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Skriv ut sidan - Flyttningsbevis (Moving Certificate)
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Titel: Flyttningsbevis (Moving Certificate)
Skrivet av: Ingela Martenius skrivet 2010-02-26, 07:06
Jim,
Many - though not all - flyttningsbevis are indeed preserved in the Swedish Archives. But you have to understand that it was only on the receiving end that the certificates were preserved - since there were no photocopiers in those days. This is how it worked:
Anders and Anna decide to move from their home parish A to another parish, B. They apply for a certificate from parish A. They are given their certificate (yes, the actual physical certificate; it is at the same time their domestic passport without which they couldn't move around in Sweden). Parish A makes a careful note in the migration ledger that a moving-out certificate has been issued to Anders and Anna. Anders and Anna - certificate in hand - move to parish B. The next day or so Anders and Anna go to the vicar of parish B and hand him the certificate. He makes a careful note of this in parish B's migration ledgers and files the certificate. So the certificate cannot be found in parish A but only in parish B.
(There is a variation to this: a year later Anders and Anna decide to move to parish C. When they apply in parish B for a certificate, the vicar takes out the old certificate from parish A, adds to it whatever is necessary - and the certificate from parish A isn't preserved in parish B but in parish C!)
Now apply this to emigrants: Anders and Anna wish to leave parish B and join Anna's brother in America. As good Swedish citizens they apply for a certificate. Parish B issues the certificate, makes a careful note in the ledgers - and hands over the certificate; everything just as usual. But, what happened to the certificate? Well, no one in America was the least bit interested in this piece of paper written in an obscure language. So one of three things happened: 1. They kept the important paper for a while but when they had truly understood that no one was interested in this paper, so vital in Sweden, they eventually threw it away. 2. They joined a Lutheran church with an understanding vicar. When Anders and Anna want to give him their all-important certificate he kindly accepts it - and one of two things happened: the vicar files it in an archive which is either still in the church or has been donated to the Swenson Center - or, after many years, the church clears out all the old worthless stuff in the basement and throws away genealogical goodies by the truck-load...ah, well...best not to think about it... 3. The certificate is kept, with old letters etc. from the old country, in a very special box which eventually is placed in the attic (because no one understands all those bits of paper but they were terribly important to great-grandfather, Andy) where, when the house is cleared out to be sold, the box is found by a. a genealogically interested great-great-grandchild who is over the moon or b. a great-great-grandchild who couldn't care less and the whole box is thrown away.
So if the migration certificate for the emigration has been preserved it is either in an American church archive, with relatives, in the attic or at the Swenson Center. But not in any archive in Sweden.