53 - Larger Map and Some History

 Click here to read story from beginning.

I have taken a break in the story of Grandma's 1936 trip to fill in some background information with a map of her home village.

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The village map shown and discussed in Post 52 was part of a larger area. When Grandma Cecile was living there, it was part of Austria. By 1936 when she returned to visit, it was part of Czechoslavakia. Today it is known as the Czech Republic. That previous map is a close-up view of the villages of Ober and Nieder-Mohrau. Now I would like to add a map of the larger area.

Nieder- and Ober-Mohrau are circled

This map is page 5 of the book "Unvergessene Heimat", or "Unforgotten Homeland". It is titled "Kreiskarte" which translates to circle map. That must refer to the circle in the center which marks the location of the Nieder- and Ober-Mohrau villages. To look at it closer, simply click on the image.

The areas marked in color were most likely made by Sr Agnes Beitel, Grandma's daughter who owned the book. She was probably marking important places. Some are places mentioned by Grandma in the story of her travels, some may have been places that Sr Agnes visited on one of her overseas trips. You may want to refer to this map while reading the story. The handwriting at the top of the page about Karlsbrunn was probably made by  Sr Agnes. Not sure if it is a translation, or if someone thought it was a beautiful place.

You will not find these names on modern maps. As mentioned, the area is now the Czech Republic and towns have Czech names. A few I have, thanks to my cousin Linda Koenig, are:

Roemerstadt (then) - Rymarov (now)

Nieder-Mohrau (then) - Doni Moravice (now)

Karlsdorf (then) - Karlov pod Pradedem

Wurbenthal (then) - Vrbno pod Pradedem or Vrbno (now)

Along with the maps, I thought a little history/geography might be useful or at least interesting. The same book that gave the maps, also provided some history on page 9.

Page 9 with photo of a Paper mill in Nieder-Mohrau.

As usual, I turned to my friend Al Haunold for a translation. In this case, I had sent him the page with a specific phrase or word that we had discussed. He then told me the page had interesting information and offered to tell me what it said. Here then, is his translation:

Location of our home town:
pg 9

As mentioned before, our home town was founded in the year 1258. It is located in a valley between the Harrachsdorfer heights and the Teufelsberge (devils mountains), along the village creek which in Niederdorf combines with the Mohrau (river). The Mohrau river starts in a pit below the Hohe Heide and near the Rosenberge also combines with the Seifenbach. The name of this latter one leads us to the conclusion that at some time gold was panned (washed) in this creek. As all around here this location was settled as a mountainous agricultural enterprise. Its geographic details are approximately 50 degrees North latitude and 35 degrees eastern longitude.

Located approximately 6 kilometers north of Roemerstadt, Mohrau belonged to this district. The Roemerstadt district at that time included 39 communities. It was a politically recognized district with a Bezirkshauptmann (district leader) at the top. In May 1939 the district had 26,936 inhabitants. Nieder Mohrau had 804 people, meaning 248 separate house-holds, and Ober Mohrau had 308 people, corresponding to 88 house-holds, and Roemerstadt itself had 5,859 people corresponding to 1963 house-holds.

Mohrau is at an elevation of 650 meters above sea level. At the eastern edge of the town and in parts also along the Mohrau (river) is the country’s border with Silesia. Some-time later this part of Silesia and Moravia were combined as Moravia-Silesia.

According to the regular development, both villages were Reihendoerfer (villages of single-row houses) along some forested slopes, which means that behind the farmer’s houses, fields extended up to the boundary of the next village. The neighboring communities were Neudorf, Klein-Mohrau, Wildgrub, Kleinstohl, Irmsdorf, Roemerstadt, Harrachsdorf, and Rosendorf. Since our village had two streets and also two sides, the larger side and the smaller side, there were also farmer’s houses between the two sides who had their fields extending into the direction of Kleinstohl, Irmsdorf, and also toward the direction of Klein-Mohrau. With an extension of approximately 2 ½ km, Nieder – and Ober-Mohrau were typical peasant villages. The inhabitants of these locations worked in the silk-processing factories (enterprises) of Roemerstadt, in the chain manufacturing factory in Klein-Mohrau and in the Bleiche (bleaching facility) of Kleinstohl. A portion of the workers was also employed by the paper-mill in Nieder Mohrau.

Photo below: Paper-mill Matzner, Nieder-Mohrau

Next, I will continue on with Grandma's personal account. 

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Story to be continued......  

To read Post -  "54 - Photos of Nieder-Mohrau - Click here

52 - Map of Grandma's Hometown Village

 

Click here to read story from beginning.

Note to readers: My apologies to any who have been waiting for so long for a next post in the story of Grandma's Trip. Life does seem to get in the way of the best laid plans. Enough said. This post took a while to produce because I wanted to translate from German to English all the labels in the map posted here. Not withstanding the postponements, that took quite a bit of time. I hope you enjoy exploring the result.

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Perhaps when Grandma Cecile was still living in Nieder-Mohrau, there was some space between the villages. By 1945 when it all came to an end, the villages of Nieder- and Ober-Mohrau had grown together. Klein Mohrau was still a short distance away. Today Nieder-Mohrau is known by a Czech name - Dolni Moravice.

To make the translations, I ran the words through Google's Translator. Often, it would simply repeat a word, indicating that it did not understand. Those words I then asked my friend Al Haunold to help me with. When you see some of those words, you'll know why Google couldn't come up with a replacement word!

Below is the map, followed by a list of the translations. You can see a larger version of the map to perhaps look for houses of your relatives and see what their occupation was. All you have to do is click on the image.

When going through the translations, the words in blue are those of Al Haunold. Many thanks, Al!! The map and key are from the book, "Unvergessene Heimat" or "Unforgotten Homeland".

 

map of Grandma's hometown village

 

 

Translation of Words from German to English on the map of Nieder- and Ober-Mohrau

Note: words written with the German “umlaut” are spelled with an “e” after the vowel when written in English.

Zeichernerkidrung - Character declaration (map key)

Gedenkstätten - Memorials

Gewässer – waters (river, lake, pond)

Grenze - border

Nebengebäude - Outbuildings

Strassen - Streets

Wege - Roads

Wohngebäude - Residential buildings

Hauservzeichnis mit Gewerbezweig - House directory with occupation of residents

Altes Bauernhaus Kraus - Old Kraus farmhouse

Arbeiter - workers

Arbeiterwohnhaus - Workers’ house

Ausgedingehaus zu Nr. 28 - Ausgedingehaus to No. 28

Ausgedingehaus – Ausgedingehaus -  with reference to a specific house number, that is different and hard to figure out unless you have experienced it yourself.

In Austria where I [Al] grew up, Ausgedinge had a very specific meaning. When people got older and they thought of cutting back on their work or even retiring, especially farmers, they went into the Ausgedinge. That means, they turned over much of their activities to a son (or rarely a daughter who usually was married)

They often stayed in the same house or moved to another abode which the family already owned. They thus were “ausgedingt” but still got their living expenses covered, frequently living in the same house with their child’s family.

If they moved to a different address, that’s where the “haus” and its number come in.

In this case, the retiree still depended on his sustinence from the son or daughter but did not materially work with the business anymore. He is referred to as an “Ausgediengter” (retired) and is living at a specific location. 

Bauernhof – farm

Bauernhof (frueher Olmuehle) - Farm (formerly Oil mill) referring to some machinery or perhaps a building for milling oil seeds grown on the farm.

Bauernhof unbewohnt siehe Nr. 43 - Uninhabited farm see no.43

Bauernhof und Flachshande - Farm and flax trade

Bauer u. Hausfleischer - Farmer and house butcher

Bauernhof (verp. an E. Muller) - Farm (sold to E. Muller)

Bauernhof (Wohng. Vermietet) - Farm (rented apartment)

Beamter – Official

Bleicharbeiter – bleach worker - The Bleiche is actually some vessel, tub or perhaps something larger, but definitely a vessel of some kind holding a chemical bleaching solution in a separate location being referred to as Bleiche. There is no indication for which manufacturing it was used, but [in Mohrau it could either] refer [both] to a silk manufacturing facility (Seidenfabrik) and/or a paper mill (Papierfabrik). The Bleiche (word for bleaching would be “bleichen”) was definitely used for one of these enterprises. [Thus, a bleicharbeiter would be a worker in one of those facilities.]

Ehem. - Former

Ehem. Hadwiger Kaufmann - Former Hadwig merchant – Hadwig is probably the name of the owner of the grocery store. Ehem. Is the abbreviation for “former”, thus he was the former owner of the store and now referred to as “Hadwig” merchant.

Ehem. Spunddreherei - former bung turning shop (a bung is a a round piece of wood, cork, or rubber which you use to close the hole in a container such as a barrel or flask. (from dictionary)) so this would have been a shop that produced those round pieces of wood

Ehemals Konsumverein - Former Consumer association,

like a group buying club, most likely for groceries. Like a group buying club, most likely for groceries. Ehemals means “former”. Nothing mentioned about the products, it could be fruits and vegetables, but also clothing or household gadgets or even equipment: This association probably provided more leverage for getting better prices. Not just a farmers market, much more than that

Erbgericht mit Gastwirtschaft - Google translated as: “Hereditary court with restaurant”

Al’s translation: Erbgericht refers to a family-kept recipe which was inherited. Erb refers to inherited and Gericht means menu or recipe (not the judicial term Gericht.)

Gastwirtschaft of course is restaurant, and in the former sense something usually run by a family or close relatives not the commercial enterprise we are used to today. This recipe would be an heirloom

follow-up email from Al -Dec 20, 2021: Erbgericht: Erb means “inherited or heritance. Gericht in this case refers to a menu. Thus: some family-inherited dish of some sort, perhaps main meal or dessert.

Gastwirtschaft as explained before is a place where one can get a meal and often also beverages like beer and wine.

No, it does not specifically mean that the restaurant stayed or was in the family, just the recipe had been handed down from one generation to another one and this restaurant used this old-inherited recipe for their menu and advertisement to draw curious customers.

Färbermeister - Master dyer

Fassbinderbetrieb – Cooper business (maker or fixer of barrels)

Friseurgeschäft - Barber shop

Gaertlerstelle – Google had no answer

Al’s comments: A job with a business that sells garden items, mainly vegetables such as lettuce, onions, potatoes, and in these days rarely flowers or shrubs. They were a good business then primarily in the spring when they had hot beds or even a greenhouse and could sell vegetables at an earlier time before field-grown items became available.

Stelle means job or employment.

A book, “The Adolf Story”, written by Felix and Lucille Koenig, descendants of Adolf Koenig - one of my Grandfather's uncles – provides a few more clues. Adolf was the first of the family to settle in Nebraska. The book is mostly genealogy. They included a few translations in the beginning including Community names and Professions. In that list they have Gaertler - cottager, Gaertner - field cottager, Haeusler - cottager, Hortulanus - field cottager. Different words for slight variations on the job? Perhaps whether or not the person had access to land? I did check the definition of cottager and it explained the old English version of a person living in a small cottage on a large estate. The cottager has enough ground around the house to raise a garden for food. So perhaps the "field cottager" had access to a field away from the house/cottage?

Gaertlerstelle (Wohnung. Vermietet) – Gaertlerstelle (Apartment. Rented), (see above translation for Gaerlerstelle)

Gasthaus u. Fleischerei - Inn and butcher shop

Gasthaus u. Friseurgeschaft - Guest house and barber shop

Gemeindehaus - Parish Hall

Gendarmeriestation - a police station

Al’s comments: even today the French word is used regularly and the police officers are referred to as Gendarm (singular) or Gendarme (plural)

Genossenschaftsschmiede - Cooperative forge

Gesh. -u. Mietshaus (Riedel Poldi) - Gesh. -u. Tenement house (Riedel Poldi)

Al’s comments: I am at a loss with Gesh,  [maybe] Gaestehaus, house for guests, the second word [Miethaus] is “rental”.

The names Riedel Poldi, in German they use the reverse, last name followed by first name, thus one person, could be either male or female, abbreviation for Leopold is thus “Poldi

  A guess would be an abbrevation of Geschichtliche, which would be “historical?

Gespannführer - Team leader

Al’s comments: this refers to a horse drawn vehicle, called “Gespann”, he held the reins (Al H. email 5/9/22), so the team referred to is a team of horses, not people

Greislerei - Grocery store

Haushälterin - housekeeper

Hüttenarbeiter - Ironworkers

in der Kolonie - in the colony

in this instance it is used in the phrase "Zur Kettenfabrik i.d. Kolonn” My question to Al was what Colony?

Al’s comments: the reference might be to an African colony since Germany prior to WW one had several colonies in Africa. Kettenfabri is a facility where they made chains, likely iron or steel for various applications.

Kauffmann – Google simply repeated the word

Al’s comments: The German spelling is wrong, only one f and thus Kaufmann. That is a merchant, either groceries or clothing, shoes or a combination. Thus just “businessman”

Kettenschmied – Chain smith

Kleinbauer – Small (land)holder, small farmer

Al’s comments: A Kleinbauer is a small farmer who may own a few slivers of land and has troubles making a living.

Kleinbauernhof - Small farm

Kleinbauer und Muellergehilfe - Small farmer and mueller assistant

Kleinbauer mean small farmer. Mueller assistant means assistant to a miller, namely one who mills grain to produce flour.

Kleingartlerstelle - Allotment agency - “allotment gardens” according to Wikipedia are like community garden spaces, rented out for people to have a space for their gardens in this case, small gardens.

Landwirtschaft verpachtet - Agriculture leased

person leased some agricultural land, and he had leased his agricultural holdings to somebody else

Lerchhaus – Lerchhaus - This one stumped even Al, so ??

Maurer - Bricklayer, mason

Mietshaus - Tenement house

Mietshaus (Neuvoglseifen) – tenement house (Neuvoglseifen) – I believe Neuvoglseifen was a town in the area

Al’s comments: Mietshaus is a rental house. Miete means rent

Neuvogelseifen is likely the name of the village, Literal translation would mean “Soap for new birds”

Mietshhaus zu Nr. 8 - Apartment building to No. 8

Mühlenbetrieb und. Landwirtschaft – Mill (grain?) operation and Agriculture

Neubauwohnhaus - New residential building

Packerei u. Kaufladen – Packing and shop

Papierfabrik u. Landwirtschaft - Paper mill and Agriculture

Pfarrhof – rectory

Postbeanter - Mailman

Postelle – mail department (Post Office)

Privat – private

Rentner - pensioner

Saegearbeiter - Sag workers

Al’s comments: Saege means a saw, like “cutting wood with...” Thus this person works in a sawmill, or works with a saw of some sort.

Sattlerei u. Kleinbauer - Saddlery and small farmer

Schiefererzeugung u. Kleinbauer - Slate production and small farmer

Schmiedebetrieb u. Wohnhaus - Blacksmith shop and residential building

Schneiderei - Tailoring

Schuhmacherei - shoemaking

Schulgebäude – school-building

Spenglerei - Plumbing

Strassenwärter u. Milchhandel - Roadman and milk trade

Tabakhandel - Tobacco trade

Textilarbeiter - Textile workers

Tischler – carpenter

Tischlerei - Joinery

Tischlerei u. Kleinbauer - Carpentry and small farmer

Villa – villa, mansion

Villa means like Google interpreted, except in the local surroundings,  it has the meaning of “mansion” - people looked at such dwellings as something that few people could afford and their owners are esteemed and rich. Like nobility of some sort or very rich merchants who have little contact with the common folk.

Wagner u. Kleinbauer - Wagner and small farmers

Wagner refers to a profession, a person who is licensed to make wagons, perhaps even carriages. Most wagons that the wagner built were for heavy loads such a hay, wood, fruits, grain.

Waldarbeiter - Forest workers

Waldarbeiter u. Gaertlerstelle - Forest workers and Cottage garden workers

Werkstischler - Carpenter

- My question was – what is the difference between a Werkstischler and a Tischler? An apprentice? A different type of carpentry???

Al’s comments: a carpenter, not just an apprentice, perhaps a licensed shop owner who makes furniture. Likely not building houses, that would be a Zimmermann.

Wohn - u. Retiebsgebaude zu Nr. 31 - Residential and retirement building to No. 31

Wohnhaus - Residential building

Wohnhaus f. bei ihm Beschäftigte - House for employees

Wohn u. Betriebshauser - Residential and industrial buildings

Wohn - u. Mietshaus - Residential and tenement house

Zimmermann – Carpenter [as mentioned above by Al, this carpenter would build houses]

Zimmermann u. Kleinbauer - Carpenter and small landholder/farmer

Zu – to

zur Kettenfabrik i.d. Kolonie - to the chain factory i.d. colony (see above)

1942 abgebrannt - Burned down in 1942

small box in bottom right of map page:

Geschichtliche Daten - Historical Data

1200 to 1400 25 villages were listed in the vicinity of Roemerstadt

1258 Founding of the village Mohrau

1350 construction of a wooden church

In the second half of the 15th century the total population succumbed to the Plague

In the middle of the 16th century new settlers arrived: Protestants

1594 construction of a new church

1623 switch to the Order of German Knights: catholic

1794 church burned down due to a lightning strike

1795 construction of a new church in a Romanesque style

1798 installation of a pipe organ in N. M. (Nieder Mohrau ?)

1803 purchase of three new bells for the church

1806 construction of a school building

1834 surveying all fields for the ownership registry, Roemerstadt

1892 founding a voluntary fire brigade

1902 construction of the main village road/ installation of a clock into the church tower

1903/04 and also 1927 huge damages due to flooding

1918/19 Huge flu epidemic (Spanish flu; influenca)

1919 due to the peace treaty of Versailles the area which until then was Austrian

went to Czechoslovakia

1920 electrification

1922 construction of a war memorial

1928 expansion of the cemetery

1934 fire destroys the Brech house (4 women died)

1938 Reunion with Germany between October 1 to 10

1942 fire destroys the sawmill owned by Hubert Matzner

1946 forced relocation from the old homesteads

Ortsplan von Nieder-und Ober/Mohrau (Stand: Ende April 1945) – Map of the place as of its end in April 1945

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Entwurf nach dem Gedaechtnis aufgestellit im Jahre 1968 von Franz Klos und Willi Aust. - design from the memory & presented in the year 1968 by Franz Klos and Willi Aust.

Gezeichnet von Herbert Schallner 1972 Zusammenstellung Fruehjahr 1982/E-L.K

- Personal remembrances of Herbert Schallner 1972, compilation spring 1982/ E-L.K

Hoehenlage: 650m ue. NN – elevation, 650 meters above sea level [about 2133 feet]

Km/Angabe: Ab Kirche N. -M. - as listed: from the church in Nieder-Mohrau

[general translations by Google translator, refined translations by Al Haunold 

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Story to be continued......

To read Post -  "53 - Larger Map and Some History" Click Here