Tag Archives: Saxony

Genealogy, Historic Photos, Krosch

First Known Photo of Christiana Krosch Discovered in Old Album

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To borrow a phrase from the 1994 movie Forrest Gump, an old photo album is a lot like a box of chocolates: you never know what you’re going to get. That was certainly the case with a very old leather-bound album we recently acquired from a collector in Ohio. In it we found the first known photograph of great-great-great grandmother, Christiana (Schlagel) Krosch.

The album was purchased from the same source who provided us the carte de visite image of Philipp Treutel. Based on his inclusion in the album, we surmised that the other photos would be related to the family tree of my grandmother, Ruby (Treutel) Hanneman. One of the first carte de visite photos we pulled from the album was labeled, “Grand Mother Krosch, Our Mother’s Mother.” It was right next to a photo of Henrietta (Krosch) Treutel. Since Henrietta was the only girl in the Krosch family of six children, it was an easy jump to conclude the photo showed her mother, the former Johanna Christiana Schlagel (1801-1884).

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Christiana (Schlagel) Krosch in an undated photograph. The portrait could have been taken the same day as that of her daughter, Henrietta, shown at the bottom of this article. The carpeting and staging of the studio are identical.

The photograph is the first image in our collection that goes back five generations. It was taken at the studio of F.D. Faulkner in Waukesha, Wisconsin. There are a number of other unlabeled photos in the album that could also be Christiana Krosch. We laid the photos side-by-side in Adobe Photoshop, and even overlaid a low-opacity version of Christiana’s head and face on the other images. The facial contours, distance between the eyes, etc., are remarkably similar. Could the other photos show Christiana later in life? The beady pupils in the right two photos were likely drawn in by the photographer.

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Could these photographs show the same woman?

If she is the woman in the far right image in the series, then we have an ever bigger discovery. That image was taken from a portrait of an elderly man and woman. The portrait was from the studios of F.L. and A.M. Bishop, who had locations in Mukwonago and Waterford, Wisconsin. Christiana and her husband John Frederick Krosch settled on a farm just north of Mukwonago after emigrating from Saxony in 1854. Based on visual comparisons, that portrait could show Frederick and Christiana Krosch. We have no images of Frederick Krosch for comparison. He died in August 1876.

Frederick and Christiana were married on May 10, 1824 at a Lutheran church in Salzwedel, Saxony, Prussia (now Germany). They had six children between 1824 and 1842. Their second youngest was Caroline Wilhelmine Henriette Krosch (born in January 1839), who was called Henrietta. According to Lutheran church records, she was baptized on January 13, 1839 in the parish at Gössnitz. We have unsourced information that she was born at Merseburg, Germany, which is not far from Gössnitz. This information conflicts our earlier belief that the family came from Jessnitz, Prussia. Many Prussian villages had very similar names, which can lead to confusion in genealogy research. More work is needed on where the family lived in Prussia.

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This portrait could show John Frederick Krosch (1799-1876) and Christiana Schlagel Krosch (1801-1884). The portrait was taken at Mukwonago, Wisconsin. ©2017 The Hanneman Archive

As documented in an earlier article, the Krosch family left Germany in June 1854 for America. Theirs was a perilous journey aboard the Barque Bertha, which encountered terrible storms and stiff trade winds that delayed arrival in New York by one week. After 40 days at sea, they reached New York, set out for Chicago and Milwaukee, and eventually reached East Troy in Walworth County. Frederick took to farming on an 80-acre plat north of Mukwonago. After Frederick Krosch’s death, Christiana moved to Minnesota to live with her son, William Frederick Krosch. She died in December 1884 and is buried at the Dobson Schoolhouse Cemetery in Elmore.

Henrietta Krosch married Philipp Treutel sometime in the late 1850s. Philipp established a blacksmith shop at Mukwonago, but he also worked as a blacksmith in Milwaukee during the 1860s. The couple had seven children between 1859 and 1879. Their youngest, Walter Treutel, became father to our grandmother, Ruby Viola (Treutel) Hanneman. The newly acquired photo album also had a carte de visite of Henrietta at a much younger age than the other two photos of her in our collection.

Family Line: Frederick and Christiana Krosch >> Henrietta (Krosch) Treutel >> Walter Treutel >> Ruby V. (Treutel) Hanneman >> Donn, David and Lavonne Hanneman.

©2017 The Hanneman Archive

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This portrait of Henrietta (Krosch) Treutel could date to the 1860s. The caption on the back reads: “Henrietta Krosch, Philipp Treutel’s wife, Mother of Oscar and Emma.” ©2017 The Hanneman Archive

 

General History, Hanneman, Military

Maj. Julius R. Hannemann: Washington’s Ceremonial Cannon Man

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It would be easy to say that Julius Rudolph Hannemann lived his life with a boom. There were likely many in Washington, D.C. in the 1870s and 1880s who wished he hadn’t created so many of them. As president of the district artillery corps, Maj. Hannemann provided the ceremonial explosive huzzahs at civic events from decoration day to the inauguration of presidents.

Although Hannemann had a distinguished record of service with Union Army units during the Civil War, one senses just a bit of resentment at the noise created by his artillery men. Hannemann commanded the artillery for Decoration Day at Arlington National Cemetery one year. A local newspaper quipped, “All persons residing in the vicinity are advised to have their lives insured.” The article ran under the headline: “The Poisoned Major to the Front.” Another article said he “has broken millions of panes of glass, the peace of the capital, more often than can be computed, by firing cannon.”

On New Year’s Eve 1875, his corps fired a 37-volley salute to the new year in Judiciary Square. According to one news account, “the ammunition for this purpose having been furnished by the War Department.” On September 18, 1880, a platoon fired a 200-gun salute to commemorate the Republican victory in Maine, according to a front-page article in the The Evening Star. In 1879, President Rutherford B. Hayes approved Hannemann’s promotion from second lieutenant to captain. Hannemann was later promoted to major.

The Evening Critic carried the news on Page 1.
The Evening Critic carried the news of the major’s death  on Page 1.

Hannemann was struck with apoplexy (possibly a stroke) at the inauguration of President James A. Garfield in early March 1881. It was this condition that eventually took his life on the morning of January 28, 1885. He was just 43 years old. “His death had been expected for some time,” wrote the The Evening Critic. “A well-known and efficient militia officer and a prominent member of the G.A.R. passes to that bourne where military parades are unknown and the weary are at rest.”

Hannemann was born in Prussia in 1842 to a military family. Upon emigrating to the United States, he volunteered for duty in the Civil War on May 17, 1861. He served with the 39th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, known as the “Garibaldi Guard.” He started as a private, but by March 1865, he was a 2nd lieutenant with the 7th New York Infantry Regiment. In June of that year, he was named adjutant of the 7th.

We don’t know of any link between Julius Rudolph Hannemann and the Hanneman family that came from Pomerania to Wisconsin in the 1860s. The major seems to have come from an area in the  Kingdom of Saxony, south and west of Pomerania.

©2015 The Hanneman Archive

Family Tales, Genealogy, Historic Photos

Henrietta: A Rare Photographic Discovery

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When 16-year-old Henrietta Krosch embarked on a long ship journey from Jessnitz Germany to America, she could not have known that her memory would echo in family history for more than 150 years. When she and her family stepped off the ship Bertha in New York in July 1854, they were  headed for Waukesha County, Wisconsin. She would meet a young blacksmith named Philipp Treutel, get married and become mother to many generations. And now we discover her photograph is still a part of living history.

Portrait of Henrietta (Krosch) Treutel, taken about 1906 in Nekoosa, Wisconsin.
Portrait of Henrietta (Krosch) Treutel, taken about 1906 in Nekoosa, Wisconsin.

Henrietta’s great-grandson, David D. Hanneman, was a pack rat. Over many decades during his 74 years, David (my Dad) tucked away countless family items, from scraps of letters to an extensive collection of old photographs. After his death in April 2007, the photograph shown above was found in his collection. Mounted on photo board with a black oval matte, the photo has the following written on the back:

“Henrietta Krosch Treutel. Married to Philipp Treutel. Parents of Lena Treutel Moody (Wm); Lisetta Treutel (Winfield); Henry Treutel (married to Josephine Garlack); Charles (Mary Miller); Oscar; Emma Treutel Carlin (Orville); Walter Treutel (Mary Helen Ladick).

The photograph likely dates to between 1901 and 1908. The Treutels moved to Wood County in 1901 and Henrietta died in 1908. The photographer’s imprint on the photo is from Nekoosa in southern Wood County.

Family Line: John Frederick Krosch >> Henrietta (Krosch) Treutel >> Walter Treutel >> Ruby (Treutel) Hanneman >> David D., Donn and Lavonne Hanneman

©The Hanneman Archive