Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Family History Center Visit 13

Yesterday, I paid a visit to the local Family History Center, and I took a look at the microfilm that had arrived. That microfilm happened to be of civil marriage records from Gelnhausen, Germany, but unfortunately, I was unable to find the marriage record for my ancestors, Adolph Kees and Amelie Cotta. The problem was partially due to the fact that I had difficulty reading the handwriting and partly due to the fact that I was unfamiliar with this record type. (Up until this point in researching my German ancestors, I was only familiar with the civil records in Trippstadt, Germany which was a part of Bavaria in the time frame of my research. Gelnhausen was part of the country of Hessen-Nassau at that time, about early to mid-1800s. Thus, I was looking at the records for another country than I was used to, and so, I was unfamiliar with the records that I was researching.)

Of course, I thought that by ordering the civil records first, I might be able to find a record of my ancestors' marriage without having to look at the church records. (There was more than one microfilm of Protestant churches in the LDS catalogue, so I wasn't sure of which church to look at first.) Obviously, I was unsuccessful, so I'll have to order microfilms from the churches in Gelnhausen the next time. Of course, I'll have to wait until I'm on break from school because I will be going back to school soon. Hopefully, the other three microfilms will come in soon, especially the other German microfilm because I don't have much time left.

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