Today’s tale begins with the birth of a set of twin girls on November 29, 1851. Pauline and Clara Hopfer were the daughters of Michael and Justine (Quaas) Hopfer. We have photos of these parents.

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These girls were baptized at Grace Lutheran Church in Uniontown, Missouri. Below are their baptism records.

Clara Hopfer did not make it into a census. She died in 1858 at the age of 6. Her death record in the books of Grace Lutheran Church says she died of bronchitis. That record also says Clara was the first person to be buried in the “new cemetery”. Grace Lutheran has 3 cemeteries, described as the Upper Cemetery, the Middle Cemetery, and the New Cemetery. I think the new cemetery in 1858 was the Middle Cemetery. That cemetery is not well documented on Findagrave.com.

We find Pauline Hopfer in the 1860 census for Brazeau Township. She was 8 years old.

Pauline’s first husband was going to be Heinrich Rabold. Heinrich was born on September 8, 1848, the son of Michael and Amelia (Schatte) Rabold. Let’s go back and look at the arrival of the Rabold’s in America. Numerous Rabold names are found on the ship, Favorite, that arrived in America in 1842. Here is a passenger list for that group. At the bottom of the list, you will see the name of Johanna Reichenbecker.

Not long after their arrival, Michael Rabold (shown as being 25 years old on the passenger list) married Johanna Reichenbecker at Grace Lutheran Church in Uniontown. One child was born to this couple, but then Johanna died in 1845. Michael remarried in 1846. His second wife was Amalie Schatte, who was the mother of Heinrich. Heinrich was baptized at Grace, Uniontown. Here is his baptism record.

Henry shows up in his first census in 1850 at the age of 2.

Next, we find Henry in the 1860 census at the age of 11.

On August 22, 1869, Henry Rabold married Pauline Hopfer at Grace Lutheran Church. Below is the civil record of that marriage.

We can also take a look at the church record for this wedding.

A son, Emmanuel, was born to this couple in 1872, but then sometime shortly after that, Henry Rabold died. Their son had been baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg, so it is likely that Henry’s death record is part of the “Koestering Hole”.

Pauline’s second husband was Heinrich Seibel. This Henry was born on February 4, 1849, the son of Jacob and Christiane (Rabold) Seibel. That’s right, Henry Seibel’s mother was a Rabold. The two husbands of Pauline were cousins. I will also add that Henry Seibel was also the sister of my great grandmother, Wilhelmina (Seibel) Schmidt. Here is Henry’s baptism record from Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg.

Heinrich is found in 3 different census records before he gets married. First, we find him in the 1850 census at the age of 2.

The 1860 census shows Heinrich at the age of 11.

Next, we find Henry in the 1870 census.

There is a Perry County marriage record saying that Henry Seibel married Anna Popp in 1873. There is also a record of a Jacob Seibel born to this couple in 1874. However, I do not know what happened to Anna Popp.

Pauline (Hopfer) Rabold married Henry Seibel on April 11th. There is a little debate about which year this marriage took place. The civil record says these two were married in 1875. This record also calls her Juliane Rabold.

The church record for Pauline’s second marriage says it took place in 1874. At least that is what the transcription of this record states. I think the record is unclear on the year.

We find the Seibel couple in the 1880 census for Brazeau Township. There is a Jacob Seibel whose age corresponds with the son born to Anna (Popp) Seibel in 1874. The son born to Pauline’s first marriage, Emmanuel Rabold, is also included in this household..

Our German Family Tree says that 4 children were born to Henry and Pauline before the 1880 census was taken. Only one of those 4, Theodor Seibel, shows up in the above census. The others must have died. In fact, our GFT lists 12 children born to Henry and Pauline, but I think only 3 of them lived to adulthood.

Henry Seibel died in 1888 at the age of 39. I’m amazed at some of the stats involved in this marriage. First, Henry and Pauline were married just 13 or 14 years, yet this couple had 12 children in that time period. There was only one set of twins in this group. Most of those children that died only lived a matter of days or a few months. The last child was born about a month after Henry died, so Pauline was quite pregnant when she was burying her second husband.

I was unable to find Pauline in the 1900 census. I did find her in the 1910 census. One son, Gottlieb, was living with her.

The last census in which we find Pauline was the one taken in 1920. Once again, we see just Pauline and Gottlieb living in the household. I included the household of Emmanuel Rabold, Pauline’s son, and Paul Hopfer, who was her nephew.

Henry Seibel’s death record is found in the Trinity, Altenburg books, so he is probably buried in that church’s cemetery. Pauline’s death record is found in the Grace, Uniontown books, so she is probably buried in that church’s cemetery. Findagrave.com does not list either one of these two people on their site.

Pauline’s story is really an amazing one. It includes so many cases of infant deaths. For a time period from 1875 until 1888, Pauline spent most of her time being pregnant. And then, when those babies were born, so many of them died. It must have been heart-breaking.