The Stehlin and Wittekind Ancestors
“The family is one of nature’s masterpieces.” George Santayana CAROL WRITES: My long journey digging back into my ancestral tree has been both exhilarating and humbling. Against impossible odds, both Stehlin and Wittekind ancestors made terribly long and dangerous sea journeys from Germany as they immigrated to a new land in the mid-1840s. In order to follow the Stehlin and Wittekind stories, it may be helpful to refer to my family tree. Each Stehlin cousin would use their own name instead of mine and substitute their father’s name for my father’s name. The Schmidt cousins would use their own name and substitute the name of Aunt Dolores for my father’s name. On the Stehlin side, the history begins with Martin Stehlin (50), his wife Anna (34), and their three young children—Martin (9), Anne (8), and Marie (4). The full name of Martin’s wife was Anna Maria Linder. I have a copy of an immigration card in the name of of 9-year-old Martin...