Anna Maul Hoffman: From Russia with Love and Bravery

 

Anna Maul Hoffman (1833-1927)

Anna’s story is tied to her husband August Hoffmann but she outlived him by many years, living to be 93 at a time few survived to that age. As one of the last members of her generation, she told various tales to her grand-daughters long after the events were finished. Like all family stories, some are true but other parts do not quite fit what the records tell us or even the known history of Europe. By the end of her life, not only were her siblings long gone but so were many children. As a result, some of Anna’s history is only now emerging as new document indexes appear online and DNA evidence link her to long lost family and her birth home.

Girl Talk with the Grand-Daughters

When Anna's grandson, Fred L. Hoffman, recorded his understanding on the early Hoffman family arriving in Michigan from Russia (see the story of August Hoffmann in this blog), he made little mention of his grandmother even though she had lived many years with his family in the Ann Arbor house on Seventh Street. In fact, Anna’s son Fred G (father of Fred L.) had built an addition onto the house just for his mother. The addition was later rented out to provide extra income to the family. 

Fred L. noted that Anna’s husband August left her behind when he came to the US. She arrived several years later with four children when her husband was able to send money for their passage.

More personal stories of Anna’s life came from her female descendants. As noted by her grand-daughter Clara:

I remember Grandma H. saying that she was born in Tilsit, northern Germany. I remember that name. It seems that Grandpa H was born in the south of Germany. Perhaps you know more about this than I do, but the marriage was arranged by the family. I remember her telling how she cried and cried to think of marrying him. I don't think she had met him before they were married. [Letter from Clara Jay Hoffman to Phyllis Hoffman, Feb 8, 1957]

The oldest of her great-grand-daughters, Dorothy born in 1892, apparently loved to listen to the old tales, even when others were uninterested. According to Dorothy:

Grandpa & Grandma Hoffman [Fred. G and Lydia] had built a large double house on 7th St in Ann Arbor for their 5 children which could be and was divided later into a two family. It was more or less used as such by the family, as great grandmother [Anna] had one side. It had 8 bedrooms, a large attic, 2 baths, 2 sets of living rooms, dining rooms, kitchens & large front porch.

She was a bossy old lady to hear mother and grandma talk. Children always take in more than parents think. However, I liked great grandma and since my parents spent a lot of time with my mother’s parents [at the house on Seventh Street], she talked a lot to me.

Her story to me was that there were originally 9 children (or more) and they came to the US across Siberia and landed in California near Long Beach. Some of the older children dropped off in Europe & Russia. One or two, perhaps more dropped off in California and Montana & Washington. [Written by Dorothy Williams Burpo, 1981].

Dorothy amplified the story verbally to myself and others in the family, describing the many challenges in dealing with needed documents required on the trip and a harrowing train ride across the Siberian wintery wastes.

Hints from Original Documents

How much of these tales was true? Initially there was little known to disprove the oral legends. Births, deaths, and residence info from census rolls give an outline of family life in the US but little from earlier times. Known facts: Anna’s family initially settled in Manchester, Michigan and were there by 1880. They had six children, two dying young. Only the youngest son, Charles, was born in Michigan with the others all born in Russian Poland (now Lithuania). The family spoke German attesting to their Germanic rather than Polish or Russian roots. They resided in the city of Manchester rather than the countryside nearby, with August working for the railroad and then as a day laborer until his death in 1891. Anna continued to live in Manchester until about 1900 after her youngest son headed to Montana and she moved to the Ann Arbor house on Seventh.

Although many immigrant families have no information on their Old World origins, the Hoffman-Mauls retained three documents that pointed to the Russian Polish past. Of those infamous documents needed for Anna’s journey were three transcripts from church and official records which survive to the present: a marriage record for August Hoffmann and Anna Maul dated 1856, and two birth records for sons Joseph and Louis. These were given to my Aunt Phyllis, the original family historian, by Clara and Dorothy. 

It is sometimes hard to imagine in this era of the Internet that finding documents and getting translations was a time-intensive and often costly process requiring travel and connections. Clara had attempted to learn more about her father, but had little knowledge of Eastern European history.

Amongst my mother's things I found my father's birth certificate, christened "Ludwig Hoffmann.” It is written in Russian and a Russian lady translated it for me. It was made out in Deminitka, Village Seynes, Dec 9, 1864 (January, according to the certificate that being the Russian calendar). Certificate was written by K. Edward Weigal, Pastor of Seynes of the Assyrian Evangelical Reform Congregation.

As I understand they owned a farm in Germany that had belonged to Russia, that is, it was Russian territory ceded (or something) to Germany, but returned to Russia officially, evidently since papa's birth certificate was written in Russian. It would be interesting to find out where the family really lived before they came to this country. I can't find a place named Diminitka on any maps that I have seen.

Fred L. had also talked about Seynes as the birth place of his father, and Phyllis had discovered the marriage record from Mariampole was hand written in Russian and in Polish on the document, but was unsuccessful in finding someone to translate it before her death. Neither Seynes nor Diminitka appeared on any modern maps.

Internet to the Rescue

The ability to request help on the Internet now makes the possibility for getting translations easier thanks to many kind volunteers as well as locating information on towns no longer in existence or renamed.

The marriage record for August and Anna revealed their parents and home locations. August was farming in a different village than his father’s home. His parents were listed as being from Tamiliszki and her parents from Karkuplenai, places in what is now eastern Lithuania near the Polish border.

Initial translations of the birth document for Clara’s father (known in the US as Louis but christened Ludwik) showed the document was a written copy of records from the Sejny Evangelical Reform parish book of births, extracted 26 Dec 1874/7 Jan 1875. Ludwik Hoffman, son of August Hoffman and Anna nee Maul. Born 9 December 1864, in Dyminiszki.

More recent document finds are from the International Association of Germans from Lithuania (IAGL) indexing project. Birth certificates for all the Hoffman-Maul children have been located from church records in Lithuania. These documents have also revealed other family members, showing a richer picture of Anna’s early life.

Reinventing Anna Maul Hoffman

With more complete documentation, a somewhat different version of Anna’s story emerges. Anna was born about 1833 to Wilhelm Maul and Maria Muller. No record of her birth has been located so it is unclear where she was born. A marriage record for her sister shows she was born in Prussia, perhaps supporting an origin nearer Tilsit. However, at the time of the marriage her family lived in Russian Poland, Karklupiany village, county Mariampole (now Lithuania).

The documents show that the Hoffman and Maul families knew each other although it is possible Anna did not know August before marriage in 1856. Their parents lived in neighboring villages, and August lived apart from his parents. At the time of their marriage, both August’s mother and Anna’s father were deceased, perhaps an underlying reason for the timing of an arranged marriage, particularly if Anna’s mother could not support her children after the father’s death. Their parents operated inns or pubs in villages linked to the large “folwark” estates owned by nobles and farmed by local serfs. The German and Jewish residents were craftsmen and merchants in their communities, well educated and more independent than the poorly treated Polish serfs.

Anna’s oldest daughter was born in Tamuliszki, the home of August’s parents. It is not clear when August moved to establish his own farm, one that Anna reportedly sold to a local Jewish family prior to moving to the US. From at least 1860 until August left, the family lived in Serejai where they had six children all recorded at the local church. One daughter died as a toddler, and if there were nine, the others were possibly stillborn and births not recorded. August took one son with him to the US in 1872 (documented in passenger records), leaving Anna to raise the other five on her own for three years.

The dates on the original documents show Anna began collecting the extracts and passports needed to emigrate about 1874, and passenger records show her leaving Bremen in January 1875 with her four surviving children ages seven to seventeen. There was no wild train ride across Siberia even if it makes a great adventure story, and the children she took with her did not scatter. They arrived almost three weeks later in New York in February 1875 and presumably headed to Michigan where August had established residency.

The house on Seventh with the addition right (1905)

Anna spent most of her adult life in Manchester, Michigan, keeping house as the census records show. One son died shortly after arrival, and another in 1883. After her husband died in 1891, she continued to live in Manchester renting space in her house. As she grew older, in the early 1900s she moved in with son Fred G. and family in Ann Arbor.

There is little but hints of how aging affected Anna, but she was moved for some period into an old-age home and son Louis moved back to Ann Arbor during these years to help with her care. Her death certificate indicates she died of senility and heart disease, so she may have suffered from dementia in the final years of her life. 

Who is the real Anna?

The picture that emerges of Anna is one of a strong woman who survived many challenges. She not only moved with a young family from Lithuania to Bremen to Michigan without her spouse, but in her later years traveled on her own to visit son Charles in rural Montana in the early 1900s. She was reported to be “difficult” but that may just be an indication that she was strong-willed and did not fit neatly into the more passive female role stereotype of the time. 

In Montana with son Charles

That she was lonely in her old age does seem likely. Although family did not scatter on arrival, by the early 1900s her children had indeed mostly moved away and her siblings who had come to Michigan were deceased when she told her story. Very few of her age cohort remained by the time she passed away. She died Feb. 26, 1927 at the age of 93, and is buried in Ann Arbor’s Bethlehem Cemetery near her son Fred G. 

More Mauls in Michigan

With new records and DNA matching, it turns out Anna was not quite as isolated from family as she implied in her later stories. From at least the 1880s forward, she had relatives nearby. Her brother Fredryk Maul married a widow, Mary Strauzs Breanizer, in Russian Poland, and brought his family to the Jackson County area, not far from the Manchester home of the Hoffmanns. 

Anna’s sister Louisa Maul died in Russian Poland, but her son Julius who was already living in Jackson County, brought the rest of his family to the US about 1883 after Louisa died. The family took an Americanized name, Coulson rather than the longer Polish one of Kielczewski found in Louisa's marriage record.

Anna had three other known sisters based on records from Serey, but at present no descendants of these families have been located beyond initial records of births and marriages in Russian Poland in the late 1800s. DNA matches have only been found for Louisa and Fredryk descendants. Both Louisa and Fredryk had large families, and many still reside in the Jackson County area.

Sarah Mulholland: Sister, We Hardly Knew Ya

Despite the many genealogies that have been done for the Superior Township Mulholland families, many with undocumented daughters, the surprise was discovery of Sarah Mulholland. 

Sarah’s story was unknown until close examination of early Washtenaw County deed records in 2020. Like sisters Phebe and Eliza, she married and moved away, and was lost from family stories. It is interesting to note that the speculative relationship to Phebe Mulholland Barber has links to Sarah’s story, as both settled in Mt. Morris, Genesee, Michigan.

A story hinted in land records

Sarah’s story began to unravel with a deed record dating from 1836. Two females, Sarah and Jane Mulholland, purchased a parcel of land in the newly growing village of Dixboro, Washtenaw County. This deed is unusual for several reasons, particularly the fact that the purchasers are female. 

Multiple Mulhollands bought lots in the village, and their father Samuel is known to have lived in Dixboro in his later years as did brothers James and John. James had early dealings with John Dix, the town founder who tried to build the platted subdivision as the future major city in the region, a plan that collapsed when the railroad was routed through nearby Ann Arbor. Dixboro remains a small village today with numerous historic buildings and a cemetery holding several generations of Mulhollands.

Following the deed trail showed this Dixboro lot was sold in 1846 by Jane and her then husband, Horace Stebbins, to Jane’s brother William. Jane is documented as a a daughter of Samuel Mulholland. Also listed as sellers were William and Sarah Sissons of Genesee County. Not a huge leap to think the Sarah Sissons was originally Sarah Mulholland, although she lived rather distant from Superior Township, and other records show her maiden name to be Mulholland.

Sarah Mulholland Sissins of Genesee County, Michigan

As the story emerged, it is likely Sarah arrived with her Irish family in Superior Township in 1833 at age 13 but no records have been found of her there in the 1830s other than the deed from 1836.

Sarah Sissins (or Sissons, as there are multiple spellings in records) was married to William Sissons, an immigrant from England. No records have been found for their early lives. From the records of children and tombstones in the Mt. Morris cemetery, Sarah’s maiden name was Mulholland. Her oldest child, James R. Sissins, was born in 1842. 

When the family settled in Genesee is unknown. William is an original early settler who bought land patents in the county in 1837, and locally registered in 1847. He and his family appear in the 1850 census but he was not on the 1840 one. It is likely he married Sarah in about 1841 at which time they settled into their farming life.

William and Sarah had seven known children, two who died in childhood. William died in 1868 at the age of 58. Sarah appears in deed records after her husband's death, buying land in the village of Mt. Morris and a plot in the countryside and in the 1870 census living with her two youngest children. Sarah briefly remarried John Delbridge in December 1875 at the age of 55 (listed as Sarah Sissins Mulholland in the register), but the marriage was short lived as she died just over a year later in January 1876 at the age of 56. 

She is buried along with William and several children in the Sissins plot in Mount Morris Cemetery, in an area still mostly rural with the farms continuing that were established by the early settlers in the area.

Dowry lands?

At the time of the original purchase in Dixboro, Sarah (age 17) and Jane (age 12) were still girls. Not many young women were land owners, and it seems unlikely they could purchase the Dixboro parcel without funds from a relative. 

What make this purchase interesting is that a similar event occurs two years later, when land was transferred to two of their youngest sisters, Eliza and Mary Ann, at the time ages 12 and 10 respectively. While the reason for these land gifts is unknown, it is possible this was seen as a way to ensure a dowry for the girls and some personal financial stability for the future. All these lands were eventually sold by the husbands after marriage, except for Mary Ann’s share, sold by the husband of Eliza who was her guardian. 

The value of land to the Mulholland family can be seen in the growth of their holdings once they came to the US, and the prosperous farms indicated from agricultural census records. These farms remained in the family throughout the nineteenth century, as did the land of the Sissins in Genesee which passed to oldest son James R. Sissins. James died in 1907, with census and directory listings showing he was a farmer to the end.

Phebe Mulholland Cargill Barber: DNA Helps When a Woman Disappears

Evidence for the various children of Sam Mulholland sr and his wife Jane Bullock has gradually accumulated from multiple sources. Genealogical proof can be a challenge in early Michigan history when few records were kept and even fewer survived. Further, Sam and Jane were illiterate, using an X for signing their names. Many stories and evidence for the extended Washtenaw Mulholland clan are elsewhere on this blog.

This is a tale of how DNA may tell us what missing documents may not. It is as yet hypothesized as a two DNA matches is not enough. The tale is posted here in hopes others may supplement what is now suspected.

The Documentary Evidence for a Connection

The single documentary source suggesting that Sam and Jane Mulholland had another daughter is a marriage record from 1833. The nuptials of Pheba Mulholand and William Cargill are recorded in the first county marriage register:

Territory of Michigan, Washtenaw County. Be it remembered that on the second day of September Eighteen hundred & third three that the marriage of William Cargill and Pheba Mulholand was solemnized before me, one of the Justices of the Peace in and for the said county of Washtenaw, E. Munday.

Except for this entry, not one solid piece of documentary evidence has been found for the couple, including any clear link to the Sam Mulholland family. Only conjecture suggested she is related, given that the extended family arrived in 1833 and they seem to be the only Mulhollands in Washtenaw County at the time. Further, a daughter old enough to marry in 1833 would be just the right age to fill the gap between James and Sam jr, a rather long period for there to have been no children. Earlier genealogists made this assumption, and it remains a reasonable one, though until now very hypothetical even if reasonable.

Marriage register for Washtenaw County, 1833

Desperately Seeking Phebe

As any genealogist will tell you, finding females is far more difficult in times past than finding males. Most official records only recorded the names of white men who owned property, were able to vote, headed the family, and gave their names to a spouse so female maiden names were lost. Until 1850, census records for Michigan had no names except male heads-of-household. Official birth and death records were not required in Michigan until 1867 and even then were less than complete until the 20th century. No regular church records were kept in most early Michigan communities, with many rural churches sharing a traveling clergyman.

In the case of Phebe Mulholland, the first line of search is to follow her husband. William Cargill seems to have left little trace. Like her Mulholland brothers, a William Cargill appears as a petitioner to Congress for road improvements in Michigan in 1833 suggesting this is the man Phebe married. The petition may indicate a link to the family although petitioner William did not sign with the others from Washtenaw County. But beyond the petition and the marriage register, William cannot be found after 1833. Searches for varied spellings (some family historians gave the name as Carlisle or Carroll) did not reveal the couple in later years, even beyond the boundaries of the state. As shown by marriages for sisters Eliza and Jane, misspelled husband names can be a problem in finding these women.

So what happened to the Cargills? One might just assume bad record keeping has kept them hidden. But other directions are possible which have been noted by genealogists seeking women who were invisible from official record keeping. 

One option is that both William and Phebe died young in one of the many epidemics that swept the countryside in those days. With no formal recordings of deaths, and no formal cemeteries in Superior Township, they were quietly buried and lost to history.

But another option when women disappear is a quite different story. Because of early deaths, both men and women found new spouses and many families show multiple marriages because of the demands for labor to raise families and manage the many chores of farming. Daily life did not favor singles. Widows or widowers remarried soon after the death of a spouse or had to find lodging with their siblings. A widow who remarries can be hard to find when there are no records of marriages, and those that exist do not show other family members. 

Could Phebe have remarried after a tragic early death of William?

OMG, another Phebe?

With online records, it has become easier to look more broadly at possible family connections. One of the reasons for a more extensive search for Phebe was finding other lost sisters who had been uncertain because early records from Washtenaw County had been misleading. Names were misspelled and dates uncertain for this early period, and in one case only deed records were the needed link. 

With so few Mulhollands (and other similar spellings) in Michigan in the early 1800s, there are few individuals to trace in depth. With my retirement in the mid 2010s, I had the opportunity to spend more time on research and actually found a Phebe Mulholland of the right age and in the right places. At the time, I posted her story online in hopes others could supplement what was known, but after years of no further revelations, I removed the extended story as too speculative. Yes, it appeared that Phebe had remarried and was living only a short distance from her sister Sarah in Genesee County, Michigan. But no, records just did not provide the needed support.

DNA to the Rescue

Retirement has provided the time to learn more about DNA genealogy, at the same time online databases for DNA have expanded to include more people. For the first time, I found a link that was more than speculation based on age and place. A match to a descendant of Phebe, and no other known links to my family! Yes, I did a happy dance although I realize that one link for such an early ancestor is still weak. And on another DNA site, I located a second match to a Phebe descendant, but closely related to the first so still could be another connection. Both are distant enough cousins to my family to be related in some other way.

So once again, I am posting the documentary story for what happened to the missing Phebe, and hoping that future DNA evidence will emerge to strengthen the connection. At present, the DNA evidence was found in the Ancestry DNA database for a single linkage between my father and a descendant of Phebe. Limited evidence but a start that remains worth further examination.

Below is the posting I removed earlier based on the documentary records, but now can argue more strongly as correct based on DNA evidence.

How many Mulhollands are there in Michigan?

A tantalizing possibility is that the Pheba Mulholland Cargill from the marriage register was not lost, but remarried. From surviving records, Mulhollands in Michigan before about 1840 seem to come only from three families: the Superior Mulhollands related to Sam sr, the Monroe Mulhollands in the Daniel Mulholand family, and by about 1840, Steele Mulholland who settled in Ann Arbor.

So when a Phebe Mulholland appears about 1835, there is at least a possibility that she is the same one from the marriage record. What if her husband died not long after the marriage and she found another husband? And what if this newly identified Phebe is the right age, although admittedly her name is hardly unique so a leap of faith is required for this to be the true story. Even more tantalizing is the fact her sister Sarah settled in Genesee County with her husband, William Sissins. How convenient to find Phebe Mulholland just at the right time in Michigan records! And if she followed in the footsteps of her sisters, it is no surprise that her family moved away from Washtenaw County where only the Mulholland sons settled for the long term.

The following story is accurate in terms of a Phebe Mulholland who lived in Michigan and is the right age. While there is documentation of her name and age, as yet there is no documentary evidence that clearly links her to the Washtenaw family.

Phebe Mulholland Barber of Genesee County

Henry Barber, born about 1808 in Ireland, was married to Phebe Mulholland, also born in Ireland about the same year. With their oldest son born in 1836 in Michigan, a good guess is they married about 1835 in the state. The family first appears in 1850, when the census shows them living in Genesee County with son Robert, age 15, and six daughters ages one to twelve. Based on census records, the family added one additional daughter in 1853. A 1916 history of Genesee County indicates Henry Barber had settled in the eastern part of Mount Morris Township by 1839 not long after the initial settlers about 1833-34 (although the formal organization of the township did not happen until 1850). A Henry Barlow appears in Genesee County in the 1840 census with household members of the right age to be the Barber family, possibly name misspelled. 

Henry Barber grist mill in Mt. Morris, 1873

Henry was a very prosperous farmer and enterpreneur, paying taxes on land in sections 2 and 3 in 1844 and section 1, 2 and 3 in 1855. He accumulated lands and businesses estimated at $35,000 by 1870, including the local steam-powered grain mill in Mount Morris. According to the 1873 Bradstreet report, Henry's mill business was rated "superior business credit and ability, and in excellent credit." Henry served as township treasurer in 1860, 1867, and 1871.

Henry and Phebe lived out their lives in the Mt. Morris area of Genesee County, and son Robert remained there throughout his life as well. By contrast, the daughters married and some moved West, with daughters Emeline Barber Warner, Melissa Sarah Barber Ingersoll, and Eliza Barber Woodin all ending in California. The others settled in nearby Flint.

Where the family lived before 1839 is uncertain, as is their arrival from Ireland other than the fact all their children were born in Michigan from at least 1836 onward. Intriguing but inconclusive is an older Henry Barber in Superior Township in 1840, and a Henry Barber from the same county who was an original land patent purchaser in Handy Township, Livingston County in the same section as James and John Mulholland. Could this be Henry's family? Given inaccuracies in the early census records and lack of names for family members other than the head-of-household, the connection is unclear.

Phebe’s maiden name is known from death records for her children. Robert’s death record shows his parents as Henry Barber and Phebe Mulholland. Daughter Lucy Barber Milner is shown as the child of Henry Barber and Phebe McHolland (a common misspelling of Mulholland). Census records from 1850, 1860, and 1870 consistently show Phebe’s birth date of about 1808 or 1809 in Ireland, at least potentially possible for the person who was married in 1833, and fits neatly in the gap between Sam sr.’s sons.

Phebe Mulholland Barber’s death and burial are unknown, but her husband appears alone in the 1880 census at age 71 and is not again in records after this date. It is probable they are buried on the farm where they spent their lives in Mt. Morris Township in graves no longer remembered (the Mt. Morris cemetery was not established until 1878).  But perhaps Phebe Mulholland Barber will yet reveal the secret of her family connections to other Mulhollands and our family tree in some yet unfound cache of records.

Note: this posting has been revised multiple times as different evidence has come to light to suggest new directions. With a single DNA link it remains a hypothesis, even if a good one. The current posting is from August 2024. Documentation for the Barber-Mulholland family is in my family tree on Ancestry. Would love to hear from you if you have suggestions!

Caroline Knodler: Young Woman finds Trouble in Paradise

The exact circumstances of Caroline Knodler's early life are clouded by the family's long reluctance to discuss the scandals involving her marriage to and later divorce from Sam J. Mulholland, and the birth before the marriage of her son, William (Bill) Mulholland, all very improper in the nineteenth century.

Carolyn (Carrie) Knödler Mulholland

Caroline (Carrie) Knödler was born in 1865. She grew up in Cottenweiler, Württemberg, Germany in the region where her ancestors had been since at least the sixteenth century. She followed her brother Gottlieb (George) Knodler to New York, then settled in Michigan. 

Exactly when she arrived in the U.S. is uncertain as she gave multiple dates ranging from arriving with her brother who immigrated around 1880, to coming when she was 12 in 1877. In 1894, she claimed in the state census to have been in Michigan for 11 years, after arriving in the U.S. the year before that which would have been 1882. According to one family story, Carrie left Germany when her father remarried after her mother's death, and she did not get along with her new step-mother, a marriage known from records to be in 1884.

While many immigrants reported inconsistent arrival dates in various documents, Carrie's changing story is at least in part related to the birth of her son born from an unknown father in 1886, four years before her official marriage to Samuel Mulholland in 1890. For years, she claimed she and Sam were married in 1885 before William (Willy or Bill) Mulholland's birth to protect the family from public scandal. Bill was consistently claimed to be Sam's son, at least in all social settings. Even Carrie's obituary in the Ann Arbor newspapers used the incorrect date of 1885 for her marriage to maintain this fiction. But the state holds a marriage record for the couple documenting the 1890 date.

First America, then the Poor House

In Carrie's story as reported years later by her youngest daughter Ada, after arriving in the U.S., Carrie decided not to return to Germany. Ada wrote:

As [Carrie] liked this country, she decided to stay and earn her own way through life. Many were the times when the pangs of homesickness overtook her, but she would not recross the treacherous seas. For a few months she kept house for her brother, who soon married. Then she worked in a summer resort on a mountain near by.

Brother Gottlieb (George) and second
wife Nellie (back); Carrie and
George's daughter Helen (front)

According to the next stage in the story as reported by daughter Ada, while working at the mountain resort after George married, her brother and wife invited Carrie to join them on a visit to an aunt in Michigan. Carrie liked the area better than New York so she did not go back with her brother. Michigan at the time had many families from Württemberg, was more rural than the busy city of New York, and shared a similar climate to their German home. George, by contrast, liked the big city and did return to New York.

Somewhere in there may be the story, but the dates don't work. In fact, marriage records for Gottlieb and his first wife, Frieda indicate they married in 1889. And Carrie was already in Michigan by early 1886 living at the Washtenaw county poor house where her first son was born.

Poor House from Evert & Steward, 1874 Combination Map Atlas of Washtenaw County

Hiding the Stigma of an Illegitimate Child

What we now know from official documents is that Carrie had a child out of wedlock, and all of the shifting stories and dates were intended to obscure it. Based on Willy's birth record, he was born in February 1886 while Carrie was living in the Washtenaw County Poor House and Insane Asylum, with the infant listed as illegitimate and father unknown. According to records from the Poor House, Carrie was sent there from January 26 to March 3, 1886, leaving a month after her son's birth. 

Carrie and son Bill Mulholland, 1940s

There are more hints about her son's parentage in the 1894 Michigan census after Carrie's 1890 marriage to Sam. Willy is correctly reported to have been born in Michigan with a father and mother born in Württemberg, Germany. By contrast both of the children born after Carrie's marriage to Sam, Minnie and Everett, have a father born in Michigan and mother in Württemberg as would be expected. More confusion is added when Carrie indicated she had only two children not the three listed. Later confirmation of the birth before marriage can be found in the divorce papers from 1905, as Willy is absent from the list of children shared by Samuel and Carrie.

Neither the official records, nor Carrie's multiple versions of her own story provide explanations for her early history and the circumstances surrounding William's birth and her eventual change from the poor house to Sam's wife. In all family records, Willy shares the Mulholland name which he used throughout his life.

Whatever had happened to put her in the county poor house must have been tragic. It is hard to believe her brother George who was doing well in New York would not have helped her out but maybe she was too embarrassed to tell him. There were the usual rumors later of an affair with a wandering carnival worker who fathered her son Bill, but no real information is known about Bill's father or how Carrie ended up pregnant and penniless in Washtenaw County, Michigan.

Just seeing these records of her hard life made me want to cry for her and all the women back then who were treated so poorly if they were single mothers. I don't think we will ever know the whole story, and even more interesting how she went from being a resident in the poor house to getting married to Sam four years later. While the sanctioned family story claimed she was a recent arrival to Michigan when she met Sam, the birth certificate shows she had already been in the state for several years.

Carrie and Sam Mulholland, about 1890,
possibly a wedding picture

From Poor House to Sam's Wife

According to the story Carrie told in later years, she met her future husband, Sam Mulholland (the third of that name), while living with her aunt in Michigan. Carrie at 25 was an unwed mother who needed a husband. If family or friends helped make the arrangement possible, we do not know.

On the other side of the marriage equation, the much older Sam probably looked like a good catch, having inherited a sizable farm in Superior Township in 1888 when his father died. While the Mulholland family was relatively respected, Sam was the black sheep because of his alcoholism and unsettled ways. Locals likely knew of his problems, making finding a spouse difficult. Supposedly the Mulholland family decided to get rid of their problem by marrying the 37-year-old Sam to the much younger Carrie, still in her mid-20's. 

The couple married in July 1890 and had three children on the farm near Dixboro that Sam had been given by his father. In 1896, Sam and Carrie moved into Ann Arbor where the last three of their daughters were born. After living north of the city (in what was then called North Ann Arbor but today is part of the city) with Sam’s sister, Sarah Mulholland, they lived briefly in a house at Main and Felch in Ann Arbor, then moved in 1900 to a rental house at 204 Chapin Street. 

Carrie on the back steps at the Chapin
house, about 1909

The Not-to-be-Mentioned Divorce

It is not clear that the arranged marriage was ever a happy one, and it ended in an official divorce in 1905, a socially unacceptable practice in the early 20th century. Sam was an alcoholic and periodically absented himself from the family, leaving Caroline to raise the family and earn their keep. 

While the community believed that Sam was a cordial drunk, the testimony his wife filed in the divorce papers indicated that he was verbally abusive and failed to support his family. In the two years before the divorce complaint, Sam had been jailed for drunkenness multiple times, to the "disgrace" of his wife and children. 

Carrie filed her complaint requesting the divorce after a particularly threatening event in June 1905, when 

he came home intoxicated, he rolled up his sleeves and said he would kill his [wife] and the whole damn family and paint the house with blood. (from the complaint filed with the court requesting the divorce, 27 June 1905) 

Carrie, about 1915

While Sam denied the part of the complaint describing his drunken rages and non-support, the divorce order indicated the court found the charges "satisfactorily" true and Sam Mulholland "guilty of several acts of extreme cruelty." The court not only granted the divorce and gave Carrie custody of the children in late 1905, but also issued an injunction against Sam coming to her Chapin Street house. 

From the Mulholland family point of view, Carrie was beneath them socially when she first married Sam as well as tainted by her illegitimate child. With the divorce official, many of that family distanced themselves from her. Bill's daughter Mae Mulholland claimed that only the Parkers, cousins on the Mulholland side, were friendly to Carrie in later years and no other Mulholland relatives attended Carrie's funeral. 

Despite Carrie's careful attempts to hide the truth of the divorce, according to Dorothy Williams Burpo who grew up in town and was a niece of Minnie's by marriage, everyone in Ann Arbor knew something of this story even though the family refused to acknowledge it. With city directories showing Sam often living only blocks away from the Chapin Street house, Carrie's claim to be his widow in the same directories was probably recognized as less than accurate but a social nicety given the attitudes of the time.

Carrie, about 1919

While Carrie's children hinted that something was funny in later years, they refused to acknowledge Willy's too-early birth or the divorce, and records kept by the family preserve the sanitized version. It was still so unacceptable that even when family genealogist Phyllis Hoffman tried to talk about this seventy years later and after Carrie's death, with evidence in hand as part of her genealogical research, the now aging children simply wouldn't hear of it or discuss what they may have known. 

In a letter to Phyllis, Willy's daughter Mae wrote: 

I would have to be an idiot not to know something was wrong about Caroline and Sam's wedding. Before Ada died I had come up with three different dates when they were supposed to have been married. I knew something was wrong when Ada let me look at the bible and I saw the date had been changed in Edna's handwriting. We started to talk about it but when I saw Ada starting to cry I told her to forget it. It was over years ago and nothing could change it at this late date. She made me promise I would keep my mouth shut and do nothing to hurt Caroline's memory.

New Directions and Long Life

Carrie and her daughters brought
in extra income by taking in laundry

After her divorce, Carrie purchased the house on Chapin Street in Ann Arbor in 1906 with a legacy she received when her father died in Germany. There Caroline took in washing to make money and also sold milk and eggs. In their pre-teen years, each of the children went to work to help support the family. Only the youngest, Ada, finished high school.

Not all their life was a hardship. The children reported regularly playing across the street from the Chapin St. house at West Park, and spending time in the summers at the lake as well as visiting the Parkers on their farm north of town. 

Carrie and grandson Erwin, about 1914

If there were "skeletons in the closet" at Carrie's house on Chapin, they stayed in the attic and Carrie was adamant that no one could ever go up there (it wasn't really an attic but an unfinished storage space over the kitchen). At one time when young Stan Hoffman was visiting, Carrie and the daughters were mentioning that they would like to be able to plug in the electric iron in the kitchen. Like many old houses, the wiring was added long after it was built and there were few sockets. There was no electrical wiring in the kitchen except for one overhead light bulb. Daughter Minnie's husband, Fred Hoffman told Carrie that he could fix the light fixture so it would have the light and an outlet to plug in the iron. Carrie's immediate response was that he most certainly couldn't go into the attic. Fred assured her he could fix it without going upstairs over the kitchen.  

Carrie with her Hoffman grandsons,
Jerry, Erwin, and Stan. At West Park about 1927

Grandson Jerry Hoffman remembered that he and his brothers spent most time with their Mulholland relatives when they went to visit in Ann Arbor from their home in Detroit. Carrie's kitchen had a pantry attached to it, more of a long cupboard, that was the first stop during a visit because it always had cookies for the grandsons. Another popular stop was West Park across the street. At the farther end of the park was a pond with pollywogs that were captured and taken home to watch them become frogs. The boys carefully carried the young frogs down to the nearby Detroit River to hopefully spend a happy froggy life.

Carrie remained in the Chapin house until her death at 82 in 1947, living with her two unmarried daughters, Edna and Margaret. 

In her obituary, Carrie was noted as being a member of the first Baptist Church and was a charter member of the Ladies Auxiliary of the Graf O’Hara Post of the Veterans of Foreign Wars. She was also reported to be active in the German social clubs that brought together the many immigrants from Germany who settled in the Ann Arbor area. Carrie is buried in the family plot at Bethlehem Cemetery with her children, and in death, next to her ex-husband Sam.

She was a tough woman who survived scandal and raised a large family alone successfully. In a letter to daughter Edna Mulholland in 1943, Rhubena Mulholland Schaal, a niece through Sam Mulholland, wrote of Carrie:

 I could wish that your mother's blood flowed in my veins—she is indeed a grand lady.

Carrie Knodler Mulholland, 1946 (location unknown)

William Muholland: The Good Son

William Mulholland is the youngest son of Samuel Mulholland sr and Jane Bullock's known children. Like his older brother Samuel jr, William Mulholland spent his life as a farmer in Superior Township after arriving from Ireland. While Sam was out adventuring in the new world, William was the good son who stayed home then helped move the family to Michigan in 1833 at age 19. His role in aiding family members continued throughout his lifetime, as his farm was constantly the shelter for his siblings and other relatives when they needed a refuge. While little is known of his life, the surviving evidence indicates he was a man who others relied on.

William Mulholland

Throughout his life, William sought to build his holdings and his community. He first appears in the records in early 1834 as a signer of a petition to Congress requesting road improvements to connect communities from Washtenaw to western Michigan. This road would ultimately become Michigan Avenue, connecting Detroit to Chicago. He was also buying and selling land in Ingham and Livingston counties (places he never lived but bought initial land patents) with his father and brother Sam jr, using the gains to expand his farm in Superior Township where he ultimately became one of the prominent citizens in the community. 

Initially William lived with his parents and siblings. William married Mary Pounder in 1844 when she was 18 and he was in his late 20s. Like brother Sam and his wife, Eliza Pounder Mulholland (the two brothers married two sisters), William had a large family with ten children.

Just months after his wedding, William purchased land from his parents in Section 17 of Superior Township for $800 in May 1845.  He owned 100 acres having started with very little. In his mid-50s, his farm was valued at $8000, a substantial holding back in 1870. At that time, he had four horses, three milk cows, four cattle, forty sheep, and six pigs. He grew winter wheat, Indian corn, oats and buckwheat, with 60 acres of undeveloped woodland. His farm later grew to 160 acres with a second parcel in a nearby area. William was considered very well off for his time, making money through prudent land purchases and sales, including in neighboring counties and as far away as Nauvoo, Illinois. As suggested by the stories of his sisters, land was a highly prized commodity for these once land-poor Irish immigrants.

In the 1881 History of Washtenaw County, William is described:

William Mulholland ranks among the honored and aged pioneers of the fertile valley. He was born in Ireland in 1816 and is a son of Samuel and Jane (Burlock) Mulholland, who emigrated with their family to America in 1835. He settled in Superior tp. the same year, where William grew to manhood. In 1845 he married Mary Pounder. The fruits of this union was the birth of 10 children, 9 of whom, 3 sons and 6 daughters are living. Mrs. Mulholland departed this life in 1880. The names of the children are - Eliza, Margaret, Mary Jane, Anna, William H., Elceba, Josie, John J. and Samuel L. Mary died September, 1880. Mr. M is a consistent member of the Presbyterian Church. His wife was a faithful and consistent member of the Episcopal Church. Mr. Mulholland is Democratic in politics, and has served the citizens of Superior tp. in various official positions. He has many warm friends in this country, who desire to see him prosperous in life. (1881 History of Washtenaw County, p. 1086)

William died in 1883 at the age of 66 of heart disease, three years after his wife. At the time of his death, five of his children were living at home. His mentally disabled sister MaryAnn Mulholland had been living with him since about 1847 when their sister Jane Mulholland Stebbins died. At various times he had others living on his farm, including Joseph Crawford, son of Martha Crawford Mulholland of the Dixboro ghost fame and stepson of William's deceased brother, John Mulholland. Also living near him were his newly-wedded sister-in-law Margaret Pounder and husband Francis Collier. 

William is buried in the Dixboro Cemetery along with his wife Mary and many of their children and grandchildren.