Sweden Military-Did your Ancestor Serve?

Hello everyone! How has your week gone? I hope life hasn’t been too hard on you this week. If it has, then I sympathize. It’s no fun going through a trial or challenge. It’s much better for us humans to be on the other side of those. I may not understand what your trial looks like or how it affects you, but you’ve definitely have my sympathy.

Anyway, how did we get onto that subject?! Whew! Let’s move on to this week’s topic. I want to talk with you about Sweden’s military records and how it relates to your Swedish ancestor. Have you ever wondered if your ancestor served in the military and how to find those records? Well look no further. I will explain the history of it this week and next week I will tell you how to search for those records.

Sweden’s Military History

It all started back in 1523 with Gustav Vasa being the first king of Sweden. At first, Vasa’s army and navy were made up of mercenaries (or hired soldiers), from foreign regions and from Swedish recruits. This got very expensive during the 1500’s because Sweden was in constant war at this time. So a new system of obtaining soldiers was introduced in the 1600’s. Check out this link here to see Sweden’s military timeline. It’s fascinating to see how many wars Sweden was involved in.

Military Conscription

The king decided to use a conscription system in the 1600’s where they would gather all the Swedish men from 15 to 45 years old in each parish. They would then divide them into groups of 10 and pick one man from each group. This process happened every three to four years. The selected men would then be shipped off to the battlefield with hardly any training and chances of returning home were slim.

Military Allotment

Of course, nobody liked this system, so a new one was devised in 1682. This was called the allotment system. Each province or parish contracted with the king to furnish a regiment of at least 1,200 soldiers at disposal at all times. The provinces were divided into “rotes” and each rote had several farms on it. Each rote recruited one soldier, gave him a place to stay and a small piece of land to farm. The soldier and his family would then live here until his military service was up or he died in war.

In return, the soldier had to go to war when he was summoned during wartime. His employers, the farmers of the rote, would then take care of his farm and family while he was gone. He had to go to exercises with his regiment every year during peacetime. He could also be requested to do other duties outside of his regular farm duties during peacetime. His family would move off of the farm to make way for the new soldier and his family if the former soldier was killed in action. The new soldier would often marry the former soldier’s widow if he was a bachelor. Sweden used this allotment system from 1682 to 1901.

Sweden Military Names

Sweden also has a unique naming system for their soldiers and sailors. They had a problem of having multiple men with exactly the same name in one regiment. How do you distinguish between them? How do you ask one Niels Nielsen to do a task without having all five coming forward? Sweden decided to start their own military naming system. The commanding officer was in charge of giving the new soldier or sailor their new military surname. They would use this name for their military service and then relinquish it when their service was up. The next soldier in line would then get the new military name. No two men had the same military surname. Military names often came from places in nature, animals, military equipment, or characteristics.

Summary

Isn’t this neat? I think it’s so fascinating to learn the reasons behind what a country does. Sweden definitely wanted to be their own country. They have different census records then other Scandinavian countries and now they have different military records. So don’t lose hope if this new information overwhelms you a bit. I will definitely walk you through next week on how to find your ancestor’s military records.

Sweden’s other records such as church and household examinations play an important part in finding their military information. If you would like to read more about military records, then go here. Check out my articles on Sweden’s church records and household examinations to refresh your memory before diving into military records. As always, if you need more help, then contact me and I am willing to do a free 30 minute consultation.

Good luck and happy hunting!

Tiffany

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