Emigrants Setting Sail: Questions and Answers

City and Port of Antwerp Belgium

Steamship Leaves Le Havre (ebay postcard)

Ever since I wrote blog posts about the trip to America from the Port of Le Havre in France, I have gotten related questions. One reader asked how long it would have taken his ancestor to reach New York after setting sail from New York. Another reader wondered how an immigrant ancestor might have gotten from Kreis Saarburg to the port at Antwerp. There was a question about what conditions German immigrants encountered if they arrived in New York before the immigrant station at Castle Garden was created. 

Why not answer some of those questions from letters that immigrants sent back home to family and friends. I have chosen to take excerpts from a few of those letters which touched on the questions I had received. Who better qualified to write about their experiences than the individuals who made the trip to the New World. 

Two of the letter writers traveled by sailing ship in the 1840s when Antwerp was the most convenient port of departure for emigrants from Kreis Saarburg and the Rhineland.   Many other letters from this time period must have been similar.

Letter 1 

Excerpts from the first letter were written by Michael Rodenkirch, a German emigrant and one of the first settlers in the Village of St. Michaels, Wisconsin. The unincorporated community of Saint Michaels is located partially in the town of Kewaskum in Washington County Wisconsin. You can read the full text at: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~konrath/emigrantletter.html 

"State of West Konsin 
December 26, 1846 

Dearest Mother, All Sisters and Brothers, Brothers and Sisters-in-law, relatives and Acquantances: 
Sincere Greetings to you All! 

Thanks to God we are all well and hope the same of you. I do hope that by now you have received my letter of Oct. 22, telling you where we have finally landed. Should you have received this letter, I hope that news from you is on the way. I will tell you again briefly about our trip... 

Emigrants to America generally pay half fare from Cochem to Coblenz, 10 silver Groschen; from Coblenz to Coeln, 20 silver Groschen; from Coeln to Antwerp by railway, two dollars per adult person, older than 10 or 12 years, children below that age pay half fare, and babies under one year travel free. From Antwerp to New York adults pay 80 francs while minors pay 70 francs... 

Should you plan to undertake the trip to America, make sure that you are on time at the depot or dock, as neither ships nor train will wait a minute for you - they are gone like a shot. Whoever makes the trip will be impressed with the omnipotence of God. It is still impossible for me to describe our voyage adequately. We were enroute 75 days. Back home we always thought that England was far, far away, but after five days of travel we were nearing the English coast and after 10 days we were alongside Scotland and Ireland; after that we were soon out in the open sea. This shows the speed of our ship. On the ocean we were for 55 days. High waves often dashed our ship. The slant of our ship often made it impossible to stand without hanging onto something. At times gusts of wind almost threatened to overturn our ship, but like a floating egg, it would always right itself. The last ten days we sailed along the American shores and then entered the world famous, beautiful New York harbor. We remained in New York for a day... 

For your sea voyage make your own "zweiback" and take along sufficient oatmeal and wheat flour. If you can obtain potatoes, use them for your vegetable. Also carry along ham, butter, brandy, spices, coffee, sugar, and whatever else you might like to eat on your trip across the sea, for on the sea your money will not buy you anything. If you plan on traveling through the woods here, bring several pairs of boots and shoes and durable clothes; also bring waffle iron and cake pan... 

From New York you should acquire passage on steamship to Albany. From Albany to Buffalo you may travel by "Ralter," perhaps ferry or railway. From Buffalo you travel again by steamboat to "Milwaukee in West Konsin." Trip from New York to Albany costs 4 shilling, or 20 silver groschen; from Albany to Buffalo costs 5-6 dollars, from Buffalo to Wisconsin by steamship costs 6 dollars. At each place "veradkirdiert," [register or be recorded?] anew and do not trust every German thieving trickster approaching you as exchange agent; these people are usually bad characters... 

We had made arrangement for passage to Chicago, however, we went ashore at Milwaukee on Lake Michigan, 80 miles above Chicago. We live now 40 miles northeast of Milwaukee in Town 12, Range 19, Section 13. We are all well satisfied here, have good land, and none molest us... 

The trip across the ocean took 52 days; despite storm and high waves, thanks to God, all went well. The trip through America to Milwaukee took us 18 days. Whoever makes this trip had better take good care of his money. With us there were people from Brohl on the Maihfeld who were robbed of 2,200 dollars in Albany. Their plight was great as they could only travel a short distance... 

I greet you a hundred thousand times and remain. 

Your sincere brother, 
Michael Rodenkirch" 

Letter 2 

This letter was transcribed verbatim by historian Josef Mergen, a dedicated researcher on emigration from the Rhineland to the United States. The source is the book 
 Copies are in German and are available on interlibrary loan at public and university libraries.  

Milwaukee, Wisconsin 1846 
Dear Cousins, Brothers, Sister-in-law! 

Because we are so far from one another, so that we may no longer talk with one another, I have decided to report my words to you in written fashion and to describe my journey, my present situation, the land, the crops, how house and homes are built, to the best of my ability. 

I will tell you about the pleasant, as well as the unpleasant, exactly as I have experienced them. 

We departed from Antwerp on the 21st of May (1846) and went as far as Vlissignen (Netherlands). Here we anchored and made a brief pause. From this point on, we could no longer anchor due to the depth of water....dear God, what an incredible amount of water! Here one sees nothing but sky and water, it appears as if the entire world were water. 

On the 30th of May, we had a beautiful day. We caught a shark and I had ever so much fun. But my fun was soon found an end. From the 1st to the 4th of June, we had storms. The ship began to roll; all chests had to be tightly bound; pots rolled from one corner to another, beds fell together, one couldn't walk or even stand. The incredble waves threatened to overwhelm us. Then we were all sick. This lasted until the 14th of June. Then we were again revived. Your brother Joseph was perfectly healthy. He had to take care of us and cook. 

On the 1st of July (the 40th day of our ocean journey) we first saw the American land. The joy that I felt then, I will never be able to describe to you. At about 9:00, a ship came to get us and by 12:00, we were in New York. As I left the ship, I wanted to walk on land. I felt as if the earth moved, I mean America, swung (he still had sea legs) 

Now we have passed one station of suffering (by that, I mean the difficulties of the ocean journey), which I will never be able to fully describe to you. 

We were now in New York, a big, beautiful city which encompasses more industry than did all of Prussia.

On the 21st (of July) we left New York by steamship. On the 3rd (of August) we arrived in Albany. There we got into a train and rode until Buffalo. There we waited one day. we again left via steamboat and journeyed over Lake Erie and Lake Michigan until we arrived in Milwaukee. On the 16th we arrived in Milwaukee. We had achieved our goal...

Johann Schroeder, Milwaukee
Territorium Wisconsin, N.A

There are three reasons that I chose the last two letters.  1) The emigrant in each case was young and single, 2) the voyages to America took place by steamship rather than sailing ship, and 3) The true ocean travel of each emigrant's journey was out of the port at Le Havre, but Le Havre was reached by an unusual circuitous route.  In one case, the New York Passenger List for the ship probably stated that all passengers left Europe from the port of Hamburg but did not mention a stop in Le Havre.  Did this steamship pick up additional passengers there? If so, were those people listed as starting their journey in Hamburg?

Letter 3

Barbara Klinger was a 20 year old country girl who wanted to go to New York and find work as a domestic servant.  In letters exchanged between Barbara's father in Wuerttenberg and his son-in-law, Franz Schano who lived in New York and was married to Barbara's sister, the young woman's trip was carefully arranged.  Packing details and travel options were discussed in an exchange of letters.  In one of the letters, Franz Schano told Barbara's father that there was a choice of a ticket - with food provided or a passenger bringing food themselves.  He did not know which would be more economical and left it up to Barbara's father to decide.  It was decided that Barbara would bring her own food.  Barbara's sister instructed her to fill two potato sacks with enough food for a "simmen" which was about the measurement of two bushel baskets. The brother-in-law in New York arranged for Barbara to get her passage and sent her a ticket document and 15 gulden which would pay for extra fees she would encounter as she traveled.  She was to give the ticket document to the travel agent in Mannheim.  In return she would receive three travel tickets, the first was for the steamship from Mannheim to Rotterdam, the second from Rotterdam to Havre, and the third from Havre to New York.  As complicated as the land travel was, Barbara had no difficulties.  Safely in the home of her sister, she wrote the following: 

New York
July 16, 1851

Dear parents and brothers and sisters,

I want to let you know what kind of journey I had to New York.  On the 18th we boarded a sailing ship, from Havre to New York.  I was at sea for 26 days on the ship, there were 725 persons with the sailors and we only had a storm once.  But it was nothing compared to the voyage Mari had, the ship had 3 decks and one cellar completely under water, the people slept in the 2 lower ones and in the two higher ones there are two kitchens, two toilets, two stalls, and another stall for cows, there was one cow and in the back there is another small room, where the mates and the 3 cooks who cook for the sailors they were blacks, one had his wife along, she was a black too, and the ship was named Wilhelm Tell, it is one of the biggest ships that go between Havre and New Jork and even when the wind was strong it can't throw it around like the little one, it also rolls more, such a big ship on the ocean is like a nutshell swimming in the lake at Korb.

Letter 4

Wilhelm Buerkert was a teenager of 16 when he left his apprenticeship in his home village of Waldenburg in Wuerttemberg.   Both of his parents were dead but his father had been relatively well to do.  Now, with only a stepmother and a guardian, he seems to have been at odds with his stepfamily and he was permitted to emigrate to America.  It seems that the money for a ticket and some additional cash were given to him.  His youth comes across clearly in his rambling first letter home.  The excerpts I chose are a very small part of what he wrote.

New York, 
IX 29, 1875
Dear mother, grandparents, sisters, and honorable guardian,
Praise be to the Lord, etc., that is the first hymn that we can strike up, for you can count yourself lucky to have arrived here safely, especially when you hear that at the same time our ship left, on the same water, no less than 3 ships sank from running into one another in the fog.

So, let us turn our attention to the journey. In Heilbronn there was a one-hour stop, then straight on to Heidelberg. Here there was time to see the main sights. Then on, after refreshing yourself, to Frankfurt. Here after getting all your things at Mr. Treschof's, the emigration agent's, which cost a lot of money as well, you were taken to an inn, "zum goldenen Adler" (Golden Eagle). Oh, to hell with that food and those beds, bedbug covers, not featherbeds, just a miserable mattress with torn sheets, and awfully expensive...

In Frankfurt we left on a Sunday at 8 o'clock in the morning and arrived the next morning at 3 o'clock at a station where we had to spend the night sleeping on the benches in the waiting room, until the train left at 6 o'clock the next morning...

We were in Hamburg in 2 hours time. We were brought by coach to our inn to the Gasthaus zum suddeutschen Hof (South German Guesthouse). Here we spent 2 nights...

On Wednesday the 15th of September...we got on a nice small steamship. In two hours we were out of the Elbe...we were met by a ship like you can't imagine, with 2 big smokestacks...The next morning everyone was already seasick. For on the open sea the ship rolls terribly. It goes as fast as an express train...

On the 17th of September we arrived in the French city of Havre. In this port there was a 24-hour stop. We were allowed to get off. We looked around this really lovely, large and luxurious city. On Sept. 18th at 10 o'clock in the morning, we departed. But thenout on the Atlantic Ocean the ship really started to roll and the waves went clear up to the helmsman...

The last few days we had such a storm that you couldn't stand up or lie down. The trunks we had with us were tied down. The last night we had fog. On the 27th of Sept., or on the Monday, you couldn't see anything at all for 2 nights, the ship went very slowly. The steamwhistles were blown a lot. All at once at 9 o'clock they called out excitedly, Hurray, the pilot. He was coming toward us in a small boat. He had to guide us through the reefs off shore and in through the straits. It was a chief helmsman--almost like a ship's officer. At 4 in the morning we heard land-land. And that is a sight, oh splendid. We were in Stett-Neuland (Staten Island). Here the anchor was cast...

(Wilhelm Buerkert did not sign his name to the letter but ended it with "Your thankful son, grandson and brother.--Greetings, too, to Gustav

These last two letters were taken from a 1991 book entitled "News from the Land of Freedom: German Immigrants Write Home" edited by Walter D. Kamphoefner, Wolfgang Helbich, and Ulrike Sommer and translated by Susan Carter Vogel.

To the best of my knowledge, none of my immigrant ancestors wrote home, but I still dream that someday, somewhere in a German archive or attic, there will be letters like these to people still living in the villages of Kreis Saarburg, and I will find them!

Sources:
"News from the Land of Freedom: German Immigrants Write Home" edited by Walter D. Kamphoefner, Wolfgang Helbich, and Ulrike Sommer and translated by Susan Carter Vogel, Cornell University Press, 1988, 1991

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~konrath/emigrantletter.htm

Mergen, Josef, "Die Amerika-Auswanderung aus dem Kreise Saarburg" (The American Emigration from the County of Saarburg).  Part of the book, Die Amerika-Auswanderung aus dem Regierungsbezirk Trier / 2. Die Amerika-Auswanderung aus dem Kreise Saarburg.  Metzdorf, 1952

Travel Tuesday - The Date an Ancestor Left for America

Sailing the English Channel near Le Havre

This blog post is different from most.  Rather than writing about the  social customs of the people of the Saarburg Kreis, I switched gears for this one time.

My average blog post has about 25 hits shortly after it is posted.  These probably come from followers who are interested in all aspects of German culture. Then, depending on the subject of the piece, numbers increase as a subject is searched and one of my posts is thought to have potential to give the information needed.

Until last year, my posts about the customs of Christmas in the Rhineland area, especially about Knecht Ruprecht, the not-so-kind companion of St. Nikolaus, were the most popular. As you can tell from that last sentence, I do check my statistics which are calculated for me each day by Blogger.

Last year a new blog post began to receive a surprising number of hits. I had written a piece about the Port of Le Havre, describing the struggle to reach the port and then find a place to wait for the ship as it arrived, usually with merchandise from the last country visited.  Often the hold of the ship was refitted for a new cargo - the emigrants. Almost every day, that particular post about Le Havre had more views than any other post and so it continues. In addition, the comments were more numerous than any other post I had ever written.  Do not let any genealogical expert tell you that Hamburg and Bremen are the only important ports for German immigrants.  Le Havre saw an enormous amount of Bavarian, Swiss, Austrian and Rhineland immigration.

One of those comments left on the Le Havre blog post asked if I had any information about the amount of time it took for a ship to reach New York after it left Le Havre. It was the same question that had bothered me many years ago - before the days of the Internet search and all the data sources on Ancestry, Roots Web, etc. I set out for the Wisconsin Historical Society Library to try to find additional information on the ocean voyages that brought some of my ancestors to the port of New York. I knew the names of two of the ships - the Rattler and the Albion - their dates of arrival, and their ports of departure. What I didn’t know was the length of the voyage and the registry of the ship. That information was not required on the form for ship arrivals which each ship captain submitted.  Thus, it is also not on the microfilms of “Registers of Vessels Arriving at the Port of New York from Foreign Ports.”

My German Bohemian ancestors’ ship, the Albion arrived in New York in August 1856 (with Elizabeth and Anton Luniak and their children).  On May 9, 1861 (with Magdalena and Johann Meier and their children aboard) the ship Rattler reached New York's port. The Luniaks were arriving from Liverpool and the Meiers from Le Havre. There was no clue to tell me when either of those ships had set sail.

I tried another route but none of the published books about sailing ships, some with pictures and good descriptions of immigrant ships, listed the ships on which my ancestors sailed.  If a wonderful library like the Wisconsin Historical Society's library, holding records and books from every state east of the Mississippi, could not help me; there was nowhere else to turn without a trip to Europe, or so I had begun to think.

Then I took the step I should have begun with.  I asked the reference librarian if he could point me in the right direction. "Did they arrive after September 18, 1851?" he asked. When I said yes, he told me to look at the front page of the New York Times newspaper.  I know I gave him a confused stare! To my surprise, I learned that ships arriving at the port of New York were always reported there, giving details such as country of registry, the owning company or individual, the port of departure, the length of the journey and the type of cargo. In addition, the listing sometimes gave other details about the voyage. Here are the entries I found for my two ships:

May 9, 1861 - “Ship Rattler, Almy (the ship’s captain), Havre, 32 ds. (length of trip) with mdse. and 197 passengers to Wm. Whitlock Jr. (the ship’s owner)” This means that they left on the 8th of April in 1861. (Easter was on March 31 so they celebrated the important Catholic Feast Day just one week before they started out for Le Havre).

August 9, 1856 - “Ship Albion, Williams (the ship’s captain), Liverpool, July 11, (date of departure) with mdse., and 621 passengers to Tapscott and Co (the ship’s owner).  July 14 (three days out of port) James H. Simpson, of Newport R.I., fell from the mizzen topgallantyard and was drowned.”  I assume he was a crew member but the newspaper doesn't say so.

By looking at information on other ships arriving from European ports the same day, I learned more about the crossing. I could surmise that the Rattler probably was rocked by storms like other ships in that day’s list since several ships were "in ballast" when they arrived.  This meant that heavy material had to be placed in the ship’s hold to enhance stability. An entry for another ship arriving from LeHavre the same day noted that it was in ballast and that the ship “has had heavy westerly gales for the last 10 ds.” My heart ached for my great great grandmother who was in the early months of her pregnancy.

So if you’ve found your ancestor’s ship in the New York passenger lists, or in Germans to America, and the date is after 18 September 1851, I recommend checking the New York Times Newspaper on microfilm or online to get “the rest of the story.”  The online heading you are looking for is under the "ARCHIVES" tab of the newspaper and the subject you want is "marine intelligence (month, day, year)

Once I had information on the owners, I wanted more information about the shipping companies.  I did a web search.  I learned that the owner of the Albion was the Tapscott Company.  They were described as “systematic villains,” a fact so well know that this was immortalized in a sea shanty, a song sung when the ship was being “warped” out of harbor at the beginning of a voyage. (To find out more about the shipping lines, such as Tapscott, there is good information at "The Ship's List."  Even if your first search is not successful, new information and lists are being added to "The Ship's List" regularly as I found just now when I went back to check for this post.  The passenger list of the ship Rattler, which carried my ancestors, has now been transcribed.  If your ancestor arrived at the Port of New York before September 1851, this site may help you.

A word of warning.  If you are an e-mail subscriber to the free New York Times Newspaper headlines, be aware that your 10 full articles per month are counted whether you click on their e-mail headlines of the current day in 2014 or find a New York Times article in 1861 while doing an on-line search.  I just lost all my free articles for the month of January by checking accuracy of New York Times articles used in this article in the NY Times Archive on line.  Evidently even a headline from May of 1861 meets their restriction criteria.

According to the last comment received on this post, Newspapers.com, a for-profit website, has records for the New York Times going back at least as far as 1832.  That is where a reader of this post found the arrival of her ancestors' ship.  I thank her very much for taking the time to share the information.

  

Christmas Markets of Today and Yesterday

Christmas Market in Stadt Saarburg

This December I was at a loss for an idea that reflected the Christmas Season in Kreis Saarburg.  After eight years of posts about Christmas customs in the Rhineland area of Germany, there wasn't much I hadn't tried to research.  Then I found an article that was brief yet concise, full of interesting details I had not known.  Thus the information that follows is taken from that source.  

In the spirit of the season of the Christmas market, I am including photos from markets which are near to Kreis Saarburg, even though one market is in Strasbourg, France.  After all, a Prussian general once referred to our ancestors as "painted French."  And at the time the Christmas markets developed, German and French citizenship could change from week to week.

The History of the Christmas Market

The centuries-old tradition of the Christmastime markets were joyful occasions for weary villagers and gave them something to look forward to on the long winter nights.  The first Christmas markets were held at a time when regular markets took place throughout the year. The first Christmas markets were little more than winter markets that lasted a couple of days. Instead of the colorful booths that are a part of Christmas markets in our time, traders in some cities just laid their goods out as best they could, sometimes even in the street.  

I found it surprising that as early as the 17th century, gift-buying at Christmas Markets had already become a usual thing.  There is something about the Christmas spirit that opens the heart and also, at times, the purse.

The usual place for the Christmas Market to be found was surrounding a city's church.  In larger cities, the main church was chosen in order to attract the most buyers when residents arrived for the services.  According to the writer of the article I am using as a basis for my post, a priest in Nürnberg in 1616 complained that he did not hold the afternoon service on Christmas Eve because no one attended.  They were waylaid by the Christmas market.

The same article says, "It is likely that the Christmas markets drew more visitors when religious reformer Martin Luther instituted new customs for Christmas.  Before Luther, the exchanging of presents took place on the saint days of St. Nicholas, December 6, or of St. Martin, on November 11.  It was Luther who suggested that children receive presents from “the Christ Child,” hence the name “Christkindlsmarkt” (Market of the Christ Child), a popular name for many Christmas markets especially in the south of Germany."

In the past, only local tradesmen were allowed to sell their wares at the city’s market, which led to the distinctive regional character of today’s markets.  Because in the past each region had its own customs and needs, Christmas markets have continued to focus their wares in that direction, giving each market a distinctive air.  They specialize in "local delicacies and traditional products." 

Beyond the commercial aspect of the markets, they have another function: a cheerful, high-spirited place for local residents to meet as well as a place to sell their homemade crafts, decorations, and ornaments.

The items in the Christmas market in each city are not all unique, or course. There are traditional German handicrafts that can be found at nearly every Christmas market.  There have to be nutcrackers, wooden figurines, straw stars and smokers as well as the iconic cookie tins, glass balls, toys, and tin tree ornaments.

Since most of us will not have a chance to tour these Christmas markets, here are some photos taken at regional Christmas markets by the photographers listed below:

Christskindl Market in Stadt Saarburg

At the Saarbrucken Christmas Market

'

Saarbrucken Market

Strasbourg's Famous Christmas Market

Strasbourg Market at night

Market is next to Strasbourg Cathedral still!

Strasbourg Market classic items

Delicious Bakery in Strasbourg

Trier Christmas Market closeup

Trier Christmas Market in the market square

The Joy of the Trier Christmas Market 

Merry Christmas Wishes from the Singleminded Offshoot!

Source: 

http://www.germany-christmas-market.org.uk/christmas_in_germany.htm

Pictures: 

Trier Volksfreund Täglischer Newsletter 

Josiane of Lorraine

City of Trier Webpage

Giving Thanks and Celebrating Autumn in Kreis Saarburg

Irsch, St. Gervasius and Protasius Catholic Church in Autumn 2004

Irsch, St. Gervasius and Protasius Catholic Church in Autumn 2010

Potatoes, squash, apples, grapes

Halloween celebrated, we look forward to Thanksgiving in the United States, and Christmas is already here in if you believe shop windows, TV ads, and some radio and television stations.

In Kreis Saarburg, there are also celebrations but they seem to meld better into the autumn of the year.  Here are some that originated with our ancestors and are still a part of the excitement of early and late fall.

Giving Thanks For the Harvest 

Autumn customs in one of my Heimat villages come to mind at this time of year as the leaves fall and pumpkins, squash, root vegetables and winter apples appear in our American markets.  We use many of them for the feast of Thanksgiving, decking our tables with cooked or baked varieties.

An article I read in a German language book explained the thanksgiving of German farming communities of the past.  They thanked God for the harvest, whether good or bad, by sharing their crops with God who gave them.  This has been carried on for centuries, even to the present day.  God's table in the Church, is decorated with the produce of the current year.  There may be squash, cabbages and other large vegetables, but there are often dry seeds of all kinds: flax, rye, wheat, oats, barley, legumes of all kinds.  All are harvested from German soil, traditionally from the soil that surrounds the village where the church is located.

I had seen this kind of decoration on autumn trips to my ancestors' village church in Irsch, enchanted with the kind of workmanship I generally associate with the Rose Bowl parade.  The closeup pictures above and the one below show the elegance of the most commonplace of decorating materials and the time given to produce this kind of thanksgiving to God from the fruit of the land.


Giving Thanks for St. Martin, Happy Children, and Rabimmel, Rabammel, Rabumm

Over the past several years, I have explained many of the traditions associated with St. Martin's Day (also known as Martini) as well as the importance of his November Feast.  If you click on the St. Martin's Day label at the right of the post page, the many activities associated with the day as well as the history and social customs are described, including carrying hollowed out gourds or pumpkins lit with candles.  

The custom of this celebration is still alive and well in the villages around Saarburg and in that city itself.  Most of 2013's customs are much the same as in the 1800s, although the lanterns carried by the children as they parade in the street are made of fireproof material and lighted with safe candles of one kind or another.  The Irsch website page just recently announced the village's 2013 lantern parade:

"The St. Martin's traditional lantern procession in Irsch will take place on Saturday, 09.11.2013 (November 9, 2013).  The assembly place is the parish church of Irsch at 5:30 p.m.  It will begin with prayer and a short homily about the holy St. Martin. Then the lantern parade (about 6 p.m.) led by St. Martin (on horseback) will parade to the Irsch multi-purpose hall. Once there, the great St. Martin's bonfire will be ignited and the Martin Brezeln (St. Martin pretzels) will be given to the children.

The lantern parade will be accompanied by the music society of Irsch as well as the torch bearers of the volunteer fire department, who also provide for the safety of traffic management and the burning of the St. Martin fire.  All children and adults are welcome  Hot drinks and snacks will be sold. The net proceeds as in prior years will again be used for the cost of transporting Christmas packages to help the needy in such countries as Romania."

In the event that you would like to see a typical St. Martin's parade, you can watch the video called "Rabimmel, Rabammel, Rabumm." The German words are given as subtitles on each screen of this very traditional children's song.  Unfortunately the translation in English below does not rhyme.

I go with my lantern

And my lantern goes with me

Up above the stars are shining,

Down here we're shining.

The rooster, he crows; the cat meows.

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

The rooster, he crows; the cat meows.

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

I go with my lantern

And my lantern goes with me.

Up above the stars are shining,

Down here we're shining.

St. Martin, he marches on.

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

St. Martin, he marches on.

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

I go with my lantern

And my lantern goes with me.

Up above the stars are shining,

Down here we're shining.

Lantern light, don't go out on me!

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

Lantern light, don't go out on me!

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm

I go with my lantern

And my lantern goes with me.

Up above the stars are shining,

Down here we're shining.

A sea of light in honor of Martin.

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

A sea of light in honor of Martin.

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

I go with my lantern

And my lantern goes with me.

Up above the stars are shining,

Down here we're shining.

My light is out,

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

We're going home,

Rabimmel, rabammel, rabumm.

Giving Thanks for a Blog Recovered

Due to circumstances I do not understand, for two weeks I lost access to this blog.  When I tried to make a correction in one of the previous posts, Blogger refused to let me do it.  After a great deal of wasted time and several curt notes to Blogger, all ignored, I had the good luck to bumble back into possession.  I was so thankful.  But it made me realize that, had I not had that bumbling good luck, I could never have posted to this blog again.  It would have been necessary for me to start an entirely new blog. So if you are a regular reader, you would probably have concluded that I got tired of blogging and quit without a goodbye.  

There are two ways to find out if I have been forced to start a blog with a new name: Register as a follower of my blog, and I will be able to notify you about where to find my new posts.  Or you can use my e-mail address (which you can find by reading my profile) to e-mail me.  

In the meantime, I promise to try to keep "Village Life in Kreis Saarburg" posts of the future right here.

Happy Thanksgiving to all


Sources:
Die Martinsumzug, http://www.irsch-saar.de/irschnew.htm

English for Rabimmel, Rabammel, Rabumm, http://german.about.com/library/blmus_laternegeh.htm

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Looking Inside the Ranzen Satchel

Antique Ranzen on ebay

Child's School Slate

I have begun my vacation. You will understand when I say that I was not planning to post to my blog. But shortly after my last post, "Schultüte und Ranzen Go to School," Ewald Meyer, who grew up in the little village of Beurig, gave me some exceptional details about his own Ranzen after he read the blog post. I am very glad to have this new information about his school days when writing paper in a school satchel was rare.

Rather than add this content to the September 6, 2013 blog post, which would make it unlikely that people who have already read that post would read it again, a short new post seemed a better idea. Therefore, this month's post is mostly written by Ewald Meyer with a few additional details which were left out the last time I posted.

Here is what Herr Meyer says he carried to school in his satchel on the first day of his first year in school - my translation. "When I first went to school in Beurig in 1937, the Schultüten (see last post) were still unknown here. They existed in Beurig only since about 1950."

He goes on to say that in his satchel were a slate with a wiping cloth, a wooden pen box with pen for the first written exercises, and a small box with a wet sponge to clean the blackboard. There was a primer in the satchel for learning to read. The slate's front panel had double lines which were to help the youngest students write the letters of the alphabet by giving them ample space. On the back side there were squares for mathematical problems.

As I had surmised in the last post, the Schultüte was not known in the villages of Kreis Saarburg until the 1950s. In the local history book, "Beurig Lese- und Bilderbuch," there are yearly photos of the first grade class for each school year. From 1950 on, the Schultüte is held by every child. Earlier pictures, dating back to 1908 show no sign of the paper cone filled with little gifts.

In Beurig, where Herr Meyer went to school, first grade students were known as ABC Schütze. Schütze, Herr Meyer tells us, is derived from the Latin "tiro" or raw. Thus, a recruit who was drafted into the military, was known as a Schütze. The beginning school children therefore became the "ABC Schütze."

In some places in Germany, i-Dotze or i-Männchen was the nickname for the first-time scholars, a throwback to the time when the first letter of the alphabet to be learned was the letter "i." It was the most easily taught. Sometimes on the school grounds the little ones were teased with the following nonsense rhyme:

i-Männchen,
Kaffeecänchen,
Abgeleckte Heringsschwänzchen'"

This translates as

"i-little people, 

little coffee pots, 

licked-off herring tails." 

 It defiinitely seems to lose something in translation.

Sources:

Der Blumenbaum, Oct, Nov, Dec 2005, p. 68. 

Ewald Meyer e-mail

The Schultüte and the Ranzen Go to School

Early photo of boy with Schultüte and Ranzen

Wooden Ranzen School Satchel

School has just begun in Germany, and it seemed to me that a post about the Schultüte would be very timely. American school children, as well as most other school children outside of Germany are not familiar with the custom of the sugar cone Schultüte. In fact, the English language has no exact equivalent word for it, but the picture above will give you the idea of this "school bag." (Tüte means "bag" when translated literally; however the Schultüte was in the shape of a cone.)

After seeing some pictures of a young relative from the area near Saarburg, Schultüte in her arms and a shy smile on her face, I wanted to determine if the custom reached back to the time of my Kreis Saarburg great grandparents or, if not, just when and where did this custom originate.

To begin my search, I called up the German version of Google and found two good articles that answered many of my questions. One of the first things I learned was that German children of the 19th century did have my version of a school bag - something called a "Ranzen," a word that means satchel.   Not every child's family could afford a leather Ranzen and those who had them guarded them carefully. They were shaped like a small briefcase with backstraps. The Ranzen was the German school child's prize possession. The true Ranzen was leather except in areas where people were poor but wood was plentiful. A poor child from the Schwarzwald might have a Ranzen made of wood, as illustrated in the picture above.

I also learned that the beginning of the school year has been a special occasion since the middle ages, usually celebrated with a special church service and a procession to the school and/or the presentation of cookies baked in the shape of letters of the alphabet. It was a momentous event for these young children to take the first steps away from their parents' home into a school room.

In some parts of Germany, parents accompanied their child on the first day of school and stayed for a time, while the children became acquainted with each other and with the teacher. In other regions, the celebration of the first day of school took place in the home, often with godparents and other relatives present. It is my impression that, as the 19th century began, education was less highly valued than in the later days of the century. Parents, especially those who were struggling to put food on the table during the hard times in the 1840s and 1850s, were less than enthusiastic about a child being taken away from the work on the farm for several years.  Such might have been the case for some of my ancestors.  It is not likely that they had either Ranzen or Schultüte.

The Schultüte did not appear until the 19th Century. The first documented report of the cone-shaped Schultuete comes from the city of Jena in 1817, closely followed by reports from Dresden (1820) and Leipzig (1836). It caught on in popularity in the bigger cities first and spread eventually to the small towns and villages of northern Germany.  One source I read was of the opinion that the sugar cone Schultüte was a way of "sweetening" a young child's anxiety at beginning school.

About forty years after the acceptance of the Schultüte as a tradition in northern Germany, a book about the sugar cone tree was written for young children and even recommended by a teaching manual used in many schools. It was meant to be read to a child just before the little beginner started attending school. In this tale, a Schultüte'sugar cone tree began to sprout and grow in the school basement. It produced not fruit but cones with sugar cubes and candies.  It was time for the little ones to go to school when they were brave enough to go into the school's cellar and pick the tree's cones which had now matured and were filled with sweets.

There was also a difference in the Schultüte's first appearance in North Germany to the adoption of it in south and western Germany. The Schultüte was almost unknown in the Catholic part of Germany in the mid 1800s. In the Catholic areas, it is my guess that a blessing for the new little scholars and perhaps a procession from the church to the school took place, sometimes with and sometimes without parents and godparents on hand. One source says that in rural areas there was possibly a large "baked pretzel" for the whole class or small school day treats from the teacher to reasure newcomers on their first day.

After the introduction of compulsory education in all of Germany in 1871, the demand for sugar cones increased greatly and were very commonplace in north German schools as the first years of the 20th century began. By the 1930s, the Schultüte occasionally appeared in the schools of west and south but did not really become a custom until after WWII.

Today the custom has changed in that less and less sweets are appearing in the Schultüte, with more practical gifts such as crayons and pencils, small toys, CDs, books and even articles of clothing replacing them for the good health of the child.

My research about the origins and time period of the Schultüte revealed that none on my ancestors carried such a prize to their first day of school.  But I do hope they had a teacher who distributed small treats or let them share a pretzel.

Sources: 

Der Blumenbaum, vol. 26, no. 3

Der Blumenbaum, vol 23, no. 2

http://fanzone50.com/Oberstein/schultueteHistory.html
http://fanzone50.com/misc/Schultuete.html http://www.brauchwiki.de/Die_Schultüte
http://www.erster-schultag.de