Our Family in Sweden, Part One

One pedigree chart from www.familysearch.org extends back several generations of Swen Backman’s paternal line. Recently I have found an alternate pedigree that shows Inger’s pedigree extending several generations back. You can see that our family research has no single conclusion. Nor is there one single researcher; this, a note “to self”.

My usual project is to give an accounting of five generations of descendants in a  family, which for me would be Samuel Backman and Anna Anderson. Most of my Utah Pioneer ancestors are within five generations from me. Because Inger Dahlberg Backman did come to Utah I am using her as the common ancestor for this blog, and this makes it a six-generation project.

Let’s look back to the beginnings. Through the 18^th and 19^th centuries we were farmers, usually. And, usually, we were farmers on someone else’s land, so it was not uncommon to change farms here and there. Generally, I have found us in Älvsborg lan or Göteborg och Bohus lan, there were families also in Dals lan, which later was absorbed by the other two

Bohus was the name used for the county until 1700, when the designation was changed to Göteborg och Bohus lan and so it remained until 1998. The modern county is Vastra Gotaland, within Bohuslan Province.

Before the 11^th century there were only small kingdoms throughout Scandinavia. With the advent of Christianity strong leadership wrought more control and order in the north lands. At about this time there were two notable kingdoms, one from which the national name, Sverige was derived and another in what is now Vastra Gotaland, our ancestral homeland. Skone, the very southernmost part of Sweden, was under the control of the Danes.
Prior to emigrating, several of the children of Inger and Sven had moved to Gothenburg, engaged in work there.

Gothenburg was founded in the 17^th century, developed with influence from the Dutch, Scot and German allies of the monarchy. Shipping became all the more vital to Sweden as the industrial revolution and trade expanded. Gustave Hilmer Backman, in his recollections talked of the adaptations his family made to economize, writing that if they were poor, it was never shared with the children. Still, rye bread (which I take to mean course) with lard was sometimes a meal, and bread with butter a luxury. Sam and Anna would take fine clothing to a pawn shop for cash in hand during the week and reclaim it for Sunday. Famine, due to political and environmental events, during the 1860s probably drove increasingly more work-seekers into Gothenburg so that employment may have been stressed, certainly food supplies were. Immigration to America -or Canada, Great Britain or Australia was spoken of on farms, in the factories, the ship yards, and the docks. Sweden lost hundreds of thousands in the nineteenth century to this.

Add a new religious fervor.

When the LDS Church made converts in Scandinavia there arose the desire to join up “in Zion.” By the time our family began to plan for this gathering, the Zion they envisioned was Utah. Gustave Hilmer, Inger’s grandson was one of the first.  His uncle, Johan Peter Backman, had been in the Royal Navy for several years before 1877 hoping his wages would enable him to come to Utah.  He brought Gustave (who could travel at half-price) with him, as there was no way to purchase passage for everyone to come together.

They departed Gothenburg May 12, 1877 and traveled by boat and rail to Liverpool, England (I presume: the path often was Sweden to Denmark by sea, over the isthmus to the English Channel by rail, across to Hull, England by sea, rail to Liverpool and from there by sea to America). It is possible that Johan Peter sailed with his ship to England, if I read it correctly he planned to leave the navy at Liverpool.

It was six days before they arrived in Liverpool where they stayed with Charlotta, Johan Peter’s sister, and her husband, John Anderson. A little over a month later they landed in Castle Garden, New York, and two weeks later arrived in Salt Lake City. Many families donated to the Perpetual Immigration Fund or pooled money with other members of the LDS Church; Samuel, along with family efforts, had taken part in a group who pooled resources to buy property from which they could withdraw shares to make the expenses for the journey.

In time, most of Inger’s children came to America; settling both in Utah and Idaho. The last of the second generation passed away in 1924. They are memorialized from Santaquin, Utah County, Utah northward to Annis-Little Butte, Jefferson County, Idaho.

I would enjoy the thought that my record of this family is correct. Experience has taught me that I need help with that: when – not if – you find an error, tell us all; you can even do it here. If you have a question about this story ask it here, I hope someone will know or find an answer.

I have a little cheat sheet for using the Swedish alphabet. If I ever figure out how to use it here, I will. I enjoy being able to spell names and places correctly in my research, next perhaps I will learn the correct pronunciation!