Ever since I was a child, I have been interested in my family history and used to update the handwritten family tree that my mother had compiled. Our family’s biggest mystery, a source of my considerable attention and curiosity, was the unknown circumstances of my great-grandmother Irinae’s life before she came to Mexico. I did not know my great-grandmother, but my mother, Irinae’s granddaughter (daughter of Irinae’s elder son, Manuel), had the letter Carl Blum wrote to Plutarco Maldonado in May 14, 1869, leaving Irinae with Plutarco’s family. Irinae was seriously ill at the time with a strong possibility of dying, and Blum and the rest of the family had to leave Mexico without waiting for her recovery. Blum apparently never told Plutarco Maldonado that they were Jewish.

In 1996, I began a quest to trace the Blums. At that time, all I had were the memories transmitted to my mother by her grandmother, Irinae, and a letter written in 1869 by Irinae’s stepfather, Carl Blum. Included in Irinae’s memories were only the first names of family members who had come to Mexico with her. We knew that Irinae’s father had died in Mexico, but she did not know his last name. Neither did she know her own birth date. This article describes how I succeeded in uncovering my family’s past as well as in tracing living relatives in the United States.

The search covered Canada, Europe, Mexico, and the United States and involved documents written in English, German (including old, Gothic, cursive German), and Spanish. At the time I began, I did not know that my ancestors had been Jewish. I began this investigation in Vancouver, Canada, where Barbara Schumacher of the Jewish Community Centre told me about the likely Jewish origin of the Blum surname. I met Schumacher when I lived in Vancouver, and I had asked her informally if she knew about the Blum last name. (I think we were having a conversation about her European ancestors.) She told me this surname typically was Jewish and gave me access to the resources of the Jewish Genealogical Institute of British Columbia located in that same center.

Tracing Ancestry

Our family in Mexico had always thought that our ancestors had come from Austria, although we did not know exactly from where. Deciding that I needed to know the historical background of my ancestors’ times, I read extensively, learned that in the 19th century many emigrants had left Europe via Bremen or Hamburg, and sought records of ship passengers. As most genealogists know, the Bremen lists were destroyed, but those for Hamburg survive. Five years had passed. It was already 2004, and I had conducted intensive searches in institutions and libraries and on websites. I decided to search the Hamburg passenger lists from 1864 to 1867. Those were the years when most of the Europeans from countries other than Spain came to Mexico, because it was the time of Maximilian’s Empire.^* Also, these were the closest years to the date of Carl Blum’s letter. At that time, these records were available only on microfilms of the original documents in old German at the LDS (Mormon) Family History Library.

I spent many hours searching the ships and lists of passengers that came to Mexico from Hamburg. Whenever I found a ship going to Mexico, I checked each passenger’s

Irinae Zeidler [Image]

name, transliterating the names from old German (a difficult task). I was looking for the set of first names of the members of my great-grandmother’s family. At the same time, I also was looking for Carl Blum, who became Irinae’s stepfather after her father’s death. After studying all the films for 1864 and 1865, I realized that few ships had gone to Mexico; that made the remaining search more bearable. When I finally found the names in the 1866 microfilm, I was totally astonished; my heart pounded when I saw all the names I had been seeking. There was Irinae’s name, all the family names she had remembered, and those of other members of the family whom she had not remembered, since she was only two years old in 1866 when they went to Mexico. Finally, I had found the surname, Zeidler; the city and country from which they had come, Stassfurt, Prussia; the number of members in the family; their ages; the name of the ship; and when they left Hamburg. On the same ship, I also found Carl Blum with his own large family.

After 135 years of my family’s not knowing our ancestor’s surname, the names of all the members of the family, ages, and city and country of origin, I had in front of my eyes all the precious information. Immediately, I communicated my findings to my family in Mexico, where this discovery caused considerable excitement.

Carl Blum’s Letter

In 1869, three years after arrival in Mexico, Irinae’s mother, my great-great-grandmother, Friederika, left Mexico with Carl Blum for someplace unknown. Irinae, who was seriously ill, was left behind in Mexico with a hacendado (rich landowner) and his family, according to a letter Blum wrote to the hacendado on May 14, 1869, and which has remained in my family’s possession ever since. My next task was to discover where Blum and the others had gone. At this stage, in addition to the date of the letter, I also knew the Zeidler surname, the exact German names and ages of Irinae Zeidler’s family members and Carl Blum’s family members. In the letter, Blum mentioned that the rest of the family would go to Veracruz.

Veracruz was an important Mexican port in those days, and I began to consider possible routes to other important ports. I thought about New York, perhaps the most important U.S. port of the time. Calculating, I concluded that one month, more or less, would have been needed to travel by ship from Veracruz to New York. I searched New York passenger lists—and there they were. The record also held a new surprise. It showed that Carl Blum and my great-great-grandmother, Friedericka, had a baby boy in Mexico, whom they named Carl after his father. The new Blum family was small. Some of Irinae’s siblings had died, either during the trip to Mexico or in Mexico. Evidently, Carl Blum had lost his wife and some of his children as well. A search of Mexican civil records revealed that Blum’s eldest daughter had survived and married and that she had remained behind in Mexico.

Using Census Records

My next step was to learn where the Blums settled after arriving in New York, and for that the U.S. federal census was the major resource. Many Carl Blums lived in the U.S. in the years in question—but a baby boy with the same name as his father and born in Mexico was a key clue. In all U.S. censuses from 1880 onward, baby Carl Blum was the only Blum born in Mexico. Even when Carl Blum the elder changed his name to Charles Blum in the U.S. (as he had changed his name to Carlos Blum in Mexico, probably to fit in better in each country); I found them because of baby Carl.

I followed the lives of my ancestors’ families in the U.S. mainly from census information, which enabled me to conclude that Irinae’s brother, Theodore, had married but never had children—and thus no possible descendants .

A new challenge arose when Irinae’s sister, Anna, disappeared from family household records in the 1910 census. She probably had married and changed her surname to her husband’s surname. The U.S. census showed that Carl Blum’s family lived in Lenox or Canastota, Madison County, in New York State—but a study of the names of all the families in each year of the original census records in Lenox and Canastota revealed so many married women named Anna that it was impossible to go further in this direction. At this stage of my research (July 2004), I decided to post a brief message in Rootsweb for Madison County, New York, that said, “I am looking for relatives of Carl (Charles) Blum, Frederica Blum (wife), Theodore Blum (son), and Anna Blum (daughter). They were from Prussia, and they were living in Lenox, Madison County, New York, in 1880. I know that Theodore married Lizzie A., and they lived all their lives in Lenox or Canastota. I can not find more information. Theodore’s and Anna’s real surname was Zeidler. Carl Blum was their stepfather.”

For many years after that I continued to search for more information and eventually found the records for all the other children who were born in New York from the union of Carl Blum and my great-great-grandmother, Friederika. I posted additional messages in 2005 and 2006 on Ancestry.com. The 2005 message said, “I am looking for relatives of Charles (Karl) Blum (husband) and Frederica Blum (wife); they were born in Prussia. Children: Theodore, Anna, Charles, Lena, Minna, Willie, and Hattie. (Only Theodore and Anna were born in Prussia.) In 1880, they lived in Lenox, Madison County, New York, and in Canastota, New York.” The 2006 message said, “I am looking for relatives or links to Franz Zeidler, Friederika Zeidler (wife), children: Theodore, Yda, Anna, Irinae, and Franz. They lived in Stassfurt, Prussia, now Germany. They left Hamburg on May 15, 1866, and went to Mexico. Some of the family members died in Mexico. Friederika got married again to Karl (Charles) Blum in Mexico. Karl was also from Prussia. Friederika, Karl Blum, a new baby Karl, Theodore, and Anna left Mexico in 1869. They went to New York where they lived in Lenox and Canastota. All the Zeidler children got the Blum last name. However, they left a sick child (Irinae) behind in Mexico with a wealthy family. They never came back to pick her up. She grew up in Mexico with the wealthy family in a hacienda. There are Irinae Zeidler’s descendants in Mexico.”

I had almost lost hope of finding descendants of Irinae’s sister, Anna, when, in February 2007, one of her descendants replied to my earliest posting. We discovered that we were cousins and held a family get together in the summer of that year. My U.S. relatives had not known about Irinae, the family in Mexico, or the details of the journey they had taken from Prussia to Mexico and from Mexico to the U.S. The two family branches had been separated for 138 years when we came together to share our memories. While looking at each other’s photographs, we discovered family members from both branches who looked like one another—despite more than a century of separation.

Reconstructed Family History

Although the Mexican family believed they originally came from Austria, research revealed that our ancestors were from Prussia. My ancestors left Europe via the Port of Hamburg, Prussia (later, Germany), on May 15, 1866, aboard the steamship San Luis, sailing directly to the port of Sisal, in Yucatan, Mexico. Aboard the SS San Luis were 215 passengers, 115 men and 100 women with 69 children less than 14 years old and 18 infants below the age of one year. Aboard was my Zeidler family:

Franz Zeidler, 33 years old

Friederika, 28 years old, wife (Fredrika or Frederica in some registries according to the registrar’s ability to write and to understand the language)

Theodore, 7 years old, son

Yda, 6 years old, daughter

Anna, 4 years old, daughter

Irinae 2 years old, daughter

Franz, baby, without specified age, son

The 1880 census shows the Carl (Charles) Blum family living in Lenox, Madison County, NewYork. The census notes the father, Charles, age 47; mother, Frederica, age 42; Theodore, 21; Emma, 18; Charles, 12; Minna, 9; Willie, 1; Lena, 2 and Hatty, 6 months.

Franz declared that he was a laborer from the city of Stassfurt (also called Salzland-Stassfurt), 143 km (898 miles) west-southwest of Berlin. As an adult, Irinae adopted the surname Salts, because she remembered something vague about the word Salt. She did not know her real family name, and she never wanted to use the last name Blum. As it happens, her memory was remarkably accurate since her birthplace, Stassfurt, was well known as Salzland, and the river Saale runs through it.

All of the passengers aboard the San Luis were Jewish, the majority from Prussia. Aboard the same ship was Carl Blum, who became Friederika’s second husband and the stepfather of her children. Accompanying Blum was his family:

Carl Blum, 35 years old

Caroline, 39 years old, wife

Marie, 16 years old, daughter

Carl, Jr., 15 years old, son

Wilheim, 13 years old, son

Elise, 11 years old, daughter

Charlotte, 11 years old, daughter,

Wilheim 8 years old, son

Frieor, 8 years old, son

Ludwig, 8 years old, son

The Blum family came from Ulsenheim, Prussia, 304 km (189 miles) southwest of Berlin. Carl Blum declared that he was a laborer. With three repeated ages and one repeated first name among the children, this was a strange and interesting family. If the eight-year-olds were not triplets, maybe they were the adopted children of deceased relatives. Or maybe they were just children of relatives who wanted their children to find a better life in Mexico. Unfortunately, misfortune accompanied these two families, whose structures changed drastically less than a year after leaving Prussia.

It appears that Friederika became pregnant by Carl Blum in approximately March or April 1867, less than a year after they arrived in Mexico. Their child, born in 1868, was named Carl after his father. Thus, between May 15, 1866, and March or April 1867, it seems that Carl Blum lost his wife and most of his children, and Friederika lost her husband and two children. It may be that Yda Zeidler and baby Franz Zeidler died aboard ship (in those years many passengers died of typhus on the ships), or they died in Mexico from yellow fever. The family story is that Franz Zeidler died in Mexico of yellow fever, and the same may have happened to Carl Blum’s wife and children. Marie Blum, Carl Blum’s eldest daughter, survived and remained in Mexico. She married Marcos Novelo on August 17, 1866, in Merida, Yucatan, and gave birth to a daughter named Maria Carolina Novelo Blum on December 15, 1869.

The Zeidler and Blum families arrived in Yucatan during the dangerous season when yellow fever appeared. During the period of the French Empire of Maximilian of Augsburg (1864–67), Yucatan was a place where immigrants felt well received; they had the total support of the inhabitants, and this was the rendezvous point of immigrants, according to an imperial plan. There was also a secret imperial plan to locate most of the foreigners in Yucatan and test their resistance to the sickness in that area. Austrians considered the people in Yucatan to be honest and totally loyal to the empire, so it is understandable that my family, like other immigrants, would consider Yucatan a safe place to settle. Yucatan also was home to a growing henequen industry, the so-called “green gold” that made Yucatan the richest state in Mexico in those years. The henequen plant’s fibers are used to make hemp or rope. Most likely, Carl Blum and Franz Zeidler came to Yucatan to work as laborers on one of the rich haciendas dedicated to henequen cultivation.

After Maximilian was shot on June 19, 1867, the situation for recent immigrants changed radically; some were deported, others were killed or ordered to leave the country (although many others remained). Apparently Carl Blum felt some urgency to leave Mexico (perhaps fleeing before the next yellow fever season, or perhaps for political reasons), but it is curious that he left behind some of his own children and Irinae. In his May 14, 1869, letter, Carl wrote that he was leaving Irinae with Plutarco Maldonado and his family. He stated, “I conform with the commitment from your part to take care and educate my daughter as if she were yours…tomorrow, leaving from here to Veracruz.…” At that time, Plutarco was one of the richest hacendados (landowners) in Mexico. His Hacienda San José of the Carmen was one of the largest haciendas in Mexico; located then in Tabasco State, it no longer exists.

The Blum family arrived in New York on June 9, 1869, aboard the S.S. Cleopatra from Veracruz after stops in Sisal, Yucatan, and Havana, Cuba. Upon entry, Carl Blum provided the following information:

Name: Carl Blum

Age: 38

Occupation: farmer

Place to which belongs: Prussia

Listed under Blum’s name were Friederika and the children, Theodore, Anna, and baby Carl, all with the Blum surname and origins in Prussia. They were:

Fredrika, 32-year-old woman. Blum did not declare Friederika as his wife, apparently indicating that they had not yet married.

Theodore, 10 years old, boy

Anna, 6 six years old, girl

Carl, 1 year 5 months old, boy. Hence, Carl Jr. apparently was born in January 1868.

Carl Blum did not declare Anna as his daughter or Theodore as his son; perhaps because he had not yet married Friederika. Although the United States did not require passports at this time, some European countries issued family passports in those years. Recently, I learned that Blum obtained such a passport in May 2, 1866. He left Germany on May 15, 1866.

. This document has been kept by the descendants of William Blum, one of Friederika and Carl’s children born in the United States. It includes his birthday, the city where he was born, and only the names and ages of two children with the last name Blum. According to the U.S. censuses from 1870 to 1930, the family lived in Lenox and Canastota, Madison County, New York, all those years and had several more children: Minna, William, Lena, and Hatty. In 1870, the couple declared that they could not write or speak English, and the children were at home, not in school.

Friederika and Carl never returned for Irinae, and no further communication between Carl Blum and Plutarco Maldonado exists. Irinae lived a wealthy life; she had private teachers in her childhood and was treated as a daughter by the Maldonado family. She married Narciso Vidal, a businessman. Irinae herself became a landowner, owning a coastal lagoon as well as land. Research revealed that Irinae Zeidler was born in 1864 and died in 1949 at age 85. Carl (later, Charles) Blum and Friederika disappeared from the household census in 1910, probably they died some years before 1910.

I allow myself to express here my deep admiration and respect for all the members of my family who, looking for a better life, experienced a dangerous adventure, especially “Nanny” Irinae who, without her family, had the strength to live a successful life. This research was difficult because of the scarce information available. However, the close contact and communication between Irinae and my mother, Lucia, who kept and transmitted to me such valuable information, and the letter that Carl Blum left were fundamental pieces in this research.

Note

    * From 1864 until 1867, Mexico was ruled by Emperor Maximillan of Hapsburg.

Silvia Elena Zarate Vidal is a U.S. citizen born in Mexico City. She is a marine biologist and biotechnologist and was a scientific advisor at the United Nations, New York, and Food and Agricultural Organization—Italy. She works as a research scientist at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington, and has been researching her genealogy since 1996. Her publications include scientific publications on infectious diseases and the book, Oceanografia de Mares Mexicanos. She lives in Seattle with her daughter; they love to travel.