It never fails to amaze me when fate joins cousins from across the globe.

Yep, it has happened once again and I’m jumping for joy.

Johann Rudolpf Muller and his wife, Margretha had several children – among them, two daughters.

I descend from daughter Sibylla born in 1672, and my distant cousin, Wolfram descends from her older sister, Veronica, born in 1666. That makes us roughly 7th cousins.

Let me say before going any further that this article would not have been possible without Wolfram’s generosity – sharing his research, information, time, and photos. He has been immeasurably patient with me asking what probably feels like endless questions.

For me, the view he has provided of where our ancestors lived is like drinking the nectar of the Gods. This not only provides a glimpse into the village of Grossheppach, but transports me across time as well.

This ancient stone marks the boundary of Grossheppach where it borders neighboring Kleinheppach. Gross means large and Klein means small. Of course, both are a matter of perception.

Originally, these two villages were one.

Großheppach and Kleinheppach emerged as a joint expansion site in the 9th century (at the time the Fronhof constitution was still in force) and was probably founded in Waiblingen. The place takes its name from the stream, which at that time was already called Heckebach or Heggebach, which stands for a stream between hedges; the village and corridor image of the Middle Ages was characterized by the many hedges that served as fences. The oldest spellings of the place name are Hegnesbach (1236) and Hegbach (1365). As an independently tangible place, Kleinheppach first appears as Heckebach superiori (1294) or Obernheggebach (1297).

Kleinheppach, the smaller village consisted of a church surrounded by a few houses in 1686.

Sometimes the church records of residents of Kleinheppach are mixed with those of Grossheppach in the Grossheppach church register.

Wolfram has a unique perspective because he still lives in Grossheppach, village of our ancestors, along the little stream beside the church, the blacksmith’s shop, the old inn, and the mill.

I’ve asked Wolfram a lot, and I mean A LOT of questions this week. I’m very grateful for his answers and insights, not to mention, pictures.

Did I mention pictures???

Grossheppach in Pictures

Yes, pictures of beautiful Grossheppach, today and yesteryear! Notice the stately church dome in the background.

Many of these buildings hail from the time when Johann Rudolph and Margretha lived here. They walked these streets which were probably cobblestones or even dirt at the time and saw these very same buildings. This building on the corner above, now the Schreiber bakery, is one of the oldest buildings in town, built before 1560.

The historic Lamm Inn was the only place for travelers to rest, standing across from the church in the center of the old part of town, also originating on the old Roman road before 1560.

Rudolph and Margretha knew these buildings well. They would have been in and out of these structures over the years. Their daughter, Sibylla, may have been the midwife in Grossheppach before she became the official midwife in neighboring Beutelsbach.

Given the apparent age of this building in this early 1900s photo, Wolfram thinks it’s from the 1800s. It’s not connected to our family.

Wolfram tells us about the milk house:

The milk house was a house where the people sold their milk to if they had more than they needed. I am not sure. Maybe they did cheese out of it but definitively also butter. There you were able to buy milk, butter, cheese.

The people you can see on the picture was the family of my grand-grandfather.

The small child at the hand of my grand-grandfather Gottlob Stilz (1875-1942) was my grandmother Sophie (1909-1977). The wife is my grand-grandmother Sofie Böhringer (1881-1964) with her other child (aunt Anna Bertha) on her arm. The picture must be from 1912.

The house is not existing any more. But my mother told it was placed at today’s Kleinheppacherstrasse 26.

By the way, maybe interesting for you. Normally the people had beside the chicken, some cows for the milk and sometimes maybe meat. Most people were poor. And as you might know, a cow needs to birth every year a calf to get milk. Means you need a bull. So the bull was normally a municipal owned animal, so not everybody needed to have one. They had an extra stable for these bull which was called “Farrenstall”. Because the name of such a bull was “Farren”. In Großheppach it was located in former days in the town hall – ground floor;)

I’m sorry, but this made me just laugh out loud. I was raised on a farm in the US and am all too familiar with bulls. We too shared one bull for the entire neighborhood. You might say he got to go for slumber parties. Happiest bull ever.

German “farms” are much different than in the US. Because of the need to cluster houses together defensively, all the houses are built with the barns in the village, and the farm fields extend behind the village.

Medieval cities were walled, but in smaller towns, only the church and cemetery were walled. In some cases, estates that enclosed several houses and barns were walled as well.

In the Beginning

Let’s start closer to the beginning, with the bridge and the mill, above and also seen in this beautiful 1686 drawing of Grossheppach when Rudolph, Margretha and their children were living in one of these approximately 55 homes.

The count is approximate for two reasons. First, it’s hard to discern between roofs, and second, because some of those roofs are likely barns beside houses. I can’t tell. So perhaps as few as 20 or 25 houses.

In 1832, Grossheppach had a total of 125 houses.

Even in the 1950s, Grossheppach was still a small village nestled snugly in the Rems Valley beneath sloping hillside vineyards.

We do know a few things for sure.

Rudolf and Margretha didn’t live at the mill, although they were quite close to the miller who stood up for several of their children’s baptisms. They didn’t live in the church or in the vineyards. People didn’t actually “live” in either of those places. Farmers and vinedressers lived in the village and walked up to the fields to work. The village was established in time out of mind beside the little stream of Heppach and grew slowly over many centuries.

Wolfram begins:

I can tell you the origin of “Heppach” which is “Heck-bach”. This phrase of the town is often shown in early documents. Origin is ‘Hecke’ and ‘Bach’ which basically means ‘hedge’ and ‘creek’. So the creek at the hedge, or hedge at the creek – as you wish😉

On your second picture you can see a big building close to the bridge. This is the old mill. The buildings still existing. And today the bridge is almost at the original place. Two years ago they digged part of an old bridge. You can read an article about the bridge here.

The archivist Bernd Breyvogel is working in the archive of Weinstadt which is – by the way – located in the old castle of Großheppach. In the 1970’s there was a reform and the 5 villages Großheppach, Beutelsbach, Endersbach, Schnait and Strümpfelbach went together to the new city “Weinstadt” but still the people here know which village they relate to;).

The article asks, “Is the historical bridge the bridge where there was heavy fighting between the imperial and Swedes with 300 dead in January 1643?”

Based on the archaeological dig in combination with this drawing, the answer appears to be yes.

As a genealogist, I have to wonder – how in the heck would a small village bury 300 dead people all at once. That’s probably more people than the entire adult population of the village, maybe more than the population of surrounding villages, combined.

The battle in 1643 occurred during the Thirty Years’ War. This bridge connects Grossheppach with the vineyards on the north side of Beutelsbach. Clearly, anyone living in either village would have been painfully aware of this battle. While Rudolf Muller wasn’t yet living in Germany, my ancestors from Beutelsbach certainly were, and they would clearly have heard that battle, assuming they weren’t involved in some way themselves.

That battle lived in infamy and shaped the village where Rudolph and Margaretha would settle 17 years later.

Wolfram continues:

About the small island close to the mill. This “island” can still be recognized, even though it is not in use any more. On site you can see, that there is the old mill race between the two old buildings. I marked it here into the google map. The one building above the yellow arrow is the one in the map of Kieser’s forest map with the mill wheels. The building below the arrow is built after 1686. But the river course of the Rems has been changed.

Ahh, this explains why I was having trouble finding that island on the map today.

By the way, you can also use Google Maps in 3D. Then you have even a more real and realistic view of my (actual) village:

Wolfram explains that Grossheppach is much older than this though.

As of location of this village you need to know, the village is placed directly at an old road from roman times. Which were going from east to west. The road is today located in Großheppach as “Grunbacher Straße” and “Pfahlbühlstraße” and came from Bavarian region along the former roman border “Limes” and finished in Bad Cannstatt.

There was a roman fort at this strategic place, built in the first century AD. Still today some construction from roman times in the ground of the former castle. Unfortunately, I have only found a site in German. Maybe Google can do the rest for you: https://www.roemerkastell-stuttgart.com/geschichte/

Also the corresponding Wikipedia article is only in German: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kastell_Stuttgart-Bad_Cannstatt.

But about the roman border “Limes” there is an article in English: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limes_(Roman_Empire)

It’s only about 500 feet from the castle to the church, so it’s probable that this old portion of the village is much older than Grossheppach as we know it.

The Roman limes passed directly through Grossheppach, guarded by Roman soldiers from the first through the fifth centuries.

I can’t help but wonder how many of the original families in this area are descendants of the soldiers and local women. Y DNA of early families might well tell that story.

Grossheppach to Beutelsbach

It’s just over a mile from church to church, across the infamous bridge. Throughout Europe, it’s quite common to see steeples in every direction in the countryside, looking at the horizon across the fields. Most villages remained small and all residents needed to be able to fit inside the church and get there quickly.

The mile between villages would only have taken a few minutes to walk. During that 1643 battle, the sounds of armor clashing and the screams of men would have traveled piercingly through the air.

I sure wish Google had StreetView in Europe.

Understanding the dynamics of chronic warfare in Europe over the ages, the walled church and churchyard/cemetery make much more sense.

Both churches retain at least a portion of their original walled structure.

Seen from the air, the church in Beutelsbach is walled with a separate entrance through a small tower near the bottom of the photo.

The yard beside the church is the old cemetery where Rudolph and Margretha’s daughter, Sibylla would have been buried.

Residents would have gathered within those walled churches. Looking at the front, we can see the fortification slots that would allow archers to shoot from the church towers.

Safety was found within churches, in more ways than one. It’s no wonder that everyone lived as close as possible to the church, made of stone, easier to defend and less likely to burn.

The church would literally have been where the community sheltered and literally made their last stand.

Wolfram shares this bit of history:

Rudolph Müller was a farrier, specialized in horseshoes. But you need to know, this was a small village with not so many people living – especially after the 30-years-war. I estimate that 70 – 80% of the people died during the war – mainly from diseases and hunger.

There were some bad periods which were mainly two pest pandemics: 1627 and 1634 after the lost battle of Nördlingen where thousands of marauding foreign soldiers came down the valley of the Rems from Aalen and taking everything which was not nailed down. They destroyed even wine yards. The big and important city Waiblingen – which is only 5 km away – was destroyed totally (only 2 or 3 buildings from the period before are still available in the town). Details of the battle you can read here,

The Church

The church in Grossheppach is ancient, predating Rudolph and Margretha. Their children were baptized in this building. Some of their funerals were preached here too, just before their tiny caskets were carried out the side door into the churchyard, their final resting place. Eventually, Rudolf and Margretha would join them, the dust of their bones still lingering.

Wolfram tells us about the church:

The nave of the church was built in 1468, so it is a Gothic building.

But they built on an older building which was has been built between 1300 and 1350 as a chapel and became a church around 1430. The chapel was built on a place which was part of the estate “Gmünder Hof” and was owned by the earl of Württemberg (by the way, three estates merged together and founded the village Großheppach).

In 1540’s the church converted from catholic to protestant by decree from Duke Ulrich of Württemberg. His son, Duke Christoph ordered on 30 Jun 1550 to stop catholic mass. The protestant baptism records of Großheppach are available from 1558. Earlier church documents are not available as far as I know.

The lower part of the tower is the oldest part (Romanesque) and might even older than the first chapel. Still today you can see the arrow slits on the east side. I am not sure, if those you can see on the south side are original. The helmet of the tower was different in the past and was looking similar to the one of the church in Endersbach:

In the local historic book is a small but quite nice drawing how it could has been around 1560. In the book you can read, that the drawing has been made according to researches of old documents:

You can see the gothic church with its churchyard. A high wall around with a 2-floor wall walk and arrow slits. Parts of the wall on the east and south side are still existing (west is left, east is right at the pic). On the right side you can see the former estate “Gmünder Hof” on the lower right corner of the estate you see a bigger timbered house. This is also still existing and contains today the bakery Schreiber (they have the world’s best Prezel!). Across the street you can see the Lamb Inn with its double roof.

There’s a significant difference in this drawing from 1560, which was followed by the Thirty Years War which began in 1618, and the drawing from 1686. Wolfram doesn’t say when the three estates merged to form Grossheppach, but based on the 1686 map, I’d wager it was between 1560 and 1686. By 1686, based on the map, we know it’s called Grossheppach.

If more than half of the people died during that war, then some of these homes would likely have been empty. Families would have been recombining, attempting to make the best of things. If the three independent estates had not yet merged, it would have made sense at this time.

Income of the nobility relied on taxes, and if people weren’t living on the land and raising crops, there was nothing to tax. After the devastation of the war, Germany needed people to work the land again and rebuild the economy.

After the war ended, it was common for German localities to advertise, in the vernacular of the day, for settlers from neutral countries such as Switzerland that were relatively unaffected by the war – hoping to relieve overpopulation there and provide opportunities for land ownership, freedom of religion and other benefits that might entice settlers.

Devastation for some, leaving empty homes, meant opportunity for the next generation.

Looking at Google Maps, we see those same three buildings today. The church at left, the Lamm Inn with a yellow star and the bakery with red.

Wolfram tells us that in 1769 the top of the church tower roof was replaced by a baroque helmet. The original tower would have been in place when Rudolph and Margretha walked from their home, not far away, to worship.

I asked Wolfram if he had a photo of the interior of the church, and if the baptismal font is original.

Unfortunately, the inside of the church is very puristic.

In former days the church has been painted inside, like you can see in the church of Beutelsbach or Schnait today and there were pictures at the walls and statues.

Also the windows have been different.

The protestant pietists broke very much with the catholic and wanted to reduce more to the inner spirit of the people. They destroyed a lot of old interiors in all of Europe. So today the chorus area/chapel looks like this which is directly below the tower:

If the baptismal is original from former days I do not know and I was not able to find it in the Grossheppach history book.

The baptismal font is underneath that tablecloth.

When I first saw that church tower, I wanted to see what was inside. Church towers are often off-limits for safety reasons.

It was my lucky day because Wolfram sent several photos from inside of the church tower and narrates his visit.

The picture is from inside the church tower. Normally the tower is closed and only some small wooden stairs are going up. The entry is outside from the north. Some years ago there was an open house day and I had the opportunity to get up the tower. I took some pictures.

Just look at this bell. I wonder if this bell was in place when Rudoph and Margretha lived there? Fortunately, Wolfram has the answer:

About the church bells – the biggest was from 1495, called “Hosanna bell”. But this bell was melted in 1904 into a new one after it has been broken during ringing on 28 Feb 1904. But this new big one has not been melted then. Neither in the first nor second World War. (You need to know, many bells have been melted because metal was rare). So at least the size and material is original:)

 

Then there were two smaller bells. They had to be melted in 1917 for the first World War. Only 1922 they had money enough to get two new ones but those both had to be melted again in 1942. The two small ones we have now are from 1948.

 

And here is a link for something you will definitively love. There are some videos of the church and you can hear the bells ringing 🙂

 

The history of the church provided in Wolfram’s link says that the church had a beautiful peasant painting above the pulpit at one time. I suspect this is beneath the paint and I can’t help but wonder if that couldn’t be painstakingly restored, or at least exposed. It also mentions that the church had an organ by 1600. I wonder how much damage the church sustained during the Thirty Years War. I suspect a substantial amount, but no one would want to carry parts of an organ or church bells away. The original organ was replaced more than a century ago.

You can see and hear Easter and Christmas services here and here.  

Still, we know that even after a couple of remodels, it’s still the same church. Rudolph and Margretha sat in pews in this very place, baptized their children in this very building, probably in a baptismal font in just about that same location.

They would have been as at home in this church as they were in their own house.

They would have heard the voices of the bells every time they rang. They would have heard them ring to announce deaths, including those of their own children. The only thing they never got to do in this church, together, was to attend one of their children’s marriages. The family attended Margretha’s funeral in this very sanctuary in 1689 before any of their children married.

This bell would have summoned residents to church on Sundays.

Of course, the beams had to be strong enough to support the weight of the bells and not shift as they rang. Thinking about the engineering required for these early churches and large buildings – it’s actually an amazing feat and not only do they still stand, they are functional. These buildings have truly withstood the test of time.

If only these walls, beams and bells could talk. What stories they could tell.

Two bells side by side. The bells do sound quite different.

Well, this is a mystery. Always a curious genealogist, I asked Wolfram about this whatever-it-is.

It turned out to be an old clock that used to be located outside on the tower.

Also this one which looks like a cupboard or cabinet, it is from the old church clock.

Today the clock is electric and this one is from 1900 and they placed it there. I do not know if this is the original place but there was space in the tower. As you can see on the picture there is some text. I will translate it for you:

“In memory of
Miss. Elise Vreede,
died here 19 Nov 1899,
donated from her three sisters
Mrs. Marie Schmid, Schorndorf,
Mrs Luise von Wendland, München,
Mrs. Therese von Abel, Grossheppach
In the year of salvation 1900.”

Therese von Abel was the local landlord’s wife. They lived here in the small castle.

I would guess that this is the platform inside the tower and the steps to the bell lead upward from there. Back then, the bell-ringer would have climbed those steps to ring the bell as needed. It would be interesting to know how often the bell rang.

The churchyard in Grossheppach is now bricked with pavers, but the graves of both Rudolph and Margretha assuredly lie beneath these pavers, within the fortified walls.

Wolfram added information about the cemetery beside the church in Grossheppach.

As of cemetery: There were three of them. The oldest was around the church in the churchyard, you are totally right. Once this cemetery became too small because of higher population and some pandemic diseases and they needed to create a new cemetery. And outside the village also because of the pandemic. In Großheppach they built a new one northwest of the church. The location you can see here:

This second cemetery does also not exist anymore. And since some years people totally forgot about it. But then bones came out of the ground due to some new buildings, people remembered. By the way, the bones have been buried a second time on the actual cemetery. The third one is that what is used today, northeast of the church. The age I have to estimate (never thought about it) but it is maybe interesting for you to sort it historical wise. I think it is around 100 years old, maybe 120 years. But honestly, I do not know, it could be also only 80, or 150 years.

What this tells us is that in 1832, when this map was created, that part of the village was still pretty much vacant. Notice the fields surrounding the cemetery. What we don’t know, of course, is when it began to be used. Of course, I wonder if those soldiers were buried here in 1634, while spaces in the churchyard were reserved for Grossheppach families.

On this current map, I’ve marked the church. The red star shows the 1832 cemetery and the purple star at right indicates the castle.

The blue dots are the end of the walking path from Beutelsbach to the church in Grossheppach. It’s clear that the old village consists of the buildings immediately surrounding the church. You can view many at this link.

Extracting More Information

Understanding the culture and customs in the village allows descendants to extract more information about the life and time in which our ancestors lived.

Wolfram made this observation about the burial record of Johann Rudolph’s second wife, also named Margaretha.

Her second marriage:

“Den 12 Nov. ist H, Johann Heinrich Berger Schulmeister v. Gerichtschr. alhir Mit Margretha Margaretha Knauß[en] Copuliert word[en] ./.“ [On 12 Nov has been married here Mr. Johann Heinrich Berger, schoolmaster and law clerk (the one who was writing the official documents of the village) with Margretha Knauß.]

Margaretha’s burial record:

„Eodem ward begraben Margaretha, Rudolph Millers, gewesenen Schmidts u burgers allhir hinterbliebene wittib, (…) genannt die Knaußerin, weil ihr erster Mann Hanß Jerg Knaußen, Barbier alhier geweßen.“ [at the same date has been buried Margaretha, survived widow of Rudolph Miller, former smith and citizen here, (…) called the „Knaußerin“ because her first husband was Hanß Jerg Knaußen, barber here].

Interesting here is, that this wife was from a “better” family because she was the widow of the schoolmaster and law clerk Knauß. And well-off family members have mostly married in a family with similar social status. Means, the smith Rudolph Müller was also part of the “upper class”.

Citizenship

Wolfram found Hanss Rudolph and Margretha’s citizenship records in Grossheppach in 1662.

Hanß Rudolph MÜLLER/MILLER; von Stein am Rhein; „aus dem Schweitzerland“ [Seelenbuch GH, pg 431]; Bürger und Hufschmied zu Großheppach; * um 1632 Stein am Rhein [Fleckenbuch GH, pg 422]; □ 28.07.1692 Großheppach [TotB]

Hanß Rudolph becomes a citizen from Großheppach at 28.02.1662 together with his wife

No marriage record in Großheppach]

Margretha NN.; von Schefen [= Stäfa?], area of Zürich [Fleckenbuch GH, pg422]; from 1662 Bürgerin in Großeppach; * in Switzerland; „ein Cammermädgen“ [Seelenbuch GH, S.431]; □ 30.10.1689 Großheppach [TotB]; Die Margaretha becomes a citizen from Großheppach at 28.02.1662 together with her husband.

Their first child born in Grosshappach arrived in May of 1661 and died in October of the same year. On the last day of February in 1662, when both Rudolph and Margretha became citizens, she was about 4 months pregnant for their next child.

I have no idea what the criteria was at that time to become a citizen. Did Rudolph and Margretha always intend to become citizens, or did they make that decision after living there for some time? Did they discover that the village needed a blacksmith and ferrier and moved to Grossheppach from Switzerland intentionally for that position?

Were the local residents excited about the young couple settling in their midst, providing a much-needed craftsman?

Perhaps these new settlers helped them heal from the ravages of such a long, miserable war.

Drum Roll – Origins

Wolfram’s research about Rudolph and Margretha is very, VERY illuminating and resulted from his one-place-study research.

And now about the origin of Johannes Rudolph and his wife.

During searching for interesting sources for my study of Großheppach in the archive of Großheppach, I found a historical source which is called “Fleckenbuch”. Which means basically “book of the village”. The record started in 1529. The recorder of the village was writing important things in. Also people who became citizen in Großheppach. You know, church records are the most important while searching about family history. But sometimes also civil sources are important. Especially during and after 30-years-war many people moved around and settled somewhere. Furthermore, church books from the period of 30-year-war are often missing or information are listed bad. Even in the years after the war – so 1648 until around 1670 – church records are often not precise and information missing. In addition to this, these civil records become very important.

 As in this case with Johannes Rudolph Müller.

Anno 1662. „Denn. 28 Februarÿ seindt NachFolgende Persohnen zue MitBurgern vff: vnnd angenom[m]en worden.

1. Hannß Rudolph Miller, Huoffschmidt von Stein am Rhein gebürtig, vnd seine HaußFraw Margaretha. von Schefen, im Zürcher gebieth.“ [On 28 February following persons became citizens. 1. Hannß [= Johannes] Rudolph Miller, farrier and born in Stein am Rhein and his wife Margaretha, from Schefen, territory of Zurich.]

So it is written clearly that he came from Stein am Rhein.

The name of the town where his wife came from could be also read as ‘Schefer’, ‘Sehefen’ or ‘Sehefer’ but these villages cannot be located. So finally, this is open.

I can tell you, here and now, that indeed Rudolph has been located (thanks to cousins Wolfram, Pam and Tom) and we have a lead on a possible marriage to Margretha thanks to Tom’s sleuthing.

There’s going to be a wonderful article in the future. You’re just not going to believe how this unfolded between several very eager people. Now, we wait for another friend to see if she can find the original record we need.

Fingers crossed!

The Castle

Rudolph was a ferrier, and Margretha was a “waiting maid,” according to Wolfram’s translation of her death record. Tom translated it as “chambermaid,” but the essence is the same. This makes me wonder if she was a “waiting maid” at the Grossheppach Castle. Who else would be able to afford a maid?

This castle photo dates to about 1930, and below, the castle as restored today.

A portion of the original defensive wall remains today. I wonder how badly this structure was damaged during the Thirty Years War.

This castle dates to 1592 and was expanded in 1655. In addition to the castle itself, the property included a horse stable, below.

Is this the farm building at the castle where Rudolph shoed horses? I’d wager that answer is yes.

The castle cellar door is at right. The stone vaulted wine cellar dates from 1593 but I think that has a separate entrance.

Families who owned this castle were reportedly not aristocrats, but the bourgeois upper class.

Hmmm, a horse stable…Rudolph was a ferrier and Margretha was a “waiting maid”….

This surely makes me wonder. These families could assuredly afford both a ferrier and a waiting maid. Could Rudolph and Margretha possibly have lived in one of these buildings on the castle property?

Beautiful Vineyards

Grossheppach is located in the middle of the wine region where the entire economy is dependent on the grape harvest.

After the soldiers destroyed the fields in 1634, the residents would have immediately begun to replant the vineyards. From seedling to grape harvest takes about 3 years – years which are filled with pruning and cultivation. Baby and pamper those vines.

And pray. Pray that the temperature doesn’t drop below freezing and damage those tender shoots.

A good vinedresser knows how to strike the perfect pruned balance of shoots and buds that will produce not just a good harvest, but quality, sun-ripened grapes.

It’s very unusual to find a cousin, interested in genealogy and history, who still lives in the ancestral area. Wolfram has graciously provided several photos with historical significance, which I’m including here.

You can also see additional photos on his website, here, including basket weaving.

Why is basket weaving important? Baskets were used for harvesting grapes without damaging or bruising them.

Grapes were and are picked by hand, but that’s just the final task.

When the vines are dormant in the winter, they need to be tended and pruned.

Vines are tied to stakes so that they will grow and produce as much yield as possible. Too much shade from leaves and other vines prevents ripening. Hence the ancient occupation in the wine region known as a vinedresser.

This work needed to be done in the winter when the vines were dormant, without leaves.

Note the little buildings on the hills in the background. They look to be too small for people to live in, so I asked Wolfram.

Wolfram says:

The tiny houses are not for living. You are right, they are for the needed tools and in former times definitely also for sudden bad weather or to warm up by using a small oven inside. Still today you can see them. I guess you can see them also at google maps🙂

I never thought about warming up, but of course. Much of their work was done in the winter.

And yes, most pictures were from grape harvesting. For the people these were festival days. You collect the fruits of the whole-year-work!. When I was young it was still this way. And relatives and friends helped relatives and friends. Today it became different. It became more a business and during harvesting seasons there are also foreign workers from Poland etc. So on these pictures mostly relatives are working. But still today the most of the grapes are harvested by hand. This improves the wine quality.

“Festival days.” What a wonderful way to view this activity. Of course it was festive. A celebration. I never thought about that. I had commented to Wolfram about how happy everyone in the following photo looked. They are all smiling and happy, and the people sitting on the ground are eating grapes right out of the basket. They must have been luscious, sweet and warm.

I notice that the women all have their hair pulled back with scarves. Having long hair myself, this would be to prevent your hair from getting in the way and to prevent it from getting tangled in the vines and leaves. I’m thinking grape juice in hair would be very sticky.

I asked Wolfram about the various sized baskets, from small to the one on the man’s back, to the vat in the wagon behind the man.

Yes, these were the standard “baskets” for carrying the grapes. They were made from wood and they are called “Butte” (single) or “Butten” (two or more). In former days most of the people were poor. Horses were almost not existing (only at the mill). Mostly they had some single cows for the milk and some chicken for the eggs and meat. All for their own need. And the hills are quite steep. In some areas they were able to use cows to transport the grapes in bigger barrels (as you can see at this pic) but often they had to carry the grapes in these baskets downhill to the wine press. Therefore this bigger size. When I was young, we still had always these “Butten”. But made of plastic instead. Today you can drive almost everywhere in the vineyards in Großheppach with tractors through the rows. So you cut also by hand but you are using buckets to put in a 1000 l tub on the tractor.

The age of this picture is quite clear because the man with the “Butte” is my grandfather Hermann Mayer (1904 – 1996) and the wife with the white bucket is my grandmother, Sophie Stilz (1909 – 1977). And the wife next to her with the white cap is my grand-grandmother Pauline Mayer (1872 – 1945) 😉 My grand-grandmother died in 1945 and in 1939 my grandfather got injured very heavy and was not able to work for at least 1.5 years. And it seems for me the picture has been made before 1939. So maybe between 1932 and 1939.

This “mountain press” was built in the Grossheppach vineyards in 1660, which means it was brand new when Rudolph and Margretha moved to Grossheppach.

I asked Wolfram about the mountain presses along with the man, the cart and what he was doing:

There were three presses in Großheppach. I tried to localize it but for me it was only possible for two of them.

The use of the small barrel honestly I do not know. It might can be for some wine. But definitively not for grapes, you carry them always open. It could also be used to transport cider. Unlikely water. The man is also interesting. He is wearing a backpack sprayer for agent. And therefore the barrel could be also for the agent.

I noticed in this picture that the vineyards seem to be fenced with rocks. This is somewhat enlightening because it’s reported in the records for Sibylla Muller’s husband, Johann Georg Lenz, a vinedresser, that “stones fell on his body and back.” Were those stones being quarried for the vineyards? I notice that the stones are all squared. Where were they quarried and how far were they transported?

This looks like a new vineyard, with the stakes for tying vines just waiting. Lots of small sheds for supplies. I must admit, I’m quite curious as to why it appears they were “starting over” with such a huge swath of land.

Wolfram included another photo of an old house in the vineyards.

Wolfram didn’t know the history of this structure, but it’s clearly old and is no longer standing today.

I asked if the vineyards are privately or governmentally owned.

The vineyards are privately owned. Behind my house my cousin has one of his vineyards here.

Wolfram indicated that most of the work was done by oxen and not horses. The vat is an open barrel into which grapes were deposited as family members picked the harvest.

He noted:

The man on the back is my grandfather Hermann Mayer (1904 – 1996) and right next to him his wife and my grandmother Sophie Stilz (1909 – 1977) And yes, it is a picture from autumn, harvesting grapes. My mother told, they had some cows for the milk. I do not know if they had oxes just for work. Maybe I should ask my mother.

Translation via Google translate: Here too, grapes were harvested in 1928 in Bader, below the steep Buhlerbuckel. At the front as the smallest you can see my father Gottfried Klopfer holding his sister Johanna’s hand.

Confession

I’ve been drawn to vineyards ever since I can remember. I have no idea why. I like only a few wines – ones that tend to be sweet. Muscatos and Niagaras – and oh yes, ice wines.

Or maybe some Moscato wine and apricot liqueur. Oh yes!!!

Of course, a real vintner would laugh me right out of the building. These are “sissy” sweet wines when compared to the “real thing.” My husband accuses me of loving grape juice – and he’s right. I love grape juice too – including the sparkling variety.

But I love, and I mean LOVE vineyards.

Not to get all sappy on you, but, can I tell you a secret?

I got married at a winery. Outside, in the yard, with the majestic medieval stones providing a beautiful backdrop. The vineyards are right next door where you can’t see them in the photo.

Weddings don’t’ normally happen at wineries, but we told them not to worry – the yard outside would be just fine.

You can see the barrels stacked behind the wedding party. We stood in front of the grape arbor, of course. What else?

The Mon Ami Winery original building was purchased in Europe in the 1870s, essentially in ruins, disassembled, transported to the US on ships, then reassembled.

When I travel, I almost always seek out wineries. I don’t actually mean to – it just kind of happens.

• Indiana – check
• Michigan – check
• Ohio – check
• California – check
• Williamsburg – check
• Texas – check
• Austria – check
• Germany – check
• Norway – check
• Australia – check
• Homer, Alaska – check
• New Zealand – check
• Tasmania – check
• North Carolina – check

Oh, look! I think I found the colonists…

Finding dark chocolate while following a “wine trail” I just happened across. Check.

Yes, I find wineries everyplace. I have never understood this allure, especially given that I’m not much of a wine drinker. Maybe it’s the old-world ambiance I love. Maybe it’s my roots showing through.

Our standing joke when we go wine-tasting is that Jim gets his and mine too, and I drive. But if there’s a lovely sweet wine, I’m sunk. Unfortunately, there almost never is – but I’m just happy being around grapes, vineyards and anything that smells like wine. Winery tours are always wonderful fun and every one is unique.

I’ve made grape and wine-themed quilts. There are also Quilt Wines but they look too dry for my taste.

Although in all fairness, I should warn you that quilting and wine do not pair well. Well, at least the mistakes are funny.

At one point, I made wine at my own very own “Ore Creek Winery.” Don’t ask, I’m not a vintner. I’m more the vinedresser. But designing and making those hand-stitched wine bottle labels was fun nonetheless.

I often take pictures of grapes when I travel, with the sun shining on or through them. They represent liquid sunshine and I feel incredibly close to both the earth and my ancestors.

It’s amazing where you find grapevines growing. While these are in a vineyard, it’s not unusual in Europe to find them growing up the side of a house or fence in a very small space. Grapevines are beautiful as well as functional.

I especially love grapevines with roses blooming nearby. Roses are often planted at the end of rows of grapevines in vineyards and serve as an early-warning system for fungus and other pests that invade both plants. If they appear in the rosebushes, the grapevines need to be treated before the year’s harvest is damaged.

Not only that, roses attract pollenators and beneficial insects, and they are a feast of color for the eyes, and the soul.

I even have wild grapevines growing in my yard that I can’t seem to get rid of. It’s like they sought me out and found me, compliments of my ancestors, I’m sure.

Yes, I know, my ancestors are probably rolling over in their graves at the thought of me trying to “get rid” of grapevines.

My husband tried to harvest these, and they are, bar none, the sourest grapes either of us has ever tasted. The birds wouldn’t even eat them and the bear threw them back. The raccoon and possums looked at us like we were crazy. No wonder their seeds are proliferating all over the place – no one wants them.

There’s simply not enough sugar or fermentation to fix this problem. We tried. But darn, those leaves, berries and vines are just so stunningly beautiful.

How ironic that my ancestors prayed for the vines and grapes to grown and here I am with doing everything possible to arrest their growth.

Nevertheless, these cumulative experiences connect me with my German vintner, vinedresser, vineyard roots.

My moth-to-flame attraction to anything and everything vineyard connects me to those ancestors – where they lived, what they saw and experienced. I can paint their lives in the colors and flavors of the vinebow.

Winemaking wasn’t just a part of their life – their entire economic existence depended on the ripening harvest on the hillside – whether they were vinedressers or the ferrier who serviced their horses and oxen. Everyone depended on the lowly grape.

I can close my eyes and almost smell the earthy soil and see them among the rows of vines, picking grapes in the warm sunshine, smiling at me across the centuries.

Or maybe, just maybe, they’re amused at their descendant with a wild grape problem.

Cheers!

_____________________________________________________________

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We don’t know Margaretha or Margretha’s birth surname, but we do know that she was born in Switzerland and married Johann Rudolph Muller, probably in Switzerland as well – sometime before the birth of their first child in Grossheppach, Germany in 1661. Clearly, the young couple migrated from Switzerland before that time, probably about that time, and not long after their marriage.

They theoretically could have met and married in Grossheppach, on the Rems River in Germany after both families migrated, but there are no records to support that theory – and church records in Grossheppach do exist during this timeframe.

It’s most likely that the newlyweds answered the call of the German nobles for settlers in the German lands that had been devastated and depopulated during the Thirty Years War which had ended in 1648. It took generations to recover from that war – in terms of rebuilding and in terms of population loss which averaged 50%, but ranged from 30% to 100% in various regions.

Grossheppach, shown here in 1686, was spared the worst of the devastation, so was probably more stable with at least some remaining original population. Note the mill – you’ll see it again later!

Grossheppach, a small village, is located smack dab in the middle of the wine-growing region, but Margretha’s husband, Rudolph, was a blacksmith and ferrier.

Like many women of that era, what little we know about Margretha is from the church records.

Margretha’s Birth

We can estimate the year of Margretha’s birth based on when her last child was recorded in the Grossheppach baptismal records.

Her first child in the Grossheppach church records was born in 1661 and her last child was born in 1675. If we presume Margretha was about 43 when the last child was born, that places her birth at about 1632, give or take a couple years in either direction.

If Margretha was born about 1632, she likely married sometime after 1652. She may have married and had children in Switzerland, but there are no burial or marriage records for Rudolph and Margretha in Grossheppach as parents to children not born there.

My suspicion is that the young couple married and saw settlement in Germany as the “great adventure” that awaited, promising reprieve from taxes among other perks for settlers.

Opportunity awaited.

They may have migrated with others. After all, there’s safety in numbers and family is more likely to help you in a time of need than unknown strangers.

One-Place Study

How lucky could I have been to stumble across a one-place study about Grossheppach families, which you can find here.

The one hint I can find about the Swiss location of Margretha is in the document of tracking “foreigners” in Grossheppach, in German, on page 59 where we find the locality, name of the individual, a year, and what the researcher found.

In this case, the locality is “Schefen, Kanton Zurich (=Stafa?), the individual is Margaretha, no known birth surname, This indicates von “Shefen” which translates literally to “from sheep,” followed by (wird Bg. in GH) which means became a citizen in Grossheppach.

Her husband’s information is noted with him being from Stein am Rhein. What the heck is Stein am Rhein? It’s the name of a village!!!

The researcher also lists Rudolph as “Bg.” meaning berger, and farrier. This is the researcher’s list of ancestors, so I suspect that the researcher descends through daughter, Veronica.

If this location is indeed accurate, this provides us with a location, probably for both Rudolph and Margretha. I’ve written to the researcher and heard back just before publishing this article today. Hint – there will be a chapter 2😊

Stein am Rhein is breathtakingly beautiful, the central, compact medieval old city still quite visible. It was probably walled at one time.

Be still my heart!

Stein am Rhein is a small, stunningly beautiful village on the Rhine River in Switzerland, with the medieval church still intact. Just take a look. OH MY.

I’m trying to tell myself NOT to fall completely in love until I can confirm the accuracy of this information. I already want to climb on a plane.

Stein am Rhein is 20-25 miles from Zurich as the crow flies.

Church records do exist for Stein am Rhein, but I’d need the transcribed records, only available at the Family History library in Salt Lake, here, as opposed to the unindexed and German script original records, here. Not only that, but Stein am Rhein has records dating from the 1400s. I might have to seek out someone with expertise in Swiss records who can actually read that script!

Stein am Rhein would have been about a 100-mile journey to Grossheppach.

Let’s hope there are records in Switzerland and they are somewhat available. My heart is racing just thinking about an additional 200 years of possible records and ancestors.

Margretha’s Life’s Story Spun Through Her Children

A huge thank you to Tom for finding and translating these Grossheppach records.

Margretha’s known children were all born in Grossheppach and baptized in the local church which includes the remains of a fortified wall.

If Sibilla, born in 1661 was Margretha’s first child, this was truly a heartbreaking time. Margretha had looked forward to the arrival of her first baby, loved her, and then lost her 24 short weeks later. I wonder if the baby struggled from birth or contracted some childhood disease that ripped her from her mother’s arms and broke her heart.

Baptism: 6 May 1661 + Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Sibilla

Parents: Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Lienhardt Herman; Margretha, Ulrich Schweikhardrt from Stutg(art); Sibilla, Stöckler(in) from Stutgardt, farm maid.

Note that one of the godparents was also named Sibilla, which might be a hint indicating a relative.

Burial: 19 Oct 1661 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Sibilla, 2 weeks old, child of Rüdolph Müller, smith

These churchyard fortifications likely enclosed the cemetery at the time Margretha buried her baby.

In this aerial view, you can see the area that would have been the cemetery, with its fortified wall remaining yet today, at the lower right.

The treed area may be another portion of the ancient cemetery, now returned to nature.

Margretha became pregnant about the same time that Sibilla died, and the first son, Hanss Rudolph, named for his father, arrived the following August.

Baptism: 7 Aug 1662 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Hanss Rüdolph

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Leonhardt Herman; Ulrich Schweickhart from Stutg(art); Sibilla Glöckhler(in) also from ?

The next two baptisms are somewhat confusing. Someone later stamped the church records with dates. Obviously these two children could not have been born 8 months apart – or at least not unless the first child died and the second child was very premature. If these girls had been twins, they would have been baptized at the same time. There are no death records, nor any further records for either Anna Magdalena nor Anna Margretha.

After I originally wrote this article, cousin Wolfram who lives in Grossheppach and has access to the original records and corrected this record for Anna Margaretha’s birth in 1663.

Baptism: 12 Feb 1663 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Anna Magdalena

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Schmid from Grunbach; J.L. Herman, miller; Daniel’s wife, Magdalena.

Baptism: 11 Oct 1664 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Anna Margretha

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Leonhard Herman, miller; Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler; Anna Margretha, wife of Ulrich Schweickh(a)r(t).

Given that the next child, Veronica, didn’t arrive for 21 months, it’s unlikely that Anna Margretha died at or near birth.

Baptism: 29 July 1666 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Veronica

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Daniel Ziegler….; Hanss Eiber……; Maia Elisabetha Blaror(in)?

Two years and a few days later, Hanss Jacob joined the growing family.

Baptism: 9 Aug 1668

Child: Hanss Jacob

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Ulrich Schweigger from Stuttgardt; Jerg Lienhard Herman, miller; Magdalena, Daniel Ziegler’s wife.

A death record for Hans Jacob exists on August 18, 1675, but with no parents’ names, and is most likely this child. Just 9 days after his 7th birthday.

The next baby arrived 16 months after Hanss Jacob, just before Christmas. By this time, assuming all children except two lived, when Anna Barbara was born, Margretha would have had four children ages 16 months to 7 years. I’d say she had her hands full.

Baptism: 17 Dec 1669 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Anna Barbara

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Schmid, schoolteacher in Grunbach; Jerg Lienhard Herman, miller; Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler.

Anna Barbara died on October 31, 1679.

It would be almost three years before the next child arrived, hinting at a child that was stillborn in late 1671. We don’t see births of children who were not baptized in the records – nor burial records.

Baptism: 6 Sept 1672 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Sibylla

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Schmid, schoolteacher in Grunbach; Jerg Lienhard Herrman, miller; Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler.

It’s interesting that they named a second child Sibylla. It’s also interesting that the original godmother, Sibilla, of the first Sibilla born in 1661 is not present for this baptism. That original Sibilla Stockler(in) or Glockler(in) was only present for the births in 1661 and 1662, causing me to wonder why she wasn’t present later, and isn’t present for this birth when the child is apparently named in her honor. Of course, this makes me wonder if she died.

This also causes me to ponder the possibility if she is a sister or maybe niece to Margretha. The (in) suffix to her surname indicates that she is not married, so either Stockler or Glockler would be her birth surname.

Fortunately for me, this child named Sibylla lived. She’s my ancestor and her story can be found here.

Baptism: 27 Sept 1674 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Child: Jerg Lienhardt +

Parents: Hanss Rüdolph Müller & Margretha

Godparents: Jerg Schmidt, schoolteacher in Grunbach; Jerg Lienhard Herman, miller; Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler.

I noticed that Jerg Leinhard Hermann, the local miller, is the godfather for six of seven of Margretha’s children. This close association also suggests a close relationship. Their last child, who, unfortunately, did not live long, was named for Jerg Leinhard.

Burial: 31 January 1675 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Cause of Death: ?

Decedent: Jerg Lienhard, 18 weeks old

Child of Hanss Rüdolph Müller, smith.

It appears that Margretha ended her childbearing years in almost exactly the same way she began them. In 1675, Margretha was likely in her early to mid-40s. She had given birth to at least 9 children whose baptisms appear in church records.

Given the three-year space, she probably had one stillborn child who was simply buried but not baptized, meaning she had at least 10 children.

We don’t know that Margretha didn’t have more children that died in Switzerland before settling in Germany, or after the child born in 1675. We do know that the last child baptized, in 1675, Jerg Lienhard passed away 18 weeks later.

To Margretha, who 14 years earlier had lost her firstborn daughter 24 weeks after she was born, this must have seemed terribly, horribly familiar.

Margretha’s Death

Margretha died on October 30^th, 1689 when she was about 57 years old.

Burial:30 Oct 1689 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Buried the wife of Rudolph Müller.

At the time of her death, none of her children had married. Her eldest son would have been 27 years old, but he wouldn’t marry until 1696.

Daughter Veronica would marry a year after Margretha’s death, in 1690.

Sibilla, born in 1672 would have just turned 17 that late October day when the family gathered inside the medieval church to hear Margretha’s funeral sermon, then walked outside to bury her mother’s coffin. Sibylla didn’t marry for another several years, in 1698.

There are no marriage records for any other children, before or after Margretha’s death.

No grandchildren were born before Margretha died, so she never had the opportunity to enjoy those cherubic faces. I hope they all heard stories about Margretha and her life, including her family left behind in Switzerland.

In 1689, Margretha’s home was probably bustling with activity as her adult and near-adult children helped with household activities. Her son named for his father, or two sons if Hans Jacob survived, likely assisted Rudolph in the blacksmith shop and as the local ferrier.

The men may have worked in this very barn, or one similar, still standing, in Grossheppach.

The daughters would have assisted Margretha with the never-ending household chores and probably took care of her in her final illness.

Margretha’s home might have looked like, or could even been this medieval cross house in Grossheppach.

Or maybe this one.

Regardless, Margretha would have been in and out of all of these homes over the years. They would have been familiar, likely open to the neighbors, most of whom were related, at any time. Women likely came and went, especially in a time of need – childbirth, illness and the ever-present death.

Two years later, Rudolph remarried to another Margaretha. He died a year later, in 1992, joining Margretha and their children in the cemetery beside the church in Grossheppach.

It’s somehow ironic, and not just a little sad, that Margretha’s daughter, Veronica died in 1708 at only 41 years of age. Of course, there were many causes of death, but I always wonder about childbirth for women of childbearing age. Her sister, Sibilla, was a midwife and I wonder if she delivered Veronica’s children.

Unfortunately, the minister, in the Register of Souls, incorrectly attributed Veronica’s step-mother, who was also named Margaretha, as her mother. I realize that’s an easy mistake to make, but it hurts my heart for Veronica’s mother, our Margretha.

Hopefully, this error meant one thing – either Veronica and step-mother Margaretha had a wonderful relationship. Of course, it could also be that the minister was new to the church and didn’t know the family history. We don’t know exactly when this register was compiled, but it was clearly after 1711.

Seelenregister (Register of Souls) Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Veronica (spouse of Johann Jacob Mahler); died 11 January 1708, aged 41 years, 6 months.

Father: Rudolph Müller, citizen and farrier (smith) from Switzerland Cand (Kanton?); died 1692.

Mother: Margaretha, born in Switzerland, a chambermaid; died 23 March 1711, about 71 years of age.

Note by Tom who performed these translations: This Margaretha is Veronica’s step-mother. Her birth mother died in 1689 and was also named Margaretha.

This does cause me to wonder if step-mother Margretha truly was also from Switzerland, or if the two Margrethas have been intertwined, which I suspect is the case. If the step-mother is also from Switzerland, this tells us that perhaps several Swiss families settled in Grossheppach – and maybe they are related or from the same region or village.

Was our Margretha a chambermaid, or was the step-mother the chambermaid? Was chambermaid somehow different than “housewife” in that time and place? If so, how?

Godparents

I’m always so grateful when ministers include the names of the various godparents with baptisms. I wish when records are indexed, the godparents’ names were indexed too, because they are often the keys to unraveling relationships.

I compiled this table of godparents in order to see who is found in multiple baptisms and what can be discerned about those individuals. People who journeyed from out of town were more likely to be relatives than those who might have been godparents because they were neighbors or village officials.

It’s worth remembering that the Godparents were responsible for raising the child, and raising them up in the church, if something were to happen to the parents. Before the days of modern medicine, that happened all too often. Godparents were making this solemn promise in from of everyone, including God.

Godparents made a serious commitment, which is why they are often trusted family members.

Child	Godparent	Location	Comment
Sibilla 1661	Jerg Leinhardt Herman, Margretha		In 1657, one Georg Leonhard Hermann married Maria Magdalena Krausin. This family seems to have been in Grossheppach for several generations, so not Swiss.
	Sibilla Stockler(in)	Stuttgart, farm maid	Given the same first name, the distance from Stuttgart and her peasant status, this person is likely related.
Hans Rudolph – 1662	Jerg Leinhardt Herman		This family is found in the region in the earlier 1600s, so not Swiss.
	Ulrich Schweikhardt,	Stuttgart	I don’t find this individual, but I do find this family in Stuttgart earlier than this timeframe, so apparently not Swiss.
	Sibilla Glockler(in)	Also from…[probably Stuttgart]	These 3 people at this baptism are the same as the 1661 baptism, so likely all 3 connected in some way. There is a 1626 birth in Stuttgart for Anna Sybilla Gletler or Gloeckler.
Anna Magdalena 1664	Jerg Schmidt	Grunbach	Jerg died in 1686 in Grossheppach. Grunbach was perhaps 2 miles distant.
	J. L. Herman	Miller	Probably Jerg Leonhard Herman
	Daniel’s wife, Magdalena		Probably Daniel Ziegler, see below
Anna Margretha – 1664	Jerg Leonhard Herman	Miller
	Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler
	Anna Margaretha, wife of Ulrich Schweickh(a)r(t)
Veronica 1666	Daniel Ziegler
	Hans Eiber		Mayor in Grossheppach
	Maria Elisbetha Blaror(in)?
Hans Jacob 1668	Ulrich Schweigger	Stuttgart
	Jerg Leinhard Herman	Miller
	Magdalena, Daniel Ziegler’s wife
Anna Barbara 1669	Jerg Schmid	Schoolteacher in Grunback
	Jerg Leinhard Herman	Miller
	Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler
Sibylla 1672	Jerg Schmid	Schoolteacher in Grunbach
	Jerg Leinhard Herrman	Miller
	Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler
Jerg Leinhardt 1674	Jerg Schmidt	Schoolteacher in Grunbach
	Jerg Leinhard Herman, miller
	Magdalena, wife of Daniel Ziegler

Typically, when we see the same people repeat as godparents, especially when they have to travel from out of town, that often means they are relatives, and probably close relatives – often siblings.

Stuttgart is not nearby, about 11 miles distant. Either Rudolph or Margretha had some connection to the individuals from Stuttgart.

In this case, the fact that these families were living in this region for at least a generation suggests strongly that they were not from Switzerland, but perhaps they had married people who were, or there is a connection from an earlier generation.

Johann Rudolph and Margretha appear to be particularly close to Jerg Leinhardt Hermann, the local miller. They both would have seen the former Grossheppach mill, above and below, daily.

Why Johann Rudolph Muller and Margretha selected the same godparents for their children repeatedly will have to remain a mystery, at least for now.

Mitochondrial DNA

The mitochondrial DNA of Margretha would have been passed on to her children of both sexes, but only females pass it on.

We don’t know what happened to three daughters:

• Anna Magdalena reportedly born in 1664
• Anna Margaretha reportedly born in 1664
• Anna Barbara born in 1669

We know that two of Margretha’s daughters did in fact marry and have children, Veronica and Sybilla.

Veronica

From the Register of Souls, we see that Veronica had six daughters.

• Veronica’s daughter Veronica born in 1700, died in 1717.
• Veronica’s daughter, Anna Barbara Mahler married Jacob Kloepfer in 1732 and died in 1763. It looks like she had one daughter in 1733, but only three children are shown in the Grossheppach book through 1737.

Sibilla

Margretha’s daughter, Sibilla Muller born in 1672 married Johann George Lenz/Lentz in neighboring Beutelsbach in 1698. She had two daughters who lived.

• Elisabetha was born in 1709, but we know nothing more.
• Anna Barbara Lenz born in 1699 and died in 1770 married Johann Georg Vollmer in 1729, having four daughters who lived to adulthood:

1. 1. Barbara 1729-1744
   2. Maria Elisabetha 1732-1795
   3. Regina 1738-1740
   4. Anna Maria 1740-1781

Descendants of these females, through all females, to the current generation which can be male or female would carry the mitochondrial DNA of Margretha. I have a DNA testing scholarship for the first person who qualifies.

Stay Tuned

Just before I finished this article, I received a reply from the researcher who performed the one-place study of Grossheppach. They, indeed, to descend from Johann Rudolph Muller and Margretha through daughter Veronica – and – they have additional information they are willing to share. Bless that person.

As it turns out, they still live in Grossheppach.

I’m doing the genealogy happy dance.

Stay tuned. There’s more to come!

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

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• MyHeritage FREE DNA file upload – Transfer your results from other vendors free
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• 23andMe Ancestry Plus Health

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• MyHeritage FREE Tree Builder – Genealogy software for your computer
• MyHeritage Subscription with Free Trial
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Books

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Rudolph Muller lived in Grossheppach, Germany, sometimes known as Heppach, in the 1600s.

While Grossheppach is located in the middle of the wine region, as seen in this photo and the village shield, Rudolph didn’t work in the vineyards. Nor was he a miller, as his surname would suggest. Rudolph was a blacksmith.

The Village Blacksmith

This 1606 print of a German blacksmith shows us what Rudolph’s blacksmith’s shop would have looked like, and the tools he would have worked with. Google translate provides us with the following”

Work block; Anvil; Hammer; Pliers; Poker; bucket

Description: The brother works a glowing metal tip with a hammer, which he holds on the anvil with pliers. Further metal points lie next to the anvil and on a table in the background of the workshop. There is a second anvil here. Various saws hang on the wall and on the wall bracket in the window opening, a large saw blade lies on the ground in the foreground, while a poker and metal spikes lie in the fireplace.

The art of medieval blacksmithing is described here and here.

One thing is for sure. It was beastly hot, especially in the summers, probably outright miserable from time to time, and dangerous. Notice the bucket which would have contained water, on the floor.

Rudolph was probably burned in one way or another almost daily. Metals were scalding hot after being taken out of the forge, and hammering caused hot sparks flying everyplace. I shudder to think about his unprotected eyes.

Unknown to them then, carbon dioxide poisoning is also a concern for blacksmiths, but I’d wager their shops were probably pretty open due to heat.

They didn’t have safety goggles back then, or welder’s gloves. While this man is wearing long sleeves and some type of apron, I think, his legs are bare as are his hands and face.

I wonder if Rudolph might have been hard of hearing in his later years due to the noise of years of constant pounding.

Rudolph died at 59 years of age. No cause of death was entered, but I can’t help but wonder why he died.

Rudolph’s First Appearance

The first record we find is the birth of Rudolph’s daughter, named Sibilla, in 1661, in the Grossheppach church records. That daughter passed away and is not to be confused with the second daughter named Sibilla, born in 1672 who survived and is also my ancestor. I can’t help but wonder if the fact that they attempted that name twice means she was named after the mother of either Rudolph or Margaretha.

Both Rudolph and his first wife, Margaretha, were born in Switzerland, as determined by their death records, which means that either they married in Switzerland and subsequently settled in Heppach, or they met and married in Heppach.

Baptisms records begin in Grossheppach in 1558 and marriage records in 1564. Part of 1627 is missing due to an epidemic, according to this site. Deaths begin in 1648, immediately after the Thirty Years War.

Therefore, if Rudolph and Margaretha had married in Grossheppach, there should have been a record, so we can probably presume they married in Switzerland sometime between 1650 and 1660, and may have had their first children before arriving in Grossheppach.

Grossheppach

All early villages grew up beside a stream, the life-giver, and nourisher to people and animals. You can see the little stream of Heppach as it exists today, here, connecting Grossheppach with its neighbor village, Kleinheppach. The word grossen translates to “huge” and klein means “small.” There doesn’t seem to be a translation for heppach.

The stream named Heppach connects those two villages and looks quite small today. This early drawing shows the Rems River, not the stream of Heppach that empties into the Rems.

This drawing, made in 1686 from Kieser’s forest map would have been created during the time that Rudolph was the village smith. In fact, his house would have been one of those shown. The village wasn’t large, about 55 homes, as best I can tell, with maybe between 5 and 7 inhabitants each.

The church, as always, was in the center of the village and the cemetery would have been located outside, in the churchyard.

By 1686, Rudolph would have buried at least two children there and would bury his wife just three short years later. But in 1686, Rudolph and his family would have been living happily in one of these houses, going about the routine of daily life in the village.

An artist drawing the village would have been quite an interesting event. Perhaps Rudolph and the other villagers would have watched the artist as he worked, or listened in the evenings at the pub as he told tall tales about other German villages he had visited. Did they look at their own houses on the map and comment?

Another view shows the village from the opposite perspective.

The same area today, for comparison. That little river island looks to be long gone, or under the bridge.

I can locate the original Kirschstrasse on this current map, along with the castle for orientation. The church, with a different steeple, is located at the end of Kirschstrasse and matches up with an 1832 map.

The orderly rows on the hillsides are vineyards as seen looking down at the region from the top of one of the hills.

The map below shows the distant hills with the villages clustered in valleys along the streams.

These villages were not isolated.

Rudolph’s daughter married Johann Georg Lenz from Beutelsbach, across the Rems River, and spent her adult life living there, but she was clearly within walking distance of her family members. It’s less than 3 miles from Beutelsbach to Kleinheppach, north of Grossheppach.

You can view more photos of Grossheppach here and here

History and Vineyards

The vineyards in Grossheppach reach back into time immemorial. As with any location, geography and climate dictate what can be grown, and agriculture defines the occupation and lifestyle of the residents. Viticulture has sustained the Grossheppach residents, along with their neighbors, probably since humans have inhabited this valley and figured out what happens when you ferment grapes.

Historical information is found on the Wayback machine, translated as follows:

The first mention of this village [vineyards] is when the knight ‘Fridericus miles de Heggebach’ in 1279, Master Rudolf (doctor in Esslingen) bequeathed three “Jauchert vineyards” from Großheppach to the Bebenhausen monastery in addition to his house in Esslingen.

A castle site mentioned in 1485 once had a wooden castle on which Staufer ministerials – the Knights of Heppach – sat; they are first mentioned in a document in 1236 [where Grossheppach was identified as Hegnesbach.] The monastery Gundelsbach was founded by a hermit in 1359 for the St. Pauls hermits, to which houses and farms have been attached since 1470. The church consecrated to St. Aegidius – a foundation of Waiblingen – was raised to an independent parish in 1489. In 1769 the church received a so-called ‘Welsche Bell’ as a tower dome.

Note that Welsche likely refers to the colloquial term for “French-speaking Swiss, their portion of Switzerland known also as Welschland.

Next to the church, the renaissance castle is a landmark of Großheppach. It was built in 1592 by the Württemberg Chancellor Dr. Martin Eichmann from a town house; at the same time he acquired various rights on site. The castle property later passed into the hands of the noble families von Abel, von Goeben and von Gaisberg.

During the uprising of the ‘poor Konrad’ in 1514 (see also the local history of Beutelsbach), Großheppach saw peasant revolutionaries in its corridors. On Easter Monday 1514, the goat Peter moved with a group of farmers to the Rems between Beutelsbach and Großheppach in order to subject the newly introduced weights of the Duke of Württemberg to a ‘water test’: the weights promptly sank below what the farmers saw as a judgment of God. They marched against castles, cities and monasteries, but were soon blown up. The leader of the Großheppacher Fähnlein, Klaus Schlechthin, later took part in the peasant uprising of 1525 and was captured in the Battle of Böblingen and executed by running the gauntlet.

During the Thirty Years’ War, on January 21, 1643, there was a skirmish between the imperial and Swedes at the Remsbrücke, where around 300 soldiers were killed. In the War of the Spanish Succession [1701-1714], Großheppach was again the starting point for warlike ventures. On June 13, 1704, the greatest generals of the time – Prince Eugene of Savoy, the English military leader Marlborough and Margrave Ludwig von Baden – held a council of war on the operations of the Battle of Höchstädt here in the Lamm Inn, which still exists today.

The listed buildings of the Häckermühle and the town hall from the 16th and 17th centuries are well worth seeing.

Rudolph’s Life

The only evidence we have of Rudolph’s age is the age at which his wife had their last child which was born in 1675. If Margaretha was 43 at that time, she would have been born about 1632, so we can assume he was born sometime around 1630, or perhaps slightly earlier.

Rudolph would have married between 1650 and 1660, most likely, and they would have packed up their cart, maybe hitched up a mule and walked from someplace in Switzerland to Germany, assuredly after all danger from the Thirty Years War had abated.

Most German villages had been heavily depopulated during the war, although Grossheppach did not appear to have been abandoned. In the best-case scenarios, German villages lost only one-third of their population. Some lost 50%, and some were entirely destroyed and depopulated.

This settlement pattern suggests that Rudolph came from the German-speaking portion of Switzerland.

How might Rudolph and Margaretha have made the journey to Grossheppach?

While we don’t know Rudolph and Margaretha’s departure point in Switzerland, we do know that the Bernese Oberland was far more Protestant than much of the rest of Switzerland.

The mountains southwest of Bern marked the dividing line between the German and French-speaking regions of Switzerland. Regardless of where they originated in the German-speaking region, it was not a short journey and was probably a one-way trip – forever leaving family behind.

This trek was likely not undertaken by water unless they navigated the Rhine, then backtracked down the Neckar (against the flow) followed by the Rems.

Perhaps German villages issued advertisements or notices that they were looking for specific skilled trades. Maybe Rudolph knew that Grossheppach needed a blacksmith. It’s certainly possible that they joined with other family members, either as they journeyed or joined those who had already settled in Germany.

Rudolph’s daughter, Veronica’s death record gives us the closest approximation with the phrase, “Switzerland Cand.”

Seelenregister (Register of Souls) Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Veronica (spouse of Johann Jacob Mahler); died 11 January 1708, aged 41 years, 6 months.

Father: Rudolph Müller, citizen and farrier (smith) from Switzerland Cand (Kanton?); died 1692.

Mother: Margaretha, born in Switzerland, a chambermaid; died 23 March 1711, about 71 years of age.

Note by Tom who performed these translations: This Margaretha is Veronica’s step-mother. Her birth mother died in 1689 and was also named Margaretha.

If anyone has any further idea what “Cand” might mean other than perhaps Canton, or which Canton, I’d be forever grateful.

I do wonder if the newlywed couple set off for Germany on a great adventure, arriving before their first child did. Of course, they could have married a few years earlier and had already begun their family when they decided to leave, which meant travel would have been more difficult. If so, there are no marriage records for those earlier children in Grossheppach, although, clearly they could have married in nearby villages.

Children

• One way or another, Rudolph and Margaretha had settled in and welcomed a baby, Sibilla in May of 1661.
• Heartbreak followed a few months later. Sibilla died in October, when she was just 24 weeks old, the first family member to be buried in the cemetery beside the church.
• In August of 1662, Hans Rudolph, named for his father, joined the family. Johann Rudolph Muller married in 1696 to Anna Barbara Mercklin and died sometime between July 1718 and January 1735. We don’t have the Y DNA of Rudolph Muller, which is passed from father to son. If Hans Rudolph and Anna Barbara had sons, who had sons, whose descendants carry the Muller (or derivative) surname today through all males, I have a DNA testing scholarship for that Muller male.
• 1663 saw Anna Magdalena baptized in February. She married Jacob(y) Sonntag on August 14, 1688.
• Anna Margaretha was baptized in October 1664.
• Veronica was born in July 1666 and married in 1690 to Hanss Jacob Mahler the local tailor. She died on January 11, 1708.
• Son, Hanss Jacob Muller, was born in August 1668. Cousin Wolfram, living in Grossheppach indicates that one Hans Jacob died in 1675, but with no parents listed. If he did not die and had male children who have direct line male descendants today, they would qualify for the Y DNA scholarship as well.
• Anna Barbara’s baptism is recorded in December 1669 and died in October 1679.
• There is almost three years before the birth of Sibilla which makes me wonder if they lost a child.
• September of 1672 welcomed the second daughter named Sibilla who married Johann Georg Lenz/Lentz in 1698 in Beutelsbach, living the rest of her life there as a midwife.
• Jerg Lienhardt was born in September of 1674 and died in January of 1675 at 18 weeks of age.

That was the last child and the last church entry for 15 years. But on October 30th of 1689, Margaretha, Rudolph’s wife, died.

We don’t know exactly how many children were living at this time. There were no marriage records yet, and the oldest child, Hans Rudolph, Rudolph’s namesake wouldn’t marry until a few years later. He would have been age 27, living and working at home when his mother died.

At least two daughters were living; Veronica who would have been 23, and Sibila, the youngest, who would have been 17. It’s possible that up to four other children were living as well. Rudolph wasn’t alone, nor did he have a number of small children.

A year later, almost exactly, on October 28, 1690, Rudolph’s daughter, Veronica married the local tailor, Hanss Jacob Mahler.

Perhaps that wedding made Rudolph ponder marriage again and realize that he did not want to remain a widower forever. Or, perhaps his daughter had done a good deal of the cooking and domestic work and simple logic kicked in when a local woman was widowed and started looking admiringly in his direction. Necessity often plays cupid.

Rudolph did what most people of that time did if their spouse died. He remarried.

Marriage: 11 August 1691 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Johann Rudolph Müller, from here with Mrs. Anna Margaretha Berger(in), surviving widow of Herr Berger, former court bailiff? from here.

However, Rudolph didn’t live much longer himself, passing away in July of 1692.

Burial: 28 July 1692 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

Joh(ann) Rüdolph Müller was buried.

I sure wish they had recorded Rudolph’s age and birth location. Just a few strokes of the pen could have told us so much.

Rudolph’s second wife, Margaretha, not to be confused with his first wife of the same name, died in 1711.

Burial: 23 March 1711 was buried Margaretha, surviving widow of Rüdolph Müller, former smith and citizen here……..Knauss(in)…..aged 71 years.

Marriage: 12 Nov 1678 Grossheppach Evangelical Church

H(err) Johannes Heinrich Berger, …master and juror here with Margretha Knauss were married.

Given that Margaretha (born Knauss) married previously in 1678, at the age of 38, she likely had a child or two, and Rudolph probably had step-children that would still have been at home when he married Margaretha in 1691.

The Sweet Spot

Rudolph was born during the Thirty Years War, but in Switzerland where the residents were unaffected. Switzerland was an oasis of peace and prosperity. No one wanted Switzerland to fall, because the Swiss provided mercenaries to many other countries. In essence, that was payment for keeping the war off of their land.

Brave or hopeful, or both, he moved to Grossheppach as a relatively young man, probably as a newlywed.

Rudolph’s children did not marry during his lifetime, so he never got to know any of his grandchildren, but he did manage to actually live in the “sweet spot” in German history.

Rudolph didn’t live in the Palatinate which was constantly being overrun by the French in the 1670s, 1680s, and 1690s. I don’t know why he chose Grossheppach instead of the Palatinate, but that was either smart or fortuitous.

Rudolph died before the beginning of the War of Spanish Succession in 1701, so he avoided warfare for his entire lifetime – a rare event for any German in the 1600s.

The Lamm Inn

Grossheppach seemed to be a quiet village. After a long day standing and pounding at the forge, Rudolph probably walked a few feet to the Lamm Inn, across from the church which existed then and still exists today as a restaurant. Trust me, I’d like nothing better right about now!

Cousin Wolfram, who lives in Grossheppach tells us that the Lamm Inn was the only inn in the village in olden times.

Of course, given that wine was produced locally, Rudolph wouldn’t have been drinking German beer, but whatever was available from the cool wine cellar. His body probably ached, and he was hot and thirsty, so he would have been grateful for anything cold, along with warm friendships.

Oh Rudolph, I so want to visit you.

To sit in the Lamm Inn where you sat.

To walk on the cobblestone streets where you walked for more than 30 years.

To discover which home was yours, and maybe, if I could be so lucky, the remnants of your forge.

To sit in the church where you assuredly sat, every Sunday, along with too many more “funeral days.” Maybe I would luck into “your pew.” I would close my eyes and feel your spirit nearby.

I want to stroll the churchyard, knowing that you are there, somewhere, along with Margaretha.

Would you know that I am visiting? That some part of your DNA has come home to connect with your ashes and dust?

And, if I listen oh-so-carefully, will you whisper in my ear where, in Switzerland, you were born?

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

• FamilyTreeDNA – Y, mitochondrial and autosomal DNA testing
• MyHeritage DNA –Autosomal DNA test
• MyHeritage FREE DNA file upload – Transfer your results from other vendors free
• AncestryDNA – Autosomal DNA test
• 23andMe Ancestry – Autosomal DNA only, no Health
• 23andMe Ancestry Plus Health

Genealogy Products and Services

• MyHeritage FREE Tree Builder – Genealogy software for your computer
• MyHeritage Subscription with Free Trial
• Legacy Family Tree Webinars – Genealogy and DNA classes, subscription-based, some free
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Genealogy Research

• Legacy Tree Genealogists – Professional genealogy research

Books

• Genealogical.com – Lots of wonderful genealogy research books

Sibilla Muller was born September 6^th, 1672 in Grossheppach to Rudolph Muller and his wife, Margaretha.

Grossheppach isn’t far from Beutelsbach where Sibilla’s future husband lived. He probably walked the short distance to court her regularly.

Marriage

Sibylla married Johann Georg Lenz, a vinedresser, in 1698. We are fortunate that while they were married in the church in Beutelsbach, her home church in Grossheppach also recorded the marriage the following week. I don’t know, of course, but I’d wager that the newlywed couple attended the bride’s church the Sunday following their wedding, taking with them news of the good tidings of their marriage.

Johann Georg was turning 25 in a couple of weeks. Sibilla was already 25 and would turn 26 that September. High time to marry and start a family.

My friend, Tom, translates the Beutelsbach record:

The Purification (of Mary) (February 2nd), (married):

Hanss Georg Lentz, legitimate son of Hanss Lentz, citizen and vinedresser from here and Sibilla, legitimate, surviving daughter of the late Johann Rudolph Müller, former smith from Hoppach (Grossheppach).

Next, the Heppach record:

1st Sunday after Epiphany in the local church was proclaimed, Hanss Jerg Lentz, legitimate son of Hanss Lentz, citizen in Beutelsbach and Sibylla, surviving, legitimate daughter of the late Hanss Rudolph Muller, citizen and smith here; were married in Beutelsbach on the 2nd of February (1698).

Why would the couple marry in the groom’s church instead of the bride’s church, as was the custom?

Perhaps because her parents were deceased, and his father was still living?

Sibilla’s mother had died in 1689 and her father in 1692. The young couple made their home in Beutelsbach where he could tend the vines in the vineyard, as his ancestors had done for generations. They probably lived with his father.

Sibilla, also spelled Sibylla, died May 28, 1746 when she was 73 years old from a combination of asthma and typhoid, at least as best I can tell from present-day translations combined with older names for known illnesses.

Martin Goll compiled family information for Sibilla, here. Using an automated translation tool, we discover:

Daughter of Joh. Rudolf Müller, gew, blacksmith Heppach.

Can print and read something written. Has 8 1/2 year in Großheppach served here all. About 1740 was chosen for Midwife. Due to the head disease.

Cause of death: Asthma and typhoid

Profession: midwife

I don’t know what head disease translates to in modern terms. I don’t understand this translation in its entirety, but I can pick out relevant pieces.

The word “gew” did not translate.

It’s interesting, if this translation is literal then Sibilla did not begin her midwife career until 1740 when she was already 68 years old. I wonder if this translated strangely. Or maybe the 8.5 years in Grossheppach refers to midwifing there before Beutelsbach.

Maybe I can learn more by researching midwifery in Germany in that era.

Midwifery

According to the book, The Art of Midwifery, midwives in southern Germany in the 1600s and 1700s were actually public employees. Furthermore, midwife was the “best” career for women, of which there were very few, providing the midwives with a degree of independence not normally allowed women.

Most midwives were the wives or widows of artisans, minor city officials or day laborers. Many were not wealthy enough to own their own homes. They were respectable, but certainly not bourgeois, and were generally referred to by their clients and in municipal notes as either “Weib” or “Mutter,” not the more respectable “Frau.”

Midwives were actually sworn public officials beginning in 1489 in nearby Stuttgart, so probably in Beutelsbach as well about that time. The city councils took care to regulate the midwives, issuing, and changing ordinances.

Midwives were different from other women in this context, not to mention that they were actually paid. In the city and village payment records, midwives were listed right after surgeons and apothecaries, but of course, they were paid much less. Midwives received 2 to 8 gulden per year while the city barber-surgeons received 10-25 gulden. In the 16^th and 17^th centuries, the pay disparity increased.

Therefore, midwives earned money, but not enough to support themselves. Perhaps this was a subtle, or maybe not-so-subtle way to control these women, lest they become *too* independent.

Sometimes, when midwives performed additional responsibilities, such as caring for pregnant women during times of the plague, or in the city hospital, the midwife would receive a grant or additional money from the council – not because she deserved it, of course, but as a sign “of our goodwill and not their rights,” to quote municipal council records.

Sometimes midwives had to approach the council directly to request payment. They generally did not employ the supplicatory language common for women asking assistance but directly requested either salary increases or “the payment of rye and wood which is due to us.” It strikes me that they shouldn’t have had to ask at all, but perhaps that’s my 21st-century perspective showing through.

It’s also worth noting that a midwife who moved into a city or town would often ask specifically to be granted citizenship – a status not normally accorded to women specifically and which was accompanied by obligatory rights and responsibilities. Sometimes citizenship was offered in order to entice a midwife and her husband to move to a town. Apparently, a good midwife was in demand.

I wonder if this might be related to the commentary about Sibilla being in Heppach for eight and a half years. Perhaps as that village’s midwife before becoming midwife in Beutelsbach about 1840.

Wealthy women might want to arrange for their own midwife instead of receiving the services of the midwife selected by the council. Midwives who didn’t have a husband to rely on for income often took private clients in addition to their civic duty.

Wealthy women paid fees comparable with the fees that barber-surgeons received.

The cost of a simple, uncomplicated birth was similar to that of a circumcision. (I’m sorry, but this comparison just makes me cringe.)

A more difficult birth, such as a breech birth or twins was comparable to setting a bone or removing tonsils. (This made me cringe too, for other reasons.)

These comparisons are fascinating because I would not think of them as equivalent.

Midwives had to study as an apprentice with an experienced midwife for generally a year or more, then pass an examination in order to be licensed.

Sometimes physicians, who did not deliver babies and were not trained to do so, decided who was qualified to become a midwife.

As time passed, another layer of bureaucracy was added in many places in order to minimize the appearances of midwives who were considered to be “peasants” before the council. Upper-class women known as “honorable women” were paid to “manage” the midwives so that the councils didn’t have to deal with them directly. Both “honorable women” who knew nothing at all about the practice of midwifery and physicians participated in the quizzing, testing, and selection of midwives.

The questions in such an examination reveal the level of knowledge which city councils hoped every new midwife would have. First came questions about her training and experience. With whom had she studied and for how long? Had she had children herself? How many births had she seen or taken part in? Then came questions about the content of her training. What food, drink and baths will help a woman have an easy birth? How does she know if a woman is pregnant and does not simply have some other kind of swelling? How does she know whether the fetus is healthy or sick, alive or dead? What is the normal position for birth, and how is this to be brought about in the case of abnormal presentation? What should be done with the umbilical cord and afterbirth, especially to make sure that the latter has emerged? How are the new mother and infant to be best taken care of, and what advice should she give the new mother?

The doctors judged the prospective midwife’s answers about the medical aspects of delivery and pre and post-natal care while the ‘honourable women’ assessed her morality and character. Though the questions appear sensible, it is important to remember that the physicians holding the examination had received all their training through the reading of classical medical texts and perhaps observing a single autopsy on a female cadaver; they were thus testing the skills of women who may have observed or assisted in as many as a hundred deliveries, while they had never even witnessed the birth of a live child.

Additional Responsibilities and Expectations

Midwives were expected to determine if the mother was in need of food or clothing, in the case of indigent women in particular.

Another responsibility of midwives was the emergency baptism. The first known ordinance about midwives stated that if the midwife determined that a child was near death that she should perform an emergency baptism or “she would have to answer to God for her laziness and irresponsibility.”

I recall at least one instance in the church record where it was recorded that the grandmother performed an emergency baptism of a child immediately following birth.

Religious differences entered this realm, because when babies were supposed to be baptized, and in what way was deemed critically important – especially if they had to be rebaptized, just in case the child survived and/or the midwife might have performed the baptism incorrectly. At one point, “rebaptism,” because it was related to the “radical” Anabaptist religions, carried the death penalty, so everyone was walking on eggshells. It was perceived that the midwife literally held the destiny of the child’s soul in her hands.

Municipalities varied in their requirements – but some passed ordinances requiring the midwife to seek out a member of the clergy, a councilman, or in one case, the mayor, before baptizing an ailing child to be absolutely positive that the baptism was done correctly. Of course, the midwife had to weigh the responsibility of protecting the child’s soul by baptizing the baby without seeking permission-disguised-as-assistance and following the “rules,” which might mean the baby died without being baptized at all. The city that enacted the ordinance requiring midwives to seek out the mayor reported exactly zero cases of that actually happening. Apparently, midwives had plenty of common sense in addition to birthing skills.

In some cases, during a difficult birth that might or would result in a deceased child, such as when hooks had to be utilized to extract the infant from the birth canal, the child was actually baptized by pushing something with either “holy water” for Catholics or “baptismal water” for Protestants, into the mother’s vagina to reach the head of the child before it died. I have heard these colloquially called “sponge baptisms.”

I can only imagine what the mother was going through as this occurred, understanding exactly why, and that she herself was also on the verge of death.

It was up to the midwife to report the identity of the father if the birth was illegitimate and the father was previously unidentified. Midwives weren’t always trusted, so often one of the “honorable women” was sent to monitor illegitimate births where the father was unknown. It was believed that the mother would “exclaim the name of the father during the pains of birth.”

In larger cities, especially as guilds and others began to regulate the morality of their members, midwives were expected to report on any child that was born “prematurely,” or full-term, before 9 months had elapsed after the wedding.

Several church records over the years have commented about the bride being pregnant, although clearly, not all pregnancies were evident yet when the wedding occurred.

Additionally, midwives were entirely prevented from assisting with an abortion or participating in infanticide. Mothers who engaged in strenuous physical activity were suspected of attempting an abortion, as were women who took herbs or drugs.

Midwives were forbidden from burying a deceased child or fetus. Any child that died during or as a result of childbirth was to be observed by “3 or 4 unsuspecting female persons.”

Not only was it bad enough if your baby died, but 3 or 4 non-family members were requested to come into your house to view your dead baby. Peachy.

If something foul was suspected in the death of a child or fetus, the midwife was required to take a barber-surgeon with her to inspect the deceased child. The physician or barber-surgeon would possibly perform an autopsy which midwives were not allowed to do.

While the midwife could not normally bury a deceased child, since these already-dead babies had not been baptized and were therefore relegated to hell, the midwife was allowed to bury them since nothing more could be done for their souls and “no one would have worried about the type of funeral such a child received.”

I had to read that section more than once because even though I realize their beliefs were different then, the callousness of that way of thinking is still quite shocking.

The word of a midwife could easily condemn another woman.

Anytime witchcraft accusations were on the increase, so were accusations of abortion and infanticide. Some midwives were even accused of causing deaths through “natural” methods or witchcraft.

As if the midwife didn’t have enough to worry about, eventually, they were also responsible for attempting to enforce the desired level of morality.

As cities enacted more stringent sumptuary codes in the sixteenth century, midwives were required to inform parents about laws that governed baptisms so they would not, for example, spend too much money on the infant’s baptism gown or invite too many people to the baptismal feast.

Interestingly, this tells us a bit about what happened, socially, surrounding a baptism. In a small village like Beutelsbach, I wonder if the entire village attended the baptismal feast. Everyone would have been related.

I also wonder if baptismal gowns became heirlooms and were passed from child to child within the family.

How Many Babies Did Sibilla Deliver?

Beutelsbach was not a large village.

I counted the baptisms in the church book in Beutelsbach in 1740-1745. Of course, if there had been deaths where Sibilla baptized the child before it died, that child would probably not have been recorded in the births/baptisms – but then again – who knows. I did not look through the deaths to see if any children that died on the day they were born were also recorded in births.

Suffice it to say that assuredly, Sibilla had to perform at least a few emergency baptisms as infant death was rather common.

Year	Number of births/baptisms
1740	40
1741	35
1742	36
1743	40
1744	49
1745	33

I stopped counting at the end of 1745 because Sibilla died midway through 1746.

Sibilla would have averaged about 39 births per year, or one birth every 9 or 10 days. if she was a midwife for 8.5 years, that equates to about 330 births.

At least some of those deliveries would have been close family members – grandchildren and children of her husband’s family members who had been living in Beutelsbach for generations. Some of her family members probably also lived in the same village since Heppach was only a half-hour walk or a mile or so away.

This birth information also tells us something about the size of the village in those years.

How Large was Beutelsbach?

A couple whose child did not die would have a baby every 18-24 months. For ease of math, let’s figure that couple would have a child in the baptismal register every other year.

Therefore, the number of child-bearing couples is double the yearly birth rate, or about 78. Granted, some couples appeared more often, but some couples had “aged out” of bearing children, so the number of households was likely not more than double the number of reproducing couples. Therefore, the village probably had about 150 houses, assuming each family lived separately. If each household had an average of 7 residents at any one time, the village had a total of about 1000 people.

This 1797 map of southwest Germany shows Beautelsbach, along with Grossheppach. Note the cemetery beside the church, which is difficult to see, right beside the cemetery. The actual village is located at 11 o’clock, above the blue pin, and the cemetery is at the end of the U-shaped street, on the way out of town. Based on a wider view of this map, I believe the little black dots aren’t houses, but are small stands of forest. Notice the rows of vineyards on the hillsides.

Children

Sibilla had 8 children herself, all born in Beutelsbach, the first child arriving just 10 days or so before her first wedding anniversary. No need for the midwife to report Sibilla to the council, although I suspect most midwives were discrete and understanding.

• Anna Barbara Lenz was born on January 23, 1699, and died July 15, 1770. She married Johann George Vollmer on October 26, 1729, and had 9 children. Given that 2 of her children were born in 1740 or later, it’s probable that Sibilla delivered at least these two of her own grandchildren. Three of these grandchildren died before Sibilla.

I would think that delivering your own grandchild who subsequently died would be doubly difficult. Thankfully, none of these children died at birth, but one died about 10 days later. Did Sibilla wonder if she could have or should have done anything differently, even if the death was clearly not her fault and had nothing to do with delivery?

There is a comment about Anna Barbara being in the house in 1746 with the “heated illness,” which is typhoid. This is when Sibilla died as well and is clearly remembered many years later. Anna Barbara could read and write.

• Johannes Lenz born December 15, 1700, died December 24, 1700.

This must have been a miserable Christmas for Sibilla.

• Jakob Lenz born April 1, 1702 died July 8, 1702.
• Johann Adam Lenz born July 1, 1703, died July 11, 1746, just a few weeks after his mother died of typhoid. He too was a vinedresser. Martin Goll says, “When he was already married he had to be under occupation for 7 weeks, but deserted there because he already had a brother in the war.” He could read and write.

Johann Adam married Maria Katharina Bauer in 1735 and had 7 children before his own death 11 years later of typhoid. His last child was born two months after his death.

At least three of Johann Adam’s children were probably welcomed into the world by his mother. Two of his children died before he and his mother passed away, one that she would have delivered died about 2 weeks later, probably also of typhoid.

• Margaretha Lenz born October 21, 1704, died March 15, 1717, at the age of 12. No cause of death is given, but I have to wonder why she died.
• Johann Georg Lenz born December 2, 1707, died January 26, 1710, of smallpox. Smallpox was highly contagious and deadly about 30% of the time.
• Elizabetha Lenz was born in 1709. Nothing more is known but she likely died. Some records are missing during this time.
• Johann Jakob Lenz born July 25, 1712, died March 8, 1793, of a “sore throat.” Can read and write. Has served here and in Stetten for many years. Was elected as a Grenadier in 1734, was Captain of the Roman Company, and bought out in 1742.

Johann Jakob married Catharina Beerwarth on April 25, 1741, and had one child who was born and died a few days later in 1742. Sibilla likely delivered this child and knew there was a problem of some sort. Three months later, Catharina died too.

Johann Jakob remarried on November 12, 1744, to Katharina Haag in Heiningen. There was some question about his marriage certificate and military service at the time he was married and his first child was born. His mother may have delivered this child. The child was baptized in Beutelsbach but could have actually been born in Heiningen.

Typhoid

Clearly, Sibilla’s household and apparently the household of at least one adult child experienced an outbreak of typhoid during 1746. Typhoid is bacterial and treatable with antibiotics today, but it likely infected the entire village, if not the entire region.

In the book, A brief history of epidemic and pestilential diseases; with the principal phenomena of the physical world, which precede and accompany them, and observations deduced from the facts stated. : In two volumes, we find:

At Zurich in Switzerland and in Saxony prevailed a very malignant dysentery. Indeed for a number of years, at this period, dysentery was epidemic in many parts of Europe and America.

Typhoid is a person-to-person transmitted bacterial disease that can be passed through water, often through wells located in close proximity to septic pits. This 1939 conceptual illustration shows various ways that the typhoid bacteria could contaminate a well, creating a never-ending cycle of infection. Wells in German villages were generally in the center of the town, shared by all residents. Waterways, meaning creeks and rivers would be even more susceptible to contamination from fecal runoff.

Typhoid is mentioned decades later in reference to one of Sibilla’s adult children who did not die, so the outbreak must have been widespread and devastating.

I counted the deaths from 1744 through 1747 in the church records. It appears that the records may be incomplete in 1746 and 1747, with at least a couple of months missing from both years. The records are at least in disarray. This likely reflects the chaos of what was occurring in the village and it’s certainly possible that the Reverend and his family were ill too.

Year	Deaths recorded in the church book
1744	34
1745	28
1746	71
1747	66

The death rate began to increase in April of 1746, rapidly, so the contamination must have occurred in March since typhoid takes about a month to kill its victims. Sibilla died on May 28^th.

Life and Death

As I write this, in the midst of a pandemic at the very end of 2020, I’m struck by several thoughts.

Sibilla was one of the few women of her time who actually had a career, and one that paid, even if the pay was minimal and not on par with other medical providers. I’m so proud of her.

Clearly, Sibilla was well-respected or she would not have been asked to be a midwife and continued in that role until her death.

I wonder if Sibilla caught typhoid in the process of midwifing.

I wonder how much was understood of hygiene and the role of washing hands in both the prevention of infection during childbirth and as well as the prevention of transmission of disease. Based on later writings, I suspect that correlation had not yet been made.

Sibilla must have been concerned as she felt the first of the Typhoid symptoms that would have started about the end of April. Headache, low fever, weakness, fatigue, muscle aches, sweating, dry cough, loss of appetite – then progressing into more serious symptoms including a very high fever – then into death roughly 4 weeks later on May 28th.

At some point, Sibilla’s symptoms went from “not feeling well” to a nagging worry, to knowing, to being alarmed, to being terrified, to being so sick she just wanted to die.

According to WebMD:

People with acute illness can contaminate the surrounding water supply through stool, which contains a high concentration of the bacteria. Contamination of the water supply can, in turn, taint the food supply. The bacteria can survive for weeks in water or dried sewage.

About 3%-5% of people become carriers of the bacteria after the acute illness. Others suffer a very mild illness that goes unrecognized. These people may become long-term carriers of the bacteria — even though they have no symptoms — and be the source of new outbreaks of typhoid fever for many years.

This surely makes the moniker, “Typhoid Mary” much more understandable.

Given how many people died, that suggests that the entire village had to be sick. No wonder the burial records are incomplete and in disarray. And God help anyone who delivered a baby during this time.

Given what we are living through now, I don’t think I’ve ever felt such camaraderie with any ancestor before. While I’m not entirely surprised at that feeling, I am amazed to have that connection because of uncontrolled, fatal illness. The difference is, of course, that in 1746, they didn’t understand about transmission and how to prevent it. It would have, of course, required the entire village (and maybe neighbor villages too) to adopt those same prevention measures. Perhaps that would have meant boiling their drinking and cooking water at that time along with hygiene routines that included more hand-washing.

We do clearly understand what’s needed today, although many in our modern “village” refused and still refuse to take the proper precautions to protect everyone and modify their behaviors accordingly – just for long enough to get the current pandemic under control. Maybe small German villages would have had a better conformance rate, especially if the minister preached it from the pulpit and everyone literally knew and were related to people who were suffering and dying.

Sibilla and her son’s burial entries both convey the story of their deaths – as do so many others in the village. Her daughter’s death entry, 24 years later mentions that she lived through the 1746 “heated illness” as typhoid was described because fevers topped 104, followed by delirium, seizures, and death as the brain overheated and fried.

One day, the obituaries or burial entries for those of us who don’t succumb to Covid will also reflect that we lived through the epidemic of 2020, the dark winter of our time.

Sibilla, if she’s watching, must be incredulous and wondering why our “village” refuses to do the simple things we can, before it’s too late. After all, we have the advantage of knowledge. Knowledge of how the dread illness spread and how to protect themselves is something Sibilla and her family didn’t have and would have given anything for – and an opportunity we are collectively squandering.

It does, indeed, take a village.

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

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Books

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Johann Georg Lenz, known as Jerg, was born on February 21, 1674 in the beautiful wine-region village of Beutelsbach, Germany to Hans Lenz and Barbara Sing.

Martin Goll, the local historian has kindly documented the various families Beutelsbach, here.

Martin, through a German to English automatic translator, provides the following information about Johann Georg Lenz:

Can read and write. Has always stayed with his parents. Has had to be sent to the field 5 times, and has had to endure a few months each time. He was unlucky several times while breaking stones, when stones fell on his body and back.

Cause of death: Old age

Occupation: Vinedresser

Let’s look at what each one of those statements tells us about Johann Georg Lenz, known as Jerg in the village.

If he can read and write, that tells us that Jerg went to school which would likely have been associated with the local church.

“He has always stayed with his parents,” would suggest that he never married, but that isn’t the case. I do wonder if this means that Jerg always lived in his parents’ homeplace, both before and after their deaths. Or perhaps it means stayed in the local village.

Martin Goll located and documented the Hans Lenz home in Beutelsbach. Whether or not Jerg lived here as an adult, he assuredly was raised here.

Homes of the farmers and vinedressers were located in the village, and the men walked up to the vineyards on the hillsides every day.

These vineyards had been long established when Jerg worked those vines, beneath the ever-watchful sentry-like ruins of the castle, here. Today, those same vineyards line the hillsides surrounding Beutelsbach, creating artistic flowing designs.

I wonder about the commentary, “sent to the field 5 times.” Based on mandatory military service required for males, I would suspect that’s what this is referencing – not the literal fields where he went to work daily, probably from the time he was a small child, toddling along beside his father and the other village men as they manicured the vines.

1674, the year Jerg was born was after the Thirty Years’ War which had ended in 1648, although peace, such as it was, was short-lived in Germany.

Jerg’s younger brother served in the military at various times, including 1705, and it’s likely Jerg did as well.

Jerg’s occupation is given as that of a Weingärtner, the same as his father and generations of his descendants to follow.

A weingartner is a vine tender in the vineyards, literally a vine gardener or wine grower.

Given his occupation, passed down for generations, it’s unlikely that Jerg would be “breaking stones” in the vineyards, which had already been established for centuries by this time, so I suspect that his wounds from breaking stones would have occurred during his time “in the field” in military service, or perhaps elsewhere.

This ancient building in Beutelsbach assuredly stood when Jerg lived there and shows  squared stones used for the first story. Those would have had to be gathered or quarried, and cut and chiseled to shape.

I feel Jerg’s pain though. Having suffered a back injury in my 20s, I can vouch for the fact that while you may heal somewhat, your back is never the same again and you never recover completely. It reminds you exactly who is in charge every single day.

Chronic pain at some level was probably just a fact of Jerg’s life. At least the vineyards were beautiful and peaceful, even if you did have to climb up to them. Beutelsbach is in the valley along the river.

Blog reader, Sharon, attended college in Beutelsbach when Stanford rented part of an estate, now the Hotel Landgut Burg, high above Beutelsbach. She returned for a reunion, and was kind enough to share her photos with me and allow me to share them with you.

As steep as this hillside is, I hope Jerg tended the lower regions or rode in the cart or on the wagon.

You can see more photos of Beutelsbach, here.

This photo was taken by Sharon from the top of one of those hillside vineyard rows. I can’t help but wonder if any of those vines were tended by Jerg. Probably not, given that grapevines appear to live 100-120 years at the top end – but hey – maybe these vines are the descendants of those earlier vines just like I’m Jerg’s descendant.

You can see the incredibly beautiful vineyards above Beutelsbach, with wildflowers planted between the rows, here. They will take your breath away.

Warfare

Germany, located in a strategically important location with the Rhine River at its east border, and also bordering France, was anything but a peaceful location.

Wurttemberg, located mostly east of the Rhine except where it bordered the Rhine on its south was positioned in the center of Europe which is on the way to and from almost everyplace. A crossroads that almost every army seemed to tromp through, if not attack. Some of the most chronic offenders were the French although they certainly didn’t have a monopoly on attacking the area that is today modern Germany.

In 1688, 1703 and 1707, the French entered the Duchy of Wurttemberg and inflicted brutalities and suffering upon the inhabitants.

Jerg was born in 1674, so in 1688, he would have only been 14 years old, not old enough to serve in a war.

However, in 1703, he would have been 29, and 33 in 1707, a prime age to defend Wurttemberg.

It’s likely then that he would have been called into the military “field” and was breaking boulders when injured.

I would think for a back injury to be significant enough to warrant a legacy, the injury would have had to be substantial.

Yet, he died of old age, at age 84. His back didn’t kill him, although it may have felt like it was trying.

Little Ice Age

All of Europe suffered during the 1690s from failed harvests due to a Little Ice Age in which growing seasons were significantly shortened. The result was smaller harvests, less food, and in some locations, starvation, and depopulation.

Massive eruptions of volcanoes in Iceland in 1693 followed by two different volcanoes in Indonesia in 1693 and 1695 likely caused or contributed to these crop failures which continued to some extent through 1699.

One of the worst famines in the seventeenth century occurred in this part of Europe due to the failed harvest of 1693. Millions of people in France, Germany, and surrounding countries were killed. The effect of the Little Ice Age on Swiss farms was severe. Due to the cooler climate, snow covered the ground deep into spring. A parasite, known as Fusarium nivale, which thrives under snow cover, devastated crops. Additionally, due to the increased number of days of snow cover, the stocks of hay for the animals ran out so livestock was fed on straw and pine branches. Many cows had to be slaughtered.

This time of famine also led to economic strife, which in turn led to aggressive behavior of countries towards each other in an attempt to obtain scarce commodities.

Johann George Lenz Marries

People will be people, no matter what. In the midst of the famine and food shortage, Johann Georg Lenz got married.

On January 9, 1698, in the Grossheppach church book, we discover the entry for the marriage of Sybilla Mullers and Hanss Jerg Lentz, short for Johann Georg Lenz/Lentz, of course.

My friend and cousin, Tom, translates:

1st Sunday after Epiphany in the local church was proclaimed, Hanss Jerg Lentz, legitimate son of Hanss Lentz, citizen in Beutelsbach and Sibylla, surviving, legitimate daughter of the late Hanss Rudolph Muller, citizen and smith here; were married in Beutelsbach on the 2nd of February (1698).

Wait?

What?

This entry says they were married the week before in a church in another village? It’s not like Beutelsbach was far away either – just a mile and a half and a thirty-minute walk. If someone was hoping to “live in sin” in one village claiming they had been married in the other – rest assured that everyone would have known in BOTH villages.

Typically, a marriage was only recorded in the church books where the marriage occurred, by that minister.

Interestingly, this marriage seems to have been recorded in both churches, the home church of both the bride and groom, a week apart, something I haven’t seen before. I can’t help but wonder why.

Beutelsbach record, below, also translated by Tom:

The Purification (of Mary) (February 2nd), (married):

Hanss Georg Lentrz, legitimate son of Hanss Lentz, ciitizen and vinedresser from here and Sibilla, legitimate, surviving daughter of the late Johann Rudolph Müller, former smith from Hoppach (Grossheppach).

Why was this marriage recorded in both churches? Maybe to give genealogists twice the opportunity to find it some 322 years later😊.

The timing of the marriage in terms of the “Little Ice Age” may explain, at least in part, why the newly-married couple might well simply have joined his parents in their home. Houses couldn’t just be built willy-nilly either, so the “best” solution for everyone was likely to combine households.

However, that might not have been the only reason.

Jerg’s Mother Dies

1686 was a terrible year. The preceding ones hadn’t been much better.

Jerg’s parents, Hans and Barbara were married in January 1669, and like normal, their first child followed a few months later, a month before their first Christmas as a married couple. What a joyous Christmas that must have been.

Their next two children were born in 1671 and 1672, and both died within two days of each other in July 1678, at 6 and 7 years of age. I can only imagine their parents’ heartbreak. Something was probably contagious in the village and there was likely much more death too. It may not be a coincidence that while the plague was smoldering throughout Europe during this time, 1679 would see a massive outbreak.

Of course, right now I can certainly identify with that.

Johann George, Jerg, was their first son, born in 1674, followed by Daniel in 1675.

Elisabetha was born in 1677, and nothing else is known so it’s presumed that she must have died.

Anna Maria was born in December of 1678, 5 months after her sisters died, followed by Johann Jacob in 1680 and Philipp in 1681.

Additionally, Martin born in 1683 died 17 days later.

In April 1684, Jerg’s maternal grandparents both died. That’s 6 deaths if you’re counting, in less than a decade.

Finally, there was Barbara Lenz who was born on July 2^nd, 1686. This must have been a difficult delivery, because Barbara, the baby’s mother, died 8 days later, on July 10^th. The baby, Barbara, died 17 days after her mother.

Barbara’s daughters who died in 1678 had died on July 11^th and 13^th. This entire family must have dreaded every July which was probably remembered as a month of death.

Jerg was 12 years old when his mother died. At that time, he had 4 younger siblings ranging in age from 11 years on down to 20 months.

What were they to do?

The Burial

You can see a drawing of the church in Beutelsbach in 1883 with the adjacent cemetery, here. The description reads, “View over the fortified cemetery to the church with its half-timbered house.”

Sharon’s photo shows that same area today – and it’s almost exactly the same except the stream is now a street. Jerg would have walked up those steps many, many times.

Jerg might have vague memories of burying his sisters two days apart in 1678, when he was 4 years old.

He might have remembered burying his sister, Elisabetha, depending on when she died.

Jerg would have remembered burying his younger brother, Martin when he was 9 years old in 1684.

Jerg would have remembered burying both of his maternal grandparents in this same cemetery,11 days apart, in April of 1684 when he was 10 years old. His mother must have been horribly distraught. I wonder if whatever took them is the same thing that took both daughters two days apart in 1678.

In July of 1686, with the birth of Barbara, Jerg’s mother must have suffered terribly. Who knows what went wrong, but something very clearly did. Barbara died 8 days after giving birth and followed her parents into the cemetery just 27 months later.

Then, 17 days later, yet another funeral for the baby named after her mother.

Whatever happened during that birth, it likely affected both mother and child. In a German village, had the child been alright, a wetnurse could certainly have been found.

In addition to Jerg having suffered an incredible amount of grief in his short 12 years, his father, Hans, would have been grief-stricken too.

Worse yet, how was Hans supposed to go and work in the fields without a wife to care for the household and children? He did have a daughter who was 17, but she couldn’t keep house and take care of all those children herself. She needed to attend school and prepare for her own married life.

Life After 1686

I’d wager that Hans and his children banded together as best they could, with the help of their relatives who, of course, were their neighbors in this village – at least for the next 13 months until Jerg’s father did what any sane German man did under those circumstances. He remarried to a widow.

Jerg gained a step-mother and perhaps step-siblings. His step-mother would go on to “mother” him for 17 years, 5 years longer than his biological mother had been able to do.

Marriage

When Jerg married Sybilla Muller in 1698, a few days before his 24^th birthday, there would have still been three of his siblings living at home. His oldest sister had married 5 years earlier.

Daniel, at 22, would have been quite valuable as a hand in the vineyards where his “stupid eyes,” probably meaning crossed eyes or eyes that don’t look the same direction at the same time wouldn’t have prevented him from working with the vines. Daniel was unable to learn to read. Jerg’s father was in his mid-50s by then, and probably couldn’t work as hard as he used to. He was likely very grateful for both Jerg and Daniel.

Anna Maria who at age 20 was being courted by suitors, or at least one suitor, would marry later that year.

Johann Jakob at 18 and Philipp at 17 would have worked shoulder by shoulder with their father and their brothers, Jerg and Daniel, in the vineyards. All 4 boys spent their life as vinedressers and vintners. Neither of these younger brothers would marry until 1716 and 1717, although Daniel married in 1702.

Daniel, according to Martin Goll, spent most of his life with his parents too, except for a year that he spent working on field walls in Bittenfeld, 10 miles up the road.

It’s this note about Daniel that might, indeed, shed light upon why his brother, Jerg, was breaking stones, if not due to serving in the military. Field walls. While the fields today above Beutelsbach don’t appear to have walls, some fields did and do have walls. In some locations, hillsides had to be reinforced and on others, vines grew up walls.

We won’t ever know what Jerg was doing when he injured his back so severely, or why those stones fell on him, but we do know that he managed to work throughout his life in spite of his disability, dying on April 7, 1758 in Beutelsbach, beneath his much-loved vineyards, as an 84 year-old man.

He joined both his first and second wife, along with his parents and all but one of his siblings, Daniel, in the cemetery – although Daniel followed just 7 months later. Six of his own children awaited him there as well. Jerg only outlived two of his children and his third wife.

Life was harsh, hard and often devastating. Very hard. While our current pandemic is a once-in-a-hundred-years event – the plague festered, ebbed and emerged continuously in Europe. Losing children today to death is the exception rather than the rule, while for them, losing half their children to death before adulthood was “normal.” Death, warfare, and often hunger was their nearly constant companion.

Yet, somehow, Jerg mustered his strength and courage to survive all of those challenges.

It makes me feel good to know that my ancestor overcame a chronic back issue too, one severe enough to be recorded for posterity, becoming part of his legacy. Jerg gives me hope and inspiration to persevere. If Jerg can do this, before the days of physical therapy, hot baths, ice packs, and Tylenol while laboring long hours in the vineyard – so can I.

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

• FamilyTreeDNA – Y, mitochondrial and autosomal DNA testing
• MyHeritage DNA – ancestry autosomal DNA only, not health
• MyHeritage FREE DNA file upload – transfer your results from other vendors free
• AncestryDNA – autosomal DNA only
• 23andMe Ancestry – autosomal DNA only, no Health
• 23andMe Ancestry Plus Health

Genealogy Products and Services

• MyHeritage FREE Tree Builder – genealogy software for your computer
• MyHeritage Subscription with Free Trial
• Legacy Family Tree Webinars – genealogy and DNA classes, subscription-based, some free
• Legacy Family Tree Software – genealogy software for your computer
• Charting Companion – Charts and Reports to use with your genealogy software or FamilySearch

Genealogy Research

• Legacy Tree Genealogists – professional genealogy research

Books

• Genealogical.com – lots of wonderful genealogy research books

Steffan Koch was probably named Johann Steffan Koch. Koch translates to “cook” in English, which I suspect may hold an invaluable clue as to the family history at the time surnames were first adopted in the region where his family lived in Germany.

Were it not for the Dürkheim marriage document of his daughter, Margretha, we would know absolutely nothing about Steffan – not even his name.

My friend, Tom, translates:

On the same day (9 Sept 1650) Hans Georg Kirsch and Margretha, legitimate dau of M Steffan Koch, former pastor in Fussgonheim.

This record is absolutely fascinating for more than one reason.

• First, this 1650 marriage does not take place in Fussgoenheim, but in Durkheim.
• Second, the word “former” here could mean either of two things, or both. Former in this context often means deceased. However, Tom, a retired German genealogist is of the opinion that in this case, “former” probably means that he used to be the pastor in Fussgoenheim. Of course, it could mean both – that he was the Fussgoenheim pastor, and that’s he’s deceased.
• Third, regardless of whether “former” means currently deceased or not, it clearly means former in the sense of “used to be,” because in 1650, the 30 Years’ War had just ended and no one had returned to Fussgoenheim. The question is, when was he the pastor?

Therefore, this marriage record provides us with extremely valuable information not available anyplace else.

We know Steffan was a minister and that the Koch family originally lived in Fussgoenheim before the Thirty Years’ War.

Von Immanuel Giel, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=53102712

While no buildings remain from this time, this early house in Fussgoenheim probably dates from the rebuilding that occurred in the late 1600s or early 1700s and is similar in nature to the homes in Fussgoenheim when Steffan was the pastor there.

Fussgoenheim’s Lack of Records

There are no records from Fussgoenheim during or before the Thirty Years’ War. The church and all homes were burned and destroyed – along with all of the fields. In that time, homes were clustered centrally in villages, with barns attached, and the fields stretched out lengthwise behind the houses.

This arrangement provided at least some protection for the families.

The History of Fussgoenheim book tells us that there was a “court box” of court records, along with the Weistum, a document detailing accepted village customs, family history, and land ownership from 1627/28 that did survive, but was subsequently destroyed by the devastation in the War of Palatinate Succession (1688-1697) when the village was again burned to the ground.

Hereditary rights in this part of Germany at this time were not based on the eldest son receiving everything, but distributed among the heirs, including lessee rights to the farming the church properties. Therefore, from time to time, a Weistum, or summary, was produced and recorded, along with the various responsibilities.

For example, there were two schools and two mayors, one in the upper and one in the lower village, but one court with representatives of each “half” attending. The church marked the division between the two halves. The village fell under the jurisdiction at that time of two noble families, not one. Since time immemorial, according to the Weistum, one of the tasks shared by the entire community was the maintenance of the bells and the clock – oh – and yes, free wine for everyone.

Fussgoenheim produced two history books, both in German, one published in 1993 and one in 2001. By scanning select pages and using both Google and DeepL translators, I was able to sift through information about this timeframe.

Martin Luther

Before looking specifically at religion in Fussgoenheim, it’s important to note that Martin Luther only nailed his 95 Theses to the Castle church door in Wittenberg in 1517, sewing the first seeds of the Protestant Reformation. The Holy Roman Empire frowned on his activities, to put it mildly, and in 1521, he was banned and exiled, which only served to strengthen his resolve. Upon being freed in 1522, he decided it was time to act forcefully. From then until the actual Reformation in 1534 and until his death in 1546, Luther continued to guide his followers away from the Catholic tenets, rituals, and traditions, although he did call his services “Lutheran masses.”

By the time of his death, the Lutheran faith was sweeping across not only Germany, but much of the rest of Europe – and along with it, sowing division among the people, as you might imagine, and raising the ire of the established Catholic church. Luther’s ideas and concepts represented radical change that were believed to be heresy by many and the true salvation by others.

Lutheranism Comes to Fussgoenheim

The Fussgoenheim history book tells us that the transition to the Lutheran faith from Catholicism happened in Fussgoenheim no earlier than 1553 when Count von Falkenstein decreed the Reformation in this region. In 1560, the Count of Leiningen, who ruled over Fussgoenheim directly, converted to Lutheranism. In 1567, a request was made for a Lutheran pastor for the Fussgoenheim church, which was denied. Clearly, by this time, the conversion had occurred and the residents had little choice in the matter given that they were serfs, peasants, living under noble rule.

Another clue as to the effective date of the Lutheran conversion is a stone with the date of 1563 in a wall that was demolished in 1832 in the Fussgoenheim parish house that is believed to represent the date of the first rectory.

We only know the name of one other minister before the Thirty Years’ War in Fussgoenheim – Elias Roschel. The only two gravestones remaining from before 1700 are the 1605 and 1606 stones of Roschel’s wife and son. Until 1732, when Jacob Tilman von Hallberg, a noble who established another Catholic church, there was only one Lutheran church in the village, with one pastor at a time. Fussgoenheim was small and didn’t need more than one church.

These two stones are embedded in the outer wall of the nave of the church in Fussgoenheim which was reconstructed sometime about 1726, based on documents where von Hallberg was complaining because the townspeople did not (or would not?) pay for the building of the Lutheran church. Extant Lutheran church records also began in 1726.

This information tells us several things.

• First, the local pastors were not local men. A call was issued and a Lutheran minister, when approved, came from elsewhere to serve the local congregation. Googling did not reveal where Lutheran ministers were trained at that time, but given that Catholic priests had to train in special seminaries, I’d wager that Lutheran ministers did too. The Lutheran faith was different than Catholicism but still used the same foundation pattern. Martin Luther was heavily involved with the University of Wittenberg.
• Second, this tells us that although Steffan Koch was the pastor in Fussgoenheim before the war, it’s unlikely that his family originated in Fussgoenheim. We find no Koch families in the church records after the war, although that’s not necessarily unexpected because many families did not return to their original location from 30 years prior.
• Third, the stones from 1605 and 1606 tell us that Elias Roschel was probably the minister in 1605 and 1606, so Steffan Koch was likely the minister sometime between 1606 and when the village was abandoned. But when was that, exactly?

Palatinate Campaign

Steffan Koch was probably the minister sometime between 1605/1606 and 1620.

The 30 Year’s War started in 1618 with the Bohemian revolt. The Spanish Hapsburgs committed to eradicating Protestantism from the face of the earth, with Jesuit-educated Ferdinand famously saying, “I’d rather see my lands destroyed than tolerate heresy for a single day,” and he set about ruthlessly doing exactly that.

By Barjimoa – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=84113547

Not only was Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands profitable to the Holy Roman Empire, it was also a hotbed of Protestants – and the “Spanish Road” ran directly through the Palatinate. France, also strongly Catholic, sided with Spain and Italy, and the battle lines were drawn. Unfortunately, France also bordered the Palatinate.

Fussgoenheim, with fertile farmland and desirable vineyards, was nestled between the Rhine River and the Palatinate Forest, southwest of Mannheim, within about 40 miles of the French border.

By 1620, the Palatinate Campaign had begun, and the Pfalz was no longer simply “collateral damage,” but targeted directly.

In August 1620, 25,000 soldiers left Brussels and invaded the lower Palatinate. Disease followed the soldiers as well, infecting the troops as well as the residents.

For two years, battles raged incessantly until the villages were depopulated and the final cities, one by one, fell. In September of 1622, the Heidelberg fortress fell, followed by Mannheim on November 2^nd and Frankental, without a fight, on November 29^th.

Only two cities, Dürkheim and Speyer still held. Both of those, on the other hand, were nearly completely destroyed in 1689 during the Nine Years’ War.

In 1626, all Protestant clergy had to leave the country on pain of death. Fortunately for the Germans, the Swedish King came to their aid and took back much of the land and cities previously lost, including Frankenthal. Between 1630-1634, many of the Protestant pastors returned to Germany, but shortly thereafter, France would attack directly through the Palatinate. Fussgoenheim was always “on the way” to everyplace it seemed, because the roads followed the river.

I can’t help but wonder where Steffan Koch and his family were sheltered during this time. What I wouldn’t give for his journal. As refugees, it’s unlikely they had more than literally the clothes on their back. While they may have found temporary refuge in cities, they would not have been residents, and therefore second-class citizens, serfs, with virtually no rights. Non-residents would have been the last to receive any type of assistance, including food.

While these military campaigns killed the residents and caused the remainder to flee by the fall of 1622, the war itself was far from over and would continue until a truce was finally called in 1648.

By then, the human and economic toll was devastating. The war was no longer really about religion, but about control and who would rule Europe.

Those who hadn’t starved or died had abandoned the farms, villages and cities, decades earlier. In some regions, the loss was 90% of the population, such as in Oberamt Zweibrucken and 87% in Kaiserslautern. In 1635 alone, 50% of the inhabitants of Speyer died of hunger and plague and the rest were impoverished and starving. How could they have even buried that many people? That year in Speyer was bracketed by years of plague and famine.

A peasant begs for mercy in front of his burning farm; by the 1630s, being caught in the open by soldiers from either side was tantamount to a death sentence

Constant troops, looting, combat operations, and decimation of both the population and farms meant that there wasn’t food for anyone – and the soldiers on both sides, often mercenaries, took what little could be found.

In 1649, the Deidesheim tax role noted that in many taxable places, including both Fussgoenheim and Ruchheim, “no living soul can be found anymore.”

The parish descriptions of the 19th-century lament the loss of tradition:

Now follows the time of the third Big Years War, whose darkness, as far as Fussgoenheim is concerned, has not been illuminated by anything shines as through the complete darkness that lies above it. For there are no after-judges are available, neither from priests nor others.

Twenty years after the end of the war, by about 1670, still, only 30 people lived in the village of Fussgoenheim.

By 1670, we know that Jerg Kirsch and his wife, Margretha Koch were two of those people. If children were counted among the 30, then their children would have accounted for another 6 or 7, if not more. We know of a total of 7 sons and no daughters, so it’s likely that they had children we are unaware of.

We also know that Jerg was co-lessee of the Jostens estate, so there was at least one other family involved who might well account for another 10 people. At that time, the former monasteries and religious orders owned much of the land in the Palatinate, and in Fussgoenheim.

The archivist at neighboring Schaurenheim was exactly right when he said that only a handful of families returned to any of these villages during this time after the war, and then very, very slowly. It’s likely that the villages were rebuilt by the offspring of those few families intermarrying.

However, the villages would again be abandoned in 1684 due to the Nine Years’ War, also known as the War of Palatinate Succession, when the rest of the Fussgoenheim records were destroyed. Still, some families returned, yet again.

Those hereditary rights to farm the land were likely powerful draw cards – and although rebuilding represented untold hours of labor – it was still better than nothing accompanied by no hope for better.

Questions – More Questions

I have so many questions.

• Where was Steffan Koch from, before Fussgoenheim?
• When did he serve the Fussgoenheim congregation?
• When did he and his family leave Fussgoenheim?
• Did they go directly to Dürkheim, now Bad Dürkheim, or did they attempt to shelter in other locations first?
• Based on the description of Steffan as the former pastor in Fussgoenheim, it’s possible that he married a local gal.
• Was Steffan deceased in 1650?
• Did Steffan and his family have to leave the country in 1624, and if so, where did they go? Was Margretha born there?
• Why did they come back?
• Why was Steffan not involved as a pastor in the church in Dürkheim?
• What did Steffan do to support his family during that time, assuming he did not die in Fussgoenheim?
• Did either Steffan or his wife survive the war? What about their children?

Steffan might have known Elias Roschel. In fact, if the wife and son died after Elias himself, Steffan might have been the minister to perform those funerals. If Elias died after this wife and son, Steffan could have been the minister to bury him.

Based on the dates we do have, we can estimate Steffan’s age, very roughly.

He was a pastor in Fussgoenheim, which tells us that he was an adult before 1618.

If his daughter was born between 1620 and 1630, based on her marriage date of 1650, it’s very likely that Steffan indeed did survive to leave Fussgoenheim and she was born in Dürkheim or wherever they were living between 1618 and 1630.

Assuming Steffan’s daughter was born about 1630, and his wife was his same age, they could have been newly married, or married for 25 years when Margretha was born. We know Steffan was an adult by 1618, and let’s assume he would not be a pastor until he was at least 25 years old. This brackets his birth year between 1585 and 1593.

If Steffan lived to see his daughter marry, he would have been between 57 and 65 years of age.

Not elderly by today’s standards, but between the war, starvation, plague, and what would be considered normal health issues – it’s unlikely that Margretha’s parents were in the church with her on September 9, 1650. They were probably buried just outside, in the churchyard.

Steffan’s Religion

Steffan Koch was a man of the cloth. A believer in a new, or relatively new, religion, Protestantism, born of the desire to reform Catholicism. He probably knew people who had personally known Martin Luther.

Steffan was probably inspired with a convert’s fire – and he literally risked his life and those of every family member to defend those beliefs.

This wasn’t just a religion, but a movement questioning papal authority, errors, abuses, and discrepancies in the Catholic Church, such as the selling of indulgences.

Indulgences were sold in order to raise money and in order to reduce the amount of punishment one had to undergo for a sin.

Reconciliation

Steffan would have been either first or second-generation Protestant. If he was born between 1585 and 1593, his father would have been born before 1565/1573, about the time that various regions in the Palatinate were converting.

Steffan’s grandparents would have been born Catholic and were probably practicing Catholics, so Steffan might well have been viewed as quite the rabble-rouser and trouble-maker, not just by the authorities, but by his family as well.

Clearly, Steffan’s beliefs were steadfast and unmovable, and he was completely committed. The church where he was assigned to serve would become his family away from home, even if his family, or at least some members, were supportive. Unquestionably, Steffan was on the leading edge of a new movement and any change that radical is bound to make many people uncomfortable for a variety of reasons.

Steffan would have known first-hand of the trials and tribulations being suffered by converts. He would have heard from other ministers when he was studying and from his family as well if they were the first generation to convert. He would have likely been warned and was prepared to suffer because anyone who has ever been on the leading edge of anything that’s disruptive to religious beliefs knows full well they’re on the bleeding edge.

Yet, Steffan clearly could not have understood or even imagined the magnitude of the suffering to come – although he did have the example of Christ’s life, especially at the end. Would that be enough to sustain him? We don’t know.

Steffan may have felt that the trials and tribulations he, his wife, and family had to undergo and suffer through were divinely ordained.

Having said that, I have to wonder if his wife and children survived the war. What about his parents, siblings and their children?

If they did not die a natural death, how did Steffan frame his understanding of the “purpose” of their deaths? How did he correlate a loving God with the fact that millions of people were dying? Did he not wonder why an all-powerful God did not stop the invading armies – either physically like the Red Sea parting, or by causing them to have a change of heart?

Did Steffan not wonder how a loving and caring God could allow his followers and believers to starve – including innocent children – perhaps his own?

How did Steffan reconcile this in his mind, with his family and parishioners who would have looked to him for guidance as a man of the cloth – even if he wasn’t the active pastor in Dürkheim?

How did the heartache and utter devastation affect his faith? Did his faith sustain him in those dark days, or did he question his decisions of the past that led to the horrific suffering of the time in which he lived?

For. Thirty. Long. Years.

11,000 days of Hell on Earth.

Was his faith somehow reinforced or shaken? After all, the Catholics weren’t suffering.

What did he say if he was preaching funerals for those who starved to death?

Was Steffan angry with God?

The Comet

According to the article, Jeremiah in the Village: Prophecy, Preaching, Pamphlets, and Penance in the Thirty Year’s War, in 1618, at the height of the Lutheran apocalyptic fervor, a great comet blazed across the European sky, visible from September 6-25, sparking more than 100 pamphlets warning of God’s anger and prophesying doom. Pastors preached from the Old Testament in the spirit of the prophet, Jeremiah, in lengthy mournful lamentations that would come to be known as jeremiads.

As the war unfolded, ministers used the misery and suffering to call for more pious action. Seeing themselves as the chastened Israelites, ministers admonished that only increased religious action and adherence could save their countrymen. Jeremiah stated that God punished those who deviated from his commandments. Therefore, the Germans suffering such horrible devastation were undergoing punishment for their sinfulness and lack of repentance. God even sent a comet to warn them, yet they still had not adequately repented.

I shudder to think how the father or mother felt who watched their home burn, their children die and even their spouse perish. The guilt must have been as devastating as the war itself – to be blamed for something so incredibly beyond your control or even influence.

Conrad Dietrick, a Lutheran minister, on New Year’s Day 1619 published a pamphlet of his sermon that was very straightforward:

• What comets are
• What they mean
• What we should do as a response to the meaning

Then, he answered his own questions:

• God sent the comet as a warning because sin abounded in Germany, although that theme had been ever-present since the Turkish threat in the 1580s.
• Mend your ways.
• Stop disregarding God’s commandments and live a moderate and pious life.
• God might not have to follow through on his threat to destroy his people if they heeded the celestial warning and subsequent warfare and live within the bounds of Lutheran discipline.

One pamphlet called out the deadly sins of the parishioners responsible for the devastation, such as the following, therefore making Germany responsible and subject to punishment:

• Excessive pride and display
• Swearing
• Fornication
• Disobedience to authority

Oh, and by the way, good deeds alone aren’t enough to get you out of this pickle and earn God’s Grace, because your sins are very deep.

Preachers and pamphlets were the social media, television and radio of the day.

By the end of the war, in 1648, one pamphlet published regarding the Treaties of Westphalia opened with the comet’s prophesying appearance in 1618 and closed with the war ending, “by God’s Grace,” in 1648. In other words, the people were suffering and had suffered through their own choices and actions. No one was going to feel sorry for them. They deserved what God saw fit to do to them, and probably worse.

It’s interesting to note, that whether true or not, the idea that the comet had appeared for 30 days across the skies was connected to the fact that the war had lasted for 30 years. In other words, by that time, the comet wasn’t just a warning, it was simply accepted as having been an accurate prophecy of what was to come.

During the war, the ministers attempted to make the essence of the sermons reach home in their communities – tailoring the message as needed. As the war dragged on, they became discouraged that their parishioners, the “common men,” were apparently unable to either understand or fulfill their messages. Many pastors became increasingly desperate for the much-needed change within their congregation necessary to end the war and suffering, and their sermons became increasingly reproachful and filled with missionary zeal.

They continued to predict that war would devastate Germany, and they would continue to be correct. Preaching itself became a form of prophecy and the ongoing war and atrocities only confirmed the message.

Sermons of one minister included the following New Years’ Day messages:

• 1623 – Amos 4:6-12 – On the 3 punishments of the land/dearth, war and devastation with which God now afflicts our dear Germany because of its sins and how we should properly view them.
• 1624 – Haggai 1:6-7 – Laid out reasons why it has happened that in these times no happiness, blessing, and increase for timely nourishment can be found.
• 1625 – How we should act when we hear of foreign war preparations, recruiting, and troop movements.
• 1626 – Habakkuk 1:12 – Why the armies on the march are an instrument of God’s punishment.
• 1627 – Ephesians 5 – How one may properly get along in the current troubled times of war.
• 1628 – How Christian subjects should pray for their rulers in these troubled times.
• 1629 – Jeremiah 47:6-7 – The Lord’s sword – that is the word of the Prophet Jeremiah wherein the only proper cause is laid out, why one sighs and calls in vain for peace and an end to the war.”
• 1632 – Jeremiah 15:11 – Land ruin and war consolation.
• 1636 – The year of the plague in Ulm, the minister stated that 15,000 people had died that year, including thousands of beggars and refugees from neighboring villages. About one third were deaths of citizens from Ulm. Some days as many as 170 died – going on to say that those figures of death and misery needed no more explanation other than that provided in Psalm 107:17-20.

17 Fools by reason of their transgression, and because of their iniquities are afflicted.

18 Their soul abhorreth all meat and they are brought to death’s door.

19 Then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivereth them from their distress.

20 He sendeth his word and healeth them, and delivereth them from their graves.

• 1637 – Jeremiah 14:19-20 – Hammer of Peace, wherein is reported, what the causes are that the Peace that we have longed for for so many years has not come at all or let itself be seen.
• 1638 – Psalm 14 – Heartfelt Zionish New Year’s Sigh – This was the year that cannibalism was reported in Breisach during a siege.

One preacher said 8 times in a funeral oratory for a minor noblewoman, “O, that we have sinned so much.” The topic and images of both punishment and penance, along with exhortations, were common themes in the sermons of Lutheran pastors during the war. They repeatedly referred to and lamented, “Oh woe, oh woe, the great sinfulness.”

How did the residents feel who heard these sermons that clearly placed the blame for the war and their great suffering squarely on their own shoulders?

In 1630, the shoemaker, Hans Heberle, in Neenstetten wrote as a preface to his journal that he began with the 1618 comet:

Anno 1618 a great comet appeared in the form of a large and horrible rod of punishment, with which God mightily threatened us because of our sinful lives, which we deserved many times over and still deserve today…what it means – what also will come of it – that is something we may cry hot tears over, as we, alas, experience now and have experienced from 1620 up to 1630 and which can’t be described.

Depending on one’s perspective, two other dates for the “beginning” of the war are given in contemporaneous literature; 1617 which is the 100 year anniversary of Martin Luther’s 95 Theses, a particularly galling event to Catholics, and 1619 when Ferdinand was elected Holy Roman Emperor.

It seems that the more pious believers suffered inwardly, feeling responsible for the devastation by their failings. The less pious certainly suffered, but not from the added layer of guilt.

Most people seemed to believe what they were being told and accept the horrible responsibility for what befell them. In the words of one man, “our sins are more than the stars in the heavens, more than the sand on the sea, more than the dust on the earth. Because we have sinned excessively, the punishment has overwhelmed us.”

The ministers and people of the Palatinate, along with the rest of Germany, tried their best to make sense, through the lens of religion, of a situation over which they had no control. Anything resembling normalcy was entirely absent. By the time the war had ended, not only were millions dead as a result, untold more had died not directly due to the war, but due to age or being displaced, having begun their lives in bucolic villages where they expected to live out their lives.

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

We don’t know if Steffan Koch lived to see the end of the war and his daughter’s marriage in 1650, but another pastor celebrated the end of the war in 1648 with one last passage from Jeremiah 33:47:

Thus says the Lord: In this place of which you say:

It is a waste without man or beast,” in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem that are desolate, without man or inhabitant or beast, there shall be heard again the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the voices of those who sing, as they bring thank offerings to the house of the Lord: “give thanks to the Lord of hosts, for the Lord is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!” For I will restore the fortunes of the land as at first, says the Lord.

Indeed, two years later, Steffan Koch’s daughter would be the voice of the bride in the church in Dürkheim.

The Church of St. Johannis in Dürkheim

The church in Fussgoenheim was destroyed during the Thirty Years’ War, so we have no record of what that church looked like, or even who was buried in the churchyard. The books of baptisms, confirmations, marriages, and burials, written in Steffan’s own hand was destroyed.

We don’t know much about Steffan’s life after Fussgoenheim, aside from the fact that Dürkheim is one of only two cities that stood, and that his daughter married into another Fussgoenheim family in 1650. Of course, we don’t know that Jerg Kirsch’s parents were actually from Fussgoenheim before the devastating war, or if the couple returned there because Jerg was able to obtain an order to become the co-lessee of the Josten’s estate in 1660.

What we do know is that from the time Steffan left Fussgoenheim, probably between 1620 and 1622, likely before the birth of his daughter, Margretha in about 1630, the church in Dürkheim, for however long he lived, was his church home.

To the best of our knowledge, Steffan was never the pastor there, because he was not referenced as such in Margretha’s marriage record. Given that he certainly didn’t die until after Margretha was conceived, it’s likely that he spent at least some time in Dürkheim, in the church there which does survive.

I would wager that Steffan helped the pastor there as he could – perhaps filling in when necessary. Dürkheim suffered terribly from both plague and starvation during the war, so there would likely have been many funerals, some occurring hurriedly so that the body or bodies could be quickly buried.

So much suffering, so much need – so many who would welcome the comforting hand and prayers of a minister, even if Steffan wasn’t their official minister. He was still a man of God, having answered a higher calling. He would have known what to say to provide comfort for the grieving.

I can only extrapolate about how Steffan felt in Dürkheim. It must have been some torturous combination of every-single-day terror, gratitude for surviving, at least so far, grief at the life they had to leave behind, grief over what their family, friends, and neighbors were suffering, probably grief over the deaths of his own family members, hunger, and overwhelming guilt if he indeed believed that God was punishing him for his lack of…well…pretty much everything. I can’t even begin to imagine what it would be like to see your child starve and die if you believed their suffering was doled out by God because YOU weren’t pious enough.

On the other hand, Steffan may have somehow taken comfort in his religion. Given that his faith would have been strong enough to commit his life to convincing others that Lutheranism was indeed the way and the light, he probably believed that whatever happened was “God’s will” and that those who passed over were indeed sitting at the feet of God in Heaven – relieved from their earthly worries here.

Or, maybe some combination of all of that.

Since I don’t know what or how he felt but do know what the church looked like, I’d like to take a walk with Steffan and perhaps, to be able to glimpse at least this much through Steffan’s eyes.

Walking in Steffan’s Footsteps

The church of St. Johannis, or St. John, now known as the Castle Church was built in Dürkheim sometime before 946, obviously as a Catholic church. Around 1300, the current church, minus the current spire, was built on the original foundation. Ironically, the church was built in part with indulgences for those believers who visited the church – one of the very things that caused Martin Luther to part ways with the Catholic Church.

In 1504 and 1508, burial crypts and a chapel were built on to the church and would have been present when Steffan walked those hallways.

Dürkheim was not a small town. This illustration from 1450, 200 years before Margretha was married in the church there, shows that the houses were clustered closely together.

Limburg Abbey was destroyed in 1504, the remains resting high above Dürkheim. You can take a stunning flight over by drone, here. While Steffan wouldn’t have had this bird’s-eye-view, he would have seen the ruined Abbey above the town – and you can see the town from the drone footage. Wow, just wow.

The Hardenburg castle stood sentry over Dürkheim when Steffan trod these streets, although it lies in ruins today.

This 1630 drawing of the church with the Latin school across the yard doesn’t’ show the wooden crosses marking the graves in the churchyard. Steffan and others stood here all too often. I can’t help but wonder about mass graves during that time of inordinate death resulting from warfare, plague, and starvation.

By comparison, you can see the church today, with the churchyard now paved with brick or cobblestone. I can’t help but think of the generations of people whose ashes rest below. And yes, my mind does wander to bones and DNA.

This engraving, from 1650 shows the fortress and the church that Steffan attended, and where his daughter, Margretha, was married that very year. This scene would have been very familiar to the Koch family.

This drawing from 1787 shows the ruined abbey in the distance

Today, the church which sports a tall spire that was replaced in the 1800s nestles in the modern city of Bad Dürkheim.

The ancient streets and a few old houses remain today, probably rebuilt after the devastating 1689 fire.

You can still walk up to the church on the old cobblestone streets, approaching from the rear, here. Steffan probably walked this pathway hundreds if not thousands of times. I have to wonder if the residents sought refuge inside the church from time to time as troops advanced.

Only the walls of the church remained after the church was burned in 1689, taking roughly 20 years to repair and rebuild. These walls stood when Steffan walked in the churchyard surrounding the church, now covered with bricks.

Von Immanuel Giel – Eigenes Werk, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33547176

The original church was constructed at different times. Beautiful stonework with quarried stone corners on the rear of the Leininger burial chapel that was added in 1505. The door allowed the Count to exit the service without going through the church proper.

Von Immanuel Giel, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57943700

The church is beautiful, even without the new spire.

Walking around the church, we can see the burial chapel, built in 1505 and already more than 100 years old when Steffan lived there.

I wonder if the vine harkens back to the time before the churchyard was bricked or paved with cobblestones. We can’t see the beautiful door on this side of the church very well.

Steffan walked through the larger double side doors on the other side of the church. The door in place at that time would have led to the churchyard and was probably the doorway through which coffins were carried after the funeral service on their final journey.

The size of this side door and stones shows just how massive this church is and gives us some idea of why it took 35 years or so, from about 1300 to 1335, an entire generation, to build.

Inside the burial chapel, we find this stone of Agnes von Leiningen-Hardenburg who died in 1586. Did Steffan perhaps seek solitude in the quietness of this chapel from time to time? As refugees, they probably lived in cramped and noisy quarters with other families.

In the same burial vault, the stone of the Count who built the chapel beside his consecration cross.

Inside the burial crypt.

Today, the tombstone of the Limburg abbot who died in 1531 has been moved outside, but when Steffan sat inside this church, this stone was there was well. I wonder how Steffan felt about this, given that the Abbott was clearly Catholic at that time, and the devastation Steffan was living through day-to-day was wrought by a war with Catholics and Catholicism.

Von Altera levatur – Eigenes Werk, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=53165415

Another stone moved outside shows the alliance coat of arms of the Lords of Weingarten and those of Sickingen.

Von Immanuel Giel, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57943697

Steffan would have walked past, and perhaps stopped to tough this double epitaph carving of Count Emich XII. and Maria Elisabeth von Pfalz-Zweibrücken in the castle church, carved in 1612. She died in 1629, so it’s certainly possible that Steffan was present at her funeral.

Behind the figures is a relief of the Hardenburg Castle, home of the Leiningen family.

Von Immanuel Giel, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57943744

Did Steffan absentmindedly run his fingers along these carved branches, leaves, and acorns, silently praying for strength?

A lovely, friendly gargoyle that Steffan saw and perhaps loved too. Did he tell his children or grandchildren stories about this mythical beast? Gargoyles are said to protect what they guard against evil or harmful spirits. If the gargoyle’s mouth was open, it was devouring a giant. This gargoyle looks kind of like it’s contentedly chewing its cud.

This south aisle, facing west, probably looked much the same, without the modern accouterments, of course. Did the thick walls deaden the city sounds, allowing deep reflection?

Perhaps the single most iconic item of the Lutheran faith representing inclusion into the flock, both earthly and Heavenly, is the baptismal font. This font survived from 1537 and if any of Steffan’s children were baptized in this church, this was the font in which that holy ritual occurred. Given that he was a minister, Steffan may have baptized his children himself.

I can close my eyes and witness that act of faith, love, and devotion.

Von Immanuel Giel – Eigenes Werk, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33547186

While the stained glass windows and cross are new, the nave is not. Steffan may have preached here and assuredly prayed in this sacred space; for safety, for deliverance, for himself, for his family, and for so many others. But more than anything, Steffan probably prayed to find a way to live better, more religiously, more piously, in order that God would not be angry with him.

Punishing anyone with warfare punished everyone with warfare. Steffan would have prayed to find a way to be a more convincing leader, not so much for himself, but for the other parishioners who suffered for 30 years, and more. If only, if only, he could successfully obtain God’s Divine assistance to convince them. If God would just grant him the words that would be convincing enough.

Not unlike how many of his descendants feel today, in the midst of another plague that could, in fact, be affected and slowed by convincing enough people to do so. A direct link from me to Steffan, across 400 years, almost exactly.

Given what Steffan went through, whether or not he survived the actual war and accompanying horrors, I’d expect that prayer is what defined his life – and probably his death. A lifetime of increasingly desperate prayer.

_____________________________________________________________

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I surely wish we knew more about Margretha Koch. We’re fortunate to have a few tidbits.

The first and only record for Margretha directly is her marriage to Johann Georg “Jerg” Kirsch in Dürkheim on September 9, 1650. Given the customs of the time, she was probably 20 or 21 years old.

My friend, Tom, translates:

On the same day (9 Sept 1650) Hans Georg Kirsch and Margretha, legitimate dau of M Steffan Koch, former pastor in Fussgonheim.

By inference, this tells us that Margretha grew up entirely during the Thirty Years’ War which started in 1618, a few years before she was likely was born. By 1622, all of the remaining population in the Palatinate that hadn’t been killed or died as a result of the initial onslaught of the war had left the countryside with what little they had left, but not by choice.

The entire population became exiles with nothing more than they could carry, as shown by this painting, seeking shelter someplace, anyplace as a simple matter of survival. The cities swelled, then one by one, they fell either in battle or by siege.

This drawing of Casale Monferrato in 1630 shows the soldiers waiting. During a siege, the attacking soldiers simply surrounded a city and waited as the pinned-in residents starved and died. No food could get in, and they couldn’t escape without surrender.

During the siege of Prague in 1648, the soldiers waited until the residents were weak from hunger and thirst, then attacked.

Life in Exile

Humans have amazing resiliency. Margretha was probably born between 1625 and 1630. Only three Palatinate cities withstood the ravages of war and weren’t burned to the ground. Dürkheim, now Bad Dürkheim, was one of those, and that’s where Margretha would have been born to refugee parents. The first wave of attack in 1618 burned most of the Palatinate, so by the time Margretha entered the world, they were likely settled in Durkheim and had been for some time.

I wonder if the family lived in a communal home, crammed to the gills with other families in the same dire situation. Dürkheim was a walled city, which afforded protection, but also prevented expansion to accommodate masses of refugees.

Margretha’s parents would have worried night and day about where their next meal was coming from and simply if they would survive to the next day and the next week. Since the fields had been burned by the advancing army, there were no crops nor animals. The grim reaper arrived as starvation. Estimates range as high as 60% of the population died, someplace from 4.5 to 8 million in a political-religious war with the French Catholics attempting to eradicate German Protestantism.

Note the devastated landscape in this 1647 painting of marauding soldiers.

Surviving a year might have seemed impossible, but one year poured into the next while the war was constantly fought around them – for 30 long years – one after the other.

Somehow, miraculously, Margretha survived.

Margretha, growing up had never known anything else. However and wherever they lived in Dürkheim – it was “normal” to her.

The Church

The church was always the center of a German town, but in Margretha’s case, even moreso. Margretha and her family probably lived within sight of the church. Dürkheim wasn’t exactly a large city and her father would have wanted to be near the church. After all – it was their cherished religion for which they were willing to sacrifice their lives.

We know that Margretha’s father, Steffan Koch, was a Protestant minister in Fussgoenheim before the war, so their home would likely have been filled with prayer and they would have attended church every Sunday in the nearby St. Johannis Church, today known as the Castle Church.

 

The Latin School Margretha would have attended was located just across the churchyard, which, at that time would have been filled with wooden crosses. This church had already been in use by then for hundreds of years, so graves were probably already being reused.

It’s certain that Margretha would have buried her parents here, unless of course by some miracle, they returned with Margretha and Jerg to Fussgoenheim sometime around 1660. There wouldn’t have been much if anything to return to.

The French burned everything more than 40 years earlier. The ONLY reason Jerg Kirsch with his young family would have left Dürkheim at that point was for opportunity – and that came their way when, somehow, they became co-lessees of the Jostens estate. I must say, given that this was a lease from a religious body, I have to wonder if Steffan Koch was somehow involved with those arrangements.

We have no reason to doubt that Margretha was Jerg’s only wife, although it’s certainly possible that she died and he remarried.

The end of the war and the move to Fussogoenheim was neither immediate nor uneventful. The archivist in neighboring Schauernheim tells us that people didn’t begin to return immediately after the war. A few brave souls began returning about 1650 and even then, only a handful in each village.

Another War, Another Evacuation

After settling in Fussgoenheim in 1660 or so, the family had to hurriedly evacuate again in 1674 when France again annexed the Palatinate to the Rhine, declaring War on this region and in 1688, the French king instructed his soldiers that “the Palatinate should be made a desert.” They did their best. War had returned with a vengeance, along with starvation, with warfare not subsiding until 1697.

By the time they moved to Fussgoenheim, Jerg and Margretha would have had several small mouths to feed. By the time they left again, their youngest children, if they survived, could have been marriage age.

They remained in Dürkheim the second time until after 1695 when their son, Wilhelm, married. If Margretha was still living, she likely returned to Fussgoenheim with her sons by 1701 when Adam was noted as Mayor.

Children

We know, based on records from the mid-1700s in Fussgoenheim that Jerg had 7 children, which of course, means Margretha did too:

• Johann Jacob Kirsch born about 1655, died before 1623 and married Maria Catharina, surname unknown. They had 6 known children beginning in about 1695 through about 1710.
• Daniel Kirsch born about 1660, died before 1723. Nothing more known.
• Johannes Kirsch, born about 1665, died November 15, 1738 in Ellerstadt, single.
• Andreas Kirsch, born about 1666, died April 21, 1734, single or at least no children in Fussgoenheim. Lived in Oggersheim and Ellerstadt.
• Johann Michael Kirsch, the Judge, born about 1661, died January 1, 1743, married Anna Margaretha Spanier, and had 6 children beginning in about 1700.
• Johann Wilhelm Kirsch born about 1670, died before 1723, and married Anna Maria Boerstler in Durkheim in 1695. They had 4 known children beginning in about 1700 through 1718. A daughter, born about 1718 was named Anna Margaretha, likely for her grandmother.
• Johann Adam Kirsch, born between 1650 and 1677, died before 1740, married a Greulich female, then Anna Maria Koob. He had 5 children, beginning about 1700 and continuing until about 1716.

Notice that there are no females listed. It’s possible they had no daughters, or we were unable to identify them through later death and baptismal records of other Fussgoenheim village residents. Many times women’s birth surnames were not recorded.

Let’s hope that Margretha had the opportunity to enjoy at least some of her grandchildren.

What Happened to Margretha?

We don’t have any idea when Margretha died, but we do know that by 1695 when Johann Wilhelm married, she was either deceased or a widow. Johann Wilhelm’s marriage record in the church states that Jerg is deceased.

Given that Margretha’s sons that we are aware of moved back to either Fussgoenheim or that region, if she were living at the time her son was married in 1695, she may well have returned to Fussgoenheim with her adult children.

By 1701 when we know that Adam was living in Fussgoenheim, Margretha would have been between 70 and 80 years old, so it’s certainly possible that she is buried in the graveyard outside the beautiful church in Dürkheim, She could also have been buried in Fussgoenheim if she died while the family lived there between 1660 and 1674, or if she returned to Fussgoenheim after 1697 with her children.

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

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Christoph Bechtold’s daughter, Margaretha, married on July 28^th, 1671 to Michael Hag in the village of Ebersbach. That marriage record led us to her parents and her birth record.

Marriage: Friday, the 28^th of July 1671

Michael Hag, legitimate son of Hanss Hag, Koss, & Catharina Bäur(in) and Margaretha, legitimate daughter of Christoph Bechtold deceased baker in Ebersbach and Margaretha Ziegeler. Bride pregnant.

Christoph’s Children

Margaretha wasn’t Christoph’s firstborn child.

Christoph’s name was spelled Bechtoldt when twins, Maria and Margaretha were baptized in 1640, Christophorus Bachtoldt in the baptism of Leonhardus in 1642, and Bechteles when Jacobus was baptized in 1644.

Margaretha was born on May 1, 1646, two years before the end of the 30 Years War, a time of massive heartache and depopulation in this part of Germany.

Neighbor villages were sacked in 1634, with many villagers being massacred, leading to a population drop to 20% of pre-war levels. By the time Margaretha was born, the war had raged for 28 years, an entire generation, and villagers probably wondered if they would ever be safe.

It’s certainly possible that Christoph had absolutely no memory of life without warfare.

Yet, life, to some extent, went on. People married and babies were born. According to church records, there were a total of 25 baptisms in 1646, suggesting a reproductive population of about 50 families.

Village Life

Christoph and his family attended the Lutheran church in Ebersbach, By the time they lived there, that church was already old, having been built in the 1200s.

Church in a German village was the center of life and generally the center of the village as well. People were married there, attended services on Sundays, baptized their babies, celebrated confirmations, attended funerals, and buried their family in the churchyard outside. Birth to death, life revolved around the church.

The Protestant religion was extremely important to villagers – worth fighting and dying for. The 30 Years’ War was a religious war between Catholics and Protestants, beginning in 1618 and not ending until 1648.

Christoph lived much of his adult life, perhaps most of his entire life, as this war raged around him. We’ll never know how this affected him, but I’d wager that a baker suffered significantly because the grain crop had to be planted, allowed to grow without being trampled or burned, harvested, dried, and then ground into meal or flour before a baker begins the actual baking process. No flour or ingredients? No baking.

The military approach to the 30 Years’ War was to destroy everything in the German countryside, including the fields. I wonder how enough grain managed to make it through the entire growing season – how any did, actually. We know that much of the population starved.

In a way, I’m actually amazed that this family was able to survive at all. For all we know, Christoph didn’t. We don’t know when he was born, or died, nor when his wife died. They could have been war casualties.

Other than Margaretha, the only thing we know for sure about his children is that the twin named Margaretha born in 1640 died. Otherwise, the daughter born in 1646 would not have been named Margaretha.

When Was Christoph Born?

We don’t know when Christoph was born, or where, but it was most likely in this same village or at least nearby.

Christoph would have had to apprentice as a baker to learn the trade, and the most likely place to have done that was in his own home. In a small village, there would have been only one baker.

If Christoph’s first child was born in 1640, Christoph would have been born about 1619 or earlier. Of course, there’s no way to know if the child or children, twins actually, born in 1640 was his first, or if that’s just the first child we have a record for.

If that birth was the first, then Christoph likely married about 1639 which means he would have been born before 1619.

I have found mention of a Christof (Stofel) Bechtold born August 3, 1615, in Esslingen, not far away, but I don’t have that record and I can’t confirm that it’s him.

Of course, Christoph could have been substantially older. If Margaretha born in 1646 was his youngest child, and his wife was the same age, Christoph could have been born about 1600.

A Baker

I keep hearing the refrain, “the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker.” These were the all-important trades that any village required. Christoph’s daughter, Margaretha married a baker as well, so it’s certainly possible that Christoph had an apprentice who caught his daughter’s eye.

This medieval baker is working with his apprentice.

You can learn about reconstructing medieval bread, here. After reading that article, I had a MUCH greater appreciation for what Christoph did – every single day.

The Bechtold home would have incorporated the large oven required to bake bread and other pastries such as savory meat pies and treats such as gingerbread, daily.

Gingerbread, from a manuscript dating about 1520, being lovingly baked by a barefoot medieval baker. Ok, I give, why was the baker barefoot?

Gingerbread in medieval Germany was so popular it was regulated by a gingerbread guild!

The tops of gingerbreads were decorated with designs from molds.

Next, my research revealed an AMAZING thing. Gingerbread + dark chocolate. Oh yea!

There was both “regular” gingerbread and dark chocolate Lebkuchen as well, an assortment shown today. That combines two of my very favorite things.

I actually sampled some of these when I was in Germany from a tin just like this, and never realized the connection. I need a dark chocolate gingerbread recipe!!!

I clearly have the gingerbread gene and so did my mother. My son still asks for gingerbread as his birthday cake every year!.

Apparently, lots of other people love gingerbread too. I’d wager Christoph was a VERY popular man at the local market! In fact, this might explain a lot.

Ebersbach, first mentioned in 1170, was an old market town, located on the oft-traveled Roman road between Italy and the Netherlands, nestled at the feet of the Swabian Alps.

Of course, the only people traveling that road during the 30 Year’s War were likely refugees and soldiers. Soldiers, like it or not, had to eat too, and perhaps the fact that bakers were essential and ovens weren’t transportable played a part in Christoph’s family’s survival. Maybe gingerbread, and chocolate, literally saved the day for my ancestors.

_____________________________________________________________

Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

• FamilyTreeDNA – Y, mitochondrial and autosomal DNA testing
• MyHeritage DNA – ancestry autosomal DNA only, not health
• MyHeritage FREE DNA file upload – transfer your results from other vendors free
• AncestryDNA – autosomal DNA only
• 23andMe Ancestry – autosomal DNA only, no Health
• 23andMe Ancestry Plus Health

Genealogy Products and Services

• MyHeritage FREE Tree Builder – genealogy software for your computer
• MyHeritage Subscription with Free Trial
• Legacy Family Tree Webinars – genealogy and DNA classes, subscription-based, some free
• Legacy Family Tree Software – genealogy software for your computer

Genealogy Research

• Legacy Tree Genealogists – professional genealogy research

Books

• Genealogical.com – lots of wonderful genealogy research books