The term "l'enfant naturel" is new to me. It is a French expression meaning a natural child, one born out of wedlock. I had no idea that this condition (is that the right word?) would apply to my family line, not just once, and not even twice, but in three successive generations from 1836 to 1880. Wow.
So working backward as genealogists do, I came first to the civil registration of the birth of my great-grandmother, Marie Klein. She was born 13 Aug 1880 in Strasbourg, Alsace, Germany. But what's this? The name on the record is Marie Grimm. This record is written in German, so I had to ask for some translation help from the experts at the international desk at the Family History Library in SLC. Where usually the father's name is listed was instead the name of the midwife. The mother was then described as a single (unmarried) servant girl named Cecile Pauline Grimm. Wow #1.
Ok, so now let's look at Pauline. We have her death certificate from Brooklyn in 1921 but it has always been confusing because her father was listed as Henry Kitzinger and her mother Salome Grimm. How does that work? Well, this way. Finding now the civil registration for the birth of Pauline on 26 Feb 1860 in Strasbourg, the first thing it says is that she was the "fille naturelle" (here's our new expression, "natural girl") of unmarried Salome Grimm, and then it proceeds to list Salome's parents as George Grim and Rosina Hieber of Kutzenhausen. Francois Henri Kertzinger was the man Salome married in 1866, well after Pauline's birth. Henry Kertzinger was Pauline's step-father. Wow #2.
Surely, that's enough surprise to go around - a mother and daughter both born outside the institution of marriage. At that point, it seemed a good time to stop asking questions, because after all, there is a limit to how far back is far enough.
Except that I have a funny need for completeness. When looking at my "new and revised" family tree where some ancestors have known mothers and unknown fathers, I realized that I had not attached a civil registration record for Salome even though one is available for the time she was born. Unable to find such record, I went back to check Salome's marriage record, the one to Mssr. Kertzinger that occurred AFTER the birth of Pauline. This record is terribly out of focus, so as I was squinting at it, I saw what I had not seen before, that she was born "hors le mariage" - outside of marriage. Whoa! Stretching my eye strain, I came up with a birth date of 7 Aug 1836 and a place of St. Marie aux Mines in Haut-Rhin. Lots of digging and churning later, there she was, the next l'enfant naturel. Salome was "reconnu" meaning recognized. George Grimm claimed that he was the father of the female child whom he wanted to name Salome, and that she was born of Miss Rosine Hiebert. Wow #3.
And there we have it - three generations of women, and direct ancestors at that, born outside of wedlock. At first I was taken aback with it all, maybe even a little ashamed. Now I find myself slightly amused, partly at the situation and partly at my own apparent inheritance of social judgments about such things. Try even a two-minute google search with these keywords: 'nineteenth century' europe france marriage illegitimate children. The resulting reading is intriguing. Suffice it to say that one-third of children born in 19th-century France were natural. 183 years ago was a different time and place, and the birth of any child was less the subject of moral judgment. Moreover, their survival is how I got here.
So let me state for the record, I am thrilled at discovering what is essentially a small matrilineal pocket in my family tree: three generations of women, my grandmothers, whose mothers were unmarried, and two of those generations whose fathers went unrecorded. These women and their baby girls survived and kept moving forward in a world that was changing fast irregardless of gender. May we all, and especially their many descendants, honor their memory gratefully.
Monday, November 4, 2013
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Obituary
We already knew that Peter Schaefer and Maria Magdalena Vierling Schaefer had a son referred to as "Louie" because he appeared on the 1880 census of Murray, Iowa with his family there. But I could never find any trace of him after that, and so assumed that Mary Schaefer returned to New York with the only two children she had remaining, namely Charles and Lena.
I recently discovered a Schaefer family in the 1892 census of New York. Mary Schaefer, age 42, was enumerated on Devoe St. in Brooklyn with Ludwig, age 21, Charles, age 17, and Lena, age 14. Ludwig was a laborer.
On 5 Jun 1893, there was a death of one Louis Schaefer who lived on Devoe St. in the same block where the census of the previous year was taken. He died of some kind of disease of the heart, and he was buried at Holy Trinity cemetery. He was 22 years old.
I recently discovered a Schaefer family in the 1892 census of New York. Mary Schaefer, age 42, was enumerated on Devoe St. in Brooklyn with Ludwig, age 21, Charles, age 17, and Lena, age 14. Ludwig was a laborer.
On 5 Jun 1893, there was a death of one Louis Schaefer who lived on Devoe St. in the same block where the census of the previous year was taken. He died of some kind of disease of the heart, and he was buried at Holy Trinity cemetery. He was 22 years old.
The EMPIRE CITYs - Amateur Baseball in Brooklyn
This post pertains to our "other" Schaefer line, the one that intersected with ours in 1902 when John Schaefer (not our line) married Madeline (Lena) Schaefer, who was our great grand-aunt (sister of our g-grandfather, Charles Schaefer). I've never been able to establish any certain connection between the two Schaefer lines, the most notable difference being their line was Lutheran and ours was Catholic. Still in all, Uncle George remembers the characters from this other line, one of whom was known as "Pig's Foot Schaefer".
So every year I try to comb through our family tree to add updates based on new and sometimes changing information. This year I stumbled across a newspaper article where the baseball fans of the Empire City amateur baseball team expressed sympathy to its manager, John "Jerry" Schaefer, for the loss of his wife Madeline. The article listed the Schaefer's address, known to be the address where our John and Madeline were living, so there is no mistake about there being a different Schaefer in this case.
What a surprise to find that this John Schaefer was involved in early baseball! And he was known as Jerry? I will withhold my guess as to why he was called that. But a subsequent search of Jerry Schaefer and the word "baseball" resulted in many interesting articles about his career with amateur baseball! Jerry was apparently an acquaintance of Charles Ebbets, and was responsible for bringing up many of the talented baseball players who later would rise to fame. From 1910-1921, his team played at a place known as Arctic Park on the north side of Johnson Ave. at Gardner Ave. in Brooklyn. According to a website about Brooklyn's semi-pro fields, "There were no locker rooms, so teams had to change their clothes at a nearby saloon. In 1912, the Empire City team, realizing they had little chance against the powerful Lincoln Giants negro team, tried to get their opponents drunk and overfull by offering lunch at the saloon before the game. The Giants ate and drank well, and won the game easily."
But John must have decided to leave it all behind as noted in a 1928 news article about an event paying tribute to veteran ball players where it says "Schaefer is no longer actively connected to the game". It appears that he then moved on to become a restaurateur. What's sad to me is that his obituary doesn't mention his baseball involvement at all, which must have been an important aspect of his life. And worse still, there is no entry for the Empire City baseball team in wikipedia! If anybody out there can tell me where to find more information on this amateur team, please contact me.
Even though John "Jerry" Schaefer was not a direct relation to our family, my father would have loved this story!
So every year I try to comb through our family tree to add updates based on new and sometimes changing information. This year I stumbled across a newspaper article where the baseball fans of the Empire City amateur baseball team expressed sympathy to its manager, John "Jerry" Schaefer, for the loss of his wife Madeline. The article listed the Schaefer's address, known to be the address where our John and Madeline were living, so there is no mistake about there being a different Schaefer in this case.
What a surprise to find that this John Schaefer was involved in early baseball! And he was known as Jerry? I will withhold my guess as to why he was called that. But a subsequent search of Jerry Schaefer and the word "baseball" resulted in many interesting articles about his career with amateur baseball! Jerry was apparently an acquaintance of Charles Ebbets, and was responsible for bringing up many of the talented baseball players who later would rise to fame. From 1910-1921, his team played at a place known as Arctic Park on the north side of Johnson Ave. at Gardner Ave. in Brooklyn. According to a website about Brooklyn's semi-pro fields, "There were no locker rooms, so teams had to change their clothes at a nearby saloon. In 1912, the Empire City team, realizing they had little chance against the powerful Lincoln Giants negro team, tried to get their opponents drunk and overfull by offering lunch at the saloon before the game. The Giants ate and drank well, and won the game easily."
But John must have decided to leave it all behind as noted in a 1928 news article about an event paying tribute to veteran ball players where it says "Schaefer is no longer actively connected to the game". It appears that he then moved on to become a restaurateur. What's sad to me is that his obituary doesn't mention his baseball involvement at all, which must have been an important aspect of his life. And worse still, there is no entry for the Empire City baseball team in wikipedia! If anybody out there can tell me where to find more information on this amateur team, please contact me.
Even though John "Jerry" Schaefer was not a direct relation to our family, my father would have loved this story!
Kaiser Updates
I've been able to make alot of progress on the Kaiser line in the last few months, and I wanted to post here that progress. Most notable is that we have now identified the mother of John F. Kaiser. His death certificate had listed her given name, but we just could never make it out because of the way it was written. But now we have it. Her name was Christine Dunmeier, or some derivation thereof. Her maiden name comes from the death certificate of one of her other children, Frederick Kaiser. Since I have learned that the information on death certificates is not 100% reliable, it would be wise to look for more documentation to confirm that maiden name. In the meantime, we at least have the clue.
What's even more interesting is that Christine's husband, John C. Kaiser and our third g-grandfather, died as a result of being hit by a Manhattan train. The title of the newspaper article in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle about the incident is called "He Was Cut to Pieces". There was an inquest and the engineer was found not to be at fault. Meanwhile, Christine inherited his farm and subsequently wrote a very informative will, which was probated in 1901. It describes her children as:
What's even more interesting is that Christine's husband, John C. Kaiser and our third g-grandfather, died as a result of being hit by a Manhattan train. The title of the newspaper article in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle about the incident is called "He Was Cut to Pieces". There was an inquest and the engineer was found not to be at fault. Meanwhile, Christine inherited his farm and subsequently wrote a very informative will, which was probated in 1901. It describes her children as:
- John F. Kaiser and his wife Kate (our 2nd g-grandparents, both of whom died in 1900)
- Anna Kaiser who married Henry Mahland
- Frederick Kaiser who married Elizabeth "Lydia" Behn
- Elizabeth Kaiser (1882-1937) married Harry Tietjen, they had two sons
- Catharine Kaiser (1884-1973) married Hugo Palm, they had two daughters
- Charlotte Kaiser (1886-1958) married Herman Jaeger, they had 10 children, lived in Prattsville, NY
- Magdalena (Lena) Kaiser (1888-1966) married Michael Flaherty, they lived in NJ and had one son who became a priest but who died young
- William John Kaiser (1890-1977) married Caroline F. Ludwig, they had one son whose family relocated to Missouri
- Frederick William Kaiser (1893-1974), married Laura I. Kent, they had one daughter. This last guy has some confusion because of another man of the same name, about the same age, living in the same general area. After careful study, however, I'm confident that this Frederick belongs to us!
Klein Connections in Germany
I was recently contacted by a Klein relation, the wife of my second cousin once removed. His father and my grandfather were cousins who became New Jersey neighbors. We've been able to compare notes and share lots of information, which has been wonderful and exciting. One of those shared items was an old photograph that apparently comes from Germany - wowee!
First let me give some background about what we know of our Klein origins:
Here are some observations and notes:
Do you have any additional comment or information that could help us further identify this photo? Please contact me!
First let me give some background about what we know of our Klein origins:
- Michael Klein, who was married to Pauline Grimm, might never have come to America. We have only found passenger records for Pauline and her children, but never her husband. (Pauline arrived in New York in 1892 and in 1897 Brooklyn directory she was listed as a widow.)
- Several references state that Pauline was born in Alsace, Germany. To give a very simplified account of the history of the Alsace region, France ruled the area from 1648-1871, after which time the Treaty of Frankfurt ceded the area to Germany in 1871. The German Empire ruled the area from 1871-1918, after which the area was restored to French rule in the Treaty of Versailles. So during the time that the Klein's emigrated, the area was definitely German.
- One of Pauline's children emigrated later, in 1905. Her passenger record clearly states she was coming from Strasbourg.
Here are some observations and notes:
- The photo probably dates from the 1900s - the presence of the bicycle is clue to that.
- Regarding the label on the building, the word "Wirtschaft" means pub (often had a meaning of hotel). This particular pub apparently belonged to Eugen Antoni. So far, we have not been able to find any connection between that name and our Klein or Grimm family. There is some hope that it might help establish where the photo was taken.
- The men on the right side of the picture are holding what is called a Dreschflegel, in English called a flail used for threshing wheat. The barn located behind them is likely where they were doing the threshing.
Do you have any additional comment or information that could help us further identify this photo? Please contact me!
Our Crown Roots in Ireland
I *think* I have located where our Crown's came from in Ireland! Look up Lurganboy and Manorhamilton in County Leitrum. These are the places about 25km east of Sligo where a pair of twins named Catherine and Charles were baptized in 1866, whose parents were Patrick Crown and Anne Clancy. These same twins appear in the 1870 census in Brooklyn. Catherine did not survive but Charles did. Although Charles H. Crown never married or had children, his claim to fame might have been being busted for breaking prohibition laws!
Meanwhile I also located the death certificate for Patrick Crown who died in Brooklyn in 1903. His parents were listed as Richard Crown and Sarah Meehan. This sent me looking for Richard Crown in the Griffith's Valuation for County Leitrim at a wonderful website called Ask About Ireland. There was one match for Richard Crown in the townland of Pollboy, in the civil parish of Cloonlogher and the barony of Drumhaire. It looks like Richard's property was just across the Shanvaus River, southwest of Lurganboy, denoted on an old map of the area as farm "2a". When comparing that old map to a current-day satellite map, there appears to be a building still standing there, but of course it's hard to tell for sure.
So this is all very exciting. I am in search of more documentation to verify my assumptions here, and will post my findings as they become available.
So this is all very exciting. I am in search of more documentation to verify my assumptions here, and will post my findings as they become available.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Udenhausen - Our German Roots
We've known for a long time about Udenhausen, Prussia, the birth place of our Schaefer immigrants. The problem has been that there are no less than three places of that name in Germany today. So which one is ours? Well, I researched each one (naturally), and rated them by the probability of which was most likely to be ours, based mostly on Catholic population historically. My first choice was a place which is today called Boppard, situated along the Rhine River within an area that has been designated as a World Heritage Site. In
1976, Boppard incorporated several of the small surrounding villages,
which included a village called Udenhausen.
Well, how to proceed? In looking online at German Google, I noticed that the current mayor of Boppard-Undenhausen had the surname Schäfer. Well, of course, Germany is full of people with this surname, but I thought it was worth a shot. I sent Herr Schäfer an email, completely written with Google Translate saying "I know you're busy and you can forward my email to the nearest archives, but I also can't help wondering if we're related...."
A week went by with no reply, so I figured it landed in the ethereal bit bucket. But then on December 15 came an email into my in box, all in German, which of course immediately got pasted into Google Translate. It was from the wife of the mayor! She wrote to say her husband had given her my message, and she was writing to say that I was most definitely NOT related to him. However, SHE was born and raised in Udenhausen, and just happened to have access to the town genealogy, of which she scanned pages pertaining to Schäfer and sent to me. And OMG, there they were - our Schaefer family! There can be no doubt. Next to the name of Peter Schäfer, it says "wandert 1867 in die USA aus".
So that I have it correctly recorded, the village genealogy I refer to is called this:
Bopparder Bürgerbuch / 3 Die Ortsbezirke Buchholz, Herschwiesen, Oppenhausen und Udenhausen by Michael Frauenberger; Bernd Minning; Werner Stoffel, published in Boppard in 2003, it is apparently already out of print.
Here is the summary update based on information from that book:
Johannes Schäfer married Margareta Gipp in 1824. The information we had previously for Margareta was a maiden name of Gibb, but with German pronunciations, the letters B and P are often interchanged between German and English.
This couple had 10 children, in this birth order: Paul, Gerhard, Elisabeth, A. Maria, Johannes, A. Maria (yes it was common to name children the same name if the first one died), Philipp, Anna, Peter, and Josef.
Knowing that Philip also emigrated to America shortly after his brother Peter, I checked his birth date as recorded in Germany. It matches exactly with Phil's gravestone in Murray, Iowa: July 3, 1838. Bingo.
As if this news were not big enough, the town genealogy also takes our family tree back TWO more generations on both the Schäfer and Gipp side, which is to say around the 1750's. I know enough German history at this point to know that was a time when Germany was just coming out of the Thirty-Year War (which reduced the German population by half), and was about to enter the Seven-Year War. And by the time our gg-grandfather emigrated 100 years later, he was probably trying to get away from serving in the army of Mr. Otto von Bismarck, who, by the way, didn't much like Catholics. Wouldn't we like to know the whole story?
But here we are, knowing about Boppard. The mayor's wife has offered to host a visit when she will be happy to show me around. It's hard to believe. We actually found Udenhausen.
Well, how to proceed? In looking online at German Google, I noticed that the current mayor of Boppard-Undenhausen had the surname Schäfer. Well, of course, Germany is full of people with this surname, but I thought it was worth a shot. I sent Herr Schäfer an email, completely written with Google Translate saying "I know you're busy and you can forward my email to the nearest archives, but I also can't help wondering if we're related...."
A week went by with no reply, so I figured it landed in the ethereal bit bucket. But then on December 15 came an email into my in box, all in German, which of course immediately got pasted into Google Translate. It was from the wife of the mayor! She wrote to say her husband had given her my message, and she was writing to say that I was most definitely NOT related to him. However, SHE was born and raised in Udenhausen, and just happened to have access to the town genealogy, of which she scanned pages pertaining to Schäfer and sent to me. And OMG, there they were - our Schaefer family! There can be no doubt. Next to the name of Peter Schäfer, it says "wandert 1867 in die USA aus".
So that I have it correctly recorded, the village genealogy I refer to is called this:
Bopparder Bürgerbuch / 3 Die Ortsbezirke Buchholz, Herschwiesen, Oppenhausen und Udenhausen by Michael Frauenberger; Bernd Minning; Werner Stoffel, published in Boppard in 2003, it is apparently already out of print.
Here is the summary update based on information from that book:
Johannes Schäfer married Margareta Gipp in 1824. The information we had previously for Margareta was a maiden name of Gibb, but with German pronunciations, the letters B and P are often interchanged between German and English.
This couple had 10 children, in this birth order: Paul, Gerhard, Elisabeth, A. Maria, Johannes, A. Maria (yes it was common to name children the same name if the first one died), Philipp, Anna, Peter, and Josef.
Knowing that Philip also emigrated to America shortly after his brother Peter, I checked his birth date as recorded in Germany. It matches exactly with Phil's gravestone in Murray, Iowa: July 3, 1838. Bingo.
As if this news were not big enough, the town genealogy also takes our family tree back TWO more generations on both the Schäfer and Gipp side, which is to say around the 1750's. I know enough German history at this point to know that was a time when Germany was just coming out of the Thirty-Year War (which reduced the German population by half), and was about to enter the Seven-Year War. And by the time our gg-grandfather emigrated 100 years later, he was probably trying to get away from serving in the army of Mr. Otto von Bismarck, who, by the way, didn't much like Catholics. Wouldn't we like to know the whole story?
But here we are, knowing about Boppard. The mayor's wife has offered to host a visit when she will be happy to show me around. It's hard to believe. We actually found Udenhausen.
Getting Started
As mentioned on my web page, it's taken me awhile to get started with this blog. The purpose is to post periodic updates regarding my research pertaining to the Schaefer-Crown family. It serves as a log for me and updates for any family (or others) who are interested. Enjoy!
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