Ahnenforschung / Genealogy in Germany

[Angela Shelley]

Guten Morgen!

I live and work in southern Germany, helping German-Born Adoptees to locate and contact their German Birthmothers and siblings. The majority of my clients were born in Germany between 1945 and 1969 and adopted by US families, and they have spent most of their lives in the USA.

Maybe you know someone who was born in Germany and adopted by a US military couple, who would like to find out more about his or her German birthfamily?

If you have questions concerning genealogical searches in Germany, I would be glad to lead you in the right direction.

Greetings from Germany!

http://www.germanbirthregister.com

[madinmaryland]

1. Interesting, but unfortunately my familiy left Germany in 1738.

Given the language barrier, what is the ease of doing research in Germany for an American?

mim.

[Angela Shelley]

2. Hi Madinmaryland ... about German research

If you are researching after 1876, the records are in the local civil registry offices. No extensive language skills are required in requesting information, but you would have to find someone to read the documents for you (sometimes handwritten and in old script).

Before 1876, the records were kept by the local churches. The data can be found at the archives.

There are an amazing number of genealogical associations in Germany, and most of them have websites and offer assistance; the internet is an amazing tool for genealogy.

I do know a man who is specialized in Bavarian genealogy, he also speaks English.

I would start by googling the family name and the place where they came from.

[madinmaryland]

3. Interestingly, our family name has been researched by others in the

family, and they have published a book which I have yet to purchase. I also understand it is on CD which would be my preference. As it is, we have traced back to an ancestor born in ca. 1609 in "Hofreith, Weiburn, Haag am Haustruck Upper Austria"

They eventually ended up in "Dietfurt, Bavaria Germany" before immigrating to the US in 1738. I understand we may have been caught up in the "Salzburg Expulsions" of the 1730's. Unfortunately time and financial resources are a bit of a hinderance for me.

I have found a lot of source by googling, but would be interested if you might know of any german sites that might be of use to me.

Thanks!

[Up2Late]

5. Have you tried Ancestry.com? Parts of my family came the the U.S. in the 1840's...

...but thanks to the automated search features at Ancestry, I've traced a few lines all the way back to the 1400's in Germany and other to the founding of some of the American Colonies. In just under 2 months, I when from a family tree of fewer than 20 people to now more that 5000.

The only real problem I found there was the occasional sloppy researcher who added data that didn't make sense.

Plus, they have a cool feature that looks for famous people in your line. I really surprised my dad when I told him we were cousins with Felix Mendelson, the German composer.

[madinmaryland]

6. I've been to there web site, but don't they charge for just about everything?

I'm probably going to have to do something like that in the future, but I do have some options open to me. Since I am close enough to DC there are some books (including one on my specific surname) that I know are in the LoC.

[Up2Late]

8. Well, sort of, here's what you do...

The basic site is free, so you start by entering all the family data you already know, that gives you a good start and it helps you organize your data, which is a big help if you already have a bunch of records and research done. And it also give you an easy way to show your friends and family who you are related to without having to pull a bunch of charts out of a dusty book. Plus, if you have a big family, you can have them enter their parts of the tree, so you can share the work.

So as you are doing that, you will probably see the computers finding your records, but the way they get you is, they only letting you see what the computers might have found for you, but you can't be really sure until you sign up for their 15 day free trial.

But if you're really well organized 15 days is enough for a lot of it. But what happens is, you usually find way more records than you ever had a clue about, which sucks you into going past the free 15 day trial.

But if you are really disciplined, and post a bunch of reminders around so you don't forget to quit after 14 days, it really is free. I planned on the full 45 days (15 free and one months at $30.00) because I had almost nothing to start with.

The problem I ran into is that I just kept finding more records, so when i quit I still could have gone another 10 to 15 days to finish the parts I didn't get to, but then again, I'd probably keep finding for after that, and so on and so on...

But once you've decided to stop, it's stays on-line for free and you can still add stuff manually, because there are lots of other places to find record, but it helps to have good solid base. I have a slight advantage over most people, because a lot of my relative made a lot of money back in the first part of the 20th Century, then gave most of it away starting Hospitals and charities, so a lot of them have pages on Wikipedia and conspiracy theory websites. Unfortunately, I never met any of them, because my Dad and Grand-father were too traumatize by the whole escaping Europe ahead of the Nazi Army thing, so I grew up without any cousins, which is why I'm doing this now.

[fudge stripe cookays]

4. Hi Angela--

Thanks for offering this very valuable research!

I think for a lot of Americans of German extraction, our main problem is finding from where and when our Germans came over. It's not always as easy as it sounds from your end!

My Rennscheidts were a good example. We have family info that says they came from Gladbeck and we found them enter Ellis Island in 1903, but where would I start in Gladbeck? They were Catholic, and settled in Illinois, but all the other Rennscheidts I've been able to find in Germany from just before that period were all Protestant. This was very unusual!

And for my Schmidts, I'm still trying to trace back far enough to find out where they came from, and who the first emigrant was. It would have probably been mid to later 1700s. But in that era, the records were not as thorough, so I may not find out. We have family information that this Schmidt may have been a cousin of John Jacob Astor, so he might have come frm Waldorf, but that has not been proven.

[madinmaryland]

Dupe - Delete

[madinmaryland]

7. You might want to check this out.

Many Germans came over through Philadelphia, as did my ancestors in 1738.

Check this site out for passenger ships and their passenger lists arriving in America.

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~pagermanpioneers/index.html

[fudge stripe cookays]

9. Thanks mad!

First, I need to make a trip up to Easton, PA to see if I can figure out who our "Ancestor Zero" was (the first one to come to the states).

The first guy I have now was born in 1783, evidently in Pennsylvania, and died in 1829, so I don't have much information on him. My job is going to be finding out who his father was, and if he was the one we're looking for, or if it was a grandfather. I have no clue.

Mr. 1783 guy's wife was interviewed around the time of the nation's centennial for the local paper (she lived to be 100), and in this article she told about her life, her birth, etc. Only the guy who told me about the article couldn't remember exactly WHEN it was published! Argh.... All I know is that it was in the Ithaca, NY newspaper about 1876 or 1877. I'll have to hit Ithaca before I can go to PA, I guess!

And finding Schmidts in PA in the 1700s is going to be fun anyway.... :eyes:

[CountAllVotes]

10. I've got a bizarre surname I can't find

it is KAJERASKA. That was my great grandmother. She was born in Germany, I know that much as my grandma spoke fluent German. The family said they were from eastern Germany (I'm thinking Prussia perhaps?).

Has anyone ever seen this name at all?

[CountAllVotes]

11. I forgot to add

Miss Kajeraska immigrated to the United States (but to where?) in 1886 according to the census records I found with her in them FYI. Any help at all is greatly appreciated. :)