The Germans: Lineage Series, Book Six: Lineage, #6

By Michael Paul Hurd

Germans, either by nationality or ethnicity, made their mark on the United States in the late Ninteenth and early Twentieth Centuries in the two decades leading up to World War I. Taking up mostly agricultural pursuits, some settled in Southwestern Michigan, and Berrien County in particular. Where did they come from? How did they get to Michigan? What difficulties did they face?

 

Emma Waldheimer and Freddie Fenstermacher were of the first generation born in the United States. They grew up in German farming families. A chance meeting at a fruit market near the beginning of the Great Depression was enough for the two of them to fall in love. Eloping on Emma's eighteenth birthday, the young couple was quickly catapulted into adult life with all of its trials, tribulations, and conflicts.

 

The Germans tells the story of how two ethnic German families emigrated from Imperial Russia to Berrien County Michigan, were eventually joined by marriage, and assimilated into American life. Most realized early on that this assimilation and especially the mastery of English was the essence of survival and prosperity. The one area that retained its German flavor was worship. The German community, wherever they settled, established churches and generally conducted services auf Deutsch, making it their own language of faith, not unlike Latin was to Roman Catholics.

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lineage Independent Publishing
• Release date: Nov 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201005894

Michael Paul Hurd

Michael Paul Hurd was born in Michigan in 1959. He is the son of Paul S. Hurd and Carolyn J. Hurd (both deceased). Married to his wife, Sandy, since 1980, they have two sons and three grandchildren; however, their eldest son, Adam, passed away from cancer in 2010. During his formative years, Michael Hurd lived in Michigan, Virginia, and New Hampshire. He graduated from Hopkinton High School, Contoocook, NH, in 1977. Hurd is a veteran of the United States Air Force, serving from 1978 until 1992, and was Honorably Discharged as a Technical Sergeant. While on active duty, he earned a Bachelor's Degree from the University of Maryland/European Division during an assignment to England. After discharge, he was employed for another 26 years by the United States Government as a civilian and retired in 2018 along with his wife. It is during this time that Hurd developed a love for the written word and the deep research that was needed to author first book, "Lineage."  The "Lineage" series was inspired in part by Sara Donati's "Wilderness" series and the many works of James Michener. The original “Lineage: A Novel” was constructed so that each of the chapters could be spun off into a full-length book.  Michael Hurd is an avid fisherman, has hiked nearly 100 miles of the Appalachian Trail in four states, and is a slow-but-steady road bicyclist. The Hurds currently reside in Maryland, within 10 miles of all three grandchildren. They travel extensively and are huge fans of the Disney Cruise Line.

Book preview

The Germans

Map Description automatically generated

Yellow: Volhynia

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Image: Original version (Ukrainian) by Alex Tora; translated by KaterBegemot; Creative Content BY-SA 3.0

Red: Berrien County, MI; Public Domain Map

The Germans

Lineage Series: Book Six

Michael Paul Hurd

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Copyright © 2021 Michael Paul Hurd

Cover Design and Photography by Michael Paul Hurd.

Graphics and Photos: as sourced

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form or by electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews, without the express written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

This is a work of fiction. The characters, relationships, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and should not be construed as portrayals of real events.

ISBN (e-book): 9798201005894

Publisher: Lineage Independent Publishing,

Marriottsville, MD

Maryland Sales and Use Tax Entity: Lineage Independent Publishing, Marriottsville, MD 21104

www.lineage-publishing.com

[e-mail]

To the descendants of ethnic German farmers who came to America and settled in Berrien County, Michigan.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Prologue

Chapter One: Beginnings

Chapter Two: In Another Village...

Chapter Three: A Chance Meeting

Chapter Four: Courtship and Betrothal

Chapter Five: Friedrich the Groom

Chapter Six: Dorothea the Bride

Chapter Seven: The Wedding and Feast

Chapter Eight: Meanwhile, in Michigan

Chapter Nine: The Game’s Afoot

Chapter Ten: For Those In Peril on the Sea

Chapter Eleven: America, At Last

Chapter Twelve: Destination

Chapter Thirteen: Expansion

Chapter Fourteen: Smitten

Chapter Fifteen: Accidents Happen

Chapter Sixteen: More Mouths to Feed

Chapter Seventeen: From Father to Son

Chapter Eighteen: Matters of Necessity

Chapter Nineteen: Life on Two Farms

Chapter Twenty: Boy Meets Girl... and Her Family

Chapter Twenty-One: Courtship and Betrothal, Round II

Chapter Twenty-Two: When I Am Eighteen...

Chapter Twenty-Three: Life Goes On

Chapter Twenty-Four: Baby Makes Three

Chapter Twenty-Five: Storm Clouds

Chapter Twenty-Six: War and Prisoners of War

Epilogue

Author Note

Acknowledgments

Introduction

This book, the sixth in my Lineage Series, has proven to be the most difficult to write – so far. Researching anything related to Imperial Russia before the 1917 Revolution can go down many rabbit holes, especially when republics were absorbed into what would become the U.S.S.R.

Take, for example, the German settlements that existed in modern-day southeastern Poland, western Ukraine, and southwestern Belarus in an area that was then known as Volhynia. Beginning in 1763 under Catherine the Great, German farmers were invited to relocate from Germany to Volhynia to farm underused lands, all at the expense of the Imperial Russian Government. As incentives, the German expatriates were offered freedom from taxation, exemption from compulsory military service, and larger parcels of land than what they normally could own in Germany. The Germans were also permitted to establish their own local administrations.

Central to each of the German settlements (sometimes referred to as colonies) in Volhynia was a church, most often Lutheran, where most of the vital records ultimately were kept. These records included births, baptisms, confirmations, marriages, and deaths; they were often more accurate and more durable than the civil government records. In fact, because of the expulsion of Germans from the area, beginning with World War I, the civil records often did not survive.

Sometime around the turn of the 20th Century, conditions and relations with the Russian government changed. A mass German exodus from Volhynia, usually to the United States, began in earnest. The emigration was so great that the Russian Imperial Government allegedly put policies in place to restrict departures from the German colonies.

My own family, on the maternal side, was part of that migration. Both my maternal grandmother’s family and maternal grandfather’s family left Volhynia for the United States, in 1895 and 1901 respectively. They settled in Berrien County, Michigan – where other German farmers had already established a presence, along with German-speaking churches. In those days, emigration was a monumental undertaking, with families literally abandoning their farms and selling their possessions before embarking on a journey that could take months, even with the availability of rail travel.

Please remember that this book is a fictionalized account based on my own imagination and research. There certainly will be places where fact and fiction intersect; that is unavoidable. For added authenticity, I have also included the occasional German word or phrase in the dialogue. This includes uniquely German punctuation like the umlaut over vowels or the scharfes S (ß) for the notorious German double-s (which for some arcane grammatical reason does not appear in words like Abendessen). In each case, the reader should be able to determine the context of the phrase from the dialogue or narrative around it. I hope that no one will be offended.

Throughout the work to put this book together, I learned more about my mother’s side of the family than I had ever known before. I started with the pre-Internet written accounts and family trees compiled by my great-uncle, Robert Freier, and my great-aunt, Leona Peters .(both now deceased). With modern access to numerous online databases, plenty of new information came to light – some of which contradicted their accounts.

Perhaps the greatest contradiction of family legend is the port of arrival for my maternal grandfather’s mother, father, and his older surviving sister. It was originally thought that they came into the United States through New York City; however, the passenger manifest for the SS Dresden lists the family arriving through the Port of Baltimore on March 22, 1901. Their final destination was listed as Benton Harbor, Michigan – and a sponsor by the name of "Fr. Essig," who might be the same Friedrich A.W. Essig who married my mother’s maternal grand-aunt, Pauline.

Of the six books in my series so far, this one has been one of the most enjoyable and enlightening to research and put together. It expands the story from Chapter Four of Lineage: A Novel. I hope that you will enjoy reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

Michael Paul Hurd

Third Generation Descendant of

German Farmers from Volhynia

Prologue

Stuttgart, Germany—Sometime After 1763

Attention, Farmers!

By Order of Her Imperial Highness,

Catherine II Alexeyevna,

Up to Fifty Farmers and Their Families

Will Be Resettled Each Year

From This Area to Volhynia

In the Russian Empire

At the Expense of Her Imperial Highness.

Volunteers Will Be Free From Taxation,

Free From Compulsory Military Service

And

Will Be Granted a Parcel Up to Ten Times Greater

Than What They Now Hold in Germany

Please Confer With The Russian Representative

In the Town Square

A griculture is our wisest pursuit, because it will in the end contribute most to real wealth, good morals, and happiness.

Thomas Jefferson

Chapter One: Beginnings

Volhynia, Russia (Ukraine), 1870s

Springtime had come to the small village of Ostroh with the last melting of the winter snow. It was an idyllic, but bucolic, setting. The thatched roof cottages with smoke rising from their chimneys provided a backdrop for the many colors of spring flowers coming into bloom. Lawns as such were not yet in vogue, but the deep green of the grass between the flowers and the cart path provided a vivid contrast of colors.

The sound of newborn lambs bawling in hunger was suddenly matched by the unmistakable piercing wail of a newborn child. Klara Fenstermacher had just given birth to a son. It was her seventh child born alive out of nine pregnancies.

It was an uneventful birth, as 19th Century births went. Klara did not need the assistance of a doctor as the baby was in a normal head-first presentation. She was attended by two family members: her younger sister, Katarina, and her mother, Rosamund Dahlke. The two Dahlke women had been living in the Fenstermacher home in anticipation of the birth. It was fortunate for the somewhat squeamish Katarina that labor and delivery took less than six hours. Katarina’s presence, as a woman now of marriageable age, was more for her own education on the birth process than it was to assist her mother and sister with the delivery. Rosamund, on the other hand, had served as midwife for countless births in the nearby villages.

The infant’s piercing cry brought August Friedrich Fenstermacher, Klara’s husband, running into the house from their nearby barn. He had been tending to the leather harnesses for the family’s two plow horses – a task he enjoyed when he needed a mindless distraction. This was one of those times, as it was his wife’s ninth labor and he knew there was little he could do to help with the birth process.

August walked into the birthing room to a beaming Klara and a now cooing male infant. Fenstermacher had already decided that if the baby was a boy, he would be named Friedrich. Friedrich Helmut Fenstermacher. The previous children’s names had all been chosen by Klara; August wanted this one to at least bear a part of his own name.

Seeing that the infant and his beloved wife were both healthy and knowing that Klara would need to nurse the baby soon, August summoned the other six children to the birthing room. Once they were all assembled, he called for the family to kneel in prayer at Klara’s bedside. Devout Lutherans, the Fenstermacher family prayed together at least twice a day and before every meal; they attended church as a family every Sunday except during the harvest. Friedrich’s birth was a special occasion that warranted a separate and additional family prayer. The two Dahlke women knelt as well.

"Gott im Himmel, höre unser Gebet, August began. God in Heaven, hear our prayer. He continued, We thank You that You have delivered our beloved Klara of a healthy son who we will baptize in Your holy name. We also pray that the newness of spring will keep them healthy into the coming year. In Your holy name, we pray as your Son, Jesus Christ, taught us to pray... This was the cue for the family to join in, Vater unser im Himmel, geheiligt werde dein Name... Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. The children, ranging in age from four to fourteen, continued the Lord’s Prayer as they had been taught by their mother and father, ending with a resounding Amen!"

It was fortunate for the Fenstermachers that the itinerant pastor would be making his rounds in about ten days; this would provide an opportunity for the timely baptism of young Friedrich. Ostroh had a church building, but because there was a temporary shortage of pastors in Volhynia, baptisms were often performed by the local school teacher, always a male, or one of the village elders. August and Klara both preferred that their children be baptized by the traveling pastors and they held fast to this preference with all of their children, sometimes delaying the baptism for several months.

Regardless of the pastor’s scheduled arrival, the secular registration of the birth needed to be accomplished. This task was always handled at the office of the Bürgermeister (mayor) and it was the father’s duty to report the birth. It was also the father’s responsibility to wet the baby’s head with a round of beer at the local Bierstube. This was the part of childbirth that August loved the most, whether it was his infant or someone else’s: drinking afterwards, and lots of it.

After an afternoon of heavy drinking with the other German farmers and the Bürgermeister, August Fenstermacher was thoroughly inebriated. Normally, he could tolerate about a half dozen tankards of the local brew without any ill effects. However, today was different: August had, in the matter of just a couple of hours, consumed nearly a dozen tankards of very potent beer without any appreciable intake of solid food. In other words, he was falling-down drunk.

Even in her exhausted state, Klara knew the likely outcome of August’s trek into Ostroh. Her suspicions were confirmed when he did not return by five p.m., a half an hour before the family’s evening meal was always served. Klara was also aware that her mother and sister had spent every minute since Friedrich’s birth preparing the family’s meal. "Albert! Klara barked from her bedroom, Kommst du hier!" Albert was fourteen years old and knew that his mother’s tone meant business.

"Ja, Mutti, said Albert as he walked into his mother’s room, what do you want?"

Your father has not returned from the village yet, and I suspect he is once again drunk at the side of the road, Klara said with no emotion evident in her voice. Please take one of the horses and our market wagon. You know the rest... It wasn’t the first time that Albert had been sent to fetch his father from the village Bierstube.

Ja, Mutti! replied Albert, anxious to once again prove that he was becoming a man. He smiled at his mother and walked out of her room and headed immediately to the barn. There, he hitched up one of the two plow horses to the cart August used to transport their produce to market. Albert knew that his mother trusted him, the eldest of the Fenstermacher children, to retrieve August without causing too much of a fuss.

It took Albert less than half an hour to locate his inebriated and semi-conscious father. August was leaning against a tree at the side of the cart path leading into Ostroh village. Albert actually went a bit past his father so that he could turn the cart around; doing so with a drunk August on board would have upset his equilibrium to the point that a round of vomiting was likely. The last thing that Albert wanted to do was clean the cart before dinner. His grandmother always prepared wonderful meals, and missing them was not something a nearly-grown boy would do.

After turning around, Albert pulled the wagon alongside his father, set the cart brake, and tied off the horse to the front stanchion. "Vati, kommst du mit Albert cajoled, I’m here to take you home. Mother is worried about you."

"Liebchen, August mumbled as he partially regained consciousness, you have a new brother. It was all August could utter before he passed out once again. Albert thought to himself how much he, now a man, hated being called Liebchen" like a little girl.

A strapping lad, Albert muscled his father into an upright position and then heaved the inert form over his shoulder like a sack of grain. As gently as he could, Albert laid his father into the back of the wagon and tied him down gently but securely. The last thing Albert wanted was for August to fall out of the wagon on the way home, as the cart path was sloppy with mud and rutted from the spring rains.

In the short ride back to the Fenstermacher farm, August had started to sober up. As Albert unhitched the horse and walked it back to its stall, August somehow unfastened himself from the cart, staggered to the side of the barn, and relieved himself before losing the contents of his stomach. Albert arrived just in time to keep August from falling into the manure pile near the rear of the barn; undressing and bathing his father was even more loathsome than cleaning a vomit-covered wagon would have been.

Albert guided his father towards the Fenstermacher cottage. As they stumbled inside, the entire family (minus Klara, of course) was seated around the rough-hewn table preparing for the evening meal. Rosamund Dahlke was clearly in command, quietly but firmly giving instructions not only to her own daughter Katarina, but to all of her Fenstermacher grandchildren.

Besides Albert, the Fenstermacher children included Julianna Bertha, a blossoming girl of thirteen; Gottlieb Wilhelm, a precocious boy of twelve; Klaus Christian, nine; Eduard Rudolph, seven, and the youngest daughter and apple of August’s eye, Paulina Mathilde, four. Between Eduard and Paulina, the Fenstermachers had lost a male infant and between Paulina and Friedrich, another female infant. Both of the deceased children only lived a matter of hours and were baptized by a tearful August.

Albert! August! Welcome home! said Rosamund with a hint of sarcasm in her voice. We were just sitting down for our meal. Perhaps Albert would like to lead us in prayer? But not until he washes his hands.

"Ja, Großmutter," an obedient Albert replied. He claimed he was more man than boy, but his grandmother always seemed to send him back into subdued boyhood obedience. August stumbled to his seat at the head of the table, knowing that he, too, could be manipulated by his domineering mother-in-law.

After washing at the hand-pumped washbasin, Albert took his assigned seat at the table. A very traditional family, the eldest son was always seated at the right hand of his father. At the other end of the table, the eldest daughter was seated to her mother’s right side; this was Julianna’s assigned seat. Klara’s seat remained empty out of respect for her condition.

"Vater Unser, Gott im Himmel, Albert began the prayer, We thank you for the meal we are about to eat and the sustenance it will provide for our bodies. Im Namen des Vaters, des Sohnes und des Heiligen Geistes. Amen." In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Mealtimes around the Fenstermacher table were often boisterous affairs. The children chattered constantly – about everything and nothing. The four eldest children were close enough in age that they had similar interests to discuss and usually did so in a polite, conversational manner; there were times that tempers did get a little heated, though. The two younger ones were finicky eaters and mealtimes were a constant, sometimes tearful battle to get them to eat what Klara put on the table from their farm. They seemed to be different children when Rosamund was around; their grandmother had a way of getting them to clean their plates and not waste a bite. It usually only took one look from Rosamund and full spoons and forks somehow magically made the journey from plate to mouth.

Once the children were fed and Klara had been given enough time to rest and nurse her new arrival, Rosamund prepared a small plate to take to her daughter’s room. Besides a healthy portion of early vegetables and sauerkraut from one of the always-fermenting crocks in the larder, Klara’s plate contained a small portion of boiled beef and a steaming heap of spätzle smothered in Rosamund’s silky-smooth brown gravy.

Klara smiled when she saw the food her mother had prepared. Vielen Dank, Mutti! Klara said in acknowledgment of her mother’s thoughtfulness, will you sit with me while I eat?

Of course, my dear. You need your rest, but also your food – and company to keep your spirits up, Rosamund replied, knowing full well the impact childbirth could have on a woman’s moods.

I don’t know what I am going to do about August’s drinking, Klara said, looking downcast as tears began to well up in her eyes. I love him so much, but this is the third time this month I have had to send Albert out with the wagon to fetch his father.

"Liebchen, Rosamund replied, the caring in her voice obvious, your husband is just like your father used to be. He may drink too much, but has he ever struck you or raised a hand to the children?"

"Nein, Mutti... Klara said, almost in a whisper. He has never lost his temper like that. When he is sober, he is a doting and loving father to all of our children. Klara blushed as she continued, we’ve been married for just over fifteen years and I have been with child nine times," a grin spreading over Klara’s face. Her mother gave a knowing look in response to her daughter’s unsaid admission that things were more than satisfactory in the marital bed.

After about six weeks, Rosamund and Katarina returned to their own farm a few miles away. Katarina’s next-younger sister, Julia, had been left in charge of the household. Their father, Klaus, was now a non-drinker (which was highly unusual for men of German origin) and Julia had him wrapped around her little finger. Anything Julia wanted, Julia got – including obedience from Klaus in all household matters.

The Dahlke’s farm was much like the Fenstermacher’s: a few animals, plenty of space to grow fruits and vegetables, and a well-kept flower garden in front of the thatched-roof cottage. The one thing that differentiated the Dahlke farm from others in the area was that Klaus was an expert in the art of curing and smoking meat; the smokehouse was always full of beef, pork, lamb, or wild game in various states of cure, and the smells emanating