First, however, I had to de-code the sumbols used in German genealogical research. On the family tree were the following symbols: *, + , oo , and ~ . I did not know what they and other symbols meant, but thanks to Google, I was able to find out. * means born. + means died. oo means married and ~ means baptized. So with this code, I was able to decipher the various dates offered. However, there were still some words under the names that I did not understand.
For instance, I did not know the meaning of the word Colon or the word Colon followed by a name, such as Thomes. I found out that Colon is the word used to designate that the person is a "farmer" while Colon Thomes means that the person is a farmer on the Thomes farmland. In some cases, it means the farmer inherited the tenancy through marriage and changed his name to that of the farm. This is what happened to my ancestor Christian Mathias Esch who changed his name to Wrocklage when he married so that he could claim his wife's farm.
Up until I had this research done, I did not know the names of the parents of Christian Mathias Esch Wrocklage (my 3rd great grandfather), nor the name of the father of Hermann Frecker (my 2nd great grandfather). Now I have all four names of the parents. The father of Christian Mathias Esch Wrocklage is Conrad Esch and he was a farmer. Christian's mother was Maria Angela Gartmann. They were married October 26, 1777, so they were probably born around the mid-1700s.
I knew previously that the mother of Hermann Frecker was Angela Monter, but I did not know the name of his father. Angela had come to this country either with or close to the time her adult children, Clara Philomena Frecker and Hermann Henry Frecker, had emigrated. She is buried in Delphos, St. John's Cemetery. I do not believe Hermann's father emigrated and it is likely he died before the rest of the family left Germany. He was a soldier and his name was Franz Eberhard Frecker. He was born in 1787 in Oesede. Hermann's mother's name on her birth and/or baptismal record was Cahtarina Engel Monter. Engel means Angel, hence the use of the name Angela in America.
I'm hoping to soon receive more information on the siblings of some of these ancestors which will help me to identify any relationships with other emigrees from Germany who have the same surnames. For example, there are several Monters who lived in Delphos, the town where Angela Monter Frecker and her two children settled. I would like to know if any of these Monters were Angela's siblings or cousins. It seems likely that Angela would have settled in an area where she had kin, yet without more information, I do not know how closely related these Monters are.
In the meantime, here is a picture of the interior of the Cathedral in Osnabruck where some of my ancestors were married.
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