I really hate to admit it, but I've lived longer in the state of Ohio longer than anywhere else. Yet I really feel like a New Yorker, despite the fact that I only (!) lived there 15 years. My pursuit of genealogical connections, however, has physically taken me back to the state four times in the past two years. Our latest visit was to the Big Apple, where our goal was to retrace the family's first Swedish immigrants to the U.S.: Gustaf Alfred Westerlund and his wife Johanna Charlotta Barthelson.
This couple is my great grandfather and great grandmother, parents of Fredrick Arthur Johnson (whose name at birth was Arthur Westerlund) and Wilma Westerlund Coperwitch. In my next blog, I'll cover how I came to the conclusion that Arthur Westerlund = Fred Johnson, but this time I will to focus on Fred's parents, Alfred and Lottie.
Alfred was born in Teda, in the county of Uppsala in Sweden on March 9, 1855. Teda is actually just across the county line from Västmanland, from which most of the Westerlunds originate. It's about 10 miles east of the city of Västerås, and it's around this town that I've found most of the records. Just to further place Teda, it's around 30-40 miles northwest of Stockholm (see the red pointer on the map). In 1872 Alfred is recorded as an apprentice to the painter Carl Gustaf Ahfeldt in Västerås. Now, in this case, I think "painter" doesn´t mean artist, but something more prosaic. Later, when he had moved to New York, one document says that he was an interior decorator, so I suspect his specialty was painting walls and the like and not people (but, that´s just a guess).
Alfred emigrated to the U.S. in 1884, going from Sweden to Copenhagen, and then to New York on the ship Island. In 1886 he married Johanna Charlotta Barthelson (Lottie), and they lived in Brooklyn. When Queens was established as a borough of New York City in 1898 they “moved” without changing their street address. I'll hold off on Lottie's background for the moment: in just the past couple of weeks I've come across some very interesting connections, but I need to do a lot of digging to be sure that I'm not running down the wrong trail. To wrap up this little history, Lottie passed away on 25 January, 1922 and Alfred followed a little over a year later on 23 February, 1923.
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My goal here wasn't to go into the details of the history of Alfred and Lottie in Sweden, but to give some background for our trip to NYC. Luciana and I flew to Laguardia on Friday, and were joined the next morning by my son, Dennis, who took the train down from Poughkeepsie. The death certificates for both Alfred and Lottie say that they were buried in The Evergreens Cemetery. This is a huge graveyard that straddles the boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn, right off the L line. The first goal was to find their graves, and the prospect of just wandering around through 225 acres and 526,000 people wasn't very realistic. An email to the cemetery, though, got me a return call and the information that Alfred and Hannah (remember, her name was Johanna Charlotta) were buried in Bethel Slope in plot #16642. This was very generous of them: in contrast, Aunt Wilma is buried nearby St. John Cemetery. Just to find out exactly where would have cost me $105. Not surprisingly, we didn't go to St. John's on this trip!
The other reason that I was particularly interested in finding their graves is that there are records that indicate that Alfred and Lottie had more than two children that we have known about. These were Arthur/Fred and Wilma. Familysearch.org has a record for a child named Erik William being born to Arthur Westerlund and Lottie Barthelson Westerlund in 1894. Yet the 1900 census does not list him, so I presume he died in the interval. Then, the 1905 New York State census lists Alfred Westerland (misspelled), Hanna Westerland, Arthur and William (another error, this time for Wilma) … and two other children named Harry and May. The 1910 national census has only Alfred, Charlotte, Arthur and Vilma, but it says that Charlotte had had four children, of which two were still living. So I'm confused: I have for a total of five kids, yet the census cites four. So I was hoping against hope that a visit to the cemetery would have the childrens' graves and clarify how many there were, their names, and their dates of birth and death.
Lu and I stayed at a hotel in midtown Manhattan in the Flatiron District, just a couple of stops north of Union Square. There we could catch the L train and get off at Bushwick Ave./Aberdeen St. From the subway stop it was a short walk to the main cemetery entrance. As we strolled on our way toward Bethel Slope, a truck pulled up and the driver asked where we were headed. This turned out to be Donato Doddario – Danny – whose family has been working at the cemetery for generations. He gave us directions to the site we wanted, in fact he drove on ahead and found the exact spot! So instead of wandering about for hours looking for the right spot, which has been my experience elsewhere, we practically had a guided tour.
So what did we find? The standard line that I give to graduate students doing research is that you start out trying to answer one question and end up with several more. The same is true here. Unfortunately, there is no family monument nor individual headstones to be found at the gravesite. There is one marker, though, with two words: Ostergren (on top) and Westerlund (below it), and the plot number, 16642, in the lower right corner. So, we were at the correct spot, but came up with no gravestones for Alfred or Lottie, nor any information on their other children. A disappointment there. But who the heck are the Ostergrens? Another Swedish family, clearly, but I've never heard of them in connection with the Westerlunds. Perhaps two (or more) burials in the same spot? This one has me scratching my head: how do I go about figuring out who they are?
Well, since we had the red carpet service in the cemetery, we finished early and had a chance to be tourists in New York. We also had a beautiful day to work with. We had a fantastic lunch at a Shanghai restaurant in Chinatown on Mott Street, walked out on the Brooklyn Bridge, and browsed through the Strand bookstore. My thanks to Lu and Dennis for humoring me on the trip. Didn't come up with definitive answers, but it did result in one intriguing lead, and I learned more of the history of the family and of New York City!
You can hear an NPR story about the Evergreens Cemetery at following link. There, you'll get your own chance to hear from Mr. Doddario on the graveyard's history and know that we have a family connection there.
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