Ellen G. White in Europe 1885-1887

Chapter 19—a Second Round of Meetings in Scandinavia

Conference sessions in Sweden and Denmark

The 1886 session of the Swedish Conference was slated for late June, with a week of workers’ meetings to precede it. So two weeks after her visit to Tramelan and her tour of the Swiss churches, Ellen White was on the road again. On this six-week tour of the Scandinavian countries (June 15-July 28) her strong spiritual influence would be seen and felt by thousands of people. EGWE 192.1

This time Sara McEnterfer and Kristine Dahl accompanied her. Kristine had been living with the W. C. White family in Basel since the previous November, and now she was returning to her family in Christiania. EGWE 192.2

The party left on Tuesday, June 15. The following evening they met Willie in Hamburg. He had gone the day before to attend to publishing house business in Leipzig. EGWE 192.3

Their route was the same as before, to Kiel, Germany, by train, then by boat to Korsor, Denmark. Arriving in Copenhagen, the party was able to catch a boat leaving for Malmo, Sweden. EGWE 192.4

When they reached Orebro, the site of the conference, no one was there to meet them, but a Swedish coachman appeared eager to “help.” The man “seemed determined to take our satchels right out of our hands,” Ellen White related, “but we held to them valiantly. Although he talked eloquently in Swedish, we knew not a word he said.”—Letter 2, 1886. It was about seven in the morning, so they decided to walk the mile to the Jacobson home where they stayed before. Here they discovered Elder O. A. Olsen,^* who had recently come from America to labor in Scandinavia. Elders Oyen and Matteson were also at the Jacobson home. EGWE 192.5

The men explained that they had met every train the day before, but had thought that the party could not then possibly arrive before noon. Just to be sure, they had given a Swedish coachman special instruction to bring them should they come earlier! Poor coachman! EGWE 193.1

Two furnished rooms and a kitchen had been rented for Mrs. White and Sara. “We found excellent accommodations,” noted Ellen White, as she turned her attention to the workers’ meeting, which had already begun. EGWE 193.2