Svensson, Johan

[Theresa Rossiter]

Hello,
Thank you for this opportunity. I am grateful for any direction you can provide.
 
My question: How might I best proceed to look for my Swedish grandfather?  
 
My grandmother, Helene Therese Lebginski, was a servant in Denmark when she gave birth to my father, Johann August Svensson in March 1901 in Abenra. I have a copy of the birth certificate and it does not mention a father's name. I can read enough to see that the birth was witnessed by Sophie Kurtzweil Andresen and that my grandmother was a Catholic. Notes written on the side (in the Suetterlin script) seem to suggest that my father looked for marriage records in 1918 at the register office in Kiel (heiratsregister des Standesamts Stadt) and found that a marriage was drawn (Record No. 137). A second child was born in 1903 -- a daughter, Tehrese who had a daughter in 1944 who may still be alive.  
 
I have a photo of my grandfather taken at the Julius Simonsen Photo Atelier, Oldenburg I. Holstein. Someone has written on the back, John Svensson 1950, and in pencil in another hand, the number 175. There is a matching photo taken at the same studio with the name Helene Svensson, 1950 and the number 190. Two earlier photos exist -- one of each of them, Johan's with no markings. Helene's, stamped Meldestelle - Kiel. may have been a passport photo.  
 
Family stories tell that both Johan and Johann Svensson were sailors, and I have a written document that says my father was a dock worker in Kiel in 1918 living at Jungfernstieg 23. I have quite a lot of information about his life in Germany and the US but know nothing of his childhood. He left Hamburg for the USA on 16 May 1922 and died in Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, USA in Feb, 1954.
 
I appreciate any pointers you can offer.
Thank you,
Theresa Swanson Rossiter

[Agneta Schick]

From what you have written, I can see no connection to Sweden.  
 
Since all information points to Germany, I suggest you start there. I know  of no digital german records, so you will have to write to the cities (note that inquiries may have fees) where your father lived and trace him backwards.  
There is a very small chance that the name of the father was noted in the church books in Abenrå, Denmark even though it was not printed on the civil birth certificate.
 
Good luck
Agneta

[Theresa Rossiter]

Thank you very much. I appreciate your quick response. I will try records in Abenrå and Germany.  
 
Theresa

[Arne Nilsson]

Hello,
 
it would be necessary to bear in mind, that Åbenrå/Apenrade from ca. 1864 to 1920 was, as part of the duchy Schleswig, prussian. In 1919/1920 the northern part of the duchy Schleswig was ceded to Denmark after a plebiscite. So information about people living in Apenrade at the fin de siècle does not fit in the danish standards of administration (census/folketælling, civil status, military service). Hence local information is divided. Local archives in Denmark still contain the local documents (civil status), governmental documents may be are to be found in german archives (documents about citizenship, conscription, immigration).
 
The information given is quite meager. Even the surname Lebginski does not seem to be likely (and seems more polish than russian, but part of Poland was russian before WW I), as the 5 hits in Google are results of your own research. It would be necessary to have the handwritten documents you have read by an expert for german handwriting (S?tterlin is a writing introduced in schools in germany in 1915; it was created by Ludwig S?tterlin; so a document written between 1900 and 1918 by an adult civil servant can't be in S?tterlin) and german civil status documents, to get the correct name and the real sense of the document.
 
Quite puzzling are your remarks about notices on the birth certificate. When was the certificate made? Who did the notice, and when? In german birth certificates for illegitimate children between 1876 and ca. 1935 the preprinted text is filled with the dates of mother and child. If a fatherhood was accepted by a man, or by a subsequent marriage, there will be an official marginal note at the left margin of the document telling about this fact (from ca. 1935 on there would be a new birth certificate which tells about father and mother, without giving hints about an illegitimate birth).
 
I hazard a guess that Helene Theresia and Johan Svensson married in Kiel in 1918. So why so late? Why having children in 1901 and 1903 and marrying 1918? Well, marrying in germany as a foreign citizen required (and requires) some documents proving the marital status as being eligible for marriage. For not so wealthy people this could mean quite high expenses for travelling to Sweden and fetching an Utflyttningsattest from the parish of the last domicile in Sweden.
 
Your father was in 1918 a 17 year old german boy with a german mother. By marrying the mother, Johan Svensson could instantaneously change the boy's citizenship from german to swedish. So the boy was no more endangered by conscription ath the end of WW I. Quite a good reason for the boy's parents to marry.
 
I have quite an idea who the father was, if the aforementioned assumptions are right. According to EMIBAS-database a certain Johan August Svensson, born 1870-07-12 in Asarum parish, Blekinge province, emigrated 1918-03-06 to Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein, Tyskland. This Johan August Svensson left Asarum parish before 1890 without telling the authorities that he emigrated and where he was going (1886-05-16, 13 days after his mother's dead, he received an arbets-betyg, a permit, which was necessary for working in another parish. After that he was absent until 1918). Thence he was registered as obefintlig (absent) at the censuses 1890 and 1900 and until his return in 1918. So this Johan came back after 28 years abroad and immediately left again in March 1918, amidst a world war. This journey was not made without a good reason and intended to get his records complete, and this was necessary for a marriage. Keeping in mind the time and circumstances of the journey, there will not have been too many Johan Svenssons going to Kiel in March 1918.
 
I would suggest to ask for a copy of the marriage-record in Kiel (Landeshauptstadt Kiel, Standesamt, Postfach 1152, 24099 Kiel, Germany)
 
http://www.kiel.de/Aemter_01_bis_20/12/Amtsverzeichnis_12/Standesamt_Allgemeine_ und_Rechnungsangelegenheiten_Urkundenausfertigungen.htm#Allgemeine
 
For a thorough reading of german documents, you may send me a pdf, jpg or bmp-file of the referring document.
 
 
Good luck
 
Arne Nilsson

[Theresa Rossiter]

Oh Bless you for helping me with this. I have been thinking I would never know what happened to my family. It gives me great hope of finding something -- and just the right point I need to begin. I cannot thank you enough.
 
You ask: Quite puzzling are your remarks about notices on the birth certificate.
 
There is hand-written script on the side of the birth certificate. I do not read German but with the help on an online alphabet and babelfish online translation I think it says that my father Johan August Svensson, was a resident in Kiel, Jungfernstieg 23 in 1918 and that a marriage was recorded heiratsregister des Standesamts Stadt Kiel and it was with my grandmother beurkundeten Eheziehung mit der Helene Therese Lebginski  
 
I will most definitely take your advice and send copies to be translated.
 
Again, thank you for your conjectures, your advice and your kind help.
 
Theresa