I have been trying to discover some background to Fredrikke Wilhelmine Christopherson who came to England in the late 1890s (probably soon after her mother died), trained as a nurse and spent almost the rest of her life caring for military families.

By the beginning of WW1 she had risen to the rank of Matron. During the war she served on the Hospital Ship Goorkha, then in the Egypt Expeditionary Force. After 3 years she contracted dysentery and returned to England.

She was awarded the 1914-15 Star with British War and Victory Medals, was Mentioned in Despatches and received the Royal Red Cross (First Class).

She died in 1930 at the rather early age of 58 and was buried in Dypvåg Cemetery with her mother Louise Amalie (Wiersen), herself dying at the early age of 47.

We know Fredrikke's father was Knud Bjørn Christophersen (a Mercantile Marine Captain), that she had a brother "John" (also in England at the time of her death), and that she had a sister Anna Margrethe who married in turn Marcus Marcussen and Theodor Martini Nielsen.

It seems Knud Bjørn Christophersen was from a long-established line of ships' captains and owners in Lyngør, but this is all we know. He was not buried with his wife and daughter, so was he lost at sea?

We have a local subscription to Ancestry.co.uk but cannot afford the International version, so cannot directly explore Norwegian resources.

If anyone can help to fill in some detail it would be deeply appreciated. We should be very happy in exchange to carry out a little research at this end!

Thank you very much or tusen takk...

Paul White
London