Henry Oswald Deranged • 1911

Early 1800s

Henry Oswald's family came from the south of Germany.

His parents, Franz and Catherine, came to America between 1846 and 1852 from Baden-Württemberg, the Black Forest area of Germany . It was a rural area and many emigrated for economic reasons by the end of the nineteenth century.

Baden-Württemberg

Württemberg Castle Ladies wearing their traditional Bollenhuts.

1852

Henry Oswald was born October 28, 1852 in St. Louis, Missouri.

St. Louis city has 79 distinct neighborhoods. Henry lived with his family on Julia Street, in the Soulard Neighborhood. The house was only a five minute walk from the famous Soulard Farmer’s Market.

Buildings in the photo are across the street from the location of his house, which no longer exists.

1876

In 1876, 25 year old Henry married Elizabeth Schwendemann on the other side of the Mississippi River in Madison, Illinois. She was born in Pocahontas Illinois, and they set down roots in Bond County near her hometown for 35 years, until moving to Texas in 1910.

He had been a successful farmer in Bond county Illinois. For what reason, I do not know, he sold his land and moved the family to the town of Anchor in Brazoria County, Texas (on the Gulf coast near Galveston) in November 1910. He hung himself in the barn four months later. Elizabeth and the children moved back to Pocahontas.

1911

This informative article was published right after Henry's funeral. I no longer have the original so I am not sure which newspaper. Possibly from Greenville, Illinois.

He is buried in Pocahontas, Illinois. In the St. Nicholas graveyard with Elizabeth. This is what the church looked like in Henry's time.

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