Portraits

Johann Kroening

Our first known ancestor and patriarch of this branch of the family tree was Johannes K. Kroening. Johannes (Johann, John) was born in “Heckenberg, Pommerania” on 25 May 1828 according to his death record at St Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in Rozellville, Wisconsin. From his son Ernst’s death record, we have the possible location of “Hagenberg” listed as Johann’s home village. In any event, nothing definitive is known about Johann’s early life. He must have married his wife, Frederike Wendorff, in about 1852 and the oldest 5 of their children were born in Prussia before the family left for the US on 16 May 1868 from Hamburg.

The Kroening family was living in “Wismar” Germany before they left for the US in 1868. Both of the marriage records for children Charles and Wilhelmine state Wismar as their birth place and son Fred was most certainly born there as he was an infant when the family emigrated. Johann and family arrived in New York on 2 June 1868 and made their way to southern Wisconsin. Son Ernst was born the following summer and son John was born in 1874 both in the tiny village of Kirchhayn. Both children were probably baptized at David’s Star Evangelical Lutheran church.  The 1875 Wisconsin State Census shows the family living in Jackson, Washington County, but by 1878 when Johann filed his first papers for Naturalization they were living in Marathon County.  The family settled and farmed in the area of Stratford/Rozellville and attended St Paul Lutheran Church where Johann and Frederike are buried.

The records from St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in Stratford show that the Kroening family did more than just attend church there. From the 125^th anniversary book published in 2018, we learn that St Paul’s was founded by a group of immigrants who met to form a cemetery association on 1 May 1880. They organized into a group called “Den Friedhoffin  der Letzten Haimat”, which literally translated means “the cemetery in the last home.” Adam Zimmerman, Jacob Reichert, and John Reichert were elected officers and the founding members were Gustar Wolff, John Kroening, Martin Wetterau, E.W. Cook,  Ernest Wallman, George Koehler, and Nicholas Hoffman.

Johann lived his life as a farmer in Marathon County, Wisconsin. He died of kidney failure at the age of 76 in 1904 leaving behind his wife and seven children.