Wedding Wednesday - Blomberg in Brandenburg, Germany

Most of my more or less distant ancestors that emigrated went to the US. I have spent quite some time digging into on-line American genealogy resources so I find when its says America in the Moving to-column in the Swedish church books rather exciting.

Also, some of them went to Denmark. Not too bad but I haven't really had the time to dig that much in the Danish archives. But when it says Germany I feel it might just as well said "the moon" and I quickly turn around and away from that brick wall.

That is way I rolled my eyes when my 26-year old Carolina Blomgren with her six-month baby-girl born out of wedlock Anna Mathilda went to Brandenburg, Germany in 1880. That was the last thing I would see about them I thought.

But then suddenly, weeks later, the leaves began to shake at ancestry.com, record hint about Anna Mathilda. And it was a match.

Anna Mathilda Blomgren, born in Karlskrona, Sweden, November 16 in 1879 on October 22 in 1904 married Ferdinand Friedrich Christian Krüger in Prenzlau, Brandenburg, Germany. The record also states she is the daughter of Karolina Hangohr, born Blomgren.

Suddenly I find some more matching records. Ferdinand dies in December 1916 and Anna Mathilda married Johan August Max Lasser on May 2 in 1919.

I notice that in some records Blomgren is spelled Blumgrenn and that generates even more records. Carolina had a son, Wilhelm Ernst Hangohr in 1884. And he got married in Berlin 1909 to Johanna Ernestine.

Thanks to that first marriage record, my German immigrants doesn't feel like such a big brick wall anymore.

The databases on Ancestry.com where I found the information:
Prenzlau, Germany, Marriages, 1874-1923
Prenzlau, Germany, Births, 1874-1901
Berlin, Germany, Marriages, 1874-1920

Sympathy Saturday - Dead on the ground

Dead on the ground is noted as cause of death of 73-year old Stina Svensdotter in Djursdala, Sweden. It seems like she disappeared on October 10 and on Christmas Eve her body was found. The body is mutilated and torn by predators writes the priest in the death-and funeral book.

The priest in Djurdala has written pretty detailed, much more than I am used to find in those areas I usually research.

She was born in the parish of Horn and the house Erstorp. Father was Sven Persson and mother Annika Svensdotter. Married 1770 to farmhand Johan Danielsson.

The funeral is on New Years Eve in 1809.

Her husband dies in 1813 of "vattusot", an old Swedish word meaning oedema.

Sorting Saturday - Organizing my DNA-relatives

You know, you got your huge list with DNA-relatives and trying to figure out how they are connected to you. I tested with FamilyTreeDNA September 2013 and I have been struggling on how to organize my matches in a clever way to find out our common ancestor.

If you are lucky, there is a tree attached to your match, but that is not always the case. And I understand why. A lot of people have relatives tested but are only interested in their common matches  to verify a certain relationship and don't add tree to every tested person. Understandable.

I use Reunion for mac as my main genealogy database. For DNA, I figured that the function Flags was a useful tool. I have added a flag "DNA known", that I use to flag people that have been tested and where we have found out out common ancestor.

I have added some people to my database where we are working on finding out how we are connected. They got the DNA flag. I have also created  haplogroupflags, for example, I myself have a flag called: HG D5a3a (mt), my mother has the same flag, my father have one flag for his Y and one for his mt and so on.

I have also chosen to show the flags in the familyview to when clicking around in my program I get a fast visual indicator on the DNA-status.

I am also able to search for everyone that has a certain flag, like everyone with the DNA flag checked or people with a certain haplogroupflag and I get the result fast in a nice list.

It is really easy to add flags in Reunion and flags can also be used to indicate people who emigrated, who were in the military or as "research done" (never used that one).

So, look into flags if you are using Reunion for mac or simular function in the program you are using to get those DNA-cousins a bit more organized.

Any other ideas on how to organize your DNA-relatives in your ordinary genealogy database?