Hello All,
I have been researching the BORGEMENKE family in Cincinnati,Ohio and
Damme,Germany for several years now and have often wondered where the name
BORGEMENKE originated. Just recently I was given an interesting story of how
this happened, and I am now looking for evidence to back it up.
Here are the details - in the Damme church records I was able to find the
family that started using the name:
Father: Joan Bernd SCHRÖDER
aka BORMENKEN SCHRAER
aka BURMENKE SCHRÖDER
Mother: Cath. Angela RONNEBAUM
Children (names as listed at birth):
1787 Dec 20 Joan Henrick SCHRÖDER
1789 Dec 28 Joan Bernd BORMENKEN SCHRÄER
1792 Mar 23 Bernd Henrick BURMENKE SCHRODER
1794 Sep 79 Frans Henrik SCHRÖDER
(married 1 May 1827 Maria Elisabeth BRINKMANN)
1797 Nov 5 Catharina Maria Elisabeth SCHRÖDER
(married 8 Apr 1823, died 6 Feb 1839)
(See < http://members.aol.com/Bkercher/Damme-Borgemenke.htm > for more
details)
The Frans Henrik SCHRÖDER above married as Franz Heinrich BORGEMENKE-SCHRÖDER
(Kötter in Borringhausen) and all of his 4 children were baptized as
BORGEMENKE-SCHRÖDER. This family emigrated to Cincinnati where they took the
name BORGEMENKE. (I believe there are no more Borgemenke's in Germany, only
in the USA, mostly in Cincinnati.)
I had assumed that this name change had something to do with marriage and
property customs at the time, of which much has been written on this list.
Then last week I was contacted by a Borgemenke cousin in Cincinnati who told
me an interesting story.
Some 30 years ago, an elderly woman called this cousin and told her that the
BORGEMENKE family actually used to be SCHRÖDER, and that the new name was
adopted from a village somewhere in order to honor the Count who "owned" the
village. She made doubly clear that the Count was Norwegian.
Now from what I have been able to find with limited resources, I did discover
that there is indeed a BORGE in Norway that is a canton which contains the
city of Sarpsborg. I have not been able to find out any more about it, such
as who the nobility (Count) was in the area at that time (late 1700's). I do
see that the first use of the BORGEMENKE name change was in 1789, the year
the French Revolution began, and I wonder if that had anything to do with it.
There has been much written about the "Hollandgänger" back then, so I wonder
if there were any "Norwegengänger". Borge was apparently a center for lumber
and other industries, so perhaps some of the German migrant workers went to
Norway for work?
So the overall question I have for the "old professors" on the list is
whether there is anything out there in the historical resources that would
connect a Norwegian Count to a farmer in Damme in the late 1700's?
Also, if someone has a copy of Hans Bahlow's Deutsches Namenlexikon handy,
can you look up for me what there is that resembles Borgemenke, Borge, and
Menke?
Thanks for reading this all and thanks in advance for any help.
Bryan Kercher