The Hebbs

I walked over 35kms yesterday and had no trouble sleeping at all when I got back to my hostel. My last four days have been spent in Heidelberg in Southwestern Germany. It is near the Odenwald "mountain" region where the Hebbs and the Haughns are from. I've visited four places in the countryside two relevant to the Hebbs and two to the Haughns. Lets start with those concerning the Hebbs.

To avoid reinventing the wheel, here is a summary that my mom e-mailed me:

Wendell Heeb (born 1683), was the origional Hebb from the village of Mangelsbach. (There is a village nearby called Bensheim where there are many people by the name of Heeb.) His son, Johann Adam Heeb (1712-1739), lived in the village of Falken-Gesab in Odenwald, which is near Wilhelmsfeld. He married a gal named Margaretha in 1738 (her first name was actually Anna)and they had a son named JohannAdam II (Aug. 1738-Oct. 1803). Adam I ran a mill with his father-in-law and a year after his son was born, he was killed at the mill. Margaretha moved to Wilhelmsfeld with her son Adam II and she married Hans Adam Eisenhauer. in 1744. They moved to Canada,sailing on the Pearl, in 1752, to Halifax. The name eventually changed to many forms, but
the one we adopted was Hebb.

My ancertry goes like this: Wendell Heeb, Johann Adam Heeb, Johann Adam Heeb (Hebb) II, Johann Georg Hebb, Abraham Hebb, William Amos Hebb, Fletcher Leopold Hebb, Gerald Douglas Hebb, and then me.

By the way, Adam II was 12 years old when he came to Canada.

Yes, my Mom's information was pretty good. Adam came on a boat as a boy and probably wouldn't have if his father didn't die. In another source, the author thinks there is something suspicious about the death of Adam I. Coupled with the remarriage of Margaretha and the family's choice to emigrate, I'm inclined to be suspicious. What was true is that Adam II grew up in Falken-Gesab and his father Adam I was a grain miller or lumber sawyer, depending on the book you read.

I set my task on finding the villages of Falken-Gesab and Mangelsbach a few weeks ago in Norway. Problems arose as neither place name brought results in any search engine, save for genealogical articles from Canada which only told me things I already knew. I searched a few hours here and there and didn't get results until I was in Amsterdam. It seems that Falken-Gesab is a misspelling and that Mangelsbach is so small and obscure, no one writes about it on the Internet.

Correctly spelled Falken-Gesäß, Adam II's birthplace is located in the southern part or the Odenwald mountains. If you look on a map, find Heidelberg, then find Eberbach due east about 40 or 50 km. North of Eberbach is Erbach. Falken-Gesäß is nearly halfway between these two places to the west of a small place called Beerfelden.

I went to Falken-Gesäß on Monday. The DB (railway) staff printed out all the information I needed. It was two hours there and one back, taking a train and 2 buses to get there. The day was wet cold and miserable but I didn't come all this way to sit around and wait, so I set out. with my daypack and umbrella.

The first bus stopped at Beerfelden, about 5km from my destinations. Beerfelden was a small town that supported a row of shops a Turkish kebab/pizza shop and some farm equipment and hardware stores. I was definitely in a farm town, although it was marked by the odd gingerbread half timber house here and there. I got a kebab, doddled around town, and stood in the cold waiting for my bus. I thought nothing of it being 20 mins late, as the first bus had been that late, but at 25 mins I was freezing and decided to find a hot beverage and some information.

Luckily, there was a combination bakery and Cafe 100m down the road. I had my coffee, told the couple that owned the place my story, and showed them my transportation itinerary. I was a bit curious how this was all going to work out because there was only ONE bus in to Falken-Gesäß and one out in a day and a few hours between. The bus going in didn't come and I was a good 5 km walk away. The wife was worried that I would miss the second bus, so the the couple furnished me with a map of the area and her husband called to bus company to see what the schedule was like. It turns out that Easter break had started, and that buses run more infrequently. I wasn't worried, thinking that things would work out somehow. The husband got off the phone and showed where the bus stop in Falken-Gesäß was. The wife then informed me that a "special bus" would take me to the cemetery, where I wanted to start from.

The bus turned out to be her husband driving me in his car. He was very thorough, taking me to the bus stop first and then going step by step thought the route I would walk from the cemetery. I thanked him and got his name and address so that I can send something when I get home. His wife wanted to visit Canada, so I thought getting some Lunenburg information in German might be helpful.

The graveyard was a bit of a disappointment. All of the graves were of people who dies in the last 50 years. I learned from a German guy in my form room that as soon as a grave had been left untended by the family, it is fair game to be dug up an occupied by someone else. I took that as an indication to stop looking for graves in Germany.

The town itself was beautiful. It was set in a shallow vally between rolling green hills capped by woodlands. They had a local biergarten and restaurant, and about 50 to 100 houses scattered around. There was no sign of an old church, leaving me to guess that this village was too small to suport one. Walking down the main road, I noticed one and only one building built near the stream. It was a mill of some kind. I walked around it and wondered if it could have been powered by water at one point. The building was made of red stone, and was at least 100 years old, but I doubted that it could be old enough to have been the mill that Adam I died at. It wouldn't be that unlikely that the present mill is built over the site of the old one, however.







I had 45 minutes left to make it up the hill to the bus stop about 1 km away. Although the rain started coming down a but harder the extra exertion of going uphill warmed me up and soon my hands were no longer freezing, although they were still damp. I stoped at various points up the hill to take pictures and admire the beauty of the green fields.



My second Hebb destination was Mangelsbach, the home of Wendal Heeb. I took a day of rest on Tuesday, which was sunny and beautiful, and then when Wednesday (Yesterday) rolled around it was back to cold and rain. I put on both my sweaters and took both my umbrella and my rain jacket. I would not be caught in the same situation as Monday.

The train ride was the same from Heidelberg to Eberbach, but then I boarded the "Odenwald Bahn" local train which took you through gorgeous country scenery. I passed within 10 km of Falken-Gesäß and then headed further north to Michelstadt. Michelstadt was an interesting little town with a lot of it's historic centre still standing. I took a picture of every half-timber (Gingerbread) building I saw.
I was determined not to stand still and freeze like on Monday, so rather then wait an hour for a bus that I'd pay 4 Euros for, I bought a topographical map and walked.



The great thing about the map was that it showed every hiking trail, woods road, house, cemetery ... It piratically showed every telephone pole. The abundance of detail meant that I could cut directly to Mangelsbach without worrying about getting lost.





I had walked about 4 km though the woods when I started to feel hungry and like I hadn't prepared well enough (I certainly wasn't cold). About five minutes later, I came out of the woods to cross the highway and ran straight into a roadside restaurant. It was quaint and housed in the former cottage of 17th century quasi-nobility (who were executed for poaching a big stag on the King's, Prince's or Baron's land.) I had Odenwalder Wildschweinbratwurt, which were spicy dark sausages made of Wild boar meat from the region.


5 or 6 km later, the my route narrowed and I made it to Mangelsbach. There is once building that may have existed at the time of Wendall Heeb, and other than that, nothing is older than 50 or 100 years. All that is left of Mangelsbach are five houses, one of which is an active farm. The houses face a wooded area and are backed by huge fields to which I could see no end. The weather had improved from earlier and I started walking back into Michelstadt. I found out that the woods behind Mangelsbach are a deer sanctuary for "hunters." The sanctuary is really small so I can't imagine there being and sport in hunting there.







As an aside, here is the inscription on the grave of Adam Heeb II, located on Heckmans Island near Lunenburg, NS.

"TOMBSTONE OF JOHANN ADAM HEEB II"
Come O death,thou sleeps dark brother,
Come and lead me forth to God
Loose of my soul's ship, the rudder,
Guide me safely into port
Let him, persecute who will
Thou canst soothe and cheer me still,
For through thee, alone come I
To my saviours home on high.