Johnny, I'm not researching either of the surnames you mentioned, but I did a quick check of ancestry.com for a Joseph Holstein and George Heisler and found many people with these names. Do you have any other information on the people in whom you are interested that might help narrow the field?

Hi Catherine, I had already researched ancestry.com and found the father of the Joseph I was searching for and his father Joshua. I am trying now to find where they came from in Germany originally. I spent six years in Germany and know the country fairly well. It would be nice to know. It is the same for George Heisler, where in Germany?

I received a very nice e-mail from a gentleman in Germany who lives in Essenheim and has done much research on families from that town. I have an ancestor named Braunewell from that town. He said that there is still a Braunewell family in Essenheim who owns a winery, where a family reunion was held. Quite a few of the Braunewell family made their way to America. It would be interesting to make contact here in the US. Any Braunewells out there?

I am trying to find record of my Great Grandmother. Her name according to County of Alameda, Certificate of Death, information given by her daughter, Mary Holmes/Smith, city of Oakland.
Wilhelmina Nesensohn/Holmes
Husband: Samuel Oliver Holmes
Father: Mathew Nesensohn
she was born: May 21 1855 in Germany,
died: July 30 1940. I find her in the 1900,1910 us census, as well as,California Death Index.
I have personaly verified and viewed her family Headstone and from the Cemetery itself.
In the 1900 US Federal Census, living in Oakland Ca. Ward 2 with husband and 6 children. It also shows year of immigration to US. as 1873.
With this info I am still unable to find anything else, like who was her mother? My Father said she was from Karlsruhe, my Aunt says Baden.
Anybody have any suggestions?

Hello. I have many German ancestors but the one I am most interested in at the moment is Wilhelm Heinrich Bergfeld, born 30 May 1868 in or near Magdeburg. Arrived in Galveston, TX at age 14 in 1882, traveling either with his mother or grandmother. I have requested his naturalization record from Caldwell County, TX and hope that gives more details. However, would LOVE to see any record of him prior to his immigration....names of parents or other family in Germany. Thanks.

Marcy and Susan, German civil or church records might be a place to look, and according to familysearch.org, the Family History Centers have microfilms of this kind of information for both Magdeburg and Karlsruhe (Susan, your father and aunt may both be right--Karlsruhe is a city in the old state of Baden). Unfortunately, though, both Madgeburg and Karlsruhe are big enough to have several divisions, each with their own churches, etc., so a search through the records could be long and tedious unless you can narrow down the area you need. One suggestion another user of this group made a little while ago was to check phone books for the various areas and see if people with your surname now seem to fall into one area or another, then check that area's church and civil records in the hopes that the family has had a consistent presence in that area.
Michael Boscarato (below) suggested trying www.dastelefonbuch.de for this latter kind of check.

Catherine, Thank you so much for your information, it sure gives me plenty to keep me busy for sure.

On all the papers I have so far regarding my grandparents country of birth states they were born in Prussia or Germany. I have found grandfather August Pust on Italia ship passenger manifest coming out of Swinemunde with Zehrten as orgin. My grandmother is elusive though. I'm not sure if she came over with family and married William Brose in Minnesota or if they were married when they immigrated. On his passenger manifest it doesn't show her there. On the 1900 Census it is listed that her immigration year was 1884. On a paper that has been in the family for some time her name shows as Johanna Luecke or Lueke --not sure. Swift County His. Soc. have given all they can find on both William and Johanna. They found my grandparents marriage in 1895 but nothing on what happened to William leaving her either widow or what. Any suggestions? Thanks

I am interested in sharing stories and ancestors with descendents of immigrants from Venne, Ostercappeln (Niedersachsen) Germany. My husband's families are from Venne and neighboring villages where we have made good friends. A very detailed book on the lives of tenant farmers in Venne who emigrated in the 19th century, including a list of over 2000 immigrants and their destinations, is Venne in America by Udo Thoerner. More details on the book and websites for Venne on my blog.

Helen, found the following naturalization info for Johanna Brose on ancestry.com:
Minnesota Naturalization Records Indes 1854-1957
Johann Brose
County: Swift
Reel 1
Code 3
Vol A-3
p 199
declaration of intent
years 1888-1907 & 1909
numbers 1-448
I also found the following description of how to use this info to obtain more information about the naturalization documents:

Source Information
Peterzen, Conrad, ed.. Minnesota Naturalization Records Index, 1854-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: The Generations Network, Inc., 1999.

About Minnesota Naturalization Records Index, 1854-1957
Several years ago, the Iron Range Research Center purchased the entire set of microfilmed Minnesota County Naturalization Records (61 counties) from the Minnesota Historical Society. Because the record set was one of the most widely used records in the Iron Range Research Center, it quickly became apparent that the indexes to the records were incomplete and often inaccurate. Conrad Peterzen, a Research Center volunteer, resolved to make a new comprehensive index to the entire set. His index recorded the name of each person requesting citizenship and included the following information: Spouses name, county of residence, microfilm reel reference, print volume, and page number. The index also includes records of people who were denied citizenship and those who never completed the process. The present version of the index contains all of the 61 counties and roughly over 865,000 records.

The fact that spouses are listed in the index can be especially important because before 1922, women became citizens through their husbands and did not have their own papers. This index provides the necessary information for researchers to access the original papers in the microfilm collection. The microfilmed papers contain most of the relevant genealogical information, i.e., dates and places of birth and marriage.

Note: While most of the locations refer to counties, the following names are cities in St. Louis County: Ely, Duluth, Hibbing, and Virginia.

To receive additional information and forms to access your ancestor's naturalization documents, please contact: Iron Range Research Center

To contact the Iron Range Research Center directly, you can write them at:

Iron Range Research Center
ATTN: Naturalization
801 SW Hwy. 169, Suite 1
Chisholm, MN 55719

Phone: (218) 254-7959

Fax: (218) 254-7971

Email:yourroots@ironworld.com

Please include as much information as possible.

Helen--I meant to type Johanna, not Johann. As a PS, William Brose's naturalization record has the exact same citation as Johanna's. T

Carolyn, My ancestors were in the Venne immigrants. My 3rd great-grandfather was Johann Heinrich Tormohlen, they wer from Osanbruck.

I'm researching my great grandparents Jacob and Esther Dicker who arrived in New York sometime between 1880 and 1900. Their Daughter is Minnie Mildred Dicker (my fathers mother). My grandmother never told anyone her history or anything about her family. My sister just found information that leads us to believe that Minnie and her family were German Jewish, she found Minnie and 3 other siblings had possibly been taken from thier home and put into a Hebrew asylum in Brooklyn NY. Trouble is that we have no documentation on minnies birth or her parents birth due to a fire where the records were held.


Does anyone have advice on where to start? I thought maybe court documents from that time period but don't know what to ask for exactly, or even where to look for such records.

Wow thank you Michael, This is them......great english...lol. Minnie's sister should be Doris and I believe there are two more siblings. My sister has some census records and from year to year you can see the children gone and then back again. The record of Harold (another brother) and Minnie has been found in the census of the Hebrew Childrens Asylum abt. 1911 to 1918 which matches them missing from the home census. In that one the parents are from Austria and the kids speak german. Just can't seem to push past the kids to see where the parents are actually from. and now we have another mystery to solve, Why were the children removed? Not hard to conjecture being that immigrants had a very difficult time surviving the first few years after getting here.

Thank you so much for looking this up for me, you're a great help.

Cheryl, don't forget that before WWI, Austria and Hungary were parts of a dual kingdom--Austria-Hungary--and before 1867, Hungary was part of the Hapsburg (Austrian) empire. Possibly, your ancestors came from the Hungarian side of Austria. See http://www.answers.com/topic/austria-hungary for multiple encyclopedia entries about Austria-Hungary.

Wow, Michael! You did some amazing and very helpful research for Cheryl! Good for you!! Nice to see people on here so willing to help each other. =)

Oh my! LOL, thank you again Michael, My sister is Dian, she's also searching in areas I can't pay for. Did you message her? We've been doing this for a long time and seem to end up going in circles. I haven't seen that info on Esther, that's a great find.

Thank you too Catherine, I didn't know about the Hungary/Austria connection.

You all have been so wonderful here and I'm very grateful for all the help you've given.

I have been researching my paternal Rhinesmith surname for a number of years. So far, I have a direct, unbroken lineage to Johannes Reinschmit (Reinschmidt) b. 1728 in Germany, d. 03/01/1787 Northampton Co., PA. Trying to find origin and ancestry in Germany. Evidence suggests Siegerland Rhineland - Pfaltz area, possibly Plittershagen, Neunkirchen-Altenselbach, Eisern. Agreeable to exchange data with other researchers of this line.

I am searching for my great grandfathers family. His name was Herman Samuel Neumann (father name Gottfried) born 1871. All I know of him is that he was a sailor on the ship Bertha which arrived in South Australia in 1893 from Amsterdam (Holland). His naturalisation papers state his birthplace as Clein Lukto. Has anyone heard of this place? Any suggestions?

I am researching the Hoff family from North Codorus, my great x 7 grandfather Johann Adam Hoff b: 1704 came to america in 1730. While researching at the Historical Society in York Co., I came acrossed a packet of papers that some one had written stating that the Hoff family are descendants of the Vanderhoff's of Holland and also have been called Von Hoff. This is to be one of the most ancient names in Switzerland and possed from the beginning the honors of Nobility. The front page of this documents gives three individuals going back to 1130. The next page starts with Johann Adam Hoff my Great x 7 grandfather pages after that has his son Heinrich and his family which would be my Great x 6 grandfathers brother. Any idea where to start looking to see if the above information could be right?

Shonda, Since there is no information in your packet on your specific family between 1130 and 1704,I'm going to guess that the first page of the packet came from a generic book on family origins rather than proof of relationship, so you are right to want to look further! You need to know the town where Johann Adam Hoff was born, then you can check for church records (many Germany records are available on microfilm via your local Family History Center). Most church records only go back as far as the 1500s. Before that time, records for commoners were pretty much non-existent, but if, as you work backwards, you find a connection to nobility, you may be able to find the nobles mentioned in ancient governmental documents, which may be available at the various staat (state) or stadt (city) archives in Germany. (Switzerland is a more difficult place to trace ancestors due to the country's privacy laws, but some records are available at the FHC and other places--see http://genealogy.about.com/od/switzerland/Swiss_Genealogy_Family_Hi....)

Note, also that "von" merely means "of" and was used in front of a city or town's name by both nobility and commoners who came from the same place. As one genealogist explained to me, a German noble will always have "von" in his name but a name with "von" is not always "noble."

I have traced my Hoff's back to Anthonius Hoff b: 1616 not sure where in Germany he was born but I found death 4 March 1677 Heddesdorf, Germany. I have not been able to trace back any further than that. As for the packet that I found I believe that it was typed up by this Ruby Ellis at the bottom it states Note: and then list as Grandma Stauffer, born, died and grandpa Stauffer born and died and a uncle Bert. There is actually names given the first paragraph states The ancestor of the family was the Swiss Knight, Ludolff Von Hoff who flourished about the year of 1130 and that he was the commander (Stadt Hauptmann or Mauptamann hard to tell if it is a H or a M) of the city of Bern and the possessor of numerous rich estates.

The Next paragraph gives a Walter Von Hoff on of Ludolff's descendants accomplished vbyer important services for the Emperor Rudolf I for which in the year of 1268 he was invested by the latter with the Austrian honor of free baron of the empire.

I actually laughed when I found this b/c I find it very hard to believe that my Hoff's would have any nobility, but then I could be wrong.

Even more interesting--Stauffers were Dukes of Swabia and some of them were Holy Roman Emperors, including Frederic Barbarossa. I don't really know anything about the Stauffers except that the city of Schwabisch Gmund, where I visited with my husband on a business trip, claims to be the oldest city of the Stauffers. It has a very beautiful old city center!

I played around on the web trying to find out if the Germans have some kind of official peerage book, and I found several mentions of a series of books nicknamed, "The Gotha," apparently highly respected for accuracy of the info it contains, although it does not necessarily contain all nobles. Genwiki gives the complete title of the Gotha; I don't know if you can find the book outside of Germany. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nobility

I am new to this group and wouold like to tell you of my interests. My family emigrated from the area northeast of Berlin known as the Uckermark. A large town in the area is Prenslau. The names are Wagner, Buehring, Hofert, Maas, Roggow, Buller, Lindow and Giertz. They came to Niagara County New York and went west to WI, In and MI. Any help appreciated.

i, I am looking for information on Fleckenstein from Bavaria, Germany

I hope someone here knows something of the Hungarian language. We found a ww2 draft card of a Jacob Dicker. If he didn't speak very good english or didn't learn to write the language very well, what could the actual spelling of " Trabershar" be? That is what he put as his home town in Hungry but I can't find anything like it in searching the web.

LOL, translation please Michael. I went to the link and it was pretty interesting but didn't have what I was looking for, but what a coincedence about a Dicker PHD in languages? Where did you pull up the names from Budapest? Are there dates too?

I am new to the site more or less, and I am tracing my husband line named Druck. Looking for information on a Fredrick and Catherin who came to America sometime in the late 1700's to early 1800's.

I am new at genealogy and wouldn't you know I hit a brick wall right away. My great grandfather, Phillip Rottman, born about 1835, Bavaria. I only know that because I found him on the 1880 Census in Iowa. He married Mary Eva Reeder, born 1849 France, but do not know the date. Their children are John, born 1870 Georgia, Anna, born 1874 Missouri, Malissa, born 1875 Pennsylvania, Charles (my grandfather) born 1877 Iowa, Mabel, born 1879 Iowa and George, born 1882 Iowa. I found the family in the 1880 US Census and the 1885 Iowa State Census. Mary Eva died 1899 and is buried in Mount Vernon Cemetery, Mount Vernon, Iowa. But I can find nothing on Phillip and I don't really know where to start looking. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Barb

Thank you, Michael......it's a place to start.....Thanks

Thank you again, Michael...I have been in contact with the Linn County G.S. but have not heard back from them yet......

One of my brick walls is a German ancestor...I have been searching Bavarian Cemeteries for the family name.....in that search I learned that in Germany re-use of grave plots is very common. You/your family "rent" the plot for 20-25 years (the time varies from state to state). When that time period is up, church or civil authorities approach the family/next of kin concerning rental renewal. If the next of kin cannot be found or choose not to renew, the plot is reallocated and reused. My question, what do they do with coffins and bodies that have been resting there for 20-25 years....and this has to be a genealogists nightmare when it comes to searching for older graves.

That is very interesting to know. Thank you for sharing!

I am fairly new at German genealogy research, but am more than willing to share what ever I have or happen to run across....

I can't speak for all German cemeteries, but we visited one in Stuttgart-Vaihingen, where the current cemetery is on the only hill in town, and it is a hill because they periodically bring in a new 6 feet of dirt, and pile it on top the existing graves. The same grave-holes were not actually reused, so no coffins were moved, just a new layer put on type of an older one. I don't know what they did with old gravestones, however. We didn't see any there from before the early 1900s. However,in Schwabisch Gmund, some quite old tombstones which had been removed from cemeteries were embedded into the outside of the church wall. I would suspect this was only done for people who had been prominent--nobility, rich merchants, and the like--but don't know for sure.

I don't know that it happens in all German cemeteries, I was just searching Interment.net for a family name, and the "rental" blurb was posted on almost every cemetery I searched, saying that it was very common in Germany.....

Thank you, Michael for the websites......I have a translation page I use, but it is fun trying to brush up on my two semesters of college German.....

When I visited Germany the old cemetery was covered with the new one. I had an old cemetery picture from my grandmother but the new one on top. You may have to talk to the church to find out.

Check out http://www.genealogywise.com/video/centennia-mapping-software .

The trailer shows a quick changing picture of Germany from 1850 to the present.

I am not advocating the purchase of this software--and, in fact, have not bought it myself--but the "trailer" which shows a quick changing picture of Germany from 1850 (when Germany's states first tried to unify) to the present, is worth watching for those of us trying to figure out how German geography may affect our research. Realize Germany didn't become unified until the 1870's under Bismarck, and, even then, "dukedoms" remained until after WWI. From a genealogy standpoint, it's even worse before 1850, when Germany was not unified at all but was divided into states which sometimes owned land outside the state's geographic boundaries (Bavaria, e.g., not only included the land of current Bavaria, in the southeast around Munich, but also had land along the Rhine in the northwest.)

I followed Catherine Davis' suggestion, but could not find the software in their store under centennia. Suggestions?

Click on the link in Catherine's Comment. Just below the video box is another link to their store, click on that. In the center section, it is the third item in the list. Legacy is selling it for $60. Or, you can go to the Centennia site and pay $80
Legacy store link:
http://www.legacyfamilytreestore.com/SearchResults.asp?Cat=5
The Clockwork site:
http://www.clockwk.com/p1.asp?x=1u

Bob, thanks for a cheaper alternative. Linda

This may already be posted but I couldn't find it. Here are two web sites for German researchers. They are both in German so you may have to work a little harder than usual.

http://wiki-de.genealogy.net/Hauptseite
http://www.online-ofb.de/ this one has information by village or town.

On online-ofb.de, it's possible to go to the left column "Sprachen", click on English [or whatever] and the site is translated for you.

Trying to check out the site that Marianne mentioned...online-ofb.de. Having trouble finding the 'Sprachen' link that will translate the site to English. How am I missing it?

You need to first go to the page that shows the map with the various locations - Sprachen is at the left

"Sprachen" doesn't show up on the page that appears on my computer either. Instead, "translate" (in English) appeared at the right hand edge of a bar across the top of the page.

I just tried it and my "google translate" automatically translated it

Looks like I wasn't totally clear in my post. First, click on the location in which you are interested. When it opens, there will be a sidebar to the left with "Sprachen" about halfway down and several languages listed. Click on the language you want and the copy is translated.

I just bought a old book (all in German) printed in 1897 in Berlin. Title "David Müller - Geschichte des deutschen Volkes" Interesting trying to read it. Lots of Names and dates.