Michael Leineweber

1830s–1850s

Born 20 May 1837 in Greimerath, near Trier, in Prussia's Rhine Province, the youngest known child of Matthias Leinenweber and Gertrud Blindauer; baptized the same day at Zerf.

1860s

Left Prussia (family tradition says to escape the draft), sailing from Le Havre and London aboard the Atalanta and reaching New York on 12 October 1868.

1870s

A farm laborer in Dubuque County, Iowa, in 1870, later working on the Gansemer family's farm. Married Catharina Gansemer at Sherrill on 29 September 1874 and declared his intention to naturalize in 1875. Children Catharine (1875), Peter (1877), and John Baptiste (1879) were born.

1880s–1890s

Bought the Gansemer farm, about 109 acres near Sherrill's Mound, from his mother-in-law in 1882 for $4,000, and farmed it for the rest of his life. Voted at Bloody Run school-district meetings.

1900s

Died at home at Sherrill's Mound on 12 June 1902.

From Prussia to Iowa

Michael Leineweber (Leinenweber in the German records) was born on May 20, 1837, in Greimerath, near Trier, in Prussia's Rhine Province, and baptized the same day at Zerf, with Michael Leinenweber and Susanna Schwickerath of Greimerath as godparents. His parents were Matthias Leinenweber and Gertrud Blindauer, and he was much the youngest of their known children; his sisters Margaretha, Magdalena, and Luzia and his brother Peter were born between 1822 and 1829.

He was past thirty when he left. On October 12, 1868, he reached New York aboard the Atalanta from Le Havre and London. Family tradition says he went to escape the Prussian draft ahead of the war with France, traveling with a couple of brothers or cousins and an uncle, an officer in Bismarck's army, who was smuggling several of his conscripted nephews out of the country; the party is said to have come to Iowa by way of Canada. Michael was remembered as a man with a ferocious temper, and he fell out badly with the relatives he came with. His sister Magdalena, who had married Matthias Naumann, also ended her days in Sherrill, Iowa, where she died in 1888.

His grandson Pete later told the story this way: Michael "came from a farm near Trier in Germany as a young man to escape the draft then imposed by Bismark of Germany to fight the war with France of 1870. He settled and worked on the farm of a family named Gansemer and there met a very young daughter named Catherine. They were married and I believe grandmother (Catherine) was but 16 or 17 years of age."

Farmer of Peru Township

In 1870 Michael was a farm laborer in Jefferson Township, Dubuque County, perhaps living on the farm of Michael and Anna Ehl. He went on to work on the Gansemer family's farm in Peru Township, and on September 29, 1874, he married Catharina Gansemer, who was sixteen, at SS. Peter & Paul Church in Sherrill. The next June he signed his declaration of intent to become an American citizen. Their children were Catharine (1875), Peter (1877), John Baptiste (1879), and a baby born in 1880 who died the next spring.

In 1880 the couple were living and working on the farm of Catharina's mother, Katharina Gansemer. On November 30, 1882, Michael bought the land from her for $4,000: 83 acres in one parcel and nearly 27 in another, about 109 acres in all, with a well and rights-of-way across the neighbors' farms, among them the right to pass through Andrew Burget's farm "on foot or with horses or wagons" on the way to town. In 1883 the county valued the land at $960 and the buildings at $130. Michael farmed it for the rest of his life. He turned out for the meetings of the Bloody Run independent school district in 1887, 1890, and 1895 to vote for its president and directors.

Death at Sherrill's Mound

Michael died at home at Sherrill's Mound, in Peru Township, at eleven in the morning on June 12, 1902, of heart disease and apoplexy, at sixty-five. He was buried at Saints Peter and Paul Cemetery in Sherrill. Catharina stayed on the farm with their son Peter for nearly thirty years more. The old farm's address today is on Bumpster Road near Sherrill.