Death of Great Grandmother Elisabeth (Knell) Kränzle

One of my "brick walls" was finding the date of death of great grandmother Elisabeth Knell Kränzle.
The biggest obstacle was obvious. I live in the Chicago area and I cannot just hop into the county clerk office or local church in Worms, Germany. What was so frustrating was that I KNEW the results were somewhere online. After all, the Worms records were more completely available online than many many other German cities. I had found the records of her husband (great grandfather), sons, and even a daughter that had died as a child. The family had no information about her. All I knew was what an uncle, now deceased, told me about his paternal grandmother. "She was selfish and mean. She didn't like my mother and didn't even care if her own grandchildren were starving during WWII. We would climb her fenced yard to steal potatoes from her garden." Wow, nice grandmother wasn't she? That explains no information on the family side I guess. Another problem is her surname. Many German records on Ancestry.com for instance may have been transcribed by those whose native language is English. ä translates into ae. Kränzle in the US (and sometimes in Germany ) is Kraenzle. Elisabeth also lived during a time when German writing was transitioning from the old (beautiful but tough to decipher) Gothic script. And what if the particular clerk or priest just had lousy or sloppy handwriting?

I wrote out Kränzle and Kraenzle hurriedly in cursive and looked at it to see how different it may appear if I had no clue her name was Kränzle. Found her! Ancestry thought great grandmother was Elisabethe Krauzee!

2 May 1946 death record of Elisabeth Kränzle nee Knell

great grandmother

Elisabethe Knell Kränzle

b: 28 February 1873 Biblis, Hesse, Germany

d: 2 May 1946 Groß-Bieberau, Hesse, Germany

***click on document to enlarge for easier reading***

Josef Kränzle - A heritage in the Carpentry Trade

My husband is a carpenter. A proud member of the Chicago Regional Council of Carpenters. A Union Carpenter and proud of it. It seems it runs in the family. His father was a cabinet maker as were both his grandfathers, along with his great grandfather and many many other ancestors. He could give you a multitude of reasons why a tradesman would be wise to be part of a union but there is not enough room to list them all here, nor is it the purpose of my blog to recruit new union members. I will however agree with him on all points. He would be especially proud of this document. Hubby never knew his maternal grandfather (he died in WWII) but this document unites them across time.

Josef Kränzle
Eichbachstrasse 13, Worms,
born 19 February 1902
Is registered as owner of a carpenter's workshop on 1 April 1933 in the handwerksrolle (Guild or Union)
registered in Darmstadt on 8 September 1936
Stamped and signed by the official Hessian Handicraft Chamber (Guild or Union) of Darmstadt
posting Josef's photo and signed by him.
The craft card must be handed over to the craftsmen 's office when the operation is stopped.

I wonder if Josef would be surprised and proud to know that 

all of his American grandsons followed him into the carpentry trade. 

**click on document to enlarge for easier reading**

Grandpa Josef's Body Language - Culture, Character or Caring?

What I love about genealogy or more accurately family history is exploring the lives of my ancestors through photos, documentation, stories and histories. Finding out where they lived, the times they lived in, the family that surrounded them, their occupation, and on and on, all gives me a clue as to who they were and I can perhaps see how they were a part of who I am. I begin to feel I know them, understand them, feel connected to them. I like them.

The couple pictured above are my husband's maternal grandparents.  These photos are truly representative of the photos I have of his grandparents. My thoughts are about his grandfather. My husband never knew his grandfather so has no opinion on the kind of man he was. My mother in law spoke lovingly about her mother and all she did and sacrificed for them during World War II in Germany and the following difficult post war years. She spoke little (to me anyway) about her father. Josef Eugen Kränzle died in the fall of Berlin at the end of World War II. My thoughts and feelings about Nazi Germany I'm sure color my opinions, fairly or not, of those who fought for the Axis. However in the dozen or so photos I have of Josef Eugen he is never smiling, even as a young man. He stands straight as a poker and never in any photo does he come in contact with or even touch anyone else. His arms are always behind his back or folded in front of him. Only his wife is seen touching or holding their children. He never stands within touching distance of his wife either. In fact, look at the body language. He noticeably tilts away from his wife and family. Is this merely cultural? The German way? I don't think so. My family is Scandinavian, a group also not noted to be particularly demonstrative with their affection. They however never appeared THIS cold. Is this his character? He was a good looking man, and appears somewhat arrogant. Or did he just not care? Josef married his wife Wilhelmine barely six weeks before their first child was born. Did he feel forced to marry?
I have to investigate his life and times more.  I almost wish I had no photos of him because you know what?

I don't think I like this guy.

Great Uncle Otto Joseph Kränzle

My husband's grandfather had a brother. Otto Joseph Kränzle. This is the only photo I have of him, given to me originally by Aunt Margret. I spoke earlier how Aunt Margret was instrumental when I began my journey into the German beginnings of the Feick Family.  YOU GOTTA LOVE TANTE MARGRET

personal Feick family photo

Never was a word spoken about him by his niece (my mother in law) so I sort of assumed that family had lost contact with him or he had died in the war. I found the record of his birth on Ancestry.com. He was born at the turn of the twentieth century. Seeing him in uniform I wondered if he had served in WWI or WWII?  I found this next photo on the internet. German soldiers posing at the Arc De Triomphe after the fall of France to Germany in 1939. The uniforms appear to be identical, therefore I conclude he served in the German army in WWII.

 German soldiers before Arc du Carrousel 1940.jpg
creative commons use Wikipedia

Then it occurred to me that he was 17 at the start of WWI and possibly draftable age. What kind of luck is that to have been a soldier most of his young life? Or maybe he was really lucky. What are the chances a young man would make it through two world wars? On the losing side no less?  His birth register has a notorized stamp that states he was married in 1937 and died in 1989. Both events were in Welldorf, Groß-Gerau, Hesse, Germany. This is not far from his town of birth in Worms and even closer to where his niece lived after her marriage, Groß-Bieberau. I would think my mother in law would have mentioned she had an uncle and aunt? What was his wife's name? Great Grandfather Otto had written it in the family register but the name was unreadable (to me anyway). Uncle Otto married at 37. Did he have any children? The hunt for Uncle Otto goes on.

my husband's Great Uncle

Otto Joseph Kränzle

b. August 5, 1900 Worms, Rheinland-Palatinate, Germany

d. December 4, 1989 Welldorf, Groß-Gerau, Hesse, Germany

Otto Joseph's birth record

**click on photos to enlarge for easier viewing**

Christmas in Germany 1935

Christmas in Herrnsheim, Worms, Germany. I am dating this photo about 1935 as the little girl with the braids up front, showing off her Christmas gift, is my mother in law, born in 1928. Just behind her is her brother Otto, born in 1930. She is with her parents, her maternal grandmother and relatives on the maternal side of her family. Life appears to be good. In less than a decade the life they knew would be over. In 1945, at the end of WWII, two of these family members would be gone. 65% of the people in Worms would be homeless due to bombing by the Royal Air Force. The family would be cleaning bricks from the rubble of their home to build themselves a place to live. This once prosperous, well fed family, posing in front of the Christmas tree, showing off their gifts, would now be starving. Knowing what we now know of the horrors that Nazi Germany visited on the rest of the world I really don't know how much, if any, sympathy I should feel for them. 

I just don't know.

Marriage of great grandparents Otto Kränzle and Elisabeth Knell

This is a  scan of a certified copy of the marriage of great grandparents Otto Kränzle and Elisabeth Knell.  You have to love the vast amount of family knowledge this one document  gives. Along with the marriage date (it was the 414th marriage in Worms in 1899) it gives birth dates, places and even the names and occupation of the parents. This copy was typed up, certified and stamped in 1951.

***click on document to enlarge for easier viewing***

You gotta love Tante Margret!

My in-laws rarely spoke about their life back in Germany. I had asked a few questions throughout the years but I only got the incomplete names of their parents and the information that they all had died young, one grandfather having been killed in World War II. Unfortunately, as often happens, I did not seriously get into family history until after the passing of my parents and in laws. My hubby's only uncle had also passed and then it occurred to me. Tante Margret, his wife!

My husband thought quite a bit of her and so did I. An interesting, smart, talented, energetic, opinionated, and feisty woman  who could be counted on to spill the beans on everyone, I thought she would be a good choice to interview. I was right. Over our periodic Rummikub and Gin Rummy games (she cheated and we all knew it) I would question her.  She knew some about her late husbands family and offered to loan me a photo album he had kept. Within that album was a family ledger that her husbands maternal grandfather (my husbands great grandfather) had kept. Bingo! I now had the names of some of my mother in laws ancestors and photos of my husband as a child that even he had never seen.

I scanned the ledger, blew it up on my computer screen and with some internet tutorials on old Germanic script I was on my way.  Margret turned out to be a great resource that I went to again and again. She was my bridge back to family in Germany. You gotta love Tante Margret!

Otto's Kränzle's "Famlien Stammbuch" (family ledger) can be viewed by clicking the tab up top of the blog. or just click HERE!