What's in my DNA?

The results are in! What a fascinating thing, this DNA. On Ancestry.com, it gives a break down of where I am from using both my paternal and maternal DNA but doesn't tell me who belongs to what. On 23andme.com, I was only able to find out info on my maternal line until my dad takes the DNA test which he will do soon.

Here is a link to the information on my Maternal Haplogroup, a rare group that is 25,000 years old.
Laura's Maternal Haplogroup and Ancestral Map

From Ancestry.com here is the breakdown which is culled from both paternal and maternal DNA:

My thoughts on the breakdown, based on my paper research of my family tree is that the entire percentage of the British Isles and 8% of the Scandinavian is from my dad's DNA with 27% Scandinavian and all of the European percentages belonging to my mother. To say I was a little shocked is an understatement. I grew up believing I was mostly German and Bohemian but that accounts for only 5% of my DNA. I had no idea at all that I was 35% Scandinavian. I knew only of one Dutch ancestor that I discovered last year doing research and one other this year from Sweden, but both were born centuries ago and probably wouldn't account for 35%. I do look Scandinavian and when I was in France once, someone thought I was from Sweden. Makes sense now, but who were these Scandinavian ancestors? It could be assumed that there is some Viking blood seeing how they were such voracious conquerors and that would be a good assumption. But how about some scientific evidence? Turns out in 2006 a genetic link was discovered that linked the Sami people to the Volga-Ural region in Russia, which is where my mother's great grandparents were born.

John and Mary Spahn. My great-great grandparents. Both born in the Volga-Ural region

of Russia. Possible descendants of the Sami people of Southern Sweden or Finland.

My great-great grandparents considered themselves German, although they were both born in Russia, but the truth is that they were most likely of Scandinavian blood, and possibly descended from Sami people from Southern Sweden or Finland. The Sami people fall into the U halpogroup with most being U5, but a small population is in the U4. This hints at just a tiny slice of the mystery waiting to be uncovered but it's a good start!. Pretty darn cool. This will make an already planned trip to Scandinavia in 2014 have a different meaning altogether! Next, I will wait for my Paternal Halpogroup results from my dad and see how much of his DNA is from Scandinavia. If it's more than 8%, I may have to re-think this whole blog post,lol.

Here are some images, music and interesting facts of the Sami people: Saami Blog

Another shocker was the 18% Southern European which encompasses Portugal, Spain and Italy. Huh? What? Wait a minute! I haven't found anyone in my line from any of these countries. Some digging is going to have to be done to find out who these Southern Europeans are, or where they came from and how they got into my DNA. First I'll need my dad's results to determine if it's in his line or my mother's line which is what I suspect.

Not a shocker? 42% British Isles. I've always known I was descended from Irish ancestors (I was born with the last name of CLARE after all), although I'm still trying to find the immigrant Irish ancestor. And I've been drawn to England as a homeland since well, probably birth. :) It's why I trek the land, spend so much time there, have an affinity for it's people, love it's shows and movies and totally get their humor. I belong there, my DNA longs to be there. It's strange but I always felt like I had lived there before in a past life and I believe that even more now. Plus, nearly every line in my paternal family tree leads back to an ancestor from the British Isles.

Always happy to be in Britain! Sitting atop a rock in Northumberland, overlooking Hadrian's Wall.

From 23andme.com, the Maternal results say I am 100% European which encompasses all of the British Isles, Scandinavia, Western and Eastern European. What that means is there is no Native American DNA on my mother's side and very little if any Jewish ancestry. Today, my maternal DNA most closely resembles people from France and Germany. I can't wait until next month when I find out my Paternal Halpogroup from my dad. And one of the best things about having your DNA done is as new genetic research is discovered, they can update your own information! The adventure continues!

I'm a Nutter...

My English friend Ray has been calling me a nutter for years. Little did we know back then that I actually AM a Nutter! My Great Great grandmother is Mary Nutter, a direct descendant of Christopher Nutter, my 8th Great Grandfather, who sailed from England to Maryland in 1665 when he was just 21. When I began to research this line, I was very excited to find out how far back it would go and to connect it to England (as you all know, it's the land I love most!). The name is Anglo-Saxon and is found in both Yorkshire and Lancashire. It was first recorded in Gloucestershire and variants of this surname have been around since the early middle ages. I was able to take my Nutter line back even further to Christopher's Grandfather, Richard Nutter, who was born in Lancashire in 1579. I still have lots of research to do on my Nutter ancestors but I've discovered quite a bit in a short amount of time.

Last April I was lucky enough to have a friend who was living in Maryland at the time and invited me for a visit. One day we set out by car and drove to the Eastern Shore and down to Nutters Neck. This was land owned by Christopher and given to his sons Matthew and Christopher. This was the birthplace of my 5th Great Grandfather, Matthew Nathan Nutter who was grandson of Matthew and great grandson of Christopher. He was the last in my direct line to have lived at Nutters Neck, having left for Harrison County, Virginia where he and his brother built Nutter Fort. It was so cool to walk around the area. There is just one small dirt road called Nutters Neck Road that leads into some woods and deadends at Manumsco Creek. I could imagine how it looked in 1665 as there weren't any towns or buildings around, save a few farms and there was certainly nothing around or along Nutters Neck. I could imagine the Nutters fishing in the creek and hunting in the woods. I wondered if they ran into any Indians or had to endure any hurricanes or blizzards. Still so much to find out! But for now you all can enjoy these images we took while there. It was so cool to walk where my ancestors once tread and it's always so much more fun to be hunting for clues somewhere other than the internet! :-)

Nutters Neck Area

Nutters Neck Road

As Shadows Fall

 On the Trail of Ancestors

The Woods Surrounding Nutters Neck

Panoramic View of the woods around Nutters Neck. Pic taken by my friend Missy Trent.

 Feeling at Home

Manumsco Creek

Matthew Nathan Nutter was the son of John Huett Nutter (Matthew's first son and Christopher's grandson) and in the next post I'll be sharing the fascinating history on that middle name, another of my direct lines! You won't want to miss this one, as it's historical, tragic and full of political drama! Stay tuned...

Czeching Out Our Bohemian Ancestors

My Dolechek Line

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Josephine Margaret Dolechek (great grandmother)

b. 1901, Barton County, Kansas

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Ferdinand William Vetus Dolechek (2nd great grandfather)

b. 1873, Mt. Ayr, Iowa

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Leopold Dolechek (3rd great grandfather)

b. 1837, Klášterec nad Ohří, Czechslovakia

My Dolechek family came over from Klášterec nad Ohří, Czechslovakia ( Klösterle), Bohemia in 1866 and settled in Ringgold County, Iowa. This group included my third great grandfather, Leopold, his wife and two children (they would have 6 more after moving to Ringgold and then three more after moving to Kansas), his two brothers Vetus and Peter, their families and their widowed mother, Frantiska, my fourth great grandmother who died in Ringgold in 1875. Her husband, my fourth great grandfather must have died then prior to their arrival into Iowa in 1866. I have not yet discovered his name. A trip to Klösterle will be required in order to find additional records so that I can continue down the line. Many immigrants from Bohemia settled in Ringgold, including some of the Pacha family, the Bohemian ancestors of my husband, Charlie. Other Bohemian families that settled in Ringgold include Toman, Krechky and Sedlicek just to mention a few.

The Krechky home in Ringgold was the largest log house in the neighborhood and served as a place for most of those early social gatherings. The first Bohemian church was also a log cabin and it remained for many years until the settlers built a new church on the edge of the cemetery on part of my third great uncle Peter Dolecheck's farm. Peter performed the lay minister services for the church for 25 years.
His obituary reads:
"In the year of 1866 Peter DOLECHECK Sr. and his brothers, Vet and Leopold and families and several related families of theirs, started on a long journey to America where they arrived the same year. At that time it took six weeks to cross the Atlantic Ocean. They all settled in Washington Township about nine miles northwest of Mt. Ayr. Peter DOLECHECK's Sr. made their permanent home in Washington Township and after their arrival in America. Peter DOLECHECK Sr. conducted the services in the Bohemian Church for about twnety-five years. The services in the beginning and for many years after, were held in a log cabin but later on when the settlers were better situated financially, they build a new church on the cemetery grounds. It was located on a part of the Peter DOLECHECK farm."


The Bohemian Cemetery in Ringgold Iowa where many of the Dolecheck and Pacha ancestors are buried:

Many immigrants who came to the new world changed their surnames. Some added or subtracted letters from their surnames while others shortened or lengthened the names.In Czech, Dolecek has a hácek mark over the letter c that is pronounced like "CH" in the word church which is how it got its americanized spelling of Dolechek, with the extra "h" added.

Sometime after 1880 my third great grandfather, Leopold and his brother Vetus moved their families from Ringgold, Iowa to Barton County, Kansas where they both built farms and worked in agriculture.  

My second great grandfather, Ferdinand who was Leopold's third son married and moved to Kinsley, Kansas where he built a farm and raised his family including my great grandmother Josephine. Here is a photograph of Ferdinand and his wife Margaret and her sister Sophie:

and a photo of my great grandmother Josephine Dolechek on her wedding day to my great grandfather Adam Spahn:

I'm very keen on finding out more about the life of my Bohemian ancestors in Iowa and Kansas as well as what life was like in Klosterle.  I'm curious to see if any of my Bohemian ancestors were descended from either the Habsburg Monarchy or any of the other Bohemian Dynasties.  Although most of the Bohemian settlers that came to America were hard working farmers, you never know what you will find when you take a climb further up the family tree!

At Odds: My Puritan and Quaker Heritage

I've been moved my many stories of my ancestors but none more so than that of Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick and two of their children, son Daniel and daughter Provided who lived in Salem, Massachusetts.

Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick of  England were members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in a very puritanical Salem. They were persecuted, fined, whipped, thrown in prison and eventually banished for not following the Puritan ways. They were my 9th Great Grandparents (and 8th great grandparents of Winston Churchill and Richard Nixon, my second cousins, 8 generations removed) and their daughter, Provided, my 8th Great Grandmother. To find out the horrors your family members went through is gut-wrenching. What I find utterly unbelievable is that the Puritans, who left England because of religious persecution became persecutors themselves and many Quakers suffered terribly as a result. Even more shocking to me was to find out that the person who passed judgement on them was my own 9th Great Grandfather, Puritan and first Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony, John Endicott:

"According to the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, "Under his authority the colony of Massachusetts Bay made rapid progress, and except in the matter of religious intolerance in which he showed great bigotry and harshness, particularly towards the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)" (including religious executions), "his rule was just and praiseworthy. Of him Edward Eggleston says: A strange mixture of rashness, pious zeal, genial manners, hot temper, and harsh bigotry, his extravagances supply the condiment of humour to a very serious history; it is perhaps the principal debt posterity owes him."

Quaker Trial, 17th Century

Because of the unfair treatment of their parents, having bear witness to the repeated lashings and imprisonments, Daniel and Provided decided not to participate in a church that was so persecuting and for this they were fined ten pounds each even though it was known they would not be able to pay. The Governor then issued an order in the General Court of Boston that Daniel and Provided would be sold as slaves to any English nation at Virgina or Barbados.  

This image shows my 9th great grandfather, Governor John Endicott attempting to sell my 8th great grandmother, Provided Southwick into slavery.  The writing below the image reads:

"The attempted sale into slavery of Daniel and Provided Southwick, son of Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick by Gov. Endicott and his minions, for being Quakers."

I wanted to know more and after several days of research I came upon the book:

"Genealogy of the Descendants of Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick of Salem Mass.

The Original Emigrants, and the Ancestors of the Families Who Have Since Borne His Name (1881)

I've discovered that books on family Genealogy such as this one don't come cheap! In fact, some can be selling for hundreds of dollars!  But, this book was totally worth the purchase as I uncovered so much more than what I had found previously.  It included Historical Extracts such as this one:

"Lawrence, Cassandra and their son Josiah were imprisoned at Boston for being Quakers and were kept there twenty weeks on a charge of violating a law enacted while they were in prison."

Quaker Meeting House, 17th Century

Eventually all Quakers were banned from setting foot in Massachusetts under "pain of death" although several risked imprisonment and even death by hanging in order to continue their ministry.  Lawrence and Cassandra were banished and fled to Shelter Island, Long Island Sound, New York where Nathaniel Sylvester, the island's first white settler gave shelter to them and many other Quakers.  Another except from the Southwick Genealogy book reads:

"Lawrence and wife Cassandra went to Shelter Island, Long Island Sound, being banished under pain of death in 1659, and died there in the spring of 1660 from privation and exposure; his wife died three days after him."

It was really sad to discover that they died of starvation and exposure.  Even though they weren't family members that I knew in the physical sense, they were still my grandparents, whose blood flows through my veins. I still had an ache in my heart for the way they died which seems completely unfair and unnecessary.


Yesterday, as I was sitting on my patio in the morning sun, sipping my favorite brand of coffee and enjoying the views over the lake, I thought about Lawrence, Cassandra and Provided and how this day, this moment of enjoyment is a result of all my ancestors, on both sides of my tree. Those who suffered humiliation and persecution, those that fought and died in war, those who endured hardships in the new lands and on the open prairies.Those that gave me life, protected me and loved me. I honor all of them by continuing my research, telling their stories and keeping memories alive.

Using Search Engines to Expand the Family Tree

Using Search Engines to Expand the Family Tree

This week I joined Genea Bloggers group on Facebook and was invited to participate the weekly challenge "52 Weeks to Better Genealogy" created by Amy Coffin. I'm a little late to the party, starting with Challenge #14:

Use a different search engine for your online genealogy research. Google is quite popular, but other search engines may provide different results. Try Yahoo! Search (http://search.yahoo.com/), Bing (http://www.bing.com/), Ask.com (http://www.ask.com/), Dogpile (http://www.dogpile.com/), and even Clusty (http://clusty.com/). Pick an unusual surname and search it in different engines. Make note of the top 10 page returns for each. If you’re a genealogy blogger, share your observations on this experience.


I have chosen to search the surname of my 6th Great Grandmother on my paternal grandmother's side, Quattlebaum. I picked this name for two reasons.  Firstly, I haven't done any research at all on this name and second, well, the name makes me smile when I say it. I just love it...it sounds like a fun game of sorts, like a cousin to "Whiffle Ball".


Challenge in hand, I started do some searching starting with Yahoo! Search which yielded these various pieces of information on the surname Quattlebaum that I found useful:
*Altered spelling of German Quattelbaum, probably a topographic name from Middle Low German quattele ‘quail’ + bōm ‘tree’.


*"Quattlebaum, a Palatine Family in South Carolina" by Paul Quattlebaum
Finding this book led me to a wealth of information and I got sidetracked from my challenge for about an hour while I read excerpts from the book which in turn led to an additional link at Genealogy.com where I found bits of detail.  I've decided to blog separately about the stories of the Quattlebaum line and keep this posting about the links that have helped me find this information thanks to this week #14 challenge. Most of the other links on Yahoo! Search led me to message boards of various genealogy sites with postings of fellow enthusiasts looking for information on their own Quattlebaum ancestor. Next, I decided to try the search through Bing which yielded pretty much the same results but when I clicked on "images" I found a Quattlebaum cemetery located in Arkansas. Will bookmark that for later review if needed.


Searching on Ask.com, the first hit was for DistantCousin.com which is useful for organizing all the records you can search by surname including death and burial records, immigration passenger lists and military records which should come in handy when I delve deeper into the line. Also useful will be Linkpendium which lists worldwide information for the chosen surname. This site was completely new to me and I can see that it will be helpful for all future surname searches. The next two search engines, Dogpile and Clusty, I had never heard of before this challenge. I was definitely curious to see what results the sites would give me.
Clusty didn't reveal any new information or links but for Dogpile, I found Public Domain Genealogy, a website with access to millions of free records.  Also, Meaning-of-Names.com which said that Quattlebaum meant "dweller near the bridge across the bog". Not very useful, but fun all the same. I enjoyed this challenge of using different search engines and seeing the results and where they would lead me to.  It allowed me to have new eyes to find new links to various genealogy sites, many that I hadn't known before of before the challenge. 

Quattlebaum family history

Deep Roots in American History: The Gaskill Line

Gaskill Name Meaning and History

English (Lancashire): habitational name from Gatesgill in Cumbria, so named from Old Norse geit ‘goat’ +skáli ‘shelter’.
The Gaskill Name in History

My Gaskill Line

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Billie Louise Gaskill (grandmother)

b. 1919, Dodge City, Kansas

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Claude Everett Gaskill (great grandfather)

b. 1890, Wray, Colorado
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Asbury Gaskill (2nd great grandfather)
b. 1844, Mt. Pleasant, Iowa
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Timothy Sewell Gaskill (3rd great grandfather)
b. 1811, Wilmington, Ohio
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Thomas Gaskill (4th great grandfather)
b. 1788, Fayette County, Pennsylvania
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Samuel Gaskill (5th great grandfather)
b. 1749, Burlington County, New Jersey
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Benjamin Gaskill (6th great grandfather)
b. 1709, Burlington County, New Jersey
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Edward Gaskill (7th great grandfather)
b. 1667, Salem, Massachusetts
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Samuel Gaskill (8th great grandfather)
b. 1639, Salem Massachusetts
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Edward Gaskill (9th great grandfather)
b. 1604, Upholland, Lancashire, England

Well...wouldn't you know it! My paternal grandmother's line leads right to some major events in American History, including the founding of Salem, Massachusetts and the Salem Witch Trials.

The entire line is full of interesting characters that led interesting lives although sometimes those lives were filled with betrayal, persecution, torment and tragedy. There are so many stories to tell here including treacherous travel on the high seas,  the pioneering of New Jersey and Ohio. Several books are filled with the accounts of this line of ancestors that include their diary entries, letters and trial accounts .I must buy all of them! My 8th Great Grandfather and grandmother, Samuel Gaskill and Provided Southwick Gaskill, were Quakers and have deep roots in the beginnings of the Quaker religion. Provided has an amazing story herself, one of being nearly sold into slavery to pay the owed fines of her parents, also Quakers. More on these individuals in later postings for each one deserves their own so that their story may be told once again.

I have come to enjoy the detective work involved with following the lines, verifying documents and making sure everything matches up with proven sources. It's so exciting to find a story while on the paper trail, one that may have been buried under years of past generations but now uncovered by yet another descendant.

Such was the case with my Great Grandparents, Claude E. Gaskill and Myrtle Irene Currey Gaskill. My great grandfather Claude was born in 1890 in Wray, Colorado and before the age of five, the family up and moved taking Claude and his seven siblings (a 9th child would be born later) to Washington County, Kansas. He grew up in Mill Creek and after he turned 20 years old he left home looking for work as a "Hired Man" in Grandview, Kansas. He married Myrtle Irene Currey on March 24, 1917 when he 26 years old and Myrtle just 18. During their marriage they had four daughters, Dorothy, Billie (my grandmother), Marjorie and Ruth.  Their marriage lasted about 10 years, then, for unknown reasons, by 1930 they were divorced and Claude was living in Wichita, Kansas shacked up with a woman thirteen years younger than himself. This left my great-grandmother in Dodge City to raise four daughters, all under the age of twelve, alone and during the Great Depression. This couldn't have been easy. After the divorce she rented a room at the Lora Locke hotel which had just opened in 1928 and where, coincidently, my 2nd Great Uncle Carl Clare was also a lodger. She began work as a maid at the hotel while the children lived with her parents. It's assumed that she also stayed with her children at her parent's home when she wasn't working as she was listed at both locations during the 1930 census...oops!  She was counted twice!

The Lora Locke Hotel, 1930's

Without access to the 1940 census (to be released to the public in April 2012) I cannot be sure when she was able to get back on her feet and have her children living with her. I do know that she remarried Everett Donald Jones but I am unsure of when this marriage took place. My dad said that he never liked Myrtle or his step-grandfather much because they were mean and gave out beatings if you misbehaved (Myrtle does come from a line of  Slave Owners!). He told the story of how all the families, cousins, siblings, everyone would gather over at "The Joneses" and that they would always have a big meal but that Myrtle, being a rather large woman, would just sit and boss everyone around. When they would go over to visit, she would put the kids to work in the yard. When my dad was old enough to say his peace, he told his parents that he wasn't going over there anymore and that was the end of his visits. Perhaps, though, she had a hard, long life full of heartbreak and disappointment. Perhaps discovering the story of her raising her four daughters during the depression, will give him a new perspective. He said his mother, Billie, never talked about when she was a child, never talked much about her mom or the life they led so this story of his grandmother as a strong, single parent was new to him.

On the other hand, my dad loved going to visit his grandfather, Claude in Wichita, Kansas. Claude would call the kids "Scallywags". He lived next door to a penny arcade and my dad and his siblings would save up all their pennies for the visit just so they could go and play all the games. Claude died in 1962, three years before I was born. Myrtle died in 1970 when I was six years old. I wasn't raised with this side of the family so I don't have any memories of her and I'm not sure if she had a chance to see me when I was a baby.  But, I feel like I know her now and I'm very proud to have yet another strong woman in my family tree!

The Clare Line

Clare Name Meaning and History

1. Irish and English: habitational name from Clare in Suffolk (probably named with a Celtic river name meaning ‘bright’, ‘gentle’, or ‘warm’). One of the first Normans in Ireland (1170–72) was Richard de Clare, Earl of Pembroke, better known as ‘Strongbow’, who took his surname from his estate in Suffolk.
2. English: habitational name from Clare in Oxfordshire, named with Old English cl?g ‘clay’ + ora ‘slope’.
3. English: from the Middle English, Old French female personal name Cla(i)re (Latin Clara, from clarus‘famous’), which achieved some popularity, greater on the Continent than in England, through the fame of St. Clare of Assisi. See also Sinclair.
4. English: occupational name for a worker in clay, for example someone expert in building in wattle and daub, from Middle English clayere, an agent derivative of Old English cl?g ‘clay’.
5. 
   
6. 
   

   The Clare Line

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   Larry Clare (father)
   b. 1940, Kansas
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   Carl Clare (grandfather)
   b. 1917, Kansas
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   Harry Cleveland Clare (great grandfather)
   b. 1883, Kansas
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   James Daniel Clare (2nd great grandfather)
   b. 1849, Kentucky
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   James Clare (3rd great grandfather)
   b. 1805, Kentucky
   
   
   Not much is known about my main paternal line. I didn't grow up with this side of the family so I don't have much to go on at all. James Clare Sr. moved his wife Elisabeth and four children (Martha, Sara, James Daniel & Luella) from Kentucky to Illinois sometime before James Daniel was 12. What brought him to Illinois is unknown at this time.  I'm going to have to rely on a marriage record for James Daniel Clare to try to get me further in the search. Most of the Clare's that settled in Kentucky where English but I'm sure there must be an Irish connection somewhere with a surname like Clare!
   James Daniel married Amanda Clarke in Illinois and sometime between 1895 and 1900 moved the family (Ray, Harry Cleveland, Elsie, Katie and Carl) to Perry, Oklahoma.  During this time, the famous Land Runs were taking place.  I doubt that James participated in the land run as the 1900 census shows him as a "renter" and "day laborer"  in Perry.  It's more probable that he went there to find work because towns were quickly growing as a result of the land settlements.  Just five years later he was living as a widower in Winfield, Kansas.  My great grandfather was 24 at the time but two of his siblings were still teenagers and living without their mother.
   Most of the information I found for my great grandfather, Harry Cleveland Clare came from his WWI draft registration card which showed him married with 4 children (Clinton, Clyde, Carl and Laurence), working as a truck driver and having gray eyes and brown hair. All that my dad really remembers about his grandfather was that he was a boxer in his youth.  I like the sound of that...both the Oklahoma Land Run and an Irish boxer make me think of the movie "Far and Away". A distant cousin is researching my great grandmothers line and shared with me his funeral card which gives the date of birth, death and final resting place:
   
   
   
   I hope the luck of the Irish will be with me as I continue to search records trying to find the birth city and parents of James Clare, Sr. and his wife Elisabeth.

The Spahn Line

Spahn Name Meaning and History

1. metonymic occupational name for a carpenter or for a roofer who applied wooden shingles, from Middle German span ‘chip’, ‘shaving’, ‘splinter’.
2. nickname for a skinny person.

Our Spahn Line

Betty Jane Spahn (grandmother)

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Adam George Spahn (great grandfather)

b. 1897, Topeka, Kansas

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John Spahn (2nd great grandfather)

b. 1864, Saratov, Russia

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Adam Spahn (3rd great grandfather0

b. unknown, Saratov Russia

Part of the problem researching this line is lack of documentation for immigration for my 2nd great-grandfather, John Spahn.  According to family legend, he never wanted to talk about his life in Russia or how he came to the United States.  He told a story to his great granddaughter, Betty Jane when she was young about boys being forced out of their homes and made to go serve in the Russian Army.  It was rumored that John went A.W.O.L. from the Russian Army.  This rumor could be fact because out of all records from Saratov, John and his wife Mary are not among the passenger lists.  From the various Census reports, I was able to determine that they arrived into the United States in 1891.  I searched all the ships that came into port in 1891 and they weren't on them.  In addition, the Census tells us that they were naturalized as American Citizens in 1900.  They settled in Topeka, Kansas where my great grandfather and his siblings were born before the entire family moved to Offerle.

I had always wondered how the Spahn's ended up in Russia because I knew Spahn wasn't a Russian name but rather a German name.  Researching the Spahn immigrants in general, including John's assumed brother, George Spahn, yielded a wealth of imformation about how the Spahn ancestors ended up in Russia...they were Volga Germans who settled the region in the mid 1700's.  Here is the story from Wikipedia:

The Volga Germans (German: Wolgadeutsche or Russlanddeutsche, Russian: Поволжские немцы, Povolzhskie nemtsy) were ethnic Germans living along the River Volga in the region of southern European Russia around Saratov and to the south. They maintained German culture, language, traditions and churches: Lutherans, Reformed, Roman Catholics, and Mennonites. Many Volga Germans emigrated to the Midwestern United States, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and other countries in the 19th and early 20th centuries. During World War II, many died in Soviet labour camps. In the late 20th century, many of the remaining ethnic Germans moved to Germany.

Here is a lovely picture of Norka, Saratov settled by the Volga Germans:

Another issue with searching the records for John and George Spahn is an abundance of Spahn's with the same names...Adam, George, John are all popular and there are several of each, including the infamous George Spahn who owned Spahn Ranch in California, where the Manson Family stayed and hatched their murderous plan.  Even the female Spahn's had repeating names such as Elizabeth, Katherine, Mary/Marie.  Most are probably related to each other and to me in one way or another.  I will have to add the Saratov region to my list of ancestry travel destinations.  I could visit this church in Norka and just maybe I will find the birth and marriage records for John Spahn, which in turn, could lead me down a longer road back in time.  To a time and place where the Spahn's were once again back in the motherland of Germany.

Even though I can't currently get further down the line, I was happy to finally understand how the Spahn ancestors ended up in Russia. One mystery solved!