I had a very exciting day today! If only genealogy was always this easy. I had left my zip drive at the Briggs library when Charlotte and I visited. So I wanted to visit again. And I knew that I wanted to find at least one more piece to the puzzle. I walked in and asked for a bit of help. After listening to me, the librarian walked to the shelf and found two Lawrence County history books that had information about the Schweickart family. But the HUGE find was two volumes written by John Schweickart about his family that included Fred Schweickart. My gut feeling is that this is indeed my family, too.
Next I looked for an obit for my 2-gr-grandmother, Barbara Schweickart Hornberger Unger. There was nothing in the index file which was disappointing. BUT when I pulled out the microfilm for The Ironton Register I found it! The Register was a weekly paper in that time period. There was a obit for Mrs. George Unger in the Thursday, March 16 issue. And the obit not only called her Mrs. George Unger, but it named her son, Fred Hornberger and mentioned that she left two brothers to mourn her: Fred Schweickart "of this city" and Lewis Schweickart of Cincinatti. Exactly what I had hoped to find! I have checked the census on ancestry and there is only ONE Fred Schweickart in Ironton, Ohio in the 1900 census and one Lewis Schweickart of Cinn in the 1900 census. By 1910, there is no Fred Schweickart in Ironton in the census. This is not a surprise. My information from others tells me that her brother died the year after she did: in 1906.
I have now e-mailed John Schweickart to see if it is possible to buy his book. There is no doubt in my mind that his Schweickart family is also my Schweickart family! Hurrah!
Here is my transcription of the above: Mrs. George Unger a well known and highly respected citizen of the South Side passed away Monday morning....with pneumonia. Mrs. Unger lived on Walnut near Seventh up to a week ago had been at the home of her son, Fred Hornberger, where she was receiving attention. The deceased was 71 years of age and leaves a husband, one son, Fred Hornberger, two brothers, Fred Schweickart of this city and Lewis Schweikart of Cincinatti and several grandchildren to mourn her loss. The Funeral service took place Wednesday afternoon.....Lutheran Church....Interment at Woodland Cemetery.
Charlotte and I had found the graves of Barbara and her husband, George, on our last trip to Ironton at the Woodland Cemetery.
Interesting to note that Barbara was 11 years older than George Unger. Also interesting to see that when Barbara died George's last name was spelled Ungerer. But the stones are side by side and there is no doubt in my mind that they are husband and wife.
One more piece of evidence that this connection is correct: The death certificate for Fred Hornberger says that his mother's maiden name is Barbara Schweickart. The information is given by Fred's daughter, Emma Hornberger. Emma is very likely to have known her grandmother and to have given correct information. She lived with her father until his death.
I am adding information to this post a week later. I was able to get in touch with A. John Schweickart at his e-mail address: ajschweickart@comcast.net
John is wonderful to work with and shared his information about the Schweickart family. He had never before been aware of the fact that his ancestor, Fred Schweickart, had a sister Barbara. There is no way that he could have tripped over this obit that spells out the relationship without having read every Ironton paper for many years.
One of the most interesting pieces of information in John's work is the inclusion of a Church obit for Frederick Schweickart. The Obituary was dated July22, 1906 and must have been printed by the Emanuel M.E. Church when N.R. Bornemann was pastor. I have a copy of this in my filed information from John. The first paragraph says: Mr. Frederick Schweickart was born Dec. 13, 1832 in Lembach, Canton Weissembourg near Alsace Lorraine, which at the time was French Territory. He was baptized when only four days old and in 1847 by confirmation was admitted to the Holy sacrament of the Lord's Supper under Reverent Noeffner, then the Pastor at that place. Barbara is not mentioned in his obituary which is not a surprise as she had died the year before. His brother Lewis of Cincinnatti is mentioned without naming wife or children.
Here are my thoughts about the above:
1) Barbara was born c. 1831 and Fred was born c. 1832. Barbara's birth date is taken from her tomb stone. John is a very thorough researcher and probably has very good supporting evidence for the date of 1832 which is where I obtained that date of birth for Fred. So it is quite likely that I can assume all of the above that would have applied for a female in that time period in that geographical region. It is likely that the family did not move in a two year period in which their were two births in the family. So I conclude it likely that Barbara was born in the same location and was also baptized soon after her birth in the same church.
Of course, the first thing I do is Google the place of birth and I found in the archives of the Alsace Lorraine mail list:
Lembach is in the département du Bas-Rhin, France (northern
Alsace), in the arrondissement and canton of Wissembourg, about
11 km west-southwest of Wissembourg. In 1807 it had a
mixed population of Catholics, Lutherans, Jews, Anabaptists
and Calvinists.
And from Wikipedia:
Lembach lies in the
Sauer valley, surrounded by the woods and sandstone cliffs of the
Palatinate Forest-North Vosges Biosphere Reserve. It is positioned on the local road RD3 which connects
Wissembourg, fifteen kilometres (nine miles) to the east with the north western tip of
the département, and the road to
Bitche. The German frontier is approximately six kilometres (four miles) to the north, but motorists wishing to visit Germany would be well advised to use a less direct route.
At the heart of the Lembach is a Protestant church from 1750 (but incorporating a tower from the late Medieval period) as well as a nineteenth-century Catholic church.
The commune, which embraces an extensive land area, much of it uninhabitable due to the topography, also includes the small village of Mattstall and the hamlet of Pfaffenbronn.
And here is a picture of Lembach taken from Wikipedia as well:
There is a great photo and information about the Lutheran church in Lembach that is most likely the place where both Fred and Barbara were baptized:
This URL takes the reader to a home page maintained by Joan Young. Joan has been very helpful in giving me a feeling for the area.
Go to blog post dated September 16, 2014 for a continuation of this story. I will add a URL at a later date.
