St. Johannis of Memel

Part I

Part II

Where once the church St. Johannis over Memel towered, only an outline of stone with a vast lawn shows its existence today.   The building was destroyed in World War II, but  the memories of the former church remain. The church documented in its baptism, marriage and death  registers the vital events of this city.   Who searches for his ancestors in these books by examining page after page can come up with some results - however, who is able to read between the lines, interesting facts, which are not necessarily to be found in historical books, can come to light. 

The church books of St. Johannis since 1615 are found today in microfilms and can be searched for in the genealogical research centers of the Mormon Church, which can be found in many cities around the world.   The search for the ancestors can become, however, the famous search for the needle in the haystack.

The baptismal registers of the first years begin with entries which are quite spartan (regarding the information).   Important were at that time child's name and day of baptism as well as name and status of the father, but even these specifications were not always complete and unique.   Today, after over 400 years, one can hardly find out, to whom it referred to.   Not to be missing were the godparents, who normally originated from the family.  

The day of the birth and the name of the mother were worth mentioning only many years later, and if the mother was not married, eternal religious condemnation was a threat.   The entries in the registers for such "children conceived in dishonor" were written upside-down and, later in history,  a special baptismal register for the illegitimate children was created.   There one can find entries such as:  "a whore's child was baptized", "the son the Anna conceived outside of  marriage... was baptized."

Of course one also counted back the months of newlyweds, and if a child came "early", then this dishonor was documented in the marriage register with "appropriate" notes.

Already early one kept simple statistics; First only baptisms, marriages and deaths per church year (starting on the 1. Advent) were counted and documented.   Later the statistics developed to be more and more refined.   The fact that death in childhood was frighteningly high in earlier centuries is also proven in the statistics of St. Johannis.   Who had gotten through this critical phase, however,  had quite a chance to become old -  even really, really old!   Thus died, for example, in 1720 a 106 year-old Sergeant, in 1792 a widow at the age of 103 died of "weakness", and in the year 1798 a widower died at 101 years.   To what extent this information is reliable must remain undecided because often the people did not know at that time the exact birth year.

A quite different dimension however beholds another entry, which reports the death of a boozer - or using the politically correct terminology -  an alcohol-dependent person:   On 12 September 1782 "the former butcher ..., at the end a quite verbal man of about 58 years, in a questionable, miserable house was found dead. "