Looking for the swedish? origins of Carl Erick Carlson

Question

Thanks for reading.

I'm looking for a connection to a Carl Erick Carlson from Sweden? (or Norway?) He is related to my deceased husband.

DNA is available for 3 related persons through Ancestry. The closest reIative (grandson of Carl Erick) has 16% Sweden and 9% noway. Hope to find some matches.

Our Carl Erick arrived in Sydney, Australia about 1874. He had an estimated birth year in the mid 1950s estimated from information on naturalisation(1880), marriage and death records.

It was rumoured he was a royal ????? who jumped ship.???? 

He may have been a seaman. He worked as a cooper in Sydney.

Parents listed on the marriage record (1882) are Gustaf Carlson and Katerina Anderson. They were not listed on the death record (1893)

Answer 1

Unless there is a DNA match, this one will be a bit tricky because those names are not uncommon and he left Sweden before the 1880 census. The names are all Swedish names though so he should be in the Swedish records. There is probably a note of him being a sailor and possibly even emigrating in his Swedish parish record. The problem is narrowing it down enough to know what parish record to look in. How certain are you of the birth year? Do you have any additional information about what part of Sweden he may have come from? Any possible names of siblings?

Elisa

Comments

The only other part of information is that father Gustave was an officer in the army. if true it may be a valuable lead. There is a lot of Carl Carlsons that moved to Australia in the time period.... Some I have definitely discounted through newspaper researches. There is a great free resource in Australia called Trove which covers many early newspapers. Reality is it could all be a made up story re his origins. Re birthdate it is an estimate based on declaration on naturalisation 1880 (23) marriage 1882 (24)and death 1893 (39)

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The Swedish archives are thorough when it comes to army officers, so that is a good lead. The records of officers would be in Krigsarkivet, and his father and/or his mother would probably be in the army pension records (Arméns Pensionskassa) as well. I'm not sure if any of those records are online or if you would need to contact the Swedish national archive (Riksarkivet) for help. If his father had been a regular soldier instead, he would probably be in Soldatregistret which is searchable at https://soldat.elektronikhuset.it/soldatregister/search.en.aspx A quick search there shows over 400 Gustaf Carlsson or Gustaf Karlsson, so let's hope he was an officer.

PS The Swedish spelling of his parents' names (with common versions) are probably Gustaf/Gustav Carlsson/Karlsson and Katarina/Catarina/Katharina/Catharina/Karin/Carin/Kajsa/Cajsa Andersson/Andersdotter

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Thank you! Great information...the parish records are challenging as occupations don't line up with the ancestry list of swedish occupations.

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There is a Swedish website called Arkiv Digital that is a bit pricey but really worth it if you are searching for a lot of Swedish records, because it has indexed a huge part of the church records. I tried searching for different variations of the names you gave us in the birth records, and got a bunch of matches but none that matched 100%.

The one I feel is the best match though is the birth of Carl Erik to Gustaf Mauritz Mellberg (a second corporoal in the royal lifeguard grenadiers) and Catharina Carlsdotter, on October 27 1847 in Köpings landförsamling.
Here is a link to the birth record: https://sok.riksarkivet.se/bildvisning/C0009637_00087

I am by no means sure it is the right Karl Erik, and I have not taken the time to look further into it, but it is at least a possibility.
Good luck!

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Thanks for doing that, Annika.

I have just checked for this Carl Eric in Arkiv Digital. He used the surname Mellberg and died in Kila parish in 1924. So not him.

ArkivDigital is the absolute best, and has you say, it costs. They do have short-term subscriptions and the occasional free weekend (which I always forget to look out for).

I suspect that a short-term subscription is not enough to learn the workings of the site and the indexes with vague data like this case; it's different if you have an exact birth date and/or a birth parish.

I did a search yesterday and found one Carl Eric with  Gustaf Carlsson and Karin Andersdotter parents (no military connection, that info came later). Since, in the end, this guy also lived out his life in Sweden, I didn't find it worth posting. The names are really very common.

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Thank you for the research. The most hopeful one I found in my look at some parish records was a carl eric who was a foster son... Of course I may be looking at the wrong timeframe if he was a seaman and was working he may have left parishes before 1870

Answer 2

If those DNA tested relatives have any close Swedish matches that could be really useful. If the DNA tested relatives haven't transferred (for free) their Ancestry tests to FTDNA and Myheritage yet, they should do that, to increase the chance of finding close Swedish matches.

Comments

Not sure how to do the DNA bit you talked about..sounds like a good idea! I'll look into it.