How reliable are German sources in respect of " Mothers Alias "

Question

I am having a major battle with the sources in my Herrmann family tree, which the Data Doctor has noticed. The puzzle is complicated by the above records which show that Backfleisch-1 and Wolf-6737 ( alias Freudenberg ) may be the same person. If I merge the two then there are complications with some of  the siblings being born after the mothers childbearing age. This mix up needs an experienced genealogist as it has become too complicated for me!

Answer 1

Could you please add a link to the profiles.

What sources do you have? Upload them as image to the profiles, so that somebody can check it.

It is always better if more then one person proof that complicated things.

Birth records of the children are also important.

Comments

Hi Dieter

Thanks for your reply. I would like to suggest that you go to Family Search & check the following profiles ( where you will find the children listed )

Johann Georg Gottlieb Herrmann G73Y-M4M

Johanne Christiane Wolf G73Y-SPZ (LAST FIGURE MIGHT BE 2)

Johanne Christiane Backfleisch or Bockfleisch G48T-1D4.

You might have to look at the marriage sources of some of the siblings where I came across some confusing entries, but I don't want to  give too many facts as it will take up space.Anyone can email me if they wish to. Good luck!

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Sorry, but you mixed up at least three different families. One family is fome Stendal in the Altmark, one from Goldschau near Magdeburg and one from Spören near Bitterfeld.

You need to find at first the desth record of YOUR family and then you can work out the rest of the family.

In familysearch at least three children were born before the marriage of the parents (impossible at that time).

They don't belong to that family or one or two of them could be children of the father's possible first marriage.

All others belong to other families

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Thanks Dieter

How do you unscramble an egg once you have scrambled it? I looked at the situation this morning & it is a nightmare. I can see where I went wrong. There are 3 Johanna Christiana's.i.e. Wolf, Backfleisch & Flemming. I started to attempt to fix things in Family Search but decided to leave it as I was becoming more & more frustrated. Thank you for looking into things anyway.

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Dieter, you wrote: "In familysearch at least three children were born before the marriage of the parents (impossible at that time)."

I have done extensive research in German church records spanning 1600-1875, and I regularly see births before marriages. My own emigrating ancestor was born three years prior to the marriage of his parents.

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Hi Jillaine, yes one might happen and it happens often. In many German areas (parishes) those people got a church punishment and in parish records they were called "Poenitenten".

A second time might happen, but not in the same parish. There are some exceptions, e.g. with charcoal burners, who lived far away from civilization in the forest and where it could happen that couples were not married at that time.

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Hi Dieter

I worked on the profiles yesterday & will continue tomorrow. It meant going through each source & determining which mother the child belonged to. I also checked each siblings marriage record for the mother & fathers names. This also resulted in changes. I am getting along slowly & hope to get somewhere by the middle of the week. I have also advised Data Doctor of the problem. I am unfortunately not able to copy records & send them. At 80 I am past learning new computer skills so I plod on regardless. Regards

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Hi Brian,

no problem. If you find the correct mother and thus the correct place of residence, I can upload the images as sources to the profiles, transcribe and if you want translate them into english language.

To make it easier for me I need only the profile ID for the mentioned profiles.

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Thanks Dieter

I started yesterday, spent most of today & will try to finish by Friday. Appreciate your assistance.

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Please check the following which are as accurate as I can make them with my limited resources:

Wolf-6737    Family Search REF  G73Y-SP2

Backfleisch-1  Family Search ref  G48T-1D4

Herrmann-731  Johann Georg Gottlieb Herrmann Family Search ref G73Y-M4M

Herrmann-1571  Johann Georg Herrmann Family Search ref G466-XCP

Many thanks

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Dieter, it WAS possible at that time to have a bunch of children and not being married. Yes, it was rare, but it happened. My 2xgreatgrandmother was one of 8 siblings and ALL of them were illegitimate. Looking at the age difference between the children, the sponsors and witnesses I am very sure that all of the kids have the same father. The only problem is his name doesn't appear on any document about the children.

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Okay, you convinced me that it was possible.

Here the problem was that there were three different Johann Georg Herrmanns at three different places with three different wives.

Now we only have the Johann Georg Herrmann from Stendal and a new one, born in Breslau.

Based on the estimated date of birth, it could be the same person who was married twice and moved from Breslau to Stendal.

The problem in Stendal is that there are currently only publicly available church records from 1808 - 1875. Here it would be important to find the marriage certificates now.

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Regarding births before marriage in the German Empire -- in order to limit population, there were laws in many places that required couples needed enough property to marry.  This may have limited the population, but it also resulted in a lot of births out of wedlock and emigration.  See: https://www.genealoger.com/german/ger_marriage.htm 

Answer 2

Hi Brian,

that sounds good.

I added the original marriage records from 1824, 1833 and 1835 from the parish Stendal to the three children.

I also added the burial record from 1834 (parish Stendal) to the profi l of the wife of Johann Georg Herrmann.

I also found the death record of the son Johann Christoph in 1871 and added the original source. I edited the profile by adding the death date.

More I cannot do in the moment because from the parish Stendal there are only parish records between 1808 - 1875 avaible.

Comments

Well, well. It looks like we are getting somewhere at last.

Thanks so much for your extra input. I have worked so long on this that I was beginning to give up hope. You really are a star. Maybe, in time additional sources will become available. Keep safe.

Regards

Brian Herman (Hermann, Herrmann)

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Thank you very much for the Star Brian.