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Henry Wielage and Katrine Devermann were born in 1821 and 1827, respectively, in the northwestern territory of what later became part of Germany. Most of the people there were involved in employment that was closely related to agriculture. After they married in 1857, they owned and worked on a small farm and gaststatte (inn) in Gronloh. Here their seven children were born, Henry died and Katrine remarried.

Johann Heinrich "Henry" Wielage was born in the small village of Fladderlohausen. He was the fifth child of Johann Hermann Wielage and Catharina Maria Haverman.

Anna Chatarina "Katrine" Busch, born Devermann, was born in the nearby village of Gronloh, north of Fladderlohausen. Anna was the fifth child of Hermann Heinrich Devermann and Catharina Margarethe Elsabein Dierker.

Fladderlohausen is in the lower left corner and Gronloh is straight north (above the Dinklage inset).  Click here to connect to this map on the Internet. You will also find other interesting links at this site - be sure to go look!  Click here to read a brief discussion regarding names/farms in the area.

During the 1960s a neighbor to the property and friend of the family in Germany researched civil and church records and copied references to the property along with some family genealogy. His name was Walter Gohlinghorst. In his Vorwort (forward), written in an old form of Low German, he wrote:

" Hi, reader,

"When you are older, you will want to hear something of your ancestors, about their character, their fitness, their talents and performance, their problems and successes.

"In your youth you did not ask your parents and grandparents. In times of inattentiveness, fire and war, much material was lost. The information here can not be a complete story. It was written to remember the farm and the people who were living there.

"Read the news with love to your relatives and your ancestors. Without them you would not be in this world. With this remembering you will be a rich human. I think we should write down and we should take pictures of the life of the farms yesterday and tomorrow.

"Most of the former times we know. Your descendants will be very glad and they will say, ' Thank you' and so your ancestors will say 'Thank you', too."

Early History of preGermany and Our Family

Area borders as well as the cultural background of what was eventually to become Germany were determined by the religions in power. First Catholic and later Lutheran Count-Bishops ruled the area. As the two religious powers vied for control, local civil Count-Bishops gained control. A 100 year battle for the area ended in the mid 1660s. It remained quiet here until the French Revolution at the beginning of the 19th century.

Land was owned by Herrnen (lords), though about 5% of the land was owned by Baueren (farmers). Those attached to the estates and people in bondage were an integral part of the farm relationship of a manorial system. People belonging to the mansion were free in body, which did not apply to the people in bondage. These, including their off-spring, were the property of their master.

Apart from free people, people belonging to a mansion and people in bondage, there were also people living in their own cottages on a mansion estate (Erbkotter and Pferdekotter). They owned little pieces of arable land within their common area of settlement. Although small, these farmers were all equals when it came to dividing the common land. In the 15th and 16th centuries a new "kind" of people appeared - those who lived on grassy and hilly patches of land (Markkotter and Brinkkotter). They received little plots of land when the common land was divided up, but they also needed other forms of income to survive. Their farms lay outside the borders of the mansion estate in the common land (Mark) and were therefore not bound to any lord of the manor. Finally there came Heuerleute (one with less rank than a hired man) who did not have their own plot of land and were therefore not considered when it came to dividing up the common land.

Farmers had control over their land, but had to pay taxes on it as well as on their livestock, buildings, etc. Farmers used Heuerlings and family members to make enough to support themselves and pay the taxes.

People could not marry across social levels. Indeed, couples needed permission to marry at all. It was the practice for the oldest son or daughter to assume ownership of the farm and at that time draw up a written agreement with the parents regarding all living arrangements. The arrangement even included which rooms in the house would be for the parents and which rooms for the younger couple and their family. However, with larger families, this was not workable because as the oldest child came to marrying age, his/her parents would often still have young children. The parents could not afford to give up their farm income until their children were raised.

Names for both places and people underwent changes throughout this time. Until the 13th century, individuals had only given names, not family names. A son would be known with a different name than his father, and a grandson a different one again. Later place names or family positions were added as family names. In earlier times, for example, we would find Gert. Later he could be Gert Wahlde (place in a forrest) or Gert Honkamp (plot of land).

For about a century, farms were also named. Their names described their physical attributes - Busche (bushes), Wald (forrest), Horst (an elevated place surrounded with morass), etc. For a time it was the custom for a man to take the name of the farm into which he married (whether daughter or widow). As owners changed, the place name remained.

So it was that during the power struggle among the religious and civil Count-Bishops, in 1599, the first recording of property related to the Busch family is of Grete im Busche paying tax on his property in Gronloh. Twenty-nine years later, in 1628, there is a record of Jorrien up dem Busche, cousin or nephew of Grete and Gertrud im Busche, paying a tax. It is likely that a larger farm was divided in 1631 because an inheritance register records Gerdt Busche paying tax on a Kleinhaus (smaller house). In another old register, Gerdt is recorded as owner of a Backhaus, which is the building in which baking is done. Backhaus is a very common name in northwestern Germany still. This farm was small enough that the farmer was free from "Hand und Spanndiensten" (labors owed to the lord of the manor).

A Gastwirtschaft (guest house) on the property was operated separately from the farm and had several owners. At some point, this property was identified as "die Buscherei", most certainly due to the farm having bushes on the property. The farm's size and number of buildings varied through the years.

Gerdt im Busche is recorded through a 39 year period, with recordings in 1631, 1651, 1655, 1661 and 1670. In 1655 Gerdt's property is listed as a Markkotter (in low German, this translates to small meadowland farm). Subsequent tax recordings were from Johann Busch in 1722 and Arend Busch in 1748. Johann had a son, Johann, who married Anna Chatherina Elting. They had no children before Johann died. Anna Chatherina Elting remarried Berend Dierker. They had a daughter, Catharina Margarethe Elsabein Dierker.

This is how Herman Heinrich Devermann, father to Katrine, came to adopt the name Busch. Herman married Catharina Margarethe Elsabein Dierker. About 1816, Catharina inherited the Busch farm and her husband became Colon und Wirt (farmer and innkeeper) on die Buscherei. Herman had first been a Heuermann (hired man), then tenant (paid rent). Upon this inheritance, Herman's name became Herman Heinrich Devermann, jetzt (now) Busch. All of Herman and Catharina's children were born here.

At this same time, Napoleon I held control over this area as he tried to gain control of all of Europe. The citizens were subjected to stricter tax-laws and levies. Special financial burden were encumbered by citizens in order to provide for the French army's provisions including special uniforms. Road construction and other hand-work tasks were required. Men, women and children were required to work based upon their rank in society, the higher the rank, the more work required. Workers had to supply their own tools. They had to supply horses for the army. Napoleon also demanded sailors for his warships in order to subjugate England and Russia. In March of 1811, inhabitants were granted a license to hold a party to celebrate the birth of the Emperor's son. They were allowed to dance and amuse themselves as they could at 3:00 in the afternoon on March 31st.

Unrest broke in the middle of March, 1813, in all of Northern Germany as the citizens heard about the retreat of Napoleon's army from Russia. By August the French occupation withdrew leaving economic depression in its wake. Three years later, Katrine's mother inherited the Busch property. around 1816. Eleven years later, Katrine was born.

Catharina Maria Elsabein Dierker Devermann, jetzt Busch, Katrine's mother. This picture was taken in Badbergen, probably in the late 1800s.

Now we come to our Katrine and Henry who married in 1857. Henry's father had been owner of a small horse farm (He was recorded as an Erbpachter und Pferdehandler (small farmer and horse handler).
After Katrine and Herny married, Katrine, the fifth of eight children, inherited the Busch farm from her mother. (Katrine's father had died about 7 years earlier.) Henry, born Johann Hinrich Wielage, now became Wielage, jetzt Busch.

All of Henry and Katrine's children were born on this farm. The farm and inn were not large enough to be divided up for all of their children, so, as the practice was, the older children needed to find other places to work. They chose to emigrate during a time when large numbers of Germans were immigrating to North America, mostly to the U.S. Thus, the farm eventually went to their youngest daughter, Johanna Marie Elise "Hannah" Busch-Wielage. Interestingly, all of the children that immigrated to the U.S. dropped the name Wielage and used only Busch as their surname.

Henry died April 5, 1871, at age 49. Their oldest child, Anna Catharina Elise, was 12 and their youngest child, Hannah, was 1. Katrine was 43.

Nearly 4 years later, January 27, 1875, Katrine remarried Herman Friedrich Wilhelm Ottermann (born June 10, 1843). He became Herman Ottermann, jetzt Busch. Katrine and Herman had one child, Heinrich Diederich Wilhelm Busch, born on July 31, 1875. This child died seven years later in 1882.

For future reference to the Busch farm and inn, refer to Johanna Marie Elise Busch-Wielage's web page.
 

19th Century "Germany"

Only a decade before Henry and Katrine were born, Napoleon's French Empire extended over the Wielage and Devermann homeland. As the great powers of the time, Great Britain, Russia, Prussia and Austria, met to reconstruct Europe after Napoleon's defeat, the middle class also stood firm against their attempt to rule, as in the past, without middle class representation in government.

Into this mix in the 1820s Henry and Katrine were born. When they were 27 and 21 (nine years before they married), Henry and Katrine and their families must have endured the failed harvests throughout Europe (best remembered as the Potato Famine of Ireland) that sparked food riots in Europe and led to an economic crises that sparked armed uprisings.

At the turn of the 19th century, roughly the land mass we know today as Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Austria, Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and parts of France, was a stew of mini states, kingdoms, grand duchies, electorates and principalities (over 200 in all) whose peoples shared a common language, a brilliant literature, music and art tradition and a hefty body of mythology.

The idea of "Germany" existed only in hopes and dreams and was continuously fed by books, songs and poems. Predominately liberal minded thinkers saw a unified country as the only means of breaking the power of the innumerable petty despots running various mini states and of unleashing the enormous creative powers of the "German" people. They were the major forces throughout the first half of the 19th century. Even the future German national anthem, "Deutschland Uber Alles" was written 30 years before there was any Deutschland to be over anything.

The centers of the most significant uprisings were Berlin, Vienna, Baden and the southwest of Germany. Out of here came the Revolution of 1848/49. The Revolution's goals eventually were lost due to continued political divisions and bickering and the overwhelming number of tasks its National Assembly faced. However, Germany still today celebrates the Revolution as a pivotal moment in German history that led to the creation of a unified Prussia (which later became Germany, as parts of Prussia were divided off, not without struggle, of course). The Germans involved in the Revolution emigrated to the U.S. and were named the Forty-Eighters.

Throughout their lives, Henry and Katrine lived in a territory that was under continual political struggle. In fact, the severe fighting and tremendous suffering of wounded soldiers led Swiss Jean Dunant to organize the Red Cross in the very year that Henry and Katrine's first son, Hermann, was born. For Dunant's efforts, in 1901 he was awarded the first Nobel Peace Prize. Ironically, Nobel's nitroglycerin plant was blown up the year the Red Cross and Hermann were born!

All of the Busch children were born and raised during a restless and dramatic time that included the 1864 Prussian-Austrian victory over Denmark; 2 years later a war between Prussia and Austria; in 1870-71 the Franco-German War (Napoleon III vs Bismarck); in 1871 the founding of the German Empire under Bismarck; in 1872-80 Bismarck's "Kulturkampf" (cultural struggle) against the Catholic Church; and in 1882 the tripartite alliance with Austria and Italy.

Add to these events, the dramatic changes also being brought about by the Industrial Revolution in Europe and the massive emigration to America. There were few years of peaceful living for the Busch-Wielage family.
 

The old gaststatte (inn) and the pig barn burned in 1913 and was rebuilt in 1914.   The alte Buscherei around 1920 with owners Wilhelm and Hannah (Busch-Wielage) Fluszmeyer and their children.

Another view of the property taken around 1972.

Here the Gaststatte Fluszmeyer is shown in 1993.

In 1998 The Gaststatte Fluszmeyer, Gronloh, Gemeinde Badbergen, Krs. Osnabruck prior to the sale of the property.   "The old hotel Fluszmeyer on Bundesstrasze 214 between Holdorf and Gehrde after the death of the last owner. It is not in operation at present."

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