So I just covered Johanna Kuis' mother's family and how they're a line of my great-grandpa's ancestry that was indeed Dutch (which is good since he thought it all was). What about Johanna's father Bernardus Kuis?
I already linked his marriage record in the last post. You'll note from the translation that it lists that both of his parents died at "Nienkirchen". Robert was able to find this record (I believe at the archion website), which led him to being able to take my brick wall family back 3 full generations. He was able to zero in on what town to check in spite of him stating this in an email to me: Chuckled when I typed in Nienkirchen and it showed ZERO hits. I know for sure I have seen town referred to with this spelling in a few places, but here is a link so that you can see that there are well over 50 towns that have a N????kirchen spelling, a variant form of what was written on the Dutch record. And it stretches all over what is currently called Germany. He was using the Meyers Gazetteer and as you can see, there are a LOT of possible towns. So how did he do it? He went to the FamilySearch website and found the supplemental marriage information and it listed Westfalen - and then he knew exactly which of the 50+ he needed to check and boom, there he was!
Since I mentioned Margarieta's siblings I'll mention Bernardus' that Robert was able to find (all born at Neuenkirchen):
- Anna Marie 3 Jul 1785
- Johann Hermann16 Mar 1787
- Anna Maria Catharina 8 Nov 1793
- Herman Antoon 7 Jul 1796 - he moved to the Netherlands and died at Uithuizen 13 May 1877. He and his wife Bieuwke Hulscher had 6 sons, 4 that died young and 1 I can't trace.
I don't know what caused Bernardus to move to the Netherlands but he and Margarieta raised their family there, and he passed away at Uithuizen 18 Jul 1861. In the year 1861, the 20st July, appeared for us, Mayor, Civil Official of the municipality of Uithuizen, district of Appingedam, province of Groningen, Andreas Bulthuis, 64 years old, profession Inn keeper, living in Uithuizen, good acquaintance of the deceased, and Hendrik Boersema, 32 years old, without profession, living in Uithuizen, neighbor of the deceased, who have told us that on the 18th of July of the year 1861, in the morning at 7 o'clock, in Uithuizen is passed away, Bernardus Kuis, 70 years old, without profession, living in Uithuizen, born in Pruissen/Prussia, widower of Grietje Jans Graftema, being the names of his parents unknown.
Of which this document is registered in the two death records of this municipality, and after it has been read aloud to the declarants, it has been signed by them and by us, Civil Official of the Municipality.
Of which this document is registered in the two death records of this municipality, and after it has been read aloud to the declarants, it has been signed by them and by us, Civil Official of the Municipality.
So far I've covered all of my great-grandpa Nick Denhof's ancestors, with the exception of his maternal grandfather. One more blog to go - will it be another German family he thought was Dutch?
