I chose this story today because, like yesterday, it contains another example of a Schuessler marrying a Burkhardt. I found the story because one of the Schuessler sons was born on this day. Herman Schuessler is today’s birthday boy. He was born on September 7, 1862. We will get back to him later. First, let’s look at two other characters, Gottlob Schuessler and Christiane Burkhardt. Like yesterday’s highlighted couple, these two were members of the Gesellschaft, and they were both found on the passenger lists I displayed in yesterday’s post. Here is the Schuessler passenger list again. Gottlob was 5 years old.
Next, the Burkhardt family passenger list shows Christiane as 9 years old.
These two would eventually get married, but not before each of them were married to someone else and were raising families of their own.
Gottlob Schuessler was born on February 27, 1834 in Langenchursdorf, Germany. That was the hometown of Rev. C.F.W. Walther. Gottlob was the son of Michael and Rosine (Hoppe) Schuessler. The Schuessler’s lived near Frohna and were members of Concordia Lutheran Church. Gottlob would have been confirmed around 1848, but that was a time when Concordia was without a pastor, and Pastor Loeber from Altenburg was assisting them. Rev. Loeber was probably overwhelmed with work, so a confirmation record for Gottlob cannot be found. We find Gottlob in the 1850 census. He is described as a 17 year-old farmer. His father had died in 1849. The rest of this census entry is on the next page, and I chose not to show it.
On April 3, 1856, Gottlob married Dorothea Harnagel at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg. Here is a Perry County marriage record for that wedding.
We also have the church record from Trinity.
The first census in which we find this couple was the one taken in 1860. They had one child by this time, and Dorothea’s mother, Augusta, was living in their household. Apparently, this Schuessler family became members of Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg because all of their children were baptized there.
According to our German Family Tree, this couple had 8 children, including today’s birthday boy, Herman Schuessler. He was baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg.
We find Herman in the 1870 census at 7 years old.
Now, let’s turn our attention to Christiane Burkhardt. She was born on August 13, 1831, the daughter of Johann Gottlieb and Eva Rosine (Schumann) Burkhardt.
Christiane was confirmed at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg in 1844. Rev. Gotthold Loeber must have been her teacher. Rev. Loeber’s daughter, Martha Loeber, was in the same confirmation class. Below is a list of that class from the Trinity books. Christiane is #6 at the bottom of the first column.
The 1850 census for the Burkhardt family was shown yesterday, but I will show it again. Christiane was 19 years old at that time.
On February 23, 1851, Christiane married Gotthilf Leonhardt at Trinity. Gotthilf was the son of Gottfried Leonhardt. We do not know his mother’s name. Gotthilf was an engineer. Interestingly, Gottfried, Gotthilf’s father, was a sponsor for Herman Schuessler’s younger sister born in 1866. Below is the church record for the Leonhardt/Burkhardt marriage.
When we see the Leonhardt family in the 1860 census, it helps explain some of the future events in today’s story. We find the Leonhardt household above the Berghardt (Burkhardt) household, and that is above the Gottlob Schuessler household.
We do not know exactly when Gotthilf Leonhardt died, but it must have been before 1870. In the 1870 census, we find Christiane as a widow.
Now we have both Gottlob Schuessler and Christiane (Burkhardt) Leonhardt up to the 1870 census. On April 6, 1871, Dorothea Schuessler died, leaving Gottlob a widower. Later that year, he would marry Christiane Leonhardt on November 21, 1871. Here is a civil record for that wedding.
Gottlob died in 1879, so we find this interesting household in the 1880 census. Gottlob and Christiane had two children of their own. In addition, on this entry, you find Clara Schuessler, who was a daughter from Gottlob’s first marriage to Dorothea. You also see Emma Leonhardt, who was Christiane’s daughter from her first marriage to Gotthilf. It was a little bit like the Brady Bunch if the Brady’s would have had a few children of their own to add to their story.
Today’s birthday boy, Herman, was not in the above entry. He was a 17 year-old farm worker in the Saalfeld household in that census.
On October 20, 1887, Herman married Clara Kuehnert. Below is the record for that wedding found in the Trinity Lutheran books. Someone was nice enough to transcribe the old German script for us.
Herman and Clara had just one child, Paul Schuessler.
The Herman Schuessler farm can be seen on this 1915 land map of Perry County. You can see that his land was located very near some Kuehnert land.
I will close this post by just mentioning some deaths. Christiane (Burkhardt) Schuessler died in 1905. Since I could not find her gravestone on Findagrave.com., I went to the cemetery to check into that. I found another one of those notorious empty spots that have no marker.
Clara (Kuehnert) Schuessler died in 1919; Herman Schuessler died in 1927. They are both buried in the Trinity Lutheran Cemetery.
This was another one of those posts that contain all sorts of names. Those names intertwine with one another over time. I discovered this Shuessler/Burkhardt connection just by chance, only because I found two events on consecutive dates. What are the chances that I find another Schuessler/Burkhardt story for tomorrow?
