Finding Sophia in 1870

Ancestry.com recently announced an “update” for the 1870 census and it got me to thinking about one of the people that I cannot find in 1870: Sophia Elizabeth (Derle) Trautvetter.sophia-trautvetter

My other two “missing” direct ancestors in 1870 are single, relatively young men who were living in rural parts of the United States. While I would like to find them as well, the likely scenario is that they were working somewhere as a hired man and were simply not enumerated in the census. In their cases I’m really not certain how how much I would learn from their enumeration.  The time spent looking just may not be worth it.

Sophia’s different.

She would have been approximately 62 years old in 1870. She was alive in 1870 since she died in 1877 (per her tombstone at the Bethany United Church of Christ in Tioga, Hancock County, Illinois and the church entry of her death). The stone is faded and somewhat difficult to read. I went back and reviewed her death entry from the church records to confirm that it was intermingled with entries from the year 1877 and had not been misinterpreted. The year was correct. She died in 1877.

She and her family (husband George and sons Michael, George, and Theodore) are enumerated in Hancock County, Illinois’s 1860 census in Rocky Run Township. The family owned a farm there and that’s where son George is enumerated in 1870. Son Michael is a newly married man living in nearby Walker Township in 1870.

In 1869, George and Sophia sold their farm land in Rocky Run Township to their son George. George the father died in Germany in 1871. The church entry for his death and funeral indicated that he lived in Bad Salzungen where he had returned to live as a “retiree” due to marital difficulties. Based upon the 1869 sale of real estate, George’s death in Germany in 1871, and my inability to locate him in the 1870 US census, it’s been surmised that he returned to Germany before the date of the 1870 census.

But what of Sophia?

Where is she in 1870?

To make matters worse, twenty-six year old son Theodore cannot be located in 1870 either. He clearly was alive in 1870 as he later married in 1872 (in Hancock County). He likely was with Sophia in 1870–the question is where.

It is possible that Sophia and Theodore returned to Germany with George, only to come back to Illinois sometime before Theodore married in 1872. Just because George died there alone doesn’t mean he went back to Germany alone. If that’s the case, then Sophia and Theodore should appear on a passenger manifest for the return trip. There’s no record of that either.

This is one question to which I do not have an answer, so we’ll make no promises of when there is an update.

Of course, I should not just search the 1870 census index at Ancestry.com. I should see if there are independently created indexes. And I should manually search for Sophia and Theodore in locations where they could be living, starting with Hancock County, Illinois’ Walker and Rocky Run Townships where Michael and George are living in 1870.

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11 thoughts on “Finding Sophia in 1870

  1. Did you try newspapers? There might have been a story on the breakukp or the trip. Or there might be a newspaper on the son’s marriage that indicates where his mother was living.

    • mjnrootdig says:

      Not yet. That’s a possibility, but in the location where these people were living any type of wedding announcement was usually just an announcement of the license. The wedding information would be easy to look up in the newspaper, but the other incident would require a manual search as the local newspapers are only available on microfilm.

      Thanks for the suggestion.

      Michael

    • mjnrootdig says:

      That’s true. Actually that’s a good reason to perform a manual search and check the page numbers to make certain they are sequential as one searches.

  2. Does she have a daughter? There is an Elizabeth Trautfetter who married George Burk in Hancock County in 1857. If that is her daughter, you might find her with them in a census.

  3. Sometimes I put a name into Google or dogpile.com, in quotation marks, just to see what pops up. In so doing, I found a plat map, and the alternate spellings of Trontrelter, Troutfetter, Trolretter, Trauvetter, and a John Trautvetter in Wisconsin in 1877. Perhaps that’s where she went. One of the records showed Theodore Frederick, so it’s possible the F was indexed as a T in other records. Sometimes it’s hard to tell. There’s an 1855 record from the Illinois State Census which only shows George Trautvetter, and other family members counted but not named.

    Additionally at least one source listed Sophia’s husband as John, while others said George. Anyway, good luck on this search!

    • mjnrootdig says:

      Thanks. The Trautvetters in Wisconsin are a different bunch entirely. George was actually Johann George and occasionally that gets rendered as John or George.

  4. “Marital difficulties” may be somewhat different than we think of them today. Is it possible that Sophia may have had some mental difficulties, dementia, or something similar, that may have resulted in hospitalization? If so, and if in the US, there would most likely have been a census away from where she was previously living, that would have her by name, but listed as an “inmate”.

  5. Barbara G DeHart says:

    I’ve been doing research for over 50 years and have forgotten some things I use to know but I believe the 1870 Census was filmed twice by the LDS Church. Don’t remember why but do know some pages were left out on 2nd filming. Friend of mine was trying to find a family in 1870 and was told by relative where the the family was. Cathy still couldn’t find them, relative was looking at the 1st filming and Cathy at the 2nd. When I suggested she look at the 1st, she found them. Both filmings use to be available. Today I went to the LDS Catalog and FamilySearch for the 1870 but neither mentions there were 2 filmings. If Ancestry got their census info from the LDS Library, who knows what filming they used. If you contact the library and don’t get someone my age, they might not know about the two filmings either. Good luck!!

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