2. The quartermaster

On the 10th March 1770 a boy was born in the city of Schleswig. He was called Johann Friedrich Engellenner (also called Hans Jürgen). When he had grown up, he married a woman from the town called Rabenkirchen (located in Anglia), named Johanna Dorothea Gulbrands (sometimes also called Guldberdsen), born 9 January 1770. He works as an eskadron-quartermaster in Schleswig around 1800 and lives in the quarter “Friedrichsberg”. After 1811, the family lives in Tønder (German: Tondern), a town in south Denmark and at that point, they have seven children:

In Tønder, Johann Friedrich worked as a porter at the local administrative office and as a scrivener. When the children were older and had left their home, the couple received alms from a local organization, so their live was not a wealthy one. When in 1854 a workhouse was established (Gørrismark, danish article on this workhouse here), no support was given to people outside the workhouse anymore. Around 104 people were subject to this and notified, and it is possible that Johann Friedrich and Dorothea were two of them. The couple lived on the so-called „Freigrund” (danish: frigrund) on the premises of the old Tønder castle, probably close to the ruins of the former castle. Dorothea died there the 24th July 1854 and Johann Friedrich only a year later, the 26th March 1855. Their children are by then already spread around the world.

(Image on top: Own signature of Johann Friedrich Engellenner on a passport from 1837)