There used to be an ad for a jam company that said, “With a name like Smuckers it has to be good”. In this case, with a DNA match with a name like Schwechheimer, it has to be a relative. This Schwechheimer match came up as a DNA match for my mom recently at MyHeritage:
The Scwechheimer Tree
The tree is a bit sketchy:
Dates are only given on the maternal side.
I can try to build out a tree at Ancestry to see if I get anywhere.
My Version of the Schwechheimer Match Tree
I like this suggestion from an Ancestry Tree for Kurt Schwechheimer:
I have written to my mom’s Schwechheimer relative in Germany to see if this is the same Kurt that is in her tree.
Meanwhile, I see that the owner of the tree for Kurt Friedrich Schwechheimer is a match to my mother at ancestry.
My Mom’s DNA Match with Karin at Ancestry
This is a modest match. Here is Karin’s tree:
This tree is unlinked, so Ancestry is not working to see where our common ancestors are. I suppose that I could try and build out the Hirschenhof (maternal) part of Karin’s tree. Hopefully, the vital records are not in Russian for that time. Interesting, I already have a Smits tree going. It must be for a relative of Karin:
This is likely for Karin’s brother.
Delving into a Latvian Genealogical Website
The go-to website is https://www.raduraksti.arhivi.lv/. I’ll give that a shot. Here are the Church records for Linden:
However, I think that this is the wrong set of records. I believe that the first Linden below is correct:
Now I am noticing some discrepancies between the two trees above. One has Friedrich born in 1894 and one in 1896. Here is a Schwechheimer record from 1894:
Unfortunately, the record is in Russian. Does Mar mean March?
Meanwhile, I heard from my mom’s Schwechheimer match and Kurt is the same as Kurt Friedrich as I expected.
Looking for Helma Lutz
Entry #32 in the Linden Church records shows an Olga Helma born in 1902:
This entry goes on to the next page:
I’m going to make a guess that this is the correct Helma. This gives us two more names: Johann Jacob Nicolai Lutz and Emilie Friederike Lutz. Here the record keeper was nice enough to put the parents’ names into more understandable (to me) German.
I think that this Johann Jacob (second entry) fits the bill:
Here is the Ancestry transription:
The father’s middle name is abbreviated. Perhaps for Michael.
Here is Emilie Friederike in 1867:
I assume that the right side of the page are sponsors or godparents. The transcription adds the day and month:
Here are Emilie’s parents:
Here the initials before Johann Gustav Lutz are unclear to me. I suppose it could mean that he had been married before?
Above there is a slight discrepancy of the spelling of Gagnus and Gangnus – which is not unusual. I have a book on the Gangnus family which I take to be the correct spelling. It is by Gustav Gangnus written in 2003.
Friederike AKA Anna Friederike Emilie Gangnus
According to Gustav Gangnus’ useful book on page 71 Friederike was born 16 Mar 1843 and Georg Michael Lutz was born 24 Oct 1841:
Looking for Johann Gustav Lutz and Anna Catherine Gangnus
I have Emilie born in 1867. I like this choice for Anna Catharina:
That would mean that Anna Catharina likely was married 1841 or before.
Here is a possibility for Michael:
However this birth was in 1849 and would have Michael at age 18 at the birth of Anna Catharina Gangnus. It seems like given enough time, I could find at least one common ancestor between my mom and this Schwechheimer match, but I will leave this to another time.
Summary and Conclusions
- A DNA match with a Schwechheimer name is very likely to be a match to my mother
- Unfortunately, the match’s great-grandparents were born during a time when the birth records were in Russian
- For Helma’s Lutz’s birth time-frame, the names of the person and the parents were also given in German in the birth records. This was helpful in going back one more generation
- At the third great-grandparent level, two Lutz ancestors married two Gangnusses
- Between the Schwechheimer and Gangnus names there are a lot of opportunities to find common ancestors, but those common ancestors have not yet been found.