The Pearl of the Danube and the House of Terror

For this blog post I would like to talk about Budapest and the House of Terror. Budapest is a beautiful city. Most of the buildings date to the late 19th-early 20th centuries. Despite the destruction during WWII and the 1956 Revolution, the city has worked hard to restore its buildings and culture. On our first day in Budapest, we went to Obuda, which is old Buda. Budapest was originally three different cities: Obuda, Buda and Pest. They were unified in 1873 to become Budapest. Obuda is the historical part of the city. It is where the old fortress stands on top of the highest hill in Budapest. Outside the walls stands a statue of St. Hedvigis and her husband Wladislaus. She was a Lithuanian princess and there were miracles attributed to her during her lifetime. As such, she is revered along with her husband in Eastern Europe. The Hungarian national archives are also in this area. It is a beautiful old building with patterns on its roof. Further down the cobbled street is the beautiful Matthias Church. The Buda castle district has numerous monuments and houses from the 17th and 18th centuries. The castle itself dates back to the 1200s. One of the best parts about the Buda Castle district is that you can get the best view of Budapest! We were very lucky with the weather. The weather was sunny, clear and warm the whole time we were there! That evening we went to visit my Bozoky cousins. We opened the evening with a toast of Palinka. Now, let me tell you about Palinka....I would like to quote what the tourist pamphlet says about it, "You can find the national spirit of Hungary in almost every household, restaurant, bar or souvenir shop in a wide variety, mainly of fruit flavours. Watch out! You can get easily smashed by it's high alcohol content." This definition is followed by a smiley face. I can tell you, it is served in a small shot glass for a reason!

 

   Matthias Church, note the patterns on the roof.

    View from the Buda Castle District

St. Hedvigis and her husband Wladislaus. 

On Saturday, we walked down Andrassy street, stopping in at a little cafe for a breakfast of chocolate and sausage-cheese croissants with coffee. Side note, I never drink coffee, but since coming to Europe I have been drinking coffee everyday! Then we took in the glamorous sight of the Hungarian State Opera House. When we visited in 1998, we went to the opera and saw Banka Ban, a Hungarian opera. The opera house is a neo-Renaissance building, opened in 1884. My Bozoky cousin's wife sings in the opera and showed us her wide variety of costumes from operas by Puccini to Verdi and Mozart. 

     The Hungarian State Opera House

Not far from the opera house is a memorial to some of Hungary's darkest times, the House of Terror (Terror Haza). In 1944, this building at 60 Andrassy street was known as the "House of Loyalty" and was the headquarters of the Hungarian Nazis. Between 1945 and 1956, it served as the communist secret police headquarters. The AVO and AVH secret police were the tools by which the communist government instilled fear and terror among the Hungarian people. In this building, now known as the House of Terror, thousands of people were interrogated, imprisoned, tortured, and killed. I cannot begin to relay the horror the Hungarian people experienced between 1945 up until the end of communism. This museum put things in perspective as my great grandmother lived through these regimes, first the Horthy regime which was questionable, then the Nazi regime and finally the communist regime, one after another. The fear she must have experienced, the things she witnessed with her eyes would have been truly terrible. In looking at pictures of her, I see a face that is haunted by hardship and the images of a past she would probably have liked to forget. The Terror Haza had videos of victims who had been imprisoned and tortured. One man was forced to kneel at a dinner of officials and his head was used as an ashtray. Another man was forced to use his own hand as a shovel to clean the embers out of a stove and put new wood in. The fire was still hot and burning. A woman talked about how soviet soldiers had stormed into her home and noticed her. She broke off suddenly, crying. She said she couldn't finish. She was raped. A priest was arrested for being a priest, although the reason was given that he had wasted rye on his pigs. Some people were arrested on false charges, appearance or just to arrest. The idea that was instilled was that anyone could be arrested. Intimidation and fear ruled. In the cellar of the Terror Haza are prison cells, interrogation rooms and execution rooms. There were four types of prison cells: 1) the detention cell was for solitary punishment, 24x20 in floor space and 6 ft high. There were two light bulbs at eye level that constantly shone in the prisoner's eyes. 2) the wet cell, the prisoner was forced to sit in water. 3) the fox hole, a dark, low- ceiling concrete cell in which the prisoner could not straighten up. 4) the condemned cell, where condemned prisoners were kept, their appeals for clemency rejected. Air ventilation could be controlled, cutting off air flow for punishment. Then there was the treatment room which was where the prisoners were tortured. Various tools such as pliers, electrocution, and burning cigarettes were used to break bodies and spirits. Prisoners could not change their underwear, take a bath or have towels, soap, toilet paper, toothpaste etc. Sometimes they were forced to stand facing the wall with their noses rammed against it and arms stretched out for 10-12 hours at a time. The execution room had the gallows. Apparently there were no actual executions at this building, those were done in the Vac penitentiary and Kozma street prison. At 60 Andrassy street, only fatal bashing and "suicides" took place. In other words, officially there were no executions, but in reality, there were. Along the outside of the building are pictures and names, victims of the regimes. Considering one in three families had a victim, I have no doubt that my great grandmother knew people who became victims. She is lucky she lived since she was a staunch Catholic and had close family in the United States and Canada. The secret police would have known who she was and would have opened letters to her and from her. Considering my mother was interrogated in 1967 when she visited Hungary, and those she visited in Hungary were likewise interrogated about her after she left, I have little doubt that my great grandmother was interrogated since the regime during her time was even worse than the one when my mother visited. To live, one learned to be silent. 

    The House of Terror aka Terror Haza

             The Fox Hole cell

                     Torture tools

                       Gallows

Later Saturday afternoon, I met with my Kreuts cousins for coffee and learned some new things about the Kreuts family, which included the realization that perhaps my great grandfather's family did not have a set spelling for their name, as well as that there may have been another brother. After coffee, we slowly wandered back, enjoying the pleasant evening and stopping in at a little restaurant for dinner. I had a delicious stew of tomatoes, peppers, cabbage and sausage. Yes, I am very much enjoying the food! 

On Sunday, we visited the various addresses I had for my grandmother, great grandparents and great great grandparents. Then we took a ferry cruise up the Danube, enjoying the warm sunshine and spectacular views of the palaces, churches and parliament building, not to mention the Erszebet hid (Elizabeth Bridge), for which I have a special fondness and insisted we walk to so I could get a picture by it. Later that evening we ate at a restaurant named for Emperor Franz Jozef, or in Hungarian, Ferencz Joszef. Since it was our last night I had my favorite Hungarian dish, beef goulash with dumplings, all washed down with a Dreher beer! We decided to splurge and have a delicious dessert of chocolate stuffed cottage cheese dumplings covered in chopped almonds and served with a vanilla sauce. Perfection! 

Palaces along the Danube on the Buda side. 

                 On the Danube

       Hungarian Parliament Building

Me in front of the Erszebet hid (Elizabeth Bridge)

Last dinner in Budapest: beef goulash cooked in red wine and mushrooms with cottage cheese-dill dumplings and Dreher beer.

And dessert: chocolate stuffed cottage cheese dumplings covered in chopped almonds and vanilla sauce.

Now that the Hungary part of the trip is over, I feel I have a better understanding of my ancestors, especially my great grandmother and what she experienced. There is something deeply emotional about walking in the places your ancestors walked and grasping an understanding of what they lived through. It is difficult to put into words, and perhaps the best I can do is say that Hungary holds a special place in my heart. 

Cheers!

Elizabeth

The Noblewoman and the Painter

My maternal grandmother was born in Brooklyn, New York but her parents were born and raised in Hungary: Juliana Roza Bozoky, born in 1877, and Pal Kreuts, born in 1881. Juliana came from a wealthy family with noble status. According to various nobility sources, the Bozoky family was part of the gens Hont-Pazmany. The Hont-Pazmany gens has it's origins in Swabia. There were two noblemen, brothers, one named Hont and the other Pazman. In the 900s they made their way to Hungary, eventually gaining favor and titles from Duke Geza and King Stephen for aiding in battle. Their descendants settled in the northern part of Hungary and southern Slovakia, building castles and monasteries. At some point, my Bozoky ancestors made their way to the southern part of Hungary and settled in Szeged. According to family legend, one or two Bozoky ancestors named either Istvan Antal or Istvan and Antal, were knighted by Empress Maria Theresa. Considering the time period of the 1740s-50s and the considerable wealth of the family, I have little doubt the story is true, however, like any good researcher knows, it needs to be verified. I went to the Hungarian National Archives and with the help of an archivist found out there are 11 Bozoky's who have been granted noble titles. I have no idea which one is mine especially since there were no Istvans or Antals listed. But they are willing to help if I can narrow the genealogy down a bit and they gave me the website to look up the information myself. In order to assert her authority and right to rule, Empress Maria Theresa came to the Hungarian nobles for support. She in turn rewarded those who sided with her. Now we turn to the Szeged Bozoky's. My great grandmother's parents were Andras Bozoky and Veron Berta. Andras owned a large estate with orchards and vinyards. He and Veron had at least 8 children: Etel, Anna, Juliana, Maria, Andras, Szilvester, Istvan and Vincze Lajos. Until recently I assumed the Bozoky family moved to Budapest when Juliana was still a child, and that Andras and Veron had lost Etel and Vincze. But on Friday, I went to visit my Bozoky cousins who live in Budapest. They are descended from Anna Bozoky, my great gradmother's older sister. Anna died at the age of 23 from food poisoning just a few short years after her marriage to Ferenc Simon and the birth of her daughter, Ilona. My Bozoky cousins showed me Anna's marriage record which was dated 1893 and the marriage took place in Szeged. This meant that the Bozoky family had not yet moved to Budapest and it provided a wonderful clue to their timeline. My cousins also showed me a record that Anna died in Szeged in 1896 and, as her mother was listed as point of contact (with a Szeged address), the Bozoky's moved to Budapest sometime after 1896, well into my great grandmother's adulthood. Anna's marriage record also gave her address which, considering the time period and her status, was also her parents' address as well. So now I know where they were living in Szeged. After moving to Budapest, the family lived at 61 Csengery street, off of Andrassy street which was THE street. It had the posh stores, the opera house, art academy etc. If you had wealth, you lived near it. Armed with this new information, I decided to take another look at my great grandparents marriage record, dated 1905, and for the first time realized that at the time of the marriage, Juliana's father was dead. How did I realize this? There is an abbreviation in Hungarian that widows can put in front of their name to signify their widowhood: ozv., and that abbreviation was in front of Veron's name. All of a sudden I was like, whoa! I couldn't believe I hadn't realized this before, but sometimes it takes several examinations to discover what a document like this has to offer. So this means Andras died in Budapest sometime between 1896 and 1905. One more thing that I discovered about the Bozoky family thanks to my Bozoky cousins, was that Vincze Lajos Bozoky, my great grandmother's brother, who I assumed had died since he didn't show up in any pictures, had actually lived into adulthood and even married. My cousins showed me a picture labeled Vincze Lajos Bozoky and his wife with an address for Szeged. They did not know who he was but knew he was family. Knowing that my great grandmother had a brother named Vincze Lajos, born in 1881, I have little doubt that this is the same person. Perhaps a reason why he does not appear is that he stayed in Szeged. This ties into another story. Bear with me, I know I am going on several tangents. Many years ago, my mother discovered from a now deceased Bozoky cousin that there was a Bozoky relative who lived in England and had papers relating to the nobility of the family. The Bozoky cousin gave my mother an envelope with an address for this English cousin. My mother wrote to him but never heard from him. I recently found the envelope and did my own research. I discovered that the name of this individual was Lajos Ferenc Bozoky, born in Hungary in 1913. Using ancestry.com's British phone book register, I was able to track him. I found out that the address my mother used, which was from 1964, was the "wrong" address. He had moved from there in the 1980s and then died in 1994. My mother wrote to him after 1994. Now I know why he didn't write back. So, going back to Vincze Lajos, I am now speculating since the name of this other Bozoky relative is Lajos, that the latter may be the former's son. I will definitely be looking into this!

Now onto the Kreuts side. My great grandfather, Pal was born in Budapest in 1881. His parents were Mihaly Kreuts, a hat maker, and Erszebet Szoke-Vegh. Mihaly was born around 1838 in Felso-schonborn which is now in Western Ukraine. At the time it belonged to Hungary. The curious thing about Felso-schonborn is that it was settled by Germans from the Bamberg area in the 1740s and remained almost exclusively German until WWII. In other words, Mihaly's lineage is undoubtedly German. At some point, Mihaly left his village and came to Budapest. There he met and married Erszebet, who was born in Budapest in 1847. They had multiple children, including Pal, Antal Mihaly, Karoly and Erszebet. Erszebet married a German, Augustus or Gustav Fabian and had three children. They immigrated to America, settling in New York City in the early 1900s. This is important for later. Karoly and Antal fought in WWI. Karoly was captured and sent to Siberia. He was later able to come home but had been gone for so long, his family had thought him dead and his wife remarried. He released her and later married someone else. I met with Antal's descendants on Saturday, his two granddaughters and two of his great grandchildren. To back track slightly, the previous evening, my Bozoky cousins showed me a picture of the "Krejcs" brothers, saying they were related to my grandmother and her brothers. I finally understood that Krejcs was another form of Kreuts. When I met with the Kreuts cousins, one of Antal's granddaughters showed me her father's school grade book and said that when she was going through it, she had noticed that her grandfather had spelled Kreuts differently: Kreuts, Kreits, Krejcs, and Kreics. I showed them the picture of the Krejcs brothers that the Bozoky cousins had showed me but they didn't recognize them. Although, I think one may be Antal. The Kreuts cousins also showed me a picture of a man who they said was the brother to Antal. It was not Karoly or Pal. They did not know his name, but now this adds to the mystery! 

So now to my great grandparents. I would like to share their story because I think it is both sweet and sad. They met in the late 1890s, how I have no idea because they were from two different classes. Juliana was from the upper class and from a long line of nobility, Pal was a painter and the son of a hatmaker. Juliana's parents refused to let them marry until Pal finished art school, although the hope was that Juliana would find someone more suitable, so they embarked on a 7 year long courtship. Noting that Juliana's father was dead by the time of their marriage in 1905, I wonder if as a result of his death, her mother acquiesced to the marriage, realizing her daughter was near 30 and more or less an old maid. So Pal and Juliana married and began their family. I discovered not too long ago that they had a total of 6 children, not four. The first two I knew of, and the last one was my grandmother. I knew there was a brother who died at 4 months old, but these two extra were a shock. After talking with my aunt and cousins, I found that these two also died as infants, one was a miscarriage and the other was born and lived for several months before dying. In 1914, on the eve of WWI, the family immigrated to America. Pal's sister was already living in NYC with her family so that was the logical place to go. They settled in Brooklyn and in August 1916 my grandmother was born.  Four months later on December 27, Pal was admitted to Manhattan State Hospital with lead poisoning. Manhattan State Hospital was an insane asylum. Lead poisoning doesn't just destroy the body, it destroys the mind as well. The hospital was on Ward's Island, isolated from the rest of the city on purpose. I found documents at the NY Public Library that provided an excellent view on what life was like, and it was heartbreaking. My grandmother and her brothers never would have seen their father once he went into hospital, children were not allowed on the premises for fear that the contact with the insane would be detrimental to their mental hygiene. After Pal went into hospital, Juliana moved her family to lower Manhattan, to the tenement slums because that was all she could afford. After 1920, she made the decision to return to Hungary. The plan was for Pal to join as well so that he could die on his native soil, but his illness was too much. Juliana returned to Hungary with her children but without Pal. He died in March 1922 and is buried in Queens. The Hungary to which Juliana returned was not the same one she left. It had been decimated by WWI and many were living in poverty. Juliana moved in with her mother and brother on Bela Bartok Street. My grandmother was enrolled in school and attended from 1923-1926. Sometime in 1925, Juliana realized she wasn't providing the best life for my grandmother and choosing between sending her to an orphanage or back to America, decided to send her back to America to live with Pal's sister, Erszebet. As such, my grandmother grew up in Brooklyn while her two older brothers also left Hungary, going first to England and then NYC and Canada. Juliana didn't see her children for 30 years. In the meantime she experienced war.  During WWII, her apartment was bombed and she lost everything but her prayer book. She experienced Soviet invasion and the harshness of the Soviet influenced Hungarian dictatorship. It was not pleasant. There was a lot of suffering and fear. In 1956 my grandmother and her brothers were able to get Juliana to America. It took a lot of political negotiation including a letter to First Lady Mamie Eisenhower, but they got her out of Hungary. In 1963, one of her sons died and she died just 7 months later in spring of 1964. In her prayer book she had written "My God, my God, the whole world has abandoned me."

My great grandparents, Juliana Roza Bozoky and Pal Kreuts on their wedding day in 1905.

Thanks to my great grandparents marriage record, my grandmother's school grade book and my great great grandfather'a death certificate, I was able to find four addresses and visit them: where my great grandfather lived before marriage, where my great grandmother lived before marriage, where my great great grandparents lived and where my grandmother lived. I am hoping to work with the various archives to uncover more information, we shall see what we find! 

Cheers!

Elizabeth

61 Csengery street, Budapest, Hungary. This was Juliana's address before marriage. The current building dates to 1910 and is a little dilapidated but you can tell it and the street it was on were beautiful and posh.

What was 28 Also erdosor street, Budapest, Hungary. This was Pal's address before marriage.

What was 9 Munkas street, Budapest, Hungary. This is where Pal's parents, Mihaly and Erszebet, lived at the time of Mihaly's death in 1896. It is right around the corner from Also erdosor street.

St. Elizabeth Catholic Church, just down the street from where the Kreuts family lived.

What was 45 Bela Bartok where my grandmother lived after the family returned to Hungary. I remember seeing it in 1998, it was rather dilapidated and missing the upper two stories because it had been bombed during WWII. But it had a courtyard which I remember thinking was nice.

Hungary: the Land of Paprika!

Szia! Hello from Hungary! As soon as we crossed the Hungarian border I noticed that it was quite flat. This was a stark contrast to Austria, which is quite hilly and mountainous (reference Sound of Music). However, this flat plain is perfect for farming, and indeed Hungary has very rich soil. I decided I wanted to take a detour to Budapest, so we drove south towards Lake Balaton. We saw several castles perched on hills and drove through little villages. The drive along Lake Balaton was quite pretty. Then we turned north for Budapest and got lost. Go figure. In all actuality, it was one of those things where the driver just chose not to listen to the navigator, but I digress. We stayed in a little hotel in downtown Budapest on the Pest side. Dinner for the first night? Goulash and pepper-cabbage salad of course!  The next day we started the touring but before I go into that, I want to tell a brief history of Hungary and why I came here.

Hungary has a very long rich history but I will just give some brief highlights. I suppose to tell it right, I should start with the "Real" Hungarians, the Magyars from Asia. They were tribesmen and horsemen, nomads. By the 800s they had settled in the Carpathian basin. Now, it is important to mention at this point that Hungarians have their own very distinct language. The only language remotely similar is Finnish, hence the name of the group, Finno-Urgaic, although recent literature has aroused some doubt. Regardless, there was one tribe and then they divided, taking their languages with them. Let me tell you, the Hungarian language is not like any other language. It is very difficult to learn, read and speak. I only know the important words: nagymama (grandmother), igen (yes), nem (no), koszonom (thank you), cukraszda (bakery), Szia (hello), and a kid's song my grandmother taught me. So, clearly I am ready! Anyway, as I said, the Magyars went south. Fast forward a hundred something years to 1001 AD. Hungary is made officially a kingdom in the eyes of Europe with the crowning of St. Stephen. He is credited with converting the Hungarians to Christianity, although his father, Geza, actually started the process. Fast forward another couple of hundred years to the 1500s...Ottoman Turk invasion. The Ottomans invaded and took control of Hungary, holding it until Hapsburg intervention in the 1700s. This started a new wave of Germanic immigration to resettle areas that had been decimated by the Ottomans and to gain a stronger foothold in Hungarian territory. The Hapsburgs held the Hungarian territory until WWI when they were defeated. Hungary lost 2/3 of its territory and 1/3 of its population with the Treaty of Trianon. They went through four governments in 9 months before Admiral Miklos Horthy took control as acting regent in 1920. He is a rather controversial figure since, although Hungary regained some former glory, communists, Jews and non-ethnic Hungarians suffered discrimination. This led to the deportations and deaths of thousands of Jews and Roma during WWII. At the end of WWII, Hungary entered a dark period under Soviet control. I will talk more about that later when I discuss the House of Terror. Soviet occupation ended in 1991 and Hungary entered a new age. 

I am part Hungarian. My maternal grandmother's family was Hungarian, both her parents and their ancestors (or at least some of them) having been born in Hungary. So Hungary is a very special place to me! And so the Hungarian root search begins! 

Cheers!

Elizabeth

The Hills Are Alive!

For this blog I want to talk about Austria. From the Alsace we traveled east back into Germany, across the southern bit through Bavaria, eventually crossing into Austria. What is unique about Bavaria and Austria is that the churches have onion domes. You don't see that anywhere else in Germany. The Protestant churches will still have steeples but the Catholic Churches will have onion domes. As Austria is majority Catholic, you see onion dome churches in almost every town. You also see roadside chapels, shrines and crucifixes every few miles. Most are decorated with flowers. We followed the Danube for several hours. All along the way there were small castles and abbeys perched on the sides of the valley. The Danube is how the Donau-Swaben traveled to get to the eastern lands. My ancestors were among that group who settled in the western part of present-day Ukraine. They undoubtedly used the Danube to travel. 

               Passau, Germany

         Going along the Danube

       Onion dome church in Austria 

    An Austrian abbey along the Danube

We spent the night near a little village called Hainfeld in a little country gasthaus, Gasthaus Renzenhof. It had a lot of character! It has been in existence since 1531. It was granted land and existence by the local monastery. There was a framed paper in the gasthaus which outlined its existence from 1531 to the present along with all the owners. Going with the Catholic theme, the gasthaus had religious artifacts (crucifixes, statues, icons etc) all over. When we walked in the restaurant we were greeted with "Gruss Gott" which means "God is great". This is the greeting in this area. It is the equivalent to "hello".  The entire place was run by this feisty woman named Rita. When we sat down she asked us what we would like to drink. Since this area is near a brewery, there is one beer, Hainfelder. So all we had to say was "Ein bier, bitte", no need to specify what kind! There were also no menus. That is how local this place was. Rita gave us a choice of three dishes: schnitzel with salad, baked chicken or goulash. We ordered the schnitzel. Now, here is the other thing....the language. We are in the southern part of Austria and in the country. Just like anywhere else, each region has it's own dialect. With that said, we had no idea what Rita and the locals were saying. Sure, they were speaking German clearly, but they weren't speaking Hoch Deutsch (high German). It would be like someone from Maine going to New Orleans and try to understand what they are saying. I understood two words of all that Rita said, drink and eat. She said a bunch of other stuff too but I have no idea what it was. My German may be rusty, but in Germany I could at least understand most of what was being said, here, nope! All that aside, the schnitzel was excellent. After we ordered we could hear Rita pounding on the fillets in the kitchen, and boy were they tender! She served the schnitzel with potatoes, salad and lemon slices. The lemon was to squeeze on top of the schnitzel, perfection!  The next morning we turned on the TV and it was funny because on Austrian TV, they always show the ski conditions because...it's Austria! Ironically, it was pointed out that Glencoe, Scotland had 1.4 meters of snow. That is about 4 feet of snow. In Scotland. I should have brought my skis! After another excellent Germanic breakfast, we headed towards Hungary and I saw wildlife! Six huge hares, a stork, a pheasant, and a hawk that was carrying what I thought was a fish until he dropped it on the road and I saw it was a pigeon. I presume he dropped it on the road to have it tenderized as there was a large truck approaching. Anyway, enough of that! 

Cheers!

Elizabeth

The timeline of our gasthaus from 1531 until now.

         The Gasthaus Renzenhof

The Schwarzwald and the Alsace

The Schwarzwald, or Black Forest, isn't as ominous as it sounds. The Grimm brothers could really have capitalized on the name and set some of their stories there but they didn't, although I am sure the locals have some equally scary folk takes! The Schwarzwald gets it's name from the color of the trees. The firs are so thick and numerous that it does seem like they are black. I could just picture Hansel and Gretl walking through the forest and coming upon the witch's house. It is a bit creepy. However, when we drove through, it happened to be quite snowy, so it was rather pretty. The reason we went to the Black Forest region was to locate a rather elusive branch of the family, the Grofts. We really don't know much about them. Their name keeps changing which makes it difficult to track them. I have seen "Groft" as Kraft, Croft, Graf, Graff and Groff. They are flexible. The Grofts came to America in the 1850s: George (Gregorius) and Elizabeth (Felicitas) with their three surviving children, Cunigunde, Elias (my great great grandfather) and Michael. They had six other children who died: Margretha, Philomena, Eva, Egidius, Lorenz, and Leo. Until recently we only knew they came from the German state of Baden-Wurttemburg, which is huge. After some looking I discovered they may have come from the small village of Sulzbach in the Black Forest. So off we went. Considering all of the other places we have been, it is unsurprising that Sulzbach is so small it doesn't even have a town center. It is also up in the hills. It is very clear farming is not a major livelihood. The hills are too steep and the forest is too thick. Another interesting thing about this area is that unlike the other places we have visited that were Evangelische (Protestant), this region is Katholische (Catholic). It was so neat because normally church bells ring every hour anyway, but on March 25, they started ringing almost constantly beginning around 7am. It was the feast of the Annunciation, at least for the Eastern Orthodox. I have no idea if the western church acknowledges the annunciation on the same day but regardless, it was awesome to wake up to the bells ringing because it did sound like the announcement of something big. We went to St. Anna's, the Catholic Church in Sulzbach. The current church dates back to the 1800s although there has been a church there since the 1200s. The bell tower on the current church dates back to the 1600s and several parts inside the church date back to the 1500s. Just like the other churches we have come across, the priest is a circuit rider and operates out of the bigger town of Gaggenau. We went to the cemetery and found several Krafts so while that may be somewhat good news, we won't know anything until we see records. However, it is positive that this area is Catholic and we know the Grofts were Catholic as well. We went to Gaggenau during the church office hours but it was locked so I will send an email to the priest and will hopefully receive a positive response. I do not know what happened to Cunigunde as she disappears off census records but it is likely she died in Indiana since that is where the rest of her family is buried. At some point, Elias and Michael had a disagreement around the time of an accident. They were building a well and the dynamite exploded prematurely, causing Michael to lose an eye and Elias to lose his hearing. Whether this accident was the catalyst or not, the brothers never spoke to each other again. I was able to find out what happened to Michael. He changed his name to Croft and married a woman of German descent named Josephine. He died in 1923 at the age of 74, four years before Elias died. Elias married Julia Lang, a woman of English and Quaker descent. She will be discussed more later when we get to England. One final comment about the Grofts....while driving towards Sulzbach we came across a sign that mentioned this area was involved in the 1849 Badischer Revolution. Revolutions were popping up all over during this time period but it seems now perhaps especially significant as there was one very close to where the Grofts lived and the family immigrated to America just a few short years later. Perhaps a cause and effect? To get a better idea of the area we drove on the Schwarzwald Hochstrasse, which goes straight through the Black Forest. It also goes high enough that we experienced a good bit of snow! Many of the people who live in this area are carpenters or other woodworkers (like cuckoo clock makers) and herders of cattle, sheep or goats, but that is it. This is telling since Elias' choice of occupation in America was a sawyer, someone who operated a sawmill. He probably did some farming on the side in the form of a vegetable garden, like his Black Forest ancestors.

St. Anna's Katholische Kirche, Sulzbach.

              Inside the church

Sulzbach, Germany...small and hilly.

             Sulzbach,Germany 

Our next stop was the Alsace region of France to look into another branch of the Hangars (remember them?). Recap: Catharine Hangar, my great great great grandmother, was born in America in 1837. She was the daughter of Frederick Hangar and Margaret Cook/Koch. Frederick was the son of Martin Hangar and Elizabeth Fulwider/Vollenweider. Elizabeth was the daughter of Hans Ulrich Fulwider. Hans was born in Kappel, Switzerland in 1723. His family immigrated to America in the mid 1700s.  Hans married Anna Margaretha Binckele, who was born in 1735 in the Alsace. This Binckele line is who I will be focusing on now. So, the Alsace is an interesting region because it is both German and French. Both countries at one point had control of the region, and depending on who it was at the time, the language of the records vary. My ancestors came from three tiny villages, all within a few miles of each other high up in the Alsatian hills (surprise, surprise): Fouday, Bellefosse and Belmont. Fouday is first and at the bottom of the hill. Bellefosse is next halfway up the hill and Belmont is near the top. What is interesting about this area is that it is Protestant, which is not usually what one associates with France unless you look to the Huguenots. The church in Fouday dates back to the 1700s, although there has been a church there since the Middle Ages. The inside is incredibly simple, it almost reminds me of the meeting houses in New England. There is a part of the church sectioned off with glass for preservation. This section dates back to the 14th and 15th centuries and is covered with beautiful frescoes, a stark contrast to the "new" church from the 1700s. Up the hill in Bellefosse we came across another church which was built in 1913 after a cemetery had been established. Although Bellefosse itself was as old as Fouday, before the 1900s, residents went down the hill to Fouday to go to church and be buried. Further up the hill was Belmont, just as small. The church there dated back to probably the 1700s at the latest. We walked through all the cemeteries and kept seeing the name Pinkele, which we believe may be a corruption of Binckele. We headed over to Strasbourg where the Alsatian archives are kept and hit the jackpot! We found baptism, marriage and death registers going back to the 1600s in those three villages, and even better, found our ancestors! The down side is that the records are all in French and as I only took Ancient Greek and Spanish in high school, I know about as much French as a Martian. Nevertheless, we were able to figure out enough to know what we were looking at, and even better you can access the records online! So we will be able to take more time to go through them. I was able to confirm that Anna Margaretha Binckele's parents were Anna Maria Salome Werle/Verly and Peter Binckele. I also found Anna Maria Salome Verly and Peter Binckele's marriage record which indicated that Peter was originally from canton Bern in Switzerland. These records were amazing because they list dates, names and basically a brief biography about these people. Peter's parents were Christian Binckele/Binggeli and Elisabeth Burri. Anna Maria Salome Verly's parents were Johannes Verly and Marguerite Neuvillers. Curious about Peter and what could have brought him to the Alsace, I did some research online and found out that after immigrating to America, he joined the Moravian church. Apparently before Moravians die, they write their own eulogy so basically they get to speak at their own funerals. As such,  I discovered that he was born in Guggisberg, canton Bern, Switzerland in 1704. When he was 9 years old his father died so he moved with his mother to the Alsace where he lived with a brother who was already living there. This is where he met Anna Maria Salome Verly and married her in 1725. He was a woodcutter and was struck by lightening while taking shelter from a storm. The incident left him badly injured and confined to bed for several weeks. Then he brought his family to America in 1736, which is where his wife, Anna, died in 1748. He married again to a widow, Anna Margaretha Geiger, and had more children. He died at the ripe age of 89 having fathered a total of 23 children (15 by his first wife)!

View from Bellefosse, Alsace, France.

Inside the Bellefosse church, note the simplicity.

Belmont, Alsace, France (it snowed while we were there).

        Belmont, Alsace, France

The area of the Alsace where my ancestors are from.

Fouday church, Alsace, France

14th and 15th century frescoes inside Fouday church.

The name Pinkele kept popping up...it's similarity to Binckele is uncanny, perhaps a corruption?

Ich Hat Mein Herz In Heidelberg Verloren!

Friday night we spent the night in Neu-Edingen in, rather ironically, a hotel-gasthaus called Philoxenia. Yes, it was run by Greeks and yes, the only food they offered was Greek BUT they had German beer, so I had Shaeferspiese (pork kebab with onions, pepperoccini covered with sheeps cheese and served with salad and fried potatoes)....with an Eichbaum beer. I only hope that my Greek ancestors won't strike me down for this sacrilegious act! Anyway, Saturday morning we drove three blocks from the hotel to where my parents used to live when they first married. It is a bit weird how we ended up staying just a few blocks away. We literally searched for two hours for a place to stay, going from town to town until we ended up in Neu-Edingen. My dad believes they even ate at the restaurant in Philoxenia. Talk about weird! So I got to see the house my parents lived in when they first married. Dad thought it looked the same. It had a giant quince tree in the back. Side note, my parents met in Heidelberg and the title of this blog means "I lost my heart in Heidelberg" which is a famous song and is also the song my parents used at their wedding for their first dance.

My parents first house as a married couple.

From there we went to Heidelberg, the second oldest university city north of the Alps (the university was founded in the 1300s). Perhaps it's greatest highlight is the castle which sits high above the city. The castle was built in the 1200s and remained steadfast and strong, unable to be breached until the 1600s when the French discovered gunpowder and blew away part of the castle walls, WWII did the rest. It is also where many many years ago we went to see the play "The Student Prince" which is about a prince who goes to university and is introduced to life and a woman. Then his father dies and he is called back to take his rightful place but he doesn't like being hoity toity. So he goes back to the university with the hopes of the old life but he is no longer a student and they treat him as a king which makes him uncomfortable. They want to treat him like he is one of them but he isn't, so there is a reconciliation, an understanding of one's place. It ends with him going back home to assume the throne. We wound our way up to the top, couldn't find parking, wound our way down, then saw a sign for parking back up the hill so up we went! We walked around the castle and then went down into the old part of Heidelberg. As we entered the city, the cathedral started playing music on its chimes. The names of the two songs escape me for the moment but it was quite pleasant. So we went to the cathedral which was built in the 1400s. During the 1550s the kurphalz (ruler) decided that his German state which included Heidelberg would be Protestant. However, there were still a good number of Roman Catholics. So the Heidelberg ruler decided yo comprise and instead of alienating the Catholics or Protestants by making the cathedral one or the other so he built a wall down the middle that way both groups could go to the same church and sit on the Catholic or Protestant side. Obviously the Catholics eventually built their own church and the wall was taken down so the church became all Protestant. Then we wound our way back up to the castle, taking the stair path which had 303 stairs. They had the steps numbered which was rather depressing to see when you were gasping for breath and realizing you weren't even halfway. But we made it! 

From Heidelberg we went to Freiburg to visit with cousins from my mom's Hungarian side (the Kreuts side). Freiburg is in the southwestern part of Germany at the edge of the Black Forest. It is an interesting city because much of the downtown area was leveled in WWII but has been rebuilt in the old style. The new Rathaus (city hall), which dates back to the 1500s, and the old Rathaus, which dates to the 1200s, were both rebuilt in their original style as much as possible. While walking around the old downtown area we came across a group of musicians playing drums and flutes, marching through the city in somber procession. These groups are generally dressed in black and are very serious. They appear during the Lenten season and reinforce the sacrifices of Lent and somber reflection. We went to the Munster which is the cathedral. It is a mix of Romanesque and gothic styles. There was a mass in progress when we visited and it was such a joy to hear the organ and beautiful hymns. We also went by the philosopher Erasmus' house. He stayed in Freiburg during the 1530s. One interesting thing about Freiburg is it's drainage system. A series of wide open gutters called bachle run through the city and you have to be careful where you walk so you don't fall in. The local folklore says that if you step in one of these bachle, you will marry a Freiburger. My cousin's husband asked my father if he should push me in, my father contemplated this serious matter but decided against it. So, to all my single friends, if you are looking for that perfect Freiburger mate, come take the step into the bachle! 

Cheers!

Elizabeth