The author of today’s post is once again Fred Eggers. He is an outstanding researcher and has written this story with connections to his own family. It is a fascinating tale of a man’s survival during the calamity of a steamboat burning
The author of today’s post is once again Fred Eggers. He is an outstanding researcher and has written this story with connections to his own family. It is a fascinating tale of a man’s survival during the calamity of a steamboat burning on the Mississippi River. This account also contains information that is important in the history of Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg. There are facts here that will help tell the the story of the building of Trinity’s church sanctuary in 1867. Later this year, Trinity will celebrate the 150th anniversary of this structure. We hope you enjoy the story. Thanks, Fred, for your contributions to our blog.
Johann Dietrich Hellwege died on June 27, 1887 and his death is recorded in the church records of Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg. What is unique for a death in that era is that his obituary was published in the Perry County Sun newspaper.
I have transcribed what was published in the obituary as follows:
The Perry County Sun
Friday, July 1, 1887
“At his residence, in Altenberg, Perry County, Mo., on last Sunday morning, June 27th. 1887, John Dietrich Hellevege, aged 72 years, 1 month, and 26 days. Deceased was born at Lahmstadt on der Elbe in the Kingdom of Hanover on May 1st, 1815, from where he emigrated to the United States, arriving at Birmingham, in this country, in December 1842. Being a deck-passenger on the steamboat “General Pratt,” which burnt about five miles above Memphis, he lost everything he had, saved the scanty clothing that he had on and a small lot of wagon-maker’s tools. Soon after his arrival in this county he took up his abode at Altenburg, where he resided until his death. Seven years ago the excessive hand labor he had performed, together with old age, began to show on him, and for the last two years he was compelled to remain in the house, nearly all the time bedfast, under the care of a special nurse, until relieved by death last Monday from “Merasueus Cerielis.” He was respected by everybody, and leaves an aged widow, an aged brother, one stepson, a stepdaughter, and the heirs of another stepdaughter to mourn his loss. He was laid to rest on June 28th, according to the rites of the Lutheran church, in the presence of a large concourse of friends, Rev. J. F. Koestring officiating.” Note: I found information that “Merasueus Cerielis” means Lung Fever or Pneumonia as we know it now.
I first learned about this obituary in 2008 when my brother Cal in Pittsburgh, who had completed our Eggers family tree, received a letter from Mark Miesner in Perryville asking if our ancestors had immigrated with the Hellwege family from Lamstedt in 1842. At that time we knew little of their immigration except that the year 1842 was listed for an Eggers family member in the 1900 US Federal Census. While doing research for a presentation on the immigrants from the former Kingdom of Hanover to Perry County for the 2012 Biennial Immigration Conference at the museum in Altenburg we found that there were several connections between the two families:
- Mette Hellwege, mother of Peter Johann Heinrich Jacob Hellwege and Johann Dietrich Hellwege, was a sponsor at the baptism of Hermann Friedrich Eggers in Lamstedt in 1830.
- Claus Eggers and Peter Johann Heinrich Jacob Hellwege both purchased land in Section 21 of Township 34 North, Range 13 East near Altenburg in March of 1843. The deeds were both recorded on April 7, 1845 in the Perry County Recorder Office and they follow one after the other in the records.
- Peter Johann Heinrich Jacob Hellwege married his second wife, Sophia Justine Hopfer Hesse, a widow, at the Paitzdorf (now Grace, Uniontown) Lutheran Church on August 1, 1847. Hermann Friedrich Eggers was married to Johanne Hopfer at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg on November 2, 1854. The two brides were sisters.
We also learned that the two families were listed after one another in a list which Pastor Zeidler of the Lamstedt Parish had made in 1856 of the people from that congregation that had emigrated from Lamstedt from around 1840 until then. In 2014 I did a lengthy analysis of this list after I had obtained a complete copy of the list which was first published in Germany in 1990 that includes around sixty Lamstedters that emigrated to our area. I am in the process of updating that study which is available at the research library in Altenburg. This is a copy of the first page of seven of that list which contains the Claus Eggers and Hellwege entries:
This list includes Claus Eggers, Maurer (Mason), his Frau (wife), and three children which matches our family records; however, it only lists Tischler (Carpenter or Cabinet-Maker)