DNA SOLVES A MAJOR MYSTERY
In genealogy research we are taught to "cite our sources" and "do not add information that cannot be proven". But what do we do if we have a strong feeling that a piece of research is accurate but do not have actual proof? That is always difficult.
When I began researching my paternal grandfather's mother's family I came across just such a situation. This was long before DNA was in the genealogical picture. I had always had a special interest in my Feucht ancestors - perhaps because my loving grandfather, Elmer Schulte, had told me many times that his mother, Juliane Feucht Schulte, had passed away when he was only 12. There were only 3 photos of her available and she was so very young and pretty and I felt my grandfather's sorrow that he had not had his mother very long. This is one of the photos of Juliane and Elmer Schulte:
When I began my research on my Feucht family, my grandfather had already passed away and my grandmother had little information on her husband's family. I was on my own.
I did know that the Feucht family had belonged to Trinity Lutheran Church in Detroit and that they were buried in the Trinity Lutheran Cemetery on Mt. Elliott Avenue in Detroit. The minister at the time at Trinity Lutheran Church was interested in genealogy himself and I was able to obtain the baptismal certificate for my great-grandmother, Juliane, which did show the names of her parents. The minister, Gilbert Otte, graciously informed me that the parents of Juliane Feucht had been married as well at Trinity and he provided the most complete copy of their marriage information from the church books:
With that information I was able to obtain the county record of their marriage as well (which surprisingly for 1859) was written in English:
What a wonderful find! Actual birthplaces in Germany listed on their marriage certificate. I had never experienced that before and very rarely since.
With this information I could see that my 2nd great-grandmother, Helena Bauer, was born in Ezelsdorf, Bavaria, Germany and in the next few years I was able, with the help of a German researcher, to trace my Bauer and affiliated lines back to the late 1500's. But that is information for another post.
For my 2nd great-grandfather, Johann Jacob Feucht, I was able to see from his marriage certificate that he had been born in Ludwigsburg, Württemberg, Germany. Unfortunately the actual village was not shown which proved to hinder my progress for many, many years. From the dates on the marriage record and death record of Johann Jacob Feucht I had configured his date of birth as August 12, 1826. This was all I had to go on other than the general area of Ludwigsburg in Württemberg as his birth place and the fact that he had emigrated to Detroit before his 1859 marriage also in Detroit.
In the following years I learned of a series of books called "The Württemberg, Germany Emigration Index". I did purchase the first 5 volumes of this series and saw many Feucht entries but nothing that would match with Johann Jacob Feucht or even Jacob Feucht and nothing with an age at emigration or date of birth that came close to my ancestor's birth date of August 12, 1826.
Frustrating - yes!
The years passed and I devoted my energy and time to other ancestral lines, always thinking of ways to find the actual village where Johann Jacob Feucht was born. Eventually the next volume of "The Württemberg, Germany Emigration Index" became available. In this volume I was shocked to see an entry for a Johann Jacob Feucht, with birth date of August 12, 1826, from the village of Tamm, Ludwigsburg, Württemberg, Germany! Could this entry be my 2nd great-grandfather?
The facts in the book did fit with what I knew. The birth date fit as did the entry that he had emigrated to America and it also listed the emigration year of 1857 which I had not known. Was this really him? I did discuss this with two of my cousins and they both agreed that while it was not full proof, the information seemed to highly confirm this entry was for my ancestor. I did enter this information into my Ancestry tree and into my Family Tree Maker database but in the back of my mind I was still questioning my decision.
More years went by, DNA became widely available and I did the Ancestry DNA test. I had no matches with anyone related in my Feucht line except children and grandchildren from my great-grandmother, Juliane Feucht Schulte's, sisters.
Then I did have my mother do the Ancestry DNA test - not to confirm any ancestry from my father's side, of course. As a thought one day I asked my brother if he would be willing to do the Ancestry DNA test and he agreed. And that decision proved to be the one that resulted in SUCCESS!
A few years later I noticed my brother had 2 DNA Feucht matches with people from Germany. I did not have these matches myself but they were both being administered by the same gentleman. I sent off an e-mail and thankfully the man answered promptly in English. It turned out that the Feucht matches were on his wife's side of the family and he was researching their lines for them.
He introduced me to the "Württemberg Family Tables" which were created in that area of Germany by the churches in the 1700's and 1800's. These were similar to what we would call a census except they had very detailed information on 3 generations of a family unit - the husband and wife of the household, the parents of each of the adults and the children of the household. While finding church book entries are so satisfying, these Family Tables are even more so.
In the family table of what would prove to be my 3rd great-grandparents, Johannes Feucht (1783-1854 in Tamm) and Anna Barbara Meile (1789 in Tamm-1865 in Bissingen) were listed their 7 children including a son, Johann Jacob Feucht, born August 12, 1826 in Tamm - and next to that entry were the words - emigrated to America in 1857!
AT LAST - I had found my 2nd great-grandfather. The DNA matches my brother had were with the brother of our 3rd great-grandfather, Johannes Feucht (above) whose name was Philipp Feucht (1788-1864 in Tamm).
With the help of these Family Tables and the help of my German correspondent I was able to go back several more generations on my Feucht line. It certainly helped that he was able to translate the difficult records the further back we went.
Over the years of my research I have had many matches with DNA that have been helpful and interesting but these matches with my Feucht German cousins were certainly the most exciting.
My thoughts on DNA:
1. Have as many family members do the DNA test as possible. If I had not asked my brother to do the test I would not have been able to make this discovery. Siblings do not have the same amounts of DNA and one sibling may have an important match that the other sibling does not. This certainly proved accurate in this case.
2. Don't neglect your 5th to 8th cousin matches. This was shown to be very true in my case. My brother's match was with the family of "our" 3rd great grand uncle (as Ancestry describes it) and though the match was low it was an accurate match none the less.
3. Never give up and don't think you have exhausted all possible records and there is nothing else to be found. Not true - the beauty of genealogy is that the search is never over.
I have certainly learned this and have uncovered more information than I ever dreamed possible when I started this journey in the 1970's.
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