The Nehrenz Network Newsletter
Volume 7. Number 2
November 2003

From Dave Nehrenz:  This Fall, Chuck and Ruby Wolcott took a second trip to Trollenhagen and Grischow Germany, ancestral towns of the Nehrenz family. This newsletter will feature their journal and photos of this trip. Thanks to Ruby for the journal entries and to Chuck for the photos in sharing their eventful trip with us!

 
                As a reminder, recall that nearly all these newsletters since 1995 are on the Nehrenz Network web pages. Check the addresses on the third roster page -TNN Home Page 1 and  TNN Home Page 2.

Also, check out the  website called “My Genealogy Home Page.” The address is also on the third roster page. This is the “Home Page 3” and it is the whole Nehrenz Family Tree Maker database! Try all four links on the page. Follow the additional links there to access the large database.

1. WOLCOTT'S 2^ND TRIP TO GRISCHOW AND TROLLENHAGEN

[September - 2003 TRIP JOURNAL]

We landed in Hamburg, Germany the morning of September 4. We were met by Gudrun von Sobeck (Gudi). She is a life-long friend of Pastor Schulz, the retired minister of the Trollenhagen Church and other churches in the area. I met Gudi because she did Pastor Schulz’ e-mail correspondence to us. I invited her to visit, which she did. Since then, we have become very good friends. We will need her on this trip for translation since few people, other than the young ones, speak any English.

We had leased a Volvo wagon well ahead of time, so with plenty of room for all, we did a self-guided tour of Hamburg, which did not go smoothly because the town has changed so much that Gudi hardly recognized it. She lives about 25 miles out of Hamburg and rarely goes there.

After eating lunch, we went on a boat tour of Hamburg harbor, Gudi’s treat.

On this trip we brought along friends, Steve and Mary Merritt, members of our church. They are having a hard time taking it all in since they’ve never been to Europe.

One nice thing, outside of Hamburg, Gudi is familiar with all the little towns and churches. Many of them she attended at one time or another.

Chuck and I spent the night at Gudi’s house and Steve and Mary stayed in a guesthouse, complete with a sauna right in their room! And it was very inexpensive.

Sept.  5 – Friday Today we went to the little town of Undeloh, to meet Pastorin Dorothea Pape and two of her three daughters. Here, Gudi had arranged a horse carriage (actually, more of a wagon) to ride through a very popular nature park in that area. The first half of the carriage ride took about 45 minutes, then right in the park we stopped at Witthöff’s  Gästehaus to eat. We had a private room and took an hour to eat. That is part of the contract with the driver. He waited while we ate. Then we finished touring the park in about 45 more minutes. Very nice day.

Before the ride, we met Dorothea and her daughters, Lea and Maria, at a church in Undeloh. She brought her guitar and some hymns printed in English, so we had a great time singing hymns. I brought a supplemental hymnal to her that we use in our church, “With One Voice.” She was extremely pleased. She said she has about 80 young people in her church and they love to sing in English. We also brought sets of our U.S. quarters to the girls. Now, we need to keep their sets current by sending the latest quarters periodically. Maria, the oldest girl, recognized many of the places and things on the quarters.

Pastor Schulz had sent by way of Dorothea, a German text about the life of a schoolteacher in Mecklenburg, written in 1916. It will need to be translated.

After Dorothea and the girls left, we drove to the town of Luneburg. What a lovely, fascinating town! It was one of the Hanse towns (Hanseatic League). They were the wealthy trading people. Wonderful tall, buildings, reminiscent of Amsterdam. It was on the water, of course, because you had to be on the water to be part of the League.

The buildings owned by members of the League all were trimmed in masonry “rope” as an identifying feature.
Inside the Church Nave at Grishow - Pulpit, Altar, Pews

At 8:00 p.m. we found out there would be a brief concert in the village church. This is the Johannes Koch church. Huge! Beautiful! After 10 minutes of music and readings, we were all asked to go to the altar where one of the pastors explained the significance of the symbols and art. Here again, Gudi was much help.

Once again, Chuck and I stayed with Gudi and Steve and Mary at the guesthouse. They said they used and enjoyed the sauna.

Sept. 6 – Saturday – Today we drove to Trollenhagen, We used the autobahn most of the way because it was a four-hour drive. In spite of the speed, people were courteous and would fall back to allow someone a chance to change lanes.

Steve and Mary are as impressed as we’ve always been about the efficiency and the cleanliness of Germany.

We are now staying in a lovely, country inn in Podewall. Our hostess is a pretty, young girl named Christina. She knows some English and is enjoying using it. We are the first American guests the guesthouse has ever had, so there is quite a bit of excitement that we are here.

Sept. 7 – Sunday – Well, Chuck set two alarms, both of them an hour early last night to be sure we didn’t oversleep. We were up, had the room straightened and were fully dressed. We went downstairs for breakfast and saw no one there. That’s when we realized the alarms were set wrong and we got up at 5:30 a.m.!

Today has been very exciting. We have been royalty for a day. What a welcome we received both at Grischow and Trollenhagen!

Peter  Driemecker, one of the Grischow town councilmen from Grischow, came to the inn early to show us the way to the town. Since there were so many of us, we had to use two cars. Imagine our surprise when we were met by the mayor, two village women and one man who are members of the Grischow church.

They presented us with an aerial view of the town and pointed out the different buildings. They also gave us very clear snapshots of the church. Interestingly enough, they also presented us with a historical document about the schools around Grischow and about a town fire. That one will also need to be translated.

Peter Driemecker said only half kidding, “We will sell the schoolhouse to get money to finish renovating the church.” They really are going to sell it but we don’t know how much they want for it. It’s tempting to consider it.

We had a wonderful tour of the church at Grischow. Even climbed the bell tower. They are very proud of it, since it has recently been restored. They then took us to the community center, which is attached to the firehouse. There they had many journals and town records laid out for us to see. It’s hard to describe how wonderful it was to be able to look at them.

Peter, being a volunteer fireman, was happy that we took pictures in front of the firehouse.

The church is not in use now, but it is more ornate than the Trollenhagen Church. I do believe when they have finished restoring it, it will be striking. There is still shell damage in the church from past battles. One of the organ pipes has a big dent in it from being hit. We were told two Nehrenz females are buried there and the name in the church records is spelled “Nehrenz” rather than “Nierentz.”

After that, we were taken to a little local bar and restaurant. A private room was reserved and we had a long chat, as only people can do who don’t really understand each other. The owner of the place brought us in a little four-pack of Schnapps as souvenirs. The brand name was Eckert so I brought ours back to members of our church whose last name is Eckert.

The owner paid for the meal from her expense account. We joked about it because this is such a tiny village. Her expense account can’t be very big.

Since none of the people spoke any English, Gudi was wonderful. We really could not have accomplished much without her.

When showing us around the outside of the church, they pointed out a wide gate in the brick wall surrounding the church with a standard size gate next to it. It was located at the side of the church. We were told it was the gate where suicides were brought in on the wagon and the mourners came in the small gate beside it. Even though the suicides were buried in the cemetery they were not permitted to bring them through the front gate. These gates are now declared a historical site and cannot be taken down or altered.

We really didn’t want to leave. There were lots of hugs. I’m sure we will go back again. Peter drove us back to the Trollenhagen Church. Since the pastors there have to serve many churches, the service that Sunday was at 2:00 p.m. That was good. It gave us time to see both Grischow and Trollenhagen that same day.

We were a couple of minutes late and there was a sign on the door that said, “American visitors, please come right in.” Pastor Kretschmer, who is a very young, single pastor, asked one of us to read the lessons in English after he read them in German. I was elected because no one else was about to do it. There was special music on the guitar. The pastor then summarized his sermon to us in English after he spoke in German.

The church looks so much better than when we were there last. A new floor, everything freshly painted and it was so nice to know that all the structural problems had been corrected. The church should stand for many more centuries.

Pastor Schulz wanted so much to be there to play the organ, but having just had prostate surgery he couldn’t come. We visited him that evening in his home. Such a nice visit. He  tried very hard to speak most of the time in English. Before we left, we formed a circle and had prayer. He presented us with two of their hymnals. He wrote in both of them, “Remember the 7^th of September, 2003 in Trollenhagen, Mecklenberg. We certainly will. How could we forget?

But at the church, once again, just as in Grischow, it was excitement for everyone. After the service, we were invited to one of the member’s homes for coffee, tea and a lot of beautiful, delicious pastries. They had plum strudel, made from plums from the plum tree in their yard. Also, an apple cake and another one with coconut and sliced almonds. There were several other cakes and pastries besides those. Most of the church members came and we spent a couple of hours in the back yard, enjoying the food and visiting. We had such a great time. We could have been at our home congregation. It was so comfortable. I would love to get names and addresses so I could correspond with these people.

One woman said, “Es ist schade, es ist schade.” I asked Gudi what she was saying. The woman was saying it was too bad that we are sitting here chatting and really don’t know what the others are saying. However, it’s amazing how well people can communicate even though we don’t speak the same language. There were several young people there who could speak English. One has already visited the United States. She has a lot of friends in Michigan and wants to return to go to school there at a church-connected college.
 

After a while, the pastor asked us all to sit around in a circle because the people had questions they wanted to ask us. If they could speak English they asked us directly. If not, they would tell the pastor and he would ask us. It was the questions people usually ask. Where in the United States do we live? What do we do for a living? It was fun both in Grischow and Trollenhagen to tell them Steve Merritt is a tax collector. We got the same reaction in both places. Drawing back in mock shock. A tax collector!

We joked a lot. They had so much pretty china, all different patterns. I thought I could sneak a peek at the bottom of a china cup but they saw me looking at it, laughed and said, “Es ist nicht Meissen.” It is not Meissen. It was very funny.

Once again, it was hard to leave. We felt we were leaving old friends. The parting words they used were, “Alles gut, alles gut,” which translated means, “May everything go well with you.” After lots of hugs, we reluctantly left.

We felt we had the best part of our trip first. It was so special. My memories of it will last a lifetime. Gudi stayed with us until after we visited Rothenburg, Germany. She then took a train back home.

This was the end of our trip to Northern Germany and the beginning of two more weeks in Europe. How I would like to have spent much more time with the people there!

Photos-Chuck Wolcott
 Journal- Ruby Wolcott
"Alles gut, alles gut!"

He was the 2^nd eldest son of Johann Christian Theodor Nehrenz and  Johanna Maria Elizabeth Lempke.

He immigrated to the USA  in November 1869 and came over on the ship "Borussia" with his parents.

They came through the Castle Garden-Manhattan Island, New York City and came to Cleveland, Ohio.

"CHRISTIAN" -JOHANN CHRISTIAN FRIEDRICK⁴ NEHRENZ  (JOHANN CHRISTIAN THEODOR³, CHRISTIAN MATTHIAS², DANIEL FRIEDRICH¹ NIERENTZ) was born April 07, 1846 in Trollenhagen, Germany, and died October 14, 1916 in Cleveland, Ohio.  He married FREIDERIKA "RIKE" BAHLHE August 07, 1874 in Trinity Lutheran Church Cleveland, Ohio.  She was born 1850 in Neddemin Mecklenberg, Germany, and died February 19, 1893 in Cleveland, Ohio. (They are buried in Monroe Cemetery in Cleveland)

More About "CHRISTIAN" -JOHANN CHRISTIAN FRIEDRICK NEHRENZ: March 20, 1884, Naturalized in Cuyahoga County Cleveland, Ohio

Children of "CHRISTIAN" NEHRENZ and FREIDERIKA BAHLHE are:

              i.   LOUISE⁵ NEHRENZ, b. 1870, Cleveland, OH; m. JOHN SCHNUR, August 14, 1890, Cleveland, OH.   More About LOUISE NEHRENZ: Was sponsor: March 21, 1886, for Emma Louise Sophia Fischer  More About JOHN SCHNUR: Was sponsor: February 23, 1890, for Wilhelmine Johanna Nehrenz  St. Matt Luth Ch  Cleve, OH

             ii.   CARL LUDWIG ERNEST "CHARLES" NEHRENZ, b. April 15, 1875, Cleveland, OH.

            iii.   HERMAN NEHRENZ, b. 1877, Cleveland, OH.

            iv.   EMMA NEHRENZ, b. June 26, 1878, Cleveland, OH .More About EMMA NEHRENZ: July 07, 1878, Baptized

             v.   IDA NEHRENZ-HENRIETTE ALBERTINE WILHELMINE, b. November 19, 1880, Cleveland, OH; d. July 28, 1892, Cleveland, OH.

More About IDA NEHRENZ-HENRIETTE ALBERTINE WILHELMINE:

Comment 1: Sponsors: Wilhelm Balke, Wilhelmine Martens-November 28, 1880, Baptized at Immanuel Lutheran Church

            vi.   BERTHA KAROLINE FRIEDERIKE NEHRENZ, b. January 05, 1883, Cleveland, OH; d. 1963.

           vii.   JOHANN GUSTAV NEHRENZ, b. January 23, 1885, Cleveland, OH; d. August 07, 1892, Cleveland, OH. More About JOHANN GUSTAV NEHRENZ: Baptism: February 01, 1885, St. Matthew Luth Ch  Cleve, OH   Godparents: February 01, 1885, Juliane and Gustav Hass

          viii.   WILHELM HEINRICH NEHRENZ, b. January 10, 1889, Cleveland, OH; d. January 15, 1889, Cleveland, OH.More About WILHELM HEINRICH NEHRENZ: Baptism: January 15, 1889, St. Matt Luth Ch  Cleve, OH Burial: January 17, 1889, at Scranton Cemetery;  Service at St Matt Luth Ch Cleve, OH  2:00 p.m.

            ix.        WILHELMINE JOHANNA "MINNIE" NEHRENZ, b. February 23, 1890, Cleveland, OH; d. 1940. More About WILHELMINE JOHANNA "MINNIE" NEHRENZ: Baptism: February 23, 1890, St. Matt Luth Ch  Cleve, OH  Godparents: February 23, 1890, Wilhelmine Miethke, Johann Schnur  Occupation: 1930, Bookkeeper for retail dry goods store Residence: 1930, 2143 85th St. Cleveland, OH with rent of $20 per month, she boarded with Henry and M