Unraveling the Michael Mystery

The first Görz to arrive in my grandparents’ homeland of Siebenbürgen/Transylvania made the 1,000 mile trek from Gerstheim in Alsace in May, 1770,  but to Grosspold, not Neppendorf as the Lutheran church records there had stated. It was the baby on this journey that ended up being the first Görz, later Gärtz to populate Neppendorf,  my grandfather's home town.

In the last post we found out that my cousin Maria obtained copies of four microfilmed entries from the Gerstheim Evangelical Lutheran Church in Alsace, whence came Johannes Görz my grandpa Josef’s great, great grandfather (my g-g-g-g-grandfather).

19th Century church records from Grosspold. Easy to
read compared to older church records from
Gerstheim in Alsace (see below) 

But these documents were much more challenging to make out than the church family books, such as shown at right, which we saw in Lisi Ebner's Grosspold church, laying out birth (der Geburt), marriage (der Trauung), and death (des Todes) in nice neat columns.

Instead, Gerstheim church documents are divided into separate books labeled:

“Marriages”
“Births/Baptisms” [Recorded together as baptism occurred as soon after birth as possible to preclude immediate baby damnation!]
“Deaths.”

Each life event was worthy of at least a paragraph of indecipherable handwriting -- not just a dated entry, which makes them rich sources of family information--if you can find someone to de-code the writing.

First off, Görz, Goerz, Goerz, and Görz all seem to have been accepted spelling of this family’s surname in the Gerstheim records, and all would be pronounced identically. (I never knew about this varied spelling before my trip to Romania in 2007).

Among the four records cousin Maria had received from the Gerstheim, was the marriage, with all the details written out in longhand. Here’s the most important information, as deciphered from the unreadable German script by Meta, my Rosetta Stone in Germany:

MARRIAGE REGISTER FOR 1753 

In the upper left corner is the identification, separated from the paragraph of information so one can quickly scan the documents to find a name, it states:

1753
Johannes Görz
and
Maria, born Meyerin

On Tuesday, January 30th, after two prior announcements [a marriage had to be announced ahead of time to allow anyone to object] Johannes Görz, the unmarried son of citizen and inhabitant here, married Maria [Actually Anna Maria], daughter of Martin Meyers, now dead, from Eckbolsheim. God bless them.

Signed:
Johanness Görz, the groom
Maria Meyerin, the bride
Michel Görz, the groom’s father 
Bartel Gehl, the bride’s stepfather [her birthfather is dead and her mother remarried]

Witness:
M.Jo. Andreas Wagner P. L. (Pastor loci = pastor of the area)

There’s an important note made on the side:

NOTATION: In May, 1770, this married couple, together with their children, emigrated to Siebenbürgen after they sold their home and grave* and paid all their debts.

Eureka! This information confirms what I had seen in another genealogical reference, which states that "Johann Görtz with 5 Persons left Gerstheim and emigrated to Grosspold" (coincidentally, my grandmother's town, more than a century later,  in Siebenbürgen/Transylvania).

*Note: Meta said that people would buy a grave ahead of time, holding on to it for 15-25 years for any family members. When they leave the area, they can sell the grave plot.

Next came another new piece of family history:

BIRTH AND BAPTISM RECORD 1763

Tuesday, September 27th at 8:30 pm Anna Maria, born Meyerin, bore her husband, Johannes Görz, a small farmer [one with little land], a little boy, who was baptized on Wednesday and named “Johannes.” May God keep this child in his grace into eternal life.

[note: Anna Maria’s father was “Meyer,” but the “in” ending is added for a woman--feminizing it!]

Little Johannes didn’t last long. Already by 1764, he’s listed in the:

DEATH REGISTER, 1764 

Johannes Görz

Tuesday, June 19, [1764] at 9:30 a.m. Johannes Görz, born to small farmers Johannes and Anna Maria, born Meyerin, died and was buried in the Christian manner toward evening. Rest in Peace. Age 8 months, 3 weeks, 2 days.

Johannes and Maria had two other children, whose records I found: Anna Maria Görzin, (again feminine ending, "in" added to end of Görz name)  born 12/14/1758 and Johann Georg Görz, born 4/5/1766). But the one that interested me most was our direct ancestor, called Michael in the Neppendorf records. This entry explains why:

BIRTH AND BAPTISM REGISTER: October 1769:

Tuesday, October 10, 1769 at daybreak, Anna Maria, born Meierin (a phonetic spelling of Meyerin) bore for her husband, Johnannes Goerz, [the spelling changes-but pronounced the same] citizen and small farmer, a little boy, who was brought to baptism on the same day at 2 pm and named Johann[es] Michael. God hold this child in his grace to eternal life.

In both births, notice how the mother “bears [the child] for her husband!” It seems she was given little credit for doing all the work!

Then the witnesses all sign, including the father, the baby’s grandfather, so my g-g-g-g-g grandpa, and little Johannes Michael’s Godmother. [The mother of the child isn't asked to sign!]

With this additional information a lot is cleared up:

The Neppendorf Church record states (remember Gerz, Görz, Goerz, and Gärtz are phonetically identical)

From this Michael Gerz  from Alsace, who married in Neppendorf, originate all the inhabitants of Neppendorf with the family name “Gerz” [later spelled Gärtz].

This "Michael" in the Neppendorf record was actually "Johannes Michael," probably called "Michael" to differentiate him from his father, also "Johannes." (As we've seen again and again, families repeated names, especially for first-borns,  from father to son and mother to daughter generation after generation.)

So...[Johannes] Michael was taken to Grosspold as an eight-month-old baby with his family in May, 1770, but then he married in Neppendorf, and became the patriarch who eventually led to my grandfather, Josef, who also chose to emigrate -- 140 years later--to a much more distant land.

Next week, 9/20, back to Chicago in 1912 -- to see how Josef, Johann Michaels' great grandson, gets a financial  footing as a recent immigrant.  I welcome your comments, but am without internet at present, but will respond after 9/16. Please email me at lindagartz@gmail.com to explain any problems you might have commenting. Thanks so much for your interest. Next 

It Takes a Village

Cousin Maria Gärtz and Linda Gartz  visiting Gerstheim
(May, 2011) a German town and our ancestral home
in Alsace. The original church no longer exists,
but its records have been microfilmed.

So who was the first bold soul who started the bloodline of “Görz/Gerz/Gärtz in Neppendorf (my grandfather, Josef's home town) after  trekking the 1,000 miles from Gerstheim in Alsace to Siebenbürgen/Transylvania, where hundreds of thousands of other ethnic Germans had made their home since the 12th century?

He was an eight-month-old baby!

It took a village to make this discovery, and I’ve been lucky enough to have “villagers” come forth to help when I least expected it.

In the last post I described how my brothers and I received a genealogy of the “Gärtz/Gerz” family when we visited my grandfather’s church in Romania (see Churches and Spilling Secrets.

Evangelical Lutheran Church Neppendorf
interior

The Neppendorf Church's genealogy stated that “Michael Gerz,” born in 1771, emigrated from Gerstheim in Alsace and was the guy from whom all others with the name "Gerz/Gärtz -- even Görz/Goerz" in Neppendorf came from. I wanted to learn more about the family's roots in Alsace.

Enter Monica Ferrier, a specialist in emigrants from Siebenbürgen to North America, (Monica helped me find the ship that brought Josef Gärtz to New York. See Mystery of the Missing Manifest).

In an email exchange with Monica about the Gerz/Gärtz/Görz/Goerz family origins in Gerstheim, she sent me this detail from a reliable genealogical reference source known as W & K (for Wilhelm und Kallbrunner, the authors).

Translated into English, it reads:

WK 326.56 Johann Gortz 5 Persons.  Farmer left Gerstheim in or around 1770 for Grosspold.

Whoa! Something is amiss!

1.  The timing is too close to be coincidental, so some date must be off --either the date of birth of the “first Neppendorfer,” Michael Gerz (listed as 1771), OR the date of leaving Gerstheim (recorded as 1770)

2.  What about the name? The Görtz vs Gerz is a no-brainer -- varied spellings on phonetically-identical names.  But the emigrant in the above record is listed as Johann -- and he went to Grosspold -- my grandmother’s home town, not Neppendorf, where the Gärtz clan settled.

3. What about “Michael” who was supposed to be the “first” Neppendorfer? The Neppendorf church genealogy noted his father's name was “Johann,” and this record shows: "Johann Gortz - 5 people” went to Grosspold. Could that be Johann, his wife and three children? Was Michael one of the children who then later moved to Neppendorf?

Time to look at the original church records from Gerstheim.

Enter cousin Maria Gärtz who grew up in Neppendorf, in the same house in which my grandfather had lived.  Several years back, Maria had hired a researcher to retrieve some family-relevant church documents from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Gerstheim, Alsace. She sent me copies of the four separate print-outs from microfilm files dating back go 1753.

Here’s what one looked like: mostly impossible to read!

Note upper left corner: 1753 Johannes Görz 

Time to get my Rosetta Stone, Meta involved. Thanks to my “village” of helpers, I was able to make sense of this mixed up genealogy, learned details of my ancestors’ lives, and discovered how an 8 month old baby became the first of the Goerz/Gärtz clan in Neppendorf, and my g-g-g grandpa.

It takes a village to find an ancestor!

I welcome your comments in the box below. However, I will not have access to the internet for a couple weeks, but I will reply after 9/16. If you have any trouble commenting (it seems some often do), please email me at lindagartz@gmail.com as to what's going on and I'll try to see if there's a pattern to the trouble. Thanks!

The Road from Alsace

Renate, Neppendorf Lutheran Church
secretary and keeper of genealogical
treasures.

TRAVEL TUESDAY
What's in a Name? 

I had no inkling our  family surname had ever been anything other than Gärtz. But then we visited my grandfather's home town church, the Evangelische Kirche Neppendorf, and met Renate, church secretary and Neppendorfer genealogy and history-maven supreme. She handed us a two-page document chronicling the highlights of Gärtz family history in Neppendorf, researched by an earlier church pastor. For the first time, we learned about our family's German roots in Alsace, and that our Ur-immigrant's name was not Gärtz, but Gerz or Görz.

From Germany to Transylvania

Our family history document stated:

“All the residents of Neppendorf with the family name Gerz [this included Gärtz] originated with Michael Gerz/Görz, (1771-1856) [see correction below]* who came from Gerstheim on the Rhein [River] in Elsass (Alsace) in the French section of Niederrhein (lower Rhine)."

*[8/22/2011 UPDATE: as I researched the family history further, I found out these dates were off. This "Johannes Michael Görtz" was actually born 10/10/1769 and brought to Siebenbürgen by his father in May, 1770. Details to come in a future post.


My guess is that the spelling changed because the names sound so similar in German, they were simply recorded as heard. Eventually, after various iterations, the family became Gärtz.

Gerstheim is about 14 miles (22.4 km) south of Strasbourg.
From there the first Michael Gerz/Görz (1771-1856)
emigrated to Neppendorf in Siebenbürgen/Transylvania

Alsace (Elsaß in German)

We know that Alsace has been fought over by the Germans and French for centuries, so that part “in the French section” stood out. Did Michael leave because of trouble with the French? The French Revolution of 1789 affected Alsace when the French Revolutionary Army of the Rhine was victorious over Prussian/Austrian forces opposed to the new Republic, and tens of thousands (probably mostly ethnic Germans) fled east. Perhaps Michael was among them. We can’t be certain, but the timing makes it a tempting conclusion.

We had also learned that the first Germans to emigrate to Transylvania back in the 12th century came from the area around Luxembourg, and other environs along the Mosel (German spelling) (Moselle) River (a tributary of  the Rhein River), all in the vicinity of my ancestor's hometown of Gerstheim. The original Michael Gerz may have known he’d find people of a similar mindset in Neppendorf. He also had a transportable skill. He was a “Zimmermeister,” or “master carpenter,” like my grandfather, Josef.

Church as History

Not all churches have this level of detail available to family searchers seeking information on their ancestors, but it was a treasure trove for us, and I’d encourage anyone serious about family history to seek out a church your ancestors attended in the old country. No telling what you’ll find.

I breathed a sigh of relief when I learned the approximate date that the original Gärtz/Gerz/Görz had left Germany. By waiting until the 18th century to emigrate, even if under circumstances of war, my ancestors had missed living in Transylvania under the reign of one of the region's cruelest rulers -- the man from whom the Dracula legend most likely originated. Dracul, aka, Vlad the Impaler -- up next Travel Tuesday. Then back to Josef's  Neppendorf church as it spills more of its secrets.

Friday,  2/11, Lisi receives Josef's January 29th letter, including the comments from Eva Beer, the wife of the Neppendorfer who helped him in Cleveland. How would you react if you were Lisi?