Pastor Adolph Vogel, the long-time pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg, had a mother-in-law who may be celebrating her birthday today. She is listed in our German Family Tree as being born on February 28, 1854, but the only document on which I found her birthday says she was born on February 27th during that year. This story has some other facts that I find interesting, so, even though it has some other information that I could not locate along with a possible incorrect birthday, I decided to write this post anyway.
Caroline Henjes is today’s birthday girl. As stated above, I figure she was either born on February 27th or February 28th in 1854, making today or yesterday her 170th birthday. I really cannot tell you much more than that about Caroline’s early life. I only can provide a father’s name as Louis Henjes. I was unable to find the name of her mother. Caroline was apparently born in Germany, and a later 1900 census entry says she came to America in 1864. She was in America in 1870, but I was unsuccessful at finding her in that years’ census. Also, that same census entry taken in 1900 says she and her husband were married for 27 years, making their year of marriage, 1873. However, I did find a St. Louis marriage record that says she was married on September 22, 1872.
So, we will now take a look at the man listed on the above marriage record, Friedrich Spilker. Friedrich William Spilker was born on June 13, 1849 in Germany. The above marriage record calls him Friedrich, but most documents call him William. I located a transcription of his baptism record that confirms his date of birth. This document also provides us with the names of his parents, Zacharias and Anna Elisabeth (Engelbrecht) Spilker.
When Friedrich was 9 years old, his Spilker family came to America aboard the ship, E F Gabain in 1858. We see this family on the passenger list for that ship below.
William is found in the 1860 census at the age of 12. His father was a laborer in St. Louis.
A missing piece to this story is the 1870 census entry for William. I have reason to believe he was still living in St. Louis. That means the next census I can display is one that was taken after William Spilker and Caroline Henjes got married. We find this couple in the 1880 census in which it says that William was working in a stone foundry.
It appears that this couple had just one child, a girl named Magdalena, born in 1881. The next census entry we can view is the one taken in 1900. William was a grocer in St. Louis, and their daughter, Magdalena, was 18 years old.
It was in 1904, that Magdalena Spilker married the missionary to Brazil, Rev. Adolph Vogel, who was born and raised in Frohna. His story was written not that long ago in the post, Frohna Boy – Brazilian Missionary – Altenburg Preacher.
Next, we find Pastor Vogel’s in-laws still living in St. Louis in the 1910 census. William was still a grocer. In their household was a young man named Theodore Vogel, who happened to be Pastor Vogel’s younger brother. He was also in the grocery business, probably working with William.
As it turns out, the 1910 census would be the last one in which we find William and Caroline Spilker. In 1914, Rev. Adolph Vogel became the pastor at Trinity, Altenburg. It appears that his in-laws moved to Altenburg at some point after his arrival in Altenburg. Since the Vogel’s had just 3 children, I think it is likely that the Spilker’s were living with Pastor Vogel’s family in the church’s parsonage. Now, we get to one of the more interesting facts in this tale. Both William and Caroline Spilker died in 1919 in Altenburg. Caroline Spilker died on August 13, 1919 at the age of 65; William Spilker died on December 5, 1919 at the age of 70. The death records for these two are found right next to each other in the Trinity, Altenburg books as shown here.
The way I have it figured, Pastor Vogel wrote these records into his congregation’s books. Death records in those books in those days included the number of years, months, and days a person lived. Caroline’s age, 65 years, 5 months, and 16 days would determine a date of birth for Caroline as February 28, 1854. However, if you look at Caroline’s death certificate below, it says she was born on February 27, 1854. Did Pastor Vogel miscalculate his mother-in-law’s age on her death record? Here’s where it gets even more confusing. Her age is given as 65 years, 6 months, and 25 days on her death certificate. That age would not correspond with Caroline’s February birthday. I think the person filling out this form, probably Dr. Theodore Estel, made a mistake. Pastor Vogel was the informant on this document, and I figure that he would have known his mother-in-law’s birthday. Perhaps he just miscalculated when writing the death record in the church’s books.
William Spilker’s death certificate is pictured here. There seems to be no dispute about his birthday, although his given age on this form is somewhat smudged, possibly indicating someone had made a mistake and corrected it.
If William and Caroline would have been buried in the Trinity Lutheran Cemetery, they would have at least been buried next to each other, because they were consecutive deaths in the church records. However, this couple likely had made burial arrangements in St. Louis prior to moving to Altenburg, so they are buried together in the New Bethlehem Cemetery in St. Louis.
The story of Pastor Vogel’s in-laws is one that takes place mostly in St. Louis. Their only records found in our German Family Tree are their death records. Most of my blog posts include church records found toward the beginning of the characters’ lives, like baptism and marriage records. This post is different. The only 2 records shown were written down in the church books at the end of their lives.
Caroline’s roots seem to have disappeared from memory but there are several items which still offer clues to unraveling that mystery. In addition to her death certificate, which identified her birthdate as 27 Feb 1854 and her father as Louis Henges, there was also the image of her 1872 St. Louis civil marriage record to Friedrich Wilhelm Spilker (4th entry on right), which gave a longer form of her name, “Caroline Dorothea Louise Henges”, and indicates they were married Sept 22nd by “Rev. A. Claus”.
The St. Louis Genealogical Society’s Clergy Directory indicates “G. A. Claus” was pastor of Bethlehem Lutheran from 1855-1874. Sure enough, the Spilker/Henges marriage is listed in a transcription of the Bethlehem Lutheran marriage register. While the entry provides the names of their two witnesses, Georg Koch & Friederike Spilker, it unfortunately doesn’t give any background information about birthplace or parents’ names.
However, when I searched FamilySearch and Ancestry.com for a baptism record around 1854, I found an index record for a “Dorothee Wilhelmine Louise Wilhelmine Henjes”, daughter of “Ludwig Henjes” & “Caroline Louise Hesshrmann”, in the parish of Ärzen, Kingdom of Hanover. While the birthdate was slightly off from the expected value (21st Feb instead 27th Feb), I’ve previously seen “1” and “7” be mistaken for one another in index records. The fact that “Wilhelmine” was listed twice as a given name and the non-sensical spelling of the mother’s maiden name also made me think there was a good chance the index record might have contained additional errors.
When I viewed an image of the actual Ärzen baptism record on Archion.de, my suspicions were confirmed. It gives her name as “Dorothee Caroline Louise Wilhelmine Henjes” and says she was born on the “sieben u. zwanzigsten Februar” (twenty-seventh of February) to stonemason Ludwig Henjes and his wife, Sophie Caroline Louise née Hussmann. The fact that it gave the word form of the date instead of the numerals makes it all the more perplexing as to why the date was indexed incorrectly.
According to the obituary & civil death record for Caroline’s father, Ludwig (a.k.a. “Louis”), he was living with her & her husband at 4301 Blair Ave. in St. Louis, when he died in 1903. That’s the same address where the Spilkers were enumerated for the 1900 & 1910 US censuses. His death record also indicated he was a stone mason, just like Caroline’s baptism record above. His obituary indicates that he had stepped out to use the outhouse and his body was discovered when he hadn’t returned around an hour later. He was initially buried at Old Bethlehem Cemetery, though when it was closed in the 1960s, his body may have been among those moved to New Bethlehem, where his daughter and son-in-law had been buried.