This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Author: marsmemories Surnames: Meyer, Wille Classification: queries Message Board URL: http://boards.rootsweb.com/surnames.meyer/3182.1/mb.ashx Message Board Post: I do not know where Quincy, IL is but I will give you an idea of what to do to find your Meyer family. My great grandfather, Johan Heinrich Christian Carl Meyer b. Dec 31, 1838 was from Eldena, Mecklenburg, Germany. He immigrated in 1872 and went from New York to Chicago, IL. You need to start with yourself and go backwards. Where did your John Meyer get married? What religion were they? Mine were Missouri Synod Lutheran and they got married at the First Zion Lutheran Church in downtown Chicago. I went into the Illinois archives which is on line and found their marriage listed which gave the certificate #. I ordered a copy of the marriage license. This is how I found out where they got married as it listed the ministers name. Then I asked on the Cook County Rootsweb site what church he was a minister at. This church has burned down and the records are at Concordia Historical Society in St. Louis, MO. I wrote them asking for the information on the church records ! for their marriage along with a check for $20.00. I got a response saying my great grandfather listed Eldena, Mecklenburg, Germany as his birth place. It listed my great grandmother as being born in Gross Wanzer which was in Prussia at that time. Now it is in Sachsen-Anhalt. They lived only 35 miles apart in Germany. On the ship manifest it also stated they were from these towns. They were on the same ship. We do not know if they knew each other before the trip or not. You can get the information on the ship by going to the National Archives and find the manifest there. It is like looking for a needle in a haystack but you have to be persistent. You have a immigration date and his birth date so you look for John Meyer's who match that criteria and then narrow it down. Most people leaving Germany left through Hamburg and Bremman. You can go to wwww.Hamburg.de and pay them to help you find your John Meyer. Since I had the names of the towns mine came from, I got the information verified for free. Your John Meyer had several names. Normally they used the last name before the surname. My great grandfather went by Carl Meyer in the USA most of the time. Some times Charles Meyer, Karl Meyer, J. C. Meyer, then changed the spelling of Meyer to Meier around 1900. In my greatgrandfather's family, they called all the sons John with different middle names. John was what they called their saint name. They tended to do this for the girls too. If you have any questions, please email me at marsmemories@sio.midco.net. Marlene from South Dakota Important Note: The author of this message may not be subscribed to this list. If you would like to reply to them, please click on the Message Board URL link above and respond on the board.