Amelia was ten (10) years of age at the time she came with her family to America. Her son August (Gus) Dahler wrote in a letter dated 1/27/1970 that at the time of their departure the German empire had been formed from a number of independent German states, the much largest of which was Prussia. To the east of Prussia were two provinces, East and West Prussia which extended east of the Gulf of Danzig. The folks were from West Prussia. (This country now is in Poland.) To leave for America they traveled across Germany to Bremen.
It was only a small community where they lived and on leaving the neighbors gathered to bid them goodbye and they all cried knowing they would never see one another again. Going to the new world was quite an event in those days. I asked my mother if they had any other relatives and she said only an old grandmother who was too old to go. She also said war and disease took many people. My mother was not able to tell me much about Germany, but she did remember cold weather. And when the folks went fishing, they did so on the sly as fishing was a privelege reserved for the nobility and other "big shots". However, the officers didn't try very hard to catch them
When the time came to board their ship, the officials didn't want to let August (Amelia's brother), to go as he was about military age. But as the whole family was going, it was decided to let him leave. It was a long six (6) weeks voyage crossing the ocean, and they ran into two bad storms. On one occasion things looked so bad that they thought their time had come and the passengers were all praying. The youngest brother, Gustaf, sicked and died and was buried at sea. My mother said that her mother (Maria) never did get over her grief.
My oldest brother (Henry) said he remembered her sitting in the bedroom with her prayer book. She died January 8, 1894 at the age of 68 and was buried in our local cemetery.
Karl, the father, died a few years after coming to America and was buried in Ohio. For the parents it was all hardship, but they did establish their family in the new world. So in the settlement of the new world it can be seen that there were tales of hardship and heartbreak long forgotten and buried in the past.
CITIZENSHIP: Naturalized 1873 Pennsylvania
