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Frederick Metz, Sr. of Sundheim, Germany

Frederick Metz (1820-1910) emigrated from the village of Sundheim, west and south of Strasbourg, in the present-day province of Baden-Wuerttemberg in Germany. We see that his name became slightly Americanized. In the German records, he is referred to as "Friedrich Maetz" (Friedrich is simply the German variation of Frederick and the 'ae' in Maetz in German sounds very much like a short 'e' in English.

At the corner of Hauptstrasse and Am Storchennest of Sundheim village is a house with the following mural painted on its wall, depicting how the town looked nearly a century ago, a scene that Frederick Metz would certainly recognize:

In this small village, Frederick was born on August 15, 1820, met and married his wife Barbara Sommer in 1847. During a visit to Germany in the summer of 2007, almost exactly 160 years after the date of their marriage on the First of July, I had the good fortune and pleasure of visiting Sundheim and of doing research at the Landesarchiv of Baden-Wuerttemberg at Freiburg, where I found this record of their marriage, entered by Reverend Dorn in the Reformed Church records.

Here is a translation in English:

In the year One Thousand, Eight Hundred, Forty-Seven, on the first of July, according to a Marriage License (number 6126) recorded on the 9th of June 1847, were matrimonially united and blessed: Friedrich Maetz, Citizen and Day-Laborer in Sundheim, son of the departed Georg Maetz, respected Citizen and Blacksmith of Sundheim and his likewise departed wife Magdalena (nee Maetz), with Barbara Sommer, daughter of Andreas Sommer I, Citizen and Day-Laborer in Sundheim and his late wife Maria (nee Walter). Witnesses: Johannes Maetz I, Citizen and Day-Laborer in Sundheim, and Andreas Sommer, unmarried brother of the bride, Day-Laborer in Sundheim.

Kehl village, July 1, 1847
Reverend Dorn

Today, Sundheim has been expanded and modernized to the point where very few of the ancient buildings still stand and to where it is hard to know you have passed from Kehl into Sundheim, as they are so close together. But here is a photo of a building old enough to have been standing when Frederick and Barbara walked the streets of Sundheim:


I wish to express heartfelt thanks to Bernd Schuler, who was already familiar with the handwriting of Reverend Dorn due to research on his own family and who recently transcribed this very hard to read (for me, anyway) record written in Reverend Dorn's hand. Another big "Thank You" goes to Jochen Rees and his helpful staff at the Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg in Freiburg for helping me to conduct the research that resulted in this finding.

This page was last updated on November 15, 2017

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