Ancestors

Lukas Schrenk

Lukas Schrenk lived his whole recorded life at Oberflacht, a small Catholic village under the Swabian Alb in the Tuttlingen country of Württemberg. Oberflacht had no parish of its own. Its people were baptised, married and buried at the parish church of Seitingen, and that is where every record of him was written.

He was baptised there on 14 October 1712 as "Lucas filius Joannis Schrenckh et Mariae Bidermännin", the son of Joannes Schrenck and Maria Bidermann. His godparents were Josephus Münckh and Maria Münckhin, both of Oberflacht. He was the only Lucas Schrenk baptised at Seitingen in the eighteen years from 1707 to 1724. Oberflacht had only one grown Lukas Schrenk from 1735 to 1785, so the baby of 1712 and the tailor of Oberflacht were one man.

He had an older sister, Lucia, baptised in December 1707, and a brother, Joannes, baptised in May 1710. The same two godparents stood for all three children.

His father died on 3 October 1713, before Lukas was a year old. The priest entered him as "vir triginta sex annorum optimae famae Christianus", a man of thirty-six and a Christian of the best repute. His mother died six months later, on 2 April 1714, entered as "probae vitae vidua", a widow of upright life. Lukas was eighteen months old. Who raised the children is not recorded.

In October 1723 the children of Oberflacht were confirmed, and the clerk entered "Lucas et Joannes Joannis Schrenck p: m:". That is Lucas and his brother Joannes, sons of the late Joannes Schrenck. The letters p. m. stand for piae memoriae, of pious memory, the clerk's mark for a father who had died. His father had been dead for ten years.

On 10 August 1735 he married at Seitingen. The priest wrote: "Nuptias celebrârunt honestus juvenis Lucas Schröckh cum aeque honesta vidua Maria Mörtzin ambo de Oberflacht." The respectable young man Lucas Schrenk had married an equally respectable widow, Maria Merz, both of Oberflacht. Her first husband is not named. Lukas was twenty-two.

Their son Michael was born on 12 November 1736, fifteen months after the wedding. A daughter, Maria Anna, was baptised on 15 September 1742, and a son, Thaddäus, on 28 October 1744. Each baptism names the parents as "Lucae Schrenck et Mariae Merzin". Both sons later kept households of their own at Oberflacht. Michael became a farmer and in 1761 married Maria Anna Ilg, the daughter of the Oberflacht miller.

Maria Merz died some time after the end of 1744 and before January 1759. Her burial entry has not turned up.

On 23 January 1759 Lukas married again, in the parish church at Seitingen. The entry reads: "In Ecclia Pchli. Matrimonialiter conjuncti sunt hon: Viduus Lucas Schrenck ex Oberflacht, et pudica Virgo Maria Anna Lehmännin filia aeditui. Testibus Joane Schrenck et aedituo." He was entered as an honourable widower. His bride was Maria Anna Lehmann, a chaste maiden and "filia aeditui", the sacristan's daughter. She had turned twenty-one the week before. He was forty-six.

The witnesses were a Joannes Schrenck and the sacristan himself, the bride's father, Anton Lehman. The Joannes Schrenck was very probably his brother, baptised in 1710 and confirmed beside him in 1723.

The second family began five years later. Joseph was born at Oberflacht on 5 December 1764. A daughter, Anna Maria, grew up to marry Joseph Ilg. The last child, Maria Ursula, was baptised in October 1780 and died in July 1782, not quite two years old. He was sixty-eight when she was born.

The Oberflacht family register, compiled in the early nineteenth century, describes him two ways. On the pages of his sons Michael and Thaddäus he is "Bürger und Schneider zu Oberflacht", a burgher and tailor. On Joseph's page he is "Bürger und Bauer", a burgher and farmer. A Bürger was a full member of the village community, with a share in its rights. A village tailor holding land as a farmer was ordinary, and he was probably both.

He died in the autumn of 1785. He was buried at Seitingen on 8 October, and the entry is one line: "8. 8bris. Lucas Schrenk ex Oberflacht aet. 70." 8bris is October. Ages at burial in this book are often rounded. He was in fact nearly seventy-three. On 30 January 1786 his son Joseph married Anna Maria Münk, and the family register writes the groom's father as "W. Lukas Schrenk", weiland, the late.

Maria Anna Lehmann lived on as his widow for twenty-five years and died on 10 November 1810. Her stepson Michael had died six days earlier.

The two families joined again in 1824. On 27 April that year Joseph's son, another Joseph, married Maria Anna Schrenk, the granddaughter of Michael through his son Johann Baptist. The groom was a grandson of Lukas and the bride a great-granddaughter, so their children descended from him twice, once through each wife.

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Cite: Heirology, "Lukas Schrenk (1712-1785)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/lukas-schrenk-1712-1785-8784ec.