Church Records

Sweden did not really have any equivalence to the US birth, marriage or death certificates. Births, marriages and deaths were instead kept in special ledgers in each parish. So, what you want to look at are these ledgers or church books / church records. I guess you can get an excerpt of these records if you ask the Archives but a better idea is to copy the page with the actual entry in the church book, once written by the parish minister. • Birth and baptising Records (Födelse- och Dopboken) • Marriage Records (Vigselboken) • Death and burial Records (Dödsboken) • Moving Records (In- och Ut-flyttningslängder) • Household Examination Rolls or Clerical Surveys Rolls (Husförhörslängder) • Confirmation Records (Konfirmationslängder) • Parish Record Extracts (uttdrag till Statistiska Centralbyrån, SCB)

Death/Burials Records (Swedish:

Dödsboken, Döda/Begravna)

Record code: F. Death records go as far back as the beginning of the 17th century. Like the other church records, the death records were kept parish-by-parish and ordered by year. For each death an entry was made on that date in the parish where the burial took place. The time period for the death records could be as much as 50 years. The first volume of death records within each parish is called F:1, the second F:2 etc. In some death records the deceased are listed by burial date instead of death date. The burial was normally held within a week from the death. In the records you will find the name of the deceased, death date, burial date, the age, place of residence and cause of death. Stillborn children were usually recorded. Example of an extract from a death record: Left-hand side:

Page 2 of the draft card is shown above. Section 7 above contains information about possible misconduct and punishment a draftee was charged with while serving in the military. This draftee has no notes in this section. Section 12 has information about the draftee's service periods. Source: Norrbottens inskrivningsområde (Io 19), Piteå rullföringsområde (Ro 72) (BD) D4:3 (1914-1922) bild 7780 (AID: v806614a.b7780, NAD: SE/KrA/0473/B19002Ö). Back to Military records list.

Where do I find the records?

Now days the Swedish church records, military records, court records etc. are found online on the Internet which makes it easy to do genealogy research. There are three major online providers of these records. They are: • SVAR • Arkiv Digital (AD) • Ancestry You will need a subscription with one of the three providers in order to browse the records. All three providers have a complete set of church records.

SVAR

SVAR is a division of the Swedish National Archive, is the provider with most different types of records, in other words most complete. SVAR has digitalized the old black & white microfilm records which means the records have a varying quality.

Arkiv Digital

Arkiv Digital has digitalized the original records with modern technique and therefor have their records a very high quality and they are in color. The AD image database consists of about 210,000 historical books, documents and records or 60 million digital color images of Swedish church records, military records, estate inventories, court records, tax/census records and other historical records.

Ancestry

Ancestry, has like SVAR, digitalized the old black & white microfilm records which means the records have a varying quality. See each provider's web site for detailed information about the content of their respective image database!

The Church Record Codes

The following examples are from the parishes of Hög and Hälsingtuna in Gävleborg Län (X). The first column shows the record codes, the second column the time period for each record.

Swedish Archives

• The National Archives in Stockholm (Riksarkivet, RA). http://www.riksarkivet.se/ Acts, documents and other sources are available to the public unless otherwise stated in the Act of Secrecy. At the National Archives there is a printed guide available to help you find the sources in the Archive (Riksarkivets beståndsöversikt). Another aid is NAD . In Arninge, some kilometers north of Stockholm, is the National Archive Reading Room for genealogical research. The parochial records of the whole of Sweden can be found there as microfiche, from the 17th century unto the 1890s, as well as records of immigrants and emigrants. • SVAR (Svensk Arkivinformation), a division of the National Archive. https://sok.riksarkivet.se/svar- digitala-forskarsalen SVAR has online copies of most of the different types of records that are kept in the National Archive, the Regional archives and the War archive. • The Regional Archives (Landsarkiven, LA) http://www.riksarkivet.se/ • The City Archives (Stadsarkiven, SA). Stockholm City Archive: http://stadsarkivet.stockholm.se/ • The War Archives in Stockholm (Krigsarkivet) http://riksarkivet.se/default.aspx?id=102108 • The Royal Library in Stockholm (Kungliga Biblioteket, KB) http://www.kb.se/ • Military Museums: Army Museum (Stockholm), Navy Museum (Karlskrona), Air Force Museum (Linköping) • Swedish records online: Arkiv Digital (AD), SVAR and Ancestry keep images (digital photo copies) of various records online at the Internet such as church records, military records etc . • Demographic Database at Umeå University (Demografiska databasen i Umeå) The Demographic Data Base (DDB) is a national research resource. Its principal responsibility is to make historical records - 19th century parish records and early statistical information - easily available to researchers. • The House of Emigrants in Gothenburg. The House of the Emigrants in Gothenburg is a migration centre for research. http://emigranternashus.se/ • The Migration Center in Karlstad: Svenska migrationscentret i Karlstad • The Swedish online Emigrant Database EmiWeb. • Swedish maps from The National Land Survey of Sweden: http://www.lantmateriet.se/en/ • The 1890 census online: http://www.foark.umu.se/census/Index.htm covers so far only the northern parts of Sweden (English) • The Central Soldier Database - A soldier database, free of charge to search for your Swedish soldiers. Search page.

The Regional Archives

There are nine Regional Archives. Most records of genealogical value are kept at the Regional Archives. All archives are open to public. The Regional Archives: http://www.riksarkivet.se/ • The Regional Archive in Gothenburg (Landsarkivet i Göteborg) covers the following counties: Bohus län, Älvsborg län and Skaraborg län. • The Regional Archive in Härnösand (Landsarkivet i Härnösand) covers the following counties: Gävleborg län, Västernorrland län, Västerbotten län and Norrbotten län. • The Regional Archive in Lund (Landsarkivet i Lund) covers the following counties: Malmöhus län, Kristianstad län, Halland län and Blekinge län. • The Regional Archive in Uppsala (Landsarkivet i Uppsala) covers the following counties: Uppsala län, Örebro län, Västmanland län and Kopparberg län. • The Regional Archive in Vadstena (Landsarkivet i Vadstena) covers the following counties: Östergötland län, Jönköping län and Kronoberg län. • The Regional Archive in Visby (Landsarkivet i Visby) covers the following county: Gotland län. • The Regional Archive in Östersund (Landsarkivet i Östersund) covers the following county: Jämtland län. • The Stockholm City Archive in Stockholm (Stadsarkivet i Stockholm) covers the following county: Stockholm län. The Stockholm City Archive:http://stadsarkivet.stockholm.se/ • The Värmland Archive in Karlstad (Värmlandsarkiv i Karlstad) covers the following county: Värmland län. The Värmland Archive: http://www.regionvarmland.se/varmlandsarkiv/ Län = County.

Archives in the USA

• FamilySearch, LDS • The Family History Library and the Family History Centers, LDS The Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, is the main repository of all the genealogical information the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- day Saints (LDS) has collected. More than 3,400 branches of the main library, known as Family History Centers, are located throughout the world to help you search the records of your ancestors. Use of the Family History Library and Centers is free. The Family History Library and Centers has microfilmed Swedish church records up to 1920. You can order the microfilm at a low cost. Contact your closest Family History Center. • The Swanson Swedish Immigration Research Center at Augustana Collage, IL. The Research Center is a national archives and research institute for the study of Swedish immigration to North America. The Swanson Swedish Immigration Research Center sells microform copies of the records. • The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (Chicago, IL), ELCA, has microfilm of most Swedish immigrant church records in the U.S. The microfilm is available through Augustana Collage, se above. http://www.elca.org/ • Swegate, Sweden Genealogical Gate, a Gate to Genealogical Research in Sweden

Other sources

The e-zine RÖTTER

The e-zine RÖTTER (Roots) is published by The Federation of Swedish Genealogical Societies, a national organization with over 38,000 members. RÖTTER is both for beginners and more experienced researchers. Most of the information is in Swedish, but many pages also have English summaries. Roots: http://www.genealogi.se/finding-your-swedish-roots Rötter also has a Genealogy News Group called Anbytarforum, where genealogists can meet and discuss, ask questions etc. The discussions are both in Swedish and English. Anbytarforum: http://forum.genealogi.se/ To add or to answer a message go to the end of the page, fill in your full name in the box marked: Användarnamn, leave the box Lösenord blank and fill in your e-mail address in the box: E-post. Then click on the gray button "Förhandsgranska/Skicka meddelande" (Pre view/send). After you have previewed it, click an "Skicka meddelande" to Send or "Ångra" to Cancel. At the top of the webpage you can set the language to English “Choose language”. When you add a query in a News Group, be specific, add as much information you know about the person you are looking for. It’s a waste of time to advertise “I'm looking for more information about my great grandfather. His name was Karl Andersson and came from Småland”. To ask for information about a person with a common name in a large area is like asking information on a John Smith from Texas. It won't give you much. Always give the name of the parish if you know it or at least a name of a place together with the name of the county or the province. And always give a time period when your ancestor lived at that place. Add the date of birth if you know it, information on wife, children, date of emigration etc. One of the major Swedish genealogy software is DISGEN for Windows. DISGEN: http://www.dis.se/

The parish

As mentioned several times on the page it’s important to find the name of the parish where your ancestors lived and the period of time were they lived there. This is the key to the records. However, what is a parish? The parish is a local congregation that may have included many neighboring villages in its boundaries. In the records you will find the Swedish word socken (short sn). In Swedish the modern word for parish is församling (short fs). In one sense socken means the same thing as a church parish, a congregation. But socken was also the area for local government ruled by the Sockenstämma (the council of the socken), i.e. the wordly socken. A socken had a church and the boundaries of the church parish and the socken was the same. In the 1860s the municipalities (kommun) replaced the worldly socken. See Swedish parishes. At this site you will find all the Swedish parishes, arranged by municipality. Use your browser’s search function to check if the name of a place you have is the parish name (församling) or not. At the above mentioned link you ill also find the Swedish municipalities. See also Subdivisions of Sweden into regions, provinces and counties. The Conception of Socken Swedish Land Reforms

Seeking information about

Swedish ancestors by their last

name

See Seeking information about Swedish ancestors by their last name

Literature

• Cradled in Sweden by Carl-Erik Johansson, Logan Utah, 1995. • Swedish Passenger arrivals in the United States 1820–1850, by Nils William Olsson och Erik Wikén, 1995. • 24 Famous Swedish Americans and their Ancestors, 1996. • Släktforska! Steg för steg (Guide book to Swedish Genealogy) by Per Clemensson and Kjell Andersson, Stockholm 1997, 5th edition. • Emigrantforska! Steg för steg (Guide book to Swedish emigrant research) by Per Clemensson, 1996. • Hembygdsforska! Steg för steg (Guide book to Local History Research in Sweden) by Per Clemensson and Kjell Andersson, Stockholm 1990. • Statistiskt sammandrag av det svenska indelningsverket (Statistical Digest of the Swedish Allotment System) by Claes Grill.

Genealogy Links

• Genealogy Links (opens in a new window)

Registers on CD/DVD-ROM

• Svenska ortnamn, Names of places in Sweden (400.000 places listed) • NAD (The National Archive Database on CD). Lists the sources that can be found in the Swedish archives (by the National Archive) • Emigranten, two CDs with a database covering Swedish emigrants. • Centrala Soldatregistret, Military records covering (at this point - Aug 2017) about 507,000 soldiers within the Allotment System 1682 - 1901 (Indelningsverket). • Sveriges befolkning 1880, The Swedish 1880 census on a CD/DVD. It contains all persons who were registered in a Swedish parish on December 31, 1880 - almost 4.6 milion records. • Sveriges befolkning 1890, The Swedish 1890 census on a CD/DVD. It contains information about the 4.8 million persons living in Sweden at the turn of 1890/1891. • Sveriges befolkning 1900, The Swedish 1900 census on a CD/DVD. It contains all persons who were registered in Sweden in the end of 1900, 5.2 million people. • Sveriges befolkning 1910, The Swedish 1910 census on a CD/DVD. • Swedish Death Index 1901 - 2013. This is the fifth edition of the Swedish death index. This edition has been updated with information about 2.5 million deceased during the period 1901-1946, which means that 70% of the dead for that period are added since last edition. From 1947 and forward are all deceased included, where the period 2007-2009 is completed with 272 000 since last version. The DVD-rom contains 7 880 000 deceased in all. • Sveriges befolkning 1970, The Swedish population 1970. It contains information about the 8.0 million persons living in Sweden in 1970. • Sveriges befolkning 1980, The Swedish population 1980. It contains information about the 8.3 million persons living in Sweden in 1980. • Sveriges befolkning 1990, The Swedish population 1990. It contains information about the 8.6 million persons living in Sweden in 1990. • Söder i våra hjärtan (Söderskivan) - Södermalm in our hearts. Södermalm is a district (and an island) just south of the Stockholm city center and this CD covers the population living here in 1900. • Klaraskivan - The Klara CD. Klara is a parish in central Stockholm and this CD covers the population living here 1878-1926. • Gamla stan under 750 år - The Stockholm Old Town during 750 years. This CD and DVD informs you about the history of the Stockholm Old Town and about the persons living here between 1878 and 1926. • Sjöfolk - Sailors in the merchant navy. A CD with all the sailors registered at 10 of Sweden's mercantile marine offices, about 700.000 entries. Top of page

Above is an extract from a death record: Ekshärad (S) F:5 (1870-1894) image 163 / page 317 (AID: v6433.b163.s317, NAD: SE/VA/13100). Right-hand page. The above image shows the right-hand side of the page shown further above. The first column above lists "cause of death" (dödsorsak). Kramp = cramp/spasm/convulsion, Slag = stroke, Ålderdom = old age (infirmity), Okänd = unknown. For further information, see Names of Diseases Explanations: • 1th column: Cause of death • 2nd and 3rd columns: certificates: By doctor (af läkare), by midwife (af barnmorska) • 4th column: Notations about social care, medical care, penal institutions etc. • 5th column: Page in the parish book • 6th column: Remarks Back to Church records list.

Moving Records (Swe: In- och

Utflyttningslängder)

Record code: B. The Household Examination Rolls normally have a notation about a person's moving in or out of a parish. The rolls also have notes of moving between addresses within the parish. There are also special records, In- och Utflyttningslängder (Moving-In / Moving-Out records), which lists people moving to and from a parish. These records have not always been preserved. You are most likely to find moving records for the 19th century. Inflyttning = moving-in and utflyttning moving-out. They are kept chronologically, giving the person's name, occupation and marital status. The records show which parish a person moved from or was moving to. A person moving out from a parish had to obtain a moving certificate (flyttningattest) from the parish minister. This certificate had to be presented to the parish minister of the new parish. The first volume of moving records within each parish is called B:1, the second B:2 etc. Back to Church records list. Example of extracts from the moving records: Moving-out record (Utflyttningsbok):

Above is an extract from a moving-in record: Rödön (Z) B:4 (1902-1915) image 240 / page 36 (AID: v115161.b240.s36, NAD: SE/ÖLA/11090). The above moving-in extract covers year 1905 for Rödön parish Jämtland (Z). AID is the image ID used by Arkiv Digital. The first entry (51) is for Nils Gunnarsson. He moved- in to Rödön parish on October 19, 1905, from Näskott parish, Jämtland. He is listed as "Hem:egare" which is Hemmansägare" and means freeholder or farmer in English. Nils is listed on page 134 in the Rödön parish book (församlingsbok). The second entry (52) is for Erik Löfgren. He moved-in to Rödön parish on October 19, 1905, from Näskott parish, Jämtland. His occupation was laborer (Arb.). He is listed on page 294 in the Rödön parish book (församlingsbok). The third entry (53) is for Mårten Löfgren. He moved- in to Rödön parish on October 19, 1905, from Näskott parish, Jämtland. He is listed on page 294 in the Rödön parish book (församlingsbok). After his name is a note "den föreg. s." or "den föregåendes son" or in English "the former's son". So, Mårten was a son of Erik Löfgren. Explanations: • 1st column: entry number in the moving-in record for 1905, Rödön parish. • 2nd column: Date of moving in, Day (dag) and Month (månad). • 3rd column: Name and occupation of the people moving in, "Inflyttade". • 4th column: Date of birth (födelsedag). • 5th column: Gender, males (mankön). • 6th column: Gender, females (qvinkön). • 7th column: Name of the former parish (from where). • 8th column: Place of residence in the current parish. • 9th column: Page in the parish book in the current parish. • 10th column: Remarks

Summary Church Records

The X's marks the Records where you will find the information in. The (X) marks the Records where you might find the information in.

Parish Record Extracts (Swe: Utdrag till

Statistiska Centralbyrån, SCB)

The Church Records from 1860 and onward were extracted annually and sent off to Statistiska Centralbyrån, SCB (Statistics Sweden) in Stockholm. In 1992 they were forwarded to Riksarkivet (The National Archive). These records contain extracts of the birth, marriage and death records of all parishes in Sweden. They are cataloged by year and county. These extracts are easy to use as they are standardized for the whole nation. Web address: SCB Back to Church records list.

Contents of the Military Records

There is much information to be found in the military rolls if your ancestor has been a soldier or an officer.

General Muster Rolls (Swe:

Generalmönsterrullor, GMR)

A general muster (GM) was held at each regiment every 3rd year (later every 5th year). The general muster rolls (GMR) were kept at every regiment and since a new general muster roll was set up at each general muster you must know the time frame when your soldier served in the regiment. A general muster was an inspection of the regiment, where its strength in numbers, equipment, etc. was noted. The GMRs were kept between 1685 and 1885. The GMRs were kept regiment-by-regiment and within each general muster roll the soldiers were listed company-by-company. So you need to know the regiments name but it is a good thing if you also know the company of your soldier. Example of an extracts from a general muster roll: General Muster Roll (Left-hand side):

Above is an extract from a General muster roll: Generalmönsterrullor - Södermanlands regemente (D) 169 (1879-1883) image 890 (AID: v372963a.b890, NAD: SE/KrA/0023). Right-hand side. The above extract shows a GMR for the Södermanland Regiment (infantry) in 1879. Berg was present at the previous general muster as well as at the current general muster (pres. / pr.). Explanations: • 1st column: Notations transferred from the previous general muster roll. • 2nd column: Notations made at the current general muster. Typical notations in those two columns: • Pres/Präs, Pr., Presens or Praesens: Soldier personally present at the muster. • Abs. or Absens: Soldier absent at the muster. • Appr. or Approbera: approved as a soldier at the muster. • Avsked/afsked: The soldier was discharged. • Sjuk: The soldier was absent at the GM due to sickness/injury. Back to Military records list.

Draft Cards (Swe: stamkort/värnpliktskort)

Conscription: In 1812 Sweden introduced a military conscript system called Beväringen. Every male between the age of 21 to 25 was required to serve in the military as a conscript (draftee). Beväringen was a complement and reinforcement to the regular professional army. The conscription service was universal which meant that all able-bodied men fit for military service had to undergo a minimum military training in the armed forces. Hiring of substitutes was allowed until 1862, i.e. to pay someone to do the service in his place. The enrollment numbers (inskrivningsnummer) were introduced in 1885 and were a three-part conscript identification number. In 1901 both the standing allotted army and the Beväringen was abandoned and instead Sweden established an army and navy entirely based on a Universal conscription System called Allmän Värnplikt (Universal Conscription). This new conscript system was to fully replace the old standing Army and Navy with a military force fully based on conscription. In a way Beväringen was a forerunner to the Universal Conscription System. Draft cards: The general muster rolls were kept until the 1880's. They were then replaced by the "stamrullor" and "stamkort" (draft cards). The American draft card is just a registration card while Swedish cards serve a dual purpose in that they also contain service data the American doesn't have. Example of a Draft Card (Värnpliktskort / Stamkort): Page 1: