This post was contributed to the Crawford County Chapter of OGS by Kristina Stearley as part of the Florence Siefert Scrapbook in 2010.
The scrapbook is compiled from undated, unidentified newspaper clippings involving events in the lives of Crawford County citizens living in or having connections to New Washington, Tiro, Shelby, Sulphur Springs, Chatfield, Bucyrus, Ashland, Mansfield, and other areas. Only minimal spelling or punctuation corrections were made. Unreadable areas are shown by underlines, dots &/or question marks. This collection has been scanned, “optical character recognized” (OCR’d), proofed, then coded for HTML by volunteers of the Crawford County Chapter of the Ohio Genealogical Society. Since the copies are not of the best quality errors may have been made. Please contact us if you find corrections needing to be made or can verify any missing dates which could be added.
John Michael Vollmer, who died at his home in this place Saturday, Aug. 3, was born January 13, 1847 at Weiler zum Stein, Marbauch, Wurtemburg and baptized a few days after his birth. In 1861 he was confirmed a member of the Ev. Luth. church and shortly afterwards was apprenticed to learn the blacksmith’s trade.
In 1866 he left his fatherland and emigrated to this country settling in New Washington where he abode to the day of his death. He labored faithfully at the trade until 1877 when a severe attack of lung fever so reduced his robust strength that it was utterly impossible for him to do hard manual labor. He was a continual sufferer from asthma. Dropping his former trade from necessity, he opened a saloon, and sought in this way to support himself and family. In 1870 he had united in marriage with Maria Christine Walter, this union being blessed with 7 children, 1 son and six daughters of whom the son and five daughters are yet living. Deceased was sickly long before his death, but was not confined to his bed until a week before his demise. The immediate cause of his death was hemorrhage of the stomach. His age was 42 years, 6 months and 20 days. A bereaved, 6 children, 2 brothers, 2 sisters and his aged father mourn his departure. The funeral took place from the Ev. Luth. church of this place and was one of the largest ever witnessed in these parts. The funeral sermon was preached from 2 Tim. 2, 5.