10.  THE BUNGERS IN GERMANY

Besides the Fritz and Marie Bunger Fust family, another immigrant ancestor is Marie's father and our great-great-grandfather, Johann Jochim Andreas Bunger, mentioned briefly in the previous stories.

He was born May 2, 1823 in Cambs, Mecklenburg, to Jochim Christoph Bunger and Katharine Sophia Dorothea Hunemoerder.  (Hunemoerder means "giant killer".)  At age 27 on November 14, 1850, he married Maria Catherine Magdalena Schoof.  On August 31, 1851, our great-grandmother, Maria Sophia Dorothea Elisabeth Bunger was the first child born to this couple.

When she was five years old, Maria's little 3-year-old brother died (1853-1856).  The next year her brother Johann Ludwig Jacob Carl Bunger was born on April 8, 1857.  This is the brother who joined Marie and Fritz Fust on the voyage to America, commonly known to us as Uncle John Bunger, but he was really our great-uncle.  When Marie was 9 years old, another baby brother, Heinrich Christoph Johann Bunger, was born on August 23, 1860, but died at only 1-1/2 months of age.  Finally, 11-year-old Marie gets a little sister, Sophia Dorothea Henrica Bunger, on December 22, 1862. 

When Marie was 17, her mother died at 45 years and 9 months old on September 30, 1868, leaving their 45-year-old father to raise Marie, 13-year-old Uncle John Bunger, and 6-year-old Sophia.  Only two months and eight days later, on January 8, 1869, the widower married Sophia Dorothea Elisabeth Johanna Hunemoerder, his younger daughter Sophia's future sister-in-law, so you can imagine that there is a wide age difference.  We should be glad that our great-great-grandfather carried on a tradition. His father, Jochim Christoph Bunger, married Katharina Sophia Dorothea Huenemoerder just three months and 22 days after his first wife, Anna Maria Dorothea Wegner, passed away, leaving him a one-year-old daughter to care for.  This second marriage resulted in our ancestor Johann Jochim Andreas Bunger's birth in 1823.

Then more Johann Bunger children were born to him and his second wife.  Wilhelmina Maria Dorothea Johanna Bunger lived for only five years (1870-1875).  Later their two sons were born, Heinrich Emil Friedrich Hans Bunger on July 4, 1879, and Hermann Theodor Martin Bunger on October 24, 1882.

Next, read about the Bungers who immigrated to America!