Introduction
Jeppe Aakjær had studied the legal records of Fjends and Nørrelyngs lords and the minutes of the so-called “Landemode” for Viborg Diocese, which was an annual meeting for the diocesan vicar, bishop and deans of the diocese, and became interested in a priest in Kvols and Taarup parishes in Nordøstfjends, who was called in 1725. His full name was Peiter Lorenz Jenssøn Nørholm, and the reason for Aakjær’s interest was that the priest took up a lot of space in the various protocols, and not in a good way. Time and time again, he violated both the applicable legal rules and the norms of what was considered proper behavior at the time – not least for a priest. In his vocation, Peiter Nørholm was assigned Dalgaard Præstegaard, which was beautifully and idyllically located next to Hjarbæk Fjord in a valley in the village of Knud (by), which today lies on Virksundvej just northwest of Tårup. Nørholm came from the village of Gjørvad in Aarhus Diocese, where his father was parish priest.
Robbery of a sheep
The first case Aakjær mentions is about a violent robbery of a sheep in Klosterhusene in Borup near Dalsgaard Præstegaard one summer evening in 1727, just two years after he took up his post in Kvols and Taarup. The priest had sought out a mother and her adult daughter at their home and, according to the injured parties, had forcibly taken a sheep that the priest believed the two women owed him for not doing their chores at the vicarage. According to witness testimony in the judicial protocol for the above-mentioned lordships, it should have happened in the following way.
In the evening of the summer evening in question, the priest and his servant boy left the vicarage, telling the boy that they were going down to Elle Bøg in Klosterhusene to fetch a sheep that she owed him for eight missing work days. There had probably been some kind of leasehold agreement between the priest and Elle Bøg. On the way to Klosterhusene, the priest and the boy passed a man standing outside his house, and the priest asked the man why he wasn’t in bed yet, and then went on their way. When the priest and the servant boy reached Elle Bøg’s house, the priest knocked, and according to Elle Bøg and her adult daughter Birgitte, the two women were pushed, hit and grabbed by the priest, who thus got hold of the sheep. He also cut off one of the sheep’s ears and threw it away as a kind of receipt before dragging the sheep away with the servant boy. On the way back to the vicarage, they passed the same house as on the way out, but now the man had gone inside. However, the man could later testify that he had seen the priest and the servant boy pulling a sheep, and at the same time he could hear Elle Bøg and Birgitte shouting at the priest, who responded by shouting that she was a “Canalie” who should have been put in the “thief hole”. Yes, things didn’t go quietly back then.
Towards nightfall, Elle Bøg and her daughter Birgitte sought out a certain Mette Mikkelsdatter, who incidentally was the same visitor to the vicarage who had heard and seen the priest and the servant boy when they had set off in the evening to recover the sheep. They asked for lodging for the night, as they were afraid that the priest might seek them out again to beat them.
The following Sunday, Mette Mikkelsdatter and Birgitte went to the priest to settle the matter amicably, but when the priest saw the wronged Birgitte, he became furious and shouted that he wanted money for the eight working days that both mother and daughter owed him. Birgitte replied that he would get the money, which made the priest calm down and promise to return the sheep in return. Birgitte wouldn’t hear of it if the eight days were to be fulfilled anyway. This broke off the negotiations.
Some time later, on the Wednesday after Pentecost, the authorities got wind of the case. Perhaps the injured Elle Bøg and her daughter Birgitte had reported the case themselves, but in any case, two people appointed on behalf of a certain “benevolent Obrisk Fris”, probably the shire bailiff, showed up at Dalsgaard Præstegaard to find out what had happened. The two appointed were Peder Skrædder in Romlund and Chr. Jespersen in Fiskbæk, but initially the meeting with the priest didn’t lead to anything, so the two went to Elle Bøg and her daughter Birgitte in Klosterhusene. The two women told them about the violent assault, and they had the sheep’s ear cut off and a large bruise that Elle had on her right upper arm after the priest had grabbed her. Peder Skrædder and Chr. Jespersen returned to the vicarage, where they found a light gray sheep tied behind the barn. The sheep was missing an ear and appeared to have lost a lot of wool. Now it was time for the two officers to confront Pastor Peiter Nørholm, who from the beginning was in an aggressive defense position. When asked why he had taken the sheep, he replied that it was a kind of “collateral” for his debt to the aggrieved women. The defendants pointed out to the priest that it was illegal to “take it upon yourself”, i.e. to commit vigilantism, but this got back to the priest, who now demanded that the two defendants pay him two marks so that the women could get their sheep back, which they naturally refused. The wronged Birgitte was apparently also present in the vicarage and tried to mediate in the case, but when she interfered, the priest became so furious that he asked some of those present to close the door for the “Canalie” and let her stay outside. On another occasion, the priest is also said to have said about Birgitte that she should have been beaten by his cane, but it was too good to be used on her.
The protocols do not say what the outcome of this case was, but the injured mother and daughter had the best cards in their hand. They had credible witnesses in the form of Mette Mikkelsdatter, who had witnessed the priest’s departure from the vicarage, the mother and daughter’s visits at night and the meeting with the priest on Sundays. In addition, the man of the house, Anders Skjoldgaard, who had seen and heard the priest and the servant boy to and from Klosterhusene, testified, and the two witnesses’ testimony on the stand, which also included physical evidence and the priest’s admissions, probably also weighed strongly in the injured parties’ favor. It’s a shame they didn’t get the verdict of the county court. In any case, it seems that the priest Peiter Nørholm was a stubborn, choleric and vindictive person without much human understanding. If it had been a leasehold relationship between the two parties, the priest might have had a legal claim to compensation for missing working days, but that did not justify his violent and vigilante behavior.
Neglect of wife
The next case that Aakjær has written about is about what we might today call wife abuse. On October 1, 1728, just over a year after the first case, Peiter Nørholm was summoned to a country meeting in Viborg, where he was accused by the diocese of “harshness” against his second wife Ursula Margrethe Lindorff, who at that time did not live with her husband in the vicarage, but lived in Viborg, possibly banished there by the priest. The background was that the priest and his wife were reportedly living like “cats and dogs” and the wife had filed a complaint against her husband with the then Bishop Trellerup in Viborg. He had then tried to exhort the priest to a reunion, but in vain. At the diocesan meeting, the accused priest had made a number of accusations against his wife in response to the complaint, which were witnessed by his father, mother, brother and a maid. Although the four witnesses were described as biased, the accusations against the wife were that when she got married in January, she had more debt than the priest had expected. She was also drunk, scolded and even swore. She also squandered money and behaved badly, whatever that meant. All of these accusations against the wife were presented at the country meeting on October 1, 1728 and confirmed by the witnesses called by the priest, including the priest’s father, who as previously mentioned was the parish priest in Gjøvad Parish near Silkeborg.
Another witness at the meeting confirmed that there was a lot of “scolding and swearing” between the two married couples, but the witness also said that the priest both hit and slapped the wife, and that he had driven the wife to Viborg, so they no longer lived together.
The diocesan authority (landemodet) now made a settlement proposal to the priest and the wife. However, the latter had not attended the meeting due to “weakness”. In this settlement, both were admonished to lead a Christian life, and the priest was to ensure that his office was not the object of “public outrage, ruin and destruction”. As for the wife, the priest was to take her back to the rectory immediately, provide for her and “honor her as a proper priest’s wife”, albeit in relation to her age, which we do not know. In addition, the wife was to be allowed to exercise the authority that she was entitled to exercise over her house and staff, i.e. servants. However, Peiter Nørholm had no intention of complying with the demands, and according to the protocol, he made “endless and irrefutable excursions” and demanded a decision based on the statements of his father and his other witnesses. Especially the father, who was also a priest, was emphasized as a credible witness. In this context, it is understandable that the protocol described the witnesses as biased. When the diocesan authorities would not comply with the priest’s demands, he ended up rejecting the settlement. As with the first case, it is not known what the outcome was, but in any case, the wife never returned to Dalsgaard Præstegaard, and the priest continued his somewhat chequered life. Incidentally, the wife Ursula Margrethe Lindorff, who was banished to Viborg, died in Copenhagen in 1734.
Aakjær also mentions Peiter Nørholm’s three other marriages. The first marriage was to Ann Jakobsdatter, who died in 1727, two years after the priest received his calling in Kvols and Taarup. Little is known about his first wife, but according to a bishop, the priest was already at this time behaving inappropriately for the office, but whether he was somehow to blame for his wife’s death is anyone’s guess. He then married the aforementioned Ursula Lindorff, who had already left the priest a year after her marriage. His third marriage was to “Mrs.” Dorthea Pedersdatter, who died in 1739. The then Bishop of Viborg stated that she entered the marriage with a fortune of 100 Rdl, but had a “fragile” mind. However, the fortune she brought with her was quickly spent and, according to the bishop, the priest continued to keep the “same tract”, which probably referred to his behavior towards Ursula Lindorff. The fourth marriage was to Johanne Bornich, who – as it was expressed – had to “pay with a life of misery for a priestly title”. More about this later.
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Rudeness” against provost
Another case about Pastor Nørholm was discussed at a country meeting in 1732. It was about Nørholm having exercised “rudeness” against Lord Provost Barthling in Højslev, but the nature of the rudeness was not disclosed. The fine (“mulkt”) was set at 2 Rdl, but it also included a requirement that the priest had to account for the contents of two cash boxes for “Slavekassen” and “Helsingør Skole”. One must assume that these were two collection boxes for charitable purposes, which the priest was responsible for, but which obviously did not match or were empty. The national courage wanted proof that the priest had not “taken from the box” himself.
Failure to provide for widows
In 1735, things were bad again. A complaint had been received from the widow of a former pastor of Kvols and Taarup parishes that her pension was insufficient. At the time, the widows of former priests in the parish had to be supported by the incoming priest, which was part of the calling. However, Nørholm had two widows who came with the call, and the second widow also complained to the landed gentry that she had not received a pension for four years. This could indicate that the dear Reverend Nørholm had financial problems quite early on in his priestly vocation, and it was reported that the vicarage was already mortgaged and pledged to far above the chimney.
Paternity case
In 1743, it was revealed that even earlier in his vocation, Pastor Nørholm had created problems beyond financial ones that would be dangerous for his ministry. On June 18, 1743, a paternity case was initiated against him at Lysgaard and Hids Herredssting. Lysgaard is a village located at Dollerup Bakker about 15 km south of Viborg. The applicant was Mette Ivarsdatter from Gjørvad near Silkeborg. She had served under Pastor Nørholm in Dalsgaard Rectory and in 1732 she had become pregnant by the pastor, having, as she put it in court, “begotten a child in licentiousness while serving in his bread”.
According to Aakjær’s later account, which was based on Mette Iverdatter’s own testimony in court, she left the vicarage shortly after becoming pregnant, and the vicar had written a very fine recommendation for her, a so-called “passport”. She went to Zealand, where she gave birth to a baby boy, whom she named Ivar after his father. However, giving birth to a child out of wedlock was punishable, so on May 5, 1732, the priest in Aabye on Zealand signed a document proving that Mette had “endured her penance” (her punishment/penance) for breaking the sixth commandment in the Bible (Thou shalt not commit adultery). Also present at this event was the young woman’s “madfather” (employer/ breadwinner) Fridrich Andersen.
In the passport that Nørholm issued in connection with the pregnant Mette’s departure from Dalsgaard Præstegaard in 1732, the priest wrote that Mette was an “honorable and Christian” woman, and it was a “pleasure” to recommend her. In this connection, the priest also stated that Mette Ivarsdatter came from Copenhagen, where she was apparently owed money and was now on her way there. She had also served in the vicarage for two and a half years. Something could indicate that the priest with the fine recommendation wanted to get rid of the pregnant maid in 1732, and it also emerges later that he had tried to bribe her. After all, he must have suspected that he himself could be the father of Mette’s future child when she left.
From 1732 to 1740, Mette Ivarsdatter stayed with her son Ivar on Zealand, where she supported herself in the parish as a wet nurse and milkmaid, but in 1740 she came to the village of Gjørvad near Silkeborg with her son, who was now around eight years old. She went to Pastor Nørholm in Dalsgaard Præstegaard and confronted him with the boy, who was his child and who he therefore had to help pay for. The pastor apparently found this difficult to relate to, and as mentioned, he was summoned before the shire council on June 18, 1743, where Mette Ivarsdatter officially declared him the father of the child. This court hearing meant that shortly afterwards, Bishop Andreas Wøldike in Viborg wrote a letter to Pastor Nørholm, suspending him from duty until the case was settled. However, the pastor was not at home, so the letter was read out to the pastor’s wife and a few of the servants.
After this threat of suspension, Nørholm flew into a rage and sent a reply to the bishop. He described himself as a “poor, repressed and persecuted” priest who could only have God and his conscience, and the procurator (prosecutor) Hans Rafn had brought an unreliable and ungodly witness in the form of Mette Ivarsdatter as a witness at the shire council, where she had made “shameful and lying” accusations about him. This was in stark contrast to the recommendation the priest had given Mette in 1732 when she left the vicarage.
Nothing more happened immediately after that, but on July 18, 1743, a month later, Pastor Nørholm was summoned again. This time it was at the provost court in Feldingbjerg Church for violating the law on sleeping with women outside of marriage, and Mette Ivarsdatterwascalled as a witness. She said that when she had sought out Pastor Nørholm three years earlier (1740) to confront him about her son, he had asked her to suggest someone else as the father of the child, and he had also suggested a servant named Anders Jensen, but he did not exist…! He had then bribed her with three “Sletdaler”, duvet, pillow and sheet, and when Mette’s sister, Karen, had also demanded help for the boy, he had given one Rdl to each of them and 15 extra Rdl to Mette. The priest had also – perhaps as financial help – let the little boy serve with him for a year. Smaller boys were often used as shepherd boys at that time (cf. “Ole sat on a knoll and sang”). At this deanery meeting, the accused priest was again conspicuous by his absence, but the court found him guilty of breaking the law by impregnating Maren Ivarsdatter, and therefore he would lose his calling if he could not disprove the charges and thus clear his name. After this, there is no record of the priest attempting to disprove the allegations of his paternity beyond the earlier defense, and thus the beleaguered priest seemed to lose his vocation and earnings and thus his entire livelihood. As if this paternity case was not enough, Jeppe Aakjær found, in addition to the other examples of misconduct and negligence mentioned above, a long list of sins of all kinds of violations and breaches of both laws and behavior, which according to current laws and rules for proper behavior for priests was not legal or proper for a priest – but about that later.
A long list of sins
The paternity case was followed up by a deanery meeting at the parish bailiff in Dommerby on June 12, 1744, where Nørholm, in addition to the extramarital sexual intercourse and the paternity case, was now accused of a long list of “Enormities” (abnormalities), i.e. violations of what was normal for the conduct and behavior of a priest. These abnormalities were said to have been committed during all the priest’s years in office from 1725 to the provost court in Dommerby, and included misconduct, domestic violence, and violence against parishioners. One of the main characters at this provost court was the prosecutor procurator (lawyer) Rafn from Viborg, who was able to read out a long list of sins to Pastor Nørholm and the others present. The following is a review of some of the sins, although it is not possible to pinpoint the time and place of all the incidents.
Neglect of church service
The first misconduct mentioned in the long list of sins was absenteeism from church services. Nørholm is said to have repeatedly left the parish to go to the farm Keilstrup, which he may have had a share in, as the farm was located in his birth parish Gjørvad near Silkeborg. History does not say what he was doing in Gjørvad, but in any case, he would have left his parishioners in Fjends without the opportunity for worship and other church services, including funerals, for up to five weeks. There was also a mess in the church books, if they had not been lost, which meant that the authorities could not check who the priest had confessed to. This made it impossible to see if he had taken “strangers” (e.g. unbaptized, unconfirmed) to confession, which was suspected. So it was good for the priest that the books were gone! According to the bishop’s visit, the priest’s sermons were not in good shape either. They were described as dull and uninspired, even quite incomprehensible to young people preparing for confirmation. Only when he used “borrowed” work, i.e. other pastors’ sermons, was there anything positive to be gained.
As for not attending church services, according to the minister, in connection with a Lenten service on a Wednesday he sent the congregation home with the message that they could sing a hymn themselves at home. This time he had also traveled to the farm Keilstrup in Gjørvad. Once, when he was supposed to perform a wedding ceremony and the bride, groom and the whole entourage had turned up at the church, he simply failed to show up, and the whole entourage had to go home with unfinished business. It was also difficult to show up on time. In the summer, when the congregation had to attend Sunday services at 7am, they often had to wait two to three hours for the priest to show up, but it was worse in the winter when the congregation had to arrive at 10am. Here, the freezing parishioners often had to wait for two to three hours before “…it pleased the dignity to appear”.
The confessional
One of the abuses that was taken very seriously at the time was the misuse of the confessional, which was considered a sacred place that was not suitable for profanity, threats and labor agreements. One of the parishioners, Peder Jensen, was said to have been the object of the priest’s anger and had been threatened in his own home by the priest that the poor man could not enter the confessional unless he was willing to thresh grain for the priest. On several occasions, the priest had also heard that the pastor had even made work agreements in the confessional itself. The priest in the confessional had been heard to shout, swear and scold in the confessional, and once an old married couple had been threatened that the devil would cut them up if they did not obey the priest. In the confessional, the priest had also been rude and cruel to a couple who had not paid the priest enough for the sermon at their daughter’s funeral. If they had paid more, they could have had a longer and better sermon…! It was mentioned earlier that the authorities suspected that Nørholm had abused the pulpit by taking in “strangers”, which the minister could confirm. Once in Kvols Church he had let a couple of Tartars confess, which was illegal, and another time he had taken in a couple of “strays” where the woman was obviously pregnant and thus the couple had violated the sixth commandment on adultery and thus according to the law unworthy of confession.
Sermons
The bishop had previously blamed Nørholm for his deadly sermons during a visitation, and now the clergyman, named Chr. Sørensen, could substantiate this misconduct by describing the priest’s sermons with words such as “plain and unconnected”, “some self-made and fake talk”, “horrible with its endless text references”, “snoring style” and finally “something of the most spiritless and boring”. According to Chr. Sørensen, it would not have been a great experience to attend Nørholm’s church services, and the minister was forced to attend every Sunday. .
When the priest stood in the pulpit, he could also scold the parishioners. He once shouted at a certain Niels Fisker during his sermon, who had started coughing during the sermon. The priest thought that Fisker had laughed, and thus the poor man had been abused to that extent. The part about abusing the parishioners – also outside the church – will be elaborated on later.
As mentioned earlier, the priest was entitled to payment for delivering a funeral sermon on the deceased, but according to a regulation it was forbidden to accept extra payment. This happened, however, when the priest once demanded 3-4 daler for a sermon that could only cost 1 daler, because, as the priest had said in this connection, “the horse pulled what it was given oats for”, meaning that the quality and length of a funeral sermon should be directly proportional to the amount paid. Another time, when Kirsten Jensdatter had to bury her husband, she gave the priest a daler, but “too little, bette Kirsten”, so the poor widow had to work off the last few daler from the priest.
Confirmation
It was also forbidden by royal decree to accept payment for the confirmation of children from poor families, but a poor maid was required to pay three thalers for confirmation and overhearing, and when she could not pay, she had to thresh several days for the priest as payment. A boy could not be confirmed because the boy’s father had not delivered a cock, as had apparently been agreed, and as a witness stated, it was even a very talented boy. It appears from the witness statements that the priest illegally had a fixed fee for confirmation: one daler, one hen (or rooster) and two dozen eggs (40 eggs).
Drinking, swearing, spells and threats
The priest’s behavior in daily life did not improve after the threat of suspension at the provost court in 1743. He was often seen staggering in the fields due to drunkenness, or as the servants put it with “hops in his ears”, and this somewhat dazed state could also be behind all his “swearing and swearing” and violence towards his parishioners, as several examples testify. He used the devil a lot in his invocations and incantations such as “The devil break my neck” and “The devil thrust me into hell”, and for his parishioners, the threat that “The devil will cut you” was a frequently used expression towards a parishioner he was in a fight with.
Violence
Along with the threat of the devil and his use of profanity, the priest could also resort to direct violence. This happened to a neighbor who had not taken one of the priest’s cows under the stable as agreed. When the neighbor then wanted to return the cow to the priest with two witnesses, the priest came out with brandy in one hand and a wooden stick in the other. The brandy was for the two witnesses, while the neighbor was hit with the wooden stick. Another time, he broke three teeth into a fisherman, who he had gone to collect a debt in fish to which he was not entitled. The violence was also inflicted on a visitor from Gjørvad, whom he assaulted with “blows, blows and insults” during an argument before the dispute was settled with brandy and delivery of wood. Once, when some of the neighbor’s cattle accidentally ran into the pastor’s field, the neighbor was met with the threat that the devil would parry him, a gun in his hand and the threat of a broken neck. How the case ended is not known. Another parishioner, Chr. Nielsen, was once said to have been slapped by the priest, so Nielsen was slammed against the wall, after which the priest grabbed a spade. However, the victim managed to escape before he was hit by the spade.
Document forgery
Among the pastor’s long list of sins, which came to light at the provost court in Dommerby on June 12, 1744, a few of a more or less illegal nature should be added here. At one point, Pastor Nørholm had drawn up a document in his own interest, the content of which is not specified, but perhaps it was a defense to the bishop regarding some of the accusations against him. In any case, he needed some signatures from trustworthy parishioners, and in his efforts to obtain these, he had first obtained some respectable signatures from the lords of Taarupgaard. Several of his parishioners had then agreed to sign, but there was a catch with these signatures: most of them were from peasants who could neither read nor write. Firstly, they didn’t know what they were signing, and secondly, many of them couldn’t write their own name, which resulted in a few random lines as signatures. To entice the selected parishioners to sign, the priest had probably also offered them some kind of reward. In any case, after the “signatures” the signatories were treated to beer, brandy, bread and pickled herring in the vicarage late into the night.
Persecution of the deacon
As one of the more trustworthy and literate signatories, the priest had also gotten the farmer Chr. Sørensen to sign. It is not known whether he participated in the festivities in the vicarage after the signing, but immediately after the signing in the vicarage, a disagreement arose between the priest and the earl. Perhaps the priest had regretted signing the dubious document, which made the priest angry with the priest, because a dramatic and violent aftermath unfolded towards the priest.
One evening just before Christmas Eve in 1743, Chr. Sørensen was summoned to the vicarage, and their conversation developed dramatically into such a loud speech that words were not enough, so Pastor Nørholm grabbed the parson’s “dress sleeve” (sweater sleeve) and ordered a maid to fetch the parson’s “bullwhip”, which was a whip made from a bull penis. The threat of being caught by the whip made the earl struggle to break free, and he managed to wriggle free from the priest’s grip and make it home safely. The priest kept the sweater sleeve, however. However, the priest did not believe that the parson had received the punishment he deserved, so on the evening of the following Sunday, a “curious” procession took place between Borup Bakker near Kvols and Taarup. A boy, who turned out to be the priest’s servant boy, Jesper, was sitting on a teal horse with a lighted torch, which was necessary in the dark, as the narrow road was sandy and surrounded by high cliffs on either side. The horse pulled a cart behind him. Here sat Pastor Nørholm, the maid Maren, the barn boy and the second man who held the reins. The goal of this procession was the pastor’s house, and when the procession suddenly found itself outside the pastor’s door in the dark, the pastor was so frightened by hearing the priest’s voice that he hid in a room deep inside the house. Now the priest and his entire “guard” entered the parsonage, where the parson’s wife was. With bullwhip in hand, the priest sat down and politely asked the wife where the pastor was. The probably frightened wife replied that he was visiting a daughter in Knudby. Now the priest and his entire corps stood in front of the poor wife, each with their own weapons. The priest with his bullwhip, one man with a wooden stick, and the other man with a crowbar. What weapons Maren and the servant boy had is not mentioned in the story, but in any case, they stood with their weapons and threatened the pastor’s wife that her husband should have been beaten that day. During the court hearing in connection with this episode, it emerged that Pastor Nørholm during this “campaign” had, among other things, distributed brandy to his “soldiers” like another “commander”, and the whole battle plan had been to give the pastor a corporal punishment inside the house, but the mission had unfortunately failed due to the pastor’s absence. It would be nice to know why the priest wanted to punish his parson so badly. Was the priest’s aversion to the priest due to the problem with a signature, or the earlier accusations that Chr. Sørensen had made about his priest, including abuse of the confessional?
Dancing, singing and drinking in the vicarage
On Twelfth Night in 1744, while Nørholm was married to his last and fourth wife Johanne Børnich, things got lively in Dalsgaard Rectory. The entire household participated in the festivities except the vicar’s wife, who sat lonely and silent on a chair in a corner and watched passively while the others in the house were treated to beer, brandy and food. According to the servant boy, the priest led the festivities and had consumed a “rather high schnapps” before taking a turn with, among others, the wife of one of the men and a certain Lisbeth, with whom he had had a “moldy” relationship. Despite his condition, he apparently danced well enough, and what was remarkable, according to the witnesses, was that he sang while he danced. Whether this episode was a violation of what was proper for a priest, let alone a breach of the law, remains to be seen, but the episode had given rise to being presented in court.
Wife beating again
The priest’s long list of sins, which was presented at the deanery court on June 12, 1744, ended in Jeppe Aakjær’s records with the accusations of wife abuse of the priest’s fourth and last wife, Johanne Bornich, who, as the bishop had stated, had to pay with a life of misery for a priestly title. Nørholm’s third wife died in 1739, so Johanne Bornich had only been a priest’s wife for three to four years at this point, and as the following examples show, she was subjected to a bit of everything from the priest. Neighbor Chr. Sørensen reported that the vicar’s wife had shown up at his house one day with a black eye, which she said she had gotten after a fight with the vicar, and Joanne Bornich made no secret of the fact that fights between the vicar and her were a regular occurrence. Occasionally, she would also show up at Sørensen’s house and complain that she was hungry, and was then treated to beer bread. When the priest was away, the vicar’s wife also came to Chr. Sørensen to ask for food, while the servants in the vicarage could testify that the vicar’s wife toiled and toiled in the fields, even though she did not get enough to eat. Another witness had met the priest’s wife with “weeping tears” after she had been “stabbed” at night. One day, the priest had gotten drunk and assaulted the wife, damaging her eye, punching her back and slapping her so hard that she staggered around the house, even while pregnant.
On Christmas Eve 1742, things were also bad in the vicarage. Nørholm had stayed and hit his wife with several blows. She initially escaped by taking refuge in an oven, but was discovered and subjected to more blows before presumably helpful servants freed her from the priest’s madness. The priest’s mother, who was present on Christmas Eve, was not spared either, as Nørholm tried to hit her with a piece of bread. The priest could also get drunk outside the vicarage, and one day when he came home from a drinking bout, the vicar’s wife could see through his condition, and for fear of becoming the object of his violent tendencies, she hid in the oven, just like other times, but this time with a girl who also feared the priest.
On Michaelmas Day 1742, Anne Michelsdatter was summoned to the vicarage to assist with the slaughter together with the vicar’s wife, and when the two were slaughtering, the vicar came out and severely scolded the wife. She then went inside, but shortly afterwards she came out with a blue and swollen face and bruises on her arms.
“Inappropriate” relationship
Pastor Nørholm lost his calling due to his illegitimate relationship with Mette Ivarsdatter and the resulting “illegitimate” child, but there were also rumors of an “inappropriate” relationship with the maid Lisbeth Pedersdatter, or as one witness put it, that something “unsavory” was going on between the pastor and the girl. As an indication of this inappropriate relationship, the priest was at one point in a hurry to marry off the probably pregnant young girl to a servant, and the couple were even given a farm in Gjørvad. Later, however, the young bride and groom were driven away from the farm.
Dismissal
Shortly after all the pastor’s illegalities and misdemeanors had been presented at the provost court in Dommerby on June 12, 1744, the verdict came on September 18 of the same year. Pastor Nørholm was dismissed, but was given a so-called “year of grace”, where he received a kind of modest pension during the year of dismissal. After his dismissal, however, Nørholm sent a letter to the bishop on September 28, in which he tried to explain himself by claiming that lawyer Rafn had made unworthy accusations and accusations, and the accusations had given him a nervous breakdown (“stirring”). He also emphasized that in the 21 years he had been pastor in the two parishes, he had done everything he could for his parishioners. About his wife Johanne Bornich, he wrote in his letter of defense that she was a “young, uneducated child’s wife” that “common people” could play tricks on, i.e. immature, naive and impressionable. If you compare this accusation with the many previous accusations of wife abuse, you get a picture of an untrustworthy, repressive, violent, drunk and deranged priest. Apart from this letter, we hear nothing else about the priest having tried to purify himself. On October 21, 1744, he formally gave up his appeal, and after a dispute with the future priest about the purchase price, Pastor Nørholm left the vicarage during 1745. The purchase price he received from the new pastor in no way made him debt-free, and his future prospects after the long list of sins and dismissal were bleak, almost impossible. He was apparently so indebted that the agreed purchase price of 195 Rdl for buildings and fixtures and fittings, which had been finally determined after valuation and the intervention of the authorities, was not sufficient for Nørholm, so he had stripped the vicarage of all fixtures and fittings so that the new vicar did not even have a bed to sleep in when he moved in.
After the dismissal
Hinge
Aakjær tried to find sources that could tell what happened to Peiter Nørholm after his somewhat shameful exit from the vicarage in Knudby. On June 11, 1746, he was in Hinge north of Silkeborg and not far from Gjødvad, where according to other sources he had a country house. Here he had signed a document that was most likely drawn up by lawyer Rafn, who had been the prosecutor in the earlier trial. In this document, Nørholm admitted that he had paid the legal costs of 80 Rdl to lawyer Rafn in Viborg in connection with seizures and attachments and thanked him for good treatment in connection with the payment of these costs. Looking back at the accusations and allegations made by lawyer Rafn and the statements made by the priest to Rafn in this connection, the kindness of this letter seems like a paradox. It could indicate that Nørholm had resigned and now wanted to reconcile with his former enemy and therefore had Rafn draw up the document.
Viborg Penitentiary
After being able to locate Nørholm in Hinge or his birth parish Gjødvad near Silkeborg in 1746, he ended up in Viborg Tugthus for a period, but it appears from one source that he was supported here by “benevolent” Clement Fischer at the Kleitrup manor near Hobro and chamberlain Dyssel in Randers. The former was related to Johanne Bornich. These two benefactors paid for Nørholm to live in the house of correction in a separate dwelling from the other prisoners. Why Nørholm was arrested is anyone’s guess. Perhaps it was because of his bottomless debt, or the fact that he went around in a cassock begging for alms, even though it was forbidden for him to wear a cassock. At the request of his mother, among others, he left Viborg Tugthus at one point, but in doing so he lost the support from the two benefactors.
Copenhagen
After Viborg, he moved to Copenhagen, where he found himself in 1748, where he wrote a complaint to the king himself about his dismissal and asked for a new vocation. In a statement from Bishop Wøldike in Copenhagen regarding this complaint, he wrote that Nørholm was a bad priest for all the 21 years he served as pastor in Kvols and Taarup, and he was unfit to serve an office. In connection with Nørholm’s attempt to revoke his resignation in 1749, the Church Inspectorate stated that he was “confused, useless and mentally fragile” and thus not fit for service. Nørholm was also said to have walked around Copenhagen wearing a priest’s dress to beg for alms, just as he might have done in Viborg. We are also told that Nørholm lived in abject poverty, but according to Bishop Wøldike, he had an inheritance in the form of a country house in Gjørvad Parish, where he had gone immediately after his dismissal and departure from Knudby.
Christiansø
The next time the beleaguered and beleaguered priest appears in the sources is more than 20 years after the rejected appeal in 1749. In Berlingste Tidende no. 58 in 1770, it was stated that the former priest Peder Nørholm had died on Christiansø, Bornholm, where, according to the newspaper, he had stayed for 26 years. This does not correspond with the fact that he was in Copenhagen in 1749, so there is some uncertainty about his movements and whereabouts in the years 1749-1770. It could well be that he was exiled to Christiansø for around 20 years due to debts and illegalities. In certain situations, Christiansø was used by the state as a prison and for deportation, cf. Dr. Dampe in the mid-1800s.
Rounding up
It’s easy to understand why Jeppe Aakjær took an interest in the colorful personality represented by Pastor Nørholm. In a way, there was something tragic-comic about him. As a well-educated man with a theological degree and working as a priest, you would expect a learned and cultured man with a behavior and appearance that harmonized with these virtues, but also that those around him showed the respect and esteem that the calling as a priest entailed. It should be remembered that in the 18th century, a priest belonged to the upper intellectual class of society. Nørholm seems to have put all this into practice during the 20 years or so he served as pastor at Taarup and Kvols parishes.
The tragic side of his personality was expressed through his misconduct, whether it was abuse of confession by demanding work in return, absenteeism from church services, late meeting times or poor and meaningless sermons that did not live up to the standard. Then there were his extramarital affairs, which at the time were outright illegal and punishable by law. Today, his violent and degrading treatment of his wives would most likely have led to public intervention, just as his threats of violence or outright violence, such as when he attacked his neighbor Ellen Bøg and her daughter Birgitte in an effort to rob a sheep or knocked out the teeth of a fisherman, could have resulted in a prison sentence. Having said all this, there is also a more comical side.
The whole scene with the robbery of the sheep, where a priest sets off with his servant boy, meets the victims with insults and curses, grabs Ellen Bøge and acknowledges the robbery with a casual, clipped sheep’s ear cannot help but raise a smile – despite the violent aspect. The same goes for the “campaign” against the vicar, where a “quaint” heavily armed procession moves up through the hills at Borup one dark evening before Christmas Eve to punish the poor vicar, who shortly beforehand had had a shirt sleeve torn off by the priest and had therefore wisely hidden to avoid the bullwhip. during this campaign, the “Field Lord” had even rewarded one of his soldiers in the form of the 2nd man with brandy. Brandy along with beer and herring are also part of the more enjoyable and comical side of Nørholm. The three necessities appear to a greater or lesser extent, for example, when the priest needs help to get a document signed even though the signatories can neither read nor write, or when there is a party in the vicarage with the servant with singing, dancing and drinking late into the night.
There are several examples where the priest’s behavior calls for a smile despite the tragic side. In several cases, the priest’s parishioners probably crossed themselves when he swore and swore or invoked the devil to threaten enemies or debtors that the devil would get them, or when he raved drunk out in the field, but what we can do today, that we as readers can have a little fun and smile is the fact that the man was more or less a crazy original who broke all norms for a priest’s behavior, and that we can therefore see the fun in the fact that “nice people” also screw up and fall through. At the time, the authorities labeled him as an incompetent, erratic, indebted priest with a “confused mind”. If you could use our psychological and psychiatric tools back then and diagnose Pastor Nørholm, you could probably come up with several diagnoses such as DAMP, paranoid schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, etc. You could also just say that Pastor Nørholm was a nutcase who had not been boring to his parishioners in Kvols and Taarup – for better or worse – and this also suggests that Jeppe Aakjær was able to see the tragic-comic and original side of Pastor Nørholm.
Sources: Skivebogen 1911: A worse priest by Jeppe Aakjær