Testimonial

Dear Yvonne,

I am in shock - absolute shock !! You have solved a 163 year old mystery in my family !! I can’t believe that for so many years we have wondered Who Is “EMMA”?? and now you have the answer in 12 hours !! Unbelievable….. When I tell the family members their reaction will be felt even in Sweden !!

It is exciting to know the name of the ship Emma traveled on ( “American Barque Matilda”) - I assume a “barque” is a smaller vessel. I have a picture from the Ellis Island archives of the ship my paternal relatives arrived here on, and it must have taken great courage to cross an ocean in such a small ship !!

Please continue with the research as you can, I know you are busy with other people’s families too but whatever you can find out will be wonderful for me and my family. My paternal uncle, who died only 10 days ago, did the paternal genealogy research of our family 35 - 40 years ago - before computer research made things easier. I was so inspired by his work that I took on the job of tracing my maternal genealogy.

That was quite a task as on my mother’s side of the family I am only second generation born here in the USA. I have found in my own genealogy research that the idea of, as we say in English, “feast or famine” is very true.
I went 6 months searching with no luck in German records, and then one day a small church in eastern Germany sent me 4 complete generations of that family line !
I was fortunate enough to be able to continue most family lines back until the records stopped, only one or two “loose ends” left which may never be followed but other lines back to the 1500 years !
Also fortunate that I have been able to travel in Europe and visit some of the cities and towns that the maternal family came from.

You cannot believe the feeling to walk down streets that in the 1600s and 1700s and 1800s your relatives also walked so many years ago.

Yvonne, let me thank you again for the fast and incredible results !! I look forward to seeing what new and wild information you find on this discovered family line !!

Susan K. Mangus
Hickory, Kentucky
USA