Henrietta Koehler

Mennonite Genealogy with Michael Penner

Henrietta Koehler (1863-1948)

Our Friesen Heritage, third edition, p.33-34

Henrietta Koehler was born in the Osterode district of Germany on April 23, 1863 to Julius Koehler (1844-1907) and Mary nee Wolf (1836-1916). Henrietta is known to have had a younger brother, Rudolph, who was born in Koenigsberg, East Prussia in 1875. The Koehlers were German Lutherans. Henrietta was baptized as a newborn in May, 1863.

Henrietta’s family emigrated to North Dakota, where both her father and brother homesteaded.

At age 27, Henrietta married the widower Gerhard S. Friesen on July 23, 1890, in Langdon, North Dakota. She immediately became the mother to Gerhard’s three sons and one daughter, who ranged from 8 to 14 years of age. She and Gerhard went on to have ten children together, of which eight survived to adulthood. And so, Henrietta was a mother to twelve children who grew to adulthood.

The married lives of Henrietta and Gerhard are described in chapter one.

Gerhard died on Christmas Eve, 1922. At this juncture, Henrietta became a widow at the relatively young age of 59. Four days after Gerhard died, Henrietta’s daughter Tina married, after which point four grown children still lived at home with Henrietta: John (age 26), Ernie (also age 26), Peter (age 24), and Esther (age 17).

In early 1923, Henrietta moved to Neidpath, Saskatchewan. Henrietta and Gerhard had acquired a farm there sometime earlier, as in lieu of payment for an outstanding debt for horses that Gerhard had sold the owner. John and Esther joined Henrietta, while Ernie and Peter remained behind to run the Arawana farm. A year later, perhaps out of loneliness, Ernie and Peter joined the family home in Neidpath, leaving the Arawana farm behind.

Within several years, all the children except Ernie were married. Ernie married at age 39 and moved north of Neidpath to Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan. By now, at 73 years of age, Henrietta moved in with Ernie and his wife Ellen, where they cared for her for the rest of her days. Henrietta passed away on September 29, 1948 at age 85. Her body is laid to rest at a cemetery in Meadow Lake. ■

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