I am going to be telling the story of Maria Wilhelmine Gruenwald today. Maria was born on July 22, 1849, although there is a bit of debate about whether she was born on that day in 1848. This transcription of her baptism record from a parish in Germany says she was born in 1848.
All the documents I am able to view from her life in the United States indicate an 1849 year of birth. If Maria was born in 1849, today would be her 175th birthday. Maria was the daughter of Johann Casper and Maria (Kersting) Gruenwald. I do not know when she came to this country, but it looks like she arrived here when she was quite young, and it does not look as if she was here with her parents. In the 1860 census we find a Mary Greenwell living in the John G. Palisch household at the age of 9. This age is not quite right, but I figure it is close enough to say that this is today’s birthday girl.
Maria got married during the next decade, so we will now look at the man who would become her first husband. His name was Friedrich Wilhelm Rodewald, whose birthday is also a matter for discussion, but first, let me tell you that his parents were Peter and Regina (Klemp) Rodewald. Our German Family Tree says that he was born on May 15, 1837, but it appears that date is just found on his Findagrave.com entry. However, this baptism record is found in some church books in Germany, and it says that Friedrich was born on August 16, 1837. This document also gives the correct names for his parents. I think August 16th is a more likely date of birth for Friedrich.
When Friedrich was about 10 years old, his family came to America aboard the ship, Geo Stevens, in 1847. He is called 9 years old on the passenger list below.
Friedrich is found in the 1850 census at the age of 12. His father was a laborer in the Cinque Hommes Township.
Next, we find Friedrich in the 1860 census at the age of 22. He was helping on his father’s farm.
Friedrich served in the Union Army during the Civil War. His miltary record is pictured here.
Friedrich Rodewald married Maria Gruenwald on May 7, 1866 at Peace Lutheran Church in Friedenberg. A Perry County marriage record for this wedding is shown below.
The German Family Tree indicates that 7 children were born to this couple. The first child has no baptism record in the GFT. Then, the next one was baptized at Immanuel, Altenburg, and the remaining ones were baptized at Immanuel, Perryville. In the 1870 census, the Rodewald household had 2 children. For some unknown reason, Friedrich was called Edward in this entry.
This couple must have moved their family to the Bois Brule Township during the next decade. There were 6 children in the 1880 census entry for this family.
Friedrich died in 1881 at the age of 43. He is buried in the Immanuel Lutheran Cemetery in Altenburg. A newer marker has been placed in front of the old one.
Maria Rodewald married again in 1884. Let’s take a look at her second husband. His name was Johann Friedrich Ferdinand Ehrler. At this point, we need to address the spelling of his surname. A note is found in our GFT saying that Ferdinand was an illegitimate son of Christiana Meichsner, who would later marry Christian Gerler. A later marriage record says that he was the son of the late Freidrich Ehrler. Ferdinand would be called Ferdinand Gerler on the passenger list when Christian and Christiana Gerler brought their family to America in 1854. That passenger list shows 9 Gerler children who started on the voyage to America. Then the mother, Christiana, and 2 of the children died at sea. So Christian Gerler arrived in this country as a widower with 7 children, one of them being Ferdinand Ehrler. This tragic story was detailed in a previous post, The Genesis of the Gerler Genealogy. Below is that passenger list from the ship, Kossuth.
A lot happened to this Gerler family during their early years in America. Those details can be read in the previous post. By the time of the 1860 census, we find the 20 year old Ferdinand living in the Ernst Palisch household and called a farm laborer. There is an Anna Ehler in this list who was really Anna Gerler.
Ferdinand Ehrler married Martha Krum (or Crum) on September 9, 1866. This post could get too long, so I am not going to discuss Martha’s early life. The Ehrler/Krum marriage took place at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Altenburg. An image of their church record is seen here.
The German Family Tree says there were 5 children of this couple baptized at Immanuel, Altenburg, but I found no evidence that any of them lived very long. Martha Ehrler died in the early 1880’s. We have no death record for her. Then, on March 29, 1883, Ferdinand Ehrler married Maria Rodewald. This marriage was conducted by a probate judge, who happened to be Charles Weber, an original immigrant and Civil War captain. Here is the Missouri marriage license for this pair.
We can also view this certificate-like marriage license.
Later in 1883, Ferdinand Ehrler became a voting member of Christ Lutheran Church in Jacob, Illinois. Some Christ, Jacob records indicate that this couple had a child in 1866, but that infant died right away. Also, an illegitimate child born to Ferdinand was born in 1890. That child apparently died early as well. When the 1900 census was taken, we find the Ehrler’s living in the Degognia Township in Jackson County, Illinois. One Rodewald stepson lived in their household along with 2 farm laborers.
The 1910 census shows the Ehrler’s with an empty nest. They were still living in the same location.
Ferdinand Ehrler died in 1916 at the age of 76. He is buried in the Christ Lutheran Cemetery in Jacob.
Maria Ehrler lived until 1939, but I was unsuccessful at finding her in any other census entries. Her Missouri death certificate is shown below. It says she died at the age of 89 and was living in the Brazeau Township at the time of her death. The informant was Adolph Weber, who had married one of Maria’s Rodewald daughters.
An obituary for Maria can be read here. It mentions that she had an impressive number of 51 great grandchildren.
Maria is buried in the Trinity Lutheran Cemetery in Altenburg.
This story led me on a wild ride. I wonder how many people can claim to be descendants of those 51 great grandchildren?
Thanks for posting all these great photos of historical documents! There were a lot of twists and turns to this story (and a few more I discovered when investigating several other questions that arose). I have two minor corrections: first, the indexed baptism record you showed for Maria Wilhelmine Gruenwald actually pertains to another woman of a similar name born exactly one year earlier on the other side of Germany (confusing, right?). Second, the child you referenced from the German Family Tree (GFT) as an illegitimate child of Ferdinand Ehrler was actually just an adopted child.
The Maria Gruenwald in the baptism record above was born in Schwelm, Westphalia, while the one you’re looking for was born about 230 miles away near Glauchau, Saxony. Her parents were Friedrich ‘Georg’ and Wilhelmine Friederike Elisabeth Gruenwald. I’m not sure exactly when their family arrived in the US but Maria’s younger sister, Bertha, was purportedly born in Perry County in February 1854. Later that year, Maria’s father was issued a land patent for 40 acres of land about halfway between Uniontown and Frohna (now owned by Terry & Deborah Weinhold at the end of PCR 416). Maria’s father must have died shortly thereafter because her widowed mother married Johann Hermannsdorfer that December. The civil marriage return was signed by Rev. Christoph Heinrich Loeber, but for some reason, it wasn’t recorded in the church register at Concordia in Frohna, where he was then the pastor. The marriage did not last long as the bride died of typhus in August 1855, though her Paitzdorf/Uniontown death record indicates her second husband had already left her by that time. It also indicates she was survived by four children and that her first husband had died on his farm in 1854. Besides Maria and Bertha (wife of August Vogel), there was another sister, Emilie (wife of Christian Hofstetter), and a brother, Carl (husband of Johanna Schmidt). They were each named as heirs in their father’s final estate settlement (V7:p223) on 26 Nov 1858, with Johann Gottlob Fiehler serving as administrator.
The GFT attributes an illegitimate daughter, “Maria Irmer” [Ermer], to Ferdinand Ehrler, citing the Family Register at Christ Lutheran in Jacob. However, the actual entry on p79 of the Family Register calls Maria Ermer an adopted child (“angenommenes Kind”) and says she was born 10 Apr 1890 in Germany (“Deutschland”). It also says she was confirmed 23 Mar 1902 at Point Rest, MO, where the entry adds she was born in Alladorf, Bavaria. As Ferdinand Ehrler had been in the US for decades before this young lady was born, I believe she was actually the daughter of Katharina Sophia Ermer, who arrived at Baltimore, MD on 12 Oct 1897 aboard the S.S. München (the passenger list of which also says she was from Alladorf). Her mother married Johann Schmidt at Salem Lutheran in Farrar less than two weeks after their arrival, then died delivering a son in February 1900, according to her death record at the Cross congregation near Longtown. Maria’s older sister, Katharina Sophia Ermer (named after their mother), was already married to Heinrich Philipp Weibrecht. Though you may not have realized it at the time, you already figured out what became of Maria Ermer in your blogpost, Trek to the Territory. As background, August Rodewald (one of Maria Gruenwald’s sons from her first marriage to Friedrich Rodewald) was married to Maria née Holschen, who died in 1904 soon after the stillbirth of their 5th child. Sometime after August’s 2nd-born son died in 1908, he moved to Quay County, New Mexico. By the 1910 US Census, Maria Ermer was living in August’s household as a domestic servant. She married him on 23 Dec 1914, eventually having two daughters to join her three surviving step-sons. She lived in New Mexico until her death on 30 Mar 1975.