In search of Christian Gauss

I had spent my entire life looking forward and I am now obsessed with the past. A past that I cannot reflect on, a past that I was not a part of, and a person who I cannot define. I just landed in Des Moines Iowa where I will meet my father for a one week vacation. During this week I want to discover who my Great, Great Grandfather Christian Gauss was. We have a plan but I have been to busy in my day-to-day life to properly develop that plan so I am feeling a bit unprepared.

Our staging area is Grinnell Iowa where my father was born and we were attending his reunion for the class of 1958. I can remember coming to Grinnell to spend two weeks in the summer with my Grandma Grace and Grandpa Eldred. Why I never asked them about their rich family history I'll never know. My Grandfather was a decorated WWII veteran and my Grandmother a great sport for wanting three young children to come and bless their home every summer. My grandparents are the oldest Gauss relatives that I remember.

During a trial period on a genealogy site I had found what looked like my family tree where I left a post hoping that the creator was still alive and would simply fill me in on my family history. No response and my father was doubtful that the tree was accurate or included our relatives. All I had to go on were three names, Eldred, George, and Christian Gauss all from Iowa. I knew that Christian had come over from Germany and I wanted to know where in Germany he came from. I mean really, how hard could this be. I found out that this could be really hard!

There is a famous mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss from Germany, finding information on him is no problem at all but if he is not related to my Christian he just becomes a distraction. There is also a Christian Gauss in Philadelphia that was very involved in higher learning and again, if not related, a distraction. After running into dead end after dead end and my trail period on the genealogy site running out I had almost given up until I received a response to my post I had left on that familiar family tree. While looking to see if she was related to the famous mathematician Karen Johnson saw my post and responded. With my father's help we determined that she was indeed related to us and this motivated the three of us to find our Christian Gauss. Karen discovered a picture that her grandmother had of Christian and his family and the burial site which was near her hometown of Burlington Iowa.Our first stop after the class reunion is Burlington Iowa to meet Karen.

While wondering how it was that I had not met Karen before, we were sitting in her kitchen looking through old photo's while my father was catching up with her mother Mary Beth Saathoff. It seemed odd to hear my father discuss all of these family members that he knew, almost like he had been holding out this information. We piled in two cars grabbed some lunch and headed for the first cemetery. Realizing now that I did not capture the name of the cemetery all I can tell you is that it was in Burlington Iowa. My Great Grandfather George C Gauss and his wife, my Great Grandmother Alta M Gauss are both buried there. They also share the company of two other relatives Chrystal Bonar and Gertrude Venard. We then headed for the Wapello Cemetery where Christian Gauss was buried.

We were very lucky that Karen and Larry, her husband, had already came out to located the grave. The headstone sits by the exit, which appears to be the old entrance, on the old side of the cemetery. Just to the right, under the arched Wapello Cemetery sign, under two majestic trees lies Christian Gauss and Christena Gauss. Next to them the Wehmeyers which we know to be related by marriage. Just on the other side of the drive lies, Little Joe, Paul I Gauss, Anna H Gauss and the Hurley's. Who are these people and how are they related? My search for answers has only created more questions.

Larry's decides to take a different route back to Burlington. We went through Oakville, and stopped at Toolesboro where the Indian burial mounds are. Surprised to find this historic site open on a holiday weekend we stopped in. We told the woman working there about our quest to find out more about our family when she told us that she actually 'witches' the Wapello cemetery! She explained that witching is where you use two wire hangers to locate bodies underground. I have also seen this referred to as dowsing. She gave us the number of a woman on the board of the cemetery who we later learned practices this witching process also.

The next day we met up with my brother Joe Gauss and we took him to see the cemetery site. While there I called the woman on the cemetery board and she confirmed that Mary Hurley was Mary Gauss Hurley and led us to another Gauss, Michael Gauss. She said she had copies of obituaries and that we could stop by her house to get them. These obituaries helped us tie all of the people buried in the cemetery together. At this point I am completely immersed and lose track of days but I do remember the events.

We stopped into Wapello City Hall asking if we could access 'records' there. They directed us to the courthouse and it later dawned on me that we would only need city hall if ended up needing a permit. On the way to the courthouse, the very next building, I saw a Methodist church. We knew that Christian belonged to the German M.E. Church. This was a modern one level building and while my father was doubtful I convinced him to go inside. We found the church open and the pastor and one other woman in the church. We told them what we were up to and were led up a hallway to the old church that was connected to this newer addition. We entered the old church as she explained that this was the German Church of the 1800's! At the front of the church was a large stained glass window that was brought from Germany pane by pane and sent up river to St Louis to be assembled. We were then taken to a back room where there was an open safe full of old documents.

She pulled out a history of the church that was written by typewriter by the history committee appointed in 1952. Among the committee members was Fred Wehmeyer, son of Mary Gauss, daughter of Christian and Christena Gauss. Among the members listed in 1857 was Christian Gauss, our breath was taken. There he was, on paper, a real person coming to life. We were then told we could look through the church records for other references. Thanks to the pristine penmanship of the 1800's we were able to tell Christian was an active member of the church with regular tithes of .25 - .40 cents. We could tell that this was a middle class donation. We were surprised to see documents from the 1800's tossed into an open safe with no protection from elements or other damage. These documents were absolute treasures to us and deserved the upmost of care.

The church was a German speaking church until 1914 and it is likely my Great Great Grandparents never spoke english. We saw a letter signed by the Governor in 1918 letting the church know that they were no longer supposed to have German services due to the German propaganda that being spread across the state. The church had no issue with this since they had transitioned to the english language between 1910-1914 at the desires of the younger members of the church.

During a church restoration a tin box was found in the cornerstone of the church. In that box was a document that referenced Christian Gauss as a member of the 1871 Wapello mission.

We then made our way to the Louisa County Courthouse where we asked for records from the 1800's. The clerk wanted to know what kind of records but we didn't know what we were looking for so I just blurted out 'land'. From Christian's obituary we knew that he was a respected farmer so he should have had some land. We were led to a room full of books and documents that were better protected than the church records though we were still amazed that they were just there, out in the open. On the other hand we were glad they were accessible. We found a records of land transfers adding more life to our deceased Christian.

The next stop was the city library, genealogy room. This was a small room with self publications related to Louisa County and self published family histories. I combed the shelves for Gauss hoping someone had already done the heavy lifting, nothing. We found some cemetery records but we had already gotten that information from the witches (please note that the term witch used in this writing is meant as endearing as these ladies were very kind, generous with their time and a lot of help). I found a publication by Perdue who happens to be the person who posted the Gauss family tree that I originally identified. I had previously reached this person and they confirmed that they knew nothing of our family rather he found the information while doing their own research and posted it. We also read a history document written by a 80-90 year old person in 1966 that really described the town and daily life. While paging through the 1874 atlas we found Christian Gauss listed as a land owner. Township 74N. Range IV W. I hope to publish the Gauss family information in this library some day.

We decided to drive out to the land. We had an idea of where to go but that was about it. We were surprised to learn that the area we were looking for was just off the alternate route that Larry showed us on our first day in the area. He later said that he doesn't know why he took that route, we believe that this as well as the impromptu stop at the church was some sort of it was some sort of divine intervention. Not knowing where we were going we asked a local Oakville man for directions, which is hard to do if you don't know where you are going. He led us to the fire department and we matched up the atlas pics to the fire departments map and we were on our way. This was Indian country not far from the Toolesboro burial mounds and it would be unlikely that Christian and his family did not have interactions with the Indians. We accessed the land via a gravel road. The land was fertile farmland that was still being farmed. I still feel the beauty of the many open miles of farmland.

I remembered that I wanted to research the will that I had seen referenced in a newspaper article regarding Christene's (aka Christine) death. We went back to the Louisa County Courthouse and were led to an new room that housed death records, adoption records, and probate records. We never did find the Christian's will but due to litigation around the property of Michael Gauss after his death we gain insight to the family of Johann Gauss, Christian's brother. Johann had 11 children with roots in Shenandoah Iowa. The litigation was led by Grant Hook, husband of Amelia Gauss, daughter of Johann Gauss. We never did find Christian's death records or will.

While I still do not know where in Germany Christian Gauss immigrated from he has come alive for me. I spent a priceless week with my favorite fella, my father Gordon Gauss and I know so much more about my ancestors and how they lived.

Who is Christian Gauss?
CHRISTIAN GAUSS JUNE 28,1824 - JULY 14,1903
German born
Immigrated to US the in the fall of 1852 at 28 years old
Stopped in Madison Indiana
1855 married Christena (Christine, Christina) Lautenschlager
1855 moved from Madison Indiana to Wapello Iowa
1857 joined the German M.E. Church in Wapello Iowa
1871 listed as a member of Wapello Mission. This documentation was found in a tin box in the cornerstone of the M.E. Church during a restoration.
Brother Johann Gauss
Sister Mrs. Butler (Indiana)
Children:
George Christian Gauss
Mary Gauss
Anna Gauss
Emma Christine Gauss (died in infancy)
Caroline Maugaretta Gauss (died in infancy)

Family Tree is being developed on www.geni.com