Wednesday, February 3, 2016

The able Abels

An earlier post [17 Nov 2015] noted that Adam Pantle was unlikely to have been involved in sponsoring the Imle family immigrants or helping them once they arrived. The dates are all wrong and Adam had come from Grossbottwar, not Gundelbach. He would have been unlikely to have known the Imles in Germany. But there was an early Clark County resident from Gündelbach, Mathew Abel, who was born there on 22 Apr 1848, probably with the German name “Mathaus,” the name on his marriage record. Mathew and Christoph, who was six years older, had grown up in the same small town. In 1866, at the young age of 18, Matthew traveled to the Wabash Valley. He was likely a source of information about Clark County, Illinois, for the village of Gündelbach.

The third Clark County Courthouse, built in Marshall in 1839
 and torn down in 1887, was the site of the 1863 m
ilitary arrest
 of Judge Charles H. Constable during the Civil War. 
(Historical
 Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of Clark County
, 1907.)

Mathew arrived just one year after the end of the Civil War, and ill feelings were undoubtedly still present. Clark County had sent over one-tenth of its population, 1,560 men, to serve with the Union forces. Illinois had become a free state with the adoption of the Constitution of 1848. The final decision was made only after a prolonged struggle even though there had been few slaves in the state — only 331 in 1840. Although a free state, Illinois loyalties had been split. In 1863 in Marshall a group of Clark County Copperheads opposing the War, tried to safeguard soldiers deserting from the Union Army. In March of that year, an Indiana army detail arrested several of the deserters. A local judge, Charles H. Constable, freed the fugitives and ordered two Union sergeants arrested on kidnapping charges. Under the command of Col. Henry B. Carrington, 250 soldiers arrived by special train from Indianapolis, surrounded the courthouse, freed the two sergeants, and arrested Judge Constable.

Mathew Abel first worked as a farmhand in Clark County before moving to Terre Haute, where he met Rebecca Mayer. The two were wedded on 7 Nov 1875 in Clark County, but lived in Terre Haute for two years before moving back to Clark. where he and Rebecca farmed in Wabash Twp near Zion church.

In 1881, Mathew’s younger brother Gottlieb, who had also been born in Gündelbach (on 29 Jun 1851) left Germany to join his brother in Clark County. Gottlieb arrived on the on the W. A. Scholten. Accompanying Gottlieb on his trip was Christoph Imle and his family.

Does this prove that the Abels induced the Imles to come to Clark County? No. But it certainly makes it likely.

The Abel family and their descendants generally attended Zion Church, but some were members of Grand Turn, the Imle church. Mathew died 17 Jan 1931, after losing both his first and second wives. Gottlieb died 2 Feb 1933 and rests with his wife, Wilhelmina (“Minnie”), in Marshall Cemetery.

No comments:

Post a Comment