52 Ancestors #3 and #4: Szymon Walczyk and Marianna Bęben

Having skipped last week's 52 Ancestors post, this week I shall write about two of my ancestors: Szymon Walczyk and Marianna Bęben. Szymon and Marianna are my 4th great grandparents (see pedigree chart) and the earliest ancestors I have found in my Walczyk line.

When and where were they born?

Szymon Walczyk and Marianna Bęben were both probably born in Czermna (map). Unfortunately, there are no baptism records for the years 1721-1776 in this parish, so I do not know the exact dates or even the correct years of their births.

However, I do have their marriage record. Szymon and Marianna were married on 4 November 1794 in Czermna, in what was then the Galicia region of Austria. He was 28 and she was 20. It was the first marriage for both.

excerpt - Szymon Walczyk - Marianna Bębnionka marriage
Czermna, 4 Nov 1794 (2nd row)

If the ages in this record are correct, then Szymon was born in about 1766 and Marianna in about 1774. Interestingly, this means that Szymon was born in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, before the First Partition of Poland occurred in 1772. Marianna was born after Galicia was annexed by Austria. Thus it is possible they were born in the same town but in two different countries.

Children of Szymon Walczyk and Marianna Bęben

Szymon Walczyk and Marianna Bęben had at least five children who lived to adulthood, including my 3rd great-grandfather, Józef. All five of these married in Czermna and had children of their own.

• Marianna Walczyk (~1799-) married Anton Ignarski (or Lignarski)
• Jadwiga Walczyk (1802-) married Piotr Wierzgacz
• Anna Walczyk (~1805-) married Marcin Duda
• Józef Walczyk (1811-1883) married Tekla Lech
• Wojciech Walczyk (~1812-) married (1) Katarzyna Pers and (2) Petrina Janusz

All of Szymon and Marianna's children married quite young -- their three daughters at age 15, their sons at 17 and 20. Even for the time and place, marrying that young was not the norm. It was especially unusual to see a young man marry at 17. This suggests that the family may have been quite poor.

What was the Walczyk family's social status?

I have found eight parish records describing Szymon Walczyk's status or occupation between the years of 1803 and 1840. Unsurprisingly, all indicate he was a peasant.

The Name Game: Kunkel vs. Konkol

What's in a name?

I won't go there with the quote. But our ancestors' names can actually tell us a lot. The name can reveal or disguise ethnicity, point to (or at least hint at) geographic origin, and even offer clues about the family's religion.

Anna Pionke (née Kunkel) was my great-grandmother. Her descendants spell her maiden name KUNKEL and some are rather adamant about this. But the name was not always spelled this way. I have seen all of these variations in different records: Kunkel, Konkel, Konkol, Kąkol, and Kunkol.

It's spelled KUNKEL! It's literally carved in stone!!

Kunkel or Konkol – what's the difference?

So, who cares how they spelled it? What difference does it make? It matters when the name helps define ethnic background. KUNKEL is a German name and KONKOL or KĄKOL is a Polish name.

KUNKEL - Recorded as Kunkel, Kinkel, Gunkel, Kunkler and others, this is a German surname. It derives from the word "kunkel", and ultimately from the Latin conicula, meaning a spindle, cone or peg. The surname is therefore a metonymic occupational name for a spinner or a maker of spindles.[1]

KONKOL - nickname meaning ‘corn cockle’, a weed of cereal crops, Polish kąkol ... hence a topographic name for someone who lived on a weed-covered plot of land, or a nickname for a poor farmer or someone who was not highly thought of.[2]

Complicating matters, spelling was not standardized at the time. It is possible that a family's name was Kunkel, but came to be spelled Konkol by the Polish priests. Likewise, perhaps the name was originally Konkol, but came to be spelled Kunkel as the family became more Germanized.

52 Ancestors #2: Anna Data Walczyk

Anna Data was my great-great-grandmother. She was the second wife of Andrzej Walczyk and the mother of my great-grandfather Gregory Walczyk (see pedigree chart).

Anna was born in Czermna (map) on 7 March 1868 to parents Jan Data and Marianna Marcisz. She was the youngest of seven children.

excerpt - Anna Data baptism, Czermna, 8 March 1868

At the age of 20, she married older widower Andrzej Walczyk. Their marriage record says he was 52, but he was actually 56 years old. Andrzej was the father of nine children from his first marriage, but I'm not sure how many were alive when he married Anna. Daughter Clara (age 15) and son Frank (age 2½) were certainly alive and up to four more children might have been living as well.

excerpt - Andrzej Walczyk - Anna Data marriage, Czermna, 16 Feb 1889

Anna (Data) Walczyk was the mother of at least six children, all born in Czermna. Son Gregory (Grzegorz) was the first born to Andrzej and Anna, on 13 February 1890. Four more followed: Mary (Marya) in 1892, Zofia in 1894, Piotr in 1896, and Bridget (Bronisława) in 1899. Unfortunately the Czermna baptism records after 1900 are not available, so there could be a few more children I haven't found. However, one more son, Władysław, born in 1905, was discovered via his siblings' obituaries.

Frank Walczyk obituary, 5 August 1968, Dziennik Chicagoski

Siblings Bronsława Kurek, Marya Nosal, Władisław Walczyk
are named at the end of last paragraph.

In 1906, Anna's husband died, leaving her a widow at the age of 38. Son Gregory was 16 and Władysław was not yet two years old.

Andrzej Walczyk had been a farm laborer, a peasant. Their life had likely been difficult even before his death, but one imagines the situation became rather grim afterwards. Anna did not remarry. All of the children worked, even the younger ones. There was not much time to spare for education. According to the 1940 U.S. Census, Gregory had only two years of school, Mary four, and Bridget five.

52 Ancestors #1: Joseph Freibis

Starting this week, we will introduce you to one ancestor each week as part of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge. I will begin today with one of our mystery ancestors, Joseph Freibis.

Finding Joseph Freibis

Joseph Freibis was my 3rd-great-grandfather (see pedigree chart). We learned his name easily enough from the death certificate of his daughter, my 2nd-great-grandmother, Maryanna (Freibis) Pionke.

Maryanna (Freibis) Pionke death certificate

However, his name was the only easy-to-find thing about Joseph Freibis. I don't have a record of Joseph's marriage to Pauline Abraham, and I can't find Joseph's birth nor his parents' names. I don't even know if he was baptized Catholic or if he converted.

Following a trail from his children's marriage records at St. Stanislaus Kostka Church (Chicago), to the indexes on the Pomeranian Genealogical Association website, and finally to the LDS Family History Library microfilms, I found Joseph Freibis' death record in the Puck parish.

excerpt - Joseph Freibös death record, Puck parish

I may have only the one record, but fortunately it is a very informative record. Here is what it tells us:

1. Name: Joseph Freibös.
2. Age at death: 36, meaning he was born about 1826.
3. Place of death: Polchau (now Połchowo).
4. Date of death: 7 November 1862.
5. Survived by: wife Pauline née Abraham and children Johann, 10, Francisca, 7, Marianna, 4, Joseph, 1.
6. Occupation: cloth weaver.
7. Cause of death: emaciation.

I was especially interested to learn that he had a trade, as opposed to being a general laborer. His cause of death also caught my eye - I wonder what illness he had been suffering to have become emaciated. And I was quite happy to see that the names and ages of the surviving family matched my records exactly.

But after basking in the glow of the wonderful depth of information contained in this one record, I was back to the frustration of a dead end search. Where was he born? Not in Puck. Not in Góra where his wife Pauline was born. And after some research I discovered that the marriage records for the relevant years in Góra (and most neighboring parishes) are lost.

Who Were Our Immigrant Ancestors?

August Kunkel naturalization

Since we celebrate our country's birth today, I decided to look at the beginnings of our U.S. family.

There are so many questions to ask about our immigrant ancestors: When did they arrive and where did they come from? How long was the journey? Why did they leave? How did they pay for the trip? Did they miss the old country? Did they ever return to visit?

Unfortunately I don't have answers to most of those questions. What I do have, however, are some interesting facts and documents.

Eight of our direct ancestors immigrated to the U.S. Every one of them came directly to Chicago from various ports on the east coast. Six of these became naturalized citizens - four in their own right and two by virtue of their husbands' naturalizations.

Our 8 Immigrant Ancestors

1. Joseph Pionke (great-great-grandfather)
2. Marianna (Freibis) Pionke (great-great-grandmother)
3. Paulina (Abraham) Freibis (3rd-great-grandmother)
4. August Kunkel (great-great-grandfather)
5. Helene (Klawikowska) Kunkel (great-great-grandmother)
6. Valentin Pionke (3rd-great-grandfather)
7. Grzegorz Walczyk (great-grandfather)
8. Zofia (Waclawik) Walczyk (great-grandmother)

Welcome to TreeQuest: An Unexpected Journey!

This blog covers our experiences and discoveries researching the Walczyk and Pionke branches of our genealogy. Welcome and thanks for visiting!

Our journey begins with our paternal grandparents, John Walle and Helen Pionke. Both were born in Chicago in the 1910's. They were married at St. Josaphat's Church and had two sons before John died at only 31 years of age. A few years later, Helen married second husband Ralph Brandt and with him had one more son.

Below is a very brief introduction to our Walczyk and Pionke families.

John F. Walle and Helen S. Pionke

Introducing the Walczyk family

John Walle's parents, Grzegorz Walczyk and Zofia Wacławik, were Polish immigrants from what was then Galicia, Austria. Their families lived in small villages in southern Poland between Tarnów and Jasło, including Czermna, Janowice, and Zagórzany.

They arrived in Chicago in 1912, both joining family members who had immigrated before them. Grzegorz and Zofia were married in St. John Cantius church, a parish founded by fellow Galician immigrants. They had one son and four daughters, one of whom was a nun.

Introducing the Pionke family

Helen Pionke's parents, Leon Pionke and Anna Kunkel, were born in Chicago. They were both the first of their respective families to be born in the U.S. Their parents emigrated in the 1880's from what was then West Prussia, and what is now north-central Poland, near Gdańsk (Danzig). They lived in Donimierz, Kętrzyno, Puck, and nearby villages. Their background was a mix of Kashubian and German.

Leon and Anna were married in 1907 in St. Josaphat parish, which was founded by Kashubian immigrants. They were lifelong members of this parish, together with numerous Pionke and Kunkel siblings and cousins. They had two daughters and five sons, three of whom died as children.

Why a blog?

Over the past ten years researching our family's history, we have searched online, sent away for vital records, pored over microfilm, photographed cemeteries, and tested DNA. Our family tree continues to grow and we have debated the best way to share it with our extended family.

A blog is our choice because it allows us to share what we have learned in a narrative and interactive form. It is the best format for keeping everyone updated on new discoveries as they occur. Furthermore, it functions as an information hub, linking you to our Ancestry.com family tree, our Flickr photo albums, pedigree charts, maps, and more.

We hope you will enjoy reading it and we welcome your comments and suggestions.

If you're not a close relative and are wondering who we are, you can read about us here. To be brief, we are two sisters having fun working on our family's genealogy together.

© TreeQuest: An Unexpected Journey 2014.