Titel: SV: Ostpreussen
Skrivet av: Lasse Makkonen skrivet 2019-01-11, 18:37
Hej,
Sorry for finding English easier. I am a descendant of the Sprint family and I would like to tell what I think I know about the origins of them.
Sprint is a rare name from Angus area in Scotland. The first Sprint in Finland, Michael Sprint, most probably came to Finland as a paid dragoon, together with thousands of other Scottish solders arriving in 1573 to serve the Crown of Sweden in the war against Russia. His three sons, Mårten, Jacob and Petter served as dragoons for the mansions in Pernå and became later also local farm owners. Petter was eventually appointed as a captain and was raised to nobility, whereas Jacob sailed to America in 1641 to be one of the first occupants of Nya Sverige in Delaware.
Jacob had a son Lucas Sprint, who also became a captain and lived in Erlandsböle, Pernå. Lucas had at least six children Jacob, Johan, Petter, Maria, Lucia and Dorothea. The widow, Maria Christina von Möller, mentioned in the discussion, was the widow of one of them, lieutenant Petter Sprint, who lived in Taipalsaari and died in 1709 in Bender, Moldavia, where the King had settled with his remaining troops after the disaster in Poltava. The widow escaped the Russian occupation to Sweden, as did Dorothea Sprint and four of their brother's children.
The proposal that "Brigittes anfader Sprint var sannolikt en sårad svensk som togs om hand av folk i Ostpreussen" is quite believable, and there are several possibilities. Lucas Sprint's military unit was briefly located in the Grunewald area in Germany in 1649, but there were no battles then. Younger generations of Sprints include soldiers that may have participated in e.g. the war in Pommern in the 1760's. Perhaps, it is even possible that the roots of the German Sprints are in that Petter Sprint (older) was in Germany for a longer time in 1632 and took part in the battles of Breitenfeld and Lutzen.