Dear Sir or Madam,
Wonderful, a web page for Hannover! Is it the whole Kingdom of
Hannover? Is there an English translation of the first page, please? I
am sorry but I know very little German, despite my ancestry.
My great, great grandfather was born in the Parish of Soltau in 1808,
in Widingen. His name was Hans Hinrich Luers, at birth.
He came to South Australia in 1843, (via England), for the Dresden
Missionary Society . He planned to teach the native Australians how to
farm,
so that the South Australian Lutheran Mission, would become self
sufficient. Unfortunately the Aborigines were not interested in
farming, as they were hunter/ gatherers.
Since he could not fulfill his plans for the Missionary Society, he
left the Mission and moved north to Lobethal.
Soon after he was appointed school teacher of the new Lutheran Parish
at Light Pass, in the Barossa Valley. He married and had a family, but
died in 1863.
My cousins and I have been tracing our German family in Australia for
about 25 years now, and I have undertaken the research in Germany.
Our son lives and works in England.
My husband and I have been to Soltau three times and I have collected
a lot of information about the family from the St. Johannis Church
registers in Soltau, and the Ortsfamilien Bremen web site.
I was able to check the information from the web site against the
Parish records and the book the History of 97 Farms in the Parish of
Soltau. The Town Archivist allowed me to have a photocopy of that
valuable book.
We have visited two of the farms associated with the female side of my
family but no luck on the male side. So far I have been unable to
trace the birth [circa 1750 to 1770] or death [ after 1823] of my
Great great great grandfather. His name was Hinrich Luers or L�hrs.
Perhaps he was not born in the parish of Soltau.
I would be happy to send my family tree so far, to your web site if
that is the purpose of the group. If so which format is used?
Yours sincerely, Mrs. Judith Gray, Adelaide, South Australia