February 28Th, 1840 Sudlohn, Germany the Kleinefortmann Farm

Sunday February 28th, 1840 Sudlohne, Germany The KleineFortmann Farm

The mud of the old roads adjacent the ancient Teutoburg Forest is frozen solid in this February’s cold. Low hanging clouds of grey shroud the farm with a heavy cold mist. Chilling to the marrow of your bones. The stubble of last year’s crop of oats can be barely seen in the fields of the KleineFortmann Farm.

The burbling stream dug by an unremembered Great Great Great Great Grandfather Vorde/ Fortmann in the 1200’s, is quiet and encapsulated by a thin crust of ice. Just a 1/8th of a mile northwest lies the far larger GrosFortmann Farm of wealthier cousins. The failed crops of the past few years have made life difficult for all in this northern Oldenburg Province some 60 miles south of the North Sea and 40 miles SW of Bremen.

In the KleineFortmann pig sty the small herd of pigs can be heard rooting in the frozen ground for the vestiges of a long harvested barley crop. The plow horse is munching on his morning oats in contentment at the fact that today is a Sunday and even for this lowly beast this is a day of rest. Owning an ox is something this family cannot afford. A sprightly riding mare has been unbridled from the buck-board wagon and is with him this morning. She has just brought the KleienFortman’s back from Sunday Mass at St Gertrud’s in Lohne for this is the start of Lent.

The wooden plank barn of the horses is attached to the three room house of the KleineFortmann’s. The heat of the horses, in their barn, acts as an additional insulator on the east wall of the wooden house. The ground under the wooden floor of the house is perpetually wet from the great bogs that encompass this patchwork farm countryside. The potatoes stored under the beds continually draw the rats. It is a countryside of bog then farm then bog then farm. The great City of Lohne, founded in 980 is 4 miles NNE of them and like Sudlohne it to has fallen on slow economic times. Thank God Napoleon’s Army of 28 years ago never took much interest in staying here. Like the Romans of 1825 years ago, too many great bogs to believe there is anything of value here.

Gathered at this lunch hour for the Sunday repast of pork, potatoes, sauerkraut and weak beer are oldest sister Anna Maria, 27, and her younger sister Anna Maria Gertude, 21, with their oldest brother Johannes Heinrich Joseph, 25, and Clemens August Ludwig, a mere 16. They are awaiting their close friend from the adjacent Haskamp farm on their south perimeter, Anton, 15, and Clemens closest buddy. Sunday is a day for family after the Pastor’s Sunday admonitions. The talk at lunch will be about America. Heinrich has been listening with growing interest to the letters read in the village tavern of the Krogmann’s, their northerly neighbor. He likes what he hears and has been relaying it to his sister Anna Maria, the mistress of the house since Mother Catherina Maria died 6 years ago. Father Franz Ludwig passed on last year, 1839, and so they are all that is left of the KleineFortmann Clan. Should they leave, they would also leave behind sisters Maria Elizabeth and Maria Catherina in St Gertrud’s Cemetery. The door rattles open and Anton, 15, joins them with his older brother Franz, 22.

Franz and Anna Maria Gertrud are going together. In less than 7 years, on August 17, 1847, they shall marry in St Gertrud’s. But times are now hard. The 35 Silvergrochen (silver pennies) needed for Passport taxes is 6 months work for Heinrich.

Around the table the conversation swings to the Tavern letters about free land, bountiful crops and opportunity in this new place called America. No more rent’s to the Lord of the Manor. Yes, they are no longer so many wagons of oats and barley and so many sweine. Remember the tales of the Lords hirelings going into the oak forests to locate the oak- branch pens that Otto Lutke Fortmann built in the primeval forests of Teutoburg? Those were the same taxes of Tom Lutke Vorde on this land 300 years ago. Now it is Silvergrochen!

The letters speak of opportunity. The French have had their Revolution. The Americans had their Revolution 60 years ago. With these warring Princes of Oldenburg, Prussia, and Hanover how long can it be before Germany has its revolution? Perhaps the time has come for us to consider America.

Sometime in the next 3 years Heinrich, Clemens, and Anna Maria sold what they had in Sudlohne, probably borrowed more SilverGrochen, and commenced their journey to Bremen, where they boarded ship for New York. There is no boat record of their passage in New York and Bremen destroyed its records in the 1870’s. These three Fortmann’s next appear in New Trier, Illinois in the early 1840’s. Heinrich marries on 29 January 1846, Clemens 20 Nov 1848 and sister Anna Maria dies 30 Aug 1846 and is one of the first buried in St. Joseph’s Catholic Cemetery; a parish founded in 1845 by the German Community of Oldenburg and particularly Trier, Germany. The name Lauermann, of the Province of Trier stands out. Heinrich married a Lauermann girl. Clemens married a Lauermann girl. Anton married a Lauermann girl. And Father Joseph Heinrich Fortmann, 2nd Pastor of St Joseph’s married them.

This is your Fortmann Heritage and you may see much more of it back to 1510 and 9 CE (destruction of Roman Legions by Fortmann ancestors) on: davidafortmanancestors.com.

Thank you for listening.

David A. Fortman, a 14th Generation Fortmann September 14, 2008 Chicago, Illinois & Cape Cod, Massachusetts

Sources include: Records of St Gertrud Katholischen Kirche, Lohne, Germany, Local German records courtesy of Helmut Zender, Detmold, Germany; Adolf Zender, Tasmania, Australia, Walter Wendeln, Lohne, German; American: Fortmann and Lauermann Archivists: Carol Kelsey, Ohio; Ken Anderson, Buffalo Grove, Illinois, and Kory Meyerlink and Amanda Simons of Progenealogists, Utah and Mr Kate of the “Oldenburgische Volkszeitung”, Vecta, Lohne, Germany Newspaper