Wedding Bell Blues

Mary Elizabeth Lentz Protz – my paternal grand-mother

 Mary Elizabeth Lentz was the grandmother I never knew.  Born in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, she was the 5th child and 3^rd daughter of William Lentz and Elizabeth Stoebener.   Mary was born on the 15^th of August, 1887 and her birth was followed by another five siblings, all male.  Mary attended St. Paul‘s German Evangelical Lutheran Church where she was a member of the choir.   Services at St. Paul’s     were in German and so we can assume that Mary spoke the “mother” language fluently.  A number of newspaper articles find Mary and her siblings involved in several community events, most often centered around the church. 

Mary found employment in one of Wilkes Barres many Lace Factories where she was eventually made a forewoman.  While being promoted to “forewoman” meant that Mary was a reliable and trustworthy worker, we can imagine that being a forewoman required her to spend much of her day on her feet, walking to and fro among the lace workers, supervising their work. 

Mary’s older brother, William, worked as a clerk in the downtown Kresge store.  We can imagine that this is where he met William C. Protz, who was also employed there.  W.C. (as he came to be known) had a brother, Charles Frederick who was also employed at the Lace Factory.  Perhaps the three young men became friends and spent free time together.  We don’t know the details but we know that W. C. eventually met our Mary.   The two became engaged and were married by Reverand Lindenstruth of St. Paul’s Church in the parlor of his home in December 1917. 

By this time, W.C. was working in the Milwaukee area for the National Tinsel Mfg. Co.  According to a newspaper article, he left Milwaukee rather suddenly and returned with his new wife, Mary.  The two settled down to begin their life together. Mary quickly became pregnant with their first son, William Frederick.  Shortly after the birth of William, Mary became pregnant again and soon delivered another son the couple named Robert Henry.  Although we don’t know for sure how the couple arrived at the names for these small tots, we do know that Mary had brothers named William, Robert and Henry.  The German custom at the time was to name the first born son after the fathers father.  W.C.’s father was named Augusta and as he was already deceased, it is possible that they named William for either Mary’s father, her brother (whom we suspect introduced the couple) or just because they liked the name.  The second son, Robert Henry was most likely named for two of her younger brothers. 

Whether it was the cold weather, W.C.’s business related travel, homesickness, or something else, W.C. and Mary filed for divorce less than three years after their marriage.   The divorce decree listed "desertion" as the reason for the split and Mary was “awarded” a $25,000 settlement which would be roughly $344,542.33 in todays’(2021) dollars.  The divorce made front page news in the January 1921 Manitowoc Pilot.                        .                                                

Mary moved to Detroit where her mother and some of her siblings had re-located.  W.C. remained in Milwaukee.  It is likely that Mary needed assistance in raising her two young sons as by this time, she was also suffering from consumption or Tuberculosis which her father had had.  She was not the only individual in her family to come down with the dread disease, her brother Albert also suffered the same malady.  Mary was eventually admitted to East Lawn Sanitarium where she died in 1934 at the age of 34, leaving her two small children in the care of her mother, Elizabeth, and her younger brother, Walter with whom she and the boys had been living.  Walter had a good job with a local bank and eventually became the bank President.  It was Walter who directed Oakland Cemetery to plant geraniums on the grave of his mother, Elizabeth, each spring.  Mary was interred nearby but within a crypt in the Mausoleum on the same grounds.

In 2013, my niece, Emily Protz Sontag and I made the trip to Detroit to visit various family related sites.  We found the house on Shaftsbury Street and because it was being remodeled, were able to enter and explore.  We were able to walk the grounds of East Lawn Sanitarium and while it has been torn down, it was easy to see and to imagine the attractiveness of the site.   We found Mary’s crypt and her mother, Elizabeth's grave in the Oakland Cemetery.  Emily, her great great grandchild, attached a butterfly to Elizabeth’s stone and we both laid a bouquet of baby’s breath at the base of Mary’s crypt.  

Legends and Lies

No one would ever knowingly want to accuse a family member of lying, however, sometimes things just don't add up.  There are several "tall tales" in our family, a few of which I have alluded to previously.  Another one concerns Charlie Chaplin.  Charlie Chaplin was a noted silent movies film star and "man about town" in the mid 20's.  My mother had told me that we were related to him but she never disclosed what the exact connection was. 

The first discrepancy I noted in the story was that Mr. Chaplin never spent much time in New York.  If you do a Google search, you can easily see that he had four wives and was situated in California much of the time.  In addition, his family was from Italy.

Why would anyone in my family make a connection with the well known Mr. Chaplin?  My mother  saved a publicity screen shot photo and another one with several Hollywood moguls and the famed Pola Negri.

  

Piecing it together; 

In July of 1923 my great grandmother, the widowed Anna Marie Boehm Krings, married a gentleman named Joseph Auer.  Joseph had been married to an Irish woman, Margaret (Mary) McCabe  who was tragically killed in December of 1922.  She and her daughter, Rita, had just left The Church of Our Lady of Perpetual Help where they had attended a special mass and were stepping into the street when a "motor car" came out of nowhere and headed straight for the pretty pair.  Marie shoved her daughter, Rita, out of the way but could not avoid being struck herself.  She died shortly thereafter at the Norwegian Hospital in Brooklyn leaving Joseph with two children, a son, 15 y/o John, and daughter, the 9 y/o Rita.   

  

Joseph was (not surprisingly) devastated by his loss and likely overwhelmed with his new responsibilities.  He met and married my great grandmother a mere seven months later.  Initially, I was told that both John and Rita disliked Anna Marie.  I am sure that assuming the role of a step mother was no easy task.  Years later, Rita lived close to and took care of Anna Marie and became "the little red-headed girl" I've written about previously. I remember meeting Rita on a visit to my great grandmother when I was about 10.  She lived in the apartment directly across from "Grandma Auer".  In her own old age, she moved to Truth and Consequences, New Mexico and kept up a correspondence with my own mother until her death.  I struck up a correspondence with Rita's daughter, Mary Parodi, after connecting with her on Ancestry.  She volunteered many memories of my great grandmother and we chatted frequently until her death.

In one 1920 Census, there is a 40 y/o Joseph Auer living on West Houston Street with his sister in law, Rose and there is no mention of a John nor a Rita.  Rose, however, is married to a man by the name of Charlie....Charlie Chaplin.  This Charlie is of French descent.   I'm pretty sure this is not our Joseph as our Joseph would be about 60 y/o in 1920.  In another Census of 1920, I'm pretty sure we see our Joseph at 60 y/o married to Margaret (prior to her death) and living on Schermerhorn Street with their two children, John and Rita.  By 1925, our Joseph and "Grandma Auer" were living on 3rd Ave. in Brooklyn and raising Joseph's two children.  Anna Marie's three sons had already married and were their own.

None of this makes any sense and in no way points to a relationship between my great grandparents and the famed Charlie Chaplin.  Where did this crazy story even originate?  Why did my mother save the photographs?  

I'm chalking this one up to someone's creative imagination and putting it to bed.

Potter's Field

How strange and sad a name is "Potter's Field".   Defined as  place for the burial of unknown, indigent or unclaimed people, no one knowingly wants to be laid to permanent rest in one.  

I have several family members buried in a paupers' grave and each time I find one, it saddens me a little more.  I guess the one that bothers me the most is our little Anna Krings.  She died shortly after birth on Feb. 11, 1906 and for whatever reason, found her final resting place in the Potter's Field on Hart's Island, a small island off of Manhatten in New York.  At least she was given a name.  Probably named for her mother, Anna Marie, who had already had three sons and another unidentified child previously.  Jim Murphy, a diligent researcher and expert on Hart's Island burials, obtained her burial location from microfiche and gave  me all I needed to add her data to the Find A Grave Index.  Sadly, Anna didn't live long enough to have a biography and so there isn't one.  This photo below is of a burial trench on Hart's Island.  More than one million people are buried here, including our little Anna.

  

Anna wasn't the only family member to be buried in common ground.  Her father, Arthur C.H. Krings, is also in an unmarked grave.  He died on May 27th 1909 and lies in St. Michael's Cemetery located in East Elmhurst, Queens.  A letter from the cemetery revealed that he shares a plot with two other men in an unmarked portion of the cemetery.  The men are buried on top of one another and there is no marker.  I inquired about placing a marker, however, the cemetery would not allow it.  Why was Arthur buried like this?  His plot is pictured below.  I believe that he and my great grandmother were no longer together when he died and she may have "washed her hands of him" as he was an alcoholic.  His COD was peritonitis due to "typhoid perforation of the illeum".  He died at St. Luke's Hospital at the age of 33.

Martha Kerner, daughter of Louis Kerner and Elsa Wilhelmina Spatz, was born the 24th of October in 1899.  She was sister to my grandmother, Rose Kerner Krings.  Martha died of diptheria on the 17th of June in 1901 having lived a mere year and a half.  Buried in the Hebrew tradition (her father was a Russian Jew), little Martha was laid to rest the next day by the Chevra Chaset Shellemis Society in the Mt. Zion Cemetery in Maspeth, New York.  While not a Potter's Field in the traditional sense, the Chevra Chaset Shellemis Society stepped in and buried persons who could not afford burials.  They had to plots within the cemetery for this purpose and the graves are unmarked.  Martha is the only person in the family to be interred here.  She was buried in Range 16, Grave 25 on either Path 18R or Path 38 R.  The cemetery has no record.

Cousins or How I figured out who Elizabeths' mother was

Jacob lived on Fell Street in Wilkes Barre with his wife, Anna Marie.  The couple raised three daughters; Elizabeth I, Elizabeth II and Mary Elizabeth.  For a long time, this was the first and only information I had about my 2x great grandfather.  The obvious question was; "Why so many Elizabeths?"  That is the question that started the quest.

Census records revealed that there were 11 years between the birth of the first Elizabeth (Elizabeth I) and the next Elizabeth (Elizabeth II). 

A marriage certificate for Jacob and Anna Marie revealed that their marriage occurred on 5 May 1853 when Elizabeth I would have been 7 years old.  Perhaps Anna Marie was not Elizabeth I's mother.  If not, then who was?  What could I learn about Elizabeth I?   Wilkes Barre newspaper records showed that my first Elizabeth married a Henry Steinhauer.  Henry was a prominent citizen in Wilkes Barre and thus frequently "in the news".  The couple had several children but I didn't need to go forward, I needed to go backward.  

I found Elizabeth Steinhauers obituary from 1 Feb 1923.  I already knew the names of her siblings, all in attendance when she died, so I could confirm that this was, in fact, her obituary.  In addition, a "cousin" was listed; Mrs. Charles E. Heerlein.....who was this?

Searching, I found Mrs. Chas. E. Heerlein in several records and her husband, Charles E. Heerlein in even more.  Their marriage certificate showed that they were married in Alleghany, Pennsylvania and listed Charles brides name as "Lizzie Veiock".  The same document showed that Lizzie was from Lewisburg, Ohio which is where Elizabeth was from.  Lizzies' father was listed on the marriage certificate as George Veiock who was married to a Catherine Bott.  Oh my Goodness!!!  George was an older brother of Apollonia Veiock! 

Apollonia Veiock was Elizabeth I's mother!  Apollonia was Jacobs' first wife!  Apollonia died when Elizabeth was just one year old and just a few months after her arrival in the United States in 1847.  This, at last, confirmed the connection between the Stuebners and the Veiocks.

Leo and the Poppies

It wasn't remarkably beautiful.  It wasn't even signed.  It was a still life of poppies, red poppies filling and spilling over a bowl.  The frame was an old, burnished gold frame.  The picture had been my mothers.  She said that my great grandfather, Leo, had painted it.  She had a soft spot for this grandfather - the first spouse of Elsa Hedrich Spatz Koerner Haegeman. 

Somehow, I ended up with this picture.  In my mind, it simply wasn't attractive enough to hang, didn't fit with my "decor".  I pushed it from pillar to post for years.  Finally, approaching retirement and downsizing, I let it go to Goodwill.   I hope someone claimed it, gave it a loving home, especially now.

Fast forward to 2017 and my genealogy research has revealed that this great grandfather of mine was from Poland.  A connection on a Polish social media page was discussing poppies and their significance and connection to Poland.  Of course!  Those colorful native dress costumes are covered with embroidered poppies!  Well, turns out that the red poppy is the national flower of Poland.  It seems that after World War I, fields that had been run over by battles burst into bloom with poppies.  Since that time, the flower has become a symbol of that war.  Perhaps my great grandfather associated the picture with his homeland, with relatives who perhaps were lost in Poland during the war, or simply liked poppies.  

Mystery Meeting - 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks

My paternal grand-father, W.C. Protz immigrated to the United States in 1905, docking at Ellis Island on April 12th.   After an arduous voyage across the Atlantic on the Kaiser Wilhelm, William or W.C. as he was called, wasted little time traveling to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania and finding accomodations with the Strauch family at 254 Kidder Street.  By 1917,  he had married his first wife and mother of his two sons, William and Robert.   Her name was Mary Elizabeth Lentz and she was the daughter of William and Elizabeth Stuebner Lentz.  What was going on in the years between his arrival in 1905 and his marriage in 1917? How did he meet Mary?

    

W.C became a notable businessman, eventually establishing a tinsel manufacturing concern in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  Before this, however, in a 1908 directory, he is employed as a book-keeper.  I speculated that he may have become a book keeper for the S.S. Kresge company.  Interestingly, the manager of that store was William F. Lentz who happened to be the elder brother of Mary.  Was it possible that W.C. met Mary through a relationship with his co-worker, William?  I had fun imagining William inviting W.C. home for dinner and sparks flying across the family dinner table. But was that what really happened?  

Recently, I was asked to help edit a book that included information about my grand-father and his tinsel company.  This led to re-checking the old Wilkes Barre directories and there I found W.C. living at 254 Kidder Street in 1909.  His occupation was listed as “weaver”.  Weaver?  What the?  It didn’t take long before a thought popped into my head.....Mary had been a weaver at a lace factory in town.  In fact, she was a forelady there.  Could W.C.’s first job in Wilkes Barre have been as a weaver in the lace factory where Mary worked?  Did Mary introduce W.C. to her brother, William, who then offered W.C. a position at S.S. Kresge?  Wow... the timing of this possibility was more likely!

By 1912, my grand-father had moved to Detroit, Michigan where he is listed in that city directory as being employed as a "floor-walker".  He gave a home address as the local YMCA.  By 1914, he was working as a clerk in the S.S. Kresge store in Detroit.  William Lentz, in the meantime, had married and moved to Detroit where he was the manager of the same store.  I suspect that since William was the manager, he may have offered the clerk position to W.C. who was happy to take it.  It wasn't until
1918 that W.C. moved on to Milwaukee to begin work in his tinsel company.

W.C. returned to Wilkes-Barre in 1917 to marry Mary Elizabeth Lentz in what was described as "a quiet, but pretty wedding".

A New Daughter of Union Veterans of the Civil War

One will never know unless one is willing to hunt it down but some of us have ancestors dating back to the Civil War, if not earlier.  For years, all I heard was that my ancestors were fairly recent immigrants to this country.  Never did I hear that I had a great great grandfather drafted into service in this bitter War between the states.  That would mean that he was alive and living on American soil in the mid 1860's.

In fact, Johan Jacob Stoebener was very much alive and living on Fell Street in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania.  At the time of his marriage to Anna Marie Christofel in 1853, he listed his occupation as "miner".  He later moved ahead to become a "founder" and boiler maker most likely in Vulcan Iron Works  ( http://www.american-rails.com/vulcan-iron-works.html ) established in 1849 to manufacture locomotives and steam engines.

This being his second marriage (his first to Apollonia Veiock while living in Vorderweidenthal, Germany), he and Anna Marie raised two daughters of their own; Mary and Elizabeth.  Mary grew and married Henry Kropp while Elizabeth married William Lentz, became mother to Mary Lentz who became mother to my dad, Robert Henry Protz.

Johan Jacob's story of military involvement was brief but heroic none the less.  In the fall of 1862, Pennsylvania was called to organize a large body of militia to defend both the state and the Union army in the bloody battles fought in Northern Virginia.

Samuel P. Bates wrote in his History of the Pennsylvania Volunteers (http://www.pa-roots.com/pacw/1862militia/index.html) to tell of the organization and service of the Pennsylvania Militia of 1862 (vol 5, pg. 1147-1148).  He told of how then Governor Andrew Curtin issued a proclamation calling on the people of Pennsylvania to arm and prepare for defense.  According to the proclamation, all businesses were to be closed at 3pm so that proprietors and customers alike could form companies and regiments throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and to be drilled and instructed as necessary.  All able bodied men were enrolled immediately for the defense of the state and provided with 60 rounds of ammunition.  Sixty thousand men were called and directed to move to the state capital.  Meanwhile, the enemy from the South pressed forward threatening the Pennsylvania border.  Jacob became part of Regiment 19, Company K and became prepared to do battle.

On September 16th and 17th, the Battle of Antietam raged but saw the rebels defeated and retreating.

The "Emergency" as it had been called was declared over and the militia regiments were ordered to return home where they were disbanded.  The longest period of service for any of the men being one month.

Surely his wife, Anna Marie and his daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, were relieved if not over-joyed to welcome their father home.  Jacob continued to live and work in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania until his death in 1897.  He and Anna Marie are buried in the City Cemetery of Wilkes-Barre.

Johan Jacob Stoebener.....our Civil War ancestor and link to the DUVCW.