Margaret (Vasa) Hanson (bef. 1609 - 1685)

Born before 1609 in Nyköping, Södermanland, Sweden

Died 1685 after age 76 in At Sea

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Biography

According to popular myth Margaret Hanson, née Vasa, was the daughter of King Karl IX of Sweden and his first wife, Duchess Maria. She was the wife of a Colonel John Hanson and an alleged ancestress of John Hanson (1721-1783), 9th President of the Continental Congress.^[1]

The parents in question did have a daughter Margareta Elisabet Vasa, born 1580. However, this Margareta Vasa died at the age of five.

The mythical Margaret Vasa has also been provided with alternative parents, derived from the fraudulent genealogy published by Baron Adolph Ludvig Stjerneld (1755-1835) in order to give himself Vasa ancestry. Stjerneld claimed descent from King Gustav's grandson, Gustav Eriksson den yngre (1568-1607) by his wife Brita Persdotter Karth, who has been proven to be a person invented by Stjerneld.

Margaret's husband, the colonel Johan Hanson, who died in the battle of Lützen, has also been revealed as a mythical person, as explained by Elisabeth Thorsell in her article An Old Myth - Was the First President of the United States a Swede?^[2]

Colonel John Hanson first appeared in an 1876 publication, telling the story of four brothers Hanson, arriving to New Sweden with Governor Johan Printz and relocating to Maryland when Printz returned to Sweden in 1654.^[3] Thorsell explains that the Vasa wife was a later embellishment to this story, which has itself been refuted through 20th century research.

Research notes

Note: She is not Margareta (Eriksdotter) Vasa whose portrait is sometimes listed as Margaret’s - the WikiTree profile does not have images, but Wikipedia has pictures of Margareta Eriksdotter Vasa

Sources

1. ↑ Find a Grave, databas och bilder (https://sv.findagrave.com : nåddes 21 april 2021), äreminnessida för Princess Margaret de Vasa of the Vasa Dynasty (1609–1685), Find A Grave: Memorial #186624495, ; Underhålls av Sarah Leonard (bidragsgivare 49456876) Buried or Lost at Sea.
2. ↑ Elisabeth Thorsell (2000) An Old Myth: Was the First President of the United States a Swede? This article was first published in the Swedish American Genealogist, June 2001, vol.XXI:2, and the Släkthistoriskt Forum 2000:4. Updated 2005 by Elisabeth Thorsell. Online at etgenealogy.se
3. ↑ George Adolphus Hanson (1876) Old Kent: The Eastern Shore of Maryland. (Baltimore & Clearfield Co.) pp. 110-114.

• The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland & Wales by Bernard Burke, Gen. Book Company, Baltimore, MD, page 453.
• Dugdale's Visitation of Yorkshire, Vol. 2, pp. 98-99, & 104 edited by J.W. Clary (Exeter-William Pollard & Co., 1907).
• Our Royal, Titled, Noble, and Commoner Ancestors & Cousins (over 164,000 names), Person Page - 420 found at http://our-royal-titled-noble-and-commoner-ancestors.com/p420.htm