Christian Heinrich Steinhoff

STEINHOFF

Posted By: Connie Swearingen (email)
Date: 10/18/2010 at 20:50:38

History of Woodbury County, Iowa 1984

Christian Heinrich Steinhoff
By Lynette Jones Spicer

Christian Heinrich ‘Henry’ and Juliane ‘Julia’ Christian Louise Amalie (Just, Americanized to Yost) Steinhoff immigrated from Opperhausen, Duchy of Braunschweig, Germany, in 1851, with four children and Henry’s parents, Johann Friedrich and Marie Louise (Hausmann) Steinhoff. Julia’s brother had immigrated to the United States two years older.

The family settled in Monroe County, Ohio, a very hilly county resembling southern Germany and Switzerland. Monroe County had a very high concentration of German immigrants. Henry purchased 163 acres just north of Lewisville in March 1852 for $2400. On July 30, 1852, Henry’s father died and was buried in the Lewisville Evangelical Church cemetery.

On November 29, 1866, Julia died, reportedly from burns received when she filled a kerosene lamp with turpentine. She and Henry had ten children:

1( Johanne ‘Jane’ Friederike Juliane Rose, born September 28, 1844, in Opperhausen;

2( Christian Heinrich ‘Henry’, born December 9, 1845, in Opperhausen;

3( Wilhelmine Louise (Neuhart, born January 4, 1848, in Opperhausen;

4( Auguste Wilhelmine ‘Minnie’ (Weber), born January 5, 1850, in Opperhausen;

5( Juliana ‘Julia’ Auguste, born June 28, 1852, in Lewisville;

6( Karl ‘Charles’ Friedrich, born January 23, 1854, in Lewisville;

7( Augusta Minnie (Egger), born June 6, 1856, in Lewisville;

8( George Henry, born June 4, 1858, born in Lewisville;

9( Infant, born April 29, died June 21, 1860, in Lewisville;

10( William, born October 28, 1861, in Lewisville.

On June 18, 1868, Henry married a widow, Charlotte (Snyder) Buckio, a German immigrant born in 1830. They had two children: Christian, born in late 1870, died two months later; and Mathilda (Rose) born in 1871 in Lewisville.

On the 1870 census, three Buckio children- Mary, age 12, Frank, age 7, and John, age 5- lived with Charlotte and Henry in addition to four Steinhoff children( Charles, Augusta, George & William). Henry’s mother, Louisa, also lived with the family. Louisa died on January 4, 1878.

William Steinhoff, the youngest son, appears to have been the first Steinhoff to come to Iowa. On the 1880 Woodbury County census, he was listed as William Steinfoot (undoubtedly the census taker’s interpretation of ‘hoof’ as it would have been pronounced!) William supposedly came to Iowa in 1878. He was 18 and listed as a servant on the census, working on the farm and living with Philip and Margaret Weaver (an Americanization of Weber). According to the History of the Counties of Woodbury and Plymouth, Iowa, by A Varner & Co., Publishers, published in 1890-1, Philip came to Smithland in1865 and on to German City shortly thereafter.

Another son, Charles Steinhoff, purchased Woodbury County land in December 1882 and therefore was probably the second Steinhoff to arrive in Iowa. Henry, the patriarch of all Steinhoffs in Woodbury County, perhaps came to Iowa about the time Charles did. He didn’t sell his Ohio land until January and April of 1884. He purchased Woodbury County land in May 1884. Yet Past and Present of Woodbury County published in 1904 relates that both Jacob S Egger and Frederick J Rose (sons-in-law of Henry) came to Woodbury County in 1881. Lydia, Lyda and Mary Egger, daughters of Jacob, say their parents and the Roses rented a railroad coach together and came to Iowa after Henry had already come.

The Steinhoff children seemed to come to Iowa in a fairly rapid succession until all of Henry’s children were in Woodbury County. The Iowa land is much more like the land the Steinhoffs were accustomed to in Germany than was the very hilly land of Monroe County, Ohio.

Henry purchased one hundred twenty acres for $3600 and forty for $1000, two miles east of Holly Springs on May 5, 1884. In October 1885 he paid $220 to purchased an additional forty acres adjoining his land, bringing his holding in Section 14 of Willow Township to two hundred acres. Today this land is farmed by Henry’s great, great grandson, Jack Steinhoff.

Henry died on March 20, 1898, and was buried in the German City Evangelical cemetery. Henry’s son, George, inherited 1/15th of the land. He purchased the remainder of the two hundred acres in April 1899. Charlotte died on April 3, 1904. Of the ten children living to adult hood, seven are buried in the German City cemetery. Jane Rose is buried in Willow Cemetery, one mile west of Germany City. Julia Feldner is buried in Fairhaven cemetery in Orange, California. Tilde Rose is buried in Bloomfield, Nebraska.

Today, many, many descendants of Henry Steinhoff still live in Woodbury County, particularly in the Hornick, Holly Spring, German City and Climbing Hill areas. It’s probably been over twenty years since a Steinhoff reunion has been held in Woodbury County, but even twenty years ago neighbors and acquaintances would be surprised to see each other at the reunion and ask, ‘Now how are you related to the Steinhoffs?’