Next Step on Frederick and Maria Barbara Seifert

I’m trying to avoid spinning my wheels on my “new” ancestors Frederick and Maria Barbara Siefert as mentioned in an earlier post.

There’s quite a bit I don’t know about them and that impacts how effective my search will be.

I’ve decided that there is a reasonable chance that there may be something more about their daughter Barbara in the church record of her 1882 marriage in Ft. Madison, Iowa (particularly her place of birth). It is not uncommon for German Lutheran church records in the United States during this time period to give the place of birth for the marrying parties. That location is something I do not have.

There’s one little problem. The minister is named only with his initials and no church is named in the marriage record.

The minister is listed as  G. D. Wobus and he’s probably the Gottlieb Wobus listed in the 1880 federal census for Ft. Madison, Lee County, Iowa.  His occupation is “clergyman evangelical.”

Based upon that, I’ve contacted an archivist of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in Chicago to ask if there is a pastor with this name who ever served in a church in Ft. Madison. They may not have the answer and they probably don’t have the church records.

But I need the name of the church before I can attempt to find the records.

Stay tuned…this is one story where I don’t already know how it’s going to turn out.