Easier ways to find Swedish ancestors.
The subscription Swedish research site, frequently referenced in The Family Tree Scandinavian Genealogy Guide, has added/updated name-searchable birth indexes covering 1800 to 1840 for:
• Västerbotten county (approximately 68,000 index entries)
• Gävleborg county (approximately 103,000 index entries)
• Västernorrland county (approximately 85,000 index entries)
The birth register is a great help when you research since you can quickly find the correct person with a simple search. Then you can click directly to the original source in order to verify the information in the birth book. There are now approximately 2.4 million index entries in the index.
You can also now search by name in approximately 1.4 million passenger ship manifests of persons emigrating from Sweden. The ship manifests for emigrants created by the local police authorities in Göteborg, Malmö, Stockholm and Helsingborg have been available in ArkivDigital for a few years. But these manifests have finally been indexed by name so it is much quicker to search for the emigrant you are seeking.
You can search by:
• First name
• Last name
• Birth date or calculated birth year
• Departure date
• Departure port
• Vessel or ship name
You may have to be a little creative in your search, however. Many names have been abbreviated so you want to search with the full name and also using various abbreviations.
For many persons, only the age is shown on the manifest. ArkivDigital has have calculated a birth year based on the mentioned age at departure. For persons who emigrated in the 1900s, sometimes a complete birth date is noted in the manifest. If you search by the exact birth date and don’t get a match, you can search by birth year and also by the year before and year after the birth year.
Once you have found the right person in the search results, you can click on the link to see the original manifest. The original record will often include additional information such as the person’s home parish in Sweden along with the destination where the emigrant planned to travel.
ArkivDigital is also working on photographing Svenska Gods och Gårdar, a series of books published during the 1930s and 1940s describing many estates and farms throughout Sweden. The books include information about the farm owner and family, history and size of the farm, livestock and even a picture of the farm.