The Nature paper cites the book The Man Who Stole Himself: The Slave Odyssey of Hans Jonathan by Gisli Palsson [1] as its main source.
The sources for the book seem to be the census of the hamlet of Djupivogur from 1802 onwards and some "memoranda of transactions with customers, stock taking, and other aspects of his work" that survive. The memoranda I think is the complete books of the general store that are archived in the National Archives, Reykjavik. The book has some photos [2] - his very fancy signature is quite legible.
It says he is mentioned many times in the census: as a mate on a sailboat (possible owned by the store) in 1804, a donation to the poor he made in 1808, registered as an assistant and workman, in a district council meeting in 1810 his assets were recorded as "a ewe, three yearling lambs, and a horse", then no records until 1815, and by 1817 he owned two boats. The census listed him as a freed slave from Kantitusjanhill, St. Croyx since he was honest about his background.
That's about as far as I read. My impression is that it’s more of a pop-history book than a painstakingly sourced academic tome. Lots of “probably” and “must have” speculation.
The sources for the book seem to be the census of the hamlet of Djupivogur from 1802 onwards and some "memoranda of transactions with customers, stock taking, and other aspects of his work" that survive. The memoranda I think is the complete books of the general store that are archived in the National Archives, Reykjavik. The book has some photos [2] - his very fancy signature is quite legible.
It says he is mentioned many times in the census: as a mate on a sailboat (possible owned by the store) in 1804, a donation to the poor he made in 1808, registered as an assistant and workman, in a district council meeting in 1810 his assets were recorded as "a ewe, three yearling lambs, and a horse", then no records until 1815, and by 1817 he owned two boats. The census listed him as a freed slave from Kantitusjanhill, St. Croyx since he was honest about his background.
That's about as far as I read. My impression is that it’s more of a pop-history book than a painstakingly sourced academic tome. Lots of “probably” and “must have” speculation.
[1] https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo219363...
[2] https://imgur.com/a/VUmXpq0