A New Land

One of my immigrant ancestors is Gepke Janssen Smit Wessels. She is my 2^nd Great Grandmother. She was a woman whose husband, Heije Renken Wessels¹, had died in Germany in 1854. Two of her sons had also died at a young age in Germany. She left her homeland, memories, and life as she knew it in Neermoor, Ostfriesland, Germany and came to America in 1860 at the age of 56. She traveled on the ship Bremen with her four youngest children. As indicated on the Passenger list, she traveled under the name of her husband, Heye Wessels and her children are enumerated: Jantjen, 18, m, farmer; Jana, 16, female; Gretje 13, female; and Gerd 13, male.²

When she arrived in Illinois, Gepke was able to live on farmland with her family in German Valley, Winnebago Co. Her four older children had come separately to the area earlier. She lived in Illinois for about three years before moving to Timbercreek Township, Marshall Co., Iowa. In her lifetime, she was able to see her children marry and begin their families in a new land.

Laurel Methodist Cemetery is a small cemetery amid the cornfields in Laurel, Marshall Co., Iowa. Here lies the grave of Gepke Janssen Smit Wessels, 1803-1872.

It is so humbling to stand before an old tombstone of an ancestor and reflect. Thinking about who might have come to gather around there for the burial. Who has visited since? How many descendants have come from that one person? How many have made the pilgrimage to the site to pay their respects?

Well done, Gepke, well done.

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¹ Thorsten Harms, editor,  (Die Familien der evangelisch-reformeirten Gemeinde Neermoor (1669-1900), Emden, Germany. T. Harms 2007), p1280, #4965.

² "New York Passenger Lists, 1820-1957" (Ancestry.com. New York Passenger Lists, 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.), Year: 1860; Arrival: New York, New York; Microfilm Serial: M237; Microfilm Roll: 206; Line: 12; List Number: 1086.