Sunday, April 23, 2023

The Gransee and Riege Families

The obituary published in the Lena (Illinois) Star for my great-great grandmother, Ernestine Marie Gransee Hoeft, in 1923 did not mention her parent’s names or hometown except that she was from Germany.  The obituary said some sisters were still living in Germany at that time but no names. More recently I discovered that Ernestine’s mother, Dorothea was married a second time and had a second family.

Ernestine’s mother, Dorothea Sophia Hagedorn, was born to Christian Friedrich Hagedorn[i] and Anna Christina Blaesing[ii] in 1813[iii] in Prellwitz, Deutsche Krone, West Prussia, now Przelwice in Poland, about 125 miles west northwest of Berlin, Germany.[iv]  A brother, Carl August Hagedorn was born in 1817.[v] A second brother, named Carl Friedrich August Hagedorn, was born in 1818 and the birthplace was listed as Markisch Friedland in Deutsch Krone.[vi]

Dorothea was married to Friedrich Wilhelm Gransee on 26 December 1839 in Gross Latzkow, Kreis Pyritz, Pommern[vii], about fifty miles west of Dorothea’s birthplace in Prellwitz. Friedrich was born around 1813. His father was listed as Johann Gransee in the marriage record.  There is a town named Gransee in the province of Brandenburg about thirty miles north of Berlin but I haven’t found a connection with the town and the Gransee family.

Dorothea and Friedrich’s daughter, Ernestine Marie, was born in Schönow, Kreis Pyritz, Pommern on 20 February 1841[viii], a few miles away from Gross Latzkow. When Ernestine was baptized among her sponsors were Ernestine Gransee, Ferdinand Gransee from Schönow, August Muller from Schönow, Carl Gransee, and [undeciphered] Hoeft. Ernestine’s brother, Friedrich August Wilhelm, was born 18 April 1844 in Schönow.[ix]  Friedrich’s sponsors included Ernestine Gransee, Ferdinand Gransee and [undeciphered] Gransee. Two days after Friedrich birth in 1844, his and Ernestine’s father, Friedrich, died on April 20.[x] 

Six months later, on 6 October 1844, widow Dorothea married Wilhelm Riege of Schönow. Wilhelm was the son of Michael Riege of Landsberg.[xi]  Remaining in Schönow two children were born between 1846 and 1847. Marie Caroline Louise in 1846. The baptismal sponsors included Louise Beier, Maria Siedschlag, [undeciphered] Siedschlag, Ludwig Schroeder, and August Reiter or Reuter.[xii] Carl Friedrich August was born in 1847. The baptismal sponsors included Henriette Riege of Berlinchen, Friedrich [undeciphered] of Berlinchen, and Joseph Schultz of Schönow. [xiii] Caroline died in infancy[xiv] and August died at age 6 in 1853[xv].  In 1850 a daughter Henriette Auguste Amelie was born. The baptismal sponsors include Amalie [undeciphered], [undeciphered] Reuther, and [undeciphered] Siedschlag.[xvi] In 1852 a son, Carl Friedrich Wilhelm. was born. Baptismal sponsors were Auguste Ringhand and Amalie [undeciphered].[xvii]

One more potential child, Christine Wilhelmine Louise Riege was born in Gross Latzkow on 13 December 1859. [xviii]  A couple of questions are raised by the record.  First, the father’s name is recorded as William Riehe, rather than Riege.  Variable are spellings are not uncommon and comparing the other entries the letter h and letter g are distinct in the recorder’s hand.  Dorothea’s age would be forty-six, perhaps at a high end for potential childbearing.

Ernestine Gransee married Karl Hoeft around 1864 in Falkenberg, Pyritz, Pommern.[xix]  Their first child, a daughter, named Wilhelmine Augusta Fredericka Hoeft was born in Falkenberg in 1865.[xx] Their son, Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Hoeft, my great-grandfather, was born in Berlinchen in 1869.[xxi] Karl, Sr. was listed as a laborer in Berlinchen. 

Ernestine’s brother Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Riege married Augustine Kaeding in Berlinchen in 1878[xxii].  Augustine was a native of Berlinchen.  A record notes that Carl’s parents, Wilhelm and Dorothea were living in Trampe which was about four or five miles northwest of Berlinchen.[xxiii] Carl and Auguste lived in Berlinchen.  Auguste died in 1883 at the age of thirty-seven.[xxiv]  No further records were found for Carl Riege or records indicating if there were any children or if he re-married.

Ernestine’s sister, Henriette Auguste Amalia married Christian Friedrich Wilhlem Perske in 1872 in Berlinchen.  This is according to research at FamilySearch.org by Lester Ludwig.  An actual marriage record is not available to view.[xxv] A son, Franz Friedrich Wilhelm Perske, was born in 1875 in Berlinchen.[xxvi]  Henriette died in 1929 so she would have been alive when her sister Ernestine passed away in 1923.  Franz Perske is found in Berlin where he died in 1928. Franz’s first wife was Minna Agnes Ottilie Gudenschwager who he had three children with – Franz Walter Curt Perske, Georg Alfred Werner Perske, and Gertrud Charlotte Hildegard Perske.  His second wife was Mathilde Minna Hedwig de le Roi, who he married in Berlinchen in 1919.

Ernestine Gransee Hoeft, her husband Karl Hoeft and children came to America in 1883 and settled in Green County, Wisconsin.  Ernestine’s brother, Friedrich August Wilhelm Gransee, came to America in 1879 and settled in Dickson County, Tennessee where the surname became Grunsaa. He had married Auguste Emilie Ackerman in Schönow in 1868.

If any of the Riege family came to America is unknown.  There are certainly many entries in Ancestry.com for the Riege surname, especially in southern Wisconsin.  The Perske surname shows up a lot in Milwaukee and Marathon Counties. No connection has yet been established.

The research shows that at least one sister, Henriette Perske, may have been alive in Germany in 1923 but the others appear to have died young.   There certainly may be sisters that have not been discovered. 

Many people without land or another profession worked as day-laborers or contracted to work for what was called a Gutbesitzer or large proprietor on agricultural estates.  The proprietors often gave the workers just enough to remain in good working condition but not enough pay to either acquire their own property or immigrate. [xxvii] The pattern for moving from one estate or another can be seen when children are born in different communities in the same county like Pyritz.

Any research conclusions are subject to change pending additional research or new information.


[i] There is death record for Christian in 1828 that recorded a birth year of 1787. "Deutschland, Preußen, Westpreußen, Katholische und Lutherisch Kirchenbücher, 1537-1981", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6Z73-WZBJ : 16 July 2021), Christian Friedrich Hagedorn, 1828.

[ii] As the records become more sparse for the eighteenth century there are several candidates for the Anna’s potential parents in Schloppe based on an estimated birth date of the late 1780s or 1790s, these people also had children born before 1800. Though I cannot identify a birth record for Anna Christine at this time . Gotffried Blaesing and Anna Christine Luecker. Johann Blaesing and Dorothea Elisabeth Kuehter. Friedrich Blaesing and Anna Catharina Skiescken. Michael Blaesing and Maria Elisabeth Graehlern. Christian Blaesing and Dorothea Sophia Steltern.

[iii] "Deutschland, Preußen, Westpreußen, Katholische und Lutherisch Kirchenbücher, 1537-1981", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6Z73-GS6Z : 16 July 2021), Anna Christina Blaesingen in entry for Dorathea Sophia Hagedorn, 1813. Commentary: There are several sources for determining Dorothea’s birthdate.  The first being an actual is the baptismal record noted here as 29 April 1813.  The second is her marriage recorded in 1839 in endnote iii.  Her record age was is 23 which put the birth year between 1816 and 1817.  Her second marriage record in 1844 listed her age as 27 which puts the birth year between 1817 and 1818.

[iv] “West Prussia was inhabited by pagan Slavic tribes before the Teutonic Knights moved in the early 1300's. The Knights kept the land they conquered and eventually cut off Poland from the sea. This caused a lot of friction between the two groups. The Knights also bought land from Poland rather than just taking it. The Teutonic Knights lost important battles to Poland in 1410 and 1466 and signed over most of West Prussia to Poland and became a subservient state to the Polish King. Germans had been colonizing eastern Europe for centuries; most church records started between 1650 to 1750, but a few go back to the 16th century. The original land, (often called Polish Prussia), that was to become West Prussia, was predominantly Polish. West Prussia came into existence during the first Partition of Poland in 1772 when Prussia (later known as East Prussia) gained the area called Polish Prussia. Poland disappeared as a sovereign nation until 1918. With Brandenburg on the west, West Prussia in the middle, and East Prussia on the east, Prussia became a dominant power.” Germanic Genealogy Society - https://ggsmn.org/cpage.php?pt=39

[v] https://www.ancestry.com/mediaui-viewer/collection/1030/tree/20262271/person/921748135/media/931f4a68-7375-40af-a3bd-c5255521f37d?_phsrc=lEv4921&_phstart=successSource. The complete transcription: Gebohrene im Jahr 1817 Nr. 2 Am 25. Februar wurde hieselbst dem Hausinn Christian Friedrich Hagedorn von seiner Ehefrau Anna Christine Blaesingen ein Sohn gebohren welcher amten Maertz getaufet und Carl August genannt. Zeugen: 1) Adam Bart 2) Anna Christine Steltern 3) Marie Elisabeth Barten. Another transcription of the record in FamilySearch.org lists the father as Henr. Friedrich Hagedorn and mother as Anna Christina Blaesingen.

[vi] "Deutschland, Preußen, Westpreußen, Katholische und Lutherisch Kirchenbücher, 1537-1981", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CSGD-S3B7-K?cc=4111605 : 20 December 2022), > image 1 of 1. Baptism on 22 Jan 1818. The birthplace is recorded as Friedland which is mostly likely is the community Märkisch Friedland  situated in a sandy plain of West Prussia , where this province [Deutsch Krone] presses like a wedge into the provinces of Pomerania and Brandenburg. This primarily Protestant community had one of the largest Jewish populations in the area. (Deshmukh, Marion F.. Max Liebermann: Modern Art and Modern Germany. United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis, 2017. p.34.). The community was also the hometown of Max Liebermann, a noted German Impressionist painter. Karl Friedrich Kloeden, a German historian, left his impression of Friedland: "We found the country round Markisch-Friedland less pleasant that that whiche we had left, but in the town itself there was more life and greater commercial activity.  There was only one church, and that had no tower; but, to make up for this deficiency, the lord of the manor had a fine castle with a tower and a moat, and behind the moat was a wild sort of garden." Klöden, Karl Friedrich von. The Self-made Man: Autobiography of Karl Friedrich Von Klöden. United Kingdom: Strahan & Company, 1876. P. 118. Hanne Eleonore Hagedorn was baptized 26 April 1818 in Zutzer. ("Deutschland, Preußen, Westpreußen, Katholische und Lutherisch Kirchenbücher, 1537-1981", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CSGD-S3BF-N?cc=4111605 : 20 December 2022), > image 1 of 1). The father was listed as Friedrich Hagedorn.  Brother or cousin to Christian Friedrich Hagedorn?

[vii] Gross Latzkow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.117. Only one record provides a marriage date in 1839 to Friederich Wilhelm Gransee or Gransoeg transcribed. In the birth records for Ernestine and Wilhelm, the father is listed either as Wilhelm or Friedrich Wilhelm. 

 [viii] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.113. Ernestine Gransee’s birth record only includes Marie as her first name with father Friedrich Wilhelm and mother Sophia. Ernestine’s death certificate also indicates this as her birthdate. The baptismal record includes the sponsors: Ernestine Gransee of Hohenfelde, Ferdinand Gransee of Schonow, August Miller of Schonow, and [undeciphered] Hoeft of Schonow, and Carl Gransee of [undeciphered]. The Hamburg Passenger list from 1883 recorded her departure age as 42 with a birth year of 1841. The 1900 U.S. Census recorded Ernestine’s age as 59 with a February 1841 birthdate. The 1920 U.S. Census recorded her age as 77 with an estimated birth year as 1843 or 1844.

 [ix] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.130. A marriage record from 1868 lists Wilhelm’s age as 24 with a birth year of 1844.  A New York passenger list dated 1879 lists the age as 34 with an estimated  birth year of 1844 or 1845. The 1900 U.S. Census recorded an age of 56 with an April 1844 birthdate. The 1910 U.S. Census recorded an age of 66 with an estimated 1844 birth year. The 1920 Census recorded an age of 75 with an estimated birth year of 1844 or 1845.

 [x] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.132. The death record contains the name Wilhelm Gransee, aged 33, of Schönow which would be about the right age for Friedrich Wilhelm.

[xi] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.131.  The record indicates the spouse is Wilhelm Friedrich Riege of Schonow, son of Michael Riege of Landsberg an der Warthe.  Dorothea Sophia Hagedorn is record as daughter of Christian Friedrich Hagedorn of Schonow. (Though it is believed Christian died in 1828.) The record does not indicate that she would have been a widow (Witwe) of Friedrich Gransee.

[xii] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.141

 [xiii] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.146

 [xiv] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.144

[xv] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.178

 [xvi] "Deutschland, Preußen, Pommern, Katholische und Lutherisch Kirchenbücher, 1544-1966", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:2:HMMS-W2PP : 14 June 2022), Entry for Henriette Auguste Amalie Riege, 1850.

[xvii] Schönow. Pomerania, Germany, Parish Register Transcripts, 1544-1883.Ancestry.com. Kirchenbuchduplikate Pommern. Digital images. Landesamt für Kultur und Denkmalpflege, Landesarchiv Greifswald. Greifswald, Deutschland.Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.2015.Provo, UT, USA. P.170

 [xviii] "Deutschland, Preußen, Pommern, Kirchenbücher 1544-1945," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2HFN-1TB : 9 March 2021), Dorothea Sophie Hagedorn in entry for Christine Wilhelm Louise Riehe, 13 Dec 1859; citing Birth, Latzkow, Pyritz, Pommern, Prussia Germany, Landesarchiv Greifswald, Greifswald (Greifswald Provincial Archives, Greifswald); FHL microfilm 1,334,587.

[xix] "Deutschland, Preußen, Pommern, Kirchenbücher 1544-1945," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:9392-8T9W-ML?cc=1874205&wc=MKH2-L24%3A171336501%2C171897001%2C171979701%2C171494402 : 20 May 2014), Pommern > Pyritz > Evangelische Kirche Fürstensee:Falkenberg > Taufen, Heiraten, Tote 1824-1874 > image 153 of 196; Landesarchiv Greifswald, Greifswald (Greifswald Provincial Archives, Greifswald).

[xx] "Illinois Deaths and Stillbirths, 1916-1947," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:NQX4-Z14 : accessed 21 November 2015), William Busjahn in entry for Wilhemina Augusta Friedericka Busjahn, 04 Dec 1939; Public Board of Health,

[xxi] Ancestry.com. Germany, Select Births and Baptisms, 1558-1898 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.

[xxii] Berlinchen, Krs. Soldin. Heiratsregister. Landesarchiv Berlin; Berlin, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister 1876-1945; laufendenummer: 3575. Ancestry.com. Eastern Prussian Provinces, Germany [Poland], Selected Civil Vitals, 1874-1945 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016.  Image 41 or 80.

[xxiv] Ibid.

[xxv] https://www.ortsfamilienbuecher.de/famreport.php?ofb=berlinchen&ID=I9156&nachname=Riege&modus=&lang=de. The connection to the Riege family is sparsely documented.  At the reference site for Auguste Riege no family or parents are listed except for a notation that Auguste was born in 1850 and married someone with the surname Perske. A baptismal record for Henriette Auguste Amalie is found in FamilySearch.org.  The birth year is 1850 and the parents are Wilhelm Riege and Dorothea Sophie Hagedorn. With the presence of her brother, her parents nearby, and sister Ernestine Gransee Hoeft in Berlinchen – it seems plausible that she is the same person. While the reference to a Perske does not name the spouse, there is a Wilhelm Perske born in Berlinchen in 1847 and died in 1930 in Berlinchen.  Auguste died in Berlinchen in 1929. 

[xxvi] Landesarchiv Berlin; Berlin, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister 1876-1945; laufendenummer: 3550. Eastern Prussian Provinces, Germany [Poland], Selected Civil Vitals, 1874-1945. Ancestry.com. Ancestry.com Operations, Inc. 2016. Provo, UT, USA. Franz Friedrich Wilhelm Perske was born in Berlinchen to Wilhelm and Auguste Perske. A marriage record from 1901 also lists Wilhelm and Auguste Perske as parents. A marriage record from 1919 also lists the same parents.  The connections are made due to the parent’s names being the same and that Berlinchen is also a common denominator. 

[xxvii] Wisconsin Magazine of History. United States, State Historical Society of Wisconsin., 1917. P. 312.


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Friday, April 21, 2023

Johann Heinrich (Henry) Kundert (1850-1926) walks to the Dakota Territory

 

"Mr. [Henry] Kundert, Sr., came to the United States in 1853 with his mother and their first location was in Wisconsin. He walked from Wisconsin to Lincoln, Nebraska, and a little later from Lincoln to Beresford, South Dakota [Dakota Territory], where he took up a homestead claim which he improved and farmed until 1898.  He then sold the property and with the proceeds bought land in the central part of South Dakota.  He operated an entire section of land and made a specialty of breeding Poland China hogs and being very successful both in his breeding and farming operations he became a very wealthy man.  He is now seventy-three years old and he and his wife are living in Yankton, South Dakota. Mrs. Kundert being sixty-nine years of age.”[i]

Henry E. Kundert (1880-1958), a banker from Brainerd, Minnesota. He had a biographical entry in Minnesota and Its People Volume 4. The entry decribed how his father, Henry H. Kundert (and also my great-grandmother Amanda Boegli’s (1873-1942) uncle) came to the Dakota Territory. This book, published in 1924 by S.J. Clarke Publishers of Chicago, Illinois, could be described as a vanity book. One usually paid to get included in the book providing the biography and sometimes a photograph or illustrated portrait.  The genealogical information contained in these entries ranged from accurate to exaggeration.[ii] S.J. Clarke Publishers produced many town and county histories from across the United States and Canada.

Walking to Dakota

The first leg of the journey from New Glarus to Lincoln, Nebraska would have taken about 147 hours or six days by foot according to Google Maps calculations. From Lincoln to Beresford in the Dakota Territory is a 178 miles or 58 hours. Henry undertook this trip in the early to mid-1870s. Iowa was blanketed with small towns and farms.  While the transcontinental railroad had been completed in 1869, railroads only began completing lines across Iowa in the late 1870s.[iii]  He may have stopped for a while along the way to work on farms or in towns to earn money. To attract settlers, Lincoln, Nebraska promoted the wealth of the nearby salt basins. While this did not pan out, Lincoln became the state capitol.[iv]  Henry moved on to Beresford in the Dakota Territory. He had traveled much farther than 600 miles in 1853, immigrating from Rüti, Glarus, Switzerland to New Glarus, Wisconsin, an estimated 5,000-mile trip.

Background in Switzerland

Henry was born Johann Heinrich Kundert in 1850 in Rüti to Johann Heinrich Kundert (1819-1851) and Elsbeth Kundert (1823-1886).  Johann Heinrich, Sr. died in 1851 at the age of thirty-two, leaving Elsbeth a widow with seven children, the oldest, Jacob (1842-1862), about nine years old and the youngest, Caspar (1851-1914), an infant. Henry himself was still less than a year old.

Immigration to New Glarus, Wisconsin

In 1853 Henry, with mother Elsbeth, maternal grandmother Sara Voegeli Kundert (1792-1886) and siblings, immigrated to the United States. The manifest for the passenger ship, Liddons, includes thirty-one people with the surname Kundert along with other families from Glarus including Voegelis, Schindlers, and Streiffs.[v] They journeyed from Glarus to Liverpool, England before crossing the Atlantic Ocean to New York City. 

The destination was the Swiss colony in New Glarus, Wisconsin established in 1845, three years before Wisconsin’s statehood. Henry’s brother-in-law, John Luchsinger, wrote an article about the colony and was published in the Wisconsin Historical Collections, Volume XII in 1892. Here is a link to images of John Luchsinger’s article - The planting of the Swiss colony at New Glarus, Wis. | Library of Congress (loc.gov). Here is a link from the Library of Congress with pages from the diary of Mathias Duerst who recorded the trip - Diary of one of the original colonist of New Glarus, 1845 | Library of Congress (loc.gov).

There were several Kundert families among the 1845 New Glarus colonists. Only one Kundert family seems to have continued on to New Glarus – the Paulus and Barbara Zopfi Kundert family.  Paulus was born in Rüti in 1785.  He died in New Glarus in 1852.[vi]  Probably a relative to Henry but the connection has not been made.

Elsbeth’s oldest brother, Thomas Kundert (1813-1882), had already immigrated to New Glarus in 1847. An 1853 naturalization record says that Thomas arrived in New York City on 4 May 1847 with his wife Amelia Hoesly (1820-1889) and several children.[vii]   Thomas and his family are listed in the 1850 Federal Census for New Glarus Township.[viii]

Elsbeth’s older sister, Anna Kundert Babler, actually took a different ship, the Rosalie, from Antwerp and arrived in New York one day earlier than Elsbeth on 2 May 1853.[ix] Elsbeth had a number of siblings that did not survive to adulthood. All but one of the remaining siblings came to America as far as can be determined.  Her only known sibling remaining in Switzerland was Caspar Kundert (1815-1886). Many of his children came to America later.

No Statue of Liberty greeted the Kunderts when they arrived in America as it was not erected until 1886.  Immigrants were received at Castle Garden Island, a precursor to Ellis Island.  The U.S. president was Franklin Pierce (1804-1869), who had become president in the wake of the Compromise of 1850.  The Compromise was meant to end the dispute over slavery in the new territories following the Mexican-American War. The Compromise included the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 making it easier for slaveowners to recover runaway enslaved people.[x]  

From New York City the Kunderts may have traveled via the Erie Canal, a common route between 1840 and 1860.[xi] The Canal was a 363-mile waterway connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean via New York State. I researched the Disch family who settled in Milwaukee.  According to a story, the family traveled by ox cart from New Jersey to Milwaukee.

New Glarus

Elsbeth settled her family in New Glarus Township.  In 1855 Elsbeth married Dow Locke.[xii]  One child was born to this marriage, Henry’s half-brother Thomas Locke (1857-1913). The marriage appears over by 1860. Elsbeth was listed as the head of household in the 1860 Federal Census with no sign of Mr. Locke.  A Dow Locke was living in Waseca County, Minnesota in 1860 but it has not been established that they are the same person.  Thomas Locke is listed as Thomas Kundert in the census. Thomas owned and operated the Mount Horeb House Hotel at 104-106 S. Second St, Mount Horeb, Wisconsin from 1891 until 1902.[xiii] The connection between Thomas and the Kundert family was found in A History and Genealogy of the Dahle-Kittleson and Locke-Ness Families by Thomas Locke Dahle.[xiv]

In the same year Elsbeth married Dow Locke, her older sister Anna Kundert Babler died in June following childbirth that May. [xv] She was married to Jacob Babler and she had given birth to at least ten children between 1841 and 1855 but only one child, Peter Babler (1845-1905), appears to have survived to adulthood.

Henry Kundert is not listed in the 1860 Federal Census with his mother’s household.  He would have been around ten years old.  There is a Henry Kundert in the household of Markus and Magdalena Hefty in Washington Township but a connection to this Henry Kundert has not been made.[xvi] In 1860 Abraham Lincoln was elected President. South Carolina declared it was seceding at the end of the year.

The watershed event of the 1860s was the American Civil War.  Henry took no part in it. He was ten years old in 1860.  His oldest brother, Jacob Kundert, was with the 2nd Wisconsin Infantry, part of the Iron Brigade of the West, and died at the battle of Antietam in September 1862.

In the 1870 Federal Census, Henry’s occupation was farm laborer and lived with his brother Abraham and Abraham's wife Katherine Hoesly.  Elsbeth Kundert also lived with them.[xvii] The 1870 Census included an Agricultural Census.  The farm had 100 acres of improved land and 60 acres unimproved with two horses, four milk cows, and eight swine.  The following crops were produced: 320 bushels spring wheat, 100 bushels corn, and 300 bushels oats.[xviii] The biggest cash crop for Wisconsin farmers was wheat, going back to early settlement. An essay from Wisconsinhistory.org describes the decline of wheat farming:

“Most of the people who immigrated intended to become farmers, especially of wheat because of its low initial planting cost and relative high rate of return. Wisconsin was producing the second highest wheat yield in the U.S. by 1860.  Over the next five years, Wisconsin farmers harvested over 100 million bushels, more than two-thirds of which were exported. Wheat production peaked statewide in 1870 but signs of its decline had already been evident as early as the 1850s in some areas of the state. Three factors led to its decline: soil depletion, unsteady prices, and the railroads. Railroad development made eastern markets more accessible at the same time that it opened up more fertile lands west of Wisconsin, in Minnesota and the Dakotas.”[xix]

Consequently, by the early 1870s, people were headed west for new land.

Going to the Dakota Territory

An article regarding a Glarner colony in Beresford, South Dakota is contained in Patrick Wild’s website called the glarusfamilytree.com.[xx] According to Wild, a group of Swiss from New Glarus, who all served in the same Civil War company, decided to move to the Dakotas in the early 1870s attracted by the promise of the Homestead Act of 1862.[xxi] The Homestead Act was passed by Congress in 1862 to boost settlement of western lands. A 160-acre farm might cost $18 (about $432 in 2021 dollars). A settler had to homestead on the property for five years. Advertisements promised abundant farmland.[xxii] Henry was among those that would make a homestead claim. 

A number of men from the New Glarus area served with Company K of the Ninth Wisconsin Infantry.[xxiii]  The regiment spent time in Kansas, Missouri, and what was called Indian Territory where the members became familiar with the Great Plains. The first group to go west was comprised of Fridolin Kundert (1823-1891), a distant relative of Henry Kundert’s on his paternal line. Mathias Schmid (1830-1915), Henry Kundert’s future father-in-law. Thomas Voegeli (1826-) and Gabriel Voegeli (1843-1921) both distant relatives from Henry Kundert’s paternal line. Mathias Duerst (1833-1917) an uncle married to Elsbeth Kundert’s sister Rosina Kundert (1831-1896).[xxiv]

Patrick Wild writes on glarusfamilytree.com:

“About 1872/73 the small band of ex Civil War compatriots from New Glarus (Fridolin Kundert, Mathias Schmid, Thomas and Gabriel Voegeli and Mathias Duerst) set out for government lands in Pleasant Township, Dakota Territory (later South Dakota). They traveled to Wright County, Iowa where they rested and worked and then onward to take up these homesteads. The group arrived in 1873 and filed claims at the Yankton, Dakota Territory land office, more than 60 miles away. It could take a decade or more before they had free and clear ownership of the property. In addition to land claims, they filed Tree Claims to help plant trees to break up the prairie. There were cottonwood trees and other small trees along creeks and rivers. The wood was too soft for construction. Most wood had to be shipped into the area for buildings, although some maple and elm were available….

They built sod houses, heated with twisted hay bundles and dried cow dung (called by the pioneers - cow chips). They had a wood cook stove but found only a ration of corn meal mush and bread and what game they could find. They picked wild chicory to grind and make a coffee type drink. There were massive prairie fires and grasshopper invasions….” [xxv]

Among other settlers in the Dakota Territory in the same period was Charles Ingalls Wilder with his daughter, Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the Little House on the Prairie.  The website Littlehouseonprairie.com describes the Territory:

“For decades after early white explorers traversed them, the Great Plains had remained unsettled [Except for the people already living there]. Long known for grasshopper plagues and Indian hostilities, the prairies were remarkable more for aridity than for fertility, a fact not lost on cautious farmers, who first snapped up richer, well-watered lands further east. The railroad hastened to assure newcomers that “the Indians have been removed,” but the other insurmountable challenge of the Plains remained: the climate. When the Ingalls family left Walnut Grove, Minnesota, for Dakota Territory, they were moving to a far drier and notoriously fickle country.”[xxvi]

Here is a link about the homesteading process: HomesteadingDakota.pdf (sd.gov).

When did Henry arrive in the Dakota Territory?

Henry was still in Wisconsin when the census taker came on July 8, 1870.  A 1905 South Dakota State Census entry reported that he arrived in the Dakotas about 1874.[xxvii] In subsequent state censuses the arrival year was reported as 1875. As noted above, the Swiss families that came before, stopped in Iowa to rest and work for a while before moving on to the Dakota Territory. Possibly, Henry stayed for a while in Lincoln, Nebraska to earn money but did not stay. Henry’s oldest documented child, Otto, was born 6 September 1878 in the Dakota Territory.[xxviii] An 1887 article in the Canton Advocate from Canton, South Dakota reported that Henry arrived in 1873.[xxix]  

Henry reported that he was naturalized in the 1900 Federal Census.[xxx] He became a naturalized citizen in the jurisdiction of Green County, Wisconsin on March 2, 1874.[xxxi] If this is the same Henry Kundert, did he begin the process in Wisconsin and come back to finish it or had he stayed in Wisconsin until early 1874? No record of naturalization has been found in a South Dakota jurisdiction. So, he may have come to the Dakota Territory between 1873 and 1875. South Dakota did not become a state until late 1889.

In the early 1870s America Ulysses Grant was president.  The Panic of 1873 caused the first 'Great Depression' in the United States and reverberated abroad lasting until about 1879.[xxxii]  Jesse James and the James-Younger Gang committed the first successful train robbery in the American West, taking three thousand dollars from the Rock Island Express at Adair, Iowa about sixty miles west of Des Moines in 1873. The Women's Crusade of 1873-74 founded in Fredonia, New York marched against retail liquor dealers, leading to the creation of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. Susan B. Anthony illegally cast a presidential ballot at Rochester, New York to publicize the cause of a woman's right to vote. The Seventh Cavalry under the command of Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer engaged the Sioux for the first time in Montana in 1873. [xxxiii]   This was also the era of Reconstruction in the south.

Settled in the Dakota Territory

Henry married Anna Katharina Schmid [I will refer to her as Katharina going forward] about 1875 as reported in the 1900 Federal Census.[xxxiv] Katharina was born about 1856 in New Glarus, Wisconsin to Matthias and Magdalena Duerst Schmid. Mathias and Magdalena had come to the Dakota Territory in the early 1870s as part of the first group of Glarners mentioned above. Katharina’s grandparents Mathias and Anna Katharina Schmid and her father Mathias were among the original New Glarus colonists in 1845.[xxxv]

In 1880 Henry and Katharina lived in Pleasant Township, Lincoln County, Dakota Territory.  The county is located just south of Sioux Falls, South Dakota and on the border with Iowa. There were two children, Otto, age 1, and Henry, age 4 months. [xxxvi] Katharina's brother Baltz Schmid was also living in Pleasant Township.[xxxvii] In 1880 James A. Garfield defeated Winfield S. Hancock in the presidential campaign. Garfield was assassinated in September 1881. The first blizzard mentioned in Laura Ingalls Wilder's The Long Winter pummeled the prairie in the Dakota Territory.[xxxviii]

In 1882 Henry received a patent confirming his claim for 160 acres of land in Lincoln County. The patent was signed by U.S. President Chester Arthur. [xxxix]  In 1892 Henry received a patent for his claim on 160 acres under the Timber Culture Act of 1873.[xl] The Act allowed a claim of an additional 160 acres provided ten acres of trees were planted and had to survive at least ten years.[xli]

Around the time that Henry arrived in the Dakota Territory a group known as the Swiss Volhynians arrived in the southeastern part of the Territory.  The Volhynians were Swiss Mennonites who had migrated to Russia in the late eighteenth century with a promise of greater toleration.  Many decided to leave the Russian Empire as moves were made to “Russianize” the empire in the 1860s. The Mennonites primarily settled in Hutchinson and Turner counties north of Yankton, South Dakota. Naturalization records for South Dakota show quite a few people with the Kundert surname from Russia though no connection between them and the Kunderts in Glarus has been made.  See this article for more about the Volhynians - benjamin_w_goossen.pdf (swissmennonite.org).[xlii]

Henry and Katharina raised Poland China hogs. The Poland China is a breed of domestic pig, first bred in the Miami Valley, Ohio, United States, in 1816, deriving from many breeds including the Berkshire and Hampshire. It is the oldest American breed of swine. The Poland China hog was reportedly first bred on the Hankinson Farm in Blue Ball, Warren County, Ohio. As an aside, my wife Martha's maternal grandfather, Clarence Rau and his father John Rau were breeders of Poland China hogs in southern Ohio.[xliii]   

In the 1885 South Dakota Census Henry and Katharine were living in Lincoln County with sons Otto, Henry, and daughters Aurora and Annetta.[xliv] An article in The Canton Advocate [Dakota Territory] dated 27 October 1887 mentions Henry:

“Henry Kundert is another successful [resident] of Pleasant Township. He came out here from Wisconsin in 1873; ever since has been carrying on a large farm of 320 acres. Mr. Kundert is [sic] might be called ‘well-fixed,’ having accumulated his property through strict attention to business.”[xlv]

The Dakota Farmer’s Leader noted that Henry sold land in 1898 for $6,000 ($198,000 in 2021 dollars).[xlvi]  The entry in Minnesota and Its People said that he sold his original homestead claim in 1898 which was 160-acres. In 1901 he bought 500 acres of land at $35 per acre near Yankton.  In 2021 dollars that would be about $540,000.[xlvii] After retiring from farming, Henry and Katharina moved to Yankton, South Dakota.

During World War One Henry and Katharina’s son, Edwin, died 19 October 1918 while in an Army training camp at Camp Funston, Kansas of pneumonia. He had just turned thirty in September.[xlviii] The average age of a soldier in World War One was about 24 years old.[xlix] Kansas is believed to have been ground zero for the 1918 Influenza epidemic. Camp Funston, at Fort Riley, was the largest training facility in the Army, training over 50,000 men from all over the Midwest.[l] A Johnson County, Kansas History blog post in 2018 reports the following:

“The 1918 variation of influenza attacked the lungs most aggressively, leading the body to create virus-fighting toxins. Because so much damage was done to the lungs by the virus, the body’s own toxins further damaged the lungs, leading to a severe pneumonia. Many—especially the young, whose bodies could best fight the virus—were unable to recover from the lung damage, and ultimately died from pneumonia. In October 1918, over 1,100 soldiers at Camp Funston and Fort Leavenworth died (689 from pneumonia, 319 from influenza)”.[li]

Edwin was my great-grandmother Amanda Boegli’s first cousin.  Another of Amanda’s first cousins, Garnet Butler, died of diphtheria at Camp Merritt, New Jersey shortly before he was scheduled to embark for France.

Henry died in 1926 and Katharina died in 1935. They had at least nine children – Otto, Henry, August, Annetta, Edwin, Idella Ruth, Eva Alice, Beatrice Adelia, and Aurora. The Canton Advocate in Canton, South Dakota reported in its October 26, 1882 issue that a young daughter, unnamed, died of diphtheria.[lii]


[i]  Burnquist, Joseph Alfred Arner, Ed. Minnesota and its People, Volume 4. S.J. Clarke Publishing Company. 1924. P 102.

[ii][ii] https://ancestralfindings.com/what-are-county-history-books-and-how-can-they-help-with-your-genealogy/ Accessed 4/15/2021.

[v] Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.Year: 1853; Arrival: New York, New York, USA; Microfilm Serial: M237, 1820-1897; Line: 40; List Number: 353. Accessed 3/3/2021.

[vi] Schelbert, Leo, ed., New Glarus 1845-1970: The Making of a Swiss American Town. 1970. Kommissionsverlag Tschudi & Co., AG. Glarus. Pg. 202-203.

[vii] National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington, D.C.; Soundex Index to Naturalization Petitions for the United States District and Circuit Courts, Northern District of Illinois and Immigration and Naturalization Service District 9, 1840-19. U.S. Naturalization Record Indexes, 1791-1992 (Indexed in World Archives Project).   Ancestry.com Operations, Inc. 2010. Accessed 6/28/2021.

[viii] Year: 1850; Census Place: New Glarus, Green, Wisconsin; Roll: 999; Page: 303b. Ancestry.com. 1850 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Original data: Seventh Census of the United States, 1850; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M432, 1009 rolls); Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29; National Archives, Washington, D.C. Accessed 6/27/2021.

[ix] Year: 1853; Arrival: New York, New York, USA; Microfilm Serial: M237, 1820-1897; Line: 58; List Number: 346. New York, Passenger Lists, 1820-1957.Ancestry.com. Accessed 6/27/2021.

[x] https://www.history.com/topics/abolitionist-movement/compromise-of-1850. Accessed 3/3//2021.

[xii]Ancestry.com. Wisconsin, U.S., Marriage Index, 1820-1907 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2000. Original data: Wisconsin Department of Health and Family Services. Wisconsin Vital Record Index, pre-1907. Madison, WI, USA: Wisconsin Department of Health and Family Services Vital Records Division. Accessed 3/4/2021.

[xiv] Dahle, Thomas Locke. A History and Genealogy of the Dahle-Kittleson and Locke-Ness Families. United States, T.L. Dahle, 1984. P. 80.

[xv] Web: Netherlands, GenealogieOnline Trees Index, 1000-2015. Ancestry.com. Ancestry.com Operations, Inc. 2014. Accessed 6/28/2021.

[xvi]Year: 1860; Census Place: Washington, Green, Wisconsin; Page: 493; Family History Library Film: 805411.  Ancestry.com. 1860 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Accessed 3/4/2021.

[xvii] Year: 1870; Census Place: Washington, Green, Wisconsin; Roll: M593_1715; Page: 282A; Family History Library Film: 553214. Ancestry.com. 1870 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Accessed 3/4/2021.

[xviii] Census Year: 1870; Census Place: Washington, Green County, Wisconsin; Schedule Type: Agriculture

[xxii] https://www.travelsouthdakota.com/trip-ideas/article/prairie-pioneers. Accessed 3/7/2021.

[xxvi] https://littlehouseontheprairie.com/you-need-a-farm-laura-ingalls-wilder-and-american-farming/. Accessed 3/13/2021.

[xxvii] Ancestry.com. South Dakota, U.S., State Census, 1905 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014. Original data: South Dakota, State Census, 1905. Salt Lake City, Utah: FamilySearch, 2013. Accessed 3/4/2021.

[xxviii] "United States World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918", database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:K68W-PWR : 23 February 2021), Otto A Kundert, 1917-1918.

[xxix] The Canton Advocate. https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ 27 October 1887. Accessed 3/14/2021

[xxx] Year: 1900; Census Place: Lake, Aurora, South Dakota; Roll: 1546; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 0004; FHL microfilm: 1241546. Ancestry.com. 1900 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004. Original data: United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Twelfth Census of the United States, 1900. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1900. T623, 1854 rolls. Accessed 4/15/2021.

[xxxi] Ancestry.com. U.S., Naturalization Record Indexes, 1791-1992 (Indexed in World Archives Project) [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Accessed 4/15/2021.

[xxxiv] Year: 1900; Census Place: Lake, Aurora, South Dakota; Page: 1; Enumeration District: 0004; FHL microfilm: 1241546. Ancestry.com. 1900 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004. United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Twelfth Census of the United States, 1900. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1900. T623, 1854 rolls. Accessed 4/14/2021.

[xxxv] Schelbert, Leo, ed., New Glarus 1845-1970: The Making of a Swiss American Town. 1970. Kommissionsverlag Tschudi & Co., AG. Glarus. Pg. 204.

[xxxvi] Year: 1880; Census Place: Pleasant, Lincoln, Dakota Territory; Roll: 113; Page: 361C; Enumeration District: 015. Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1880 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. 1880 U.S. Census Index provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints © Copyright 1999 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved. All use is subject to the limited use license and other terms and conditions applicable to this site. Original data: Tenth Census of the United States, 1880. (NARA microfilm publication T9, 1,454 rolls). Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C. Accessed 3/4/2021

[xxxvii] Year: 1880; Census Place: Pleasant, Lincoln, Dakota Territory; Roll: 113; Page: 361D; Enumeration District: 015. Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1880 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. 1880 U.S. Census Index provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints © Copyright 1999 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved. All use is subject to the limited use license and other terms and conditions applicable to this site. Original data: Tenth Census of the United States, 1880. (NARA microfilm publication T9, 1,454 rolls). Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C. Accessed 4/14/2021.

[xxxix] Bureau of Land Management, General Land Office Records; Washington D.C., USA; Federal Land Patents, State Volumes. Ancestry.com. U.S., General Land Office Records, 1776-2015 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2008. Original data: United States. Bureau of Land Management, General Land Office Records. Automated Records Project; Federal Land Patents, State Volumes. http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/. Springfield, Virginia: Bureau of Land Management, Eastern States, 2007. Accessed 3/16/2021.

[xl] CDI Details - BLM GLO Records Accessed 3/19/2021.

[xli] HomesteadingDakota.pdf (sd.gov). Accessed 3/19/2021.

[xliii] https://www.thepigsite.com/breeds/poland-china. Accessed 3/6/2021.

[xliv] Ancestry.com. South Dakota, U.S., Territorial Census, 1885 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2002. Original data: Data indexed from images from the South Dakota State Archives microfilm collection, rolls 9527-9528. Accessed 5/13/2021.

[xlv] The Canton Advocate. https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ 27 October 1887. Accessed 3/14/2021.

[xlvii] Nachrichten-Herold. 31 October 1901. https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/. Accessed 3/14/2021.

[lii] Newscomwc.newspapers.com. Canton Advocate. 26 Oct 1882. Accessed 3/6/2021.

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