It is not known how Caroline Feige adapted to life New Orleans, at that time the ninth largest city in the United States. Where did she live, how did she support herself, how did she make social contacts? Perhaps she used one of the agencies that helped German immigrants get established.
One means that she apparently did use was to quickly associate herself with a German protestant church in the uptown part of the city where she first lived. She was a member of the Reformed Church in Bentheim, and once in New Orleans, she affiliated with what was then known as the German Lutheran Congregation of the City of Lafayette (known today as the Jackson Avenue Evangelical Congregation, an independent Reformed church).
It may have been through this church that she met three siblings in the Landwehr family, who were also making their homes in that part of the city. The younger brother, Heinrich (soon known as Henry), had been in New Orleans since 1 December 1866. His older brother and sister were already married, but he was single.
Within the first six months of Caroline's being in New Orleans, she and Heinrich "Henry" Landwehr had obviously established a relationship. The records of the church show that on Sunday, 25 April 1869, she and Heinrich were witnesses together to the baptism of a child of Johann "John" Landwehr, Henry's brother.
Seven months later, Heinrich Landwehr and Caroline Feige were married at the church on 20 November 1869 by the Rev. Ludwig P. Heintz.
| Note: This photograph remained with Feige ancestors in Germany until 1984, when cousin Karl-Ernst Kaiser mailed it to Norman Hellmers. |
