Uncovering Our Jürgensen Roots

Uncovering Our Jürgensen Roots

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

Compared to some of our other immigrant ancestors, Alvina Jürgensen was not difficult to find in the "old country." The rest of the Jürgensen family was, however, a different story.

One of the first records we found in the record books at St. Paul Lutheran Church was the marriage of Hinrich Hellmers and Alvina Jürgensen.

The church marriage record at St. Paul Lutheran Church says:

         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.

We received translation assistance from two retired Lutheran clergymen, Pastor Frederick Zucker and Pastor Erich Wildgrube. From this record, we learned that Alvina was from a place called Friedrichstadt in Schleswig-Holstein.

Envelope addressed to Leonard H. Hellmers.

We discovered that there was only one likely place named Friedrichstadt and we sent a letter dated 13 June 1963 to the "Town Council Office." They forwarded our letter to the Evangelical Lutheran Church, which had the records.

We received their response in this envelope. A copy of the original response can be seen here.

The church's response, translated for us by Pastor William F. Wedig, included the following:

     Your letter of 13 June 1963 to the Town Council Office in Friedrichstadt has been turned over to the evangelical-lutheran Church Records Office due to circumstances.
     The investigation of our church records indicate that the married couple Gustav A. Ludwig
Jürgensen and Marie Dorothea nee Petersen obviously were only temporary residents of Friedrichstadt. They were not married here and only two of their children were born here:
     1) Henriette Alwina Catharina Jürgensen
          born 10 November 1840 in Friedrichstadt
          baptized 25 April 1841    "           "
     2) Maria Henriette Nicolina Jürgensen
          born 28 February 1843 in Friedrichstadt
          baptized 25 June 1843   "    "
   The father's occupation: Master-joiner [Tischlermeister]
   Where the other children were born and where the parents went from here cannot be ascertained from our church record books.

Thus we quickly verified where Alvina was from and were given birth and baptism information for her and her sister Maria. Where the Jürgensens lived before Friedrichstadt and where they went next would be more difficult to learn.

Another clue to their whereabouts also came from the records of St. Paul Lutheran Church. The marriage record of Alvina's sister Friederica to Carl Voschera in 1855 showed that both were from "Springe, Amt Birgenmor." Through a bit of research, I learned that "Springe" was actually Sprenge, and that it was part of the church parish of Dänischenhagen. In the summer of 1979 I wrote to the church there and received in return the baptism records for the two youngest children in the family, Hinrich and Johanna. They had no record of the birth of Friederica, nor the marriage of the parents.

Advertisement from the "Familienkundlichen Nachrichten."

Having run into a roadblock finding the marriage of Alvina's parents, I placed an advertisement in a German genealogical publication, the "Familienkundlichen Nachrichten" (Issue No. 19), seeking assistance on this and several other families. I soon heard back from Herr Hermann Reese, who, for minimal fees plus expenses, said he could do research at the appropriate archives. I took him up on his offer and thus began an exchange of correspondence that lasted six years.

In the fall of 1979, when Dad and I visited the area from which the Jürgensens had emigrated, we stopped at Hermann's home in Elsdorf for a brief visit.

Our visit included seeing the city of Friedrichstadt, where Alvina Jürgensen was born, and the town of Dänischenhagen, where the two youngest Jürgensen children were baptized.

Herman Reese and Norman Hellmers in Elsdorf
Photo by Leonard H. Hellmers, Sr.

Then in the summer of 1984, Hermann came to the United States and visited our family. At the time we were living in Lincoln City, Indiana.

Hermann Reese with my children, Jennifer and Jeffrey,
by our house in Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial
Photo by Norman Hellmers

Hermann Reese was responsible for finding the marriage of Alvina's parents, the birth of her two older siblings, and most of the information that we have on Alvina's ancestors. More than any other person, he is responsible for discovering the German roots of the Jürgensen-Petersen family.

In 1985, Hermann Reese put me in touch with Peter Hinrichs of Marne. He is descended from Asmus Hans Nicolaus Petersen, who was a brother of Maria Catharina Dorothea Petersen, Alvina's mother. Peter was able to supply me with information on the ancestry of the Petersen family, along with clues to the birthplace of Maria Magdalena Elisabeth Hagelstein, Alvina's grandmother.

There is much more to be learned about Alvina's roots, but we would not know as much as we do now without the assistance of Hermann Reese of Elsdorf.

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