52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Week 16 An "Out of Place" Burbach

Johan Burbach, my great-uncle, was born in Villmar, Hessen Nassau on 15 April 1854 and baptized on 16 April 1854 in Sts. Peter and Paul Church in Villmar.[i] He was welcomed by his parents Georg Burbach and Catherina Caspari.

In 1856 the Burbach family left Villmar and made their way across two continents and the Atlantic Ocean to Milwaukee, Wisconsin.[ii] They had been encouraged to make the move by Catharina’s aunt and uncle who were already living in Wisconsin.

In Milwaukee, Georg worked at many jobs to provide for his family. He was a peddler, laborer, drover, and eventually became a stock broker at a time when the meat industry was in it’s “heyday”.  His sons attended school and worked hard to achieve the family goal, to have their own business.

John Burbach worked as a butcher alongside his father and brother Herman during the latter half of the 1870s.  The two brothers married and raised their families together in Milwaukee. To all appearances they never left Wisconsin after they arrived in 1856.

Imagine my surprise when a random search for more information on John Burbach turned up a marriage record for John Burbach and Stefania Guember in New York[iii]! What? The names were the same as the information I had recorded for John Burbach in Milwaukee. John and his wife Stephanie appeared in all of the appropriate census for Milwaukee.

Checking the Milwaukee City Directory on fold3, I found listings for both Georg and Herman for the years 1875-1877 but no listing for John who returns to the Milwaukee City Directory as a butcher in 1878.

When did John go to New York? Why did he leave Milwaukee? Records show that Stephanie was born in Baden in 1855 and her parents were Stephen Grumber and Mary Ann Schmidt and her obituary mentions a surviving brother Joseph. Clearly there is more research to be done on my great-uncle and his wife.

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[i]  Villmar Catholic Church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Villmar), Kirchenbuch 1632 - 1884, 16 Apr 1854, Birth and Baptism of Johan Burbach; FHL microfilm 1272247.

[ii] Struck Wolf-Heino, "Die Auswanderung aus dem Herzogtum Nassau 1806-1866," passenger and immigration lists index, ancestry.com, Ancestry.com (http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?f4=&f3=burbach&f11=&f9=&f14=&f15=&ti=5535 : ancestry.com 28 February 2004), immigration of Georg Burbach and family page 141; Gale Research Company.

[iii]  Marriage, (17 September 1875), "New York, New York City Marriage Records 1829-1940: FHL film 1543916; New York City Municipal Archives, New York, New York.