By Leo Nyholm, Genos 1997, Vol. 4.
I thank TM Helvi Ukkola who negotiated completion of the information, and Helge Smedjebacka of Terjärv who kindly gave me information about the older Warg family in Kaustby and Terjärv.
Translated from Swedish by June Pelo.
Despite its small size, the Warg family in Gamlakarleby appears to be problematic. It is thought to lack both a beginning and an ending.
Tradesman Anders Jakobsson Warg married in Gamlakarleby 25 Nov 1686 to Karin Mårtensdotter Hucka. In the City Council minutes there is no information about his origin. He is found most often with the name Hucka since he was married to Karin Hucka and took over his father-in-law’s farm. When son Anders was born in 1696, he was called only Anders Jakobsson.
Knowing of this varying name usage we can establish that the later Warg family descended from Anders Jakobsson Warg or Hucka. While tracing Anders Jakobsson Warg’s descent, one can notice the ease with which he took his wife’s family name. That a son-in-law took the name of the farm to which he married was customary in Western Finland and in Österbotten. One can suppose that Anders Jakobsson was from a farm in some parish in the vicinity of Gamlakarleby. The name Warg gives a clue. Without difficulty one can discover in the 1683 census that Anders Jakobsson was the son of Jakob Josefsson Warg or Hästbacka of Terjärv. This is the only time he is mentioned at Hästbacka because a few years later he moved to Gamlakarleby.
His father Jakob Josefsson Warg was born at the Warg home in Kaustby but came as a son-in-law to Hästbacka in Terjärv when he married Gertrud, daughter of farmer Karl Mattsson. Gradually the farm came to be called Warg. The list of owners of Warg in Kaustby follows:
- Anders Andersson, master 1549-51
- his widow Kerstin, master 1551-69
- son Per Andersson, master 1566-1606
- son Henrik Persson, master 1607-1635
- son Josef Henriksson, master 1635-1662
- son Jakob Josefsson, son-in-law at Hästbacka, d. 16 Jun 1703, married Gertrud Karlsdotter, d. 1711.
Jakob Josefsson’s son Anders Jakobsson Warg married in Gamlakarleby 25 Nov 1686 to Karin Mårtensdotter Hucka, baptized there 7 Nov 1660. She was the daughter of tradesman Mårten Henriksson Hucka and Anna Eriksdotter. He probably worked in his father-in-law’s firm, but later became an independent merchant. He is mentioned several times (as Anders Hucka) in settling the accounts for Stockholm’s harbor money. Both he and his wife seem to have died during war (ofreden).
Several children were born but only two survived. Daughter Anna, b. 28 Aug 1703, married in Lövånger (Sweden) 12 Apr 1720 to tradesman and postmaster in Brahestad Sven Olsbo, b. 1692 in Jönköping (Sweden), d. 27 Feb 1751 in Brahestad. She still lived in 1770.
Son Anders Warg, b. 26 Nov 1696 in Gamlakarleby, also became a tradesman there. He visited in Lövånger and married there 17 Jan 1721 to Helena Haak, daughter of goldsmith in Stockholm and later in Uleåborg, Jakob Haak and Malin Avander. She died on 31 Mar 1781 – 80 years old. Anders Warg was buried in Gamlakarleby 9 Apr 1749.
Anders Warg also had several children but only sons Abraham and Anders became adults. Anders, b. 27 Nov 1729, took the name Avander as an adult. He married Maria Holmqvist but died childless 21 Dec 1792. Abraham Warg, b. 6 Jan 1727, was also a tradesman in Gamlakarleby, and died 2 Oct 1768. He married his first wife in Kronoby 5 Apr 1757 to Margareta Helena Bergbom, b. 5 May 1733, d. 22 Mar 1761 in Gamlakarleby, daughter of district scribe Erik Bergbom and Maria Forselius, and married his second wife, Helena Renman, probably born in Sweden. She died in Gamlakarleby 1 Feb 1813 at 78 years old.
In Abraham’s first marriage two daughters died at a young age and on 24 Sep 1759 a son Erik was born. In the beginning he was a writer in Gamlakarleby, but disappeared and represents the other side of the problem concerning this family. In 1996 I found by chance that in 1779 he moved to Uleåborg and a short time thereafter moved again to Kemi where he lived with his mother’s brother Crown sheriff Jakob Bergbom. He became a sergeant major with the Kuopio battalion on 1 Sep 1789 but was dismissed 1 Apr 1790 because of sickness. He recovered and later became sheriff’s scribe in Nykarleby where he married 14 Feb 1812 to farmer’s widow Maria Larsdotter Drakabacka, b. 1763, who died in Ylistaro 20on Apr 1813 without children. Thereby one more gap in Sursillin suku: nr 2020 is filled.
In Abraham Warg’s marriage to Helena Renman four daughters were born, but only daughter Brita Magdalena, b. 21 Jun 1764, outlived childbearing years and d. 20 Nov 1848. She was single.
The merchant family of Warg in Gamlakarleby thus became smaller and short-lived. But the male line of the Warg family in Kaustby and Terjärv continues with numerous sons, daughters, and cousins of Anders Jakobsson Warg.
In Gamlakarleby in the 1790’s there was Sara Warg, married to barber/surgeon Karl Brodde; Anna Larsdotter Warg, married to merchant Petter Sneckendahl; and Anna Warg, b. in Piteå, and married to merchant Christoffer Carlbom. Unless all three were born in Västerbotten, they do not belong to this family under discussion.
