THE ABRAHAM FAMILY TOWNS – GERMANY’S SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN REGION

Visiting the northern Germany towns of my Abraham ancestry was truly an experience to remember for me. Although we did not connect with any family descendants, we did visit places having direct family historic meaning. Most of these places we had learned about through family research done by other family members over the years.

All of the family towns are located within about 20 kilometers of the North Sea. Yes, it can be windy; in fact, the town of Husum is a major center of wind power business and research in Germany. There are huge HUGE wind powered electricity generators all along this coastal region.

HUSUM – AUGUST 27^th to 30th

In the town of Husum, we stayed at the charmingly funky Hotel Jever-Stuben, run by the Muller family (Photo below left). The hotel had only eight rooms, all located on the upper two floors. Below was the Jever-Stubin Restaurant. Peter Muller greeted us at the bar when we checked in, and thankfully he spoke some English. The other family members did not, but we all somehow managed to communicate…amidst some laughter.

Our room was on the third floor, reached by a steep and creaky staircase; no elevator this time. No problem though, we’ve had worse climbs. The room was large (twice the size of Denmark’s CabInn, our benchmark for tiny rooms. Here in Husum we had only German TV, so we quickly began feeling out of touch.

  

Fortunately, we did have wireless internet, but the connection was so weak in our room we had to set up in the public hall near the staircase. Inconvenient? Sure, but these are the kinds of things we’ve learned to roll with when travelling. Even in the US we run into such inconveniences.

Every day started with a typical German breakfast; breads, jams, cold cuts, lox, cheeses, boiled eggs, cereal, yogurt, fruits, juice and coffee…no latte’s.  This was included in our room price. The balance of each day we spent visiting the other four nearby family towns, Lunden, Tonning, Garding and Freiderichstadt.

Husum was special in itself, as the church my great-grandparents, Gustav Abraham and Christine Carsten were married in was just a few minute walk from our hotel, in the town’s main square (Photos below). We were able to walk inside the church, Saint Marienkirche, on our first day in Husum. It’s difficult to describe my feelings standing in this building knowing of its distant link to my family ancestry. Let’s just say it was a deep and profound sense of connection to my father’s paternal family roots.

Maury's great-great grandparents married in this church.

 

Speaking of the Abraham family roots, it’s important to understand the historic political context of this region. Although my great-grandparents did emigrate from Germany, the region they were born and grew up in was under Danish rule, not Germany. It only came under German rule in1864, well after they were born. So, when my grandmother used to say the Abraham family was of Danish descent, seems she knew what she was talking about.

This does raise a fundamental question; what was it that caused them to leave their homeland? Was it the opportunities and freedoms available in the United States, or was it repressive conditions at home? We may never know for certain. However, we do plan a visit to a major immigration center in Bremerhaven on the next leg of our travels. Perhaps we’ll learn more then.

DAY TRIP TO RIBE, DENMARK – SUNDAY, AUGUST 28

No, this is not a misprint. We DID drive back into Denmark from our base in Husum. We wanted to visit the City of Rebe on Denmark’s western coast, but could not work out the logistics to do it by train from Vejle. So, because the family towns are so close to the Denmark border and because we now have a car, it just made more sense to visit today.

Ribe was about a one-hour drive north from Husum, following a route just inland from the North Sea. The morning weather was mixed. It had rained heavily last night, but appeared to be breaking up into scattered showers. However, as we proceeded north, the sky became increasingly dark. At about the halfway point, the skies just opened up; a massive downpour that made driving nearly impossible, as the wipers struggled to keep ahead of the rain.

We were nearly at a point of turning back when the rain lightened to a sprinkle, then a mist. Then surprisingly, we could see blue sky breaking through ahead. By the time we reached Ribe, the weather was vastly improved; we were easily able to find parking just a short (and dry) walk from the city center.

Ribe is Denmark's oldest surviving city, dating back to 705. It began as an open trading market on the north bank of the Ribe River where it runs into the North Sea.In Viking times Ribe was a bustling international trade center which made it an ideal starting point for Christian missionaries from Hamburg to begin the process of the Christianization of Scandinavia. It still contains many buildings from medieval times (Photo below right).

An old half-timbered building in central Ribe.

 

In our travels we are always looking for church towers to climb, partly because they offer expansive views, partly because we ‘like’ to challenge our abilities. RIbe’s Our Lady Maria Cathedral offered just such a challenge with its 248 steps to the top. The Cathedral  is located in the heart of Ribe, dates back to the early 1100’s and is considered Denmark's best preserved Romanesque building (Photo below).

The Cathedral interior.

So, we begin the climb, starting with the old stone steps we’ve come to expect. This one however, soon changed to wood frame stairs hugging the inside walls of the square tower. Fortunately, they seemed well-constructed, so the climb was comfortable and relatively safe (Photos below).

Jeannie peers through the timber from the tower steps.

Maury...skillfully navigating the steep tower step

From the tower top the views were in all directions and clearly show the typical Denmark countryside as well as the compact nature and red roofs of thetown below (Photos below). 

After the tower climb, we walked the narrow streets lined mostly with well-kept medieval buildings. After enjoying an early dinner late afternoon, we began the return drive to Husum. In this part of Denmark and northern Germany we had noticed numerous thatched-roof buiodings, some quite large. We had seem on particularly nice example on our morning drive, so we made it a point to stop and photograph it on our return drive (Photo below right). 

An exemplary thatched-roof home south of Ribe.

LUNDEN - MONDAY, AUGUST 29

Lunden was the birthplace of my great-grandfather Gustav Abraham. My great-great-grandparents, Peter Abraham and Anna Stien moved to Lunden following their marriage, where they raised a family of five boys and one girl. A sixth child died in infancy.

Peter had been raised on the Abraham family farm in Tonning. Anna, a widow, lived in the home she had shared with her husband in Lunden. After Gustav and Anna married, they moved to Lunden and lived in the same home. Based on information provided by a Utah cousin, Larry Abraham, we were able to locate the street the home was on and photograph what we are fairly certain was their home. Larry described it as “a mansion…the largest home on the street” (Photo below right).

Most probable to be the Abraham family home in Lunden.

However, for sake of accuracy, we photographed several other large and stately homes on the same street. We will e-mail all these to Larry, as he once visited the home when an Abraham still lived there, and should be able to confirm the correct home.

We visited the Lutheran Church, Saint Laurentius, where my Abraham ancestors likely attended. During those years, they were of the Lutheran faith. The church structure itself is quite old, dating back to the 12^th century. Though it has been enlarged over the centuries, the middle section from 1140 A.D. remains an integral part of the current church
(Photo below left).

A probable Abraham family church...Lunden's Saint Laurentius.

The church is surrounded by underground family tombs, the entrance to each covered over with a large stone slab (Photo below right). However, the identifications engraved on these stones are so weathered as to be unreadable. It seems unlikely one would have been for the Abraham family since most of that family was in Tonning. 

Tomb covers around Saint Laurentius Church.

Jeannie just HAD to explore the one open tomb! Of course, I didn't hesitate to follow.

Not easily discouraged, however, we did visit the local cemetery. We spent well over an hour methodically walking the row upon row of headstones, seeking out the names Abraham, Stien and Carstens. We did locate several Carstens burials, but no Abrahams or Stiens.

TONNING - MONDAY, AUGUST 29th & 30th

Visiting Tonning was filled with anticipation, as this was the town my great- great-grandfather Peter was born in and where the family apparently lived for several generations. Cousin Larry Abraham visited family here more than twenty years ago and actually visited the old family home. Based on information he provided, we were able to locate this Abraham home and surrounding farm buildings and lands.

The farm is located just outside today’s Tonning and is named on the map as Schrapenbull. It consists of two brick homes and several farm buildings (Photos below). We did not attempt to contact anyone in the homes because of the language barrier. If any descendants still live there, they would be very distant relatives for sure. I was just not comfortable trying to make contact under the circumstances. It was enough to me just to see this place that was such a part of my heritage.

The Abraham family home for over 250 years.

A secondary home on the Abraham family farm.

We spent time in Tonning’s town center walking the many narrow streets of medieval buildings. Many of these buildings most certainly existed in the time of my great-grandfather and my great-great-grandparents. One of the highlights was visiting the old Saint Laurentius Church (same name as in Lunden) located in the town center.

Saint Laurentius is a Luthern church dating back to the mid-1600’s. It is a brick structure, similar to so many buildings in this region, and from the exterior is not particularly remarkable (Photo below left). 

Saint Laurentius Church in Tonning.

However, step inside and the impression changes altogether. We have visited hundreds of old churches in our travels, but this one had one feature we’d never seen before; the entire ceiling was of wooden planks, completely adorned in religious art (Photo below right). Such art is not uncommon, but seeing the art on a wooden ceiling was a first for us.

A spectacular wood plank ceiling.

Once again, we did the obligatory cemetery search. Jeannie is so patient…helping me search row after row of gravestones. She’s the one that found the only two Abrahams in the Tonning cemetery (Photos below left and center). We also found several more Carstens gravestones here. For now we have no way of knowing of any possible relationship to my family. We can only speculate, but further research over time may show a link.

GARDING – MONDAY, AUGUST 29

The town of Garding is about 10 kilometers west of Tonning, and is the birthplace of my great-grandmother Christine (Carsten) Abraham. We had done some advance research on Garding during our trip planning, including reviewing Google’s maps and aerial photographs. This research disclosed nothing particularly interesting about the town, in fact our expectation was it was just a small town of scattered homes and a few businesses…kind of a suburban town.

Well, we were completely surprised! Garding’s central area turned out to be medeival urban in character, and not surprisingly anchored by an old church. We really had no further information about Christine Carsten, but it was not hard to imagine that, as a child or teen she would have been walking the streets here amidst many of the same buildings. Perhaps she even was born in or lived in one here in this, the oldest area of the town (Photos below left and right).

Central Garding...the church is out of the photo to the right.

A typical narrow medieval street in Garding.

FRIEDERICHSTADT - TUESDAY, AUGUST 30

Friederichstadt was the last of the family towns we visited in this area.  It was not high on our list as the family connection was somewhat remote; an uncle eight generations back, Mathias Abraham, was an attorney here. We had done no research on this town, but because we had the extra time, decided to pay a visit.

Friederichstadt is surrounded by water.

Again, we were pleasantly surprised!

Friederichstadt is situated at the confluence of the Eider and Treene Rivers, and with a canal on one side is essentially an island (Map photo right). At its central core is the Am Markt square and park, surrounded by shops, restaurants and residences.

The old Rathaus (City Hall) overlooks the Am Markt square (Photo below right). I imagine back in the early 1700’s Mathias probably did business in the Rathaus and likely had his office in one of the old buildings we were observing (Photo below left).

Friederichstadt's 18th century Rathaus (City Hall).

Buildings overlooking Friederichstadt's Am Markt square

It was now late afternoon and we returned to Husum for some sunset photos of the church, a bite of dinner and to prepare for tomorrow’s departure. We’ll be off to historic Lubeck, above Hamburg near the Baltic sea, where we will spend the next four nights.