Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Here is a book that the preacher must have given Ma and Pa on the day they were married. It is all in German and that is all that I could make of it. That would have been in 1897 when they were married. It really should be with the Heiden History.

(The inside panel of the book reads: Die Gebetsschule oder Die Herzen in die Hoehe! Das Gebet im allgemeinen und das Vaterunser im besonderen erklaert durch Gedanken, Sinnbilder und Dergleichen. Sonntagsschulen und der Familie dargeboten.

This translates into: “The school of prayers or High up the hearts! The prayer in general and the Lord's prayer especially explained through thoughts and allegories. Presented to Sunday Schools and to the family.”)

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - Can you understand German, Ralph?

Ralph Heiden - A little bit. I have been getting help on translations from the Prodigy computer network. Let’s start through some of this stuff that I have accumulated over the years. It was very fortunate that in about 1971 my mother and I went over to visit Aunt Agnes (William Carl Heiden’s sister-in-law and wife of John Heiden). I asked, “Do you have any old papers or anything?”

Well, she went up in the closet and got this old box with these old documents. It has August Heiden's naturalization papers when he became a U.S. citizen. There were some old letters from Germany.

In the early 70's, I sent to the East German government requesting information and that is where I got a good start on the Heiden’s in Germany.

Here is a document where my great-grandfather, August (right), applied for U.S. citizenship. He had to renounce all allegiance to the Emperor of Germany.

I have maps of the tiny little towns in what was East Germany where all our ancestors came from. They were sort of like Maybee and Ida and Grape. Very small little places only a few miles apart.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - What about High German and Low German?

Ralph Heiden - I don’t know much about it but I think it is just different ways of speaking the language similar to Irish English versus British English versus American English.

Google says, "Low German, also known as Plattdeutsch, is spoken in the northern, flatlands of Germany, while High German dialects are found in the southern and central regions, including the mountainous areas."

One of the envelopes from the 1920s letters from Germany is shown below. It seems a miracle that it was actually delivered to the correct person.

Ralph Heiden - I also have some papers here from the German government that gives August and his family permission to leave Germany. It is for August and his wife, Rika, and three children, Heinrich, Ernst and a little girl, Meta.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Meta was the one that died on the ship on the way over. August and his family arrived about a year before William was born on April 1, 1874. [See note below]

Jeanie & Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - We always heard that she died on the boat and was buried at sea.

Ralph Heiden - Unfortunately, the ship’s records do not show that happening. Normally, if someone died on the ship, that would be noted and there is nothing on the list to indicate that Meta died on ship. The ship’s list that I have shows August Heiden's age 34, a mason.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - A mason? Oh, you mean a bricklayer, not a member of the Masons.

Ralph Heiden - Yes. It also lists Rika, 31, his wife, Herman, 6 years old, male, Ernst, 4 years old, a male, his children, and Meta, 9 months, his baby.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Herman? That should be Henry.

Ralph Heiden - You’re right, it is Heinrich (right). But there was no mention of anyone buried at sea.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - We all heard the story that a baby was buried at sea.

Ralph Heiden - That would seem logical since there doesn’t appear to be a record of her here in Michigan. At least not that I have found so far.

Later research discovered that Meta made it to America but died on June 16, 1873 only 12 days after they arrived from Germany. She was just 2 years and 5 months old at the time of death and is buried at the Zion Lutheran Church cemetery in Monroe, Michigan.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - Did August Heiden have any brothers?

Ralph Heiden - Not from what I could find out. He did have a half-sister, however.

One of the other things that I got from Aunt Agnes was a bunch of letters from Germany to August and Rika (Knaack) Heiden back in the 1920's. Most of them were signed from a Maria Dohmstrich from Rostock, Germany. That is only about 30 or 40 miles away from the little towns where our ancestors lived.

On some of the letters she adds “geb. Schmidt” after her name which means that her maiden name was Schmidt. Well, it seems that August’s half sister (left) married a man named Schmidt and had a daughter, Maria.

So, the letters are from August’s half-sister’s daughter. His niece. She was born in 1866 so she would have been in her sixties at the time the letters were written.

My great-grandmother, Rika, must have sent them the occasional five dollars. That was a huge amount back then because of the inflation going on in Germany at the time. They really appreciated it.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - I didn’t know that our grandma was a Knaack.

Jeanie & Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Yes, she was.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - So, Maria Heiden never married Kannseyer?

Ralph Heiden - No, and who knows why. From what I’ve read, they were having a population problem in Germany so they made it very difficult for people to get married. But, people being what we are, they went ahead and had children anyway. A very large percentage of the births during the mid-1800's were out of wedlock.

But they never did get married. When she died in 1874, she was still listed as Maria Heiden.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - So, how many children did she have?

Ralph Heiden - Just the two as far as I know. August in 1838 and the daughter, Fredericka, in 1832. She was the mother of the one who wrote the letters.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - Pa always said they came from Mecklenburg. Is that a county or what? When we were in Germany we saw a sign for town called Heidenfahrt!

Ralph Heiden - Mecklenburg is a region of Germany. The Heidens came from tiny little towns called Gross Wokern, Mamerow, Klaber and a bunch of others.

Now, where did your grandfather, August, live here in Monroe County?

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - August always lived on South Custer where Uncle John lived. That’s the only place they lived as far as I know. The same with the Rambows. [See Note Below]

Later research showed that August Heiden and family lived on West 9th Street in the City of Monroe according to the 1880 U.S. Census. We don't know exactly when the bought the property on South Custer Road. The 1890 census reports were destroyed by a fire.

I also saw the town of Heidenfahrt on a map of Germany. It translates into Heathen Journey or a journey to a heath.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - Ma’s grandmother, Miller (or Möller), died in Germany before they came over to America. According to Ma, she was old anyway and did not know for sure if she wanted to come over here. Of course, that’s the Rambow’s side. (See below)

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - August landed in New York? How did they get to Monroe? [Heidens to Monroe]

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - Normally, they had someone over here sponsor them.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - Did the Rambows come on the same ship?

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - The Rambows and Milhans came over about the same time.  [See note below]

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - It seems that they all came over about the same time because they knew somebody here. I’ve also got the cedar chest (left) that Ma’s mother (Wilhelmina Rambow) brought over from Germany. Ma used it as a hope chest.

Ralph Heiden - When I got the ship list originally, back in 1974, I contacted a lady in Washington D.C. who, for a fee, looked it up in the National Archives.

Now, there are some books that list all the ship logs for the mid-1800's that left Germany for the U.S. I contacted a person on the computer network, Prodigy, and they looked it up for me and found the same information that appears on the information I had.

They also found at least one other Heiden that came over on the ship but I did not recognize the name.

According to reports from the Rambow family, Wilhelmina (Mrs Heinrich) Rambow's mother, Marie (Möller) Milhan was planning to accompany them to America. Unfortunately, she died just before the family was due to leave Germany in April, 1874.

Her three young children, Fredericka, William and Chrisopher Milhan came to America and Monroe County with their older sister, Wilhelmina. An older brother, Fred Milhan, had made the journey one year earlier and they all eventually settled within about a mile of each other in Raisinville Township.