Search | Advanced Search | Search Families | Search Site| Title | Email message(s) from D. Roepke | |
| Short Title | Email message(s) from D. Roepke | |
| Source ID | S1952 | |
| Text | 5 OCT 2007: I have been researching Clara Ouart (1893-1964). She was the wife of Herman Martin Senske (1889-1963) of Otter Tail County Minnesota. I have attached a picture of their wedding in 1915. I live in Canada and the Minnesota Senskes are descendants of my Senske great-great-grandparent’s family. I believe she was a daughter of the couple William Ouart and Amelia Greiff that you show in your information. Clara died in Becker County, MN and this is her death information; certid# 1984-MN-019374 SENSKE, CLARA LUELLA Date of Birth: 03/12/1893 Place of Birth: OUT OF STATE Mother Maiden Name: GREIFF Date of Death: 08/22/1984 County of Death: BECKER From this I determined that Clara was the daughter of an Ouart father and a Greiff mother. In the 1920 and 1930 US Census Clara gives her birth state as Nebraska, her father’s birth state as Illinois and her mother’s birth country as Germany. Clara is in the 1900 US Census of Otter Tail County MN living with parents William Ouart, Amelia Ouart and siblings Theodore and Louis. This matches very well with your information on the family. I traced William Ouart to Kewanee Township, Henry County, Illinois. His marriage to Amelia is in the Illinois State Records. Groom Bride Date Vol./Page License No. County OUART, WILLIAM F C GREIFF, AMELIE 02/24/1885 001/0185 00002004 HENRY Where I am having difficulty is tracing William’s parents. I believe (but am not certain) that this is William in the 1880 US Census of Kewanee; Household: Name Relation Marital Gende Race Age Birthplace Occupation Father's Mother's Status Birthplace Birthplace Abbie A. OUART Self W Female W 37 PRUSSIA Keeping House PRU PRU William OUART Son S Male W 16 IL Farmer PRU PRU Edward OUART Son S Male W 11 IL At Home PRU PRU. Frank OUART Son S Male W 8 IL PRU PRU. Ernst OUART Son S Male W 6 IL PRU PRU. Henry OUART Son S Male W 4 IL PRU PRU. Source Information: Census Place Kewanee, Henry, Illinois This is where my information and yours diverge a bit. If this is William in the 1880 census, his mother is a widow so his father died prior to 1880. Your information shows William’s father as Karl Ouart (1844-1920). I am not certain of my identification of William in the 1880 census. There are four William Ouarts in the 1880 census of Henry County and the one I have chosen is the one closest to Williams known age of 16 in the spring of 1880. However this is census information and needs to be considered as not 100% correct. The Henry County Genealogical Society shows the following information at http://www.rootsweb.com/~ilhcgs/cert/brandt_fredreka.htm for children of Christopher Brandt; Name: Albertina (maiden name Brandt) Born: 13 Nov 1842 Place: Prussia DIED: 24 Dec 1917 Place: IL Kewanee SPOUSE: C. F. August Ouart MARRIAGE DATE: It may be possible that ‘Abbie’ was Albertina Brandt. Let me know if any of this makes sense to you. I don’t have access to any pre-1880 US Census records that may help clear this up. Regards ==================== 05 OCT 2007 I did find Amelia Greiff in the http://www.castlegarden.org website. She arrived at Castle Garden on 13 June 1873 in the Ship 'Baltimore' with her parents. August Greiff Laborer 40 M Dorothea Greiff 39 F Emilie Greiff 7 F Rudolf Greiff 4 M Wilhelm Greiff 10 M The same family is in the 1880 US Census of Kewanee Township. Amelia was probably named ‘Emilia’ in German. The Prussians used feminine and masculine versions of the same name; Emil & Emilia, Wilhelm & Wilhelmina, Albert & Albertina, etc. Regards ==================== 05 OCT 2007 You probably already know that the Ouarts were Huguenots from the Uckermark in Brandenburg. A ‘mark’ in German notes a border region and the Uckermark was the eastern border region of Brandenburg in older times. I live near Niagara Falls and over 500 Germans came here in the 1830’s including many Huguenots so I am somewhat familiar with them. There is a Huguenot Society in Denmark and they have excellent information online. This link http://www.koudal.eu/slaegt/d433.htm#P19364 should take you to many Ouart families from the Uckermark. ==================== 9 OCT 2007 I was wondering if you or someone that you know has access to www.ancestry.com. They have emigration records for Brandenburg. I can see a little bit of their records for free and can see a Christian Friedrich August ‘Quart’ who was born in 1837 and emigrated in 1855. I was wondering if this person might be the C.F. August Ouart of Kewanee Township who was born in 1837. If I am correct, the Ouart family might also be in the 1860 US Census somewhere, again possibly under ‘Quart’ instead of ‘Ouart’. Regards ==================== 9 OCT 2007 Your attached information is great because it gives a birth date (day, month and year). I think the whole ‘Quart’ family that emigrated in 1855 looks like this; Jean Quart 49 1806 Elisabeth Quart, Geb. Rouvel 45 1810 Elisabeth Marie Wilhelmine Quart 23 1832 Johann Wilhelm Quart 20 1835 Christian Friedrich August Quart 18 1837 Peter Quart 16 1839 Caroline Wilhelmine Quart 14 1841 Johann Friedrich Quart 10 1845 Ernestine Emilie Quart 9 1846 Is it possible that you could jot down the birth dates for the rest of the family? This webpage http://www.ouart.net/Leere%20Seite%202-Dateien/fam/fam00006.html shows a family that almost matches the names above. It shows Jean Ouart born 6 April 1806 and his wife Elisabeth Rouvel born 10 Aug 1810. I am hoping the date in the Brandenburg records might match the website’s dates. My first link to C.F. August Ouart was at the Henry County Genealogical Society http://www.rootsweb.com/~ilhcgs/cert/brandt_fredreka.htm for children of Christopher Brandt; Name: Albertina (maiden name Brandt) Born: 13 Nov 1842 Place: Prussia DIED: 24 Dec 1917 Place: IL Kewanee SPOUSE: C. F. August Ouart MARRIAGE DATE: I was able to confirm the marriage at the Illinois State Records webpage at http://www.ilsos.gov/GenealogyMWeb/marrsrch.html . A gentleman named Monty Power shows the C.F. August Ouart family in his WorldConnect information at http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:731704&id=I35192408 . His information is from 2001. I think I emailed him in the past but did not get an answer. His link to the Ouart family appears to be through Ella Marie Ouart-Whetstone. Do you know him? A grand-daughter of Clara Ouart-Senske wrote to me; I only have one picture of William and Amelia Ouart, it is when they are older and kind of far away. The only information I have about them is that William Frederick Ouart was born in Kewaunee, Ill. on December 3, 1863. However, I have no information on his parents. I have not tried searching birth records in Ill. Amelia (Greiff) Ouart was born May 11th, 1866 in Germany. She came to America in 1871 with her parents and settled in Ill. first in Springfield then in Kewaunee. When Amelia and William married on Feb. 24, 1885 they moved to Lodgepole, Nebraska, then moved to Perham, MN in 1896. ==================== 9 OCT 2007 Thanks for the images. The birth date for Elisabeth Rouvel-Ouart in those Brandenburg records matches that of Elizabeth Ouart in the Garden of Peace Cemetery in Kewanee so I think we are on to something here. I will wait to see what else you can find out in the coming days. One more thing; this is the family of Peter Ouart in the 1880 US Census (just in case you have not seen it before) Household: Name Relation Marital Gender Age Birthplace Occupation Father's Mother's Status Birthplace Birthplace Peter QUAST Self M Male 42 PRU Farmer PRU PRU Othelia QUAST Wife M Female 35 PRU Keeping House PRU PRU Emma QUAST Dau S Female 11 IL At Home PRU PRU Louisa QUAST Dau S Female 9 IL PRU PRU Albert QUAST Son S Male 8 IL PRU PRU William QUAST Son S Male 7 IL PRU PRU John QUAST Son S Male 5 IL PRU PRU Louis QUAST Son S Male 4 IL PRU PRU Othelia QUAST Dau S Female 1 IL PRU PRU Elizabeth QUAST Mother W Female 67 PRU At Home PRU PRU Elizabeth QUAST Sister S Female 47 PRU At Home PRU PRU Paul STRIKER Other S Male 22 PRU Works On Farm PRU PRU The mother Elizabeth and the sister Elizabeth are possible matches for two of the ‘Quart’ women in that 1855 emigration list. Curiously the Illinois State Records has a database of pre-1916 deaths but there is not one ‘Ouart’ name in it. The family members must be there but so horribly miss-spelled that I can’t find them. Regards ==================== 12 OCT 2007 It seems that most Ouarts can be traced back to the villages of Gross Ziethen and Klein Ziethen (literally ‘Big Ziethen’ and ‘Little Ziethen’ in the Uckermark area of Brandenburg. This link http://www.hugenotten-uckermark.de/Kirchen/16247_gross-ziethen.htm will take you to the churches in Gross Ziethen. Of note is the bottom photo of the ‘French Reformed’ (Huguenot) Parish. The text at the bottom translates to; Community Groß-Ziethen French-Reformed After the 30-Years War, in 1650 only 2 cottagers lived in Groß Ziethen, by 1653 there was only one, the other drowned. By 1686, the first French Refugees settled almost completely in the devastated villages Groß-Ziethen and Klein-Ziethen. Unlike other Uckermark villages, they didn't form the minority there but were the majority of the inhabitants. The parish of the French-Reformed community of Groß-Ziethen is unoccupied at the moment but should be occupied again soon. So, the big parsonage stands partially empty today. It appears that two Ouart brothers came to Kewanee in the middle 1800’s. We have discussed the family of Jean and Elizabeth Ouart. Jean’s brother Abraham (1818- 1897) and his wife Caroline/Karoline Krojahn? (1823?-1880) also came to Kewanee in 1861 with eight children and this explains the large number of Ouart names in Kewanee. Abraham is the A.B. Ouart buried in the St. Michael’s Cemetery and I would think the rest of the Ouart names there are part of his family. You can piece together Abraham’s family in the Brandenburg emigration records at www.ancestry.com by looking for the ‘Quart’ family that left in 1861. I think it is possible that a married sister or two of the Ouart brothers might have also come to America. Do you have an LDS Family History Center near you? Their online list of records indicates that they have microfilms of the church books for the French Reformed Church at Gross Ziethen. Topic Germany, Preußen, Brandenburg, Groß Ziethen (Kr. Angermünde) - Church records Titles Kirchenbuchduplikat, 1796-1874 Französisch-Reformierte Kirche Groß Ziethen (Kr. Angermünde) ==================== 12 OCT 2007 I have a Family History Center just up the street from me. I don’t know if the rules at all FHCs are the same but I can tell you about my local one. I am not a member of the LDS church. The local FHC has two evenings that non-members can use library. There are no user fees at my FHC. The center is manned by a volunteer who can give you some basic help on where the books and microfilms are located in the library and how to use a microfilm reader but they don’t assist you in your actual research. My FHC has some basic microfilms onsite (US census and the like) but something as specialized as the Gross Ziethen microfilm would have to be ordered in for which they do charge a nominal postage fee. I do see you have added some information to your website. The 1900 census image for ‘Aggie’ Ouart that you show is very useful. The 1900 census, as you probably know, is one of the best ones available. People gave their birth month and year in that census so we can use it to cross-check people like ‘Aggie’ who gave November 1842 which agrees with what we know about Albertina Brandt. Also useful is that mothers gave the number of children that were born to them and the number of children that are still living. In Albertina’s case both numbers are ‘5’ so you know that who many children you need to account for. That census also gives the year of immigration to the US which can help find a person’s name on a passenger list. The census gives the number of years that the person has been married which can help track down a marriage. You do need to be careful what you see online. This link http://www.ouart.com/Other%20Ouart's%20b.htm will take you to the ‘Descendants of Charles Frederick Gustavus Ouart’ which should be the family of C.F. August Ouart and Albertina Brandt. The name used by it is ‘Charles Frederick Gustavus’ which may or may not be correct plus the list shows seven children of August and Albertina which we know from that 1900 census is also probably incorrect. I like to have multiple sources of information and so far having two sources for the exact name of C.F. August has eluded me. I have other Huguenot folk I have traced and given names can be problem for them as they usually have two versions. They were baptized in a French Reform church with French names however they also had German names that were used in civil records. William is an interesting example; the person would be baptized as ‘Guilliame’ (French version of William), he would be known as ‘Wilhelm’ in German records and probably would change his name to William if he came to America. ==================== 15 OCT 2007 I tried to work away at the Ouart information online and assemble it into a single file. It is a bit of a ‘process of elimination’ exercise; I tried to find all the German-born Ouarts and find out who they married to see if I could positively place C.F. August Ouart into the correct family. I have too many loose ends to come to a definite conclusion but thought I would pass on the information to you in case you can use it, verify it or expand on it. I used the pre-1916 Illinois Marriage records as a starting point and tried to find the families that all the Ouart names belonged to. I don’t know if I would publish the file yet. In my rush I did not quote all the sources plus I have made some assumptions that need further study. You have access to those 1900 US Census and may be able to clear up some of the assumptions. I have attached a Registry for the Descendants of Jean Ouart and also a working file of Ouart information in ‘Ouart.doc’. I have put the names of people I have been able to resolve in a bold font. Some thoughts; 1) There seem to be no pre-1916 Ouart deaths in the Illinois Statewide Death Index pre-1916. I tried all sorts of spelling variations and could not come up with any matches. Curious. 2) There is a John F. Ouart family in Kansas that may be that of Johan Friedrich Ouart born 23rd May 1845 (son of Jean Ouart and Elisabeth Rouvel) 3) There is a William Julius Ouart family that I can’t link to a parent. William Julius was born in 1862 and married Minnie Zang in 1884. He may be a son of one of the German Ouart families that came to America but was born after they arrived in America. Maybe he can be found in the 1870 census. 4) Information about the family of Abraham Ouart (1818-1897) is difficult to find. You might be able to find him in the 1870 census. 5) I show Johan Wilhelm Ouart (1835-?) married to Augusta Rouvel (1839-?) in 1867. This seems to fit the 1880 census information for a William and Augusta Ouart living in Kewanee however some of the children in that census were born prior to 1867. It is possible that this might have been a second marriage for William and possibly Augusta as well. More study is required. 6) There are children of ‘F.U. and U. Quart’ born in 1860’s and buried in the St. Michael’s Cemetery. I cannot figure out who F. U. and U’ might be but we can estimate their birth year as 1830-1840. That should make him one of the German-born Ouarts but it is not obvious which one he is. ==================== 23 OCT 2007 I have looked a little further and found two sisters of Jean and Abraham Ouart that also came to Henry County. Anna Louise ‘Louise’ Ouart, born 6th May 1823 settled in Burns Township. Her husband was Johann Friedrich Lehmann (later John Lehman) and they had at least two sons John (b. 1846) and William (b. 1850). There were probably more children than just those two. It is possible that Louise came together with her brother Jean in 1855. Another sister also settled in Burns Township. Marie Ouart (b. 17 April 1815), her husband David Couve (b. 1810), son Johan Friedrich Wilhelm Couve (b. 1841) and daughters Marie Auguste (b. 1843), Marie Emilie (b. 1846) and Marie Louise (b.1850) might have come to America in 1855 as well. This website http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=dixonsmith&id=I28067 shows the family of John and Louise Lehman and the same person shows David Couve at http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=dixonsmith&id=I27870 . The Couve family were Huguenots and the original name was ‘Couvé’. I think there were a number of Lehman families in Henry County and it is difficult to determine which ones were children of John and Louise Lehman. | |
| Linked to | Albertina A. Brandt Christopher Brandt Amelia Greiff August Greiff Rudolf Greiff Wilhelm Greiff Christian Friedrich August Ouart Clara Luella Ouart Edward A. Ouart Ernst Ouart Frank Ouart Henry A. Ouart Louis William Ouart Theodore Ouart William F. C. Ouart Herman Martin Senske Dorothea Unknown | |
| Photos |  | Wedding photo of H.M. Senske and Clara Ouart Thank you to D. Roepke for sending this image. |
| Documents |  | Modified Register for Jean OUART Descendants of Jean OUART 1786. Thank you to D. Roepke for researching and assembling this 10 page PDF document. |