Swedish American Genealogist Volume 26 | Number 1 Article 1 3-1-2006 Full Issue Vol. 26 No. 1 Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/swensonsag Part of the Genealogy Commons, and the Scandinavian Studies Commons Recommended Citation (2006) "Full Issue Vol. 26 No. 1," Swedish American Genealogist: Vol. 26 : No. 1 , Article 1. Available at: https://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/swensonsag/vol26/iss1/1 This Full Issue is brought to you for free and open access by the Swenson Swedish Immigration Research Center at Augustana Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Swedish American Genealogist by an authorized editor of Augustana Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. (ISSN 0275-9314) A journal devoted to Swedish American biography, genealogy, and personal history Volume XXVI March 2006 No. 1 CONTENTS Long Ago and Far Away. Part II .......................... 1 by Harold L. Bern Copyright © 2006 (ISSN 0275-9314) The Swedish “Wil(l)sons” ...................................... 5 by John E. Norton Swedish American Genealogist “Now We Are Arrived”............................................ 7 Publisher: by Erica Olsen Swenson Swedish Immigration Research Center Augustana College, Rock Island, IL 61201-2296 A Swede Who Had an Unusual Career ............. 11 Telephone: 309-794-7204. Fax: 309-794-7443 by Leif and Kenth Rosmark E-mail: [email protected] Web address: http://www.augustana.edu/swenson/ Children of Two Countries ................................. 13 by Agnieszka Stasiewicz Editor: Elisabeth Thorsell Hästskovägen 45, 177 39 Järfälla, Sweden A Handwriting Example, IX .............................. 14 E-mail: [email protected] The Old Picture ..................................................... 15 Editor Emeritus: Nils William Olsson, Ph.D., F.A.S.G., Winter Park, FL Bits & Pieces .......................................................... 16 Contributing Editor: Peter S. Craig. J.D., F.A.S.G., Washington, D.C. Going Home ........................................................... 17 by Lennart Pearson Editorial Committee: H. Arnold Barton, Carbondale, IL The Bridge Conference ....................................... 22 Dag Blanck, Uppsala, Sweden Dennis L. Johnson, Limerick, PA I Found the Needle! Part II ................................ 23 Ronald J. Johnson, Madison, WI by Jan Sokody Asp Christopher Olsson, Stockton Springs, ME Priscilla Jönsson Sorknes, Minneapolis, MN Solution to the Handwriting Example, IX....... 26 Swedish American Genealogist, its publisher, editors, Book Reviews ........................................................ 27 and editorial committee assume neither responsibility nor liability for statements of opinion or fact made by Genealogical Queries ........................................... 30 contributors. Correspondence. Please direct editorial correspon- Interesting Web Sites ........................................... 31 dence such as manuscripts, queries, book reviews, announcements, and ahnentafeln to the editor in The Last Page ........................................................ 32 Sweden. Correspondence regarding change of address, back issues (price and availability), and advertising should be directed to the publisher in Rock lsland. Subscriptions. Subscriptions to the journal are $25.00 per annum and run for the calendar year. Single copies are $8.00 each. Swenson Center Associates are entitled to a special discounted subscription price of $15.00. Direct all subscription inquiries to the publisher in Rock Island. In Sweden the subscription price is 200.00 Swedish kronor per year for surface delivery and 250.00 kronor Cover picture: per year for air mail. This subscription fee may be Emil/Edward Helge Bohlin, cowboy in Wyoming in deposited in a plusgiro account: 260 10-9, Swedish 1915. Picture from the Rosmark Family Collection. American Genealogist, c/o Thorsell, Hästskovägen 45, See story on p. 11. S-177 39 Järfälla, Sweden. Long Ago and Far Away: Part II Another part of the Swedish roots also came from Västergötland BY HAROLD L. BERN The earliest known ancestors of what Jöns Nilsson married Malin Jöns- nås. The problem was that there are later became the Winberg family dotter who was born 29 September six different locations in Sweden lived at Hvitatorpet. Hvitatorpet 1745 at a neighboring farm called called Ramnås. Some are farms; means “the white farm house” and Bredhult. Of this union five children some are villages; and some are is the name of a ruin in Öxabäck were born. The first Nils was born in parishes. I had looked patiently but parish today. The parish is about 40 1781 and died a year and a half later unsuccessfully through thirteen rolls miles south and slightly west of the in 1783. The couple then had Johan- of microfilm in efforts to locate the city of Borås, Sweden, in what used nes in 1784 and Christina in 1786. birth of Nils Winberg. At one point I to be Älvsborgs län in Västergötland. Their fourth child was again named had convinced myself that Ramnås Anna Jönsdotter was born there 1 Nils who was born in 1790 and a sis- was a farm in Holsljunga which no September 1728. Her mother is not ter, Edla, was born in 1792. This longer existed. Since the birth rec- identified and we can only discover second child called Nils was raised ords for Holsljunga are missing for that her father was a farmer named at the farm called Ramnås and the year 1790, I was resigned to the Jöns. She married Nils Jönsson 29 became the progenitor of the Winberg conclusion that Nils’s parents would December 1755 in Öxabäck. Nils was family. Nils’s birth name was of never be found. from the neighboring parish of Örby course patronymic, and when he first On a trip to Sweden in 1994 we and was born in 1699. They had only appears in the Öxabäck parish arrived in the village of Kinna in mid- two children, Jöns and his sister records, his name is Jönsson. afternoon on a Saturday. It was my Britta. Nils died in 1770 and his Nils first appears in the Öxabäck intention to attend the Sunday ser- widow married the Häradsprofoss, records using the Winberg surname vice in Holsljunga at the church Gunnar Kindström. Jöns was raised between 1814 and 1818. There are where my ancestors were baptized. by his stepfather and grew up in time missing years in the records so no We found a place to stay and decided to follow in Gunnar’s occupation. definitive date can be identified when that we should drive over and check Jöns Nilsson was born 13 May he first started using this fixed sur- out the church schedule for Sunday. 1757 at Hvitatorpet in Öxabäck name. parish. Jöns became the Härads- Nils was born 21 April 1790 at a A case of serendipity profoss for the area upon the death torp called Ramnås in Öxabäck On our return trip toward Kinna, we of his stepfather, Gunnar Kindström. parish. It took nearly two years of passed through another small village Literally, the word means he was the searching microfilms and finally a called Öxabäck where we had noticed District Flogmaster and is difficult trip to Sweden to locate his place of an antique store which was open 1 to translate . birth and parents. earlier. Since we had plenty of time The main road between Stockholm The difficulty began when I at- and no further plans, we stopped to and Göteborg ran right in front of tempted to trace backward to the browse. My wife looked at furniture Hvitatorpet during the 1750–1800 next generation. I was able to go back and dishes and other old household timeframe. Whereas today Hvita- to 1823 to a parish called Torestorp. artifacts. I went hunting for books. torpet appears to be out in the middle The Utflyttning records for that year We had only been there a few min- of nowhere, in that earlier era it was indicated his correct date of birth and utes when I picked up a relatively located along a main artery in the stated that he went to Holsljunga new book called Öxabäck Socken – important business of administering where I had originally found him. historia gårdar folk. I knew that this the district for the King of Sweden. The record said he was from Ram- translated roughly to Öxabäck parish Swedish American Genealogist 2006:1 1 – the history of the farm people. In Swedish church records contain thumbing through the index I found the name of the father when it was a farm called Ramnås and on page known or suspected, and the child 181 found the notation, “Nils 1790 then usually carried the father’s (kallade sig Vinberg).” My heart patronymic surname. In other cases nearly jumped out of my chest as I when no father was named, the sur- asked the storeowner to confirm my name might be the same as the translation of the Swedish paren- mother’s or in rare instances, the thetical phase - (called himself Vin- child might have a female patro- berg). We bought two copies of the nymic [metronymic] such as Annas- Holsjunga church. book. dotter. ments or letters for those who were unable to do so for themselves. At any Hökaberg rate it is an indication that he had I am not certain if we actually located been educated above the level of most Hökabergs led on our 1994 trip. We of his contemporaries. His education did positively identify the main farm and later occupation was in all called Hökaberg. The word led in likelihood linked to the reason he Swedish is a synomym for väg which assumed the surname Winberg. means road or way. On the road The custom of taking a fixed sur- toward the main farm there was a name was usually associated with small torp, with a man out near the acquiring a respectable position in road. I asked him if this was Höka- the community or accumulation of bergs led. He pointed toward the wealth. The nobility in Sweden were bigger farm house down the road and the first to start using fixed sur- said that was Hökaberg. It may well names, followed by merchants, Nils Jönsson Winberg married have been the small torp where we craftsmen, and large land holders.