HELENA BAUER'S HOMELAND
My 2nd great-grandmother, Magdalena Helena Bauer, was born January 30, 1840 in Schwarzenbach by Nürnberg, Bavaria, Germany to Johann Bauer and Margaretha Barbara Pickel. When I began my genealogical research decades ago I was very fortunate that Helena's birth place appeared in detail on both her Michigan marriage certificate and her Michigan death certificate. With this complete birth place I was able to write to the Evangelical church in Schwarzenbach and they were gracious enough to send me her birth record. Eventually I was able to go back many more generations on Helena's family - even going back to the late 1500's with the help of a professional genealogist in Bavaria.
In 1993 I was able to visit Germany where my brother and his family were living. Together we took a tour of 17 of the birth places of our ancestors that I had uncovered at the time.
Here are some photos of the village of Schwarzenbach by Nürnberg, Bavaria, Germany:
The gentleman in the above photo is not a relative but he was entranced with my brother's American van and he was willing to have his photo taken.
With the help of my German genealogist I was able to learn that the ancestors of my Helena Bauer lived in and worshiped in villages near Schwarzenbach and when I was in Germany in 1993 we also visited the nearby village of Ezelsdorf by Nürnberg, Bavaria. Here are some photos of that village as well:
The third village we were able to visit with ties to our Bauer, et al ancestors is the village of Burgthann by Nürnberg, Bavaria. Here are some photos from that village:
This leg of our ancestral journey found us in beautiful, modern villages obviously unlike the villages our ancestors called home in the 1500's to 1800's but still a wonderful blessing to be able to stand on the same land where our ancestors had once lived.
2 comments:
Thanks for sharing your lovely photos of these charming German villages. It's fun to imagine an ancestor living in one of these pretty cottages.
Thanks, Barb, for your comments. These villages were in a beautiful area of Germany and it was so inspiring to be able to see some of the areas my ancestors had once called home.
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