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Hans Månsson chose to go to New Sweden with alacrity. His alternative was death by hanging. In the autumn of 1640, a young trooper called Hans Månsson from Hanaskede, Skaraborg Iän, Sweden, entered the Crown's garden at the monastery in Varnhem "and there ruined six of the best apple trees and two of the best cherry trees in order to obt ain material for some mane combs." At his sentencing on 31 May 1641 he was given the choice of being sent to New Sweden with his wife and children or of going to the gallows. Born about 1612, Hans Månsson was not yet 30 years old when he departed from Göteborg on either the Kalmar Nyckel or the Charitas in July 1641. It is probable that his wife and children accompanied him, although no later reference to them has bee n found. Arriving in New Sweden in November, Hans served for at least five years as a convict laborer before gaining his freedom. He then settled on a tract of land on the west side of the Delaware known as Aronameck with Peter Jochimsson, a forme r Swedish soldier who married Ella Stille, daughter of Olof Stille. In 1653 Hans Månsson joined Peter Jochimsson and 20 other freemen in signing a petition to Governor Printz raising objections to the harshness of his rule. Printz labeled the petition a "mutiny" and then abruptly returned to Sweden. When Governo r Rising arrived in 1654 to assume command, both Hans and Peter joined other freemen in pledging their allegiance. Peter Jochimsson then agreed to go to New Amsterdam to deliver a letter of friendship from Rising to Governor Stuyvesant and to brin g back the Dutch governor's reply. However, Peter became in in Manhattan and died there in the summer of 1654, leaving the young widow Ella and their two infant children, Peter and Elizabeth. Hans Månsson, then 42, married Ella Stille, then 20, an d started his second family. Hans Månsson became a respected leader of the up-river Swedes living within the jurisdiction of the "Swedish Nation," later known as the Upland Court. He succeeded Sven Skute as captain of the militia and served as spokesman for settlers in his ar ea who in 1660 successfully opposed Stuyvesant's plan for them to move to a single, fortified village. His 1100-acre plantation fronted on the Schuylkill between present Woodlands Cemetery and about 60th Street and extended westward as far as Cobb 's Creek. In the mid-1670s, Hans Månsson also became the first white settler on Pennsauken Creek in present Burlington County. He moved permanently to this site by 1681 when he sold his Aronameck plantation to his stepson, Peter Petersson Yocum. Hans return ed to Pennsylvania on occasion. On 25 June 1684, at the request of William Penn, Hans Månsson, aged "72 years or thereabouts," joined Peter Cock, 74, and Peter Rambo, 72, in signing an affidavit relating facts designed to show that Lord Baltimor e recognized the right of New Sweden to occupy lands on the Delaware. Hans Månsson died at Senamensing, Burlington County, about 1691. In the following year his property was taxed to "Widow Hance." By 1693 Hans Månsson's widow and his six sons (known as Hansson, or son of Hans) adopted the surname of Steelman, undoubtedly derived from her maiden name of Stille. Old Ella Steelman, born in Sweden, was buried in Gloucester County, NJ, 22 Jan. 1 718, at the age of 83. Ella's known children, all but the first two born to Hans Månsson, were: Peter Petersson Yocum, born 1652, who married Judith Jonasdotter, daughter of Jonas Nilsson of Kingsessing, in 1676 and had ten children, seven of them sons, before his death at Aronameck in 1702. |
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