Today in Family History …the Witchcraft Trial of my 10th Great Grandfather Martin Heinzen Began (Re-Post)

On today’s date in 1629, the witchcraft trial of my 10th great grandfather Martin Heinzen started at Freigericht Ganter, near Glis, Valais, Switzerland because someone in the local populace had sick livestock and other executed witches had implicated him as their accomplice.  Martin ended up being tortured for nearly a week in hopes of extracting confessions of sorcery.

Mayor Kaspar Stockaler was the man responsible for routing out witches in the local population.  Thirty witnesses had sworn statements against my 10th great grandfather.

Because Ganter didn’t have a torture device, they borrowed one from nearby Brig.

Through his long torture, Martin confessed every sin, and in an article in French on the subject of witchcraft trials in Valais, he confessed every “pecadillo” BUT sorcery.  On the 12th of October 1629, friends and relatives of Martin demanded his release.   So he was released and ordered to pay one third of the costs of his trial!

When I found this sensational fact about my ancestor, I discovered that the witch trial madness had actually started in Valais, Switzerland in 1428 before it spread to the rest of Europe.  It started there! You can find headings about this sad phenomena under such headings as “Valais witch trials” and “Swiss werewolf witch trials.”  I am still searching for a book in English on the subject.

Martin went on to marry and have my 9th great grandfather Kaspar Heinzen.  Of note is the fact that Martin’s wife and Kaspar’s mother – Barbara Andamatten, shared a surname with one of Ganter’s witchcraft judges.

Martin Heinzen’s tale appears in “Das Freigerecht Ganter” and “Notes sur les procès d’hérésie et de sorcellerie en Valais” because he was an accused sorcerer that walked away from one of these terrible trials with his life.

I suspect Martin may be my 10th great grandfather two times over.  I need to do some more digging.  Martin is the ancestor of my immigrant second great grandmother Anne Marie Aloisia Heinzen.

Do you have Swiss ancestors accused of sorcery? Have you found European ancestors accused of witchcraft?

Sources:

Dionys Imesch, “Das Freigericht Ganter”, dans Blätter aus der Walliser Geschichte, Bd 3, 1902-1906, S. 70-100, surtout p. 82-83 (http://doc.rero.ch/record/200661) 

Kirchegemeinde Glis

“Hexerei im Oberwallis” um 1600 von Hans Steffen

Jules-Bernard Bertrand, “Notes sur les procès d’hérésie et de sorcellerie en Valais”, dans Annales valaisannes, 1921, vol. 3, n° 2-3, p. 151-194, surtout p. 189-191 (en ligne: http://doc.rero.ch/record/6753)

Thank you to the great people in Genealogie Familienforschung Ahnenforschung Schweiz and Genealogy Translations…  

This post was originally shared 4 years ago on this date.

cinziarosagenealogy@comcast.net

Today in Family History ~ Johann (John) Schuttler’s Birthday

193 years ago today, Johann (John) Schuttler was born in Wachenheim, Germany. He was my first immigrant ancestor and my third great grandfather. I have written a lot about this ancestor and the struggle to identify his parents.

The one huge clue about him was that his uncle was the Chicago Wagon King, Peter Schuttler, who made his fortune supplying wagons to the Union Army. According to the 1850 census, one year after John’s immigration, he was living with Peter Schuttler. John was the foreman at Peter’s and his son’s wagon company for decades, and my second great grandmother lived with Peter Schuttler’s family for a little while when her mother Louisa Gerbing Schuttler passed away from cholera and her father John remarried the lady he had been seeing while married to my second great grandmother.

A Charles Schuttler also worked with John, who, during the Civil War, became a Corporal in the 24th Illinois Infantry. That Charles was the godfather to John’s oldest son, according to his baptismal record, so I was again sure there was a familial connection.

Is it possible to prove who his parents really were with DNA that many generations removed? Perhaps. I have a number of matches to the Rupps of Monsheim and Harxheim near Wachenheim, and I hypothesize they are relations of Konrad Schuttler’s second wife Susanna Rupp who was also from Harxheim. I hypothesize Susanna was John’s mother and her marriage to Konrad Schuttler in December 1829, legitimized John, making the location of his baptism another mystery. Konrad is the oldest sibling of Peter Schuttler and the father of Charles Schuttler, Friedrich Schuttler. That all makes Peter his uncle and Charles his first cousin. With the help of two residents of Wachenheim, I was given the well-documented ancestry of Peter Schuttler and his siblings from that area of Germany.

When more records are digitized, the theory of his parents may be proven or disproven. Until then it is a theory and my online tree states such.

Midwife Scribing Saturday ~ Maria Giuseppa Marcella – her final midwife record

This is the last record I found mentioning Maria Giuseppa Marcella as a midwife. I located one final record mentioning her on November 1, 1918, when she passed away at number 136 Casebruciate, at age 72, 2 years after the death of her brother, my great great grandfather, Filippo Marcella. For all intents and purposes, I located no records mentioning that she and her husband had children. Maybe they did and I was just not very thorough.

I found an error in this record. So I question if Clemente De Berardiniis, who wrote the record, actually read it to those present that were illiterate, as the record states.

Book of Births, Farindola 1896

Number 139 Maria Domenica Marcella

The year 1896, day 30, of November at the first meridian, minute 30, in town hall, in front of me, Clemente de Berardiniis, secretary delegate of the mayor, from the 17th of this past July of this past year, with his approval, the Official Civil State of Farindola, Maria Giuseppa Marcella, of 48 years, midwife, living in Farindola, who says on the 1st meridian on the 30th day of the current month in a house Contrada Casebruciate, number (blank), of Elisabetta Rossi, wife of Filippo (Lacchetta) Marcella, with whom she resides, there was born a baby of the feminine sex, who has been named Maria Domenica.

The above mentioned testimony has been given in the presence of Donato Di Francesco, 31 years, farmer, and Giuliano Scaramuzzi, 28 years, farmer, also residents of this commune.

I declare that the preceeding act is legal and in this place she supersedes the spouse of Rossi because he is feeling unwell. This is read to those present because they are illiterate. De Berardiniis

Please note that he wrote Lacchetta as the surname of my great great grandfather Filippo Marcella. That is obviously incorrect. Lacchetta is the surname of his first wife and note that the record states in the margin of the Book of Births of 1896 that the child is named Maria Domenica Marcella. So, did he read it aloud?

This record is located online here: https://www.antenati.san.beniculturali.it/ark:/12657/an_ua19013152/04nblkR

Thank you Maria Giuseppa, and all your ancestresses that came before you in this line for being midwives. Thank you for aiding in the delivery of my great grandfather.

Next I move to the midwife in my great grandmother Serafina Merlinghi’s ancestry. That midwife was from Penne.