It’s Week 36 of 2023’s 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge and the theme is “Tradesman.”
When I initially found the marriage record for my German 3rd great-grandparents, I was a bit confused. Jacob Wolf was born in Siefersheim, Hessen, Darmstadt, Germany in 1801. His first three children with his wife Julianna Gurtelschmidt were born in Siefersheim in 1833, 1834, and 1835. I fully expected to find his marriage record in Siefersheim as well, but I found it in Vienna, Austria. They were married there on March 15, 1833.
How did a young man from Siefersheim end up 486 miles away in Austria? Although the location of the marriage surprised me, the record itself contained the answers. Jacob was a journeyman cabinet maker.
Journeymen are intermediary tradesmen who have completed an apprenticeship but aren’t considered skilled or knowledgeable enough to teach others. They were called journeymen or Wandergeselle because they literally used to travel from town to town seeking work and training from masters of their craft. The tradition is still practiced in Germany today.
After completing an unpaid internship with a master carpenter, the journeyman was outfitted in a special uniform so others would recognize him. He wore a broad-brimmed black cap, black bell-bottom pants and a waistcoat, and carried a sten, a curled hiking pole. He also wore jewelry – gold bracelets and an earring. If he went long periods without employment, he could sell some of the pieces, or they could be sold to cover his burial expenses if he died far from home.
The journeyman had to follow specific rules. The man was supposed to be unmarried and child-free so he couldn’t use his journey as an excuse to shirk his responsibilities at home. He travelled for a minimum period of three years and one day and was not allowed within 50 km of home during that time unless he was called back for a family emergency. To prove he wasn’t undertaking the journey for financial gain, he was given a small amount of travelling money and was supposed to return home with the same amount, proving he was neither a spendthrift or a miser.
He carried a wanderbuch (traveling book). The wanderbuch acted as a resume and a work permit. The journeyman received a stamp in each town he traveled to. Once there, he contacted the guild to see if any master carpenters could offer him employment. If he found a position, he worked under that master for about six months before moving on. If there was no work in the town, the guild would usually give him enough money to get him to the next stop. A journeyman had to complete at least half of his journey before registering with the guild to be an apprentice master. Once his entire journey was completed, he would usually settle in the workshop of the guild or with another master.
To open his own shop and employ others, a carpenter first had to achieve master status. He created a special project to highlight his exemplary skills, and master carpenters judged it. If the project met their rigorous standards, he was promoted to master. Few journeymen ever achieved this elite status. By the 1830s, the influx of cheap goods from other parts of Europe made it difficult for craftsmen – even masters-- to compete, which made them less likely to promote journeymen. They could either employ a workshop full of skilled workers and receive a substantial cut of their profits, or they could promote them to masters and increase their competition. One journeyman wrote from Paris in 1835, “But not one in a hundred of us can ever hope to obtain a master position.”
During his travels and interactions with other guild members, Jacob’s eyes were likely opened to new and exciting ideas. Germany had exorbitant taxes and citizens didn’t have a voice. Because journeymen travelled not only through Germany, but other parts of Europe as well, they encountered people from all walks of life and political beliefs. Many of these German tradesmen were caught up in the liberal intellectual movements that swept through more progressive European cities during this period, and they brought political leaflets, books, songs, and poetry home with them. As they interacted with various political groups, their eyes were opened to concepts like constitutions and elections. This awakening drew such a backlash from German authorities that they eventually banned journeymen from travelling to Western European countries.
Jacob’s traveling days ended abruptly when he met Julianna. During his years wandering through Europe and honing his skills, he was supposed to avoid distracting, romantic relationships. Instead, he fell for the young woman. To complicate matters, he was Lutheran, she was Catholic. The Catholic church rarely allowed such unions…except in the case of pregnancy. Julianna was four months pregnant when they wed at the Lichtental Parish Church on March 16, 1833. Given the scandalous circumstances, they were likely married in the rectory and not in the church itself. On August 18, 1833, Julianna gave birth to their first son, Conrad, in Siefersheim. He was baptized into the Lutheran faith.
With a growing family, diminished career prospects despite his finely tuned carpentry skills, and increased taxation and civil unrest in Germany, Jacob and his family immigrated to America. They were part of what is historically known as the “Second Wave” – German immigrants who arrived in America between 1820-1871.
Jacob, Julianna, and their young sons Conrad, Jacob Jr., and Johann arrived in New York City in 1836 and settled in Brooklyn. Like all immigrants, they came seeking a better life, but whether they found it is somewhat debatable. Life in America wasn’t all sunshine and roses for the family. In 1846 they lost one young son when his sled flew under an oncoming cart which crushed him. Julianna died in 1848. Jacob remarried soon after, and it’s possible his second wife, Clara, abandoned a baby boy in a train station washroom in 1850 (unless there was another “Jacob Wolf, cabinet maker from Brooklyn” at the time, which is entirely possible). If she did, that’s an indication that the family may have been in the midst of financial difficulties. The Wolf home at 281 Adams Street was destroyed in a fire in 1853. Police and fireman suspected the blaze, which began in a jewelry shop, was arson. The cheaply built wooden buildings went up like kindling, the fire destroying an entire city block and causing over $40,000 in losses. They didn’t have an easy time.
If his desire was to be his own boss, Jacob achieved some nominal success. He won several bids for furniture and cabinet building projects for the city, including a large job for desks at one of the court houses. He didn’t leave behind a huge business, wealth, or property. The only legacy he left behind was his trade. All of his sons followed in their father’s footsteps and became carpenters or took up a related craft. Conrad, Jacob Jr., and my 2nd great-grandfather Ferdinand were all cabinet makers, while the youngest son, Charles, was an upholsterer. With the exception of Charles, the boys probably learned the trade from Jacob, so the skills he learned from master cabinet makers in Germany were passed on to his own sons in America, who in turn may have passed that knowledge onto others.
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