Sons of DeWitt Colony Texas
©1997-2023, Wallace L. McKeehan, All Rights Reserved

Wermland Sagas--Home

If you have skeletons in the closet, make them dance!--Unknown

Photo:  A "fängporträtt" (prison portrait) from the Riksarkivet in Stockholm taken while a "guest" at Långholmen, reprinted in Pershyttans Hembygdscirkels, no. 13 1995.  

The Masterthief Noréus

His name was Karl-August Noréus and his title "retired artillery man" and Masterthief. His was the Lasse-Maja from Nora and surroundings, well known outside the parish during the latter part of the 1800’s. There are still people with memories of Noréus and his last years at Alvstorp, a poor man’s home. Older folks from Pershyttan can recall how Noréus often sat near the road near the gate between 1910-1920. His favorite question to the young people on the way home from town was: "Don’t you recognize the notorious Masterthief Karl-August Noréus?"

Let us therefore go back to the time, when the name Noréus really was notorious. Karl-August was born 1837, and his parents were carpenter Anders Noréus who married Britta Kristina Ersdotter. They lived near Älvstorp outside Nora with Karl-August’s five siblings from 1836-52, when they moved to Sjölunda in Pershyttan (1852-63) and then on to Gyttorp. The parents of Karl-August lived at Knappstaang, where his father died in 1886 and his mother in 1899. The seventeen year old Karl-August disappeared in 1854 to the capital Stockholm to sign up for military duties. However he soon came back to his native place with a title "retired artillery man," a title that followed him in the church books thrugh the 1800’s. In February 1859 he married the five year older Karolina Karlsdotter Dal. Together they had three children, two boys and one girl. The family lived in several different places in Gyttorp, but also in Bengtstorp. Karolina died in 1878.

After the marriage, Noréus long path as a "masterthief" started.  His large list of crimes started officially with a theft for which he was sentenced by the Nora Court in 1861. The day before Christmas eve 1862 he received his next sentence which was 3 months labor for fighting and cursing. Nora Newspaper has a lot to report about Noréus’ wild escapades in the countryside around Nora. A long time later in the 1800’s the paper reminded readers about the first time Noréus sat on the side of the accused in the courtroom in Nora where immediately after the questioning he desperately tried to escape from his guards. The escape would probably have succeeded, if the ice on the Nora lake which he ran out on hadn’t been too thin. In 1864 he attacked a policeman and received one years labor for penalty.

Noréus ventured further and further away from the Nora region on his stealing tours always with stolen horse and buggy. Often he was caught, but more often he managed to escape arrest or from his captors because of his natural quickness and expertise in forested areas. In 1869 he attempted an escape from a train while he still had shackles on his legs. He was being transported via rail under guard from Gothanberg to Orebro in a special train compartment for the purpose when he managed to jump out of the window while the train was in motion.  However, in this instance the prison guard had the courage to jump out the window after him which foiled his escape.  The train stopped and Noréus was put back on the train and transported to jail.  Because of this and subsequent stealing excursions, he was convicted in 1869 to 3 years labor.

Prior to the year 1867 the Nora community court decided to get rid of Noréus once and for all by sending him all the way to America.  Nora community treasurers complained about the court's decision to finance his trip to America before determining whether it was his wish or not to travel to America. The court's action was good intentioned, but was an ineffective solution.  Noréus did not like it so much in his new homeland and he took the first boat back to Sweden. The money allocated was enough to cover the two way trip.

The same year 1867 the Nora newspaper wrote:

"Former artillery man Karl-August Noréus, well known for his many bizarre escapades, has not changed his ways. Recently he escaped from Karlsborg's prison where he was sent since the attempt to send him to America did not work to get rid of him. Recently he reappeared suddenly in Eskilstuna where he apparently has traveled with less than good intentions. Saturday's Eskilstuna Allehanda wrote: 'Last Thursday a fairly well dressed man arrived traveling in a carriage took a room at a high class hotel and asked for the best room that they had, then went down to the bar where he met various people.   A police officer who accidentally happen to be in the area thought he appeared suspicious and that they should call the sheriff. After questioning the traveler, they arrested him.  Yesterday (Friday) a police investigation found that he was the former artillery man Karl-August Noréus, who together with two others had escaped from Karlsborgs prison where he had been incarcerated for theft. He had now come here with the objective to make another rich harvest, toward that goal he had made inquiries concerning local people and places, but discovered that his expectations did not come to fruition, instead he was arrested again while waiting for information from his birthplace, Nora.'"

After serving time in the years 1869-72 in Malmo's Citadel prison, upon his homecoming he was offered a job cleaning up brush on public property. However, Noréus did not even show up either at the city hall or at the workplace, thereafter he was given a strong warning against idleness. His wife and children were getting welfare support and Noréus had for a short time worked in exploration for minerals in Kopparbäcken. It is said that after Karolina died in 1878 he lived with a daughter in a hut made of earth in the Prayer House Forest close to Gyttorps Mission.

In 1873 he was again sentenced to about six years hard labor for assault and "three offenses for theft and arson, he had set fire to the place where he was held after his arrest in Filipstad.  Noréus, to the peaceful people of his hometown, had become a common dreadful terror, and the outcome caused difficulties for the regional court of appeals..…."  The assault concerned miner Israel Lofgren's wife in Gyttorp who on 2 December 1872 had her left arm broken in her home because of Noréus. He also robbed a courier from Hällefors Bruks on the road a quarter Swedish mile from Hällefors. After that he was incarcerated in the regional prison in Vänersborg, but he managed to escape in 1874, after which he traveled to Norway, where he also ended up in jail, but even managed to escape from an Oslo prison on December 7 1875. He found his way back to Sweden.

Nora's newspaper of 19 January 1876 tells more:

"Karl-August Noréus the feared and notorious artillery man was out and traveling at Christmas with 'borrowed' transportation of course. After he acquired a complete rig by taking a horse in Arvika and a sled and harness in Öskevik, he headed toward Lindesidan, but unfortunately he drove onto thin ice on the lake Rossvalen and broke through and almost ended up there permanently. He managed to crawl out, but lost the horse, sled and his hat. He borrowed new headgear from the nearest house, told them vaguely what had happened and they never saw him again…"

Göteborgs Handelstidning (local newspaper from Gothenburg) related on 12 February the same year:

"The notorious and fearless fortress prison escapee Noréus, whose trips with stolen horses could be the subject for a whole thief's adventure novel, has again visited the Arvika area and traveled with stolen horse and sled, this time he was caught by the owner and the horse and sled taken away, but managed to escape himself from them by coming out of his coat. The 30th of January in the morning he was seen calmly walking in his short sleeves down Arvika streets. Now Noréus has again disappeared and probably has headed for Norway to honor the region by his visit….."

In Norway he was once again arrested and sentenced to 4 ½ years in prison.  Whether he did the time in Norway or Sweden is uncertain, since he had 5 years more prison time in Vänersborg from where he escaped in 1874.     Again in 1880 he landed in Långholmen in Stockholm for theft and assault, where he was a prisoner for 6 1/2 long years.  February 15 1886 he was a free man and “ has since that time been in Gyttorp and from time to time specially Saturdays visiting nearby Nora Stad…”

From this time on a lot of older people from Gyttorp can tell what they had heard from their parents about Noréus. “He stole for all where he could. When the farmers from Vikers parish and those from the Stadra direction passed Gyttorp, it often happened that they got "a little too much behind the vest" because of the city visit. Now they sat half asleep on the driver’s seat and the horse had to find his way home the best he could. This Noréus took advantage off, as he had a fantastic ability to sneak around  without being discovered. Behind the driver’s seat was a little platform, where all the newly bought items were stored. These were now an easy target for Noréus and in the forest he had his retreat. Sometimes he would make a bet with farmers on who was the fastest.  One time he made a bet with a farmer from Älvhyttan, who he met at Joakim, who could be first to Pigbacken (close to Käppstaviken). The bet was of course one liter alcohol. The man from Älvhyttan, who did not know Noréus’s running ability was very surprised when he arrived to the agreed upon place to see that Noréus was first.

One time Oskar Persson from the cottage Hurrebo had been shopping in the center of Gyttorp, when he meet Noréus on the way home, ‘give me the package you have in your hand’ Noréus said. ‘Come and take it if you dare’ answered Oskar Persson.  Noréus did not dare to, since Persson was exceptionally strong and therefore got to pass. Another time Noréus came home to Lars- Ulrik  Jansson and asked for permission to spend the night in his barn. "You can do that only if you don’t steal anything from me" and to that Noréus answered  "You know that I won’t take things from you."  What happened then the story doesn’t tell.

The year 1889 the Nora newspaper reported about 52 year old Karl-August Noréus: “The notorious former Artillerist Karl-August Noréus from Gyttorp in Nora County known for his brazen thefts in Sweden and Norway is again behind prison bars since Saturday afternoon.  As ‘reasonably suspected’ he had taken from Miss Stina Lindberg from Flosjötorp a small bag containing several things and a 100 kronor bill in an envelope on the train between Nora and Gyttorp on the previously named evening, he was arrested a couple of hours later by federal marshal Johan Widen in Nora, who was informed by phone about the theft.”

The federal marshal Widen and a coworker arrested Noréus the same day in Gyttorp. Lars-Ulrik Jansson’s daughter was weeding around Kråkåsen’s Laundry building where Noréus sat carving Saturday evening.  She was now a witness to the arrest, how the two sneaked on either side of the laundry building to then take Noréus, who didn’t have a chance to escape. He was the taken to the then new prison in Nora (the present police station) and was therefore the first prisoner to lodge in Nora’s new prison. What was the reason that Noréus was arrested this time? Yes, he was in Nora on Saturday and promised there to carry a bag of the school teacher Schmidt to Gyttorp. The school teacher took the road and Noréus took the train. When he got to Schmidt’s house, Noréus had fished up a smaller bag from Schmidt’s larger bag, which he said he “found” in the third class compartment on the train. Noréus had been observed by passengers when he stepped off the train in Gyttorp “who thought they saw something sticking out" of which they suspected to be the small bag. as it was, but they did not dare with this suspicion arrest Noréus and inspect the larger bag. When the train arrived to Vikersvik they phoned Nora the result being that Noréus was behind bars the same evening  .

Noréus was then transported to the Örebro county prison to wait for hearing in Nora council. What happened to Noréus when he was on his way to this hearing in August 1889, we got to know in a quotation from the paper “Stridsropet” in the Nora newspaper. The same year the local chapter of The Salvation Army was created.  In the paper Stridsropet the captain of The Salvation Army Lagercrantz wrote:  “I was on the narrow railroad on the way to Nora. In the compartment beside me was a prisoner with his guard. I sat wondering if God had sent me in the way of the prisoner. After a struggle, which only God witnessed, I asked “have you found salvation?”  A weak ‘no’ and the prisoner turned away from me.  I changed his ways when he heard who I was and related his life had been a chain of crime.  We knelt on our knees in the shaking compartment. The prisoner cried as a child, I spoke about God’s willingness to forgive and the guard blinked down to us. His strict face had weakened and sometimes his hand moved over his eyes, when he thought nobody saw him. When we parted at Nora station, where a crowd was waiting for the town’s well-known prisoner, the prisoner whispered: 'Go to my old mother and my sisters and tell them that I really have given my heart to Jesus.'  The guard friendly greeted him and we parted as the prisoner was to be questioned and judged in the courthouse and I to proclaim freedom and forgiveness."

Salvation stuck with Noréus only a short time, since upon entrance to the courtroom which was filled with an audience, true to his habit he refused all knowledge of the theft.  Soon it became clear that Noréus only had taken a book and soap from the bag. Noréus’ opinion of encounter with the priest was revealed, even this was mostly untrue, he declared. To the judge’s question if Noréus had anything against the witnesses, who were 10 persons, Noréus answered that Mr. Schmidt should not be a witness “since he possessed the stolen items and was also Noréus’s enemy.”  The court’s chairman Magnus Unger spoke thereafter serious words to the arrested. "Noréus had no friends other than than those on Långholmen because of the way he had lived.  His life since teenage years has been an almost connected chain of crimes.  No straight thinking person had any interest.  Friendship, as common people value so highly, did not exist in Noréus."

The mentioned soap Noréus said he bought from a wandering salesman long time ago. When he on the morning of 3rd of August went to Nora, he brought the soap, “since he needed it for a bath, as he before the trip took in Gyttorp river and from there cleaned, went straight to Nora.” Noréus said to one witness that the soap cost him 33 ore, he had said to another witness previously 50 ore.  The hearing took three hours and in the report was that “Noréus had several living relatives, all honest people: children, siblings and his now 79 year old mother. The worst was, he himself said when he on the 3rd of August was arrested, that his mother still lived and still felt sorry for her son.” On the 6th of September the judgement came, before that Noréus had turned in a long writ to the court that stated that the teacher Schmidt should be the guilty one. The penalty was hard: “5 years hard labor and loss of citizen benefits for 10 years beyond the penalty." After his penalty was over in 1893 Noréus moved to “Elfstorps Poor Garden” where he in the beginning refused to work at the farm, as the poor men had do. He got the poor men on his side, so nothing got done. Noréus had said “we are not here to work –we are here to die.” He subsequently married ovisa Svensson Jakobsdaughter on the 13th of March 1895 and worked part time at the brickyard in Älvstorp. He woved falong with the ther poor men iresidents o a"Nybygget"where he and Lovisaa ived. Here the n"otorious thieff"ended his dayss 16 September1920. at the age of 83  

©1997-2023, Wallace L. McKeehan, All Rights Reserved