I always get confused when I look at the Oehlert family. Today, I will look at that family’s connection to the Krause family.  I quickly discovered how confusing the Krause family can be as well.  Then if you also throw in a Kranawetter, it absolutely throws me into a tizzy.  But I’ll do my best.

Johann Gottlieb Krause was born on November 14, 1859, the son of another Johann Gottlieb Krause whose wife was Johanna Christiane Denhardt.  We have a couple of Krause family binders in our museum, one of them which focuses on an Adolph Krause whose ancestors mainly ended up in Minnesota.  There is probably a connection between these Krause’s because they are all from Polzig, Germany, but I’m not going to go there.  Today’s birthday boy was baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg.  We have his baptism record.

Both Gottlieb Krause’s can be found in the 1860 census for Brazeau Township.  Gottlieb, Jr. was the baby of the family at the time.

Gottlieb’s mother died in 1867, so she does not show up in the 1870 census.  There are several Bodenshatz’s in this household.

There is one more census for Gottlieb before he gets married.  Here is the 1880 census.  The household was then down to just Gottlieb, Sr. and Gottlieb, Jr.

On June 12, 1881, Gottlieb Krause married Johanna Oehlert.  The church record for this wedding is found in the Trinity Lutheran, Altenburg books, but it is somewhat likely that this marriage took place in Wittenberg.  Here is that church record.  It says that Johanna was from Wittenberg.

We also have this Perry County record for this marriage.

Let’s take a look at Johanna Oehlert’s beginnings.  She was born on February 12, 1858, the daughter of Johann Gottfried and Theresia (Kranawetter) Oehlert.  Her mother was married 3 times, and her second husband was this Oehlert.  We have a photograph of Theresia Kranawetter Zwickelhuber Oehlert Dietrich.

Johanna Oehlert was baptized at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Altenburg.  Immanuel was a fairly new congregation in 1858 when she was baptized.  Here is her baptism record.

The first census in which I could find Johanna was the one taken in 1870, and that was a challenge.  Her father had died in 1864 and Theresia had married a Dietrich.  In this census, Johanna appears to be named Anna Dietrich, and the family was living in Wittenberg.

I was once again unable to find Johanna in the 1880 census, the year before she was married.  Once Gottlieb and Johanna were married, their first child was born and died in 1882.  After that, they had four more children, all boys.  Then Gottlieb died on January 24, 1899 at the age of 39.  Below is his death record.

He is buried at Trinity Lutheran Cemetery in Altenburg.  I must admit that this death date is one reason I chose to do this story today.  Gottlieb died in the same year as the two that made up the Palisch couple that was written about yesterday.  I looked at the photographs I took yesterday to see if I could see the Krause gravestone.  It was not there, although I know that it should be nearby.  It is a gravestone that can be found on Findagrave.com.  However, I wanted to see how close it was to the Palisch gravestones, so back to the cemetery I went.  At least this morning, it was a balmy 26º F.  Here is the Gottlieb Krause gravestone.  I purposely took the picture so that you can see both Trinity Lutheran Church and the Lutheran Heritage Center & Museum in the background.

In the photo below, you can see this gravestone in the foreground and the Palisch gravestones farther back.

Because they were married after the 1880 census, and Gottlieb died before the 1900 census, there is not a census in which we can see this married couple.  We find Johanna as a widow in the 1900 census with her four sons.

In the 1910 census, we find Johanna with just her youngest son, Martin, in her household.

In Johanna’s obituary, it states that she moved to Jacob, Illinois in 1919, so we find her in the Fountain Bluff Township in the 1920 census.  She is listed by herself in that census, but not far below her name, we see her son’s family.  His name was Paul Krause.

Johanna could be found in the 1930 census for the same location, still living by herself, but I choose not to display it.  She died on March 29, 1940 at the age of 82.  We have her obituary.

Johanna was buried in the Christ Lutheran Cemetery in Jacob, Illinois.

Later in her life, a photograph was taken of Johanna and her sister, Christiane.

As you can see in the photo above, Johanna’s sister, Christiana, married a Dietrich, so that surname comes into this story once again.  Add to that the fact that a few others in Johanna’s Oehlert family married Krause’s, and you get a tangled web of Oehlert’s and Krause’s.