No photograph available, this is an imaginary portrait created with the assistance of AI 1
Alexander Kutvonen's first wife, Sofia Nilsson, seemed to remain a mysterious figure for a long time. The only really certain information was the date of her marriage with Alexander (1890) and the date of her death (1902). My father has described her as the widow of a merchant from Stockholm—information we can regard as reliable. Fortunately, it turned out that her tombstone remained in the Sorvali cemetery in Vyborg, even though the Soviet Union had destroyed most of the cemetery and only a few memorials were left. The gravestone confirmed Sofia's date of birth 6th October 1849 and her date of death 24th March 1902.
Sofia was born in Netraby (Nättraby), not far from Karlskrona. We don't know who was the merchant from Stockholm who left her a widow, or how she made her way through Finland to St. Petersburg to be married to Alexander in the Finnish parish of St. Mary on 7h October 1890. Sofia and Alexander lived presumably happily in St. Petersburg for over 11 years and had two daughters, Maija and Elli. However, their last year was overshadowed by Sofia's fatal illness.
1 This is just an imaginary picture how Sofia Nilsson might have looked, based on the portraits of her daughters Ellen Sofia and Maria Josefina.