This “Uncovering Our Roots” section for each family explains how my father (Leonard H. Hellmers, Sr.) and I discovered the home community of each immigrant ancestor in the Hellmers-Neff family.
Norman D. Hellmers
When Dad and I began this project in 1961, I first asked him about his father and his Hellmers grandfather. Dad remembered both well even though his father died when he was not quite 15 years old and his grandfather died when he was 8-1/2. I asked him if he knew who his great-grandfather Hellmers was, but he had no idea. We then began checking the records we could find, especially those at St. Paul Lutheran Church.
From these records, we learned that his name was Heinrich, or in English, Henry Hellmers. His marriage record at St. Paul indicated that he was born in Bremen, but in checking there, and even using paid researchers, we could find no record of his birth. We did not have an exact birth date and we did not know who his parents were. A few other records said that his birthplace was Bremen.
Heinrich Hellmers Heinrich Hellmers
aus Bremen, Preussen. from Bremen, Prussia.
Mit with
A. Henriette Jürgesen, A. Henriette Jürgesen,
aus Friedrichstadt, from Friedrichstadt,
Schleswig Holstein. Schleswig Holstein.
Later, from his marriage license, and one other document
that he signed, we learned his named was spelled Hinrich Hellmers.
So for many years, we could not locate Hinrich’s birthplace. From all indications, it appeared that he was from one of the following: Bremen (or one of the smaller communities within Bremen); one of the many small towns or villages near Bremen in what had been the Kingdom of Hannover; or, from a small town or village in what had been the Kingdom of Oldenburg. Dad died in 1984 before we could learn the place where the Hellmers family lived in Germany.
With the constant addition of new databases to the collections of Ancestry.com, my wife Pat would from time to time check for our “problem” names. In the spring of 2007, Pat entered the name of Adolph Hellmers, a person we believed was a brother to Hinrich Hellmers. (She searched on "Adolph" since it is a less common name than Heinrich or Henry.) She came up with someone in the Bremen, Germany Sailors Registry, 1837-1873 and the Bremen, Germany Ships Crew Lists, 1821-1873. (These records had been indexed and placed online by Ancestry some time in 2006.) This Adolph, listed as being born in Reckum or Rekum, was the right age. A further check of the list showed that there was a Hinrich, also the right age, and also from Reckum or Rekum.
I then put "Hellmers" and "Rekum" into Google. One of the first “hits” was for a Hellmers family in the Ortsfamilienbuch Neuenkirchen (Schwanewede). (These church records had also just been put online in 2006.) The information can be found here.
The church records showed that Arend Helmer [Hellmers] and his wife, Adelheid Margarethe Tim [Timm] had four children, including a Hinrich, born 1828, and an Adolf, born 1834, which matched the birth years I had for my Hinrich and Adolph Hellmers. Of the 38,951 seamen in the Bremen, Germany Sailors Registry, 1837-1873, there is only one Hinrich Hellmers born in 1828 who had a brother Adolph Hellmers born in 1834. These two had a third brother, Jürgen, also a merchant seaman, who deserted his ship and remained in Philadelphia. These three brothers had one sister who stayed in Germany. With this and other circumstantial evidence, it became clear that I had found “our” Hinrich Hellmers. An explanation of this circumstantial case can be found here.
On 4 July 2008, with my wife Pat and son Jeffrey, I was able to visit Rekum and other villages and towns where the Hellmers ancestors had lived. The visit included a special tour of the church in Neuenkirchen in which Hinrich Hellmers was baptized and confirmed. Daddy would have been thrilled.