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Behind the Finds | Georg, Brigida and John Wolford
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Passenger List for the S.S. Union, a German immigrant steamship that brought the Hauswirths to the United States on Sept. 25, 1868.
Hauswirth
In my last story, I promised readers the tale of Jean Wolford — the little girl whose photograph I found in a secondhand store, frozen in time with a curious half-smile and a name that almost wasn’t hers. That’s because Jean’s last name, Wolford, traces back to a pivotal moment in the 1800s several states away, when fate dramatically reshaped the life of her paternal grandfather, John Hauswirth.
But to understand how Jean came to be a Wolford at all, we had to start with a different story — one that begins aboard an immigrant ship and ends with a man collapsing in the street, three more deaths, a family shattered, and new bonds formed out of kindness and loss.
That story, the Hauswirths’ story, had to be told first:
Brigida Stelzer was born Nov. 1, 1836, in southern Germany. She married Georg Heinrich Hauswirth in 1863, at age 27, and the couple began their family in the town of Weingarten, Germany. Five years into their marriage, Georg and Brigida took a bold leap — packing up their young children and setting sail for the United States, chasing the promise of a new life across the Atlantic.
Baden, Germany Emigration Index, 1866-1911
Boarding the German steamship the S.S. Union, the family of five departed from ports in Bremen, Germany, and Southampton, England, before entering the U.S. via New York’s Castle Garden immigration depot. They arrived on Sept. 25, 1868. Their children — Leopold “Frank” (4 years old), Marie “Mary” (2 years old), and Josef (6 months old)—traveled with them in the steerage section of the ship. They likely purchased third-class tickets for the voyage, which probably meant their accommodations were noisy and crowded near bottom of the ship.
Chicago
On the S.S. Union’s manifest, the Hauswirths listed Wisconsin as their intended destination — but it’s not clear if they ever got there. The family resurfaced two years later in Chicago, in the 1870 U.S. Census taken on July 23. Georg is listed as a laborer, and Brigida — a laborer of another kind — was noted as ‘keeping house,’ having steadily welcomed a new baby every two years or less since they were married. By this point, baby Josef, who had immigrated with them, had sadly passed away. I haven’t found his death certificate yet, though one may exist. But Leopold and Marie “Mary” are still there. And, 1870 also marked the birth of a new child: Georg Adam Hauswirth, 4 months old, born in Illinois.
1870 U.S. Census | Hauswirth Family
In a few years, Chicago would also be the birthplace of their middle son, Johann “John” Georg Hauswirth, born in October 1873. He’s a key player in this story, so we’ll circle back to him later.
Houseworth
After 1870 or so, the Hauswirths were being referred to by the Anglicized spelling of their German name: “Houseworth.” Two or three children later, the Houseworths were living in Tecumseh, Nebraska. George sported an ‘e’ at the end of his name by then, and was now listed as a farmer. Brigida, became known as the Anglicized “Bridget” and she was still keeping house and a mama to many. In fact, the pair went on to have at least 12 children, maybe more, including two sets of twins. Sadly, many of their children died as infants or in early childhood.
The Falls City Journal, July 20, 1878; Clip found by Greg Spadoni.
Delirium tremens
In 1878, tragedy struck the family again — this time at its head. Under bizarre circumstances, newspapers reported that George had — quite literally — dropped dead from “delirium tremens,” a severe condition associated with hallucinations and alcohol withdrawal. His death was sudden, according to the newspaper accounts, and involved running from imaginary things and dying in the street after collapsing from heat exhaustion.
Several months after her husband passed, Bridget, tragically, died too. I was unable to find a death certificate for her either (unfortunately, her name is spelled about 18 different ways on her genealogical records). But it appears she may have passed at the same time, or close to the same time, as the birth of her second set of twins. Those twins, whose names were not available, have 1879 as the year of their birth and death, and it’s the same year Bridget died. She was 43 years old.
New homes
The couple’s children were orphaned, and subsequently split up among different households. Which family do you think took in John, the guy I promised to steer us back to? Why, yes, he was indeed welcomed into the home of Solomon and Ellen Wolford, a well-respected couple who lived in the same town as the Houseworths.
Solomon, a Civil War veteran and former teacher, had homesteaded in Nebraska and served as county superintendent and commissioner. Ellen, who married Solomon after her first husband died, was a mom and teacher. The Wolfords had no children together, so they adopted John and his sister Maggie Houseworth.
Obituaries for the Nebraska Wolfords showed that the couple also took in George and Bridget’s youngest daughter, Mattie Houseworth (1878–1879), who died when she was about 13 months old; as well as what I think is an entirely different family’s baby named Mabel Lorena, who was left at Wolford’s doorstep as an infant. Little Mabel lived only about six more months after that.
Solomon and Ellen gave John and Maggie not only their home and their own land later in life, but also their last name — Wolford. And, in what might be a testament to his admiration of them, John kept that last name and passed it on to his wife and their own children. Maggie also kept it, but as these things tend to go, she eventually married to become Maggie Reed.
And now we’ve almost come to the point in this story where I originally wanted to begin — with John Wolford, Jean Wolford’s grandfather. But when Greg and I learned that John Wolford was really John Hauswirth, the tragic orphan whose parents died so dramatically, I couldn’t help but share their story too.
John Hauswirth Wolford
John Hauswirth Wolford
John Hauswirth Wolford was born in October 1873 in Chicago as a Hauswirth (and a Houseworth), but he carried the Wolford name for the rest of his life after age 5.
In 1893, when John Wolford was 20 years old, he moved to Selden, Kansas. Three years later, in 1895, he married the lovely Leta Hopwood — and we have what appears to be their wedding picture in our secondhand store collection. John’s sister Maggie remained in contact with John through the years. After John’s death in 1937, Maggie received word of his passing and told the newspapers.
John and Leta Wolford of Tacoma
But, three decades before that, back in 1907, John and his new wife Leta Wolford moved to Tacoma, where John worked as a railroad blacksmith for the next 11 years. The couple had four children: Don, Clyde (who died in infancy), Guida, and Marion (often spelled in her records as Marian). Their eldest son, Don Solomon Wolford (keen eyes will see he bore the full name of John’s adopted dad) married Doris Persing of Tacoma. The pair remained on the Puget Sound, living in Tacoma and Cromwell. They had one child, a daughter: Jean Guida Wolford.
And that pretty lady is my niece’s little doppelganger — the subject of next week’s installment of Behind the Finds.
But, first, back to John. With all those years of exposure to metal dust, fumes, and who knows what else, John Wolford retired from blacksmithing in 1918, about 11 years after moving to Washington state. He suffered from asthma, had symptoms of heart and kidney disease, and ultimately died of heart failure on May 15, 1937 at the age of 63.
We have quite a few pictures of John Hauswirth Wolford, often hanging with the kids, leaning on an old car and spending time with family, even Solomon Wolford, who newspapers reported came to visit his son, all the way in Tacoma.
Check back next week to learn the rest of little Jean Wolford’s story.