Curiosity

(John Johnson and grandson Jack, my Papa about, 1916)

Sr. Ambrose put both her hands on my desk and looked me in the eyes, “Your name is Johnson, so your ancestors would be from England!” She had set the class a project, “go home and find out where your family were before they came to Australia.” No one in my class, or possibly in the school, had an indigenous background so our ancestors had come from somewhere. 

I was about ten years old at the time and had not really thought about where I had come from. I knew where I lived and that was about it. We were studying Australian History (not sure what the subject was called then), and the gold rush. 

Mum was one of those people who argued everything that was said. If you said something was green she would argue it was more blue! So when I got home I asked the big question, where did our ancestors come from. Mum’s answer was, England and Ireland, pretty boring as that is where most of my classmates had descended from, except those who had come from Holland, there were a number of families in our area from there, and I thought them exciting. 

Dad however stated that “Old Johnny Johnson was from Sweden.” Wow, how exciting was that! Mum’s response was, “Oh Rob, don’t be bloody stupid!” But he bit back, “No, Dad’s grandfather was Swedish!”. So Sr Ambrose was wrong! The Johnsons came from Sweden, no boring old England! I did not know of anyone who came from Sweden. Suddenly, history was a very interesting subject. 

Along with that, I found out that I had a number of gold miners sprinkled through that history as well. That year at school we wrote and performed a play about gold miners. 

Unfortunately, my Grandfather died shortly after that so I never got to ask him about his grandfather. If only I had more time with Papa. I found out years later that he was the grandson who spent a lot of time with his grandfather and possibly knew all about him. John married an Irish lady and they had one son, who went on to have three sons. Papa was the eldest and a favourite with his grandfather. 

John’s marriage certificate states his parents were Peter Johnson and Albertine. I have a photo of a lady who is supposed to be John’s sister who went to America but no more information. DNA has many matches to the area around Sweden, Finland, and Norway, but I am yet to pin down any common ancestors. I have found a marriage between a Peter Johannisson Sandsten and Albertine Oberg in Stockholm. This may well be them, but I am still investigating, even after all these years. I have family histories go back centuries, to ancient castles in England, however, the Swedish side is still a mystery. 

My curiosity has never died with this one and will continue until I can solve it. 

Updated now I found them. I posted on a Swedish FB site. with all my little jigsaw pieces. Within a few hours, I had the best result. A lady had found my family. 

I told the group that John Johnson supposedly was born to Peter and Albertine in about 1839 in Gothenburg Sweden. I had no idea of a maiden name. Peter was a cooper by trade.

When John's wife died she suddenly had a middle name, Horsldt, this was on her death certificate, and death notice in the paper.  Anne was Irish and I doubted her middle name would be Horsldt. Then in the 1903 electoral Roll John was John Horstedt Johnson but  I was told that the names I was giving were not Swedish. 

I also was given a photo of a lady, taken in America, who was supposed to be John's sister. Uncle Jim said her name was Sylvia. Uncle Jim had a sister Sylvia and I wondered if he had this confused. John was supposed to have had 2 sisters who went to America. 

I knew John was a Merchant seaman of some kind and he said he had come to Melbourne on board the Triton. I spent many hours looking for the passenger ship "Triton". I eventually found the "Triton" was a merchant ship and it had left Warrnambool for Sydney the day before John said he landed in Melbourne. I also found several records for John Johnson, a Swede, the right age, working on ships between Melbourne and Sydney. 

Then came the results! Johan Hörstedt, born 30 August 1839, to Sven Peter Hörstedet, a cooper,  and Albertina Andersdatta (I had a lot of Andersen/son) DNA matches in Norbotten, Sweden. Sven was the son of Jöns Hörstedt. I later found Sven's christening and he was Christened Sven Peter Jönsson. 

Sven Peter and Albertine had children Johan, Josephina, August Ferdinand, Sofia Loisa Amalia,  Albertina Wilhelmina Maria, and Tekla Maria. So Silvia was in fact Sofia, which was confirmed when I found a passport photo of her. Sofia (Sylvia) and Tekla both went to America travelling often back and forth. 

When Albertina died she had written in her will that Johan was a merchant seaman but she did not know where he was. Also August went to sea but no one knew where he was either. We know August jumped ship in Cardiff, another name change? 

Suddenly everything I had fitted together. 

Two days later I had a message saying that a lady on a Swedish speaking FaceBook page was looking for this exact family. She needed to figure out where to find Johan and August. I was excited to write to her and say "Johan or John is my gg grandfather and he ended up in Australia." 

Kersten Larson is a cousin on Albertina's side of the family. She has written a book on her family and much to Kerten's delight she was able to include John's family and some of his descendants in the book. 

We have also found Sofia's passport photos and it is the same lady I had the photo of. Josephina married a sea captain as well and after she passed away her children changed their name to Herstedt and also moved to America. 

Who says Family History is boring!