days later she was taken to Seabeck and buried at Seabeck Cemetery.
At the time of her death, she had witnessed her family’s journey from rural Sweden to the American Midwest and finally to the shores of Hood Canal. Though no headstone or grave marker now remains to mark her burial place beside her husband, her life was woven deeply into the early history of the communities where she lived and helped raise a family.