This is the story of
Anders Petter Brusman who lived in the archipelago of Östergötland, Sweden between 1821 and 1897.
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Boko is an island in the archipelago of Ostergotland at the souteastern coast of Sweden. There has been people living on Boko since a very long time. Situated at the entrance of the gulf Valdemarsviken, the island has been a strategic point for the navigation and for that reason a base for the pilots. In the early 19th century, there were four pilots, employed by the state, living on the island with their families. One of the pilots was Nils Svensson. He was the master of the pilots and represented the fifth generation in a family who had been serving as pilots on Boko since the 17th century. Nils great great grandfather Sven Hansson probably came to Boko as a pilot trainee in the 1670's or 1680's. During the following centuries the profession passed from father to son. So it was meant that even Nils' son one day would follow in his father's foot steps.

Nils had married a girl from a nearby island Andrako. Her name was Stina Cajsa Andersdotter and she was eight years younger that Nils. In 1821 Stina Cajsa gave birth to a son, Anders Petter, and in the following years Stina Cajsa and Nils also had txo daughters, Carolina and Inga Stina.

In the fall of 1831 the 42 years old pilot Nils got ill and died. In the parish register, the vicar has written that Nils died on the 29th of November in "water disease", which should be understood as some sort of oedema. That is all we can know about Nils' death. As a pilot in service of the state, Nils had disposed a fourth of the grounds of Boko. Farming and fishing was the livelihood of the family. When Nils died a new pilot was to take his place, and in the spring of 1832 Nils' widow Stina Cajsa and his three children, Anders Petter, 10 years old, Carolina, 7, and Inga Stina 3 had to leave Boko to find a living at the mainland.

Stina Cajsa and the children moved to Stromsnas, a crofter's holding in Vaangsten, Gryt on the mainland. Maybe the crofters were friends or relatives who took pity on the poor widow and mother, or maybe there just was need for a helping hand that could be exchanged with food and lodging. However Stina Cajsa and the children only stayed at Stromsnas for a year. In 1833 Stina Cajsa got employed at the manor Breviksnas and moved there with the daughters. Anders Petter was to be twelve years old this autumn and was now old enough to leave his mother and work for his living. A friend of Stina Cajsa, the 26 years old Anna Stina Jonsdotter was to leave for Faagelvik in Tryserum parish to marry her fiancé, the crofter and fisherman Nils Henrik Ronnlund. Anna Stina took the boy Anders Petter with her to Faagelvik, where he should work with the fishermen. The seine fishing was hard work for a boy and the food was mostly salted herring with schnapps! Not the best to give a 12 year old boy!

Anders Petters mother and sisters stayed at Breviksnas until 1837, when Stina Cajsa married Stefan Maansson Brusman, and moved to Borrum, a parish a couple of miles north of Gryt. Stefan Brusman was a baatsman in the Swedish navy. (About the term "baatsman": see note below.) The Swedish national defence was from the 17th to the 19th centuries organized in a system where every parish were responsible for a number of soldiers in the infantry, the cavalry and - for the parish at the coast and the cities - the navy. A number of farmers formed a rote responsible for supplying the soldier with a house and farming possibilities for his family's living. One idea in the system was that every soldier had a special name. The soldier's name was connected to the rote so that when a soldier retired, his successor inherited the name. In rote no 176 in Borrum) the name Brusman was used from the 1740's to the 1890's and Stefan Maansson Brusman was the third Brusman as he got into service in 1809.

When Stina Cajsa and her daughters moved into the boatswain hose Fraastad in Borrum the daughter Carolina was 13 years old and soon she left the home to serve as a maid on the island Uvmaro in the archipelago. In 1839 Stina Cajsa gave birth to a boy, named Adolf Filip. On year later, the daughter Inga Stina fall ill and died soon at the age of 11. According to the parish records she suffered from a lung disease, possibly tuberculosis.

Anders Petter stayed in Faagelvik, working for the fishermen until 1839 as he, at the age of 18, moved to the island Harstena where his mothers sister Maria Helena lived, married to a fisherman. Anders Petter lived there and worked for his sister's husband in four years. In 1843 he worked for Sven Berntsson Ostling on one of the other farms on the island. On this farm, in 1844, he met Eva Andersdotter from Loftahammar who should become his first wife.

In 1845 Anders Petter and Eva moved to another island, called Vaderskar, and got married there on July 5th. There first child, Augusta was born in September and the same autumn the family moved back to Gryt. First they lived at the island Blanko for a year and then they moved to Boko, the island where Anders Petter was born. In Boko, Anders Petter probably worked as an assistant to the pilots. The son Viktor was born in February 1848 and shortly after the family moved to Borg on the mainland. Here, the son Gustav was born in 1850.




 




 

 


© Mats Brusman 2000/2008

 





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Anders Petter Brusman with his wife
Kristina and the youngest son Gottfrid, about 1895.

 

There are more to tell...

About what Anders Petter did after the time as a baatsman...

About his third marriage...

About his children...

Come back later to read the rest of the story of Anders Petter Brusman!


There is also a blog about Anders Petter Brusman at

www.nogg.se/brusman

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anders Petter's mother was, as mentioned, married to Stefan Brusman in Borrum. When Stefan retired in 1842 he had served as baatsman for thirty-three years. The farmers of the rote wanted Stefan's son Hohan Peter as successor, which would have been a convenient solution because the farmers where responsible for the support of the retired baatsman. The capability of the baatsman was inspected by the marine every fifth year, and as Johan Petter went to the inspection in 1847, he was judged unqualified for the service. The rote had then to find another baatsman. Stefan Brusman and his wife had to move to Gropstugan, a small cottage wich had been used for the housing of poor and old people.

The 1840's was a dynanic period in Sweden. In Europe old political systems was challenged by new ideas and caused uprising and violence. In Sweden the unrest was limited but even here the development could be described as a kind of revolution.
Between 1800 and 1900 the population of Sweden grew from 2 000 000 to 5 000 000. New laws established public schools, welfare work and freedom of trade that was the beginning of a more democratic society. At the same time, the economies based on farming turned into a industrial society with a grewing number of working people without own property.

The baatsman profession, established in the 17th century, also changed at this time. The baatsman had earlier a prominent position in the local society. He participated in the parish meetings and was often entrusted with tasks beside the marine duty. However, there is a change in the position of thebaatsman from 1815 to 1840 and the baatsmans stays for shorter time than erlier; between the 1680's and 1842 when Stefan Brusman retired (i.e. 160 years), there had been five baatsman in Borrum, all with more than thirty years of service. The same number, five, where at service through the following twenty years. After Stefan's son Johan Petter, Per Gustav Nervo and Samuel Eklund stayed in Borrum for two years each.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

In 1851 the rote again had to find a new baatsman. Probably, Anders Petter's mother and her husband recommended Anders Petter for the service. In April 1851 the farmers wrote a contract with the "sailor" Anders Petter Nilsson. This contract, which is preserved in the Regional State Archive in Vadstena, is telling us something about the economic circumstances under which Anders Petter and his family lived.

Anders Petter´s contract was similar to the contracts signed by the ones who held the post before him. First, he got an initial capital of 10 riksdaler banco. Second, the baatsman house stood ready for him to move in. The farmers had already sown a barrel of rye in the field by the house. Probably, Anders Petter used the 10 riksdaler banco for buying a cow and maybe a pig and some hens. This should give the family all the necessary provisions; bread, milk, pork, egg etc. The third paragraph in the contract states a yearly salary from the rote of 2 riksdaler and 32 shilling banco cash, 4 cords of firewood, one barrel of rye, one loaded cart of hay and 20 sheaves of straw. Fourth, during the summer his cows was allowed to graze the meadow and the wood near the house. The fifth paragraph stated that the farmers of the rote should care for the baatsman's uniform. The baatsman had two uniforms. A simple uniform was used as working-clothes and at exercise. The full uniform was used at inspections and in church on Sundays.

The baatsman name, Brusman, was given to Anders Petter on April 22nd, as he was inspected by the head of the baatsman company of Ostergotland and officially appointed a baatsman in the Swedish navy.
The first baatsmen in Borrum were named Rund or Runder, but early 18th century the name changed to Bruse, then becoming Brusman in the 1740´s. The element "-man" is very common in the construction of the baatsman names. Brus is "roar" ("Havets brus" means "The roar of the sea") and is of cause a suitable name for a baatsman. There is probably no deeper thought behind this name construct.

The name was inherited from predecessor to successor. The children of a baatsman was usually named by the fathers name (for example by the priest in the parish records) as long as they stayed at the parental home, but as soon as they left started a life on their own they usually exchanged the name for a patronymic; if the father was called Lars they used Larsson (Lars' son) or Larsdotter (Lars' daughter) etc. A retired baatsman normally kept the name. In the beginning of the 1850´s there were three former baatsmen called Brusman in Borrum; Stefan, his son Johan Petter and Samuel who had just retired. According to a anecdote this should have given rise to an idea to go back to the old name form Bruse. Anders Petter should then be named Anders Petter Bruse. The anecdote tells that Anders Petter strongly dispatched that name. Then Borre was suggested but Anders Petter didn't like that either. Finally he was offered the name Brusman. His reaction to this was "Well, at least it almost sounds like a name!" This anecdote was written down by Sigrid Anderson, daughter of Anders Petter's son Adolph, in the 1940´s. It is possible that there where plans for changing the name at this time, but main point of the anecdote, the reason that made it survive up to this day, is of cause the story about Anders Petter's independence, pride and sense of family and tradition. Also, his mother and stepfather were Brusmans.

The house where the baatsman lived was called Fraastad and had been built for Anders Petter's stepfather around 1810, since the old baatsman house, Backen, was given to his predecessor, Gudmund Gudmundsson Brusman, who had served for over thirty years and participated in the last war where Sweden was involved in 1809. The house Fraastad was rebuilt and modernized in the 1850's, probably just before Anders Petter and his family moved in. The house consisted of a entrance hall, one big room an a small kitchen. There were also an attic that could be used as sleeping room in the summer. The house still exists (though a bit changed) and is situated about a kilometer southeast from the church in Borrum.
Anders Petter served as baatsman for eleven years. He was admitted as baatsman at the age of 30, which was fairly old for a new baatsman, and was dismissed at the age of 41 in 1862, because of a leg injury. During the years as baatsman Anders Petter and his wife Eva got two more sons, August, born in 1854 and Adolf, born in 1856. The main part of the life as a baatsman ment hard agricultural work for the family's living, now and then interrupted by service at the navy that could be military practice in the nearby town Soderkoping or - every fifth year - a longer service at the naval shipyard in Karlskrona. Probably, Anders Petter served in Karlskrona three times; in 1852, 1857 and 1862. The documentation from these occations, preserved in the Military Archives of Sweden, tells us that when Anders Petter was inspected by the general for the first time, in 1852, his foremost qualification was that he had been to the sea with a merchant vessel. In 1857, at the age of 35, the records says that he is "sjovan" wich can be interpreted as "skilled mariner".

When Anders Petter was in Karlskrona in 1857 his wife Eva became ill. At this time, Anders Petter and Eva hade five children. The oldest daughter, Augusta, was twelve and the youngest son, Adolf, should be one year old this summer. From Borrum Manor, the biggest farm in Borrum a maid was sent to Fraastad to help Eva and take care of the children. Soon it was understood that Eva was very ill so a messages was sent to Anders Petter that he had to come home. As Anders Petter got the message, he immediately started to walk the long way home. A central theme in the oral history of Anders Petter Brusman is his walk from Karlskrona and Borrum, a distance of about 300 kilometers (186 miles) early spring 1857.

According to the sad story that has been told through four generations, Anders Petter walked the whole way from Karlskrona to Borrum to join his family as fast as possible. But as he came to Borrum and passed the church he saw a new grave and understood that he was to late. Crying, he went home to take care of the children. Of cause, there are reasons to doubt that Anders Petter really walked to long way from Karlskrona. As a matter of fact, it's more likely that he walked from the nearby town Soderkoping. The service at Karlskrona mainly took place during the summer months and usually the company met in Soderkoping for practice and preparations before that. An explanation is that Anders Petter went to Soderkoping in January-February and was preparing for the travel to Karlskrona when he in March got the message about Eva. The only thing we know about Eva's disease is that it was a lung disease, probably pneumonia or tuberculosis, and that she died on March 7th.

The maid from Borrum Manor was called Lovisa Larm, she was 42 years old at the time (six years older than Anders Petter) and came from the parish of Hannas some miles south Borrum. She had been working as a maid on a farm in Skallvik, near Borrum, and had given birth to two children, but she had never got married. Her son Gustav Adolf was now 17 years old and worked on a neraby farm. The youner son, Filip, was 8 years old and came to Fraastad with his mother. Lovisa probably Lovisa stayed at Fraastad the whole summer of 1857 and as a matter of fact she stayed there for the rest of her life. On October 25th 1857 she and Anders Petter got married in the church of Borrum.

Note: There are three possible translations in the dictionary for the Swedish word baatsman (actually spelt with a with a circle instead of double-a); boatswain, bosun and seaman. Though the Swedish word can describe different occupations related to shipping, I'm not sure if it would lead the readers understanding in wrong direction if I choose one of the english words. Instead I use the swedish word baatsman in the text, which indicate the aim to a very special form of soldier in the older swedish navy.